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+Project Gutenberg's The Nest Builder, by Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
+
+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: The Nest Builder
+
+Author: Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
+
+
+Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7837]
+[This file was first posted on May 21, 2003]
+Last Updated: May 29, 2013
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEST BUILDER ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Tiffany Vergon, Charles Franks, Juliet
+Sutherland, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE NEST-BUILDER
+
+_A NOVEL_
+
+
+By Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
+
+Author Of "What Women Want"
+
+
+_With A Frontispiece By J. Henry_
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+PART I
+
+  MATE-SONG
+
+PART II
+
+  MATED
+
+PART III
+
+  THE NESTLING
+
+PART IV
+
+  WINGS
+
+PART V
+
+  THE BUILDER
+
+
+
+
+
+PART I
+
+MATE-SONG
+
+I
+
+
+Outbound from Liverpool, the Lusitania bucked down the Irish Sea against
+a September gale. Aft in her second-class quarters each shouldering from
+the waves brought a sickening vibration as one or another of the ship's
+great propellers raced out of water. The gong had sounded for the second
+sitting, and trails of hungry and weary travelers, trooping down the
+companionway, met files of still more uneasy diners emerging from the
+saloon. The grinding jar of the vessel, the heavy smell of food, and
+the pound of ragtime combined to produce an effect as of some sordid
+and demoniac orgy--an effect derided by the smug respectability of the
+saloon's furnishings.
+
+Stefan Byrd, taking in the scene as he balanced a precarious way to his
+seat, felt every hypercritical sense rising in revolt. Even the prosaic
+but admirably efficient table utensils repelled him. "They are so
+useful, so abominably enduring," he thought. The mahogany trimmings of
+doors and columns seemed to announce from every overpolished surface a
+pompous self-sufficiency. Each table proclaimed the aesthetic level of
+the second class through the lifeless leaves of a rubber plant and
+two imitation cut-glass dishes of tough fruit. The stewards, casually
+hovering, lacked the democracy which might have humanized the steerage
+as much as the civility which would have oiled the workings of the first
+cabin. Byrd resented their ministrations as he did the heavy English
+dishes of the bill of fare. There were no Continental passengers near
+him. He had left the dear French tongue behind, and his ears, homesick
+already, shrank equally from the see-saw Lancashire of the stewards and
+the monotonous rasp of returning Americans.
+
+Byrd's left hand neighbor, a clergyman of uncertain denomination, had
+tried vainly for several minutes to attract his attention by clearing
+his throat, passing the salt, and making measured requests for water,
+bread, and the like.
+
+"I presume, sir," he at last inquired loudly, "that you are an American,
+and as glad as I am to be returning to our country?"
+
+"No, sir," retorted Byrd, favoring his questioner with a withering
+stare, "I am a Bohemian, and damnably sorry that I ever have to see
+America again."
+
+The man of God turned away, pale to the temples with offense--a
+high-bosomed matron opposite emitted a shocked "Oh!"--the faces of
+the surrounding listeners assumed expressions either dismayed or
+deprecating. Budding conversationalists were temporarily frost-bitten,
+and the watery helpings of fish were eaten in a constrained silence. But
+with the inevitable roast beef a Scot of unshakeable manner, decorated
+with a yellow forehead-lock as erect as a striking cobra, turned
+to follow up what he apparently conceived to be an opportunity for
+discussion.
+
+"I'm not so strongly partial to the States mysel', ye ken, but I'll
+confess it's a grand place to mak' money. Ye would be going there,
+perhaps, to improve your fortunes?"
+
+Byrd was silent.
+
+"Also," continued the Scot, quite unrebuffed, "it would be interesting
+to know what exactly ye mean when ye call yoursel' a Bohemian. Would ye
+be referring to your tastes, now, or to your nationality?"
+
+His hand trembling with nervous temper, Byrd laid down his napkin, and
+rose with an attempt at dignity somewhat marred by the viselike clutch
+of the swivel chair upon his emerging legs.
+
+"My mother was a Bohemian, my father an American. Neither, happily,
+was Scotch," said he, almost stammering in his attempt to control his
+extreme distaste of his surroundings--and hurried out of the saloon,
+leaving a table of dropped jaws behind him.
+
+"The young man is nairvous," contentedly boomed the Scot. "I'm thinking
+he'll be feeling the sea already. What kind of a place would Bohemia,
+be, d'ye think, to have a mother from?" turning to the clergyman.
+
+"A place of evil life, seemingly," answered that worthy in his
+high-pitched, carrying voice. "I shall certainly ask to have my seat
+changed. I cannot subject myself for the voyage to the neighborhood of a
+man of profane speech."
+
+The table nodded approval.
+
+"A traitor to his country, too," said a pursy little man opposite,
+snapping his jaws shut like a turtle.
+
+A bony New England spinster turned deprecating eyes to him. "My," she
+whispered shrilly, "he was just terrible, wasn't he? But so handsome!
+I can't help but think it was more seasickness with him than an evil
+nature."
+
+Meanwhile the subject of discussion, who would have writhed far more at
+the spinster's palliation of his offense than at the men's disdain,
+lay in his tiny cabin, a prey to an attack of that nervous misery which
+overtakes an artist out of his element as surely and speedily as air
+suffocates a fish.
+
+Stefan Byrd's table companions were guilty in his eyes of the one
+unforgivable sin--they were ugly. Ugly alike in feature, dress, and
+bearing, they had for him absolutely no excuse for existence. He felt no
+bond of common humanity with them. In his lexicon what was not beautiful
+was not human, and he recognized no more obligation of good fellowship
+toward them than he would have done toward a company of ground-hogs.
+He lay back, one fine and nervous hand across his eyes, trying to
+obliterate the image of the saloon and all its inmates by conjuring up a
+vision of the world he had left, the winsome young cosmopolitan Paris of
+the art student. The streets, the cafes, the studios; his few men, his
+many women, friends--Adolph Jensen, the kindly Swede who loved him;
+Louise, Nanette, the little Polish Yanina, who had said they loved him;
+the slanting-glanced Turkish students, the grave Syrians, the democratic
+un-British Londoners--the smell, the glamour of Paris, returned to him
+with the nostalgia of despair.
+
+These he had left. To what did he go?
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+In his shivering, creaking little cabin, suspended, as it were, by the
+uncertain waters between two lives, Byrd forced himself to remember
+the America he had known before his Paris days. He recalled his
+birthplace--a village in upper Michigan--and his mental eyes bored
+across the pictures that came with the running speed of a cinematograph
+to his memory.
+
+The place was a village, but it called itself a city. The last he had
+seen of it was the "depot," a wooden shed surrounded by a waste of
+rutted snow, and backed by grimy coal yards. He could see the broken
+shades of the town's one hotel, which faced the tracks, drooping across
+their dirty windows, and the lopsided sign which proclaimed from the
+porch roof in faded gilt on black the name of "C. E. Trench, Prop." He
+could see the swing-doors of the bar, and hear the click of balls from
+the poolroom advertising the second of the town's distractions. He could
+smell the composite odor of varnish, stale air, and boots, which made
+the overheated station waiting-room hideous. Heavy farmers in ear-mitts,
+peaked caps, and fur collars spat upon the hissing stove round which
+their great hide boots sprawled. They were his last memory of his fellow
+citizens.
+
+Looking farther back Stefan saw the town in summer. There were trees in
+the street where he lived, but they were all upon the sidewalk-public
+property. In their yards (the word garden, he recalled, was never used)
+the neighbors kept, with unanimity, in the back, washing, and in the
+front, a porch. Over these porches parched vines crept--the town's
+enthusiasm for horticulture went as far as that--and upon them
+concentrated the feminine social life of the place. Of this intercourse
+the high tones seemed to be giggles, and the bass the wooden thuds of
+rockers. Street after street he could recall, from the square about
+the "depot" to the outskirts, and through them all the dusty heat, the
+rockers, gigglers, the rustle of a shirt-sleeved father's newspaper, and
+the shrill coo-ees of the younger children. Finally, the piano--for he
+looked back farther than the all-conquering phonograph. He heard "Nita,
+Juanita;" he heard "Sweet Genevieve."
+
+Beyond the village lay the open country, level, blindingly hot,
+half-cultivated, with the scorched foliage of young trees showing in the
+ruins of what had been forest land. Across it the roads ran straight as
+rulers. In the winter wolves were not unknown there; in the summer there
+were tramps of many strange nationalities, farm hands and men bound for
+the copper mines. For the most part they walked the railroad ties, or
+rode the freight cars; winter or summer, the roads were never wholly
+safe, and children played only in the town.
+
+There, on the outskirts, was a shallow, stony river, but deep enough at
+one point for gingerly swimming. Stefan seemed never to have been cool
+through the summer except when he was squatting or paddling in this
+hole. He remembered only indistinctly the boys with whom he bathed;
+he had no friends among them. But there had been a little girl with
+starched white skirts, huge blue bows over blue eyes, and yellow hair,
+whom he had admired to adoration. She wanted desperately to bathe in
+the hole, and he demanded of her mother that this be permitted. Stefan
+smiled grimly as he recalled the horror of that lady, who had boxed his
+ears for trying to lead her girl into ungodliness, and to scandalize the
+neighbors. The friendship had been kept up surreptitiously after this,
+with interchange of pencils and candy, until the little girl--he
+had forgotten her name--put her tongue out at him over a matter of
+chewing-gum which he had insisted she should not use. Revolted, he
+played alone again.
+
+The Presbyterian Church Stefan remembered as a whitewashed praying box,
+resounding to his father's high-pitched voice. It was filled with heat
+and flies from without in summer, and heat and steam from within in
+winter. The school, whitewashed again, he recalled as a succession
+of banging desks, flying paper pellets, and the drone of undigested
+lessons. Here the water bucket loomed as the alleviation in summer, or
+the red hot oblong of the open stove in winter time. Through all these
+scenes, by an egotistical trick of the brain, he saw himself moving,
+a small brown-haired boy, with olive skin and queer, greenish eyes,
+entirely alien, absolutely lonely, completely critical. He saw himself
+in too large, ill-chosen clothes, the butt of his playfellows. He saw
+the sidelong, interested glances of little girls change to curled lips
+and tossed heads at the grinning nudge of their boy companions. He saw
+the harassed eyes of an anaemic teacher stare uncomprehendingly at
+him over the pages of an exercise book filled with colored drawings of
+George III and the British flag, instead of a description of the battle
+of Bunker Hill. He remembered the hatred he had felt even then for
+the narrowness of the local patriotism which had prompted him to this
+revenge. As a result, he saw himself backed against the schoolhouse
+wall, facing with contempt a yelling, jumping tangle of boys who, from
+a safe distance, called upon the "traitor" and the "Dago" to come and
+be licked. He felt the rage mount in his head like a burning wave, saw
+a change in the eyes and faces of his foes, felt himself spring with a
+catlike leap, his lips tight above his teeth and his arms moving like
+clawed wheels, saw boys run yelling and himself darting between them
+down the road, to fall at last, a trembling, sobbing bundle of reaction,
+into the grassy ditch.
+
+In memory Stefan followed himself home. The word was used to denote the
+house in which he and his father lived. A portrait of his mother hung
+over the parlor stove. It was a chalk drawing from a photograph, crudely
+done, but beautiful by reason of the subject. The face was young and
+very round, the forehead beautifully low and broad under black waves of
+hair. The nose was short and proud, the chin small but square, the mouth
+gaily curving around little, even teeth. But the eyes were deep and
+somber; there was passion in them, and romance. Stefan had not seen that
+face for years, he barely remembered the original, but he could have
+drawn it now in every detail. If the house in which it hung could be
+called home at all, it was by virtue of that picture, the only thing of
+beauty in it.
+
+Behind the portrait lay a few memories of joy and heartache, and one
+final one of horror. Stefan probed them, still with his nervous hand
+across his eyes. He listened while his mother sang gay or mournful
+little songs with haunting tunes in a tongue only a word or two of which
+he understood. He watched while she drew from her bureau drawer a box of
+paints and some paper. She painted for long hours, day after day through
+the winter, while he played beside her with longing eyes on her brushes.
+She painted always one thing--flowers--using no pencil, drawing their
+shapes with the brush. Her flowers were of many kinds, nearly all
+strange to him, but most were roses--pink, yellow, crimson, almost
+black. Sometimes their petals flared like wings; sometimes they were
+close-furled. Of these paintings he remembered much, but of her speech
+little, for she was silent as she worked.
+
+One day his mother put a brush into his hand. The rapture of it was as
+sharp and near as to-day's misery. He sat beside her after that for many
+days and painted. First he tried to paint a rose, but he had never seen
+such roses as her brush drew, and he tired quickly. Then he drew a bird.
+His mother nodded and smiled--it was good. After that his memory showed
+him the two sitting side by side for weeks, or was it months?--while
+the snow lay piled beyond the window--she with her flowers, he with his
+birds.
+
+First he drew birds singly, hopping on a branch, or simply standing,
+claws and beaks defined. Then he began to make them fly, alone, and
+again in groups. Their wings spread across the paper, wider and more
+sweepingly. They pointed upward sharply, or lay flat across the page.
+Flights of tiny birds careened from corner to corner. They were blue,
+gold, scarlet, and white. He left off drawing birds on branches and drew
+them only in flight, smudging in a blue background for the sky.
+
+One day by accident he made a dark smudge in the lower left-hand corner
+of his page.
+
+"What is that?" asked his mother.
+
+The little boy looked at it doubtfully for a moment, unwilling to admit
+it a blot. Then he laughed.
+
+"Mother, Mother, that is America." (Stefan heard himself.) "Look!" And
+rapidly he drew a bird flying high above the blot, with its head pointed
+to the right, away from it.
+
+His mother laughed and hugged him quickly. "Yes, eastward," she said.
+
+After that all his birds flew one way, and in the left-hand lower corner
+there was usually a blob of dark brown or black. Once it was a square,
+red, white, and blue.
+
+On her table his mother had a little globe which revolved above a
+brass base. Because of this he knew the relative position of two
+places--America and Bohemia. Of this country he thought his mother was
+unwilling to speak, but its name fell from her lips with sighs, with--as
+it now seemed to him--a wild longing. Knowing nothing of it, he had
+pictured it a paradise, a land of roses. He seemed to have no knowledge
+of why she had left it; but years later his father spoke of finding her
+in Boston in the days when he preached there, penniless, searching for
+work as a teacher of singing. How she became jettisoned in that--to
+her--cold and inhospitable port, Stefan did not know, nor how soon
+after their marriage the two moved to the still more alien peninsula of
+Michigan.
+
+Into his memories of the room where they painted a shadow constantly
+intruded, chilling them, such a shadow, deep and cold, as is cast by an
+iceberg. The door would open, and his father's face, high and white with
+ice-blue eyes, would hang above them. Instantly, the man remembered, the
+boy would cower like a fledgling beneath the sparrow-hawk, but with as
+much distaste as fear in his cringing. The words that followed always
+seemed the same--he could reconstruct the scene clearly, but whether it
+had occurred once or many times he could not tell. His father's voice
+would snap across the silence like a high, tight-drawn string--
+
+"Still wasting time? Have you nothing better to do? Where is your
+sewing? And the boy--why is he not outside playing?"
+
+"This helps me, Henry," his mother answered, hesitating and low. "Surely
+it does no harm. I cannot sew all the time."
+
+"It is a childish and vain occupation, however, and I disapprove of
+the boy being encouraged in it. This of course you know perfectly well.
+Under ordinary circumstances I should absolutely forbid it; as it is, I
+condemn it."
+
+"Henry," his mother's voice trembled, "don't ask me to give up his
+companionship. It is too cold for me to be outdoors, and perhaps after
+the spring I might not be with him."
+
+This sentence terrified Stefan, who did not know the meaning of it. He
+was glad, for once, of his father's ridicule.
+
+"That is perfectly absurd, the shallow excuse women always make their
+husbands for self-indulgence," said the man, turning to go. "You are a
+healthy woman, and would be more so but for idleness."
+
+His wife called him back, pleadingly. "Please don't be angry with me,
+I'm doing the best I can, Henry--the very best I can." There was a sweet
+foreign blur in her speech, Stefan remembered.
+
+His father paused at the door. "I have shown you your duty, my dear. I
+am a minister, and you cannot expect me to condone in my wife habits of
+frivolity and idleness which I should be the first to reprimand in my
+flock. I expect you to set an example."
+
+"Oh," the woman wailed, "when you married me you loved me as I was--"
+
+With a look of controlled annoyance her husband closed the door. Whether
+the memory of his father's words was exact or not, Stefan knew their
+effect by heart. The door shut, his mother would begin to cry, quietly
+at first, then with deep, catching sobs that seemed to stifle her, so
+that she rose and paced the room breathlessly. Then she would hold the
+boy to her breast, and slowly the storm would change again to gentle
+tears. That day there would be no more painting.
+
+These, his earliest memories, culminated in tragedy. A spring day of
+driving rain witnessed the arrival of a gray, plain-faced woman, who
+mounted to his mother's room. The house seemed full of mysterious
+bustle. Presently he heard moans, and rushed upstairs thinking his
+mother was crying and needed him. The gray-haired woman thrust him from
+the bedroom door, but he returned again and again, calling his mother,
+until his father emerged from the study downstairs, and, seizing him in
+his cold grip, pushed him into the sanctum and turned the key upon him.
+
+Much later, a man whom Stefan knew as their doctor entered the room
+with his father. A strange new word passed between them, and, in his
+high-strung state, impressed the boy's memory. It was "chloroform." The
+doctor used the word several times, and his father shook his head.
+
+"No, doctor," he heard him saying, "we neither of us approve of it.
+It is contrary to the intention of God. Besides, you say the case is
+normal."
+
+The doctor seemed to be repeating something about nerves and hysteria.
+"Exactly," his father replied, "and for that, self-control is needed,
+and not a drug that reverses the dispensation of the Almighty."
+
+Both men left the room. Presently the boy heard shrieks. Lying, a grown
+man, in his berth, Stefan trembled at the memory of them. He fled
+in spirit as he had fled then--out of the window, down the roaring,
+swimming street, where he knew not, pursued by a writhing horror. Hours
+later, as it seemed, he returned. The shades were pulled down across the
+windows of his house. His mother was dead.
+
+Looking back, the man hardly knew how the conviction had come to the
+child that his father had killed his mother. A vague comprehension
+perhaps of the doctor's urgings and his father's denials--a head-shaking
+mutter from the nurse--the memory of all his mother's tears. He was
+hardly more than a baby, but he had always feared and disliked his
+father--now he hated him, blindly and intensely. He saw him as the cause
+not only of his mother's tears and death, but of all the ugliness in the
+life about him. "Bohemia," he thought, would have been theirs but for
+this man. He even blamed him, in a sullen way, for the presence in their
+house of a tiny little red and wizened object, singularly ugly, which
+the gray-haired woman referred to as his "brother." Obviously, the thing
+was not a brother, and his father must be at the bottom of a conspiracy
+to deceive him. The creature made a great deal of noise, and when, by
+and by, it went away, and they told him his brother too was dead, he
+felt nothing but relief.
+
+So darkened the one bright room in his childhood's mansion. Obscured, it
+left the other chambers dingier than before, and filled with the ache of
+loss. Slowly he forgot his mother's companionship, but not her beauty,
+nor her roses, nor "Bohemia," nor his hatred of the "America" which was
+his father's. To get away from his native town, to leave America, became
+the steadfast purpose of his otherwise unstable nature.
+
+The man watched himself through high school. He saw himself still hating
+his surroundings and ignoring his schoolfellows--save for an occasional
+girl whose face or hair showed beauty. At this time the first step in
+his plan of escape shaped itself--he must work hard enough to get to
+college, to Ann Arbor, where he had heard there was an art course. For
+the boy painted now, in all his spare time, not merely birds, but dogs
+and horses, boys and girls, all creatures that had speed, that he could
+draw in action, leaping, flying, or running against the wind. Even now
+Stefan could warm to the triumph he felt the day he discovered the old
+barn where he could summon these shapes undetected. His triumph was over
+the arch-enemy, his father--who had forbidden him paint and brushes and
+confiscated the poor little fragments of his mother's work that he had
+hoarded. His father destined him for a "fitting" profession--the man
+smiled to remember it--and with an impressive air of generosity gave him
+the choice of three--the Church, the Law, or Medicine. Hate had given
+him too keen a comprehension of his father to permit him the mistake of
+argument. He temporized. Let him be sent to college, and there he would
+discover where his aptitude lay.
+
+So at last it was decided. A trunk was found, a moth-eaten bag. His
+cheap, ill-cut clothes were packed. On a day of late summer he stepped
+for the first time upon a train--beautiful to him because it moved--and
+was borne southward.
+
+At Ann Arbor he found many new things, rules, and people, but he brushed
+them aside like flies, hardly perceiving them; for there, for the first
+time, he saw photographs and casts of the world's great art. The
+first sight, even in a poor copy, of the two Discoboli--Diana with her
+swinging knee-high tunic--the winged Victory of Samothrace--to see them
+first at seventeen, without warning, without a glimmering knowledge
+of their existence! And the pictures! Portfolios of Angelo, of the
+voluptuous Titian, of the swaying forms of Botticelli's maidens--trite
+enough now--but then!
+
+How long he could have deceived his father as to the real nature of
+his interests he did not know. Already there had been complaints of
+cut lectures, reprimands, and letters from home. Evading mathematics,
+science, and divinity, he read only the English and classic
+subjects--because they contained beauty--and drew, copying and creating,
+in every odd moment. The storm began to threaten, but it never broke;
+for in his second year in college the unbelievable, the miracle,
+happened--his father died. They said he had died of pneumonia,
+contracted while visiting the sick in the winter blizzards, and they
+praised him; but Stefan hardly listened.
+
+One fact alone stood out amid the ugly affairs of death, so that he
+regarded and remembered nothing else. He was free--and he had wings!
+His father left insurance, and a couple of savings-bank accounts, but
+through some fissure of vanity or carelessness in the granite of his
+propriety, he left no will. The sums, amounting in all to something over
+three thousand dollars, came to Stefan without conditions, guardians,
+or other hindrances. The rapture of that discovery, he thought, almost
+wiped out his father's debt to him.
+
+He knew now that not Bohemia, but Paris, was his El Dorado. In wild
+haste he made ready for his journey, leaving the rigid trappings of his
+home to be sold after him. But his dead father was to give him one more
+pang--the scales were to swing uneven at the last. For when he would
+have packed the only possession, other than a few necessities, he
+planned to carry with him, he found his mother's picture gone. Dying,
+his father, it appeared, had wandered from his bed, detached the
+portrait, and with his own hands burnt it in the stove. The motive of
+the act Stefan could not comprehend. He only knew that this man had
+robbed him of his mother twice. All that remained of her was her wedding
+ring, which, drawn from his father's cash-box, he wore on his little
+finger. With bitterness amid his joy he took the train once more,
+and saw the lights of the town's shabby inn blink good-bye behind its
+frazzled shades.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Byrd had lived for seven years in Paris, wandering on foot in summer
+through much of France and Italy. His little patrimony, stretched to the
+last sou, and supplemented in later years by the occasional sale of his
+work to small dealers, had sufficed him so long. His headquarters were
+in a high windowed attic facing north along the rue des Quatre Ermites.
+His work had been much admired in the ateliers, but his personal
+unpopularity with, the majority of the students had prevented their
+admiration changing to a friendship whose demands would have drained his
+small resources. "Ninety-nine per cent of the Quarter dislikes Stefan
+Byrd," an Englishman had said, "but one per cent adores him." Repeated
+to Byrd, this utterance was accepted by him with much complacence, for,
+even more than the average man, he prided himself upon his faults of
+character. His adoration of Paris had not prevented him from criticizing
+its denizens; the habits of mental withdrawal and reservation developed
+in his boyhood did not desert him in the city of friendship, but he
+became more deeply aware of the loneliness which they involved. He
+searched eagerly for the few whose qualities of mind or person lifted
+them beyond reach of his demon of disparagement, and he found them,
+especially among women.
+
+To a minority of that sex he was unusually attractive, and he became a
+lover of women, but as subjects for enthusiasm rather than desire. In
+passion he was curious but capricious, seldom rapidly roused, nor
+long held. In his relations with women emotion came second to mental
+stimulation, so that he never sought one whose mere sex was her main
+attraction. This saved him from much--he was experienced, but not
+degraded. Of love, however, in the fused sense of body, mind, and
+spirit, he knew nothing. Perhaps his work claimed too much from him;
+at any rate he was too egotistical, too critical and self-sufficient
+to give easily. Whether he had received such love he did not
+ask himself--it is probable that he had, without knowing it, or
+understanding that he had not himself given full measure in return. The
+heart of France is practical; with all her ardor Paris had given Byrd
+desire and friendship, but not romance.
+
+In his last year, with only a few francs of his inheritance remaining,
+Stefan had three pictures in the Beaux Arts. One of these was sold,
+but the other two importuned vainly from their hanging places. Enormous
+numbers of pictures had been exhibited that year. Every gallery, public
+and private, was crowded; Paris was glutted with works of art. Stefan
+faced the prospect of speedy starvation if he could not dispose of
+another canvas. He had enough for a summer in Brittany, after which, if
+the dealers could do nothing for him, he was stranded. Nevertheless,
+he enjoyed his holiday light-heartedly, confident that his two large
+pictures could not long fail to be appreciated. Returning to Paris
+in September, however, he was dismayed to find his favorite dealers
+uninterested in his canvases, and disinclined to harbor them longer.
+Portraits and landscapes, they told him, were in much demand, but
+fantasies, no. His sweeping groups of running, flying figures against
+stormy skies, or shoals of mermaids hurrying down lanes of the deep
+sea, did not appeal to the fashionable taste of the year. Something
+more languorous, more subdued, or, on the other hand, more "chic," was
+demanded.
+
+In a high rage of disgust, Stefan hired a fiacre, and bore his children
+defiantly home to their birthplace. Sitting in his studio like a ruffled
+bird upon a spoiled hatching, he reviewed the fact that he had 325
+francs in the world, that the rent of his attic was overdue, and that
+his pictures had never been so unmarketable as now.
+
+At this point his one intimate man friend, Adolph Jensen, a Swede,
+appeared as the deus ex machine. He had, he declared, an elder
+brother in New York, an art dealer. This brother had just written him,
+describing the millionaires who bought his pictures and bric-a-brac.
+His shop was crowded with them. Adolph's brother was shrewd and hard
+to please, but let his cher Stefan go himself to New York with his
+canvases, impress the brother with his brilliance and the beauty of his
+work, and, undoubtedly, his fortune would at once be made. The season in
+New York was in the winter. Let Stefan go at once, by the fastest boat,
+and be first in the field--he, Adolph, who had a little laid by, would
+lend him the necessary money, and would write his brother in advance of
+the great opportunity he was sending him.
+
+Ultimately, with a very ill grace on Stefan's part--who could hardly
+be persuaded that even a temporary return to America was preferable to
+starvation--it was so arranged. The second-class passage money was 250
+francs; for this and incidentals, he had enough, and Adolph lent him
+another 250 to tide him over his arrival. He felt unable to afford
+adequate crating, so his canvases were unstretched and made into a
+roll which he determined should never leave his hands. His clothing was
+packed in two bags, one contributed by Adolph. Armed with his roll, and
+followed by his enthusiastic friend carrying the bags, Stefan departed
+from the Gare Saint-Lazare for Dieppe, Liverpool, and the Lusitania.
+
+Reacting to his friend's optimism, Stefan had felt confident enough on
+leaving Paris, but the discomforts of the journey had soon flattened
+his spirits, and now, limp in his berth, he saw the whole adventure
+mistaken, unreal, and menacing. In leaving the country of his adoption
+for that of his birth, he now felt that he had put himself again in the
+clutches of a chimera which had power to wither with its breath all that
+was rare and beautiful in his life. Nursing a grievance against himself
+and fate, he at last fell asleep, clothed as he was, and forgot himself
+for a time in such uneasy slumber as the storm allowed.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+The second-class deck was rapidly filling. Chairs, running in a double
+row about the deck-house were receiving bundles of women, rugs, and
+babies. Energetic youths, in surprising ulsters and sweaters, tramped in
+broken file between these chairs and the bulwarks. Older men, in woolen
+waistcoats and checked caps, or in the aging black of the small clergy
+and professional class, obstructed, with a rooted constancy, the few
+clear corners of the deck. Elderly women, with the parchment skin and
+dun tailored suit of the "personally conducted" tourist, tied their
+heads in veils and ventured into sheltered corners. On the boat-deck a
+game of shuffleboard was in progress. Above the main companion-way
+the ship's bands condescended to a little dance music on behalf of the
+second class. The Scotchman, clad in inch-thick heather mixture, was
+already discussing with all whom he could buttonhole the possibilities
+of a ship's concert. In a word, it was the third day out, the storm was
+over, and the passengers were cognizant of life, and of each other.
+
+The Scot had gravitated to a group of men near the smoking-room door,
+and having received from his turtle-jawed neighbor of the dinner table,
+who was among them, the gift of a cigar, interrogated him as to musical
+gifts. "I shall recite mesel'," he explained complacently, sucking in
+his smoke. "Might we hope for a song, now, from you? I've asked yon
+artist chap, but he says he doesna' sing."
+
+His neighbor also disclaimed talents. "Sorry I can't oblige you. Who
+wants to hear a man sing, anyway? Where are your girls?"
+
+"There seems to be a singular absence of bonny girrls on board," replied
+the Scot, twisting his erect forelock reflectively.
+
+"Have you asked the English girl?" suggested a tall, rawboned New
+Englander.
+
+"Which English girrl?" demanded the Scot.
+
+"Listen to him--which! Why, that one over there, you owl."
+
+The Scotchman's eyes followed the gesture toward a group of children
+surrounding a tall girl who stood by the rail on the leeward side. She
+was facing into the wind toward the smoking-room door.
+
+"Eh, mon," said the Scot, "till now I'd only seen the back of yon young
+woman," and he promptly strode down the deck to ask, and receive, the
+promise of a song.
+
+Stefan Byrd, after a silent breakfast eaten late to avoid his table
+companions, had just come on deck. It had been misty earlier, but now
+the sun was beginning to break through in sudden glints of brightness.
+The deck was still damp, however, and the whole prospect seemed to
+the emerging Stefan cheerless in the extreme. His eyes swept the gray,
+huddled shapes upon the chairs, the knots of gossiping men, the clumsy,
+tramping youths, with the same loathing that the whole voyage had
+hitherto inspired in him. The forelocked Scot, tweed cap in hand,
+was crossing the deck. "There goes the brute, busy with his infernal
+concert," he thought, watching balefully. Then he actually seemed to
+point, like a dog, limbs fixed, eyes set, his face, with its salient
+nose, thrust forward.
+
+The Scot was speaking to a tall, bareheaded girl, about whom half a
+dozen nondescript children crowded. She was holding herself against
+the wind, and from her long, clean limbs her woolen dress was whipped,
+rippling. The sun had gleamed suddenly, and under the shaft of
+brightness her hair shone back a golden answer. Her eyes, hardly raised
+to those of the tall Scotchman, were wide, gray, and level--the eyes of
+Pallas Athene; her features, too, were goddess-like. One hand upon the
+bulwarks, she seemed, even as she listened, to be poised for flight,
+balancing to the sway of the ship.
+
+Stefan exhaled a great breath of joy. There was something beautiful
+upon the ship, after all. He found and lit a cigarette, and squaring
+his shoulders to the deckhouse wall, leaned back the more comfortably
+to indulge what he took to be his chief mission--the art of perceiving
+beauty.
+
+The girl listened in silence till the Scotchman had finished speaking,
+and replied briefly and quietly, inclining her head. The Scot, jotting
+something in a pocket notebook, left her with an air of elation, and she
+turned again to the children. One, a toddler, was picking at her
+skirt. She bent toward him a smile which gave Stefan almost a stab of
+satisfaction, it was so gravely sweet, so fitted to her person. She
+stooped lower to speak to the baby, and the artist saw the free,
+rhythmic motion which meant developed, and untrammeled muscles.
+Presently the children, wriggling with joy, squatted in a circle,
+and the girl sank to the deck in their midst with one quick and easy
+movement, curling her feet under her. There proceeded an absurd game,
+involving a slipper and much squealing, whose intricacies she directed
+with unruffled ease.
+
+Suddenly the wind puffed the hat of one of the small boys from his
+head, carrying it high above their reach. In an instant the girl was up,
+springing to her feet unaided by hand or knee. Reaching out, she caught
+the hat as it descended slantingly over the bulwarks, and was down again
+before the child's clutching hands had left his head.
+
+A mother, none other than the prominently busted lady of Stefan's table,
+blew forward with admiring cries of gratitude. Other matrons, vocative,
+surrounded the circle, momentarily cutting off his view. He changed his
+position to the bulwarks beside the group. There, a yard or two from the
+gleaming head, he perched on the rail, feet laced into its supports, and
+continued his concentrated observation.
+
+"See yon chap," remarked the Scot from the smoking-room door to which
+his talent-seeking round of the deck had again brought him. "He's fair
+staring the eyes oot o'his head!"
+
+"Exceedingly annoying to the young lady, I should imagine," returned his
+table neighbor, the prim minister, who had joined the group.
+
+"Hoots, she willna' mind the likes of him," scoffed the other, with his
+booming laugh.
+
+And indeed she did not. Oblivious equally of Byrd and of her more
+distant watchers, the English girl passed from "Hunt the Slipper" to "A
+Cold and Frosty Morning," and from that to story-telling, as absorbed as
+her small companions, or as her watcher-in-chief.
+
+Gradually the sun broke out, the water danced, huddled shapes began to
+rise in their chairs, disclosing unexpected spots of color--a bright tie
+or a patterned blouse--animation increased on all sides, and the ring
+about the storyteller became three deep.
+
+After a time a couple of perky young stewards appeared with huge iron
+trays, containing thick white cups half full of chicken broth, and piles
+of biscuits. Upon this, the pouter-pigeon lady bore off her small son to
+be fed, other mothers did the same, and the remaining children, at the
+lure of food, sidled off of their own accord, or sped wildly, whooping
+out promises to return. For the moment, the story-teller was alone.
+Stefan, seeing the Scot bearing down upon her with two cups of broth
+in his hand and purpose in his eye, wakened to the danger just in time.
+Throwing his cigarette overboard, he sprang lightly between her and the
+approaching menace.
+
+"Won't you be perfectly kind, and come for a walk?" he asked, stooping
+to where she sat. The girl looked up into a pair of green-gold eyes set
+in a brown, eager face. The face was lighted with a smile of dazzling
+friendliness, and surmounted by an uncovered head of thick, brown-black
+hair. Slowly her own eyes showed an answering smile.
+
+"Thank you, I should love to," she said, and rising, swung off beside
+him, just in time--as Stefan maneuvered it--to avoid seeing the Scot and
+his carefully balanced offering. Discomfited, that individual consoled
+himself with both cups of broth, and bided his time.
+
+"My name is Stefan Byrd. I am a painter, going to America to sell some
+pictures. I'm twenty-six. What is your name?" said Stefan, who never
+wasted time in preliminaries and abhorred small talk--turning his
+brilliant happy smile upon her.
+
+"To answer by the book," she replied, smiling too, "my name is Mary
+Elliston. I'm twenty-five. I do odd jobs, and am going to America to try
+to find one to live on."
+
+"What fun!" cried Stefan, with a faunlike skip of pleasure, as they
+turned onto the emptier windward deck. "Then we're both seeking our
+fortunes."
+
+"Living, rather than fortune, in my case, I'm afraid."
+
+"Well, of course you don't need a fortune, you carry so much gold with
+you," and he glanced at her shining hair.
+
+"Not negotiable, unluckily," she replied, taking his compliment as he
+had paid it, without a trace of self-consciousness.
+
+"Like the sunlight," he answered. "In fact,"--confidentially--"I'm
+afraid you're a thief; you've imprisoned a piece of the sun, which
+should belong to us all. However, I'm not going to complain to the
+authorities, I like the result too much. You don't mind my saying that,
+do you?" he continued, sure that she did not. "You see, I'm a painter.
+Color means everything to me--that and form."
+
+"One never minds hearing nice things, I think," she replied, with a
+frank smile. They were swinging up and down the windward deck, and as he
+talked he was acutely aware of her free movements beside him, and of
+the blow of her skirts to leeward. Her hair, too closely pinned to fly
+loose, yet seemed to spring from her forehead with the urge of pinioned
+wings. Life radiated from her, he thought, with a steady, upward
+flame--not fitfully, as with most people.
+
+"And one doesn't mind questions, does one--from real people?" he
+continued. "I'm going to ask you lots more, and you may ask me as many
+as you like. I never talk to people unless they are worth talking to,
+and then I talk hard. Will you begin, or shall I? I have at least two
+hundred things to ask."
+
+"It is my turn, though, I think." She accepted him on his own ground,
+with an open and natural friendliness.
+
+"I have only one at the moment, which is, 'Why haven't we talked
+before?'" and she glanced with a quiet humorousness at the few
+unpromising samples of the second cabin who obstructed the windward
+deck.
+
+"Oh, good for you!" he applauded, "aren't they loathly!"
+
+"Oh, no, all right, only not stimulating--"
+
+"And we are," he finished for her, "so that, obviously, your question
+has only one answer. We haven't talked before because I haven't seen
+you before, and I haven't seen you because I have been growling in my
+cabin--voila tout!"
+
+"Oh, never growl--it's such a waste of time," she answered. "You'll see,
+the second cabin isn't bad."
+
+"It certainly isn't, _now_," rejoiced Stefan. "My turn for a question.
+Have you relatives, or are you, like myself, alone in the world?"
+
+"Quite alone," said Mary, "except for a married sister, who hardly
+counts, as she's years older than I, and fearfully preoccupied with
+husband, houses, and things." She paused, then added, "She hasn't any
+babies, or I might have stayed to look after them, but she has lots of
+money and 'position to keep up,' and so forth."
+
+"I see her," said Stefan. "Obviously, she takes after the _other_
+parent. You are alone then. Next question--"
+
+"Oh, isn't it my turn again?" Mary interposed, smilingly.
+
+"It is, but I ask you to waive it. You see, questions about _me_ are so
+comparatively trivial. What sort of work do you do?"
+
+"Well, I write a little," she replied, "and I've been a governess and
+a companion. But I'm really a victim of the English method of
+educating girls. That's my chief profession--being a monument to its
+inefficiency," and she laughed, low and bell-like.
+
+"Tell me about that--I've never lived in England," he questioned, with
+eager interest. ("And oh, Pan and Apollo, her voice!" he thought.)
+
+"Well," she continued, "they bring us up so nicely that we can't do
+anything--except _be_ nice. I was brought up in a cathedral town,
+right in the Close, and my dear old Dad, who was a doctor, attended the
+Bishop, the Dean, and all the Chapter. Mother would not let us go to
+boarding-school, for fear of 'influences'--so we had governesses at
+home, who taught us nothing we didn't choose to learn. My sister Isobel
+married 'well,' as they say, while I was still in the schoolroom. Her
+husband belongs to the county--"
+
+"What's that?" interrupted Stefan.
+
+"Don't you know what the county is? How delightful! The 'county' is
+the county families--landed gentry--very ancient and swagger and all
+that--much more so than the titled people often. It was very great
+promotion for the daughter of one of the town to marry into the
+county--or would have been except that Mother was county also." She
+spoke with mock solemnity.
+
+"How delightfully picturesque and medieval!" exclaimed Stefan. "The
+Guelphs and Ghibellines, eh?"
+
+"Yes," Mary replied, "only there is no feud, and it doesn't seem so
+romantic when you're in it. The man my sister married I thought was
+frightfully boring except for his family place, and being in the army,
+which is rather decent. He talks," she smiled, "like a phonograph with
+only one set of records."
+
+"Wondrous Being--Winged Goddess--" chanted Stefan, stopping before her
+and apostrophizing the sky or the boat-deck--"a goddess with a sense of
+humor!" And he positively glowed upon her.
+
+"About the first point I know nothing," she laughed, walking on again
+beside him, "but for the second," and her face became a little grave,
+"you have to have some humor if you are a girl in Lindum, or you go
+under."
+
+"Tell me, tell me all about it," he urged. "I've never met an English
+girl before, _nor_ a goddess, and I'm so interested!"
+
+They rested for a time against the bulwarks. The wind was dropping, and
+the spume seethed against the black side of the ship without force from
+the waves to throw it up to them in spray. They looked down into deep
+blue and green water glassing a sky warm now, and friendly, in which
+high white cumuli sailed slowly, like full-rigged ships all but
+becalmed.
+
+"It is a very commonplace story with us," Mary began. "Mother died a
+little time after Isobel married, and Dad kept my governess on. I begged
+to go to Girton, or any other college he liked, but he wouldn't hear of
+it. Said he wanted a womanly daughter." She smiled rather ruefully. "Dad
+was doing well with his practice, for a small-town doctor, and had a
+good deal saved, and a little of mother's money. He wanted to have more,
+so he put it all into rubber. You've heard about rubber, haven't you?"
+she asked, turning to Stefan.
+
+"Not a thing," he smiled.
+
+"Well, every one in England was putting money into rubber last year, and
+lots of people did well, but lots--didn't. Poor old Dad didn't--he lost
+everything. It wouldn't have really mattered--he had his profession--but
+the shock killed him, I think; that and being lonely without Mother."
+She paused a moment, looking into the water. "Anyhow, he died, and there
+was nothing for me to do except to begin earning my living without any
+of the necessary equipment."
+
+"What about the brother-in-law?" asked Stefan.
+
+"Oh, yes, I could have gone to them--I wasn't in danger of starvation.
+But," she shook her head emphatically, "a poor relation! I couldn't have
+stood that."
+
+"Well," he turned squarely toward her, his elbow on the rail, "I can't
+help asking this, you know; where were the bachelors of Lindum?"
+
+She smiled, still in her friendly, unembarrassed way.
+
+"I know what you mean, of course. The older men say it quite openly in
+England.--'Why don't a nice gel like you get married?'--It's rather a
+long story." ("Has she been in love?" Stefan wondered.) "First of all,
+there are very few young men of one's own sort in Lindum; most of them
+are in the Colonies. Those there are--one or two lawyers, doctors, and
+squires' sons--are frightfully sought after." She made a wry face.
+"Too much competition for them, altogether, and--" she seemed to take a
+plunge before adding--"I've never been successful at bargain counters."
+
+He turned that over for a moment. "I see," he said. "At least I should
+do, if it weren't for it being you. Look here, Miss Elliston, honestly
+now, fair and square--" he smiled confidingly at her--"you're not asking
+me to believe that the competition in your ease didn't appear in the
+other sex?"
+
+"Mr. Byrd," she answered straightly, "in my world girls have to
+have more than a good appearance." She shrugged her shoulders rather
+disdainfully. "I had no money, and I had opinions."
+
+("She's been in love--slightly," he decided.) "Opinions," he echoed,
+"what kind? Mustn't one have any in Lindum?"
+
+"Young girls mustn't--only those they are taught," she replied. "I read
+a good deal, I sympathized with the Liberals. I was even--" her voice
+dropped to mock horror--"a Suffragist!"
+
+"I've heard about that," he interposed eagerly, "though the French women
+don't seem to care much. You wanted to vote? Well, why ever not?"
+
+She gave him the brightest smile he had yet received.
+
+"Oh, how nice of you!" she cried. "You really mean that?"
+
+"Couldn't see it any other way. I've always liked and believed in women
+more than men. I learnt that in childhood," he added, frowning.
+
+"Splendid! I'm so glad," she responded. "You see, with our men it's
+usually the other way round. My ideas were a great handicap at home."
+
+"So you decided to leave?"
+
+"Yes; I went to London and got a job teaching some children sums and
+history--two hours every morning. In the afternoons I worked at stories
+for the magazines, and placed a few, but they pay an unknown writer
+horribly badly. I lived with an old lady as companion for two months,
+but that was being a poor relation minus the relationship--I couldn't
+stand it. I joined the Suffragists in London--not the Militants--I don't
+quite see their point of view--and marched in a parade. Brother-in-law
+heard of it, and wrote me I could not expect anything from them unless I
+stopped it." She laughed quietly.
+
+Stefan flushed. He pronounced something--conclusively--in French.
+Then--"Don't ask me to apologize, Miss Elliston."
+
+"I won't," reassuringly. "I felt rather like that, too. I wrote that I
+didn't expect anything as it was. Then I sat down and thought about the
+whole question of women in England and their chances. I had a hundred
+pounds and a few ornaments of Mother's. I love children, but I didn't
+want to be a governess. I wanted to stand alone in some place where my
+head wouldn't be pushed down every time I tried to raise it. I believed
+in America people wouldn't say so often, 'Why doesn't a nice girl like
+you get married?' so I came, and here I am. That's the whole story--a
+very humdrum one."
+
+"Yes, here you are, thank God!" proclaimed Stefan devoutly. "What
+magnificent pluck, and how divine of you to tell me it all! You've saved
+me from suicide, almost. These people immolate me."
+
+"How delightfully he exaggerates!" she thought.
+
+"What thousands of things we can talk about," he went on in a burst of
+enthusiasm. "What a perfectly splendid time we are going to have!" He
+all but warbled.
+
+"I hope so," she answered, smilingly, "but there goes the gong, and I'm
+ravenous."
+
+"Dinner!" he cried scornfully; "suet pudding, all those horrible
+people--you want to leave this--?" He swept his arm over the glittering
+water.
+
+"I don't, but I want my dinner," she maintained.
+
+This checked his spirits for a moment; then enlightenment seemed to
+burst upon him.
+
+"Glorious creature!" he apostrophized her. "She must be fed, or she
+would not glow with such divine health! That gong was for the first
+table, and I'm not in the least hungry. Nevertheless, we will eat, here
+and now."
+
+She demurred, but he would have his way, demanding it in celebration of
+their meeting. He found the deck steward, tipped him, and exacted the
+immediate production of two dinners. He ensconced Miss Elliston in some
+one else's chair, conveniently placed, settled her with some one else's
+cushions, which he chose from the whole deck for their color--a clean
+blue--and covered her feet with the best rug he could find. She accepted
+his booty with only slight remonstrance, being too frankly engaged by
+his spirits to attempt the role of extinguisher. He settled himself
+beside her, and they lunched delightedly, like children, on chops and a
+rice pudding.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+It is not too easy to appropriate a pretty girl on board ship. There are
+always young men who expect the voyage to offer a flirtation, and who
+spend much ingenuity in heading each other off from the companionship
+of the most attractive damsels. But the "English girl" was not in the
+"pretty" class. She was a beauty, of the grave and pure type which
+implies character. All the children knew her; all the women and men
+watched her; but few of the latter had ventured to speak to her, even
+before Stefan claimed her as his monopoly. For this he did, from the
+moment of their first encounter. To him nobody on the ship existed but
+her, and he assumed the right to show it.
+
+He had trouble from only two people. One was the Scotchman, McEwan,
+whose hide seemed impervious to rebuffs, and who would charge into
+a conversation with the weight of a battering ram, planting himself
+implacably in a chair beside Miss Elliston, and occasionally reducing
+even Stefan to silence. The other was Miss Elliston herself. She was
+kind, she was friendly, she was boyishly frank. But occasionally she
+would withdraw into herself, and sometimes would disappear altogether
+into her cabin, to be found again, after long search, telling stories
+to some of the children. On such occasions Stefan roamed the decks and
+saloons very like a hungry wolf, snapping with intolerable rudeness at
+any one who spoke to him. This, however, few troubled to do, for he was
+cordially disliked, both for his own sake and because of his success
+with Miss Elliston. That success the ship could not doubt. Though she
+was invariably polite to every one, she walked and talked only with
+him or the children. She was, of course, above the social level of
+the second-class; but this the English did not resent, because they
+understood it, nor the Americans, because they were unaware of it. On
+the other hand, English and Americans alike resented Byrd, whom
+they could neither place nor understand. These two became the most
+conspicuous people in the cabin, and their every movement was eagerly
+watched and discussed, though both remained entirely oblivious to it.
+Stefan was absorbed in the girl, that was clear; but how far she might
+be in him the cabin could not be sure. She brightened when he appeared.
+She liked him, smiled at him, and listened to him. She allowed him to
+monopolize her. But she never sought him out, never snubbed McEwan for
+his intrusions into their tete-a-tetes, seemed not to be "managing" the
+affair in any way. Used to more obvious methods, most of the company
+were puzzled. They did not understand that they were watching
+the romance of a woman who added perfect breeding to her racial
+self-control. Mary Elliston would never wear her feelings nakedly, nor
+allow them to ride her out of hand.
+
+Not so Stefan, who was, as yet unknowingly, experiencing romantic love
+for the first time. This girl was the most glorious creature he had ever
+known, and the most womanly. Her sex was the very essence of her; she
+had no need to wear it like a furbelow. She was utterly different from
+the feminine, adroit women he had known; there was something cool and
+deep about her like a pool, and withal winged, like the birds that fly
+over it. She was marvelous--marvelous! he thought. What a find!
+
+His spirit flung itself, kneeling, to drink at the pool--his imagination
+reached out to touch the wings. For the first time in his life he was
+too deeply enthralled to question himself or her. He gloried in her
+openly, conspicuously.
+
+On the morning of the fifth day they had their first dispute. They
+were sitting on the boat deck, aft, watching the wake of the ship as it
+twisted like an uncertain white serpent. Stefan was sketching her, as he
+had done already several times when he could get her apart from hovering
+children--he could not endure being overlooked as he worked. "They chew
+gum in my ear, and breathe down my neck," he would explain.
+
+He had almost completed an impression of her head against the sky, with
+a flying veil lifting above it, when a shadow fell across the canvas,
+and the voice of McEwan blared out a pleased greeting.
+
+"Weel, here ye are!" exclaimed that mountain of tweed, lowering himself
+onto a huge iron cleat between which and the bulwarks the two were
+sitting cross-legged. "I was speerin' where ye'd both be."
+
+"Good Lord, McEwan, can't you speak English?" exclaimed Byrd, with quick
+exasperation.
+
+"I hae to speak the New York lingo when I get back there, ye ken,"
+replied the Scot with imperturbable good humor, "so I like to use a wee
+bit o' the guid Scotch while I hae the chance."
+
+"A wee bit!" snorted Stefan, and "Good morning, Mr. McEwan, isn't it
+beautiful up here?" interposed Miss Elliston, pleasantly.
+
+"It's grand," replied the Scotchman, "and ye look bonnie i' the sun," he
+added simply.
+
+"So Mr. Byrd thinks. You see he has just been painting me," she answered
+smilingly, indicating, with a touch of mischief, the drawing that Stefan
+had hastily slipped between them.
+
+The Scotchman stooped, and, before Stefan could stop him, had the sketch
+in his hand.
+
+"It's a guid likeness," he pronounced, "though I dinna care mesel'
+for yon new-fangled way o' slappin' on the color. I'll mak'ye a
+suggestion--" But he got no further, for Stefan, incoherent with
+irritation, snatched the sketch from his hands and broke out at him in
+a stammering torrent of French of the Quarter, which neither of his
+listeners, he was aware, could understand. Having safely consigned all
+the McEwans of the universe to pig-sties and perdition, he walked off
+to cool himself, the sketch under his arm, leaving both his hearers
+incontinently dumb.
+
+McEwan recovered first. "The puir young mon suffers wi' his temper,
+there's nae dooting," said he, addressing himself to the task of
+entertaining his rather absent-minded companion.
+
+His advantage lasted but a few moments, however. Byrd, repenting his
+strategic error, returned, and in despair of other methods succeeded in
+summoning a candid smile.
+
+"Look here, McEwan," said he, with the charm of manner he knew so well
+how to assume, "don't mind my irritability; I'm always like that when
+I'm painting and any one interrupts--it sends me crazy. The light's just
+right, and it won't be for long. I can't possibly paint with anybody
+round. Won't you, like a good fellow, get out and let me finish?"
+
+His frankness was wonderfully disarming, but in any case, the Scot was
+always good nature's self.
+
+"Aye, I ken your nairves trouble ye," he replied, lumbering to his feet,
+"and I'll no disobleege ye, if the leddy will excuse me?" turning to
+her.
+
+Miss Elliston, who had not looked at Stefan since his outburst, murmured
+her consent, and the Scot departed.
+
+Stefan exploded into a sigh of relief. "Thank heaven! Isn't he
+maddening?" he exclaimed, reassembling his brushes. "Isn't he the most
+fatuous idiot that ever escaped from his native menagerie? Did you hear
+him commence to criticize my work? The oaf! I'm afraid--" glancing at
+her face--"that I swore at him, but he deserved it for butting in like
+that, and he couldn't understand what I said." His tone was slightly,
+very slightly, apologetic.
+
+"I don't think that's the point, is it?" asked the girl, in a very cool
+voice. She was experiencing her first shock of disappointment in him,
+and felt unhappy; but she only appeared critical.
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked, dashed.
+
+"Whether he understood or not." She was still looking away from him.
+"It was so unkind and unnecessary to break out at the poor man like
+that--and," her voice dropped, "so horribly rude."
+
+"Well," Stefan answered uncomfortably, "I can't be polite to people like
+that. I don't even try."
+
+"No, I know you don't. That's what I don't like," Mary replied, even
+more coldly. She meant that it hurt her, obscured the ideal she was
+constructing of him, but she could not have expressed that.
+
+He painted for a few minutes in a silence that grew more and more
+constrained. Then he threw down his brush. "Well, I can't paint," he
+exclaimed in an aggrieved tone, "I'm absolutely out of tune. You'll have
+to realize I'm made like that. I can't change, can't hide my real self."
+As she still did not speak, he added, with an edge to his voice, "I may
+as well go away; there's nothing I can do here." He stood up.
+
+"Perhaps you had better," she replied, very quietly. Her throat was
+aching with hurt, so that she could hardly speak, but to him she
+appeared indifferent.
+
+"Good-bye," he exclaimed shortly, and strode off.
+
+For some time she remained where he had left her, motionless. She felt
+very tired, without knowing why. Presently she went to her cabin and lay
+down.
+
+Mary did not see Stefan again until after the midday meal, though by the
+time she appeared on deck he had been waiting and searching for her for
+an hour. When he found her it was in an alcove of the lounge, screened
+from the observation of the greater part of the room. She was reading,
+but as he came toward her she looked up and closed her book. Before he
+spoke both knew that their relation to each other had subtly changed.
+They were self-conscious; the hearts of both beat. In a word, their
+quarrel had taught them their need of each other.
+
+He took her hand and spoke rather breathlessly.
+
+"I've been looking for you for hours. Thank God you're here. I was
+abominable to you this morning. Can you possibly forgive me? I'm so
+horribly lonely without you." He was extraordinarily handsome as he
+stood before her, looking distressed, but with his eyes shining.
+
+"Of course I can," she murmured, while a weight seemed to roll off her
+heart--and she blushed, a wonderful pink, up to the eyes.
+
+He sat beside her, still holding her hand. "I must say it. You are the
+most beautiful thing in the world. The--most--beautiful!" They looked at
+each other.
+
+"Oh!" he exclaimed with a long breath, jumping up again and half
+pulling her after him in a revulsion of relief, "come on deck and let's
+walk--and talk--or," he laughed excitedly, "I don't know what I shall do
+next!"
+
+She obeyed, and they almost sped round the deck, he looking spiritually
+intoxicated, and she, calm by contrast, but with an inward glow as
+though behind her face a rose was on fire. The deck watched them and
+nodded its head. There was no doubt about it now, every one agreed. Bets
+began to circulate on the engagement. A fat salesman offered two to one
+it was declared before they picked up the Nantucket light. The pursy
+little passenger snapped an acceptance. "I'll take you. Here's a dollar
+says the lady is too particular." The high-bosomed matron confided
+her fears for the happiness of the girl, "who has been real kind to
+Johnnie," to the spinster who had admired Stefan the first day out.
+Gossip was universal, but through it all the two moved radiant and
+oblivious.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+McEwan had succeeded in his fell design of getting up a concert, and the
+event was to take place that night. Miss Elliston, who had promised to
+sing, went below a little earlier than usual to dress for dinner. Byrd
+had tried to dissuade her from taking part, but she was firm.
+
+"It's a frightful bother," she said, "but I can't get out of it. I
+promised Mr. McEwan, you know."
+
+"I won't say any further what I think of McEwan," replied Stefan,
+laughing. "Instead, I'll heap coals of fire on him by not trying any
+longer to persuade you to turn him down."
+
+As she left, Stefan waved her a gay "Grand succes!" but he was already
+prey to an agony of nervousness. Suppose she didn't make a success,
+or--worse still--suppose she _did_ make a success--by singing bad music!
+Suppose she lacked art in what she did! _She_ was perfection; he was
+terrified lest her singing should not be. His fastidious brain tortured
+him, for it told him he would love her less completely if she failed.
+
+Like most artists, Stefan adored music, and, more than most, understood
+it. Suppose--just suppose--she were to sing Tosti's "Good-bye!" He
+shuddered. Yet, if she did not sing something of that sort, it would
+fall flat, and she would be disappointed. So he tortured himself all
+through dinner, at which he did not see her, for he had been unable to
+get his place changed to the first sitting with hers. He longed to keep
+away from the concert, yet knew that he could not. At last, leaving his
+dessert untouched, he sought refuge in his cabin.
+
+The interval that must be dragged through while the stewards cleared the
+saloon Stefan occupied in routing from Adolph's huge old Gladstone his
+one evening suit. He had not at first dreamed of dressing, but many of
+the other men had done so, and he determined that for her sake he must
+play the game at least to that extent. Byrd added the scorn of the
+artist to the constitutional dislike of the average American for
+conventional evening dress. His, however, was as little conventional
+as possible, and while he nervously adjusted it he could not help
+recognizing that it was exceedingly becoming. He tore a tie and
+destroyed two collars, however, before the result satisfied him, and
+his nerves were at leaping pitch when staccato chords upon the piano
+announced that the concert had begun. He found a seat in the farthest
+corner of the saloon, and waited, penciling feverish circles upon the
+green-topped table to keep his hands steady.
+
+Mary Elliston's name was fourth on the program, and came immediately
+after McEwan's, who was down for a "recitation." Stefan managed to sit
+through the piano-solo and a song by a seedy little English baritone
+about "the rolling deep." But when the Scot began to blare out, with
+tremendous vehemence, what purported to be a poem by Sir Walter Scott,
+Stefan, his forehead and hands damp with horror, could endure no more,
+and fled, pushing his way through the crowd at the door. He climbed to
+the deck and waited there, listening apprehensively. When the scattered
+applause warned him that the time for Mary's song had come, he found
+himself utterly unable to face the saloon again. Fortunately the main
+companionway gave on a well opening directly over the saloon; and it was
+from the railing of this well that Stefan saw Mary, just as the piano
+sounded the opening bars.
+
+She stood full under the brilliant lights in a gown of white chiffon,
+low in the neck, which drooped and swayed about her in flowing lines of
+grace. Her hair gleamed; her arms showed slim, white, but strong. And
+"Oh, my golden girl!" his heart cried to her, leaping. Her lips parted,
+and quite easily, in full, clear tones that struck the very center of
+the notes, she began to sing. "Good girl, _good girl!"_ he thought. For
+what she sang was neither sophisticated nor obvious--was indeed the only
+thing that could at once have satisfied him and pleased her audience.
+"Under the greenwood tree--" the notes came gay and sweet. Then, "Fear
+no more the heat o' the sun--" and the tones darkened. Again, "Oh,
+mistress mine--" they pulsed with happy love. Three times Mary sang--the
+immortal ballads of Shakespeare--simply, but with sure art and feeling.
+As the last notes ceased, "Love's a stuff will not endure," and the
+applause broke out, absolute peace flooded Stefan's heart.
+
+In a dream he waited for her at the saloon door, held her coat, and
+mounted beside her to the boat deck. Not until they stood side by side
+at the rail, and she turned questioningly toward him, did he speak.
+
+"You were perfect, without flaw. I can't tell you--" he broke off,
+wordless.
+
+"I'm so glad--glad that you were pleased," she whispered.
+
+They leant side by side over the bulwarks. They were quite alone, and
+the moon was rising. There are always liberating moments at sea when
+the spirit seems to grow--to expand to the limits of sky and water,
+to become one with them. Such a moment was theirs, the perfect hour of
+moonrise on a calm and empty sea. The horizon was undefined. They seemed
+suspended in limitless ether, which the riding moon pierced with a swale
+of living brightness, like quicksilver. They heard nothing save the
+hidden throb and creak of the ship, mysterious yet familiar, as the
+night itself. It was the perfect time. Stefan turned to her. Her face
+and hair shone silver, glorified. They looked at each other, their eyes
+strange in the moonlight. They seemed to melt together. His arms were
+round her, and they kissed.
+
+A little later he began to talk, and it was of his young mother, dead
+years ago in Michigan, that he spoke. "You are the only woman who has
+ever reminded me of her, Mary. The only one whose beauty has been
+so divinely kind. All my life has been lonely between losing her and
+finding you."
+
+This thrilled her with an ache of mother-pity. She saw him
+misunderstood, unhappy, and instantly her heart wrapped him about with
+protection. In that moment his faults were all condoned--she saw them
+only as the fruits of his loneliness.
+
+Later, "Mary," he said, "yours is the most beautiful of all names. Poets
+and painters have glorified it in every age, but none as I shall do";
+and he kissed her adoringly.
+
+Again, he held his cheek to hers. "Beloved," he whispered, "when we are
+married" (even as he spoke he marveled at himself that the word should
+come so naturally) "I want to paint you as you really are--a goddess of
+beauty and love."
+
+She thrilled in response to him, half fearful, yet exalted. She was his,
+utterly.
+
+As they clung together he saw her winged, a white flame of love,
+a goddess elusive even in yielding. He aspired, and saw her,
+Cytheria-like, shining above yet toward him. But her vision, leaning on
+his heart, was of those two still and close together, nestling beneath
+Love's protecting wings, while between their hands she felt the fingers
+of a little child.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+That night Mary and Stefan spoke only of love, but the morning brought
+plans. Before breakfast they were together, pacing the sun-swept deck.
+
+Mary took it for granted that their engagement would continue till
+Stefan's pictures were sold, till they had found work, till their
+future was in some way arranged. Stefan, who was enormously under her
+influence, and a trifle, in spite of his rapture, in awe of her sweet
+reasonableness, listened at first without demur. After breakfast,
+however, which they ate together, he occupying the place of a late
+comer at her table after negotiation with the steward, his impatient
+temperament asserted itself in a burst.
+
+"Dearest one," he cried, when they were comfortably settled in their
+favorite corner of the boat deck, "listen! I'm sure we're all wrong.
+I know we are. Why should you and I--" and he took her hand--"wait and
+plan and sour ourselves as little people do? We've both got to live,
+haven't we? And we are going to live; you don't expect we shall starve,
+do you?"
+
+She shook her head, smiling.
+
+"Well, then," triumphantly, "why shouldn't we live together? Why, it
+would be absurd not to, even from the base and practical point of view.
+Think of the saving! One rent instead of two--one everything instead of
+two!" His arm gave her a quick pressure.
+
+"Yes, but--" she demurred.
+
+He turned on her suddenly. "You don't want to wait for
+trimmings--clothes, orange blossoms, all that stuff--do you?" he
+expostulated.
+
+"No, of course not, foolish one," she laughed.
+
+"Well, then, where's the difficulty?" exultingly.
+
+She could not answer--could hardly formulate the answer to herself.
+Deep in her being she seemed to feel an urge toward waiting, toward
+preparation, toward the collection of she knew not what small household
+gods. It was as if she wished to make fair a place to receive her
+sacrament of love. But this she could not express, could not speak to
+him of the vision of the tiny hand.
+
+"You're brave, Mary. Your courage was one of the things I most loved in
+you. Let's be brave together!" His smile was irresistibly happy.
+
+She could not bear that he should doubt her courage, and she wanted
+passionately not to take that smile from his face. She began to weaken.
+
+"Mary," he cried, fired by the instinct to make the courage of their
+mating artistically perfect. "I've told you about my pictures. I know
+they are good--I know I can sell them in New York. But let's not wait
+for that. Let's bind ourselves together before we put our fortunes to
+the touch! Then we shall be one, whatever happens. We shall have that."
+He kissed her, seeing her half won.
+
+"You've got five hundred dollars, I've only got fifty, but the pictures
+are worth thousands," he went on rapidly. "We can have a wonderful week
+in the country somewhere, and have plenty left to live on while I'm
+negotiating the sale. Even at the worst," he exulted, "I'm strong. I can
+work at anything--with you! I don't mind asking you to spend your money,
+sweetheart, because I _know_ my things are worth it five times over."
+
+She was rather breathless by this time. He pressed his advantage,
+holding her close.
+
+"Beloved, I've found you. Suppose I lost you! Suppose, when you were
+somewhere in the city without me, you got run over or something."
+Even as she was, strained to him, she saw the horror that the thought
+conjured in his eyes, and touched his cheek with her hand, protectingly.
+
+"No," he pleaded, "don't let us run any risks with our wonderful
+happiness, don't let us ever leave each other!" He looked imploringly at
+her.
+
+She saw that for Stefan what he urged was right. Her love drew her to
+him, and upon its altar she laid her own retarding instinct in happy
+sacrifice. She drew his head to hers, and holding his face in the cup
+of her hands, kissed him with an almost solemn tenderness. This was her
+surrender. She took upon herself the burden of his happiness, even
+as she yielded to her own. It was a sacrament. He saw it only as a
+response.
+
+Later in the day Stefan sought out the New England spinster, Miss Mason,
+who sat opposite to him at table. He had entirely ignored her hitherto,
+but he remembered hearing her talk familiarly about New York, and his
+male instinct told him that in her he would find a ready confidante.
+Such she proved, and a most flattered and delighted one. Moreover she
+proffered all the information and assistance he desired. She had moved
+from Boston five years ago, she said, and shared a flat with a widowed
+sister uptown. If they docked that night Miss Elliston could spend it
+with them. The best and cheapest places to go to near the city, she
+assured him, were on Long Island. She mentioned one where she had spent
+a month, a tiny village of summer bungalows on the Sound, with one small
+but comfortable inn. Questioned further, she was sure this inn would be
+nearly empty, but not closed, now in mid-September. She was evidently
+practical, and pathetically eager to help.
+
+Unwilling to stay his plans, however, on such a feeble prop, Byrd hunted
+up the minister, whom he took to be a trifle less plebeian than most of
+the men, and obtained from him an endorsement of Miss Mason's views. The
+man of God, though stiff, was too conscientious to be unforgiving, and
+on receiving Stefan's explanation congratulated him sincerely, if with
+restraint. He did not know Shadeham personally, he explained, but he
+knew similar places, and doubted if Byrd could do better.
+
+Mary, all enthusiasm now that her mind was made up, was enchanted at the
+prospect of a tiny seaside village for their honeymoon. In gratitude she
+made herself charming to Miss Mason until Stefan, impatient every moment
+that he was not with her, bore her away.
+
+They docked at eight o'clock that night. Stefan saw Mary and Miss Mason
+to the door of their flat, and would have lingered with them, but they
+were both tired with the long process of customs inspection. Moreover,
+Mary said that she wanted to sleep well so as to look "very nice" for
+him to-morrow.
+
+"Imperturbable divinity!" admired Stefan, in mock amazement. "I shall
+not sleep at all. I am far too happy; but to you, what is a mere
+marriage?"
+
+The jest hurt her a little, and seeing it, he was quick with loverlike
+recompense. They parted on a note of deep tenderness. He lay sleepless,
+as he had prophesied, at the nearest cheap hotel, companioned by visions
+at once eagerly masculine and poetically exalted. Mary slept fitfully,
+but sweetly.
+
+The next morning they were married. Stefan's first idea had been the
+City Hall, as offering the most expeditious method, but Mary had been
+firm for a church. A sight of the municipal authorities from whom they
+obtained their license made of Stefan an enthusiastic convert to her
+view. "All the ugliness and none of the dignity of democracy," he
+snorted as they left the building. They found a not unlovely church,
+half stifled between tall buildings, and were married by a curate whose
+reading of the service was sufficiently reverent. For a wedding ring
+Mary had that of Stefan's mother, drawn from his little finger.
+
+By late afternoon they were in Shadeham, ensconced in a small wooden
+hotel facing a silent beach and low cliffs shaded with scrub-oak.
+The house was clean, and empty of other guests, and they were given a
+pleasant room overlooking the water. From its windows they watched the
+moon rise over the sea as they had watched her two nights before on
+deck. She was the silver witness to their nuptials.
+
+
+
+
+PART II
+
+MATED
+
+I
+
+
+Mary found Stefan an ideal lover. Their marriage, entered into with
+such, headlong adventurousness, seemed to unfold daily into more perfect
+bloom. The difficulties of his temperament, which had been thrown into
+sharp relief by the crowded life of shipboard, smoothed themselves away
+at the touch of happiness and peace. No woman, Mary realized, could wish
+for a fuller cup of joy than Stefan offered her in these first days of
+their mating. She was amazed at herself, at the suddenness with which
+love had transmuted her, at the ease with which she adjusted herself to
+this new world. She found it difficult to remember what kind of life she
+had led before her marriage--hardly could she believe that she had ever
+lived at all.
+
+As for Stefan, he wasted no moments in backward glances. He neither
+remembered the past nor questioned the future, but immersed himself
+utterly in his present joy with an abandonment he had never experienced
+save in painting. Questioned, he would have scoffed at the idea that
+life for him could ever hold more than his work, and Mary.
+
+Thus absorbed, Stefan would have allowed the days to slip into weeks
+uncounted. But on the ninth day Mary, incapable of a wholly carefree
+attitude, reminded him that they had planned only a week of holiday.
+
+"Let's stay a month," he replied promptly.
+
+But Mary had been questioning her landlord about New York.
+
+"It appears," she explained, "that every one moves on the first of
+October, and that if one hasn't found a studio by then, it is almost
+impossible to get one. He says he has heard all the artists live round
+about Washington Square, but that even there rents are fearfully high.
+It's at the foot of Fifth Avenue, he says, which sounds very fashionable
+to me, but he explains it is too far 'down town.'"
+
+"Yes, Fifth Avenue is the great street, I understand," said Stefan, "and
+my dealer's address is on Fourth, so he's in a very good neighborhood.
+I don't know that I should like Washington Square--it sounds so
+patriotic."
+
+"Fanatic!" laughed Mary. "Well, whether we go there or not, it's evident
+we must get back before October the first, and it's now September the
+twenty-fourth."
+
+"Angel, don't let's be mathematical," he replied, pinching the lobe of
+her ear, which he had proclaimed to be entrancingly pretty. "I can't
+add; tell me the day we have to leave, and on that day we will go."
+
+"Three days from now, then," and she sighed.
+
+"Oh, no! Not only three more days of heaven, Mary?"
+
+"It will hurt dreadfully to leave," she agreed, "but," and she nestled
+to him, "it won't be any less heaven there, will it, dearest?"
+
+This spurred him to reassurance. "Of course not," he responded, quickly
+summoning new possibilities of delight. "Imagine it, you haven't even
+seen my pictures yet." They had left them, rolled, at Miss Mason's. "And
+I want to paint you--really paint you--not just silly little sketches
+and heads, but a big thing that I can only do in a studio. Oh, darling,
+think of a studio with you to sit to me! How I shall work!" His
+imagination was fired; instantly he was ready to pack and leave.
+
+But they had their three days more, in the golden light of the Indian
+summer. Three more swims, in which Stefan could barely join for joy of
+watching her long lines cutting the water in her close English bathing
+dress. Three more evening walks along the shimmering sands. Three more
+nights in their moon-haunted room within sound of the slow splash of the
+waves. And, poignant with the sadness of a nearing change, these days
+were to Mary the most exquisite of all.
+
+Their journey to the city, on the little, gritty, perpetually stopping
+train was made jocund by the lively anticipations of Stefan, who was in
+a mood of high confidence.
+
+They had decided from the first to try their fortunes in New York that
+winter; not to return to Paris till they had established a sure market
+for Stefan's work. He had halcyon plans. Masterpieces were to be painted
+under the inspiration of Mary's presence. His success in the Beaux Arts
+would be an Open Sesame to the dealers, and they would at once become
+prosperous,--for he had the exaggerated continental idea of American
+prices. In the spring they would return to Paris, so that Mary should
+see it first at its most beautiful. There they would have a studio,
+making it their center, but they would also travel.
+
+"Spain, Italy, Greece, Mary--we will see all the world's masterpieces
+together," he jubilated. "You shall be my wander-bride." And he sang
+her little snatches of gay song, in French and Italian, thrumming an
+imaginary guitar or making castanets of his fingers.
+
+"I will paint you on the Acropolis, Mary, a new Pallas to guard the
+Parthenon." His imagination leapt from vista to vista of the future,
+each opening to new delights. Mary's followed, lured, dazzled, a little
+hesitant. Her own visions, unformulated though they were, seemed of
+somewhat different stuff, but she saw he could not conceive them other
+than his, and yielded her doubts happily.
+
+At the Pennsylvania Station they took a taxicab, telling the driver
+they wanted a hotel near Washington Square. The amount registered on the
+meter gave Mary an apprehensive chill, but Stefan paid it carelessly.
+A moment later he was in raptures, for, quite unexpectedly, they found
+themselves in a French hotel.
+
+"What wonderful luck--what a good omen!" he cried. "Mary, it's almost
+like Paris!" and he broke into rapid gesticulating talk with the desk
+clerk. Soon they were installed in a bright little room with French
+prints on the walls, a gay old-fashioned wall paper and patterned
+curtains. Stefan assured her it was extraordinarily cheap for New York.
+While she freshened her face and hair he dashed downstairs, ignoring
+the elevator--which seemed to exist there only as an American
+afterthought--in search of a packet of French cigarettes. Finding
+them, he was completely in his element, and leant over the desk puffing
+luxuriously, to engage the clerk in further talk. From him he obtained
+advice as to the possibilities of the neighborhood in respect of
+studios, and armed with this, bounded up the stairs again to Mary.
+Presently, fortified by a pot of tea and delicious French rolls, they
+sallied out on their quest.
+
+That afternoon they discovered two vacant studios. One was on a
+top floor on Washington Square South, a big room with bathroom and
+kitchenette attached and a small bedroom opening into it. The other was
+an attic just off the Square. It had water, but no bathroom, was heated
+only by an open fire, and consisted of one large room with sufficient
+light, and a large closet in which was a single pane of glass high up.
+The studio contained an abandoned model throne, the closet a gas ring
+and a sink. The rent of the first apartment was sixty dollars a month;
+of the second, twenty-five. Both were approached by a dark staircase,
+but in one case there was a carpet, in the other the stairs were bare,
+dirty, and creaking, while from depths below was wafted an unmistakable
+odor of onions and cats.
+
+Mary, whose father's rambling sunny house in Lindum with its Elizabethan
+paneling and carvings had been considered dear at ninety pounds a year,
+was staggered at the price of these mean garrets, the better of which
+she felt to be quite beyond their reach. Even Stefan was a little
+dashed, but was confident that after his interview with Adolph's brother
+sixty dollars would appear less formidable.
+
+"You should have seen my attic in Paris, Mary--absolutely falling to
+pieces--but then I didn't mind, not having a goddess to house," and he
+pressed her arm. "For you there should be something spacious and bright
+enough to be a fitting background." He glanced up a little ruefully at
+the squalid house they had just left.
+
+But she was quick to reassure him, her courage mounting to sustain
+his. "We could manage perfectly well in the smaller place for a time,
+dearest, and how lucky we don't have to take a lease, as we should in
+England." Her mind jumped to perceive any practical advantage. Already,
+mentally, she was arranging furniture in the cheaper place, planning
+for a screen, a tin tub, painting the dingy woodwork. They asked for
+the refusal of both studios till the next day, and for that evening left
+matters suspended.
+
+In the morning, Stefan, retrieving his canvases from Miss Mason's
+flat, sought out the dealer, Jensen. Walking from Fifth Avenue, he was
+surprised at the cheap appearance of the houses on Fourth, only one
+block away. He had expected to find Adolph's brother in such a great
+stone building as those he had just passed, with their show windows
+empty save for one piece of tapestry or sculpture, or a fine painting
+brilliant against its background of dull velvet. Instead, the number on
+Fourth Avenue proved a tumbledown house of two stories, with tattered
+awnings flapping above its shop-window, which was almost too grimy
+to disclose the wares within. These were a jumble of bric-a-brac, old
+furniture of doubtful value, stained prints, and one or two blackened
+oil paintings in tarnished frames. With ominous misgivings, Stefan
+entered the half-opened door. The place was a confused medley of the
+flotsam and jetsam of dwelling houses, and appeared to him much more
+like a pawnbroker's than the business place of an art dealer. From its
+dusty shadows a stooped figure emerged, gray-haired and spectacled,
+which waited for Stefan to speak with an air of patient humbleness.
+
+"This isn't Mr. Jensen's, is it?" Stefan asked, feeling he had mistaken
+the number.
+
+"My name is Jensen. What can I do for you?" replied the man in a
+toneless voice.
+
+"You are Adolph's brother?" incredulously.
+
+At the name the gray face flushed pathetically. Jensen came forward,
+pressing his hands together, and peered into Stefan's face.
+
+"Yes, I am," he answered, "and you are Mr. Byrd that he wrote to me
+about. I'd hoped you weren't coming, after all. Well," and he waved his
+hand, "you see how it is."
+
+Stefan was completely dismayed. "Why," he stammered, "I thought you were
+so successful--"
+
+"I'm sorry." Jensen dropped his eyes, picking nervously at his coat.
+"You see, I am the eldest brother; a man does not like to admit
+failure. I may be sold up any time now. I wanted Adolph not to guess,
+so I--wrote--him--differently." He flushed painfully again. Stefan was
+silent, too taken aback for speech.
+
+"I tell you, Mr. Byrd," Jensen stammered on, striking his hands together
+impotently, "for all its wealth, this is a city of dead hopes. It's been
+a long fight, but it's over now.... Yes, you are Adolph's friend, and
+I can't so much as buy a sketch from you. It's quite, quite over." And
+suddenly he sank his head in his hands, while Stefan stood, infinitely
+embarrassed, clutching his roll of canvases. After a moment Jensen,
+mastering himself, lifted his head. His lined, prematurely old face
+showed an expression at once pleading and dignified.
+
+"I didn't dream what I wrote would do any harm, Mr. Byrd, but now of
+course you will have to explain to Adolph--?"
+
+Stefan, moved to sympathy, held out his hand.
+
+"Look here, Jensen, you've put me in an awful hole, worse than you
+know. But why should I say anything? Let Adolph think we're both
+millionaires," and he grinned ruefully.
+
+Jensen straightened and took the proffered hand in one that trembled.
+"Thank you," he said, and his eyes glistened. "I'm grateful. If there
+were only something I could do--"
+
+"Well, give me the names of some dealers," said Stefan, to whom scenes
+were exquisitely embarrassing, anxious to be gone.
+
+Jensen wrote several names on a smudged half sheet of paper. "These
+are the best. Try them. My introduction wouldn't help, I'm afraid,"
+bitterly.
+
+On that Stefan left him, hurrying with relief from the musty atmosphere
+of failure into the busy street. Though half dazed by the sudden
+subsidence of his plans, unable to face as yet the possible
+consequences, he had his pictures, and the names of the real dealers;
+confidence still buoyed him.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+Three hours later Mary, anxiously waiting, heard Stefan's step approach
+their bedroom door. Instantly her heart dropped like lead. She did
+not need his voice to tell her what those dragging feet announced.
+She sprang to the door and had her arms round his neck before he could
+speak. She took the heavy roll of canvases from him and half pushed
+him into the room's one comfortable arm-chair. Kneeling beside him, she
+pressed her cheek to his, stroking back his heat-damped hair. "Darling,"
+she said, "you are tired to death. Don't tell me about your day till
+you've rested a little."
+
+He closed his eyes, leaning back. He looked exhausted; every line of his
+face drooped. In spite of his tan, it was pale, with hollows under the
+eyes. It was extraordinary that a few hours should make such a change,
+she thought, and held him close, comfortingly.
+
+He did not speak for a long time, but at last, "Mary," he said, in a
+flat voice, "I've had a complete failure. Nobody wants my things. This
+is what I've let you in for." His tone had the indifferent quality of
+extreme fatigue, but Mary was not deceived. She knew that his whole
+being craved reassurance, rehabilitation in its own eyes.
+
+"Why, you old foolish darling, you're too tired to know what you're
+talking about," she cried, kissing him. "Wait till you've had something
+to eat." She rang the bell--four times for the waiter, as the card
+over it instructed her. "Failure indeed!" she went on, clearing a small
+table, "there's no such word! One doesn't grow rich in a day, you
+know." She moved silently and quickly about, hung up his hat, stood
+the canvases in a corner, ordered coffee, rolls and eggs, and finally
+unlaced Stefan's shoes in spite of his rather horrified if feeble
+protest.
+
+Not until she had watched him drink two cups of coffee and devour the
+food--she guessed he had had no lunch--did she allow him to talk, first
+lighting his cigarette and finding a place for herself on the arm of his
+chair. By this time Stefan's extreme lassitude, and with it his despair,
+had vanished. He brightened perceptibly. "You wonder," he exclaimed,
+catching her hand and kissing it, "now I can tell you about it." With
+his arm about her he described all his experiences, the fiasco of the
+Jensen affair and his subsequent interviews with Fifth Avenue dealers.
+"They are all Jews, Mary. Some are decent enough fellows, I suppose,
+though I hate the Israelites!" ("Silly boy!" she interposed.) "Others
+are horrors. None of them want the work of an American. Old masters,
+or well known foreigners, they say. I explained my success at the Beaux
+Arts. Two of them had seen my name in the Paris papers, but said it
+would mean nothing to their clients. Hopeless Philistines, all of them!
+I do believe I should have had a better chance if I'd called myself
+Austrian, instead of American, and I only revived my American
+citizenship because I thought it would be an asset!" He laughed,
+ironically. "They advised me to have a one-man show, late in the winter,
+so as to get publicity."
+
+"So we will then," interposed Mary confidently.
+
+"Good Lord, child," he exclaimed, half irritably, "you don't suppose I
+could have a gallery for nothing, do you? God knows what it would cost.
+Besides, I haven't enough pictures--and think of the frames!" He sat up,
+fretfully.
+
+She saw his nerves were on edge, and quickly offered a diversion.
+"Stefan," she cried, jumping to her feet and throwing her arms back with
+a gesture the grace of which did not escape him even in his impatient
+mood, "I haven't even seen the pictures yet, you know, and can't wait
+any longer. Let me look at them now, and then I'll tell you just how
+idiotic those dealers were!" and she gave her bell-like laugh. "I'll
+undo them." Her fingers were busy at the knots.
+
+"I hate the sight of that roll," said Stefan, frowning. "Still--" and
+he jumped up, "I do immensely want you to see them. I know _you'll_
+understand them." Suddenly he was all eagerness again. He took the
+canvases from her, undid them and, casting aside the smaller ones,
+spread the two largest against the wall, propping their corners adroitly
+with chairs, an umbrella, and a walking stick. "Don't look yet,"
+he called meanwhile. "Close your eyes." He moved with agile speed,
+instinctively finding the best light and thrusting back the furniture
+to secure a clearer view. "There!" he cried. "Wait a minute--stand here.
+_Now_ look!" triumphantly.
+
+Mary opened her eyes. "Why, Stefan, they're wonderful!" she exclaimed.
+But even as she spoke, and amidst her sincere admiration, her heart,
+very slightly, sank. She knew enough of painting to see that here was
+genius. The two fantasies, one representing the spirits of a wind-storm,
+the other a mermaid fleeing a merman's grasp, were brilliant in color,
+line and conception. They were things of beauty, but it was a beauty
+strange, menacing, subhuman. The figures that tore through the clouds
+urged on the storm with a wicked and abandoned glee. The face of the
+merman almost frightened her; it was repellent in its likeness at once
+to a fish and a man. The mermaid's face was less inhuman, but it was
+stricken with a horrid terror. She was swimming straight out of the
+picture as if to fling herself, shrieking, into the safety of the
+spectator's arms. The pictures were imaginative, powerful, arresting,
+but they were not pleasing. Few people, she felt, would care to live
+with them. After a long scrutiny she turned to her husband, at once
+glorying in the strength of his talent and troubled by its quality.
+
+"You are a genius, Stefan," she said.
+
+"You really like them?" he asked eagerly.
+
+"I think they are wonderful!" He was satisfied, for it was her heart,
+not her voice, that held a reservation.
+
+Stefan showed her the smaller canvases, some unfinished. Most were of
+nymphs and winged elves, but there were three landscapes. One of these,
+a stream reflecting a high spring sky between banks of young meadow
+grass, showed a little faun skipping merrily in the distance. The
+atmosphere was indescribably light-hearted. Mary smiled as she looked at
+it. The other two were empty of figures; they were delicately graceful
+and alluring, but there was something lacking in them---what, she could
+not tell. She liked best a sketch of a baby boy, lost amid trees, behind
+which wood-nymphs and fauns peeped at him, roguish and inquisitive. The
+boy was seated on the ground, fat and solemn, with round, tear-wet
+eyes. He was so lonely that Mary wanted to hug him; instead, she kissed
+Stefan.
+
+"What a duck of a baby, dearest!" she exclaimed.
+
+"Yes, he was a nice kid--belonged to my concierge," he answered
+carelessly. "The picture is sentimental, though. This is better," and he
+pointed to another mermaid study.
+
+"Yes, it's splendid," she answered, instinctively suppressing a sigh.
+She began to realize a little what a strange being she had married. With
+an impulsive need of protection she held him close, hiding her face in
+his neck. The reality of his arms reassured her.
+
+That day they decided, at Mary's urging, to take the smaller studio at
+once, abandoning the extravagance of hotel life. In practical manners
+she was already assuming a leadership which he was glad to follow. She
+suggested that in the morning he should take his smaller canvases, and
+try some of the less important dealers, while she made an expedition in
+search of necessary furniture. To this he eagerly agreed.
+
+"It seems horrible to let you do it alone, but it would be sacrilegious
+to discuss the price of saucepans with a goddess," he explained. "Are
+you sure you can face the tedium?"
+
+"Why, I shall love it!" she cried, astonished at such an expression.
+
+He regarded her whimsically. "Genius of efficiency, then I shall leave
+it to you. Such things appal me. In Paris, my garret was furnished only
+with pictures. I inherited the bed from the last occupant, and I think
+Adolph insisted on finding a pillow and a frying-pan. He used to come
+up and cook for us both sometimes, when he thought I had been eating too
+often at restaurants. He approved of economy, did Adolph." Stefan was
+lounging on the bed, with his perpetual cigarette.
+
+"He must be a dear," said Mary. She had begun to make a shopping list.
+"Tell me, absurd creature, what you really need in the studio. There is
+a model throne, you will remember."
+
+"Oh, I'll get my own easel and stool," he replied quickly. "There's
+nothing else, except of course a table for my paints. A good solid one,"
+he added with emphasis. "I'll tell you what," and he sat up. "I go out
+early to-morrow on my dealer hunt. I force myself to stay out until late
+afternoon. When I return, behold! The goddess has waved her hand,
+and invisible minions--" he circled the air with his cigarette--"have
+transported her temple across the square. There she sits enthroned,
+waiting for her acolyte. How will that do?" He turned his radiant smile
+on her.
+
+"Splendid," she answered, amused. "I only hope the goddess won't get
+chipped in the passage."
+
+She thought of the dusty studio, of brooms and scrubbing brushes, but
+she was already wise enough in wife-lore not to mention them. Mary
+came of a race whose women had always served their men. It did not seem
+strange to her, as it might have to an American, that the whole labor of
+their installation should devolve on her.
+
+With her back turned to him, she counted over their resources,
+calculating what would be available when their hotel bill was paid.
+Except for a dollar or two, Stefan had turned his small hoard over to
+her. "It's all yours anyway, dearest," he had said, "and I don't want to
+spend a cent till I have made something." They had spent very little so
+far; she was relieved to realize that the five hundred dollars remained
+almost intact. While Stefan continued to smoke luxuriously on the bed,
+she jotted down figures, apportioning one hundred and fifty dollars
+for six months' rent, and trying to calculate a weekly basis for their
+living expenses. She knew that they were both equally ignorant of prices
+in New York, and determined to call in the assistance of Miss Mason.
+
+"Stefan," she said, taking up the telephone, "I'm going to summon a
+minion." She explained to Miss Mason over the wire. "We are starting
+housekeeping to-morrow, and I know absolutely nothing about where to
+shop, or what things ought to cost. Would it be making too great demands
+on your kindness if I asked you to meet me here to-morrow morning and
+join me in a shopping expedition?"
+
+The request, delivered in her civil English voice, enchanted Miss Mason,
+who had to obtain all her romance vicariously. "I should just love to!"
+she exclaimed, and it was arranged.
+
+Mary then telephoned that they would take the studio--a technicality
+which she knew Stefan had entirely forgotten--and notified the hotel
+office that their room would be given up next morning.
+
+"O thou above rubies and precious pearls!" chanted Stefan from the bed.
+
+After dinner they sat in Washington Square. Their marriage moon was
+waning, but still shone high and bright. Under her the trees appeared
+etherealized, and her light mingled in magic contest with the white
+beams of the arc lamps near the arch. Above each of these, a myriad tiny
+moths fluttered their desirous wings. Under the trees Italian couples
+wandered, the men with dark amorous glances, the girls laughing, their
+necks gay with colored shawls. Brightly ribboned children, black-haired,
+played about the benches where their mothers gossiped. There was
+enchantment in the tired but cooling air.
+
+Stefan was enthusiastic. "Look at the types, Mary! The whole place is
+utterly foreign, full of ardor and color. I have cursed America without
+cause--here I can feel at home." To her it was all alien, but her heart
+responded to his happiness.
+
+On the bench next them sat a group of Italian women. From this a tiny
+boy detached himself, plump and serious, and, urged by curiosity,
+gradually approached Mary, his velvet eyes fixed on her face. She lifted
+him, resistless, to her knee, and he sat there contentedly, sucking a
+colored stick of candy.
+
+"Look, Stefan!" she cried; "isn't he a lamb?"
+
+Stefan cast a critical glance at the baby. "He's paintable, but horribly
+sticky," he said. "Let's move on before he begins to yell. I want to see
+the effect from the roadway of these shifting groups under the trees. It
+might be worth doing, don't you think?" and he stood up.
+
+His manner slightly rebuffed Mary, who would gladly have nursed the
+little boy longer. However, she gently lowered him and, rising, moved
+off in silence with Stefan, who was ignorant of any offense. The rest of
+their outing passed sweetly enough, as they wandered, arm in arm, about
+the square.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+The next morning Stefan started immediately after his premier dejeuner
+of rolls and coffee in quest of the less important dealers, taking with
+him only his smaller canvases. "I'll stay away till five o'clock, not
+a minute longer," he admonished. Mary, still seated in the dining-room
+over her English bacon and eggs--she had smilingly declined to adopt his
+French method of breakfasting--glowed acquiescence, and offered him a
+parting suggestion.
+
+"Be sure to show them the baby in the wood."
+
+"Why that one?" he questioned. "You admit it isn't the best."
+
+"Perhaps, but neither are they the best connoisseurs. You'll see." She
+nodded wisely at him.
+
+"The oracle has spoken--I will obey," he called from the door, kissing
+his fingers to her. She ventured an answering gesture, knowing the room
+empty save for waiters. She was almost as unselfconscious as he, but had
+her nation's shrinking from any public expression of emotion.
+
+Hardly had he gone when the faithful Miss Mason arrived, her mild
+eyes almost youthful with enthusiasm. Prom a black satin reticule of
+dimensions beyond all proportion to her meager self she drew a list of
+names on which she discoursed volubly while Mary finished her breakfast.
+
+"You'll get most everything at this first place," she said. "It's pretty
+near the biggest department store in the city, and only two blocks
+from here--ain't that convenient? You can deal there right along for
+everything in the way of dry goods."
+
+Mary had no conception of what either a department store or dry goods
+might be, but determined not to confound her mentor by a display of such
+ignorance.
+
+"Seemed to me, though, you might get some things second hand, so I got a
+list of likely places from my sister, who's lived in New York longer'n I
+have. I thought mebbe--" her tone was tactful--"you didn't want to waste
+your money any?"
+
+Mary was impressed again, as she had been before her wedding, by the
+natural good manners of this simple and half educated woman. "Why is
+it," she wondered to herself, "that one would not dream of knowing
+people of her class at home, but rather likes them here?" She did
+not realize as yet that for Miss Mason no classes existed, and that
+consequently she was as much at ease with Mary, whose mother had been
+"county," as she would be with her own colored "help."
+
+"You guessed quite rightly, Miss Mason," Mary smiled. "I want to spend
+as little as possible, and shall depend on you to prevent my making
+mistakes."
+
+"I reckon I know all there is t' know 'bout economy," nodded Miss Mason,
+and, as if by way of illustration, drew from her bag a pair of cotton
+gloves, for which she exchanged her kid ones, rolling these carefully
+away. "They get real mussed shopping," she explained.
+
+Within half an hour, Mary realized that she would have been lost indeed
+without her guide. First they inspected the studio. Mary had had a
+vague idea of cleaning it herself, but Miss Mason demanded to see the
+janitress, and ascended, after a ten minutes' emersion in the noisome
+gloom of the basement, in high satisfaction. "She's a dago," she
+reported, "but not so dirty as some, and looks a husky worker. It's her
+business to clean the flats for new tenants, but I promised her fifty
+cents to get the place done by noon, windows and all. She seemed real
+pleased. She says her husband will carry your coal up from the cellar
+for a quarter a week; I guess it will be worth it to you. You don't
+want to give the money to him though," she admonished, "the woman runs
+everything. I shouldn't calc'late," she sniffed, "he does more'n a
+couple of real days' work a month. They mostly don't."
+
+So the first problem was solved, and it was the same with all the rest.
+Many dollars did Miss Mason save the Byrds that day. Mary would have
+bought a bedstead and screened it, but her companion pointed out the
+extravagance and inconvenience of such a course, and initiated her
+forthwith into the main secret of New York's apartment life.
+
+"You'll want your divan new," she said, and led her in the great
+department store to a hideous object of gilded iron which opened into
+a double bed, and closed into a divan. At first Mary rejected this
+Janus-faced machine unequivocally, but became a convert when Miss Mason
+showed her how cretonne (she pronounced it "_cree_ton") or rugs would
+soften its nakedness to dignity, and how bed-clothes and pillows were
+swallowed in its maw by day to be released when the studio became a
+sleeping room at night.
+
+These trappings they purchased at first hand, and obliging salesmen
+promised Miss Mason with their lips, but Mary with their eyes, that they
+should go out on the noon delivery. For other things, however, the two
+searched the second-hand stores which stand in that district like logs
+in a stream, staying abandoned particles of the city's ever moving
+current. Here they bought a high, roomy chest of drawers of painted
+pine, a Morris chair, three single chairs, and a sturdy folding table
+in cherry, quite old, which Mary felt to be a "find," and which she
+destined for Stefan's paints. Miss Mason recommended a "rocker," and
+Mary, who had had visions of stuffed English easy chairs, acquiesced on
+finding in the rocker and Morris types the only available combinations
+of cheapness and comfort. A second smaller table of good design, two
+brass candlesticks, and a little looking-glass in faded greenish gilt,
+rejoiced Mary's heart, without unreasonably lightening her pocket.
+During these purchases Miss Mason's authority paled, but she reasserted
+herself on the question of iceboxes. One dealer's showroom was half full
+of them, and Miss Mason pounced on a small one, little used, marked six
+dollars. "That's real cheap--you couldn't do better--it's a good make,
+too." Mary had never seen an ice-box in her life, and said so, striking
+Miss Mason almost dumb.
+
+"I'm sure we shouldn't need such a thing," she demurred.
+
+Recovering speech, Miss Mason launched into the creed of the
+ice-box--its ubiquity, values and economies. Mary understood she was
+receiving her second initiation into flat life, and mentally bracketed
+this new cult with that of the divan.
+
+"All right, Miss Mason. In Rome, et cetera," she capitulated, and paid
+for the ice-box.
+
+Thanks to her friend, their shopping had been so expeditious that the
+day was still young. Mary was fired by the determination to have some
+sort of nest for her tired and probably disheartened husband to return
+to that evening, and Miss Mason entered whole-heartedly into the scheme.
+The transportation of their scattered purchases was the main difficulty,
+but it yielded to the little spinster's inspiration. A list of
+their performances between noon and five o'clock would read like the
+description of a Presidential candidate's day. They dashed back to the
+studio and reassured themselves as to the labors of the janitress. Miss
+Mason unearthed the lurking husband, and demanded of him a friend and a
+hand-cart. These she galvanized him into producing on the spot, and sent
+the pair off armed with a list of goods to be retrieved. In the midst
+of this maneuver the department store's great van faithfully disgorged
+their bed and bedding. Hardly waiting to see these deposited, the two
+hurried out in quest of sandwiches and milk.
+
+"I guess we're the lightning home-makers, all right," was Miss Mason's
+comment as they lunched.
+
+Returning to the department store they bought and brought away with them
+a kettle, a china teapot ("Fifteen cents in the basement," Miss Mason
+instructed), three cups and saucers, six plates, a tin of floor-polish
+and a few knives, forks, and spoons. Meanwhile they had telephoned the
+hotel to send over the baggage. When the street car dropped them
+near the studio they found the two Italians seated on the steps, the
+furniture and baggage in the room, and Mrs. Corriani wiping her last
+window pane. "I shall want your husband again for this floor," commanded
+the indefatigable Miss Mason, opening her tin of polish, "and his friend
+for errands." They fell upon their task.
+
+An hour later the spinster dropped into the rocking chair. "Well, we've
+done it," she said, "and I don't mind telling you I'm tuckered out."
+
+Mary's voice answered from the sink, where she was sluicing her face and
+arms.
+
+"You've been a marvel--the whole thing has been Napoleonic--and I simply
+don't know how to thank you." She appeared at the door of the closet,
+which was to serve as kitchenette and bathroom, drying her hands.
+
+"My, your face is like a rose! _You_ don't look tired any!" exclaimed
+the spinster. "As for thanks, why, it's been a treat to me. I've felt
+like I was a girl again. But we're through now, and I've got to go." She
+rose. "I guess I'll enjoy my sleep to-night."
+
+"Oh, don't go, Miss Mason, stay for tea and let my husband thank you
+too."
+
+But the little New Englander again showed her simple tact. "No, no,
+my dear, it's time I went, and you and Mr. Byrd will want to be alone
+together your first evening," and she pulled on her cotton gloves.
+
+At the door Mary impulsively put her arms round Miss Mason and kissed
+her.
+
+"You have been good to me--I shall never forget it," she whispered,
+almost loath to let this first woman friend of her new life go.
+
+Alone, Mary turned to survey the room.
+
+The floor, of wide uneven planks, was bare, but it carried a dark stain,
+and this had been waxed until it shone. The walls, painted gray, had
+yielded a clean surface to the mop. The grate was blackened. On either
+side of it stood the two large chairs, and Mary had thrown a strip of
+bright stuff over the cushions of the Morris. Beside this chair stood
+the smaller table, polished, and upon it blue and white tea things. Near
+the large window stood the other table, with Stefan's palette, paint
+tubes, and brushes in orderly array, and a plain chair beside it, while
+centered at that end was the model-throne. Opposite the fireplace the
+divan fronted the wall, obscured by Mary's steamer rug and green deck
+cushion. At the end of the room the heavy chest of drawers, with its
+dark walnut paint, faced the window, bearing the gilded mirror and a
+strip of embroidery. On the mantlepiece stood Mary's traveling clock and
+the two brass candlesticks, and above it Stefan's pastoral of the stream
+and the dancing faun was tacked upon the wall. She could hear the kettle
+singing from the closet, through the open door of which a shaft of
+sunlight fell from the tiny window to the floor.
+
+Suddenly Mary opened her arms. "Home," she whispered, "home." Tears
+started to her eyes. With a caressing movement she leant her face
+against the wall, as to the cheek of her lover.
+
+But emotion lay deep in Mary--she was ashamed that it should rise to
+facile tears. "Silly girl," she thought, and drying her eyes proceeded
+more calmly to her final task, which was to change her dress for one
+fitted to honor Stefan's homecoming.
+
+Hardly was she ready when she heard his feet upon the stair. Her heart
+leapt with a double joy, for he was springing up two steps at a time,
+triumph in every bound. The door burst open; she was enveloped in a
+whirlwind embrace. "Mary," he gasped between kisses, "I've sold the
+boy--sold him for a hundred! At the very last place--just as I'd given
+up. You beloved oracle!"
+
+Then he held her away from him, devouring with his eyes her glowing
+face, her hair, and her soft blue dress. "Oh, you beauty! The day has
+been a thousand years long without you!" He caught her to him again.
+
+Mary's heart was almost bursting with happiness as she clung to him.
+Here, in the home she had prepared, he had brought her his success,
+and their love glorified both. Her emotion left her wordless. Another
+moment, and his eyes swept the room.
+
+"Why, Mary!" It was a shout of joy. "You magician, you miracle-worker!
+It's beautiful! Don't tell me how you did it--" hastily--"I couldn't
+understand. It's enough that you waved your hand and beauty sprang up!
+Look at my little faun dancing--we must dance too!" He lilted a swaying
+air, and whirled her round the room with gipsy glee. His face looked
+like the faun's, elfin, mischievous, happy as the springtime.
+
+At last he dropped into a chair. Then Mary fetched her teakettle. They
+quenched their thirst, she shared his cigarette, they prattled like
+children. It was late before they remembered to go out in search
+of dinner, hours later before they dropped asleep upon the gilded
+Janus-faced couch that had become for Mary the altar of a sacrament.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+Mary's original furnishings had cost her less than a hundred dollars.
+In the first days of their housekeeping she made several additions, and
+Stefan contributed a large second-hand easel, a stool, and a piece of
+strangely colored drapery for the divan. This he discovered during a
+walk with Mary, in the window of an old furniture dealer, and instantly
+fell a victim to. He was so delighted with it that Mary had not the
+heart to veto its purchase, though it was a sad extravagance, costing
+them more than a week's living expenses. The stuff was of oriental silk,
+shot with a changing sheen, of colors like a fire burning over water,
+which made it seem a living thing in their hands. The night they took it
+home Stefan lit six candles in its honor.
+
+In spite of these expenses Mary banked four hundred dollars, leaving
+herself enough in hand for a fortnight to come, for she found that they
+could live on twenty-five dollars a week. She calculated that they must
+make, as an absolute minimum, to be safe, one hundred dollars a month,
+for she was determined, if possible, not to draw further upon their
+hoard. This was destined for a future use, the hope of which trembled
+constantly in her heart. All her plans centered about this hope, but
+she still forebore to speak of it to Stefan, even as she had done before
+their marriage. Perhaps she instinctively feared a possible lack of
+response in him. Meanwhile, she must safeguard her nest.
+
+In spite of Stefan's initial success, Mary wondered if his art would at
+first yield the necessary monthly income, and cast about for some means
+by which she could increase his earnings. She had come to America
+to attain independence, and there was nothing in her code to make
+dependence a necessary element of marriage.
+
+"Stefan," she said one morning, as she sat covering a cushion, while
+he worked at one of the unfinished pastorals, "you know I sold several
+short stories for children when I was in London. I think I ought to try
+my luck here, don't you?"
+
+"You don't need to, sweetheart," he replied. "Wait till I've finished
+this little thing. You see if the man I sold the boy to won't jump at it
+for another hundred." And he whistled cheerily.
+
+"I'm sure he will," she smiled. "Still, I should like to help."
+
+"Do it if you want to, Beautiful, only I can't associate you with pens
+and typewriters. I'm sure if you were just to open your mouth, and sing,
+out there in the square--" he waved a brush--"people would come running
+from all over the city and throw yellow and green bills at you like
+leaves, till you had to be dug out with long shovels by those funny
+street-cleaners who go about looking dirty in white clothes. You would
+be a nymph in a shower of gold--only the gold would be paper! How like
+America!" He whistled again absently, touching the canvas with delicate
+strokes.
+
+"You are quite the most ridiculous person in the world," she laughed at
+him. "You know perfectly well that my voice is much too small to be of
+practical value."
+
+"But I'm not being practical, and you mustn't be literal,
+darling--goddesses never should."
+
+"Be practical just for a moment then," she urged, "and think about my
+chances of selling stories."
+
+"I couldn't," he said absently, holding his brush suspended. "Wait a
+minute, I've got an idea! That about the shower of gold--I know--Danae!"
+he shouted suddenly, throwing down his palette. "That's how I'll paint
+you. I've been puzzling over it for days. Darling, it will be my chef
+d'oeuvre!" He seized her hands. "Think of it! You standing under a great
+shaft of sun, nude, exalted, your hands and eyes lifted. About you
+gold, pouring down in cataracts, indistinguishable from the sunlight--a
+background of prismatic fire--and your hair lifting into it like wings!"
+He was irradiated.
+
+She had blushed to the eyes. "You want me to sit to you--like that!" Her
+voice trembled.
+
+He gazed at her in frank amazement. "Should you mind?" he asked, amazed.
+"Why, you rose, you're blushing. I believe you're shy!" He put his arms
+around her, smiling into her face. "You wouldn't mind, darling, for me!"
+he urged, his cheek to hers. "You are so glorious. I've always wanted to
+paint your glory since the first day I saw you. You _can't_ mind!"
+
+He saw she still hesitated, and his tone became not only surprised but
+hurt. He could not conceive of shame in connection with beauty. Seeing
+this she mastered her shrinking. He was right, she felt--she had given
+him her beauty, and a denial of it in the service of his art would
+rebuff the God in him--the creator. She yielded, but she could not
+express the deeper reason for her emotion. As he was so oblivious, she
+could not bring herself to tell him why in particular she shrank from
+sitting as Danae. He had not thought of the meaning of the myth in
+connection with her all-absorbing hope.
+
+"Promise me one thing," she pleaded. "Don't make the face too like
+me--just a little different, dearest, please!"
+
+This a trifle fretted him.
+
+"I don't really see why; your face is just the right type," he puzzled.
+"I shan't sell the picture, you know. It will be for us--our marriage
+present to each other."
+
+"Nevertheless, I ask it, dearest." With that he had to be content.
+
+Stefan obtained that afternoon a full-length canvas, and the sittings
+began next morning. He was at his most inspiring, laughed away Mary's
+stage fright, posed her with a delight which, inspired her, too, so
+that she stood readily as he suggested, and made half a dozen
+lightning sketches to determine the most perfect position, exclaiming
+enthusiastically meanwhile.
+
+When absorbed, Stefan was a sure and rapid worker. Mary posed for him
+every morning, and at the end of a week the picture had advanced to a
+thing of wonderful promise and beauty. Mary would stand before it almost
+awed. Was this she, she pondered, this aspiring woman of flame?
+It troubled her a little that his ideal of her should rise to such
+splendor; this apotheosis left no place for the pitying tenderness of
+love, only for its glory. The color of this picture was like the sound
+of silver trumpets; the heart-throb of the strings was missing. Mary was
+neither morbid nor introspective, but at this time her whole being was
+keyed to more than normal comprehension. Watching the picture, seeing
+that it was a portrayal not of her but of his love for her, she wondered
+if any woman could long endure the arduousness of such deification, or
+if a man who had visioned a goddess could long content himself with a
+mortal.
+
+The face, too, vaguely troubled her. True to his promise, Stefan had
+not made it a portrait, but its unlikeness lay rather in the meaning and
+expression than in the features. These differed only in detail from her
+own. A slight lengthening of the corners of the eyes, a fuller and wider
+mouth were the only changes. But the expression amidst its exaltation
+held a quality she did not understand. Translated into music, it was
+the call of the wood-wind, something wild and unhuman flowing across the
+silver triumph of the horns.
+
+Of these half questionings, however, Mary said nothing, telling Stefan
+only what she was sure of, that the picture would be a masterpiece.
+
+The days were shortening. Stefan found the light poor in the afternoons,
+and had to take part of the mornings for work on his pastoral. This he
+would have neglected in his enthusiasm for the Danae, but for
+Mary's urgings. He obeyed her mandates on practical issues with the
+unquestioning acceptance of a child. His attitude suggested that he was
+willing to be worldly from time to time if his Mary--not too often--told
+him to.
+
+The weather had turned cool, and Mr. Corriani brought them up their
+first scuttle of coal. They were glad to drink their morning coffee and
+eat their lunch before the fire, and Mary's little sable neck-piece,
+relic of former opulence, appeared in the evenings when they sought
+their dinner. This they took in restaurants near by--quaint basements,
+or back parlors of once fine houses, where they were served nutritious
+meals on bare boards, in china half an inch thick. Autumn, New York's
+most beautiful season, was in the air with its heart-lightening tang;
+energy seemed to flow into them as they breathed. They took long walks
+in the afternoons to the Park, which Stefan voted hopelessly banal; to
+the Metropolitan Museum, where they paid homage to the Sorollas and the
+Rodins; to the Battery, the docks, and the whole downtown district. This
+they found oppressive at first, till they saw it after dark from a ferry
+boat, when Stefan became fired by the towerlike skyscrapers sketched in
+patterns of light against the void.
+
+Immediately he developed a cult for these buildings. "America's one
+creation," he called them, "monstrous, rooted repellently in the earth's
+bowels, growing rank like weeds, but art for all that." He made several
+sketches of them, in which the buildings seemed to sway in a drunken
+abandonment of power. "Wicked things," he named them, and saw them
+menacing but fascinating, titanic engines that would overwhelm their
+makers. He and Mary had quite an argument about this, for she thought
+the skyscrapers beautiful.
+
+"They reach sunward, Stefan, they do not menace, they aspire," she
+objected.
+
+"The aspiration is yours, Goddess. They are only fit symbols of a
+super-materialism. Their strength is evil, but it lures."
+
+He was delighted with his drawings. Mary, who was beginning to develop
+civic pride, told him they were goblinesque.
+
+"Clever girl, that's why I like them," he replied.
+
+Late in October Stefan sold his pastoral, though only for seventy-five
+dollars. This disappointed him greatly. He was anxious to repay his
+debt to Adolph, but would not accept the loan of it from his wife. Mary
+renewed her determination to be helpful, and sent one of her old stories
+to a magazine, but without success. She had no one to advise her as
+to likely markets, and posted her manuscript to two more unsuitable
+publications, receiving it back with a printed rejection slip.
+
+Her fourth attempt, however, was rewarded by a note from the editor
+which gave her much encouragement. Children's stories, he explained,
+were outside the scope of his magazine, but he thought highly of Mrs.
+Byrd's manuscript, and advised her to submit it to one of the women's
+papers--he named several--where it might be acceptable. Mary was
+delighted by this note, and read it to Stefan.
+
+"Splendid!" he cried, "I had no idea you had brought any stories over
+with you. Guarded oracle!" he added, teasingly.
+
+"Oracles don't tell secrets unless they are asked," she rejoined.
+
+"True. And now I do ask. Give me the whole secret--read me the story,"
+he exclaimed, promptly putting away his brushes, lighting a cigarette,
+and throwing himself, eagerly attentive, into the Morris chair.
+
+Mary prepared to comply, gladly, if a little nervously. She had been
+somewhat hurt at his complete lack of interest in her writing; now she
+was anxious for his approbation. Seated in the rocking chair she read
+aloud the little story in her clear low voice. When she had finished she
+found Stefan regarding her with an expression affectionate but somewhat
+quizzical.
+
+"Mary, you have almost a maternal air, sitting there reading so lovingly
+about a baby. It's a new aspect--the rocker helps. I've never quite
+liked that chair--it reminds me of Michigan."
+
+Mary had flushed painfully, but he did not notice it in the half light
+of the fire. It had grown dark as she read.
+
+"But the story, Stefan?" she asked, her tone obviously hurt. He jumped
+up and kissed her, all contrition.
+
+"Darling, it sounded beautiful in your voice, and I'm sure it is. In
+fact I know it is. But I simply don't understand that type of fiction;
+I have no key to it. So my mind wandered a little. I listened to the
+lovely sounds your voice made, and watched the firelight on your hair.
+You were like a Dutch interior--quite a new aspect, as I said--and I got
+interested in that."
+
+Mary was abashed and disappointed. For the first time she questioned
+Stefan's generosity, contrasting his indifference with her own absorbed
+interest in his work. She knew her muse trivial by comparison with his,
+but she loved it, and ached for the stimulus his praise would bring.
+
+Beneath the wound to her craftsmanship lay another, in which the knife
+was turning, but she would not face its implication. Nevertheless it
+oppressed her throughout the evening, so that Stefan commented on her
+silence. That night as she lay awake listening to his easy breathing,
+for the first time since her marriage her pillow was dampened by tears.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+In the nest morning's sun Mary's premonitions appeared absurd. Stefan
+waked in high spirits, and planned a morning's work on his drawings of
+the city, while Mary, off duty as a model, decided to take her story in
+person to the office of one of the women's papers. As she crossed the
+Square and walked up lower Fifth Avenue she had never felt more buoyant.
+The sun was brilliant, and a cool breeze whipped color into her cheeks.
+
+The office to which she was bound was on the north side of Union Square.
+Crossing Broadway, she was held up half way over by the traffic. As she
+waited for an opening her attention was attracted by the singular antics
+of a large man, who seemed to be performing some kind of a ponderous
+fling upon the curbstone opposite. A moment more and she grasped that
+the dance was a signal to her, and that the man was none other than
+McEwan, sprucely tailored and trimmed in the American fashion, but
+unmistakable for all that. She crossed the street and shook hands with
+him warmly, delighted to see any one connected with the romantic days of
+her voyage. McEwan's smile seemed to buttress his whole face with teeth,
+but to her amazement he greeted her without a trace of Scotch accent.
+
+"Well," said he, pumping both her hands up and down in his enormous
+fist, "here's Mrs. Byrd! That's simply great. I've been wondering where
+I could locate you both. Ought to have nosed you out before now, but
+my job keeps me busy. I'm with a magazine house, you know--advertising
+manager."
+
+"I didn't know," answered Mary, whose head was whirling.
+
+"Ah," he grinned at her, "you're surprised at my metamorphosis. I allow
+myself a month every year of my native heath, heather-mixture, and
+burr--I like to do the thing up brown. The rest of the time I'm a
+Gothamite, of necessity. Some time, when I've made my pile, I shall
+revert for keeps, and settle down into a kilt and a castle."
+
+Much amused by this unsuspected histrionic gift, Mary walked on beside
+McEwan. He was full of interest in her affairs, and she soon confided to
+him the object of her expedition.
+
+"You're just the man to advise me, being on a paper," she said, and
+added laughing, "I should have been terrified of you if I'd known that
+on the ship."
+
+"Then I'm glad I kept it dark. You say your stuff is for children? Where
+were you going to?"
+
+She told him.
+
+"A woman's the boss of that shop. She's O.K. and so's her paper, but her
+prices aren't high." He considered. "Better come to our shop. We run two
+monthlies and a weekly, one critical, one household, one entirely
+for children. The boss is a great pal of mine. Name of Farraday--an
+American. Come on!" And he wheeled her abruptly back the way they had
+come. She followed unresistingly, intensely amused at his quick, jerky
+sentences and crisp manner--the very antithesis of his former Scottish
+heaviness.
+
+"Mr. McEwan, what an actor you would have made!"
+
+She smiled up at him as she hurried at his side. He looked about with
+pretended caution, then stooped to her ear.
+
+"Hoots, lassie!" he whispered, with a solemn wink.
+
+"Stefan will never believe this!" she said, bubbling with laughter.
+
+At the door of a building close to the corner where they had met he
+stopped, and for a moment his manner, though not his voice, assumed its
+erstwhile weightiness.
+
+"Never mind!" he held up an admonishing forefinger. "I do the talking.
+What do you know about business? Nothing!" His hand swept away possible
+objections. "I know your work." She gasped, but the finger was up
+again, solemnly wagging. "And I say it's good. How many words?" he half
+snapped.
+
+"Three thousand five hundred," she answered.
+
+"Then I say, two hundred dollars--not a cent less--and what I say
+_goes_, see?" The finger shot out at her, menacing.
+
+"I leave it to you, Mr. McEwan," she answered meekly, and followed
+him to the lift, dazed. "This," she said to herself, "simply is not
+happening!" She felt like Alice in Wonderland.
+
+They shot up many stories, and emerged into a large office furnished
+with a switch-board, benches, tables, desks, pictures, and office boys.
+A ceaseless stenographic click resounded from behind an eight-foot
+partition; the telephone girl seemed to be engaged conjointly on a novel
+and a dozen plugs; the office boys were diligent with their chewing gum;
+all was activity. Mary felt at a loss, but the great McEwan, towering
+over the switchboard like a Juggernaut, instantly compelled the
+operator's eyes from their multiple distractions. "Good morning, Mr.
+McEwan--Spring one-O-two-four," she greeted him.
+
+"'Morning. T'see Mr. Farraday," he economized.
+
+"M'st Farraday--M'st McEwan an' lady t'see you. Yes. M'st Farraday'll
+see you right away. 'Sthis three-one hundred? Hold th' line, please,"
+said the operator in one breath, connecting two calls and waving McEwan
+forward simultaneously. Mary followed him down a long corridor of doors
+to one which he opened, throwing back a second door within it.
+
+They entered a sunny room, quiet, and with an air of spacious order.
+Facing them was a large mahogany table, almost bare, save for a vase
+which held yellow roses. Flowers grew in a window box and another vase
+of white roses stood on a book shelf. Mary's eyes flew to the flowers
+even before she observed the man who rose to greet them from beyond the
+table. He was very tall, with the lean New England build. His long,
+bony face was unhandsome save for the eyes and mouth, which held an
+expression of great sweetness. He shook hands with a kindly smile, and
+Mary took an instant liking to him, feeling In his presence the ease
+that comes of class-fellowship. He looked, she thought, something under
+forty years old.
+
+"I am fortunate. You find me in a breathing spell," he was saying.
+
+"He's the busiest man in New York, but he always has time," McEwan
+explained, and, indeed, nothing could have been more unhurried than the
+whole atmosphere of both man and room. Mary said so.
+
+"Yes, I must have quiet or I can't work," Farraday replied. "My windows
+face the back, you see, and my walls are double; I doubt if there's a
+quieter office in New York."
+
+"Nor a more charming, I should think," added Mary, looking about at the
+restful tones of the room, with its landscapes, its beautifully chosen
+old furniture, and its flowers.
+
+"The owner thanks you," he acknowledged, with his kindly smile.
+
+"Business, business," interjected McEwan, who, Mary was amused to
+observe, approximated much more to the popular idea of an American than
+did his friend. "I've brought you a find, Farraday. This lady writes for
+children--she's printed stuff in England. I haven't read it, but I know
+it's good because I've seen her telling stories to the kids by the hour
+aboard ship, and you couldn't budge them. You can see," he waved his
+hand at her, "that her copy would be out of the ordinary run."
+
+This absurdity would have embarrassed Mary but that Mr. Farraday
+turned on her a smile which seemed to make them allies in their joint
+comprehension of McEwan's advocacy.
+
+"She's got a story with her for you to see," went on that enthusiast.
+"I've told her if it's good enough for our magazine it's two hundred
+dollars good enough. There's the script." He took it from her, and
+flattened it out on Farraday's table. "Look it over and write her."
+
+"What's your address?" he shot at Mary. She produced it.
+
+"I'll remember that," McEwan nodded; "coming round to see you. There you
+are, James. We won't keep you. You have no time and I have less. Come
+on, Mrs. Byrd." He made for the door, but Farraday lifted his hand.
+
+"Too fast, Mac," he smiled. "I haven't had a chance yet. A mere American
+can't keep pace with the dynamic energy you store in Scotland. Where
+does it come from? Do you do nothing but sleep there?"
+
+"Much more than that. He practises the art of being a Scotchman,"
+laughed Mary.
+
+"He has no need to practise. You should have heard him when he first
+came over," said Farraday.
+
+"Well, if you two are going to discuss me, I'll leave you at it; I'm
+not a highbrow editor; I'm the poor ad man--my time means money to me."
+McEwan opened the door, and Mary rose to accompany him.
+
+"Won't you sit down again, Mrs. Byrd? I'd like to ask you a few
+questions," interposed Farraday, who had been turning the pages of
+Mary's manuscript. "Mac, you be off. I can't focus my mind in the
+presence of a human gyroscope."
+
+"I've got to beat it," agreed the other, shaking hands warmly with Mary.
+"But don't you be taken in by him; he likes to pretend he's slow, but
+he's really as quick as a buzz-saw. See you soon," and with a final wave
+of the hand he was gone.
+
+"Now tell me a little about your work," said Farraday, turning on Mary
+his kind but penetrating glance. She told him she had published three or
+four stories, and in what magazines.
+
+"I only began to write fiction a year ago," she explained. "Before that
+I'd done nothing except scribble a little verse at home."
+
+"What kind of verse?"
+
+"Oh, just silly little children's rhymes."
+
+"Have you sold any of them?"
+
+"No, I never tried."
+
+"I should like to see them," he said, to her surprise. "I could use them
+perhaps if they were good. As for this story," he turned the pages, "I
+see you have an original idea. A child bird-tamer, dumb, whose power no
+one can explain. Before they talk babies can understand the birds, but
+as soon as they learn to speak they forget bird language. This child is
+dumb, so he remembers, but can't tell any one. Very pretty."
+
+Mary gasped at his accurate summary of her idea. He seemed to have
+photographed the pages in his mind at a glance.
+
+"I had tried to make it a little mysterious," she said rather ruefully.
+His smile reassured her.
+
+"You have," he nodded, "but we editors learn to get impressions quickly.
+Yes," he was reading as he spoke, "I think it likely I can use this.
+The style is good, and individual." He touched a bell, and handed the
+manuscript to an answering office boy. "Ask Miss Haviland to read this,
+and report to me to-day," he ordered.
+
+"I rarely have time to read manuscripts myself," he went on, "but Miss
+Haviland is my assistant for our children's magazine. If her judgment
+confirms mine, as I feel sure it will, we will mail you a cheque
+to-night, Mrs. Byrd--according to our friend McEwan's instructions--"
+and he smiled.
+
+Mary blushed with pleasure, and again rose to go, with an attempt at
+thanks. The telephone bell had twice, with a mere thread of sound,
+announced a summons. The editor took up the receiver. "Yes, in five
+minutes," he answered, hanging up and turning again to Mary.
+
+"Don't go yet, Mrs. Byrd; allow me the luxury of postponing other
+business for a moment. We do not meet a new contributor and a new
+citizen every day." He leant back with an air of complete leisure,
+turning to her his kindly, open smile. She felt wonderfully at her ease,
+as though this man and she were old acquaintances. He asked more about
+her work and that of her husband.
+
+"We like to have some personal knowledge of our authors; it helps us in
+criticism and suggestion," he explained.
+
+Mary described Stefan's success in Paris, and mentioned his sketches of
+downtown New York. Farraday looked interested.
+
+"I should like to see those," he said. "We have an illustrated review in
+which we sometimes use such things. If you are bringing me your verses,
+your husband might care to come too, and show me the drawings."
+
+Again the insistent telephone purred, and this time he let Mary go,
+shaking her hand and holding the door for her.
+
+"Bring the verses whenever you like, Mrs. Byrd," was his farewell.
+
+When she had gone, James Farraday returned to his desk, lit a cigar, and
+smoked absently for a few moments, staring out of the window. Then he
+pulled his chair forward, and unhooked the receiver.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+Mary hurried home vibrant with happiness, and ran into the studio to
+find Stefan disconsolately gazing out of the window. He whirled at her
+approach, and caught her in his arms.
+
+"Wicked one! I thought, like Persephone, you had been carried off by
+Dis and his wagon," he chided. "I could not work when I realized you had
+been gone so long. Where have you been?" He looked quite woebegone.
+
+"Ah, I'm so glad you missed me," she cried from his arms. Then, unable
+to contain her delight, she danced to the center of the room, and,
+throwing back her head, burst into song. "Praise God from whom all
+blessings flow," chanted Mary full-throated, her chest expanded, pouring
+out her gratitude as whole-heartedly as a lark.
+
+"Mary, I can see your wings," interrupted Stefan excitedly. "You're
+soaring!" He seized a stick of charcoal and dashed for paper, only
+to throw down his tools again in mock despair. "Pouf, you're beyond
+sketching at this moment--you need a cathedral organ to express you.
+What has happened? Have you been sojourning with the immortals?"
+
+But Mary had stopped singing, and dropped on the divan as if suddenly
+tired. She held out her arms to Stefan, and he sat beside her,
+lover-like.
+
+"Oh, dearest," she said, her voice vibrating with tenderness, "I've
+wanted so to help, and now I think I've sold a story, and I've found a
+chance for your New York drawings. I'm so happy."
+
+"Why, you mysterious creature, your eyes have tears in them--and all
+because you've helped me! I've never seen your tears, Mary; they make
+your eyes like stars lost in a pool." He kissed her passionately, and
+she responded, but waited eagerly to hear him praise her success. After
+a moment, however, he got up and wandered to his drawing board.
+
+"You say you found a chance for these," indicating the sketches. "How
+splendid of you! Tell me all about it." He was eagerly attentive, but
+she might never have mentioned her story. Apparently, that part of her
+report simply had not registered in his brain.
+
+Mary's spirits suddenly dropped. She had come from an interview in which
+she was treated as a serious artist, and her husband could not even
+hear the account of her success. She rose and began to prepare their
+luncheon, recounting her adventures meanwhile in a rather flat voice.
+Stefan listened to her description of McEwan's metamorphosis only half
+credulously.
+
+"Don't tell me," he commented, "that the cloven hoof will not out. Do
+you mean to say it's to him that you owe this chance?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"I don't see how we can take favors from that brute," he said, running
+his hands moodily into his pockets.
+
+Mary looked at him in frank astonishment.
+
+"I don't understand you, Stefan," she said. "Mr. McEwan was kindness
+itself, and I am grateful to him, but there can be no question of
+receiving favors on your part. He introduced me to Mr. Farraday as a
+writer, and it was only through me that your work was mentioned at all."
+She was hurt by his narrow intolerance, and he saw it.
+
+"Very well, goddess, don't flash your lightnings at me." He laughed
+gaily, and sat down to his luncheon. Throughout it Mary listened to a
+detailed account of his morning's work.
+
+Next day she received by the first post a cheque for two hundred
+dollars, with a formal typewritten note from Farraday, expressing
+pleasure, and a hope that the Household Publishing Company might receive
+other manuscripts from her for its consideration. Stefan was setting
+his pallette for a morning's work on the Danae. She called to him rather
+constrainedly from the door where she had opened the letter.
+
+"Stefan, I've received a cheque for two hundred dollars for my story."
+
+"That's splendid," he answered cheerfully. "If I sell these sketches
+we shall be quite rich. We must move from this absurd place to a proper
+studio flat. Mary shall have a white bathroom, and a beautiful blue and
+gold bed. Also minions to set food before her. Tra-la-la," and he hummed
+gaily. "I'm ready to begin, beloved," he added.
+
+As Mary prepared for her sitting she could not subdue a slight feeling
+of irritation. Apparently she might never, even for a moment, enjoy the
+luxury of being a human being with ambitions like Stefan's own, but must
+remain ever pedestaled as his inspiration. She was irked, too, by his
+hopelessly unpractical attitude toward affairs. She would have enjoyed
+the friendly status of a partner as a wholesome complement to the ardors
+of marriage. She knew that her husband differed from the legendary
+bohemian in having a strictly upright code in money matters, but she
+wished it could be less visionary. He mentally oscillated between
+pauperism and riches. Let him fail to sell a picture and he offered to
+pawn his coat; but the picture sold, he aspired to hire a mansion. In
+a word, she began to see that he was incapable either of foresight or
+moderation. Could she alone, she wondered, supply the deficiency?
+
+That evening when they returned from dinner, which as a rare treat they
+had eaten in the cafe of their old hotel, they found McEwan waiting
+their arrival from a seat on the stairs.
+
+"Here you are," his hearty voice called to them as they labored up
+the last flight. "I was determined not to miss you. I wanted to pay my
+respects to the couple, and see how the paint-slinging was getting on."
+
+Mary, knowing now that the Scotchman was not the slow-witted blunderer
+he had appeared on board ship, looked at him with sudden suspicion. Was
+she deceived, or did there lurk a teasing gleam in those blue eyes?
+Had McEwan used the outrageous phrase "paint-slinging" with malice
+aforethought? She could not be sure. But if his object was to get a rise
+from Stefan, he was only partly successful. True, her husband snorted
+with disgust, but, at a touch from her and a whispered "Be nice to him,"
+restrained himself sufficiently to invite McEwan in with a frigid show
+of politeness. But once inside, and the candles lighted, Stefan leant
+glumly against the mantelpiece with his hands in his pockets, evidently
+determined to leave their visitor entirely on Mary's hands.
+
+McEwan was nothing loath. He helped himself to a cigarette, and
+proceeded to survey the walls of the room with interest.
+
+"Nifty work, Mrs. Byrd. You must be proud of him," and again Mary seemed
+to catch a glint in his eye. "These sketches now," he approached the
+table on which lay the skyscraper studies. "Very harsh--cruel, you might
+say--but clever, yes, _sir_, mighty clever." Mary saw Stefan writhe with
+irritation at the other's air of connoisseur. She shot him a glance
+at once amused and pleading, but he ignored it with a shrug, as if to
+indicate that Mary was responsible for this intrusion, and must expect
+no aid from him.
+
+McEwan now faced the easel which held the great Danae, shrouded by a
+cloth.
+
+"Is this the latest masterpiece--can it be seen?" he asked, turning to
+his host, his hand half stretched to the cover.
+
+Mary made an exclamation of denial, and started forward to intercept the
+hand. But even as she moved, dismay visible on her face, the perverse
+devil which had been mounting in Stefan's brain attained the mastery.
+She had asked him to be nice to this jackass--very well, he would.
+
+"Yes, that's the best thing I've done, McEwan. As you're a friend of
+both of us, you ought to see it," he exclaimed, and before Mary could
+utter a protest had wheeled the easel round to the light and thrown
+back the drapery. He massed the candles on the mantelpiece. "Here," he
+called, "stand here where you can see properly. Mythological, you see,
+Danae. What do you think of it?" There were mischief and triumph in his
+tone, and a shadow of spite.
+
+Mary had blushed crimson and stood, incapable of speech, in the darkest
+corner of the room. McEwan had not noticed her protest, it had all
+happened so instantaneously. He followed Stefan's direction, and faced
+the canvas expectantly. There was a long silence. Mary, watching,
+saw the spruce veneer of metropolitanism fall from their guest like a
+discarded mask--the grave, steady Highlander emerged. Stefan's moment
+of malice had flashed and died--he stood biting his nails, already too
+ashamed to glance in Mary's direction. At last McEwan turned. There was
+homage in his eyes, and gravity.
+
+"Mr. Byrd," he said, and his deep voice carried somewhat of its old
+Scottish burr, "I owe ye an apology. I took ye for a tricky young mon,
+clever, but better pleased with yersel' than ye had a right to be. I see
+ye are a great artist, and as such, ye hae the right even to the love of
+that lady. Now I will congratulate her." He strode over to Mary's corner
+and took her hand. "Dear leddy," he said, his native speech still more
+apparent, "I confess I didna think the young mon worthy, and in me
+blunderin' way, I would hae kept the two o' ye apart could I hae done
+it. But I was wrong. Ye've married a genius, and ye can be proud o'
+the way ye're helping him. Now I'll bid ye good night, and I hope ye'll
+baith count me yer friend in all things." He offered his hand to Stefan,
+who took it, touched. Gravely he picked up his hat, and opened the door,
+turning for a half bow before closing it behind him.
+
+Stefan knew that he had behaved unpardonably, that he had been betrayed
+into a piece of caddishness, but McEwan had given him the cue for his
+defense. He hastened to Mary and seized her hand.
+
+"Darling, forgive me. I knew you didn't want the picture shown, but it's
+got to be done some day, hasn't it? It seemed a shame for McEwan not to
+see what you have inspired. I ought not to have shown it without asking
+you, but his appreciation justified me, don't you think?" His tone
+coaxed.
+
+Mary was choking back her tears. Explanations, excuses, were to her
+trivial, nor was she capable of them. Wounded, she was always dumb, and
+to discuss a hurt seemed to her to aggravate it.
+
+"Don't let's talk about it, Stefan," she murmured. "It seemed to me
+you showed the picture because I did not wish it--that's what I don't
+understand." She spoke lifelessly.
+
+"No, no, you mustn't think that," he urged. "I was irritated, and I'm
+horribly sorry, but I do think it should be shown."
+
+But Mary was not deceived. If only for a moment, he had been disloyal to
+her. The urge of her love made it easy to forgive him, but she knew she
+could not so readily forget.
+
+Though she put a good face on the incident, though Stefan was his
+most charming self throughout the evening, even though she refused to
+recognize the loss, one veil of illusion had been stripped from her
+heart's image of him.
+
+In his contrite mood, determined to please her, Stefan recalled the
+matter of her stories, and for the first time spoke of her success with
+enthusiasm. He asked her about the editor, and offered to go with her
+the next morning to show Mr. Farraday his sketches.
+
+"Have you anything else to take him?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," replied Mary. "I am to show him some verses I wrote at home in
+Lindum. Just little songs for children."
+
+"Verses," he exclaimed; "how wonderful! I knew you were a goddess and a
+song-bird, but not that you were a poet, too."
+
+"Nor am I; they are the most trifling things."
+
+
+"I expect they are delicious, like your singing. Read them to me,
+beloved," he begged.
+
+But Mary would not. He pressed her several times during the evening, but
+for the first time since their marriage he found he could not move her
+to compliance.
+
+"Please don't bother about them, Stefan. They are for children; they
+would not interest you."
+
+He felt himself not wholly forgiven.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+A day or two later the Byrds went together to the office of the
+Household Publishing Company and sent in their names to Mr. Farraday.
+This time they had to wait their turn for admittance for over half an
+hour, sharing the benches of the outer office with several men and
+women of types ranging from the extreme of aestheticism to the obviously
+commercial. The office was hung with original drawings of the covers
+of the firm's three publications--The Household Review, The Household
+Magazine, and The Child at Home. Stefan prowled around the room mentally
+demolishing the drawings, while Mary glanced through the copies of the
+magazines that covered the large central table. She was impressed by
+the high level of makeup and illustration in all three periodicals,
+contrasting them with the obvious and often inane contents of similar
+English publications. At a glance the sheets appeared wholesome, but not
+narrow; dignified, but not dull. She wondered how much of their general
+tone they owed to Mr. Farraday, and determined to ask McEwan more about
+his friend when next she saw him. Her speculations were interrupted by
+Stefan, who somewhat excitedly pulled her sleeve, pointing to a colored
+drawing of a woman's head on the wall behind her.
+
+"Look, Mary!" he ejaculated. "Rotten bourgeois art, but an interesting
+face, eh? I wonder if it's a good portrait. It says in the corner,
+'Study of Miss Felicity Berber.' An actress, I expect. Look at the eyes;
+subtle, aren't they? And the heavy little mouth. I've never seen a face
+quite like it." He was visibly intrigued.
+
+Mary thought the face provocative, but somewhat unpleasant.
+
+"It's certainly interesting--the predatory type, I should think," she
+replied. "I'll bet it's true to life--the artist is too much of a fool
+to have created that expression," Stefan went on. "Jove, I should like
+to meet her, shouldn't you?" he asked naively.
+
+"Not particularly," said Mary, smiling at him. "She'll have to be your
+friend; she's too feline for me."
+
+"The very word, observant one," he agreed.
+
+At this point their summons came. Mary was very anxious that her husband
+should make a good impression. "I hope you'll like him, dearest," she
+whispered as for the second time the editor's door opened to her.
+
+Farraday shook hands with them pleasantly, but turned his level glance
+rather fixedly on her husband, Mary thought, before breaking into his
+kindly smile. Stefan returned the smile with interest, plainly delighted
+at the evidences of taste that surrounded him.
+
+"I'm sorry you should have had to wait so long," said Farraday. "I'm
+rarely so fortunately unoccupied as on your first visit, Mrs. Byrd.
+You've brought the verses to show me? Good! And Mr. Byrd has his
+drawings?" He turned to Stefan. "America owes you a debt for the new
+citizen you have given her, Mr. Byrd. May I offer my congratulations?"
+
+"Thanks," beamed Stefan, "but you couldn't, adequately, you know."
+
+"Obviously not," assented the other with a glance at Mary. "Our mutual
+friend, McEwan, was here again yesterday, with a most glowing account
+of your work, Mr. Byrd; he seems to have adopted the role of press agent
+for the family."
+
+"He's the soul of kindness," said Mary.
+
+"Yes, a thoroughly good sort," Stefan conceded. "Here are the New York
+sketches," he went on, opening his portfolio on Farraday's desk. "Half a
+dozen of them."
+
+"Thank you, just a moment," interposed the editor, who had opened Mary's
+manuscript. "Your wife's work takes precedence. She is an established
+contributor, you see," he smiled, running his eyes over the pages.
+
+Stefan sat down. "Of course," he said, rather absently.
+
+Farraday gave an exclamation of pleasure.
+
+"Mrs. Byrd, these are good; unusually so. They have the Stevenson flavor
+without being imitations. A little condensation, perhaps--I'll pencil
+a few suggestions--but I must have them all. I would not let another
+magazine get them for the world! Let me see, how many are there! Eight.
+We might bring them out in a series, illustrated. What if I were to
+offer the illustrating to Mr. Byrd, eh?" He put down the sheets and
+glanced from wife to husband, evidently charmed with his idea. "What do
+you think, Mr. Byrd? Is your style suited to her work?" he asked.
+
+Stefan looked thoroughly taken aback. He laughed shortly. "I'm a
+painter, Mr. Farraday, not an illustrator. I haven't time to undertake
+that kind of thing. Even these drawings," he indicated the portfolio,
+"were done in spare moments as an amusement. My wife suggested placing
+them with you--I shouldn't have thought of it."
+
+To Mary his tone sounded needlessly ungracious, but the editor appeared
+not to notice it.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he replied suavely. "Of course, if you don't
+illustrate--I'm sorry. The collaboration of husband and wife would have
+been an attraction, even though the names were unknown here. I'll get
+Ledward to do them."
+
+Stefan sat up. "You don't mean Metcalf Ledward, the painter, do you?" he
+exclaimed.
+
+"Yes," replied Farraday quietly; "he often does things for us--our
+policy is to popularize the best American artists."
+
+Stefan was nonplused. Ledward illustrating Mary's rhymes! He felt
+uncomfortable.
+
+"Don't you think he would get the right atmosphere better perhaps than
+anyone?" queried Farraday, who seemed courteously anxious to elicit
+Stefan's opinion. Mary interposed hastily.
+
+"Mr. Farraday, he can't answer you. I'm afraid I've been stupid, but I
+was so pessimistic about these verses that I wouldn't show them to him.
+I thought I would get an outside criticism first, just to save my face,"
+she hurried on, anxious in reality to save her husband's.
+
+"I pleaded, but she was obdurate," contributed Stefan, looking at her
+with reproach.
+
+Farraday smiled enlightenment. "I see. Well, I shall hope you will
+change your mind about the illustrations when you have read the
+poems--that is, if your style would adapt itself. Now may I see the
+sketches?" and he held out his hand for them.
+
+Stefan rose with relief. Much as he adored Mary, he could not comprehend
+the seriousness with which this man was taking the rhymes which she
+herself had described as "just little songs for children." He was the
+more baffled as he could not dismiss Farraday's critical pretensions
+with contempt, the editor being too obviously a man of cultivation. Now,
+however, that attention had been turned to his own work, Stefan was at
+his ease. Here, he felt, was no room for doubts.
+
+"They are small chalk and charcoal studies of the spirit of the
+city--mere impressions," he explained, putting the drawings in
+Farraday's hands with a gesture which belied the carelessness of his
+words.
+
+Farraday glanced at them, looked again, rose, and carried them to the
+window, where he examined them carefully, one by one. Mary watched him
+breathlessly, Stefan with unconcealed triumph. Presently he turned
+again and placed them in a row on the bare expanse of his desk. He stood
+looking silently at them for a moment more before he spoke.
+
+
+"Mr. Byrd," he said at last, "this is very remarkable work." Mary
+exhaled an audible breath of relief, and turned a glowing face to
+Stefan. "It is the most remarkable work," went on the editor, "that has
+come into this office for some time past. Frankly, however, I can't use
+it."
+
+Mary caught her breath--Stefan stared. The other went on without looking
+at them:
+
+"This company publishes strictly for the household. Our policy is to
+send into the average American home the best that America produces, but
+it must be a best that the home can comprehend. These drawings interpret
+New York as you see it, but they do not interpret the New York in which
+our readers live, or one which they would be willing to admit existed."
+
+"They interpret the real New York, though," interposed Stefan.
+
+"Obviously so, to you," replied the editor, looking at him for the first
+time. "For me, they do not. These drawings are an arraignment, Mr. Byrd,
+and--if you will pardon my saying so--a rather bitter and inhuman one.
+You are not very patriotic, are you?" His keen eyes probed the artist.
+
+"Emphatically no," Stefan rejoined. "I'm only half American by birth,
+and wholly French by adoption."
+
+"That explains it," nodded Farraday gravely. "Well, Mr. Byrd, there are
+undoubtedly publications in which these drawings could find a place, and
+I am only sorry that mine are not amongst them. May I, however, venture
+to offer you a suggestion?"
+
+Stefan was beginning to look bored, but Mary interposed with a quick
+"Oh, please do!" Farraday turned to her.
+
+"Mrs. Byrd, you will bear me out in this, I think. Your husband has
+genius--that is beyond question--but he is unknown here as yet. Would
+it not be a pity for him to be introduced to the American public through
+these rather sinister drawings? We are not fond of the too frank critic
+here, you know," he smiled, whimsically. "You may think me a Philistine,
+Mr. Byrd," he continued, "but I have your welfare in mind. Win your
+public first with smiles, and later they may perhaps accept chastisement
+from you. If you have any drawings in a different vein I shall feel
+honored in publishing them"--his tone was courteous--"if not, I should
+suggest that you seek your first opening through the galleries rather
+than the press. Whichever way you decide, if I can assist you at all by
+furnishing introductions, I do hope you will call on me. Both for
+your wife's sake and for your own, it would be a pleasure. And
+now"--gathering up the drawings--"I must ask you both to excuse me, as
+I have a long string of appointments. Mrs. Byrd, I will write you our
+offer for the verses. I don't know about the illustrations; you must
+consult your husband." They found themselves at the door bidding him
+goodbye: Mary with a sense of disappointment mingled with comprehension;
+Stefan not knowing whether the more to deplore what he considered
+Farraday's Philistinism, or to admire his critical acumen.
+
+"His papers and his policy are piffling," he summed up at last, as they
+walked down the Avenue, "but I must say I like the man himself--he is
+the first person of distinction I have seen since I left France."
+
+"Oh! Oh! The first?" queried Mary.
+
+"Darling," he seized her hand and pressed it, "I said the first person,
+not the first immortal!" He had a way of bestowing little endearments
+in public, which Mary found very attractive, even while her training
+obliged her to class them as solecisms.
+
+"I felt sure you would like him. He seems to me charming," she said,
+withdrawing the hand with a smile.
+
+"Grundy!" he teased at this. "Yes, the man is all right, but if that
+is a sample of their attitude toward original work over here we have a
+pretty prospect of success. 'Genius, get thee behind me!' would sum it
+up. Imbeciles!" He strode on, his face mutinous.
+
+Mary was thinking. She knew that Farraday's criticism of her husband's
+work was just. The word "sinister" had struck home to her. It could
+be applied, she felt, with equal truth to all his large paintings but
+one--the Danae.
+
+"Stefan," she asked, "what did you think of his advice to win the public
+first by smiles?"
+
+"Tennysonian!" pronounced Stefan, using what she knew to be his final
+adjective of condemnation.
+
+"A little Victorian, perhaps," she admitted, smiling at this succinct
+repudiation. "Nevertheless, I'm inclined to think he was right. There is
+a sort of Pan-inspired terror in your work, you know."
+
+He appeared struck. "Mary, I believe you've hit it!" he exclaimed,
+suddenly standing still. "I've never thought of it like that before--the
+thing that makes my work unique, I mean. Like the music of Pan, it's
+outside humanity, because I am."
+
+"Don't say that, dear," she interrupted, shocked.
+
+"Yes, I am. I hate my kind--all except a handful. I love beauty. It is
+not my fault that humanity is ugly."
+
+Mary was deeply disturbed. Led on by a chance phrase of hers, he was
+actually boasting of just that lack which was becoming her secret fear
+for him. She touched his arm, pleadingly.
+
+"Stefan, don't speak like that; it hurts me dreadfully. It is awful for
+any one to build up a barrier between himself and the world. It means
+much unhappiness, both for himself and others."
+
+He laughed affectionately at her. "Why, sweet, what do we care? I love
+you enough to make the balance true. You are on my side of the barrier,
+shutting me in with beauty."
+
+"Is that your only reason for loving me?" she asked, still distressed.
+
+"I love you because you have a beautiful body and a beautiful
+mind--because you are like a winged goddess of inspiration. Could there
+be a more perfect reason?"
+
+Mary was silent. Again the burden of his ideal oppressed her. There was
+no comfort in it. It might be above humanity, she felt, but it was not
+of it. Again her mind returned to the pictures and Farraday's criticism.
+"Sinister!" So he would have summed up all the others, except the Danae.
+To that at least the word could not apply. Her heart lifted at the
+realization of how truly she had helped Stefan. In his tribute to
+her there was only beauty. She knew now that her gift must be without
+reservation.
+
+Home again, she stood long before the picture, searching its strange
+face. Was she wrong, or did there linger even here the sinister,
+half-human note?
+
+"Stefan," she said, calling him to her, "I was wrong to ask you not to
+make the face like me. It was stupid--'Tennysonian,' I'm afraid." She
+smiled bravely. "It _is_ me--your ideal of me, at least--and I want you
+to make the face, too, express me as I seem to you." She leant against
+him. "Then I want you to exhibit it. I want you to be known first by
+our gift to each other, this--which is our love's triumph." She was
+trembling; her face quivered--he had never seen her so moved. She fired
+him.
+
+"How glorious of you, darling!" he exclaimed, "and oh, how beautiful you
+look! You have never been so wonderful. If I could paint that rapt face!
+Quick, I believe I can get it. Stand there, on the throne." He seized
+his pallette and brushes and worked furiously while Mary stood, still
+flaming with her renunciation. In a few minutes it was done. He ran
+to her and covered her face with kisses. "Come and look!" he cried
+exultingly, holding her before the canvas.
+
+The strange face with its too-wide eyes and exotic mouth was gone.
+Instead, she saw her own purely cut features, but fired by such exultant
+adoration as lifted them to the likeness of a deity. The picture now was
+incredibly pure and passionate--the very flaming essence of love. Tears
+started to her eyes and dropped unheeded. She turned to him worshiping.
+
+"Beloved," she cried, "you are great, great. I adore you," and she
+kissed him passionately.
+
+He had painted love's apotheosis, and his genius had raised her love to
+its level. At that moment Mary's actually was the soul of flame he had
+depicted it.
+
+That day, illumined by the inspiration each had given each, was destined
+to mark a turning point in their common life. The next morning the
+understanding which Mary had for long instinctively feared, and against
+which she had raised a barrier of silence, came at last.
+
+She was standing for some final work on the Danae, but she had awakened
+feeling rather unwell, and her pose was listless. Stefan noticed it, and
+she braced herself by an effort, only to droop again. To his surprise,
+she had to ask for her rest much sooner than usual; he had hitherto
+found her tireless. But hardly had she again taken the pose than she
+felt herself turning giddy. She tottered, and sat down limply on the
+throne. He ran to her, all concern.
+
+"Why, darling, what's the matter, aren't you well?" She shook her head.
+"What can be wrong?" She looked at him speechless.
+
+"What is it, dearest, has anything upset you?" he went on with--it
+seemed to her--incredible blindness.
+
+"I can't stand in that pose any longer, Stefan; this must be the last
+time," she said at length, slowly.
+
+He looked at her as she sat, pale-faced, drooping on the edge of the
+throne. Suddenly, in a flash, realization came to him. He strode across
+the room, looked again, and came back to her.
+
+"Why, Mary, are you going to have a baby?" he asked, quite baldly, with
+a surprised and almost rueful expression.
+
+Mary flushed crimson, tears of emotion in her eyes. "Oh, Stefan, yes.
+I've known it for weeks; haven't you guessed?" Her arms reached to him
+blindly.
+
+He stood rooted for a minute, looking as dumfounded as if an earthquake
+had rolled under him. Then with a quick turn he picked up her wrap,
+folded it round her, and took her into his arms. But it was a moment
+too late. He had hesitated, had not been there at the instant of her
+greatest need. Her midnight fears were fulfilled, just as her instinct
+had foretold. He was not glad. There in his arms her heart turned cold.
+
+He soon rallied; kissed her, comforted her, told her what a fool he had
+been; but all he said only confirmed her knowledge. "He is not glad. He
+is not glad," her heart beat out over and over, as he talked.
+
+"Why did you not tell me sooner, darling? Why did you let me tire you
+like this?" he asked.
+
+Impossible to reply. "Why didn't you know?" her heart cried out, and, "I
+wasn't tired until to-day," her lips answered.
+
+"But why didn't you tell me?" he urged. "I never even guessed. It was
+idiotic of me, but I was so absorbed in our love and my work that this
+never came to my mind."
+
+"But at first, Stefan?" she questioned, probing for the answer she
+already knew, but still clinging to the hope of being wrong. "I never
+talked about it because you didn't seem to care. But in the beginning,
+when you proposed to me--the day we were married--at Shadeham--did you
+never think of it then?" Her tone craved reassurance.
+
+"Why, no," he half laughed. "You'll think me childish, but I never did.
+I suppose I vaguely faced the possibility, but I put it from me. We had
+each other and our love--that seemed enough."
+
+She raised her head and gazed at him in wide-eyed pain. "But, Stefan,
+what's marriage _for?_" she exclaimed.
+
+He puckered his brows, puzzled. "Why, my dear, it's for
+love--companionship--inspiration. Nothing more so far as I am
+concerned." They stared nakedly at each other. For the first time the
+veils were stripped away. They had felt themselves one, and behold!
+here was a barrier, impenetrable as marble, dividing each from the
+comprehension of the other. To Stefan it was inconceivable that a
+marriage should be based on anything but mutual desire. To Mary the
+thought of marriage apart from children was an impossibility. They had
+come to their first spiritual deadlock.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+Love, feeling its fusion threatened, ever makes a supreme effort for
+reunity. In the days that followed, Stefan enthusiastically sought to
+rebuild his image of Mary round the central fact of her maternity. He
+became inspired with the idea of painting her as a Madonna, and recalled
+all the famous artists of the past who had so glorified their hearts'
+mistresses.
+
+"You are named for the greatest of all mothers, dearest, and my picture
+shall be worthy of the name," he would cry. Or he would call her
+Aphrodite, the mother of Love. "How beautiful our son will be--another
+Eros," he exclaimed.
+
+Mary rejoiced in his new enthusiasm, and persuaded herself that
+his indifference to children was merely the result of his lonely
+bachelorhood, and would disappear forever at the sight of his own child.
+Now that her great secret was shared she became happier, and openly
+commenced those preparations which she had long been cherishing in
+thought. Miss Mason was sent for, and the great news confided to her.
+They undertook several shopping expeditions, as a result of which Mary
+would sit with a pile of sewing on her knee while Stefan worked to
+complete his picture. Miss Mason took to dropping in occasionally with a
+pattern or some trifle of wool or silk. Mary was always glad to see
+her, and even Stefan found himself laughing sometimes at her shrewd
+New England wit. For the most part, however, he ignored her, while he
+painted away in silence behind the great canvas.
+
+Mary had received twelve dollars for each of her verses--ninety-six
+dollars in all. Before Christmas Stefan sold his pastoral of the dancing
+faun for one hundred and twenty-five, and Mary felt that financially
+they were in smooth water, and ventured to discuss the possibility of
+larger quarters. For these they were both eager, having begun to feel
+the confinement of their single room; but Mary urged that they postpone
+moving until spring.
+
+"We are warm and snug here for the winter, and by spring we shall have
+saved something substantial, and really be able to spread out," she
+argued.
+
+"Very well, wise one, we will hold in our wings a little longer," he
+agreed, "but when we do fly, it must be high." His brush soared in
+illustration.
+
+She had discussed with him the matter of the illustrations for her
+verses as soon as she received her cheque from Farraday. They had
+agreed that it would be a pity for him to take time for them from his
+masterpiece.
+
+"Besides, sweetheart," he had said, "I honestly think Ledward will do
+them better. His stuff is very graceful, without being sentimental,
+and he understands children, which I'm afraid I don't." He shrugged
+regretfully. "Didn't you paint that adorable lost baby?" she reminded
+him. "I've always grieved that we had to sell it."
+
+"I'll buy it back for you, or paint you another better one," he offered
+promptly.
+
+So the verses went to Ledward, and the first three appeared in the
+Christmas number of The Child at Home, illustrated--as even Stefan had
+to admit--with great beauty.
+
+Mary would have given infinitely much for his collaboration, but she had
+not urged it, feeling he was right in his refusal.
+
+As Christmas approached they began to make acquaintances among the
+polyglot population of the neighborhood. Their old hotel, the culinary
+aristocrat of the district, possessed a cafe in which, with true French
+hospitality, patrons were permitted to occupy tables indefinitely on
+the strength of the slenderest orders. Here for the sake of the
+French atmosphere Stefan would have dined nightly had Mary's frugality
+permitted. As it was, they began to eat there two or three nights a
+week, and dropped in after dinner on many other nights. They would
+sit at a bare round table smoking their cigarettes, Mary with a cup of
+coffee, Stefan with the liqueur he could never induce her to share, and
+watching the groups that dotted the other tables. Or they would linger
+at the cheapest of their restaurants and listen to the conversation of
+the young people, aggressively revolutionary, who formed its clientele.
+These last were always noisy, and assumed as a pose manners even worse
+than those they naturally possessed. Every one talked to every one else,
+regardless of introductions, and Stefan had to summon his most crushing
+manner to prevent Mary from being monopolized by various very youthful
+and visionary men who openly admired her. He was inclined to abandon
+the place, but Mary was amused by it for a time, bohemianism being a
+completely unknown quantity to her.
+
+"Don't think this is the real thing," he explained; "I've had seven
+years of that in Paris. This is merely a very crass imitation."
+
+"Imitation or not, it's most delightfully absurd and amusing," said
+she, watching the group nearest her. This consisted of a very short and
+rotund man with hair a la Paderewski and a frilled evening shirt, a thin
+man of incredible stature and lank black locks, and a pretty young
+girl in a tunic, a tam o' shanter, enormous green hairpins, and tiny
+patent-leather shoes decorated with three inch heels. To her the lank
+man, who wore a red velvet shirt and a khaki-colored suit reminiscent of
+Mr. Bernard Shaw, was explaining the difference between syndicalism and
+trade-unionism in the same conversational tone which men in Lindum had
+used in describing to Mary the varying excellences of the two local
+hunts. "I.W.W." and "A.F. of L." fell from his lips as "M.F.H."
+and "J.P." used to from theirs. The contrast between the two worlds
+entertained her not a little. She thought all these young people looked
+clever, though singularly vulgar, and that her old friends would have
+appeared by comparison refreshingly clean and cultivated, but quite
+stupid.
+
+"Why, Stefan, are dull, correct people always so clean, and clever and
+original ones usually so unwashed?" she wondered.
+
+"Oh, the unwashed stage is like the measles," he replied; "you are bound
+to catch it in early life."
+
+"I suppose that's true. I know even at Oxford the Freshmen go through
+an utterly ragged and disreputable phase, in which they like to pretend
+they have no laundry bill."
+
+"Yes, it advertises their emancipation. I went through it in Paris, but
+mine was a light case."
+
+"And brief, I should think," smiled Mary, to whom Stefan's feline
+perfection of neatness was one of his charms.
+
+At the hotel, on the other hand, the groups, though equally individual,
+lacked this harum-scarum quality, and, if occasionally noisy, were clean
+and orderly.
+
+"Is it because they can afford to dress better?" Mary asked on their
+next evening there, noting the contrast.
+
+"No," said Stefan. "That velvet shirt cost as much probably as half a
+dozen cotton ones. These people have more, certainly, or they wouldn't
+be here--but the real reason is that they are a little older. The other
+crowd is raw with youth. These have begun to find themselves; they don't
+need to advertise their opinions on their persons." He was looking about
+him with quite a friendly eye.
+
+"You don't seem to hate humanity this evening, Stefan," Mary commented.
+
+"No," he grinned. "I confess these people are less objectionable than
+most." He spoke in rapid French to the waiter, ordering another drink.
+
+"And the language," he continued. "If you knew what it means to me to
+hear French!"
+
+Mary nodded rather ruefully. Her French was of the British school-girl
+variety, grammatically precise, but with a hopeless, insular accent.
+After a few attempts Stefan had ceased trying to speak it with her.
+"Darling," he had begged, "don't let us--it is the only ugly sound you
+make."
+
+One by one they came to know the habitues of these places. In the
+restaurant Stefan was detested, but tolerated for the sake of his wife.
+"Beauty and the Beast" they were dubbed. But in the hotel cafe he made
+himself more agreeable, and was liked for his charming appearance, his
+fluent French, and his quick mentality. The "Villagers," as these people
+called themselves, owing to their proximity to New York's old Greenwich
+Village, admired Mary with ardor, and liked her, but for a time were
+baffled by her innate English reserve. Mentally they stood round her
+like a litter of yearling pups about a stranger, sniffing and wagging
+friendly but uncertain tails, doubtful whether to advance with
+affectionate fawnings or to withdraw to safety. This was particularly
+true of the men--the women, finding Mary a stanch Feminist, and feeling
+for her the sympathy a bride always commands from her sex, took to her
+at once. The revolutionary group on the other hand would have broken
+through her pleasant aloofness with the force--and twice the speed--of
+a McEwan, had Stefan not, with them, adopted the role of snarling
+watchdog.
+
+One of Mary's first after dinner friendships was made at the hotel with
+a certain Mrs. Elliott, who turned out to be the President of the local
+Suffrage Club. Scenting a new recruit, this lady early engaged the Byrds
+in conversation and, finding Mary a believer, at once enveloped her in
+the camaraderie which has been this cause's gift to women all the world
+over. They exchanged calls, and soon became firm friends.
+
+Mrs. Elliot was an attractive woman in middle life, of slim, graceful
+figure and vivacious manner. She had one son out in the world, and one
+in college, and lived in a charming house just off the Avenue, with
+an adored but generally invisible husband, who was engaged in business
+downtown. As a girl Constance Elliot had been on the stage, and had
+played smaller Shakespearean parts in the old Daly Company, but, bowing
+to the code of her generation, had abandoned her profession at marriage.
+Now, in middle life, too old to take up her calling again with any hope
+of success, yet with her mental activity unimpaired, she found in the
+Suffrage movement her one serious vocation.
+
+"I am nearly fifty, Mrs. Byrd," she said to Mary, "and have twenty good
+years before me. I like my friends, and am interested in philanthropy,
+but I am not a Jack-of-all-trades by temperament. I need work--a real
+job such as I had when the boys were little, or when I was a girl. We
+are all working hard enough to win the vote, but what we shall fill the
+hole in our time with when we have it, I don't know. It will be easy for
+the younger ones--but I suppose women like myself will simply have to
+pay the price of having been born of our generation. Some will find
+solace as grandmothers--I hope I shall. But my elder son, who married a
+pretty society girl, is childless, and my younger such a light-hearted
+young rascal that I doubt if he marries for years to come."
+
+Mary was much interested in this problem, which seemed more salient here
+than in her own class in England, in which social life was a vocation
+for both sexes.
+
+At Mrs. Elliot's house she met many of the neighborhood's more
+conventional women, and began to have a great liking for these gently
+bred but broad-minded and democratic Americans. She also met a mixed
+collection of artists, actresses, writers, reformers and followers of
+various "isms"; for as president of a suffrage club it was Mrs. Elliot's
+policy to make her drawing rooms a center for the whole neighborhood.
+She was a charming hostess, combining discrimination with breadth of
+view; her Fridays were rallying days for the followers of many more
+cults than she would ever embrace, but for none toward which she could
+not feel tolerance.
+
+
+At first Stefan, who, man-like, professed contempt for social functions,
+refused to accompany Mary to these at-homes. But after Mrs. Elliot's
+visit to the studio he conceived a great liking for her, and to Mary's
+delight volunteered to accompany her on the following Friday. Few
+misanthropes are proof against an atmosphere of adulation, and in this
+Mrs. Elliot enveloped Stefan from the moment of first seeing his Danae.
+She introduced him as a genius--America's coming great painter, and
+he frankly enjoyed the novel sensation of being lionized by a group of
+clever and attractive women.
+
+Mrs. Elliot affected house gowns of unusual texture and design,
+which flowed in adroitly veiling lines about her too slim form. These
+immediately attracted the attention of Stefan, who coveted something
+equally original for Mary. He remarked on them to his hostess on his
+second visit.
+
+"Yes," she said, "I love them. I am eclipsed by fashionable clothing.
+Felicity Berber designs all my things. She's ruinous," with a sigh,
+"but I have to have her. I am a fool at dressing myself, but I have
+intelligence enough to know it," she added, laughing.
+
+"Felicity Berber," questioned Stefan. "Is that a creature with Mongolian
+eyes and an O-shaped mouth?"
+
+"What a good description! Yes--have you met her?"
+
+"I haven't, but you will arrange it, won't you?" he asked cajolingly.
+"I saw a drawing of her--she's tremendously paintable. Do tell me about
+her. Wait a minute. I'll get my wife!"
+
+He jumped up, pounced on Mary, who was in a group by the tea-table, and
+bore her off regardless of her interrupted conversation.
+
+"Mary," he explained, all excitement, "you remember that picture at the
+magazine office? Yes, you do, a girl with slanting black eyes--Felicity
+Berber. Well, she isn't an actress after all. Sit down here. Mrs. Elliot
+is going to tell us about her." Mary complied, sharing their hostess'
+sofa, while Stefan wrapped himself round a stool. "Now begin at the
+beginning," he demanded, beaming; "I'm thrilled about her."
+
+"Well," said Mrs. Elliot, dropping a string of jade beads through her
+fingers, "so are most people. She's unique in her way. She came here
+from the Pacific coast, I believe, quite unknown, and trailing an
+impossible husband. That was five years ago--she couldn't have been more
+than twenty-three. She danced in the Duncan manner, but was too lazy to
+keep it up. Then she went into the movies, and her face became the
+rage; it was on all the picture postcards. She got royalties on every
+photograph sold, and made quite a lot of money, I believe. But she hates
+active work, and soon gave the movies up. About that time the appalling
+husband disappeared. I don't know if she divorced him or not, but he
+ceased to be, as it were. His name was Noaks." She paused, "Does this
+bore you?" she asked Mary.
+
+"On the contrary," smiled she, "it's most amusing--like the penny
+novelettes they sell in England."
+
+"Olympian superiority!" teased Stefan. "Please go on, Mrs. Elliot. Did
+she attach another husband?"
+
+"No, she says she hates the bother of them," laughed their hostess.
+"Men are always falling in love with her, but-openly at least-she seems
+uninterested in them."
+
+"Hasn't found the right one, I suppose," Stefan interjected.
+
+"Perhaps that's it. At any rate her young men are always confiding their
+woes to me. My status as a potential grandmother makes me a suitable
+repository for such secrets."
+
+"Ridiculous," Stefan commented.
+
+"But true, alas!" she laughed. "Well, Felicity had always designed the
+gowns for her dancing and acting, and after the elimination of Mr.
+Noaks she set up a dressmaking establishment for artistic and individual
+gowns. She opened it with a the dansant, at which she discoursed on
+the art of dress. Her showroom is like a sublimated hotel lobby--tea is
+served there for visitors every afternoon. Her prices are high, and she
+has made a huge success. She's wonderfully clever, directs everything
+herself. Felicity detests exertion, but she has the art of making others
+work for her."
+
+"That sounds as if she would get fat," said Stefan, with a shudder.
+
+"Doesn't it?" agreed Mrs. Elliot. "But she's as slim as a panther, and
+intensely alive nervously, for all her physical laziness."
+
+"Do you like her?" Mary asked.
+
+"Yes, I really do, though she's terribly rude, and I tell her I'm
+convinced she's a dangerous person. She gives me a feeling that
+gunpowder is secreted somewhere in the room with her. I will get her
+here to meet you both--you would be interested. She's never free in the
+afternoon; we'll make it an evening." With a confirming nod, Mrs. Elliot
+rose to greet some newcomers.
+
+"Mary," Stefan whispered, "we'll go and order you a dress from this
+person. Wouldn't that be fun?"
+
+"How sweet of you, dearest, but we can't afford it," replied Mary,
+surreptitiously patting his hand.
+
+"Nonsense, of course we can. Aren't we going to be rich?" scoffed he.
+
+"Look who's coming!" exclaimed Mary suddenly.
+
+Farraday was shaking hands with their hostess, his tall frame looking
+more than ever distinguished in its correct cutaway. Almost instantly he
+caught sight of Mary and crossed the room to her with an expression of
+keen pleasure.
+
+"How delightful," he greeted them both. "So you have found the
+presiding genius of the district! Why did I not have the inspiration
+of introducing you myself?" He turned to Mrs. Elliot, who had rejoined
+them. "Two more lions for you, eh, Constance?" he said, with a twinkle
+which betokened old friendship.
+
+"Yes, indeed," she smiled, "they have no rivals for my Art and Beauty
+cages."
+
+"And what about the literary circus? I suppose you have been making Mrs.
+Byrd roar overtime?"
+
+Their hostess looked puzzled.
+
+"Don't tell me that you are in ignorance of her status as the Household
+Company's latest find?" he ejaculated in mock dismay.
+
+Mrs. Elliot turned reproachful eyes on Mary. "She never told me, the
+unfriendly woman!"
+
+"Just retribution, Constance, for poring over your propagandist sheets
+instead of reading our wholesome literature," Farraday retorted. "Had
+you done your duty by the Household magazines you would have needed no
+telling."
+
+"A hit, a palpable hit," she answered, laughing. "Which reminds me that
+I want another article from you, James, for our Woman Citizen."
+
+"Mrs. Byrd," said Farraday, "behold in me a driven slave. Won't you come
+to my rescue and write something for this insatiable suffragist?"
+
+Mary shook her head. "No, no, Mr. Farraday, I can't argue, either
+personally or on paper. You should hear me trying to make a speech!
+Pathetic."
+
+Stefan, who had ceased to follow the conversation, and was restlessly
+examining prints on the wall, turned at this. "Don't do it, dearest.
+Argument is so unbeautiful, and I couldn't stand your doing anything
+badly." He drifted away to a group of women who were discussing the
+Italian Futurists.
+
+"Tell me about this lion, James," said Constance, settling herself on
+the sofa. "I believe she is too modest to tell me herself." She looked
+at Mary affectionately.
+
+"She has written a second 'Child's Garden,' almost rivaling the first,
+and we have a child's story of hers which will be as popular as some of
+Frances Hodgson Burnett's," summed up Farraday.
+
+Mary blushed with pleasure at this praise, but was about to deprecate
+it when Stefan signaled her away. "Mary," he called, "I want you to hear
+this I am saying about the Cubists!" She left them with a little smile
+of excuse, and they watched her tall figure join her husband.
+
+"James," said Mrs. Elliot irrelevantly, "why in the world don't you
+marry?"
+
+"Because, Constance," he smiled, "all the women I most admire in the
+world are already married."
+
+"A propos, have you seen Mr. Byrd's work?" she asked.
+
+"Only some drawings, from which I suspect him of genius. But she is as
+gifted in her way as he, only it's a smaller way."
+
+"Don't place him till you've seen his big picture, painted from her.
+It's tremendous. We've got to have it exhibited at Constantine's. I
+want you to help me arrange it for them. She's inexperienced, and he's
+helplessly unpractical. Oh!" she grasped his arm; "a splendid idea! Why
+shouldn't I have a private exhibition here first, for the benefit of the
+Cause?"
+
+Farraday threw up his hands. "You are indefatigable, Constance. We'd
+better all leave it to you. The Byrds and Suffrage will benefit equally,
+I am sure."
+
+"I will arrange it," she nodded smiling, her eyes narrowing, her slim
+hands dropping the jade beads from one to the other.
+
+Farraday, knowing her for the moment lost to everything save her latest
+piece of stage management, left her, and joined the Byrds. He engaged
+himself to visit their studio the following week.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+
+Miss Mason was folding her knitting, and Mary sat in the firelight
+sewing diligently. Stefan was out in search of paints.
+
+"I tell you what 'tis, Mary Elliston Byrd," said Miss Mason. "It's 'bout
+time you saw a doctor. My mother was a physician-homeopath, one of the
+first that ever graduated. Take my advice, and have a woman."
+
+"I'd much rather," said Mary.
+
+"I should say!" agreed the other. "I never was one to be against the
+men, but oh, my--" she threw up her bony little hands--"if there's one
+thing I never could abide it's a man doctor for woman's work. I s'pose
+I got started that way by what my mother told me of the medical students
+in her day. Anyway, it hardly seems Christian to me for a woman to go to
+a man doctor."
+
+Mary laughed. "I wish my dear old Dad could have heard you. I remember
+he once refused to meet a woman doctor in consultation. She had to leave
+Lindum--no one would employ her. I was a child at the time, but even
+then it seemed all wrong to me."
+
+"My dear, you thank the Lord you live under the Stars and Stripes,"
+rejoined Miss Mason, who conceived of England as a place beyond the
+reach of liberty for either women or men.
+
+"I shall live under the Tricolor if Stefan has his way," smiled Mary.
+
+"Child," said her visitor, putting on her hat, "don't say it. Your
+husband's an elegant man--I admire him--but don't you ever let me hear
+he doesn't love his country."
+
+"I'm certainly learning to love it myself," Mary discreetly evaded.
+
+"You're too fine a woman not to," retorted the other. "Now I tell you.
+I've been treated for my chest at the Women's and Children's Hospital.
+There's one little doctor there's cute's she can be. I'm goin' to get
+you her address. You've got to treat yourself right. Good-bye," nodded
+the little woman; and was gone in her usual brisk fashion.
+
+It was the day of Mr. Farraday's expected call, and Miss Mason had
+hardly departed when the bell rang. Mary hastily put away her sewing
+and pressed the electric button which opened the downstairs door to
+visitors. She wished Stefan were back again to help her entertain the
+editor, and greeted him with apologies for her husband's absence. She
+was anxious that this man, whom she instinctively liked and trusted,
+should see her husband at his best. Seating Farraday in the Morris
+chair, she got him some tea, while he looked about with interest.
+
+The two big pictures, "Tempest," and "Pursuit," now hung stretched but
+unframed, on either side of the room. Farraday's gaze kept returning to
+them.
+
+"Those are his Beaux Arts pictures; extraordinary, aren't they?" said
+Mary, following his eyes.
+
+"They certainly are. Remarkably powerful. I understand there is another,
+though, that he has only just finished?"
+
+"Yes, it's on the easel, covered, you see," she answered. "Stefan must
+have the honor of showing you that himself."
+
+"I wish you would tell me, Mrs. Byrd," said Farraday, changing the
+subject, "how you happened to write those verses? Had you been brought
+up with children, younger brothers and sisters, for instance?"
+
+Mary shook her head. "No, I'm the younger of two. But I've always loved
+children more than anything in the world." She blushed, and Farraday,
+watching her, realized for the first time what a certain heightened
+radiance in her face betokened. He smiled very sweetly at her. She in
+her turn saw that he knew, and was glad. His manner seemed to enfold her
+in a mantle of comfort and understanding.
+
+As they finished their tea, Stefan arrived. He entered gaily, greeted
+Farraday, and fell upon the tea, consuming two cups and several slices
+of bread and butter with the rapid concentration he gave to all his
+acts.
+
+That finished, he leaped up and made for the easel.
+
+"Now, Farraday," he cried, "you are going to see one of the finest
+modern paintings in the world. Why should I be modest about it? I'm not.
+It's a masterpiece--Mary's and mine!"
+
+Mary wished he had not included her. Though determined to overcome the
+feeling, she still shrank from having the picture shown in her presence.
+Farraday placed himself in position, and Stefan threw back the cloth,
+watching the other's face with eagerness. The effect surpassed his
+expectation. The editor flushed, then gradually became quite pale. After
+a minute he turned rather abruptly from the canvas and faced Stefan.
+
+"You are right, Mr. Byrd," he said, in an obviously controlled voice,
+"it _is_ a masterpiece. It will make your name and probably your
+fortune. It is one of the most magnificent modern paintings I have ever
+seen."
+
+Mary beamed.
+
+"Your praise honors me," said Stefan, genuinely delighted.
+
+"I'm sorry I have to run away now," Farraday continued almost hurriedly.
+"You know what a busy man I am." He shook hands with Stefan. "A thousand
+congratulations," he said. "Good-bye, Mrs. Byrd; I enjoyed my cup of tea
+with you immensely." The hand he offered her was cold; he hardly looked
+up. "You will let me have some more stories, won't you? I shall count
+on them. Good-bye again--my warmest congratulations to you both," and
+he took his departure with a suddenness only saved from precipitation by
+the deliberate poise of his whole personality.
+
+"I'm sorry he had to go so soon," said Mary, a little blankly.
+
+"What got into the man?" Stefan wondered, thrusting his hands into his
+pockets. "He was leisurely enough till he had seen the picture. I tell
+you what!" he exclaimed. "Did you notice his expression when he looked
+at it? I believe the chap is in love with you!" He turned his most
+impish and mischievous face to her.
+
+Mary blushed with annoyance. "How perfectly ridiculous, Stefan! Please
+don't say such things."
+
+"But he is!" He danced about the room, hugely entertained by his idea.
+"Don't you see, that is why he is so eager about your verses, and why he
+was so bouleverse by the Danae! Poor chap, I feel quite sorry for him.
+You must be nice to him."
+
+Mary was thoroughly annoyed. "Please don't talk like that," she
+reiterated. "You don't know how it hurts when you are so flippant. If
+you suggest such a reason for his acceptance of my work, of course I
+can't send in any more." Tears of vexation were in her eyes.
+
+"Darling, don't be absurd," he responded, teasingly. "Why shouldn't he
+be in love with you? I expect everybody to be so. As for your verses, of
+course he wouldn't take them if they weren't good; I didn't mean that."
+
+"Then why did you say it?" she asked, unplacated.
+
+"Dearest!" and he kissed her. "Don't be dignified; be Aphrodite again,
+not Pallas. I never mean anything I say, except when I say I love you!"
+
+"Love isn't the only thing, Stefan," she replied.
+
+"Isn't it? What else is there? I don't know," and he jumped on the table
+and sat smiling there with his head on one side, like a naughty little
+boy facing his schoolmaster.
+
+She wanted to answer "comprehension," but was silent, feeling the
+uselessness of further words. How expect understanding of a common human
+hurt from this being, who alternately appeared in the guise of a god
+and a gamin? She remembered the old tale of the maiden wedded to
+the beautiful and strange elf-king. Was the legend symbolic of that
+mysterious thread--call it genius or what you will--that runs its
+erratic course through humanity's woof, marring yet illuminating the
+staid design, never straightened with its fellow-threads, never tied,
+and never to be followed to its source? With the feeling of having for
+an instant held in her hand the key to the riddle of his nature, Mary
+went to Stefan and ran her fingers gently through his hair.
+
+"Child," she said, smiling at him rather sadly; and "Beautiful," he
+responded, with a prompt kiss.
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+
+The next morning brought Constance Elliot, primed with a complete scheme
+for the future of the Danae. She found Mary busy with her sewing and
+Stefan rather restlessly cleaning his pallette and brushes. The great
+picture was propped against the wall, a smaller empty canvas being
+screwed on the easel. Stefan greeted her enthusiastically.
+
+"Come in!" he cried, forestalling Mary. "You find us betwixt and
+between. She's finished," indicating the Danae, "and I'm thinking
+of doing an interior, with Mary seated. I don't know," he went on
+thoughtfully; "it's quite out of my usual line, but we're too domestic
+here just now for anything else." His tone was slightly grumbling. From
+the rocking chair Constance smiled importantly on them both. She had
+the happy faculty of never appearing to hear what should not have been
+expressed.
+
+"Children," she said, "your immediate future is arranged. I have a plan
+for the proper presentation of the masterpiece to a waiting world, and
+I haven't been responsible for two suffrage matinees and a mile of the
+Parade for nothing. I understand publicity. Now listen."
+
+She outlined her scheme to them. The reporters were to be sent for and
+informed that the great new American painter, sensation of this year's
+Salon, had kindly consented to a private exhibition of his masterpiece
+at her house for the benefit of the Cause. Tickets, one dollar each, to
+be limited to two hundred.
+
+"Then a bit about your both being Suffragists, and about Mary's writing,
+you know," she threw in. "Note the value of the limited sale--at once it
+becomes a privilege to be there." Tickets, she went on to explain, would
+be sent to the art critics of the newspapers, and Mr. Farraday would
+arrange to get Constantine himself and one or two of the big private
+connoisseurs. She personally knew the curator of the Metropolitan, and
+would get him. The press notices would be followed by special letters
+and articles by some of these men. Then Constantine would announce a
+two weeks' exhibition at his gallery, the public would flock, and the
+picture would be bought by one of the big millionaires, or a gallery.
+"I've arranged it all," she concluded triumphantly, looking from one to
+the other with her dark alert glance.
+
+Stefan was grinning delightedly, his attention for the moment completely
+captured. Mary's sewing had dropped to her lap; she was round-eyed.
+
+"But the sale itself, Mrs. Elliot, you can hardly have arranged that?"
+she laughed.
+
+Constance waved her hand. "That arranges itself. It is enough to set the
+machinery in motion."
+
+"Do you mean to say," went on Mary, half incredulous, "that you can
+simply send for the reporters and get them to write what you want?"
+
+"Within reason, certainly," answered the other. "Why not?"
+
+"In England," Mary laughed, "if a woman were to do that, unless she were
+a duchess, a Pankhurst, or a great actress, they wouldn't even come."
+
+Constance dismissed this with a shrug. "Ah, well, my dear, luckly we're
+not in England! I'm going to begin to-day. I only came over to get your
+permission. Let me see--this is the sixteenth--too near Christmas. I'll
+have the tickets printed and the press announcement prepared, and
+we'll let them go in the dead week after Christmas, when the papers are
+thankful for copy. We'll exhibit the first Saturday in the New Year. For
+a week we'll have follow-up articles, and then Constantine will take
+it. You blessed people," and she rose to go, "don't have any anxiety.
+Suffragists always put things through, and I shall concentrate on this
+for the next three weeks. I consider the picture sold."
+
+Mary tried to express her gratitude, but the other waved it aside. "I
+just love you both," she cried in her impulsive way, "and want to see
+you where you ought to be--at the top!" She shook hands with Stefan
+effusively. "Mind you get on with your next picture!" she cried in
+parting; "every one will be clamoring for your work!"
+
+"Oh, Stefan, isn't it awfully good of her?" exclaimed Mary, linking her
+arm through his. He was staring at his empty canvas. "Yes, splendid,"
+he responded carelessly, "but of course she'll have the kudos, and her
+organization will benefit, too."
+
+"Stefan!" Mary dropped his arm, dumfounded. It was not possible he
+should be so ungenerous. She would have remonstrated, but saw he was
+oblivious of her.
+
+"Yes," he went on absently, looking from the room to the canvas, "it's
+fine for every one all round--just as it should be. Now, Mary, if you
+will sit over there by the fire and take your sewing, I think I'll try
+and block in that Dutch interior effect I noticed some time back. The
+light is all wrong, but I can get the thing composed."
+
+He was lost in his new idea. Mary told herself she had in part misjudged
+him. His comment on their friend's assistance was not dictated by lack
+of appreciation so much as by indifference. No sooner was the picture's
+future settled than he had ceased to be interested in it. The practical
+results of its sale would have little real meaning for him, she knew.
+She began to see that all he asked of humanity was that it should leave
+him untrammeled to do his work, while yielding him full measure of the
+beauty and acclamation that were his food. "Well," she thought, "I'm
+the wife of a genius. It's a great privilege, but it is strange, for I
+always supposed if I married it would simply be some good, kind man. He
+would have been very dull," she smiled to herself, mentally contrasting
+the imagined with the real.
+
+A few days before Christmas Mary noticed that one of the six skyscraper
+studies was gone from the studio. She spoke of it, fearing the
+possibility of a theft, but Stefan murmured rather vaguely that it was
+all right--he was having it framed. Also, on three consecutive mornings
+she awakened to find him busily painting at a small easel close under
+the window, which he would hastily cover on hearing her move. As
+he evidently did not wish her to see it, she wisely restrained her
+curiosity. She was herself busy with various little secrets--there was
+some knitting to be done whenever his back was turned, and she had made
+several shopping expeditions. On Christmas Eve Stefan was gone the whole
+afternoon, and returned radiant, full of absurd jokes and quivers of
+suppressed glee. He was evidently highly pleased with himself, but
+cherished with touching faith, she thought, the illusion that his manner
+betrayed nothing.
+
+That night, when she was supposed to be asleep, she felt him creep
+carefully out of bed, heard him fumbling for his dressing gown, and
+saw a shaft of light as the studio door was cautiously opened. A moment
+later a rustling sounded through the transom, followed by the shrill
+whisper of Madame Corriani. Listening, she fell asleep.
+
+She was wakened by Stefan's arms round her.
+
+"A happy Christmas, darling! So wonderful--the first Christmas I ever
+remember celebrating."
+
+There was a ruddy glow of firelight in the room, but to her opening eyes
+it seemed unusually dark, and in a moment she saw that the great piece
+of Chinese silk they used for their couch cover was stretched across the
+room on cords, shutting off the window end. She jumped up hastily.
+
+"Oh, Stefan, how thrilling!" she exclaimed, girlishly excited. As for
+him, he was standing before her dressed, and obviously tingling with
+impatience. She slipped into a dressing gown of white silk, and caught
+her hair loosely up. Simultaneously Stefan emerged from the kitchenette
+with two steaming cups of coffee, which he placed on a table before the
+fire.
+
+"Clever boy!" she exclaimed delighted, for he had never made the coffee
+before. In a moment he produced rolls and butter.
+
+"Dejeuner first," he proclaimed gleefully, "and then the surprise!" They
+ate their meal as excitedly as two children. In the midst of it Mary
+rose and, fetching from the bureau two little ribbon-tied parcels,
+placed them in his hands.
+
+"For me? More excitements!" he warbled. "But I shan't open them till the
+curtain comes down. There, we've finished." He jumped up. "Beautiful,
+allow me to present to you the Byrds' Christmas tree." With a dramatic
+gesture he unhooked a cord. The curtain fell. There in the full morning
+light stood a tree, different from any Mary had ever seen. There were no
+candles on it, but from top to bottom it was all one glittering white.
+There were no garish tinsel ornaments, but from every branch hung a
+white bird, wings outstretched, and under each bird lay, on the branch
+below, something white. At the foot of the tree stood a little painting
+framed in pale silver. It was of a nude baby boy, sitting wonderingly
+upon a hilltop at early dawn. His eyes were lifted to the sky, his hands
+groped. Mary, with an exclamation of delight, stepped nearer. Then she
+saw what the white things were under the spreading wings of the birds.
+Each was the appurtenance of a baby. One was a tiny cap, one a cloak,
+others were dresses, little jackets, vests. There were some tiny white
+socks, and, at the very top of the tree, a rattle of white coral and
+silver.
+
+"Oh, Stefan, my dearest--'the little white bird'!" she cried.
+
+"Do you like it, darling?" he asked delightedly, his arms about her.
+"Mrs. Elliot told me about Barrie's white bird--I hadn't known the
+story. But I wanted to show you I was glad about ours," he held her
+close, "and directly she spoke of the bird, I thought of this. She went
+with me to get those little things--" he waved at the tree--"some of
+them are from her. But the picture was quite my own idea. It's right,
+isn't it? What you would feel, I mean? I tried to get inside your
+heart."
+
+She nodded, her eyes shining with tears. She could find no words to
+tell him how deeply she was touched. Her half-formed doubts were swept
+away--he was her own dear man, kind and comprehending. She took the
+little painting and sat with it on her knee, poring over it, Stefan
+standing by delighted at his success. Then he remembered his own
+parcels. The larger he opened first, and instantly donned one of the two
+knitted ties it held, proclaiming its golden brown vastly becoming. The
+smaller parcel contained a tiny jeweler's box, and in it Stefan found an
+old and heavy seal ring of pure design, set with a transparent greenish
+stone, which bore the intaglio of a winged head. He was enchanted.
+
+"Mary, you wonder," he cried. "You must have created this--you couldn't
+just have found it. It symbolizes what you have given me--sums up all
+that you are!" and he kissed her rapturously.
+
+"Oh, Stefan," she answered, "it is all perfect, for your gift symbolizes
+what you have brought to me!"
+
+"Yes, darling, but not all I am to you, I hope," he replied, rubbing his
+cheek against hers.
+
+"Foolish one," she smiled back at him.
+
+They spent a completely happy day, rejoicing in the successful attempt
+of each to penetrate the other's mind. They had never, even on their
+honeymoon, felt more at one. Later, Mary asked him about the missing
+sketch.
+
+"Yes, I sold it for the bird's trappings," he answered gleefully;
+"wasn't it clever of me? But don't ask me for the horrid details, and
+don't tell me a word about my wonderful ring. I prefer to consider that
+you fetched it from Olympus."
+
+And Mary, whose practical conscience had given her sharp twinges over
+her extravagance, was glad to let it rest at that.
+
+During the morning a great sheaf of roses came for Mary with the card
+of James Farraday, and on its heels a bush of white heather inscribed to
+them both from McEwan. The postman contributed several cards, and a
+tiny string of pink coral from Miss Mason. "How kind every one is!" Mary
+cried happily.
+
+In the afternoon the Corrianis were summoned. Mary had small presents
+for them and a glass of wine, which Stefan poured to the accompaniment
+of a song in his best Italian. This melted the somewhat sulky Corriani
+to smiles, and his wife to tears. The day closed with dinner at their
+beloved French hotel, and a bottle of Burgundy shared with Stefan's
+favorite waiters.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+
+During Christmas week Stefan worked hard at his interior, but about the
+fifth day began to show signs of restlessness. The following morning,
+after only half an hour's painting, he threw down his brush.
+
+"It's no use, Mary," he announced, "I don't think I shall ever be able
+to do this kind of work; it simply doesn't inspire me."
+
+She looked up from her sewing. "Why, I thought it promised charmingly."
+
+"That's just it." He ruffled his hair irritably. "It does. Can you
+imagine my doing anything 'charming'? No, the only hope for this
+interior is for me to get depth into it, and depth won't come--it's
+facile." And he stared disgustedly at the canvas.
+
+"I think I know what you mean," Mary answered absently. She was thinking
+that his work had power and height, but that depth she had never seen in
+it.
+
+Stefan shook himself. "Oh, come along, Mary, let's get out of this.
+We've been mewed up in this domestic atmosphere for days. I shall
+explode soon. Let's go somewhere."
+
+"Very well," she agreed, folding up her work.
+
+"You feel all right, don't you?" he checked himself to ask.
+
+"Rather, don't I look it?"
+
+"You certainly do," he replied, but without his usual praise of her. "I
+have it, let's take a look at Miss Felicity Berber! I shall probably get
+some new ideas from her. Happy thought! Come on, Mary, hat, coat, let's
+hurry." He was all impatience to be gone.
+
+They started to walk up the Avenue, stopping at the hotel to find in the
+telephone book the number of the Berber establishment. It was entered,
+"Berber, Felicity, Creator of Raiment."
+
+"How affected!" laughed Mary.
+
+"Yes," said Stefan, "amusing people usually are."
+
+Though he appeared moody the crisp, sunny air of the Avenue gradually
+brightened him, and Mary, who was beginning to feel her confined
+mornings, breathed it in joyfully.
+
+The house was in the thirties, a large building of white marble. A lift
+carried them to the top floor, and left them facing a black door with
+"Felicity Berber" painted on it in vermilion letters. Opening this, they
+found themselves in a huge windowless room roofed with opaque glass.
+The floor was inlaid in a mosaic of uneven tiles which appeared to be of
+different shades of black. The walls, from roof to floor, were hung with
+shimmering green silk of the shade of a parrot's wing. There were no
+show-cases or other evidences of commercialism, but about the room were
+set couches of black japanned wood, upon which rested flat mattresses
+covered in the same green as the walls. On these silk cushions in black
+and vermilion were piled. The only other furniture consisted of low
+tables in black lacquer, one beside every couch. On each of these rested
+a lacquered bowl of Chinese red, obviously for the receipt of cigarette
+ashes. A similar but larger bowl on a table near the door was
+filled with green orchids. One large green silk rug--innocent of
+pattern--invited the entering visitor deeper into the room; otherwise
+the floor was bare. There were no pictures, no decorations, merely
+this green and black background, relieved by occasional splashes of
+vermilion, and leading up to a great lacquered screen of the same hue
+which obscured a door at the further end of the room.
+
+From the corner nearest the entrance a young woman advanced to meet
+them. She was clad in flowing lines of opalescent green, and her black
+hair was banded low across the forehead with a narrow line of emerald.
+
+"You wish to see raiment?" was her greeting.
+
+Mary felt rather at a loss amidst these ultra-aestheticisms, but Stefan
+promptly asked to see Miss Berber.
+
+"Madame rarely sees new clients in the morning." The green damsel was
+pessimistic. Mary felt secretly amused at the ostentatious phraseology.
+
+"Tell her we are friends of Mrs. Theodore Elliot's," replied Stefan,
+with his most brilliant and ingratiating smile.
+
+The damsel brightened somewhat. "If I may have your name I will see
+what can be done," she offered, extending a small vermilion tray. Stefan
+produced a card and the damsel floated with it toward the distant exit.
+Her footsteps were silent on the dead tiling, and there was no sound
+from the door beyond the screen.
+
+"Isn't this a lark? Let's sit down," Stefan exclaimed, leading the way
+to a couch.
+
+"It's rather absurd, don't you think?" smiled Mary.
+
+"No doubt, but amusing enough for mere mortals," he shrugged, a scarcely
+perceptible snub in his tone. Mary was silent. They waited for several
+minutes. At last instinct rather than hearing made them turn to see a
+figure advancing down the room.
+
+Both instantly recognized the celebrated Miss Berber. A small, slim
+woman, obviously light-boned and supple, she seemed to move forward
+like a ripple. Her naturally pale face, with its curved scarlet lips and
+slanting eyes, was set on a long neck, and round her small head a heavy
+swathe of black hair was held by huge scarlet pins. Her dress, cut in
+a narrow V at the neck, was all of semi-transparent reds, the brilliant
+happy reds of the Chinese. In fact, but for her head, she would have
+been only half visible as she advanced against the background of the
+screen. Mary's impression of her was blurred, but Stefan, whose artist's
+eye observed everything, noticed that her narrow feet were encased in
+heelless satin shoes which followed the natural shape of the feet like
+gloves.
+
+"Mr. and Mrs. Byrd! How do you do?" she murmured, and her voice
+was light-breathed, a mere memory of sound. It suggested that she
+customarily mislaid it, and recaptured only an echo.
+
+"Pull that other couch a little nearer, please," she waved to Stefan,
+appropriating the one from which they had just risen. Upon this she
+stretched her full length, propping the cushions comfortably under her
+shoulders.
+
+"Do you smoke?" she breathed, and stretching an arm produced from a
+hidden drawer in the table at her elbow cigarettes in a box of
+black lacquer, and matches in one of red. Mary declined, but Stefan
+immediately lighted a cigarette for himself and held a match for Miss
+Berber. Mary and he settled themselves on the couch which he drew up,
+and which slipped readily over the tiles.
+
+"Now we can talk," exhaled their hostess on a spiral of smoke. "I never
+see strangers in the morning, not even friends of dear Connie's, but
+there was something in the name--" She seemed to be fingering a small
+knob protruding from the lacquer of her couch. It must have been a bell,
+for in a moment the green maiden appeared.
+
+"Chloris, has that picture come for the sylvan fitting room?" she
+murmured. "Yes? Bring it, please." Her gesture seemed to waft the damsel
+over the floor. During this interlude the Byrds were silent, Stefan
+hugely entertained, Mary beginning to feel a slight antagonism toward
+this super-casual dressmaker.
+
+A moment and the attendant nymph reappeared, bearing a large canvas
+framed in glistening green wood.
+
+"Against the table--toward Mr. Byrd." Miss Berber supplemented the
+murmur with an indicative gesture. "You know that?" dropped from her
+lips as the nymph glided away.
+
+It was Stefan's pastoral of the dancing faun. He nodded gaily, but Mary
+felt herself blushing. Her husband's work destined for a fitting room!
+
+"I thought so," Miss Berber enunciated through a breath of smoke.
+"I picked it up the other day. Quite lovely. My sylvan fitting room
+required just that note. I use it for country raiment only. Atmosphere,
+Mr. Byrd. I want my clients to feel young when they are preparing for
+the country. I am glad to see you here."
+
+Stefan reciprocated. So far, Miss Berber had ignored Mary.
+
+"I might consult you about my next color scheme--original artists are so
+rare. I change this room every year." Her eyelids drooped.
+
+At this point Mary ventured to draw attention to herself.
+
+"Why is it, Miss Berber," she asked in her clear English voice, "that
+you have only couches here?"
+
+Felicity's lids trembled; she half looked up. "How seldom one hears
+a beautiful voice," she uttered. "Chairs, Mrs. Byrd, destroy women's
+beauty. Why sit, when one can recline? My clients may not wear corsets;
+reclining encourages them to feel at ease without."
+
+Mary found Miss Berber's affectations absurd, but this explanation
+heightened her respect for her intelligence. "Method in her madness,"
+she quoted to herself.
+
+"Miss Berber, I want you to create a gown for my wife. I am sure when
+you look at her you will be interested in the idea." Stefan expected
+every one to pay tribute to Mary's beauty.
+
+Again Miss Berber's fingers strayed. The nymph appeared. "How long
+have I, Chloris? ... Half an hour? Then send me Daphne. You notice the
+silence, Mr. Byrd? It rests my clients, brings health to their nerves.
+Without it, I could not do my work."
+
+Mary smiled as she mentally contrasted these surroundings with
+Farraday's office, where she had last heard that expression. Was quiet
+so rare a privilege in America, she wondered?
+
+A moment, and a second damsel emerged, brown-haired, clad in a paler
+green, and carrying paper and pencil. Not until this ministrant had
+seated herself at the foot of Miss Berber's couch did that lady refer
+to Stefan's request. Then, propping herself on her elbow, she at last
+looked full at Mary. What she saw evidently pleased her, for she allowed
+herself a slight smile. "Ah," she breathed, "an evening, or a house
+gown?"
+
+"Evening," interposed Stefan. Then to Mary, "You look your best
+decolletee, you know."
+
+"Englishwomen always do," murmured Miss Berber.
+
+"Will you kindly take off your hat and coat, and stand up, Mrs. Byrd?"
+Mary complied, feeling uncomfortably like a cloak model.
+
+"Classic, pure classic. How seldom one sees it!" Miss Berber's voice
+became quite audible. "Gold, of course, classic lines, gold sandals.
+A fillet, but no ornaments. You wish to wear this raiment during the
+ensuing months, Mrs. Byrd?" Mary nodded. "Then write Demeter type," the
+designer interpolated to her satellite, who was taking notes. "Otherwise
+it would of course be Artemis--or Aphrodite even?" turning for agreement
+to Stefan. "Would you say Aphrodite?"
+
+"I always do," beamed he, delighted.
+
+At this point the first nymph, Chloris, again appeared, and at a motion
+of Miss Berber's hand rapidly and silently measured Mary, the paler hued
+nymph assisting her as scribe.
+
+"Mr. Byrd," pronounced the autocrat of the establishment, when at the
+conclusion of these rites the attendants had faded from the room. "I
+never design for less than two hundred dollars. Such a garment as I
+have in mind for your wife, queenly and abundant--" her hands waved in
+illustration--"would cost three hundred. But--" her look checked Mary
+in an exclamation of refusal--"we belong to the same world, the world
+of art, not of finance. Yes?" She smiled. "Your painting, Mr. Byrd, is
+worth three times what I gave for it, and Mrs. Byrd will wear my raiment
+as few clients can. It will give me pleasure"--her lids drooped
+to illustrate finality--"to make this garment for the value of
+the material, which will be--" her lips smiled amusement at the
+bagatelle--"between seventy and eighty-five dollars--no more." She
+ceased.
+
+
+Mary felt uncomfortable. Why should she accept such a favor at the hands
+of this poseuse? Stefan, however, saved her the necessity of decision.
+He leapt to his feet, all smiles.
+
+"Miss Berber," he cried, "you honor us, and Mary will glorify your
+design. It is probable," he beamed, "that we cannot afford a dress at
+all, but I disregard that utterly." He shrugged, and snapped a finger.
+"You have given me an inspiration. As soon as the dress arrives, I shall
+paint Mary as Demeter. Mille remerciements!" Bending, he kissed Miss
+Berber's hand in the continental manner. Mary, watching, felt a tiny
+prick of jealousy. "He never kissed my hand," she thought, and instantly
+scorned herself for the idea.
+
+The designer smiled languidly up at Stefan. "I am happy," she murmured.
+"No fittings, Mrs. Byrd. We rarely fit, except the model gowns. You will
+have the garment in a week. Au revoir." Her eyes closed. They turned
+to find a high-busted woman entering the room, accompanied by two young
+girls. As they departed a breath-like echo floated after them, "Oh,
+really, Mrs. Van Sittart--still those corsets? I can do nothing for you,
+you know." Tones of shrill excuse penetrated to the lift door. At the
+curb below stood a dyspeptically stuffed limousine, guarded by two men
+in puce liveries.
+
+The Byrds swung southward in silence, but suddenly Stefan heaved a
+great breath. "Nom d'un nom d'un nom d'un vieux bonhomme!" he exploded,
+voicing in that cumulative expletive his extreme satisfaction with the
+morning.
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+
+Constance Elliot had not boasted her stage-management in vain. On the
+first Saturday in January all proceeded according to schedule. The
+Danae, beautifully framed, stood at the farther end of Constance's
+double drawing-room, from which all other mural impedimenta, together
+with most of the furniture, had been removed. Expertly lighted, the
+picture glowed in the otherwise obscure room like a thing of flame.
+
+Two hundred ticket holders came, saw, and were conquered. Farraday, in
+his most correct cutaway, personally conducted a tour of three
+eminent critics to the Village. Sir Micah, the English curator of the
+Metropolitan, reflectively tapping an eye-glass upon an uplifted finger
+tip, pronounced the painting a turning-point in American art. Four
+reporters--whose presence in his immediate vicinity Constance had
+insured--transferred this utterance to their note books. Artists gazed,
+and well-dressed women did not forbear to gush. Tea, punch, and yellow
+suffrage cakes were consumed in the dining room. There was much noise
+and excessive heat. In short, the occasion was a success.
+
+Toward the end, when few people remained except the genial Sir Micah,
+whom Constance was judiciously holding with tea, smiles, and a good
+cigar, the all-important Constantine arrived. Prompted, Sir Micah was
+induced to repeat his verdict. But the picture spoke for itself, and
+the famous dealer was visibly impressed. Constance was able to eat her
+dinner at last with a comfortable sense of accomplishment. She was only
+sorry that the Byrds had not been there to appreciate her strategy.
+Stefan, indeed, did appear for half an hour, but Mary's courage had
+failed her entirely. She had succumbed to an attack of stage fright and
+shut herself up at home.
+
+As for Stefan, he had developed one of his most contrary moods. Refusing
+conventional attire, he clad himself in the baggy trousers and flowing
+tie of his student days, under the illusion that he was thus defying
+the prejudices of Philistia. He was unaware that the Philistines,
+as represented by the gentlemen of the press, considered his costume
+quintessentially correct for an artist just returned from Paris, and
+would have been grieved had he appeared otherwise. Unconsciously playing
+to the gallery, Stefan on arrival squared himself against a doorway and
+eyed the crowds with a frown of disapprobation. He had not forgotten his
+early snubs from the dealers, and saw in every innocent male visitor one
+of the fraternity.
+
+Constance, in her bid for publicity, had sold most of her tickets to the
+socially prominent, so that Stefan was soon surrounded by voluble ladies
+unduly furred, corseted, and jeweled. He found these unbeautiful, and
+his misanthropy, which had been quiescent of late, rose rampant.
+
+Presently he was introduced to a stout matron, whose costume centered in
+an enormous costal cascade of gray pearls.
+
+"Mr. Byrd," she gushed, "I dote on art. I've made a study of it, and I
+can say that your picture is a triumph."
+
+"Madam," he fairly scowled, "it is as easy for the rich to enter the
+kingdom of Art as for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle."
+Leaving her pink with offense, he turned his back and, shaking off other
+would-be admirers, sought his hostess.
+
+"My God, I can't stand any more of this--I'm off," he confided to her.
+Constance was beginning to know her man. She gave him a quick scrutiny.
+"Yes, I think you'd better be," she agreed, "before you spoil any of
+my good work. An absent lion is better than a snarling one. Run home to
+Mary." She dismissed him laughingly, and Stefan catapulted himself
+out of the house, thereby missing the attractive Miss Berber by a few
+minutes. Dashing home across the Square, he flung himself on the divan
+with every appearance of exhaustion. "Sing to me, Mary," he implored.
+
+"Why, Stefan," she asked, startled, "wasn't it a success? What's the
+matter?"
+
+"Success!" he scoffed. "Oh, yes. They all gushed and gurgled and
+squeaked and squalled. Horrible! Sing, dearest; I must hear something
+beautiful."
+
+Failing to extract more from him, she complied.
+
+The next day brought a full account of his success from Constance,
+and glowing tributes from the papers. The head-lines ranged from
+"Suffragettes Unearth New Genius" to "Distinguished Exhibit at Home of
+Theodore M. Elliot." The verdict was unanimous. A new star had risen in
+the artistic firmament. One look at the headings, and Stefan dropped
+the papers in disgust, but Mary pored over them all, and found him quite
+willing to listen while she read eulogistic extracts aloud.
+
+Thus started, the fuse of publicity burnt brightly. Constance's
+carefully planned follow-up articles appeared, and reporters besieged
+the Byrds' studio. Unfortunately for Mary, these gentry soon discovered
+that she was the Danae's original, which fact created a mild succes de
+scandale. Personal paragraphs appeared about her and her writing, and,
+greatly embarrassed, she disconnected the door-bell for over a week. But
+the picture was all the more talked about. In a week Constantine had it
+on exhibition; in three, he had sold it for five thousand dollars to a
+tobacco millionaire.
+
+"Mary," groaned Stefan when he heard the news, "we have given in to
+Mammon. We are capitalists."
+
+"Oh, dear, think of our beautiful picture going to some odious nouveau
+riche!" Mary sighed. But she was immeasurably relieved that Stefan's
+name was made, and that they were permanently lifted from the ranks of
+the needy.
+
+That very day, as if to illustrate their change of status, Mrs. Corriani
+puffed up the stairs with the news that the flat immediately below
+them had been abandoned over night. The tenants, a dark couple of
+questionable habits and nationality, had omitted the formality of paying
+their rent--the flat was on the market. The outcome was that Stefan
+and Mary, keeping their studio as a workshop, overflowed into the flat
+beneath, and found themselves in possession of a bed and bathroom, a
+kitchen and maid's room, and a sitting room. These they determined
+to furnish gradually, and Mary looked forward to blissful mornings
+at antique stores and auctions. She had been brought up amidst the
+Chippendale, old oak, and brasses of a cathedral close, and new
+furniture was anathema to her. A telephone and a colored maid-servant
+were installed. Their picnicking days were over.
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+
+True to her word, Constance arranged a reception in the Byrds' honor, at
+which they were to meet Felicity Berber. The promise of this encounter
+reconciled Stefan to the affair, and he was moreover enthusiastically
+looking forward to Mary's appearance in her new gown. This had arrived,
+and lay swathed in tissue paper in its box. In view of their change
+of fortune they had, in paying the account of seventy-five dollars,
+concocted a little note to Miss Berber, hoping she would now reconsider
+her offer, and render them a bill for her design. This note, written
+and signed by Mary in her upright English hand, brought forth a
+characteristic reply. On black paper and in vermilion ink arrived two
+lines of what Mary at first took to be Egyptian hieroglyphics. Studied
+from different angles, these yielded at last a single sentence: "A
+gift is a gift, and repays itself." This was followed by a signature
+traveling perpendicularly down the page in Chinese fashion. It was
+outlined in an oblong of red ink, but was itself written in green, the
+capitals being supplied with tap-roots extending to the base of each
+name. Mary tossed the letter over to Stefan with a smile. He looked at
+it judicially.
+
+"There's draughtsmanship in that," he said; "she might have made an
+etcher. It's drawing, but it's certainly not handwriting."
+
+On the evening of the party Stefan insisted on helping Mary to dress.
+Together they opened the great green box and spread its contents on the
+bed. The Creator of Raiment had not done things by halves. In addition
+to the gown, she had supplied a wreath of pale white and gold metals,
+representing two ears of wheat arranged to meet in a point over
+the brow, and a pair of gilded shoes made on the sandal plan, with
+silver-white buckles. Pinned to the gown was a printed green slip,
+reading "No corsets, petticoats or jewelry may be worn with this garb."
+
+The dress was of heavy gold tissue, magnificently draped in generous
+classic folds. It left the arms bare, the drapery being fastened on
+either shoulder with great brooches of white metal, reproduced, as
+Stefan at once recognized, from Greek models. Along all the edges of the
+drapery ran a border of ears of wheat, embroidered in deep gold and
+pale silver. Mary, who had hitherto only peeped at the gown, felt quite
+excited when she saw it flung across the bed.
+
+"Oh, Stefan, I do think it will be becoming," she cried, her cheeks
+bright pink. She had never dreamed of owning such a dress.
+
+He was enchanted. "It's a work of art. Very few women could wear it, but
+on you--! Well, it's worthy of you, Beautiful."
+
+During the dressing he made her quite nervous by his exact attention to
+every detail. The arrangement of her hair and the precise position of
+the wreath had to be tried and tried again, but the result justified
+him.
+
+"Olympian Deity," he cried, "I must kneel to you!" And so he did,
+gaily adoring, with a kiss for the hem of her robe. They started in the
+highest spirits, Stefan correct this time in an immaculate evening suit
+which Mary had persuaded him to order. As they prepared to enter the
+drawing room he whispered, "You'll be a sensation. I'm dying to see
+their faces."
+
+"Don't make me nervous," she whispered back.
+
+By nature entirely without self-consciousness, she had become very
+sensitive since the Danae publicity. But her nervousness only heightened
+her color, and as with her beautiful walk she advanced into the room
+there was an audible gasp from every side. Constance pounced upon her.
+
+"You perfectly superb creature! You ought to have clouds rolling under
+your feet. There, I can't express myself. Come and receive homage. Mr.
+Byrd, you're the luckiest man on earth--I hope you deserve it all--but
+then of course no man could. Mary, here are two friends of yours--Mr.
+Byrd, come and be presented to Felicity."
+
+Farraday and McEwan had advanced toward them and immediately formed
+the nucleus of a group which gathered about Mary. Stefan followed his
+hostess across the room to a green sofa, on which, cigarette in hand,
+reclined Miss Berber, surrounded by a knot of interested admirers.
+
+"Yes, Connie," that lady murmured, with the ghost of a smile, "I've met
+Mr. Byrd. He brought his wife to the Studio." She extended a languid
+hand to Stefan, who bowed over it.
+
+"Ah! I might have known you had a hand in that effect," Constance
+exclaimed, looking across the room toward Mary.
+
+"Of course you might," the other sighed, following her friend's eyes.
+"It's perfect, I think; don't you agree, Mr. Byrd?" and she actually
+rose from the sofa to obtain a better view.
+
+"Absolutely," answered Stefan, riveted in his turn upon her.
+
+Miss Berber was clad in black tulle, so transparent as barely to obscure
+her form. Sleeves she had none. A trifle of gauze traveled over one
+shoulder, leaving the other bare save for a supporting strap of tiny
+scarlet beads. Her triple skirt was serrated like the petals of a black
+carnation, and outlined with the same minute beads. Her bodice could
+scarcely be said to exist, so deep was its V. From her ears long
+ornaments of jet depended, and a comb in scarlet bead-work ran wholly
+across one side of her head. A flower of the same hue and workmanship
+trembled from the point of her corsage. She wore no rings, but her nails
+were reddened, and her sleek black hair and scarlet lips completed the
+chromatic harmony. The whole effect was seductive, but so crisp as to
+escape vulgarity.
+
+"I must paint you, Miss Berber," was Stefan's comment.
+
+"All the artists say that." She waved a faint expostulation.
+
+Her hands, he thought, had the whiteness and consistency of a camelia.
+
+"All the artists are not I, however," he answered with a smiling shrug.
+
+"Greek meets Greek," thought Constance, amused, turning away to other
+guests.
+
+"I admit that." Miss Berber lit another cigarette. "I have seen your
+Danae. The people who have painted me have been fools. Obvious--treating
+me like an advertisement for cold cream."
+
+She breathed a sigh, and sank again to the sofa. Her lids drooped as if
+in weariness of such banalities. Stefan sat beside her, the manner of
+both eliminating the surrounding group.
+
+"One must have subtlety, must one not?" she murmured.
+
+How subtle she was, he thought; how mysterious, in spite of her obvious
+posing! He could not even tell whether she was interested in him.
+
+"I shall paint you, Miss Berber," he said, watching her, "as a Nixie.
+Water creatures, you know, without souls."
+
+"No soul?" she reflected, lingering on a puff of smoke. "How chic!"
+
+Stefan was delighted. Hopefully, he broke into French. She replied with
+fluent ease, but with a strange, though charming, accent. The exotic
+French fitted her whole personality, he felt, as English could not do.
+He was pricked by curiosity as to her origin, and did not hesitate to
+ask it, but she gave her shadow of a smile, and waved her cigarette
+vaguely. "Quien sabe?" she shrugged.
+
+"Do you know Spanish?" he asked in French, seeking a clue.
+
+"Only what one picks up in California." He was no nearer a solution.
+
+"Were you out there long?"
+
+She looked at him vaguely. "I should like some coffee, please."
+
+Defeated, he was obliged to fetch a cup. When he returned, it was to
+find her talking monosyllabic English to a group of men.
+
+Farraday and McEwan had temporarily resigned Mary to a stream of
+newcomers, and stood watching the scene from the inner drawing room.
+
+"James," said McEwan, "get on to the makeup of the crowd round our lady,
+and compare it with the specimens rubbering the little Berber."
+
+Farraday smiled in his grave, slow way.
+
+"You're right, Mac, the substance and the shadow."
+
+Many of the women seated about the room were covertly staring at
+Felicity, but so far none had joined her group. This consisted, besides
+Stefan, of two callow and obviously enthralled youths, a heavy semi-bald
+man with paunched eyes and a gluttonous mouth, and a tall languid person
+wearing tufts of hair on unexpected parts of his face, and showing the
+hands of a musician.
+
+Round Mary stood half a dozen women, their host, the kindly and
+practical Mr. Elliot, a white-haired man of distinguished bearing, and a
+gigantic young viking with tawny hair and beard and powerful hands.
+
+"That's Gunther, an A1 sculptor," said McEwan, indicating the viking,
+who was looking at Mary as his ancestors might have looked at a vision
+of Freia.
+
+"They're well matched, eh, James?"
+
+"As well as she could be," the other answered gravely. McEwan looked at
+his friend. "Mon," he said, relapsing to his native speech, "come and
+hae a drop o' the guid Scotch."
+
+Constance had determined that Felicity should dance, in spite of her
+well-known laziness. At this point she crossed the room to attack
+her, expecting a difficult task, but, to her surprise, Felicity hardly
+demurred. After a moment of sphinx-like communing, she dropped her
+cigarette and rose.
+
+"Mr. Byrd is going to paint me as something without a soul--I think I
+will dance," she cryptically vouchsafed.
+
+"Shall I play?" offered Constance, delighted.
+
+Miss Berber turned to the languid musician.
+
+"Have you your ocarina, Marchmont?" she breathed.
+
+"I always carry it, Felicity," he replied, with a reproachful look,
+drawing from his pocket what appeared to be a somewhat contorted
+meerschaum pipe.
+
+"Then no piano to-night, Connie. A little banal, the piano, perhaps."
+Her hands waved vaguely.
+
+A space was cleared; chairs were arranged.
+
+Miss Berber vanished behind a portiere. The languid Marchmont draped
+himself in a corner, and put the fat little meerschaum to his lips. A
+clear, jocund sound, a mere thread of music, as from the pipe of some
+hidden faun, penetrated the room. The notes trembled, paused, and fell
+to the minor. Felicity, feet bare, toes touched with scarlet, wafted
+into the room. Her dancing was incredibly light; she looked like
+some exotic poppy swaying to an imperceptible breeze. The dance was
+languorously sad, palely gay, a thing half asleep, veiled. It seemed
+always about to break into fierce life, yet did not. The scent of
+mandragora hung over it--it was as if the dancer, drugged, were dreaming
+of the sunlight.
+
+When, waving a negligent hand to the applause, Felicity passed Stefan at
+the end of her dance, he caught a murmured phrase from her.
+
+"Not soulless, perhaps, but sleeping." Whether she meant this as an
+explanation of her dance or of herself he was not sure.
+
+Mary watched the dance with admiration, and wished to compare her
+impressions of it with her husband's. She tried to catch his eye across
+the room at the end, but he had drifted away toward the dining room.
+Momentarily disappointed, she turned to find Farraday at her elbow, and
+gladly let him lead her, also, in search of refreshments. There was
+a general movement in that direction, and the drawing room was almost
+empty as McEwan, purpose in his eye, strode across it to Constance. He
+spoke to her in an undertone.
+
+"Sing? Does she? I had no idea! She never tells one such things," his
+hostess replied. "Do you think she would? But she has no music. You
+could play for her? How splendid, Mr. McEwan. How perfectly lovely
+of you. I'll arrange it." She hurried out, leaving McEwan smiling at
+nothing in visible contentment. In a few minutes she returned with Mary.
+
+"Of course I will if you wish it," the latter was saying, "but I've no
+music, and only know foolish little ballads."
+
+"Mr. McEwan says he can vamp them all, and it will be too delightful to
+have something from each of my women stars," Constance urged. "Now I'll
+leave you two to arrange it, and in a few minutes I'll get every one
+back from the dining room," she nodded, slipping away again.
+
+"Cruel man, you've given me away," Mary smiled.
+
+"I always brag about my friends," grinned McEwan. They went over to the
+piano.
+
+"What price the Bard! Do you know this?" His fingers ran into the old
+air for "Sigh No More, Ladies." She nodded.
+
+"Yes, I like that."
+
+"And for a second," he spun round on his stool, "what do you say to a
+duet?" His candid blue eyes twinkled at her.
+
+"A duet!" she exclaimed in genuine surprise. "Do you sing, Mr. McEwan?"
+
+"Once in a while," and, soft pedal down, he played a few bars of
+Marzials' "My True Love Hath My Heart," humming the words in an easy
+barytone.
+
+"Oh, what fun!" exclaimed Mary. "I love that." They tried it over, below
+their breaths.
+
+The room was filling again. People began to settle down expectantly;
+McEwan struck his opening chords.
+
+Just as Mary's first note sounded, Stefan and Felicity entered the room.
+He started in surprise; then Mary saw him smile delightedly, and they
+both settled themselves well in front.
+
+"'Men were deceivers ever,'" sang Mary, with simple ease, and "'Hey
+nonny, nonny.'" The notes fell gaily; her lips and eyes smiled.
+
+There was generous applause at the end of the little song. Then McEwan
+struck the first chords of the duet.
+
+"'My true love hath my heart,'" Mary sang clearly, head up, eyes
+shining. "'My true love hath my heart,'" replied McEwan, in his cheery
+barytone.
+
+"'--And I have his,'" Mary's bell tones announced.
+
+"'--And I have his,'" trolled McEwan.
+
+"'There never was a better bargain driven,'" the notes came, confident
+and glad, from the golden figure with its clear-eyed, glowing face. They
+ended in a burst of almost defiant optimism.
+
+Applause was hearty and prolonged. McEwan slipped from his stool
+and sought a cigarette in the adjoining room. There was a general
+congratulatory movement toward Mary, in which both Stefan and Felicity
+joined. Then people again began to break into groups. Felicity found her
+sofa, Mary a chair. McEwan discovered Farraday under the arch between
+the two drawing-rooms, and stood beside him to watch the crowd. Stefan
+had moved with Felicity toward her sofa, and, as she disposed herself,
+she seemed to be talking to him in French. McEwan and Farraday continued
+their survey. Mary was surrounded by people, but her eyes strayed
+across the room. Felicity appeared almost animated, but Stefan seemed
+inattentive; he fidgeted, and looked vague.
+
+A moment more, and quite abruptly he crossed the room, and planted
+himself down beside Mary.
+
+"Ah," sighed McEwan, apparently a propos of nothing, and with a trace of
+Scotch, "James, I'll now hae another whusky."
+
+
+
+
+PART III
+
+THE NESTLING
+
+I
+
+
+Stefan's initial and astonishing success was not to be repeated that
+winter. The great Constantine, anxious to benefit by the flood tide of
+his client's popularity, had indeed called at the studio in search
+of more material, but after a careful survey, had decided against
+exhibiting "Tempest" and "Pursuit." Before these pictures he had stood
+wrapped in speculation for some time, pursing his lips and fingering
+the over-heavy seals of his fob. Mary had watched him eagerly, deeply
+curious as to the effect of the paintings. But Stefan had been careless
+to the point of rudeness; he had long since lost interest in his old
+work. When at last the swarthy little dealer, who was a Greek Jew, and
+had the keen, perceptions of both races, had shaken his head, Mary was
+not surprised, was indeed almost glad.
+
+"Mr. Byrd," Constantine had pronounced, in his heavy, imperfect English,
+"I think we would make a bad mistake to exhibit these paintings now.
+Technically they are clever, oh, very clever indeed, but they would
+be unpopular; and this once," he smiled shrewdly, "the public would
+be right about it. Your Danae was a big conception as well as fine
+painting; it had inspiration--feeling--" his thick but supple hands
+circled in emphasis--"we don't want to go back simply to cleverness.
+When you paint me something as big again as that one I exhibit it;
+otherwise," with a shrug, "I think we spoil our market."
+
+After this visit Stefan, quite unperturbed, had turned the two fantasies
+to the wall.
+
+"I dare say Constantine is right about them," he said; "they are rather
+crazy things, and anyhow, I'm sick of them."
+
+Mary was quite relieved to have them hidden. The merman in particular
+had got upon her nerves of late.
+
+As the winter advanced, the Byrds' circle of acquaintances grew,
+and many visitors dropped into the studio for tea. These showed much
+interest in Stefan's new picture, a large study of Mary in the guise of
+Demeter, for which she was posing seated, robed in her Berber gown. Miss
+Mason in particular was delighted with the painting, which she dubbed
+a "companion piece" to the Danae. The story of Constantine's decision
+against the two salon canvases got about and, amusingly enough,
+heightened the Byrds' popularity. The Anglo-Saxon public is both to
+take its art neat, preferring it coated with a little sentiment. It now
+became accepted that Stefan's genius was due to his wife, whose love had
+lighted the torch of inspiration.
+
+"Ah, Mr. Byrd," Miss Mason had summed up the popular view, in one of her
+rare romantic moments, "the love of a good woman--!" Stefan had looked
+completely vague at this remark, and Mary had burst out laughing.
+
+"Why, Sparrow," for so, to Miss Mason's delight, she had named her,
+"don't be Tennysonian, as Stefan would say. It was Stefan's power to
+feel love, and not mine to call it out, that painted the Danae," and she
+looked at him with proud tenderness.
+
+But the Sparrow was unconvinced. "You can't tell me. If 'twas all in
+him, why didn't some other girl over in Paris call it out long ago?"
+
+"Lots tried," grinned Stefan, with his cheeky-boy expression.
+
+"Ain't he terrible," Miss Mason sighed, smiling. She adored Mary's
+husband, but consistently disapproved of him.
+
+Try as she would, Mary failed to shake her friends' estimate of her
+share in the family success. It became the fashion to regard her as
+a muse, and she, who had felt oppressed by Stefan's lover-like
+deification, now found her friends, too, conspiring to place her on a
+pedestal. Essentially simple and modest, she suffered real discomfort
+from the cult of adoration that surrounded her. Coming from a British
+community which she felt had underestimated her, she now found herself
+made too much of. A smaller woman would have grown vain amid so much
+admiration; Mary only became inwardly more humble, while outwardly
+carrying her honors with laughing deprecation.
+
+For some time after the night of Constance's reception, Stefan had shown
+every evidence of contentment, but as the winter dragged into a cold
+and slushy March he began to have recurrent moods of his restless
+irritability. By this time Mary was moving heavily; she could no longer
+keep brisk pace with him in his tramps up the Avenue, but walked more
+slowly and for shorter distances. She no longer sprang swiftly from
+her chair or ran to fetch him a needed tool; her every movement was
+matronly. But she was so well, so entirely normal, as practically to be
+unconscious of a change to which her husband was increasingly alive.
+
+Another source of Stefan's dissatisfaction lay in the progress of his
+Demeter. This picture showed the Goddess enthroned under the shade of a
+tree, beyond which spread harvest fields in brilliant sunlight. At her
+feet a naked boy, brown from the sun, played with a pile of red and
+golden fruits. In the distance maids and youths were dancing. The
+Goddess sat back drowsily, her eyelids drooping, her hands and arms
+relaxed over her chair. She had called all this richness into being, and
+now in the heat of the day she rested, brooding over the fecund earth.
+So far, the composition was masterly, but the tones lacked the necessary
+depth; they were vivid where they should have been warm, and he felt the
+deficiency without yet having been able to remedy it.
+
+"Oh, damn!" said Stefan one morning, throwing down his brush. "This
+picture is architectural, absolutely. What possessed me to try such a
+conception? I can only do movement. I can't be static. Earth! I don't
+understand it--everything good I've done has been made of air and fire,
+or water." He turned an irritable face to Mary.
+
+"Why did you encourage me in this?"
+
+She looked up in frank astonishment, about to reply, but he forestalled
+her.
+
+"Oh, yes, I know I was pleased with the idea--it isn't your fault, of
+course, and yet--Oh, what's the use!" He slapped down his pallette and
+made for the door. "I'm off to get some air," he called.
+
+Mary felt hurt and uneasy. The nameless doubts of the autumn again
+assailed her. What would be the end, she wondered, of her great
+adventure? The distant prospect vaguely troubled her, but she turned
+easily from it to the immediate future, which held a blaze of joy
+sufficient to obliterate all else.
+
+The thought of her baby was to Mary like the opening of the gates of
+paradise to Christian the Pilgrim. Her heart shook with joy of it. She
+passed through her days now only half conscious of the world about
+her. She had, together with her joy, an extraordinary sense of physical
+well-being, of the actual value of the body. For the first time she
+became actively interested in her beauty. Even on her honeymoon she had
+never dressed to please her husband with the care she now gave to the
+donning of her loose pink and white negligees and the little boudoir
+caps she had bought to wear with them. That Stefan paid her fewer
+compliments, that he often failed to notice small additions to her
+wardrobe, affected her not at all. "Afterwards he will be pleased;
+afterwards he will love me more than ever," she thought, but, even so,
+knew that it was not for him she was now fair, but for that other. She
+did not love Stefan less, but her love was to be made flesh, and it was
+that incarnation she now adored. If she had been given to self-analysis
+she might have asked what it boded that she had never--save for that one
+moment's adoration of his genius the day he completed the Danae--felt
+for Stefan the abandonment of love she felt for his coming child. She
+might have wondered, but she did not, for she felt too intensely in
+these days to have much need of thought. She loved her husband--he was
+a great man--they were to have a child. The sense of those three facts
+made up her cosmos.
+
+Farraday had asked her in vain on more than one occasion for another
+manuscript. The last time she shook her head, with one of her rare
+attempts at explanation, made less rarely to him than to her other
+friends.
+
+"No, Mr. Farraday, I can't think about imaginary children just now.
+There's a spell over me--all the world waits, and I'm holding my breath.
+Do you see?"
+
+He took her hand between both his.
+
+"Yes, my dear child, I do," he answered, his mouth twisting into its
+sad and gentle smile. He had come bringing a sheaf of spring flowers,
+narcissus, and golden daffodils, which she was holding in her lap. He
+thought as he said good-bye that she looked much more like Persephone
+than the Demeter of Stefan's picture.
+
+In spite of her deep-seated emotion, Mary was gay and practical
+enough in these late winter days, with her small household tasks, her
+occasional shopping, and her sewing. This last had begun vaguely to
+irritate Stefan, so incessant was it.
+
+"Mary, do put down that sewing," he would exclaim; or "Don't sing the
+song of the shirt any more to-day;" and she would laughingly fold her
+work, only to take it up instinctively again a few minutes later.
+
+One evening he came upon her bending over a table in their sitting room,
+tracing a fine design on cambric with a pencil. Something in her pose
+and figure opened a forgotten door of memory; he watched her puzzled for
+a moment, then with a sudden exclamation ran upstairs, and returned with
+a pad of paper and a box of water-color paints. He was visibly excited.
+"Here, Mary," he said, thrusting a brush into her hand and clearing a
+place on the table. "Do something for me. Make a drawing on this pad,
+anything you like, whatever first comes into your head." His tone was
+eagerly importunate. She looked up in surprise, "Why, you funny boy!
+What shall I draw?"
+
+"That's just it--I don't know. Please draw whatever you want to--it
+doesn't matter how badly--just draw something."
+
+Mystified, but acquiescent, Mary considered for a moment, looking from
+paper to brush, while Stefan watched eagerly.
+
+"Can't I use a pencil?" she asked.
+
+"No, a brush, please, I'll explain afterwards."
+
+"Very well." She attacked the brown paint, then the red, then mixed some
+green. In a few minutes the paper showed a wobbly little house with a
+red roof and a smudged foreground of green grass with the suggestion of
+a shade-giving tree.
+
+"There," she laughed, handing him the pad, "I'm afraid I shall never be
+an artist," and she looked up.
+
+His face had dropped. He was staring at the drawing with an expression
+of almost comic disappointment.
+
+"Why, Stefan," she laughed, rather uncomfortably, "you didn't think I
+could draw, did you?"
+
+"No, no, it isn't that, Mary. It's just--the house. I thought you
+might--perhaps draw birds--or flowers."
+
+"Birds?--or flowers?" She was at a loss.
+
+"It doesn't matter; just an idea."
+
+He crumpled up the little house, and closed the paintbox. "I'm going out
+for awhile; good-bye, dearest"; and, with a kiss, he left the room.
+
+Mary sat still, too surprised for remonstrance, and in a moment heard
+the bang of the flat door.
+
+"Birds, or flowers?" Suddenly she remembered something Stefan had told
+her, on the night of their engagement, about his mother. So that was it.
+Tears came to her eyes. Rather lonely, she went to bed.
+
+Meanwhile Stefan, his head bare in the cold wind, was speeding up the
+Avenue on the top of an omnibus.
+
+"Houses are cages," he said to himself. For some reason, he felt
+hideously depressed.
+
+      *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I called on Miss Berber last evening," Stefan announced casually at
+breakfast the next morning.
+
+"Did you?" replied Mary, surprised, putting down her cup. "Well, did you
+have a nice time?"
+
+"It was mildly amusing," he said, opening the newspaper. The subject
+dropped.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+Mary, who had lived all her life in a small town within sight of the
+open fields, was beginning to feel the confinement of city life.
+Even during her year in London she had joined other girls in weekend
+bicycling excursions out of town, or tubed to Golder's Green or
+Shepherd's Bush in search of country walks. Now that the late snows of
+March had cleared away, she began eagerly to watch for swelling buds in
+the Square, and was dismayed when Stefan told her that the spring, in
+this part of America, was barely perceptible before May.
+
+"That's the first objection I've found to your country, Stefan," she
+said.
+
+He was scowling moodily out of the window. "The first? I see nothing but
+objections."
+
+"Oh, come!" she smiled at him; "it hasn't been so bad, has it?"
+
+"Better than I had expected," he conceded. "But it will soon be April,
+and I remember the leaves in the Luxembourg for so many Aprils back."
+
+She came and put her arm through his. "Do you want to go, dear?"
+
+"Oh, hang it all, Mary, you don't suppose I want to leave you?" he
+answered brusquely, releasing his arm. "I want my own place, that's
+all."
+
+She had, in her quieter way, become just as homesick for England, though
+sharing none of his dislike of her adopted land.
+
+"Well, shall we both go?" she suggested.
+
+He laughed shortly. "Don't be absurd, dearest--what would your doctor
+say to such a notion? No, we've got to stick it out," and he ruffled his
+hair impatiently.
+
+With a suppressed sigh Mary changed the subject. "By the by, I want you
+to meet Dr. Hillyard; I have asked her to tea this afternoon."
+
+"Do you honestly mean it when you say she is not an elderly ironsides
+with spectacles?"
+
+"I honestly assure you she is young and pretty. Moreover, I forbid you
+to talk like an anti-suffragist," she laughed.
+
+"Very well, then, I will be at home," with an answering grin.
+
+And so he was, and on his best behavior, when the little doctor arrived
+an hour later. She had been found by the omniscient Miss Mason,
+and after several visits Mary had more than endorsed the Sparrow's
+enthusiastic praise.
+
+When the slight, well-tailored little figure entered the room Stefan
+found it hard to believe that this fresh-faced girl was the physician,
+already a specialist in her line, to whom Mary's fate had been
+entrusted. For the first time he wondered if he should not have shared
+with Mary some responsibility for her arrangements. But as, with an
+unwonted sense of duty, he questioned the little doctor, his doubts
+vanished. Without a trace of the much hated professional manner she gave
+him glimpses of wide experience, and at one point mentioned an operation
+she had just performed--which he knew by hearsay as one of grave
+difficulty--with the same enthusiastic pleasure another young woman
+might have shown in the description of a successful bargain-hunt. She
+was to Stefan a new type, and he was delighted with her. Mary, watching
+him, thought with affectionate irony that had the little surgeon been
+reported plain of face he would have denied himself in advance both the
+duty and the pleasure of meeting her.
+
+Over their tea, Dr. Hillyard made a suggestion.
+
+"Where are you planning to spend the summer?" she asked.
+
+Stefan looked surprised. "We thought we ought to be here, near you," he
+answered.
+
+"Oh, no," the doctor shook her head; "young couples are always
+martyrizing themselves for these events. By May it will be warm, and
+Mrs. Byrd isn't acclimatized to our American summers. Find a nice
+place not too far from the city--say on Long Island--and I can run out
+whenever necessary. You both like the country, I imagine?"
+
+Stefan was overjoyed. He jumped up.
+
+"Dr. Hillyard, you've saved us. We thought we had to be prisoners,
+and I've been eating my heart out for France. The country will be a
+compromise."
+
+"Yes," said the doctor, smiling a little, "Mrs. Byrd has been longing
+for England for a month or more."
+
+"I never said so!" and "She never told me!" exclaimed Mary and Stefan
+simultaneously.
+
+"No, you didn't," the little doctor nodded wisely at her patient, "but I
+know."
+
+Stefan immediately began to plan an expedition in search of the ideal
+spot, as unspoiled if possible as Shadeham, but much nearer town.
+All through dinner he discussed it, his spirits hugely improved, and
+immediately after rang up Constance Elliot for advice.
+
+"Hold the line," the lady's voice replied, "while I consult." In a
+minute or two she returned.
+
+"Mr. Farraday is dining with us, and I've asked him. He lives at Crab's
+Bay, you know."
+
+"No, I don't," objected Stefan.
+
+"Well, he does," her voice laughed back. "He was born there. He says
+if you like he will come over and talk to you about it, and I, like a
+self-sacrificing hostess, am willing to let him."
+
+"Splendid idea," said Stefan, "ask him to come right over. Mary," he
+called, hanging up the receiver, "Constance is sending Farraday across
+to advise us."
+
+"Oh, dear," said she; "sometimes I feel almost overwhelmed by all the
+favors we receive from our friends."
+
+"Fiddlesticks! They are paid by the pleasure of our society. You
+don't seem to realize that we are unusually interesting and attractive
+people," laughed he with a flourish.
+
+"Vain boy!"
+
+"So I am, and vain of being vain. I believe in being as conceited as
+possible, conceited enough to make one's conceit good."
+
+She smiled indulgently, knowing that, as he was talking nonsense, he
+felt happy.
+
+Farraday appeared in a few minutes, and they settled in a group round
+the fire with coffee and cigarettes. Stefan offered Mary one. She shook
+her head.
+
+"I'm not smoking now, you know."
+
+"Did Dr. Hillyard say so?" he asked quickly.
+
+"No, but--"
+
+"Then don't be poky, dearest." He lit the cigarette and held it out to
+her, but she waved it back.
+
+"Don't tease, dear," she murmured, noticing that Farraday was watching
+them. Stefan with a shrug retained the cigarette in his left hand, and
+smoked it ostentatiously for some minutes, alternately with his own.
+Mary, hoping he was not going to be naughty, embarked on the Long Island
+topic.
+
+"We want to be within an hour of the city," she explained, "but in
+pretty country. We want to keep house, but not to pay too much. We
+should like to be near the sea. Does that sound wildly impossible?"
+
+Farraday fingered his cigarette reflectively.
+
+"I rather think," he said at last, "that my neighborhood most nearly
+meets the requirements. I have several hundred acres at Crab's Bay,
+which belonged to my father, running from the shore halfway to the
+railroad station. The village itself is growing suburban, but the
+properties beyond mine are all large, and keep the country open. We are
+only an hour from the city--hardly more, by automobile."
+
+"Are there many tin cans?" enquired Stefan, flippantly. "In Michigan I
+remember them as the chief suburban decoration."
+
+"Yes?" said Farraday, in his invariably courteous tone, "I've never been
+there. It is a long way from New York."
+
+"Touche," cried Stefan, grinning. "But you would think pessimism
+justified if you'd ever had my experience of rural life."
+
+"Was your father really American?" enquired his guest with apparent
+irrelevance.
+
+"Yes, and a minister."
+
+"Oh, a minister. I see," the other replied, quietly.
+
+"Explains it, does it?" beamed Stefan, who was nothing if not quick.
+They all laughed, and the little duel was ended. Mary took up the broken
+discussion.
+
+"Is there the slightest chance of our finding anything reasonably cheap
+in such a neighborhood?" she asked.
+
+"I was just coming to that," said Farraday. "You would not care to be
+in the village, and any houses that might be for rent there would be
+expensive, I'm afraid. But it so happens there is a cottage on the edge
+of my property where my father's old farmer used to live. After his
+death I put a little furniture in the place, and have occasionally used
+it. But it is entirely unnecessary to me, and you are welcome to it
+for the summer if it would suit you. The rent would be nominal. I don't
+regard it commercially, it's too near my own place."
+
+Mary flushed. "It's most awfully good of you," she said, "but I don't
+know if we ought to accept. I'm afraid you may be making it convenient
+out of kindness."
+
+"Mary, how British!" Stefan interrupted. He had taken lately so to
+labeling her small conventionalities. "Why accuse Mr. Farraday of
+altruistic insincerity? I think his description sounds delightful. Let's
+go tomorrow and see the cottage."
+
+"If you will wait till Sunday," Farraday smiled, "I shall be delighted
+to drive you out. It might be easier for Mrs. Byrd."
+
+Mary again demurred on the score of giving unnecessary trouble, but
+Stefan overrode her, and Farraday was obviously pleased with the plan.
+It was arranged that he should call for them in his car the following
+Sunday, and that they should lunch with him and his mother. When he had
+left Stefan performed a little pas seul around the room.
+
+"Tra-la-la!" he sang; "birds, Mary, trees, water. No more chimney pots,
+no more walking up and down that tunnel of an avenue. See what it is to
+have admiring friends."
+
+Mary flushed again. "Why will you spoil everything by putting it like
+that?"
+
+He stopped and patted her cheek teasingly.
+
+"It's me they admire, Mary, the great artist, creator of the famous
+Danae," and he skipped again, impishly.
+
+Mary was obliged to laugh. "You exasperating creature!" she said, and
+went to bed, while he ran up to the studio to pull out the folding easel
+and sketching-box of his old Brittany days.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+When on the following Sunday morning Farraday drove up to the house,
+Mary was delighted to find Constance Elliot in the tonneau.
+
+"Theodore has begun golfing again, now that the snow has gone," she
+greeted her, "so that I am a grass widow on holidays as well as all the
+week."
+
+"Why don't you learn to play, too?" Mary asked, as they settled
+themselves, Stefan sitting in front with Farraday, who was driving.
+
+"Oh, for your English feet, my dear!" sighed Constance. "They are bigger
+than mine--I dare say so, as I wear fours--but you can walk on them.
+I was brought up to be vain of my extremities, and have worn two-inch
+heels too long to be good for more than a mile. The links would kill me.
+Besides," she sighed again prettily, "dear Theodore is so much happier
+without me."
+
+"How can you, Constance!" objected Mary.
+
+"Yes, my dear," went on the other, her beautiful little hands, which she
+seldom gloved, playing with the inevitable string of jade, "the result
+of modern specialization. Theodore is a darling, and in theory a
+Suffragist, but he has practised the matrimonial division of labor so
+long that he does not know what to do with the woman out of the home."
+
+"This is Queensborough Bridge," she pointed out in a few minutes,
+as they sped up a huge iron-braced incline. "It looks like eight
+pepper-castors on a grid, surmounted by bayonets, but it is very
+convenient."
+
+Mary laughed. Constance's flow of small talk always put her in good
+spirits. She looked about her with interest as the car emerged from
+the bridge into a strange waste land of automobile factories, new
+stone-faced business buildings, and tumbledown wooden cottages. The
+houses, in their disarray, lay as if cast like seeds from some titanic
+hand, to fall, wither or sprout as they listed, regardless of plan. The
+bridge seemed to divide a settled civilization from pioneer country, and
+as they left the factories behind and emerged into fields dotted with
+advertisements and wooden shacks Mary was reminded of stories she had
+read of the far West, or of Australia. Stefan leant back from the front
+seat, and waved at the view.
+
+"Behold the tin can," he cried, "emblem of American civilization!" She
+saw that he was right; the fields on either side were dotted with tins,
+bottles, and other husks of dinners past and gone. Gradually, however,
+this stage was left behind: they began to pass through villages of
+pleasant wooden houses painted white or cream, with green shutters,
+or groups of red-tiled stucco dwellings surrounded by gardens in the
+English manner. Soon these, too, were left, and real country appeared,
+prettily wooded, in which low-roofed homesteads clung timidly to the
+roadside as if in search of company.
+
+"What dear little houses!" Mary exclaimed.
+
+"Yes," said Constance, "that is the Long Island farmhouse type, as good
+architecturally as anything America has produced, but abandoned in favor
+of Oriental bungalows, Italian palaces and French chateaux."
+
+"I should adore a little house like one of those."
+
+"Wait till you see Mr. Farraday's cottage; it's a lamb, and his home
+like it, only bigger. What can one call an augmented lamb? I can only
+think of sheep, which doesn't sound well."
+
+"I'm afraid we should say it was 'twee' in England," Mary smiled, "which
+sounds worse."
+
+"Yes, I'd rather my house were a sheep than a 'twee,' because I do at
+least know that a sheep is useful, and I'm sure a 'twee' can't be."
+
+"It's not a noun, Constance, but an adjective, meaning sweet,"
+translated Mary, laughing. She loved Constance's nonsense because it
+was never more than that. Stefan's absurdities were always personal and,
+often, not without a hidden sting.
+
+"Well," Constance went on, "you must be particularly 'twee' then,
+to James' mother, who is a Quaker from Philadelphia, and an American
+gentlewoman of the old school. His father was a New Englander, and took
+his pleasures sadly, as I tell James he does; but his mother is as warm
+as a dear little toast, and as pleasant--well--as the dinner bell."
+
+"What culinary similes, Constance!"
+
+"My dear, from sheep to mutton is only a step, and I'm so hungry I can
+think only in terms of a menu. And that," she prattled on, "reminds me
+of Mr. McEwan, whose face is the shape of a mutton chop. He is sure to
+be there, for he spends half his time with James. Do you like him?"
+
+"Yes, I do," said Mary; "increasingly."
+
+"He's one of the best of souls. Have you heard his story?"
+
+"No, has he one?"
+
+"Indeed, yes," replied Constance. "The poor creature, who, by the way,
+adores you, is a victim of Quixotism. When he first came to New York he
+married a young girl who lived in his boarding-house and was in trouble
+by another man. Mac found her trying to commit suicide, and, as the
+other man had disappeared, married her to keep her from it. She was
+pretty, I believe, and I think he was fond of her because of her
+terrible helplessness. The first baby died, luckily, but when his own
+was born a year or two later the poor girl was desperately ill, and lost
+most of what little mind she possessed. She developed two manias--the
+common spendthrift one, and the conviction that he was trying to divorce
+her. That was ten years ago. He has to keep her at sanitariums with a
+companion to check her extravagance, and he pays her weekly visits to
+reassure her as to the divorce. She costs him nearly all he makes, in
+doctors' bills and so forth--he never spends a penny on himself, except
+for a cheap trip to Scotland once a year. Yet, with it all, he is one of
+the most cheerful souls alive."
+
+"Poor fellow!" said Mary. "What about the child?"
+
+"He's alive, but she takes very little notice of him. He spends most
+of his time with Mrs. Farraday, who is a saint. James, poor man, adores
+children, and is glad to have him."
+
+"Why hasn't Mr. Farraday married, I wonder?" Mary murmured under the
+covering purr of the car.
+
+"Oh, what a waste," groaned Constance. "An ideal husband thrown away!
+Nobody knows, my dear. I think he was hit very hard years ago, and never
+got over it. He won't say, but I tell him if I weren't ten years older,
+and Theodore in evidence, I should marry him myself out of hand."
+
+"I like him tremendously, but I don't think I should ever have felt
+attracted in that way," said Mary, who was much too natural a woman not
+to be interested in matrimonial speculations.
+
+"That's because you are two of a kind, simple and serious," nodded
+Constance. "I could have adored him."
+
+They had been speeding along a country lane between tall oaks, and,
+breasting a hill, suddenly came upon the sea, half landlocked by curving
+bays and little promontories. Beyond these, on the horizon, the coast
+of Connecticut was softly visible. Mary breathed in great draughts of
+salt-tanged air.
+
+"Oh, how good!" she exclaimed.
+
+"Here we are," cried Constance, as the machine swung past white posts
+into a wooded drive, which curved and curved again, losing and finding
+glimpses of the sea. No buds were out, but each twig bulged with nobbins
+of new life; and the ground, brown still, had the swept and garnished
+look which the March winds leave behind for the tempting of Spring.
+Persephone had not risen, but the earth listened for her step, and the
+air held the high purified quality that presages her coming.
+
+"Lovely, lovely," breathed Mary, her eyes and cheeks glowing.
+
+The car stopped under a porte cochere, before a long brown house of
+heavy clapboards, with shingled roof and green blinds. Farraday jumped
+down and helped Mary out, and the front door opened to reveal the
+shining grin of McEwan, poised above the gray head of a little lady who
+advanced with outstretched hand to greet them.
+
+"My mother--Mrs. Byrd," Farraday introduced.
+
+"I am very pleased to meet thee. My son has told me so much about thee
+and thy husband. Thee must make thyself at home here," beamed the little
+lady, with one of the most engaging smiles Mary had ever beheld.
+
+Stefan was introduced in his turn, and made his best continental bow. He
+liked old ladies, who almost invariably adored him. McEwan greeted him
+with a "Hello," and shook hands warmly with the two women. They all
+moved into the hall, Mary under the wing of Mrs. Farraday, who presently
+took her upstairs to a bedroom.
+
+"Thee must rest here before dinner," said she, smoothing with a tiny
+hand the crocheted bedspread. "Ring this bell if there is anything thee
+wants. Shall I send Mr. Byrd up to thee?"
+
+"Indeed, I'm not a bit tired," said Mary, who had never felt better.
+
+"All the same I would rest a little if I were thee," Mrs. Farraday
+nodded wisely. Mary was fascinated by her grammar, never having met a
+Quaker before. The little lady, who barely reached her guest's shoulder,
+had such an air of mingled sweetness and dignity as to make Mary feel
+she must instinctively yield to her slightest wish. Obediently she lay
+down, and Mrs. Farraday covered her feet.
+
+Mary noticed her fine white skin, soft as a baby's, the thousand tiny
+lines round her gentle eyes, her simple dress of brown silk with a cameo
+at the neck, her little, blue-veined hands. No wonder the son of such a
+woman impressed one with his extraordinary kindliness.
+
+The little lady slipped away, and Mary, feeling unexpected pleasure in
+the quiet room and the soft bed, closed her eyes gratefully.
+
+At luncheon, or rather dinner, for it was obvious that Mrs. Farraday
+kept to the old custom of Sunday meals, a silent, shock-headed boy of
+about ten appeared, whom McEwan with touching pride introduced as his
+son. He was dressed in a kilt and small deerskin sporran, with the
+regulation heavy stockings, tweed jacket and Eton collar.
+
+"For Sundays only--we have to be Yankees on school days, eh, Jamie?"
+explained his father. The boy grinned in speechless assent, instantly
+looking a duplicate of McEwan.
+
+Mary's heart warmed to him at once, he was so shy and clumsy; but
+Stefan, who detested the mere suspicion of loutishness, favored him with
+an absent-minded stare. Mary, who sat on Farraday's right, had the boy
+next her, with his father beyond, Stefan being between Mrs. Farraday
+and Constance. The meal was served by a gray-haired negro, of manners
+so perfect as to suggest the ideal southern servant, already familiar
+to Mary in American fiction. As if in answer to a cue, Mrs. Farraday
+explained across the table that Moses and his wife had come from
+Philadelphia with her on her marriage, and had been born in the
+South before the war. Mary's literary sense of fitness was completely
+satisfied by this remark, which was received by Moses with a smile of
+gentle pride.
+
+"James," said Constance, "I never get tired of your mother's house; it
+is so wonderful to have not one thing out of key."
+
+Farraday smiled. "Bless you, she wouldn't change a footstool. It is
+all just as when she married, and much of it, at that, belonged to her
+mother."
+
+This explained what, with Mary's keen eye for interiors, had puzzled
+her when they first arrived. She had expected to see more of the perfect
+taste and knowledge displayed in Farraday's office, instead of which
+the house, though dignified and hospitable, lacked all traces of the
+connoisseur. She noticed in particular the complete absence of any color
+sense. All the woodwork was varnished brown, the hangings were of dull
+brown velvet or dark tapestry, the carpets toneless. Her bedroom had
+been hung with white dimity, edged with crochet-work, but the furniture
+was of somber cherry, and the chintz of the couch-cover brown with
+yellow flowers. The library, into which she looked from where she sat,
+was furnished with high glass-doored bookcases, turned walnut tables,
+and stuffed chairs and couches with carved walnut rims. Down each window
+the shade was lowered half way, and the light was further obscured by
+lace curtains and heavy draperies of plain velvet. The pictures were
+mostly family portraits, with a few landscapes of doubtful merit. There
+were no flowers anywhere, except one small vase of daffodils upon the
+dinner table. According to all modern canons the house should have been
+hideous; but it was not. It held garnered with loving faith the memories
+of another day, as a bowl of potpourri still holds the sun of long dead
+summers. It fitted absolutely the quiet kindliness, the faded face and
+soft brown dress of its mistress. It was keyed to her, as Constance had
+understood, to the last detail.
+
+"Yes," said Farraday, smiling down the table at his mother, "she could
+hardly bring herself to let me build my picture gallery on the end of
+the house--nothing but Christian charity enabled her to yield."
+
+The old lady smiled back at her tall son almost like a sweetheart. "He
+humors me," she said; "he knows I'm a foolish old woman who love, my
+nest as it was first prepared for me."
+
+"Oh, I can so well understand that," said Mary.
+
+"Do you mean to say, Mrs. Farraday," interposed Stefan, "that you have
+lived in this one house, without changing it, all your married life?"
+
+She turned to him in simple surprise. "Why, of course; my husband chose
+it for me."
+
+"Marvelous!" said Stefan, who felt that one week of those brown hangings
+would drive him to suicide.
+
+"Nix on the home-sweet-home business for yours, eh, Byrd?" threw in
+McEwan with his glint of a twinkle.
+
+"Boy," interposed their little hostess, "why will thee always use such
+shocking slang? How can I teach Jamie English with his father's example
+before him?" She shook a tiny finger at the offender.
+
+"Ma'am, if I didn't sling the lingo, begging your pardon, in my office,
+they would think I was a highbrow, and then--good night Mac!"
+
+"Don't believe him, Mother," said Farraday. "It isn't policy, but
+affection. He loves the magazine crowd, and likes to do as it does.
+Besides," he smiled, "he's a linguistic specialist."
+
+"You think slang is an indication of local patriotism?" asked Mary.
+
+"Certainly," said Farraday. "If we love a place we adopt its customs."
+
+"That's quite true," Stefan agreed. "In Paris I used the worst argot of
+the quarter, but I've always spoken straightforward English because the
+only slang I knew in my own tongue reminded me of a place I loathed."
+
+"Stefan used to be dreadfully unpatriotic, Mrs. Farraday," explained
+Mary, "but he is outgrowing it."
+
+"Am I?" Stefan asked rather pointedly.
+
+"Art," said McEwan grandly, "is international; Byrd belongs to the
+world." He raised his glass of lemonade, and ostentatiously drank
+Stefan's health. The others laughed at him, and the conversation veered.
+Mary absorbed herself in trying to draw out the bashful Jamie, and
+Stefan listened while his hostess talked on her favorite theme, that of
+her son, James Farraday.
+
+They had coffee in the picture gallery, a beautiful room which Farraday
+had extended beyond the drawing-room, and furnished with perfect
+examples of the best Colonial period. It was hung almost entirely with
+the work of Americans, in particular landscapes by Inness, Homer Martin,
+and George Munn, while over the fireplace was a fine mother and child by
+Mary Cassatt. For the first time since their arrival Stefan showed real
+interest, and leaving the others, wandered round the room critically
+absorbing each painting.
+
+"Well, Farraday," he said at the end of his tour, "I must say you have
+the best of judgment. I should have been mighty glad to paint one or two
+of those myself." His tone indicated that more could not be said.
+
+Meanwhile, Mary could hardly wait for the real object of their
+expedition, the little house. When at last the car was announced, Mrs.
+Farraday's bonnet and cloak brought by a maid, and everybody, Jamie
+included, fitted into the machine, Mary felt her heart beating with
+excitement. Were they going to have a real little house for their
+baby? Was it to be born out here by the sea, instead of in the dusty,
+overcrowded city? She strained her eyes down the road. "It's only half
+a mile," called Farraday from the wheel, "and a mile and a half from the
+station." They swung down a hill, up again, round a bend, and there was
+a grassy plateau overlooking the water, backed by a tree-clad slope.
+Nestling under the trees, but facing the bay, was just such a little
+house as Mary had admired along the road, low and snug, shingled on
+walls and roof, painted white, with green shutters and a little columned
+porch at the front door. A small barn stood near; a little hedge divided
+house from lane; evidences of a flower garden showed under the windows.
+"Oh, what a duck!" Mary exclaimed. "Oh, Stefan!" She could almost have
+wept.
+
+Farraday helped her down.
+
+"Mrs. Byrd," said he with his most kindly smile, "here is the key. Would
+you like to unlock the door yourself?"
+
+She blushed with pleasure. "Oh, yes!" she cried, and turned
+instinctively to look for Stefan. He was standing at the plateau's edge,
+scrutinizing the view. She called, but he did not hear. Then she took
+the key and, hurrying up the little walk, entered the house alone.
+
+A moment later Stefan, hailed stentoriously by McEwan, followed her.
+
+She was standing in a long sitting-room, low-ceilinged and white-walled,
+with window-seats, geraniums on the sills, brass andirons on the
+hearth, an eight-day clock, a small old fashioned piano, an oak desk, a
+chintz-covered grandmother's chair, a gate-legged table, and a braided
+rag hearth-rug. Her hands were clasped, her eyes shining.
+
+"Oh, Stefan!" she exclaimed as she heard his step. "Isn't it a darling?
+Wouldn't it be simply ideal for us?"
+
+"It seems just right, and the view is splendid. There's a good deal
+that's paintable here."
+
+"Is there? I'm so glad. That makes it perfect. Look at the furniture,
+Stefan, every bit right."
+
+"And the moldings," he added. "All handcut, do you see? The whole place
+is actually old. What a lark!" He appeared almost as pleased as she.
+
+"Here come the others. Let's go upstairs, dearest," she whispered.
+
+There were four bedrooms, and a bathroom. The main room had a four-post
+bed, and opening out of it was a smaller room, almost empty. In this
+Mary stood for some minutes, measuring with her eye the height of the
+window from the floor, mentally placing certain small furnishings.
+"It would be ideal, simply ideal," she repeated to herself. Stefan was
+looking out of the window, again absorbed in the view. She would have
+liked so well to share with him her tenderness over the little room,
+but he was all unmindful of its meaning to her, and, as always, his
+heedlessness made expression hard for her. She was still communing with
+the future when he turned from the window.
+
+"Come along, Mary, let's go downstairs again."
+
+They found the others waiting in the sitting-room, and Farraday detached
+Stefan to show him a couple of old prints, while Mrs. Farraday led
+Constance and Mary to an exploration of the kitchen. Chancing to look
+back from the hall, Mary saw that McEwan had seated himself in the
+grandmother's chair, and was holding the heavy shy Jamie at his knee,
+one arm thrown round him. The boy's eyes were fixed in dumb devotion on
+his father's face.
+
+"The two poor lonely things," she thought.
+
+The little kitchen was spotless, tiled shoulder-high, and painted blue
+above. Against one wall a row of copper saucepans grinned their fat
+content, echoed by the pale shine of an opposing row of aluminum. Snowy
+larder shelves showed through one little door; through another, laundry
+tubs were visible. There was a modern coal stove, with a boiler. The
+quarters were small, but perfect to the last detail. Mrs. Farraday's
+little face fairly beamed with pride as they looked about them.
+
+"He did it all, bought every pot and pan, arranged each detail. There
+were no modern conveniences until old Cotter died--_he_ would not
+let James put them in. My boy loves this cottage; he sometimes spends
+several days here all alone, when he is very tired. He doesn't even like
+me to send Moses down, but of course I won't hear of that." She shook
+her head with smiling finality. There were some things, her manner
+suggested, that little boys could not be allowed.
+
+"But, Mrs. Farraday," Mary exclaimed, "how can we possibly take the
+house from him if he uses it?"
+
+"My dear," the little lady's hand lighted on Mary's arm, "when thee
+knows my James better, thee will know that his happiness lies in helping
+his friends find theirs. He would be deeply disappointed if thee did not
+take it," and her hand squeezed Mary's reassuringly.
+
+"We are too wonderfully lucky--I don't know how to express my
+gratitude," Mary answered.
+
+"I think the good Lord sends us what we deserve, my dear, whether of
+good or ill," the little lady replied, smiling wisely.
+
+Constance sighed contentedly. "Oh, Mrs. Farraday, you are so good for
+us all. I'm a modern backslider, and hardly ever go to church, but you
+always make me feel as if I had just been."
+
+"Backslider, Constance? 'Thy own works praise thee, and thy children
+rise up and call thee blessed--thy husband also,'" quoted their hostess.
+
+"Well, I don't know if my boys and Theodore call me blessed, but I hope
+the Suffragists will one day. Goodness knows I work hard enough for
+them."
+
+"I've believed in suffrage all my life, like all Friends," Mrs. Farraday
+answered, "but where thee has worked I have only prayed for it."
+
+"If prayers are heard, I am sure yours should count more than my work,
+dear lady," said Constance, affectionately pressing the other's hand.
+
+The little Quaker's eyes were bright as she looked at her friend.
+
+"Ah, my dear, thee is too generous to an old woman."
+
+Mary loved this little dialogue, "What dears all my new friends are,"
+she thought; "how truly good." All the world seemed full of love to her
+in these days; her heart blossomed out to these kind people; she folded
+them in the arms of her spirit. All about, in nature and in human kind,
+she felt the spring burgeoning, and within herself she felt it most of
+all. But of this Mary could express nothing, save through her face--she
+had never looked more beautiful.
+
+Coming into the dining room she found Farraday watching her. He seemed
+tired. She put out her hand.
+
+"May we really have it? You are sure?"
+
+"You like it?" he smiled, holding the hand.
+
+She flushed with the effort to express herself. "I adore it. I can't
+thank you."
+
+"Please don't," he answered. "You don't know what pleasure this gives
+me. Come as soon as you can; everything is ready for you."
+
+"And about the rent?" she asked, hating to speak of money, but knowing
+Stefan would forget.
+
+"Dear Mrs. Byrd, I had so much rather lend it, but I know you wouldn't
+like that. Pay me what you paid for your first home in New York."
+
+"Oh, but that would be absurd," she demurred.
+
+"Make that concession to my pride in our friendship," he smiled back.
+
+She saw that she could not refuse without ungraciousness. Stefan had
+disappeared, but now came quickly in from the kitchen door.
+
+"Farraday," he called, "I've been looking at the barn; you don't use it,
+I see. If we come, should you mind my having a north light cut in it?
+With that it would make an ideal workshop."
+
+"I should be delighted," the other answered; "it's a good idea and will
+make the place more valuable. I had the barn cleaned out thinking some
+one might like it for a garage."
+
+"We shan't run to such an extravagance yet awhile," laughed Mary.
+
+"A bicycle for me and the station hack for Mary," Stefan summed up. "I
+suppose there is such a thing at Crab's Bay?"
+
+"She won't have to walk," Farraday answered.
+
+Started on practical issues, Mary's mind had flown to the need of a
+telephone to link them to her doctor. "May we install a 'phone?" she
+asked. "I never lived with one till two months ago, but already it is a
+confirmed vice with me."
+
+"Mayn't I have it put in for you--there should be one here," said he.
+
+"Oh, no, please!"
+
+"At least let me arrange for it," he urged.
+
+"Now, son, thee must not keep Mrs. Byrd out too late. Get her home
+before sundown," Mrs. Farraday's voice admonished. Obediently, every one
+moved toward the hall. At a word from McEwan, the mute Jamie ran to
+open the tonneau door. Farraday stopped to lock the kitchen entrance and
+found McEwan on the little porch as he emerged, while the others were
+busy settling themselves in the car. As Farraday turned the heavy front
+door lock, his friend's hand fell on his shoulder.
+
+"Ought ye to do it, James?" McEwan asked quietly.
+
+Farraday raised his eyes, and looked steadily at the other, with his
+slow smile.
+
+"Yes, Mac, it's a good thing to do. In any case, I shouldn't have been
+likely to marry, you know." The two friends took their places in the
+car.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+After much consideration from Mary, the Byrds decided to give up their
+recently acquired flat, but to keep the old studio. She felt they should
+not attempt to carry three rents through the summer, but, on the other
+hand, Stefan was still working at his Demeter, using an Italian model
+for the boy's figure, and could not finish it conveniently elsewhere.
+Then, too, he expressed a wish for a pied-a-terre in the city, and as
+Mary had very tender associations with the little studio she was glad to
+think of keeping it.
+
+Stefan was working fitfully at this time. He would have spurts of energy
+followed by fits of depression and disgust with his work, during which
+he would leave the house and take long rides uptown on the tops of
+omnibuses. Mary could not see that these excursions in search of air
+calmed his nervousness, and she concluded that the spring fever was in
+his blood and that he needed a change of scene at least as much as she
+did.
+
+About this time he sold his five remaining drawings of New York to the
+Pan-American Magazine, a progressive monthly. They gained considerable
+attention from the art world, and were seized upon by certain groups
+of radicals as a sermon on the capitalistic system. On the strength
+of them, Stefan was hailed as that rarest of all beings, a politically
+minded artist, and became popular in quarters from which his intolerance
+had hitherto barred him.
+
+It entertained him hugely to be proclaimed as a champion of democracy,
+for he had made the drawings in impish hatred not of a class but of
+American civilization as a whole.
+
+Their bank account, in spite of much heightened living expenses,
+remained substantial by reason of this new sale, but Stefan was as
+indifferent as ever to its control, and Mary's sense of caution was
+little diminished. Her growing comprehension of him warned her that
+their position was still insecure; he remained, for all his success, an
+unknown quantity as a producer. She wanted him to assume some interest
+in their affairs, and suggested separate bank accounts, but he begged
+off.
+
+"Let me have a signature at the bank, so that I can cash checks for
+personal expenses, but don't ask me to keep accounts, or know how much
+we have," he said. "If you find I am spending too much at any time, just
+tell me, and I will stop."
+
+Further than this she could not get him to discuss the matter, and saw
+that she must think out alone some method of bookkeeping which would
+be fair to them both, and would establish a record for future use.
+Ultimately she transferred her own money, less her private expenditures
+during the winter, to a separate account, to be used for all her
+personal expenses. The old account she put in both their names, and made
+out a monthly schedule for the household, beyond which she determined
+never to draw. Anything she could save from this amount she destined
+for a savings bank, but over and above it she felt that her husband's
+earnings were his, and that she could not in honor interfere with them.
+Mary was almost painfully conscientious, and this plan cost her many
+heart-searchings before it was complete.
+
+After her baby was born she intended to continue her writing; she did
+not wish ever to draw on Stefan for her private purse. So far at least,
+she would live up to feminist principles.
+
+There was much to be done before they could leave the city, and Mary had
+practically no assistance from Stefan in her arrangements. She would ask
+his advice about the packing or disposal of a piece of furniture, and
+he would make some suggestion, often impracticable; but on any further
+questioning he would run his hands through his hair, or thrust them
+into his pockets, looking either vague or nervous. "Why fuss about
+such things, dear?" or "Do just as you like," or "I'm sure I haven't a
+notion," were his most frequent answers. He developed a habit of leaving
+his work and following Mary restlessly from room to room as she packed
+or sorted, which she found rather wearing.
+
+On one such occasion--it was the day before they were to leave--she was
+carrying a large pile of baby's clothes from her bedroom to a trunk
+in the sitting-room, while Stefan stood humped before the fireplace,
+smoking. As she passed him he frowned nervously.
+
+"How heavily you tread, Mary," he jerked out. She stood stock-still and
+flushed painfully.
+
+"I think, Stefan," she said, with the tears of feeling which came
+over-readily in these days welling to her eyes, "instead of saying that
+you might come and help me to carry these things."
+
+He looked completely contrite. "I'm sorry, dearest, it was a silly thing
+to say. Forgive me," and he kissed her apologetically, taking the bundle
+from her. He offered to help several times that afternoon, but as he
+never knew where anything was to go, and fidgeted from foot to foot
+while he hung about her, she was obliged at last to plead release from
+his efforts.
+
+"Stefan dear," she said, giving him rather a harassed smile, "you
+evidently find this kind of thing a bore. Why don't you run out and
+leave me to get on quietly with it?"
+
+"I know I've been rotten to you, and I thought you wanted me to help,"
+he explained, in a self-exculpatory tone.
+
+She stroked his cheek maternally. "Run along, dearest. I can get on
+perfectly well alone."
+
+"You're a brick, Mary. I think I'll go. This kind of thing--" he flung
+his arm toward the disordered room--"is too utterly unharmonious." And
+kissing her mechanically he hastened out.
+
+That night for the first time in their marriage he did not return for
+dinner, but telephoned that he was spending the evening with friends.
+Mary, tired out with her packing, ate her meal alone and went to bed
+immediately afterwards. His absence produced in her a dull heartache,
+but she was too weary to ponder over his whereabouts.
+
+Early next morning Mary telephoned Miss Mason. Stefan, who had come home
+late, was still asleep when the Sparrow arrived, and by the time he had
+had his breakfast the whole flat was in its final stage of disruption.
+A few pieces of furniture were to be sent to the cottage, a few more
+stored, and the studio was to be returned to its original omnibus
+status. Mrs. Corriani, priestess of family emergencies, had been
+summoned from the depths; the Sparrow had donned an apron, Mary a smock;
+Lily, the colored maid, was packing china into a barrel, surrounded by
+writhing seas of excelsior. For Stefan, the flat might as well have been
+given over to the Furies. He fetched his hat.
+
+"Mary," he said, "I'm not painting again until we have moved. Djinns,
+Afrits and Goddesses should be allowed to perform their spiritings
+unseen of mortals. I shall go and sit in the Metropolitan and
+contemplate Rodin's Penseur--he is so spacious."
+
+"Very well, dearest," said Mary brightly. She had slept away her low
+spirits. "Don't forget Mr. Farraday is sending his car in for us at
+three o'clock."
+
+He looked nonplused. "You don't mean to say we are moving to-day?"
+
+"Yes, you goose," she laughed, "don't you remember?"
+
+"I'm frightfully sorry, Mary, but I made an engagement for this evening,
+to go to the theatre. I knew you would not want to come," he added.
+
+Mary looked blank. "But, Stefan," she exclaimed, "everything is
+arranged! We are dining with the Farradays. I told you several times we
+were moving on the fourth. You make it so difficult, dear, by not taking
+any interest." Her voice trembled. She had worked and planned for their
+flitting for a week past, was all eagerness to be gone, and now he, who
+had been equally keen, seemed utterly indifferent.
+
+He fidgeted uncomfortably, looking contrite yet rebellious. Mary was at
+a loss. The Sparrow, however, promptly raised her crest and exhibited a
+claw.
+
+"Land sakes, Mr. Byrd," she piped, "you are a mighty fine artist, but
+that don't prevent your being a husband first these days! Men are all
+alike--" she turned to Mary--"always ready to skedaddle off when there's
+work to be done. Now, young man--" she pointed a mandatory finger--"you
+run and telephone your friends to call the party off." Her voice
+shrilled, her beady eyes snapped; she looked exactly like one of her
+namesakes, ruffled and quarreling at the edge of its nest.
+
+Stefan burst out laughing. "All right, Miss Sparrow, smooth your
+feathers. Mary, I'm a mud-headed idiot--I forgot the whole thing. Pay
+no attention to my vagaries, dearest, I'll be at the door at three." He
+kissed her warmly, and went out humming, banging the door behind him.
+
+"My father was the same, and my brothers," the Sparrow philosophized.
+"Spring-cleaning and moving took every ounce of sense out of them." Mary
+sighed. Her zest for the preparations had departed.
+
+Presently, seeing her languor, Miss Mason insisted Mary should lie down
+and leave the remaining work to her. The only resting place left was the
+old studio, where their divan had been replaced. Thither Mary mounted,
+and lying amidst its dusty disarray, traced in memory the months she had
+spent there. It had been their first home. Here they had had their
+first quarrel and their first success, and here had come to her her
+annunciation. Though they were keeping the room, it would never hold the
+same meaning for her again, and though she already loved their new home,
+it hurt her at the last to bid their first good-bye. Perhaps it was a
+trick of fatigue, but as she lay there the conviction came to her that
+with to-day's change some part of the early glamour of marriage was
+to go, that not even the coming of her child could bring to life the
+memories this room contained. She longed for her husband, for his voice
+calling her the old, dear, foolish names. She felt alone, and fearful of
+the future.
+
+"My grief," exclaimed Miss Mason from the door an hour later. "I told
+you to go to sleep 'n here you are wide awake and crying!"
+
+Mary smiled shamefacedly.
+
+"I'm just tired, Sparrow, that's all, and have been indulging in the
+'vapors.'" She squeezed her friend's hand. "Let's have some lunch."
+
+"It's all ready, and Lily with her hat 'n coat on. Come right
+downstairs--it's most two o'clock."
+
+Mary jumped up, amazed at the time she had wasted. Her spell of
+depression was over, and she was her usual cheerful self when, at three
+o'clock, she heard Stefan's feet bounding up the stairs for the last
+time.
+
+"Tra-la, Mary, the car is here!" he called. "Thank God we are getting
+out of this city! Good-by, Miss Sparrow, don't peck me, and come and
+see us at Crab's Bay. March, Lily. A riverderci, Signora Corriani. Come,
+dearest." He bustled them all out, seized two suitcases in one hand and
+Mary's elbow in the other, chattered his few words of Italian to the
+janitress, chaffed Miss Mason, and had them all laughing by the time
+they reached the street. He seemed in the highest spirits, his moods of
+the last weeks forgotten.
+
+As the car started he kissed his fingers repeatedly to Miss Mason and
+waved his hat to the inevitable assemblage of small boys.
+
+"The country, darling!" he cried, pressing Mary's hand under the rug.
+"Farewell to ugliness and squalor! How happy we are going to be!"
+
+Mary's hand pressed his in reply.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+It was late April. The wooded slopes behind "The Byrdsnest," as Mary
+had christened the cottage, were peppered with a pale film of green.
+The lawn before the house shone with new grass. Upon it, in the early
+morning, Mary watched beautiful birds of types unknown to her, searching
+for nest-making material. She admired the large, handsome robins, so
+serious and stately after the merry pertness of the English sort, but
+her favorites were the bluebirds, and another kind that looked like
+greenish canaries, of which she did not know the name. None of them,
+she thought, had such melodious song as at home in England, but their
+brilliant plumage was a constant delight to her.
+
+Daffodils were springing up in the garden, crocuses were out, and the
+blue scylla. On the downward slope toward the bay the brown furry heads
+of ferns had begun to push stoutly from the earth. The spring was awake.
+
+Stefan seemed thoroughly contented again. He had his north light in the
+barn, but seldom worked there, being absorbed in outdoor sketching. He
+was making many small studies of the trees still bare against the gleam
+of water, with a dust of green upon them. He could get a number of
+valuable notes here, he told Mary.
+
+During their first two weeks in the country his restlessness had
+often recurred. He had gone back and forth to the city for work on his
+Demeter, and had even slept there on several occasions. But one morning
+he wakened Mary by coming in from an early ramble full of joy in the
+spring, and announcing that the big picture was now as good as he could
+make it, and that he was done with the town. He threw back the blinds
+and called to her to look at the day.
+
+"It's vibrant, Mary; life is waking all about us." He turned to the bed.
+
+"You look like a beautiful white rose, cool with the dew."
+
+She blushed--he had forgotten lately his old habit of pretty
+speech-making. He came and sat on the bed's edge, holding her hand.
+
+"I've had my restless devil with me of late, sweetheart," he said. "But
+now I feel renewed, and happy. I shan't want to leave you any more." He
+kissed her with a gravity at which she might have wondered had she been
+more thoroughly awake. His tone was that of a man who makes a promise to
+himself.
+
+Since that morning he had been consistently cheerful and carefree, more
+attentive to Mary than for some time past, and pleased with all his
+surroundings. She was overjoyed at the change, and for her own part
+never tired of working in the house and garden, striving to make more
+perfect the atmosphere of simple homeliness which Farraday had first
+imparted to them. Lily was fascinated by her kitchen and little white
+bedroom.
+
+"This surely is a cute little house, yes, _ma'am_," she would exclaim
+emphatically, with a grin.
+
+Lily was a small, chocolate-colored negress, with a neat figure, and the
+ever ready smile which is God's own gift to the race. Mary, who hardly
+remembered having seen a negro till she came to America, had none of the
+color-prejudice which grows up in biracial communities. She found Lily
+civil, cheerful, and intelligent, and felt a sincere liking for her
+which the other reciprocated with a growing devotion.
+
+Often in these days a passerby--had there been any--could have heard a
+threefold chorus rising about the cottage, a spring-song as unconscious
+as the birds'. From the kitchen Lily's voice rose in the endless refrain
+of a hymn; Mary's clear tones traveled down from the little room beside
+her own, where she was preparing a place for the expected one; and
+Stefan's whistle, or his snatches of French song, resounded from woods
+or barn. Youth and hope were in the house, youth was in the air and
+earth.
+
+Farraday's gardens were the pride of the neighborhood, these and the
+library expressing him as the house did his mother. Several times
+he sent down an armful of flowers to the Byrdsnest, and, one Sunday
+morning, Mary had just finished arranging such a bunch in her vases when
+she heard the chug of an automobile in the lane. She looked out to see
+Constance, a veiled figure beside her, stopping a runabout at the gate.
+Delighted, she hastened to the door. Constance hailed her.
+
+"Mary, behold the charioteer! Theodore has given me this machine for
+suffrage propaganda during the summer, and I achieved my driver's
+license yesterday. I'm so vain I'm going to make Felicity design me a
+gown with a peacock's tail that I can spread. I've brought her with me
+to show off too, and because she needed air. How are you, bless you? May
+we come in?"
+
+Not waiting for an answer, she jumped down and hugged Mary, Miss
+Berber following in more leisurely fashion. Mary could not help wishing
+Constance had come alone, as she now felt a little self-conscious before
+strangers. However, she shook hands with Miss Berber, and led them both
+into the sitting-room.
+
+"Simply delicious!" exclaimed Constance, glancing eagerly about her,
+"and how divinely healthy you look--like a transcendental dairy-maid!
+This place was made for you, and how you've improved it. Look, Felicity,
+at her chintz, and her flowers, and her _cunning_ pair of china
+shepherdesses!" She ran from one thing to another, ecstatically
+appreciative.
+
+Mary had had no chance to speak yet, and, as Felicity was absorbed in
+the languid removal of a satin coat and incredible yards of apple green
+veiling, Constance held the floor.
+
+"Look at her pair of love-birds sidling along the curtain pole, as tame
+as humans! Where did you find that wooden cage? And that white cotton
+dress? You smell of lavender and an ironing-board! Oh, dear," she began
+again, "driving is very wearing, and I should like a cocktail, but I
+must have milk. Milk, my dear Mary, is the only conceivable beverage
+in this house. Have you a cow? You ought to have a cow--a brindled
+cow--also a lamb; 'Mary had,' et cetera. My dear, stop me. Enthusiasm
+converts me into an 'agreeable rattle,' as they used to call our
+great-grandmothers."
+
+"Subdue yourself with this," laughed Mary, holding out the desired glass
+of milk. "Miss Berber, can I get anything for you?"
+
+Felicity by this time was unwrapped, and had disposed herself upon a
+window-seat, her back to the light.
+
+"Wine or water, Mrs. Byrd; I do not drink milk," she breathed, lighting
+a cigarette.
+
+"We have some Chianti; nothing else, I'm afraid," said Mary, and a glass
+of this the designer deigned to accept, together with a little yellow
+cake set with currants, and served upon a pewter plate.
+
+"I see, Mrs. Byrd," Felicity murmured, as Constance in momentary silence
+sipped her milk, "that you comprehend the first law of decoration for
+woman--that her accessories must be a frame for her type. I--how should
+I appear in a room like this?" She gave a faint shrug. "At best, a false
+tone in a chromatic harmony. You are entirely in key."
+
+Her eyelids drooped; she exhaled a long breath of smoke. "Very well
+thought out--unusually clever--for a layman," she uttered, and was
+still, with the suggestion of a sibyl whose oracle has ceased to speak.
+
+Mary tried not to find her manner irritating, but could not wholly
+dispel the impression that Miss Berber habitually patronized her.
+
+She laughed pleasantly.
+
+"I'm afraid I can't claim to have been guided by any subtle theories--I
+have merely collected together the kind of things I am fond of."
+
+"Mary decorates with her heart, Felicity, you with your head," said
+Constance, setting down her empty tumbler.
+
+"I'm afraid I should find the heart too erratic a guide to art.
+Knowledge, Mrs. Byrd, knowledge must supplement feeling," said Felicity,
+with a gesture of finality.
+
+"Really!" answered Mary, falling back upon her most correct English
+manner. There was nothing else to say. "She is either cheeky, or a
+bromide," she thought.
+
+"Felicity," exclaimed Constance, "don't adopt your professional manner;
+you can't take us in. You know you are an outrageous humbug."
+
+"Dear Connie," replied the other with the ghost of a smile, "you are
+always so amusing, and so much more wide awake in the morning than I
+am."
+
+Conversation languished for a minute, Constance having embarked on a
+cake. For some reason which she could not analyze, Mary felt in no great
+hurry to call Stefan from the barn, should he be there.
+
+Felicity rose. "May we not see your garden, Mrs. Byrd?"
+
+"Certainly," said Mary, and led the way to the door. Felicity slipped
+out first, and wandered with her delicate step a little down the path.
+
+"Isn't it darling!" exclaimed Constance from the porch, surveying the
+flower-strewn grass, the feathery trees, and the pale gleam of the
+water. Mary began to show her some recent plantings, in particular a
+rose-bed which was her last addition to the garden.
+
+"I see you have a barn," said Felicity, flitting back to them with a
+hint of animation. "Is it picturesque inside? Would it lend itself to
+treatment?" She wandered toward it, and there was nothing for the others
+to do but follow.
+
+"Oh, yes," explained Mary, "my husband has converted it into a studio.
+He may be working there now--I had been meaning to call him."
+
+She felt a trifle uncomfortable, almost as if she had put herself in the
+wrong.
+
+"Coo-oo, Stefan," she called as they neared the barn, Felicity still
+flitting ahead. The door swung open, and there stood Stefan, pallette in
+hand, screwing up his eyes in the sun.
+
+As they lit on his approaching visitor an expression first of
+astonishment, and then of something very like displeasure, crossed
+his face. At sight of it, Mary's spirits subconsciously responded by a
+distinct upward lift. Stefan waved his brush without shaking hands, and
+then, seeing Constance, broke into a smile.
+
+"How delightful, Mrs. Elliot! How did you come? By auto? And you drove
+Miss Berber? We are honored. You are our first visitors except the
+Farradays. Come and see my studio."
+
+They trooped into the quaint little barn, which appeared to wear its big
+north light rather primly, as a girl her first low-necked gown. It was
+unfurnished, save for a table and easel, several canvases, and an old
+arm-chair. Felicity glanced at the sketches.
+
+"In pastoral mood again," she commented, with what might have been the
+faintest note of sarcasm. Stefan's eyebrows twitched nervously.
+
+"There's nothing to see in here-these are the merest sketches," he
+said abruptly. "Come along, Mrs. Elliot, I've been working since before
+breakfast; let's say good-morning to the flowers." And with his arm
+linked through hers he piloted Constance back toward the lawn.
+
+"Mr. Byrd ought never to wear tweed, do you think? It makes him look
+heavy," remarked Felicity.
+
+Again Mary had to suppress a feeling of irritation. "I rather like it,"
+she said. "It's so comfy and English."
+
+"Yes?" breathed Felicity vaguely, walking on.
+
+Suddenly she appeared to have a return of animation.
+
+She floated forward quickly for a few steps, turned with a swaying
+movement, and waited for Mary with hands and feet poised.
+
+"The grass under one's feet, Mrs. Byrd, it makes them glad. One could
+almost dance!"
+
+Again she fluttered ahead, this time overtaking Constance and Stefan,
+who had halted in the middle of the lawn. She swayed before them on
+tiptoe.
+
+"Connie," she was saying as Mary came up, "why does one not more often
+dance in the open?"
+
+Though her lids still drooped she was half smiling as she swayed.
+
+"It may be the spring; or perhaps I have caught the pastoral mood of Mr.
+Byrd's work; but I should like to dance a little. Music," her palms were
+lifted in repudiation, "is unnecessary. One has the birds."
+
+"Good for you, Felicity! That _will_ be fun," Constance exclaimed
+delightedly. "You don't dance half often enough, bad girl. Come along,
+people, let's sit on the porch steps."
+
+They arranged themselves to watch, Constance and Mary on the upper
+step, Stefan on the lower, his shoulders against his wife's knees, while
+Felicity dexterously slipped off her sandals and stockings.
+
+Her dress, modeled probably on that of the central figure in
+Botticelli's Spring, was of white chiffon, embroidered with occasional
+formal sprigs of green leaves and hyacinth-blue flowers, and kilted up
+at bust and thigh. Her loosely draped sleeves hung barely to the elbow.
+A line of green crossed from the shoulders under each breast, and her
+hair, tightly bound, was decorated with another narrow band of green.
+She looked younger than in the city--almost virginal. Stooping low, she
+gathered a handful of blue scylla from the grass, Mary barely checking
+an exclamation at this ravishing of her beloved bulbs. Then Felicity
+lay down upon the grass; her eyes closed; she seemed asleep. They waited
+silently for some minutes. Stefan began to fidget.
+
+Suddenly a robin called. Felicity's eyes opened. They looked calm and
+dewy, like a child's. She raised her head--the robin called again.
+Felicity looked about her, at the flowers in her hand, the trees, the
+sky. Her face broke into smiles, she rose tall, taller, feet on tiptoe,
+hands reaching skyward. It was the waking of spring. Then she began to
+dance.
+
+Gone was the old languor, the dreamy, hushed steps of her former method.
+Now she appeared to dart about the lawn like a swallow, following the
+calls of the birds. She would stand poised to listen, her ear would
+catch a twitter, and she was gone; flitting, skimming, seeming not to
+touch the earth. She danced to the flowers in her hand, to the trees,
+the sky, her face aglint with changing smiles, her skirts rippling like
+water.
+
+At last the blue flowers seemed to claim her solely. She held them
+sunward, held them close, always swaying to the silent melody of the
+spring. She kissed them, pressed them to her heart; she sank downward,
+like a bird with folding wings, above a clump of scylla; her arms
+encircled them, her head bent to her knees--she was still.
+
+Constance broke the spell with prolonged applause; Mary was breathless
+with admiration; Stefan rose, and after prowling restlessly for a
+moment, hurried to the dancer and stooped to lift her.
+
+As if only then conscious of her audience, Felicity looked up, and both
+the other women noticed the expression that flashed across her face
+before she took the proffered hand. It seemed compounded of triumph,
+challenge, and something else. Mary again felt uncomfortable, and
+Constance's quick brain signaled a warning.
+
+"Surely not getting into mischief, are you, Felicity?" she mentally
+questioned, and instantly began to east about for two and two to put
+together.
+
+"Wonderful!" Stefan was saying. "You surely must have wings--great,
+butterfly ones--only we are too dull to see them. You were exactly like
+one of my pictures come to life." He was visibly excited.
+
+"Husband disposed of, available lovers unattractive, asks me to drive
+her out here; that's one half," Constance's mind raced. "Wife on the
+shelf, variable temperament, studio in town; and that's the other. I've
+found two and two; I hope to goodness they won't make four," she sighed
+to herself anxiously.
+
+Mary meanwhile was thanking Miss Berber. She noticed that the dancer was
+perfectly cool--not a hair ruffled by her efforts. She looked as smooth
+as a bird that draws in its feathers after flight. Stefan was probably
+observing this, too, she thought; at any rate he was hovering about,
+staring at Felicity, and running his hands through his hair. Mary
+could not be sure of his expression; he seemed uneasy, as if discomfort
+mingled with his pleasure.
+
+They had had a rare and lovely entertainment, and yet no one appeared
+wholly pleased except the dancer herself. It was very odd.
+
+Constance looked at her watch. "Now, Felicity, this has all been
+ideal, but we must be getting on. I 'phoned James, you know, and we are
+lunching there. I was sure Mrs. Byrd wouldn't want to be bothered with
+us."
+
+Mary demurred, with a word as to Lily's capacities, but Constance was
+firm.
+
+"No, my dear, it's all arranged. Besides, you need peace and
+quiet. Felicity, where are your things? Thank you, Mr. Byrd, in the
+sitting-room. Mary, you dear, I adore you and your house--I shall come
+again soon. Where are my gloves?" She was all energy, helping Felicity
+with her veil, settling her own hat, kissing Mary, and cranking the
+runabout--an operation she would not allow Stefan to attempt for
+her--with her usual effervescent efficiency. "I'd no idea it was so
+late!" she exclaimed.
+
+As Felicity was handed by Stefan into the car, she murmured something
+in French, Constance noticed, to which he shook his head with a nervous
+frown. As the machine started, he was left staring moodily after it down
+the lane.
+
+"Thee is earlier than I expected," little Mrs. Farraday said to
+Constance, when they arrived at the house. "I am afraid we shall have to
+keep thee waiting for thy lunch for half an hour or more."
+
+"How glad I shall be--" Stefan turned to Mary, half irritably--"when
+this baby is born, and you can be active again."
+
+He ate his lunch in silence, and left the table abruptly at the end. Nor
+did she see him again until dinner time, when he came in tired out, his
+boots whitened with road dust.
+
+"Where have you been, dearest?" she asked. "I've been quite anxious
+about you."
+
+"Just walking," he answered shortly, and went up to his room. The tears
+came to her eyes, but she blinked them away resolutely. She must not
+mind, must not show him that she even dreamed of any connection between
+his moodiness and the events of the morning.
+
+"My love must be stronger than that, now of all times," thought Mary.
+"Afterwards--afterwards it will be all right." She smiled confidently to
+herself.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+It was the end of June. Mary's rosebushes were in full bloom and the
+little garden was languid with the scent of them. The nesting birds
+had all hatched their broods--every morning now Mary watched from her
+bedroom window the careful parents carrying worms and insects into the
+trees. She always looked for them the moment she got up. She would have
+loved to hang far out of the window as she used to do in her old home in
+England, and call good-morning to her little friends--but she was hemmed
+in by the bronze wire of the windowscreens. These affected her almost
+like prison bars; but Long Island's summer scourge had come, and after
+a few experiences of nights sung sleepless by the persistent horn of
+the enemy and made agonizing by his sting, she welcomed the screens
+as deliverers. The mosquitoes apart, Mary had adored the long, warm
+days--not too hot as yet on the Byrdsnest's shady eminence--and the
+perpetually smiling skies, so different from the sulky heavens of
+England. But she began to feel very heavy, and found it increasingly
+difficult to keep cool, so that she counted the days till her
+deliverance. She felt no fear of what was coming. Dr. Hillyard had
+assured her that she was normal in every respect--"as completely
+normal a woman as I have ever seen," she put it--and should have no
+complications. Moreover, Mary had obtained from her doctor a detailed
+description of what lay before her, and had read one or two hand-books
+on the subject, so that she was spared the fearful imaginings and
+reliance on old wives' tales which are the results of the ancient policy
+of surrounding normal functions with mystery.
+
+Now the nurse was here, a tall, grave-eyed Canadian girl, quiet of
+speech, silent in every movement. Mary had wondered if she ought to go
+into Dr. Hillyard's hospital, and was infinitely relieved to have her
+assurance that it was unnecessary. She wanted her baby to be born here
+in the country, in the sweet place she had prepared for it, surrounded
+by those she loved. Everything here was perfect for the advent--she
+could ask for nothing more. True, she was seeking comparatively little
+of Stefan, but she knew he was busily painting, and he was uniformly
+kind and affectionate when they were together. He had not been to town
+for over two months.
+
+Mrs. Farraday was a frequent caller, and Mary had grown sincerely to
+love the sweet-faced old lady, who would drive up in a low pony chaise,
+bringing offerings of fruit and vegetables, or quaint preserves from
+recipes unknown to Mary, which had been put up under her own direction.
+
+Then, too, McEwan would appear at week-ends or in the evening, tramping
+down the lane to hail the house in absurd varieties of the latest New
+York slang, which, never failed to amuse Mary. The shy Jamie was often
+with her; they were now the most intimate of friends. He would show her
+primitive tools and mechanical contrivances of his own making, and she
+would tell him stories of Scotland, of Prince Charlie and Flora, of
+Bruce and Wallace, of Bannockburn, or of James, the poet king. Of these
+she had a store, having been brought up, as many English girls happily
+are, on the history and legends of the island, rather than on less
+robust feminine fare.
+
+Farraday, too, sometimes dropped in in the evening, to sit on the
+porch with Stefan and Mary and talk quietly of books and the like.
+Occasionally he came with McEwan or Jamie; he never came alone--though
+this she had not noticed--at hours when Stefan was unlikely to be with
+her.
+
+At the suggestion of Mrs. Farraday, whose word was the social law of
+the district, the most charming women in the neighborhood had called on
+Mary, so that her circle of acquaintances was now quite wide. She had
+had in addition several visits from Constance, and the Sparrow had spent
+a week-end with them, chirping admiration of the place and encomiums of
+her friend's housekeeping. But Mary liked best to be with Stefan, or
+to dream alone through the hushed, sunlit hours amid her small tasks
+of house and garden. Now that the nurse was here, occupying the little
+bedroom opening from Mary's room, the final preparations had been made;
+there was nothing left to do but wait.
+
+Miss McCullock had been with them three days, and Stefan had become used
+to her quiet presence, when late one evening certain small symptoms told
+her that Mary's time had come. Stefan, entering the hall, found her
+at the telephone. "Dr. Hillyard will be here in about an hour and a
+quarter," she said quietly, hanging up the receiver. "Do you know if she
+has driven out before? If not, it might be well for you, Mr. Byrd, to
+walk to the foot of the lane soon, and be ready to signal the turning to
+her." Miss McCullock always distrusted the nerves of husbands on these
+occasions, and planned adroitly to get them out of the way.
+
+Stefan stared at her as flabbergasted as if this emergency had not been
+hourly expected. "Do you mean," he gasped, "that Mary is ill?"
+
+"She is not ill, Mr. Byrd, but the baby will probably be born before
+morning."
+
+"My God!" said Stefan, suddenly blanching. He had not faced this
+moment, had not thought about it, had indeed hardly thought about Mary's
+motherhood at all except to deplore its toll upon her bodily beauty. He
+had tried for her sake, harder than she knew, to appear sympathetic,
+but in his heart the whole thing presented itself as nature's grotesque
+price for the early rapture of their love. That the price might be
+tragic as well as grotesque had only now come home to him. He dropped on
+a chair, his memory flying back to the one other such event in which he
+had had part. He saw himself thrust from his mother's door--he heard
+her shrieks--felt himself fly again into the rain. His forehead was wet;
+cold tingles ran to his fingertips.
+
+The nurse's voice sounded, calm and pleasant, above him. A whiff of
+brandy met his nostrils. "You'd better drink this, Mr. Byrd, and then
+in a minute you might go and see Mrs. Byrd. You will feel better after
+that, I think."
+
+He drank, then looked up, haggard.
+
+"They'll give her plenty of chloroform, won't they?" he whispered,
+catching the nurse's hand. She smiled reassuringly. "Don't worry, Mr.
+Byrd, your wife is in splendid condition, and ether will certainly be
+given when it becomes advisable."
+
+The brandy was working now and his nerves had steadied, but he found the
+nurse's manner maddeningly calm. "I'll go to Mary," he muttered, and,
+brushing past her, sprang up the stairs.
+
+What he expected to see he did not know, but his heart pounded as he
+opened the bedroom door. The room was bright with lamplight, and in
+spotless order. At her small writing-table sat Mary, in a loose white
+dressing gown, her hair in smooth braids around her head, writing. What
+was she doing? Was she leaving some last message for him, in case--? He
+felt himself grow cold again. "Mary!" he exclaimed hoarsely.
+
+She looked round, and called joyfully to him.
+
+"Oh, darling, there you are. I'm getting everything ready. It's coming,
+Stefan dearest. I'm so happy!" Her face was excited, radiant.
+
+He ran to her with a groan of relief, and, kneeling, caught her face to
+his. "Oh, Beautiful, you're all right then? She told me--I was afraid--"
+he stumbled, inarticulate.
+
+She stroked his cheek comfortingly. "Dearest, isn't it wonderful--just
+think--by to-morrow our baby will be here." She kissed him, between
+happy tears and laughter.
+
+"You are not in pain, darling? You're all right? What were you writing
+when I came in?" he stammered, anxiously.
+
+"I'm putting all the accounts straight, and paying all the bills to
+date, so that Lily won't have any trouble while I'm laid up," she
+beamed.
+
+Stefan stared uncomprehendingly for a moment, then burst into
+half-hysterical laughter.
+
+"Oh, you marvel," he gasped, "goddess of efficiency, unshakable
+Olympian! Bills! And I thought you were writing me a farewell message."
+
+"Silly boy," she replied. "The bills have got to be paid; a nice muddle
+you would be in if you had them to do yourself. But, dearest--" her face
+grew suddenly grave and she took his hand--"listen. I _have_ written you
+something--it's there--" her fingers touched an elastic bound pile of
+papers. "I'm perfectly well, but if anything _should_ happen, I want my
+sister to have the baby. Because I think, dear--" she stroked his hand
+with a look of compassionate understanding--"that without me you would
+not want it very much. Miss Mason would take it to England for you, and
+you could make my sister an allowance. I've left you her address, and
+all that I can think of to suggest."
+
+He gazed at her dumbly. Her face glowed with life and beauty, her voice
+was sweet and steady. There she sat, utterly mistress of herself, in the
+shadow of life and death. Was it that her imagination was transcendent,
+or that she had none? He did not know, he did not understand her, but in
+that moment he could have said his prayers at her feet.
+
+The nurse entered. "Now, Mr. Byrd, I think if you could go to the end of
+the lane and be looking out for the doctor? Mrs. Byrd ought to have her
+bath."
+
+Stefan departed. In a dream he walked to the lane's end and waited
+there. He was thinking of Mary, perhaps for the first time, not as a
+beautiful object of love and inspiration, nor as his companion, but as a
+woman. What was this calm strength, this certitude of hers? Why did her
+every word and act seem to move straight forward, while his wheeled
+and circled? What was it that Mary had that he had not? Of what was her
+inmost fiber made? It came to him that for all their loving passages his
+wife was a stranger to him, and a stranger whom he had never sought to
+know. He felt ashamed.
+
+It was about eleven o'clock when the distance was pricked by two points
+of light, which, gradually expanding, proved to be the head-lamps of the
+doctor's car. She stopped at his hail and he climbed beside her.
+
+"I'm glad you came, though I think I know the turning," said Dr.
+Hillyard cheerfully.
+
+"How long will it be, doctor?" he asked nervously.
+
+"Feeling jumpy?" she replied. "Better let me give you a bromide, and
+try for a little sleep. Don't you worry--unless we have complications it
+will be over before morning."
+
+"Before _morning_!" he groaned. "Doctor, you won't let her suffer--you
+will give her something?"
+
+He was again reassured. "Certainly. But she has a magnificent physique,
+with muscles which have never been allowed to soften through tight
+clothing or lack of exercise. I expect an easy case. Here we are, I
+think." The swift little car stopped accurately at the gate, and the
+doctor, shutting off her power, was out in a moment, bag in hand. The
+nurse met them in the hall.
+
+"Getting on nicely--an easy first stage," she reported. The two women
+disappeared upstairs, and Stefan was left alone to live through as best
+he could the most difficult hours that fall to the lot of civilized man.
+Presently Miss McCullock came down to him with a powder, and advice from
+the doctor anent bed, but he would take neither the one nor the other.
+"What a sot I should be," he thought, picturing himself lying drugged to
+slumber while Mary suffered.
+
+By and by he ventured upstairs. Clouds of steam rose from the bathroom,
+brilliant light was everywhere, two white-swathed figures, scarcely
+recognizable, seemed to move with incredible speed amid a perfectly
+ordered chaos. All Mary's pretty paraphernalia were gone; white oil
+cloth covered every table, and was in its turn covered by innumerable
+objects sealed in stiff paper. Amid these alien surroundings Mary sat in
+her nightgown on the edge of the bed, her knees drawn up.
+
+"Hello, dearest," she called rather excitedly, "we're getting awfully
+busy." Then her face contracted. "Here comes another," she said
+cheerily, and gasped a little. On that Stefan fled, with a muttered
+"Call me if she wants me," to the nurse.
+
+He wandered to the kitchen. There was a roaring fire, but the room
+was empty--even Lily had found work upstairs. For an hour more Stefan
+prowled--then he rang up the Farraday's house. After an interval James'
+voice answered him.
+
+"It's Byrd, Farraday," said Stefan. "No--" quickly--"everything's
+perfectly all right, perfectly, but it's going on. Could you come over?"
+
+In fifteen minutes Farraday had dressed and was at the door, his great
+car gliding up silently beside the doctor's. As he walked in Stefan saw
+that his face was quite white.
+
+"It was awfully good of you to come," he said.
+
+"I'm so glad you asked me. My car is a sixty horsepower, if anything
+were needed." Farraday sat down, and lighted a pipe. Stefan delivered
+knowledge of the waiting machine upstairs, and then recommenced his
+prowl. Back and forth through the two living rooms he walked, lighting,
+smoking, or throwing away endless cigarettes. Farraday sat drawing at
+his pipe. Neither spoke. One o'clock struck, and two.
+
+Presently they heard a loud growling sound, quite un-human, but with no
+quality of agony. It was merely as if some animal were making a supreme
+physical effort. In about two minutes this was repeated. Farraday's pipe
+dropped on the hearth, Stefan tore upstairs. "What is it?" he asked at
+the open door. Something large and white moved powerfully on the bed. At
+the foot bent the little doctor, her hands hidden, and at the head stood
+the nurse holding a small can. A heavy, sweet odor filled the room.
+
+"It's all right," the doctor said rapidly. "Expulsive stage. She isn't
+suffering."
+
+"Hello, Stefan dear," said a small, rather high voice, which made him
+jump violently. Then he saw a face on the pillow, its eyes closed, and
+its nose and mouth covered with a wire cone. In a moment there came a
+gasp, the sheathed form drew tense, the nurse spilled a few drops from
+her can upon the cone, the growling recommenced and heightened to a
+crescendo. Stefan had an impression of tremendous physical life, but the
+human tone of the "Hello, Stefan," was quite gone again.
+
+He was backing shakily out when the doctor called to him.
+
+"It will be born quite soon, now, Mr. Byrd," her cheery voice promised.
+
+Trembling with relief, he stumbled downstairs. Farraday was standing
+rigid before the fireplace, his face quite expressionless.
+
+"She's having ether--I don't think she's suffering. The doctor says
+quite soon, now," Stefan jerked out.
+
+"I'm thankful," said Farraday, quietly.
+
+He stooped and picked up his fallen pipe, but it took him a long time
+to refill it--particles of tobacco kept showering to the rug from his
+fingers. Stefan, with a new cigarette, resumed his prowl.
+
+Midsummer dawn was breaking. The lamplight began to pale before
+the glimmer of the windows. A sleepy bird chirped, the room became
+mysterious.
+
+There had been rapid steps overhead for some moments, and now the two
+men became aware that the tiger-like sounds had quite ceased. The steps
+overhead quieted. Farraday put out the lamp, and the blue light flooded
+the room.
+
+A bird called loudly, and another answered it, high, repeatedly. The
+notes were right over their heads; they rose higher, insistent. They
+were not the notes of a bird. The nurse appeared at the door and looked
+at Stefan.
+
+"Your son is born," she said.
+
+Instantly to both men it was as if eerie bonds, drawn over-taut, had
+snapped, releasing them again to the physical world about them. The high
+mystery was over; life was human and kindly once again. Farraday dropped
+into his chair and held a hand across his eyes. Stefan threw both arms
+round Miss McCullock's shoulders and hugged her like a child.
+
+"Oh, hurrah!" he cried, almost sobbing with relief. "Bless you, nurse.
+Is she all right?"
+
+"She's perfect--I've never seen finer condition. You can come up in a
+few minutes, the doctor says, and see her before she goes to sleep."
+
+"There's nothing needed, nurse?" asked Farraday, rising.
+
+"Nothing at all, thank you."
+
+"Then I'll be getting home, Byrd," he said, offering his hand to Stefan.
+"My warmest congratulations. Let me know if there's anything I can do."
+
+Stefan shook the proffered hand with a deeper liking than he had yet
+felt for this silent man.
+
+"I'm everlastingly grateful to you, Farraday, for helping me out, and
+Mary will be, too. I don't know how I could have stood it alone."
+
+Stefan mounted the stairs tremblingly, to pause in amazement at the
+door of Mary's room. A second transformation had, as if by magic, taken
+place. The lights were out. The dawn smiled at the windows, through
+which a gentle breeze ruffled the curtains. Gone were all evidences of
+the night's tense drama; tables and chairs were empty; the room looked
+calm and spacious.
+
+On the bed Mary lay quiet, her form hardly outlined under the smooth
+coverlet. Half fearfully he let his eyes travel to the pillow, dreading
+he knew not what change. Instantly, relief overwhelmed him. Her face
+was radiant, her cheeks pink--she seemed to glow with a sublimated
+happiness. Only in her eyes lay any traces of the night--they were still
+heavy from the anaesthetic, but they shone lovingly on him, as though
+deep lights were behind them.
+
+"Darling," she whispered, "we've got a little boy. Did you worry? It
+wasn't anything--only the most thrilling adventure that's ever happened
+to me."
+
+He looked at her almost with awe--then, stooping, pressed his face to
+the pillow beside hers.
+
+"Were they merciful to you, Beautiful?" he whispered back. Weakly, her
+hand found his head.
+
+"Yes, darling, they were wonderful. I was never quite unconscious, yet
+it wasn't a bit bad--only as if I were in the hands of some prodigious
+force. They showed me the baby, too--just for a minute. I want to see
+him again now--with you."
+
+Stefan looked up. Dr. Hillyard was in the doorway of the little room.
+She nodded, and in a moment reappeared, carrying a small white bundle.
+
+"Here he is," she said; "he weighs eight and a half pounds. You can both
+look at him for a moment, and then Mrs. Byrd must go to sleep." She put
+the bundle gently down beside Mary, whose head turned toward it.
+
+Almost hidden in folds of flannel Stefan saw a tiny red face, its
+eyes closed, two microscopic fists doubled under its chin. It conveyed
+nothing to him except a sense of amazement.
+
+"He's asleep," whispered Mary, "but I saw his eyes--they are blue. Isn't
+he pretty?" Her own eyes, soft with adoration, turned from her son to
+Stefan. Then they drooped, drowsily.
+
+"She's falling off," said the doctor under her breath, recovering the
+baby. "They'll both sleep for several hours now. Lily is getting us some
+breakfast--wouldn't you like some, too, Mr. Byrd?"
+
+Stefan felt grateful for her normal, cheery manner, and for Mary's
+sudden drowsiness; they seemed to cover what he felt to be a failure in
+himself. He had been unable to find one word to say about the baby.
+
+At breakfast, served by the sleepy but beaming Lily, Stefan was dazed by
+the bearing of doctor and nurse. These two women, after a night spent
+in work of an intensity and scope beyond his powers to gage, appeared
+as fresh and normal as if they had just risen from sleep, while he,
+unshaved and rumpled, could barely control his racked nerves and heavy
+head, across which doctor and nurse discussed their case with animation.
+
+"We are all going to bed, Mr. Byrd," said the doctor at last, noting
+his exhausted aspect. "I shall get two or, three hours' nap on the sofa
+before going back to town, and I hope you will take a thorough rest."
+
+Stefan rose rather dizzily from his unfinished meal.
+
+"Please take my room," he said, "I couldn't stay in the house--I'm going
+out." He found the atmosphere of alert efficiency created by these women
+utterly insupportable. The house stifled him with its teeming feminine
+life. In it he felt superfluous, futile. Hurrying out, he stumbled down
+the slope and, stripping, dived into the water. Its cold touch robbed
+him of thought; he became at once merely one of Nature's straying
+children returned again to her arms.
+
+Swimming back, he drew on his clothes, and mounting to the garden, threw
+himself face down upon the grass, and fell asleep under the morning sun.
+
+He dreamed that a drum was calling him. Its beat, muffled and irregular,
+yet urged him forward. A flag waved dazzlingly before his eyes; its
+folds stifled him. He tried to move, yet could not--the drum called ever
+more urgently. He started awake, to find himself on his back, the sun
+beating into his face, and the doctor's machine chugging down the lane.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+The little June baby at the Byrdsnest was very popular with the
+neighborhood. During the summer it seemed to Stefan that the house was
+never free of visitors who came to admire the child, guess his weight,
+and exclaim at his mother's health.
+
+As a convalescent, Mary was, according to Constance Elliot, a complete
+fraud. Except for her hair, which had temporarily lost some of its
+elasticity, she had never looked so radiant. She was out of bed on the
+ninth day, and walking in the garden on the twelfth. The behavior of
+the baby--who was a stranger to artificial food--was exemplary; he never
+fretted, and cried only when he was hungry. But as his appetite troubled
+him every three hours during the day, and every four at night, he
+appeared to Stefan to cry incessantly, and his strenuous wail would
+drive his father from house to barn, and from barn to woods. Lured from
+one of these retreats by an interval of silence, Stefan was as likely as
+not to find an auto at the gate and hear exclamatory voices proceeding
+from the nursery, when he would fade into the woods again like a wild
+thing fearful of the trap.
+
+His old dislike of his kind reasserted itself. It is one thing to be
+surrounded by pretty women proclaiming you the greatest artist of your
+day, and quite another to listen while they exclaim on the perfections
+of your offspring and the health of your wife. For the first type
+of conversation Stefan had still an appetite; with the second he was
+quickly surfeited.
+
+Nor were women his only tormentors. The baby spent much of its time in
+the garden, and every Sunday Stefan would find McEwan planted on the
+lawn, prodding the infant with a huge forefinger, and exploding into
+fatuous mirth whenever he deluded himself into believing he had made it
+smile. Of late Stefan had begun to tolerate this man, but after three
+such exhibitions decided to blacklist him permanently as an insufferable
+idiot. Even Farraday lost ground in his esteem, for, though guilty of
+no banalities, he had a way of silently hovering over the baby-carriage
+which Stefan found mysteriously irritating. Jamie alone of their
+masculine friends seemed to adopt a comprehensible attitude, for he
+backed away in hasty alarm whenever the infant, in arms or carriage,
+bore down upon him. On several occasions when the Farraday household
+invaded the Byrdsnest Stefan and Jamie together sneaked away in search
+of an environment more seemly for their sex.
+
+"You are the only creature I know just now, Jamie," Stefan said, "with
+any sense of proportion;" and these two outcasts from notice would tramp
+moodily through the woods, the boy faithfully imitating Stefan's slouch
+and his despondent way of carrying his hands thrust in his pockets.
+
+There were no more tales of Scotland for Jamie in these days, and as for
+Stefan he hardly saw his wife. True, she always brightened when he came
+in and mutely evinced her desire that he should remain, but she was
+never his. While he talked her eye would wander to the cradle, or if
+they were in another room her ear would be constantly strained to catch
+a cry. In the midst of a pleasant interlude she would jump to her feet
+with a murmured "Dinner time," or "He must have some water now," and be
+gone.
+
+Stefan did not sleep with her--as he could not endure being disturbed
+at night--and she took a long nap every afternoon, so that at best the
+hours available for him were few. Any visitor, he thought morosely, won
+more attention from her than he did, and this was in a sense true, for
+the visitors openly admired the baby--the heart of Mary's life--and he
+did not.
+
+He did not know how intensely she longed for this, how she ached to see
+Stefan jab his finger at the baby as McEwan did, or watch it with the
+tender smile of Farraday. She tried a thousand simple wiles to bring to
+life the father in him. About to nurse the baby, she would call Stefan
+to see his eager search for the comfort of her breast, looking up in
+proud joy as the tiny mouth was satisfied.
+
+At the very first, when the baby was newborn, Stefan had watched this
+rite with some interest, but now he only fidgeted, exclaiming, "You are
+looking wonderfully fit, Mary," or "Greedy little beggar, isn't he?" He
+never spoke of his old idea of painting her as a Madonna. If she
+drew his attention to the baby's tiny hands or feet, he would glance
+carelessly at them, with a "They're all right," or "I'll like them
+better when they're bigger."
+
+Once, as they were going to bed, she showed Stefan the baby lying on his
+chest, one fist balled on either side of the pillow, the downy back of
+his head shining in the candle-light. She stooped and kissed it.
+
+"His head is too deliciously soft and warm, Stefan; do kiss it
+good-night."
+
+His face contracted into an expression of distaste. "No," he said, "I
+can't kiss babies," and left the room.
+
+She felt terribly, unnecessarily hurt. It was so difficult for her to
+make advances, so fatally easy for him to rebuff them.
+
+After that, she did not draw the baby to his attention again.
+
+Perhaps, had the child been a girl, Stefan would have felt more
+sentiment about it. A girl baby, lying like a pink bud among the roses
+of the garden, might have appealed to that elfin imagination which
+largely took the place in him of romance--but a boy! A boy was merely in
+his eyes another male, and Stefan considered the world far too full of
+men already.
+
+He sealed his attitude when the question of the child's name came up.
+Mary had fallen into a habit of calling it "Little Stefan," or "Steve"
+for short, and one morning, as the older Stefan crossed the lawn to his
+studio her voice floated down from the nursery in an improvised song to
+her "Stefan Baby." He bounded upstairs to her.
+
+"Mary," he called, "you are surely not going to call that infant by my
+name?"
+
+Mary, her lap enveloped in aprons and towels, looked up from the bath in
+which her son was practising tentative kicks.
+
+"Why, yes, dear, I thought we'd christen him after you, as he's the
+eldest. Don't you think that would be nice?" She looked puzzled.
+
+"No, I do not!" Stefan snorted emphatically. "For heaven's sake give the
+child a name of his own, and let me keep mine. My God, one Stefan Byrd
+is enough in the world, I should think!"
+
+"Well, dear, what shall we call him, then?" she asked, lowering her head
+over the baby to hide her hurt.
+
+"Give him your own name if you want to. After all, he's your child.
+Elliston Byrd wouldn't sound at all bad."
+
+"Very well," said Mary slowly. "I think the Dad would have been pleased
+by that." In spite of herself, her voice trembled.
+
+"Good Lord, Mary, I haven't hurt you, have I?" He looked exasperated.
+
+She shook her head, still bending over the baby.
+
+"It's all right, dear," she whispered.
+
+"You're so soft nowadays, one hardly dare speak," he muttered. "Sorry,
+dear," and with a penitent kiss for the back of her neck he hastened
+downstairs again.
+
+The christening was held two weeks later, in the small Episcopalian
+church of Crab's Bay. Stefan could see no reason for it, as neither he
+nor Mary was orthodox, but when he suggested omitting the ceremony she
+looked at him wide-eyed.
+
+"Not christen him, Stefan? Oh, I don't think that would be fair," she
+said. Her manner was simple, but there was finality in her tone--it made
+him feel that wherever her child was concerned she would be adamant.
+
+The baby's godmother was, of course, Constance, and his godfathers,
+equally obviously, Farraday and McEwan. Mary made the ceremony the
+occasion of a small at-home, inviting the numerous friends from whom she
+had received congratulations or gifts for the baby.
+
+Miss Mason had insisted on herself baking the christening cake; Farraday
+as usual supplied a sheaf of flowers. In the drawing room the little
+Elliston's presents were displayed, a beautiful old cup from Farraday,
+a christening robe, and a spoon, "pusher," and fork from Constance, a
+silver bowl "For Elliston's porridge from his friend Wallace McEwan,"
+and a Bible in stout leather binding from Mrs. Farraday, inscribed
+in her delicate, slanting hand. There was even a napkin ring from the
+baby's aunt in England, who was much relieved that her too-independent
+sister had married a successful artist and done her duty by the family
+so promptly.
+
+Mary was naively delighted with these offerings.
+
+"He has got everything I should have liked him to have!" she exclaimed
+as she arranged them.
+
+Stefan, led to the font, showed all the nervousness he had omitted at
+the altar, but looked very handsome in a suit of linen crash, while
+Mary, in white muslin, was at her glowing best.
+
+Constance was inevitably late, for, like most American women, she did
+not carry her undeniable efficiency to the point of punctuality. At the
+last moment, however, she dashed up to the church with the elan of a
+triumphant general, bearing her husband captive in the tonneau, and
+no less a person than Gunther, the distinguished sculptor, on the seat
+beside her.
+
+"I know you did not ask him, but he's so handsome I thought he ought to
+be here," she whispered inconsequentially to Mary after the ceremony.
+
+Of their many acquaintances few were unrepresented except Miss Berber,
+to whom Mary had felt disinclined to send an invitation. She had sounded
+Stefan on the subject, but had been answered by a "Certainly not!" so
+emphatic as to surprise her.
+
+At the house Gunther, with his great height and magnificent viking head,
+was unquestionably the hit of the afternoon. Holding the baby, which lay
+confidently in his powerful hands, he examined its head, arms and legs
+with professional interest, while every woman in the room watched him
+admiringly.
+
+"This baby, Mrs. Byrd, is the finest for his age I have ever seen, and I
+have modeled many of them," he pronounced, handing it back to Mary, who
+blushed to her forehead with pleasure. "Not that I am surprised," he
+went on, staring frankly at her, "when I look at his mother. I am doing
+some groups for the Pan-American exhibition next year in San Francisco.
+If you could give me any time, I should very much like to use your head
+and the baby's. I shall try and arrange it with you," and he nodded as
+if that settled the matter.
+
+"Oh," gasped Constance, "you have all the luck. Mary! Mr. Gunther has
+known me for years, but have _I_ had a chance to sit for him? I
+feel myself turning green, and as my gown is yellow it will be most
+unbecoming!" And seizing Farraday as if for consolation, she bore him to
+the dining room to find a drink.
+
+Stefan, who was interested in Gunther, tried to get him to the barn to
+see his pictures; but the sculptor would not move his eyes from Mary,
+and Stefan, considerably bored, was obliged to content himself with
+showing the studio to some of his prettiest neighbors.
+
+Nor did his spirits improve when the party came to an end.
+
+"Bon Dieu!" he cried, flinging himself fretfully into a chair. "Is our
+house never to be free of chattering women? The only person here to-day
+who speaks my language was Gunther, and you never gave me a chance at
+him."
+
+Mary gasped, too astonished at this accusation to refute it.
+
+"Ever since we came down here," he went on irritably, "the place has
+seethed with people, and overflowed with domesticity. I never hear one
+word spoken except on the subject of furniture, gardening and babies!
+I can't work in such an environment; it stifles all imagination. As for
+you, Mary--"
+
+He looked up at her. She was standing, stricken motionless, in the
+center of the room. Her hair, straighter than of old, seemed to droop
+over her ears; her form under its loose muslin dress showed soft and
+blurred, its clean-cut lines gone, while her face, almost as white as
+the gown, was woe-begone, the eyes dark with tears. She stood there
+like a hurt child, all her courageous gallantry eclipsed by this
+unkind ending to her happy day. Stefan rose to his feet and faced her,
+searching for some phrase that could express his sense of deprivation.
+He had the instinct to stab her into a full realization of what she was
+losing in his eyes.
+
+"Mary," he cried almost wildly, "your wings are gone!" and rushed out of
+the room.
+
+
+
+
+PART IV
+
+WINGS
+
+I
+
+
+One evening early in October Mary telephoned Farraday to ask if she
+could consult him with reference to the Byrdsnest. He walked over after
+dinner, to find her alone in the sitting room, companioned by a wood
+fire and the two sleeping lovebirds.
+
+James had been very busy at the office for some time, and it was two
+or three weeks since he had seen Mary. Now, as he sat opposite her, it
+seemed to him that the leaping firelight showed unaccustomed shadows in
+her cheeks and under her eyes, and that her color was less bright than
+formerly. Was it merely the result of her care of her baby, he wondered,
+or was there something more?
+
+"I fear we've already outstayed our time here, Mr. Farraday," Mary was
+saying, "and yet I am going to ask you for an extension."
+
+Farraday lit a cigarette.
+
+"My dear Mrs. Byrd, stay as long as you like."
+
+"But you don't know the measure of my demands," she went on, with a
+hesitating smile. "They are so extensive that I'm ashamed. I love this
+little place, Mr. Farraday; it's the first real home I've ever had of
+my own. And Baby does so splendidly here--I can't bear the thought of
+taking him to the city. How long might I really hope to stay without
+inconveniencing you? I mean, of course, at a proper rent."
+
+"As far as I am concerned," he smiled back at her, "I shall be overjoyed
+to have you stay as long as the place attracts you. If you like, I will
+give you a lease--a year, two, or three, as you will, so that you could
+feel settled, or an option to renew after the first year."
+
+"But, Mr. Farraday, your mother told me that you used to use the place,
+and in the face of that I don't know how I have the selfishness to ask
+you for any time at all, to say nothing of a lease!"
+
+"Mrs. Byrd." Farraday threw his cigarette into the fire, and, leaning
+forward, stared at the flames, his hands clasped between his knees. "Let
+me tell you a sentimental little story, which no one else knows except
+our friend Mac." He smiled whimsically.
+
+"When I was a young man I was very much in love, and looked forward to
+having a home of my own, and children. But I was unfortunate--I did not
+succeed in winning the woman I loved, and as I am slow to change, I made
+up my mind that my dream home would never come true. But I was very fond
+of my 'cottage in the air,' and some years later, when this little house
+became empty, I arranged it to look as nearly as I could as that other
+might have done. I used to sit here sometimes and pretend that my
+shadows were real. You will laugh at me, but I even have in my desk
+plans for an addition, an ell, containing a play room and nurseries."
+
+Mary gave a little pitiful exclamation, and touched his clasped hands.
+Meeting her eyes, he saw them dewy with sympathy.
+
+"You are very gracious to a sentimental old bachelor," he said, with
+his winning smile. "But these ghosts were bad for me. I was in danger
+of becoming absurdly self-centered, almost morbidly introspective. Mac,
+whose heart is the biggest I know, and who laughs away more troubles
+than I ever dreamed of, rallied me about it, and showed me that I ought
+to turn my disappointment to some use. This was about ten years ago,
+when his own life fell to pieces. I had been associated with magazines
+for some time, and knew how little that was really good found its
+way into the plainer people's homes. At Mac's suggestion I bought
+an insolvent monthly, and began to remodel it. 'You've got the
+home-and-children bug; well, do something for other people's'--was the
+way Mac put it to me. Later we started the two other magazines, always
+keeping before us our aim of giving the average home the best there is.
+To-day, though I have no children of my own, I like to think I'm a sort
+of uncle to thousands."
+
+He leant back, still staring into the fire. There was silence for
+a minute; a log fell with a crash and a flight of sparks--Farraday
+replaced it.
+
+"Well, Mrs. Byrd," he went on, "all this time the little ghost-house
+stood empty. No one used it but myself. It was made for a woman and
+for children, yet in my selfishness I locked its door against those who
+should rightfully have enjoyed it. Mac urged me to use it as a holiday
+house for poor mothers from the city, but, somehow, I could not bring
+myself to evict its dream-mistress."
+
+"Oh, I feel more than ever a trespasser!" exclaimed Mary.
+
+He shook his head. "No, you have redeemed the place from futility--you
+are its justification." He paused again, and continued in a lower tone,
+"Mrs. Byrd, you won't mind my saying this--you are so like that lady of
+long ago that the house seems yours by natural right. I think I was only
+waiting for someone who would love and understand it--some golden-haired
+young mother, like yourself, to give the key to. I can't tell you how
+happy it makes me that the little house should at last fulfil itself.
+Please keep it for as long as you need it--it will always need you."
+
+Mary was much moved: "I can't thank you, Mr. Farraday, but I feel deeply
+honored. Perhaps my best thanks lie just in loving the house, and I do
+that, with all my heart. You don't mind my foolish little name for it?"
+
+"The Byrdsnest? I think it perfect."
+
+"And you don't mind either the alterations I have made?"
+
+"My dear friend, while you keep this house I want it to be yours. Should
+you wish to take a long lease, and enlarge it, I shall be happy. In
+fact, I will sell it to you, if in the future you would care to buy. My
+only stipulation would be an option to repurchase should you decide
+to give it up." He took her hand. "The Byrdsnest belongs to Elliston's
+mother; let us both understand that."
+
+Her lips trembled. "You are good to me."
+
+"No, it is you who are good to the dreams of a sentimentalist. And
+now--" he sat back smilingly--"that is settled. Tell me the news. How is
+my godson, how is Mr. Byrd, how fares the sable Lily?"
+
+"Baby weighs fourteen and a half pounds," she said proudly; "he is
+simply perfect. Lily is an angel." She paused, and seemed to continue
+almost with an effort. "Stefan is very busy. He does not care to paint
+autumn landscapes, so he has begun work again in the city. He's doing a
+fantastic study of Miss Berber, and is very much pleased with it."
+
+"That's good," said Farraday, evenly.
+
+"But I've got more news for you," she went on, brightening. "I've had
+a good deal more time lately, Stefan being so much in town, and Baby's
+habits so regular. Here's the result."
+
+She fetched from the desk a pile of manuscript, neatly penned, and laid
+it on her guest's knee.
+
+"This is the second thing I wanted to consult you about. It's a
+book-length story for children, called 'The House in the Wood.' I've
+written the first third, and outlined the rest. Here's the list of
+chapters. It is supposed to be for children between eight and fourteen,
+and was first suggested to me by this house. There is a family of four
+children, and a regulation father and mother, nurse, governess, and
+grandmother. They live in the country, and the children find a little
+deserted cottage which they adopt to play in. The book is full of their
+adventures in it. My idea is--" she sat beside him, her eyes brightening
+with interest--"to suggest all kinds of games to the children who read
+the story, which seem thrilling, but are really educational. It's quite
+a moral little book, I'm afraid," she laughed, "but I think story books
+should describe adventures which may be within the scope of the ordinary
+child's life, don't you? I'm afraid it isn't a work of art, but I
+hope--if I can work out the scheme--it may give some practical ideas
+to mothers who don't know how to amuse their children.... There, Mr.
+Editor, what is your verdict?"
+
+Farraday was turning the pages in his rapid, absorbed way. He nodded and
+smiled as he looked.
+
+"I think it's a good idea, Mrs. Byrd; just the sort of thing we are
+always on the lookout for. The subject might be trite enough, but I
+suspect you of having lent it charm and freshness. Of course the family
+is English, which is a disadvantage, but I see you've mixed in a small
+American visitor, and that he's beginning to teach the others a thing or
+two! Where did you learn such serpent wisdom, young lady?"
+
+She laughed, amazed as she had been a year ago at his lightning-like
+apprehension.
+
+"It isn't humbug. I do think an American child could teach ours at home
+a lot about inventiveness, independence, and democracy--just as I think
+ours might teach him something about manners," she added, smiling.
+
+"Admitted," said he, laying down the manuscript, "and thank you for
+letting me see this. I claim the first refusal. Finish it, have it
+typed, and send it in, and if I can run it as a serial in The Child at
+Home, I shall be tremendously pleased to do so. If it goes, it ought to
+come out in book form, illustrated."
+
+"You really think the idea has something in it?"
+
+"I certainly do, and you know how much I believe in your work."
+
+"Oh, I'm _so_ glad," she exclaimed, looking far more cheerful than he
+had seen her that evening.
+
+He rose to go, and held her hand a moment in his friendly grasp.
+
+"Good night, dear Mrs. Byrd; give my love to Elliston, and remember that
+in him and your work you have two priceless treasures which, even alone,
+will give you happiness."
+
+"Oh, I know," she said, her eyes shining; "good night, and thank you for
+the house."
+
+"Good night, and in the house's name, thank you," he answered from the
+door.
+
+As she closed it, the brightness slowly faded from Mary's face. She
+looked at the clock--it was past ten.
+
+"Not to-night, either," she said to herself. Her hand wandered to the
+telephone in the hall, but she drew it back. "No, better not," she
+thought, and, putting out the lights, walked resolutely upstairs. As,
+candle in hand, she passed the door of Stefan's room, she looked in.
+His bed was smooth; a few trifles lay in orderly array upon his dressing
+table; boots, from which the country dust had been wiped days ago, stood
+with toes turned meekly to the wall. They looked lonely, she thought.
+
+With a sigh, she entered her own room, and passed through it to the
+nursery. There lay her baby, soundly sleeping, his cheek on the pillow,
+his little fists folded under his chin. How beautiful he looked, she
+thought; how sweet his little room, how fresh and peaceful all the
+house! It was the home of love--love lay all about her, in the kind
+protection of the trees, in the nests of the squirrels, in the voices
+and faces of her friends, and in her heart. Love was all about her, and
+the sweetness of young life--and she was utterly lonely. One short year
+ago she thought she would never know loneliness again--only a year ago.
+
+The candle wavered in her hand; a drop of wax fell on the baby's
+spotless coverlet. Stooping, she blew upon it till it was cold, and
+carefully broke it off. She sat down in a low rocking chair, and
+lifting the baby, gave him his good-night nursing. He barely opened his
+sleep-laden eyes. She kissed him, made him tidy for the night, and laid
+him down, waiting while he cuddled luxuriously back to sleep.
+
+"Little Stefan, little Stefan," she whispered.
+
+Then, leaving the nursery door ajar, she undressed noiselessly, and lay
+down on the cool, empty bed.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+The following afternoon about teatime Stefan bicycled up from the
+station. Mary, who was in the sitting room, heard him calling from the
+gate, but did not go to meet him. He hurried into the room and kissed
+her half-turned cheek effusively.
+
+"Well, dear, aren't you glad to see me?" he asked rather nervously.
+
+"Do you know that you've been away six days, Stefan, and have only
+troubled to telephone me twice?" she answered, in a voice carefully
+controlled.
+
+"You don't mean it!" he exclaimed. "I had no idea it was so long."
+
+"Hadn't you?"
+
+He fidgeted. "Well, dear, you know I'm frightfully keen on this new
+picture, and the journeys back and forth waste so much time. But as
+for the telephoning, I'm awfully sorry. I've been so absorbed I simply
+didn't remember. Why didn't you ring me up?"
+
+"I didn't wish to interrupt a sitting. I rang twice in the evenings, but
+you were out."
+
+"Yes; I've been trying to amuse myself a little." He was rocking from
+one foot to the other like a detected schoolboy.
+
+"Hang it all, Mary," he burst out, "don't be so judicial. One must have
+some pleasure--I can't sit about this cottage all the time."
+
+"I don't think I've asked you to do that."
+
+"You haven't, but you seem to be implying the request now."
+
+She was chilled to silence, having no heart to reason him out of so
+unreasonable a defense.
+
+"Well, anyway," he said, flinging himself on the sofa, "here I am, so
+let's make the best of it. Tea ready?"
+
+"It's just coming."
+
+"That's good. When are you coming up to see the picture? It's going to
+be the best I've done. I shall get Constantine to exhibit it and that
+stick of a Demeter together, and then the real people and the fools will
+both have something to admire."
+
+"You say this will be your best?" asked Mary, whom the phrase had
+stabbed.
+
+"Well," he said reflectively, lighting a cigarette, "perhaps not better
+than the Danae in one sense--it hasn't as much feeling, but has more
+originality. Miss Berber is such an unusual type--she's quite an
+inspiration."
+
+"And I'm not, any more," Mary could not help adding in a muffled voice.
+
+"Don't be so literal, my dear; of course you are, but not for this sort
+of picture." The assurance sounded perfunctory.
+
+"Thank goodness, here comes the tea," he exclaimed as Lily entered with
+the tray. "Hullo, Lily; how goes it?"
+
+"Fine, Mr. Byrd, but we've shorely missed you," she answered, with
+something less than her usual wholehearted smile.
+
+"Well, you must rejoice, now that the prodigal has returned," he
+grinned. "Mary, you haven't answered my question yet--when are you
+coming in to see the picture? Why not to-morrow? I'm dying to show it to
+you."
+
+She flushed. "I can't come, Stefan; it's impossible to leave Baby so
+long."
+
+"Well, bring him with you."
+
+"That wouldn't be possible, either; it would disturb his sleep, and
+upset him."
+
+"There you are!" he exclaimed, ruffling his hair. "I can't work down
+here, and you can't come to town--how can I help seeming to neglect you?
+Look here"--he had drunk his tea at a gulp, and now held out his cup for
+more--"if you're lonely, why not move back to the city--then you could
+keep your eye on me!" and he grinned again.
+
+For some time Mary had feared this suggestion--she had not yet discussed
+with Stefan her desire to stay in the country. She pressed her hands
+together nervously.
+
+"Stefan, do you really want me to move back?"
+
+"I want you to do whatever will make you happier," he temporized.
+
+"If you really needed me there I would come. But you are always so
+absorbed when you're working, and I am so busy with Baby, that I don't
+believe we should have much more time together than now."
+
+"Neither do I," he agreed, in a tone suspiciously like relief, which she
+was quick to catch.
+
+"On the other hand," she went on, "this place is far better for Baby,
+and I am devoted to it. We couldn't afford anything half as comfortable
+in the city, and you like it, too, in the summer."
+
+"Of course I do," he answered cheerfully. "I should hate to give it up,
+and I'm sure it's much more economical, and all that. Still, if you stay
+here through the winter you mustn't be angry if I am in town part of the
+time--my work has got to come first, you know."
+
+"Yes, of course, dear," said Mary, wistfully, "and I think it would be a
+mistake for me to come unless you really wanted me."
+
+"Of course I want you, Beautiful."
+
+He spoke easily, but she was not deceived. She knew he was glad of the
+arrangement, not for her sake, but for his own. She had watched him
+fretting for weeks past, like a caged bird, and she had the wisdom to
+see that her only hope of making him desire the nest again lay in giving
+him freedom from it. Her pride fortified this perception. As she had
+said long ago, Mary was no bargainer.
+
+In spite of her comprehension, however, she warmed toward him. It was so
+good to see him lounging on the sofa again, his green-gold eyes bright,
+his brown face with its elfish smile radiant now that his point was
+won. She knew he had been unkind to her both in word and act, but it was
+impossible not to forgive him, now that she enjoyed again the comfort of
+his presence.
+
+Smiling, she poured out his third cup of tea, and was just passing it
+when there was a knock, and McEwan entered the hall.
+
+"Hello, Byrd," he called, his broad shoulders blocking the sitting room
+door as he came in; "down among the Rubes again? Madam Mary, I accept in
+advance your offer of tea. Well, how goes the counterfeit presentment of
+our friend Twinkle-Toes?"
+
+Stefan's eyebrows went up. "Do you mean Miss Berber?"
+
+"Yes," said McEwan, with an aggravating smile, as he devoured a slice of
+cake. "We're all expecting another ten-strike. Are you depicting her as
+a toe-shaker or a sartorial artist?"
+
+"Really, Wallace," protested Mary, who had grown quite intimate with
+McEwan, "you are utterly incorrigible in your Yankee vein--you respect
+no one."
+
+"I respect the President of these United States," said he solemnly,
+raising an imaginary hat.
+
+"That's more than I do," snorted Stefan; "a pompous Puritan!"
+
+"For goodness' sake, don't start him on politics, Wallace," said Mary;
+"he has a contempt for every public man in America except Roosevelt and
+Bill Heywood."
+
+"So I have," replied Stefan; "they are the only two with a spark of the
+picturesque, or one iota of originality."
+
+"You ought to paint their pictures arm in arm, with Taft floating on
+a cloud crowning them with a sombrero and a sandbag, Bryan pouring
+grape-juice libations, and Wilson watchfully waiting in the background.
+Label it 'Morituri salutamus'--I bet it would sell," said McEwan
+hopefully.
+
+Mary laughed heartily, but Stefan did not conceal his boredom. "Why
+don't you go into vaudeville, McEwan?" he frowned.
+
+"Solely out of consideration for the existing stars," McEwan sighed,
+putting down his cup and rising. "Well, chin music hath charms, but I
+must toddle to the house, or I shall get in bad with Jamie. My love to
+Elliston, Mary. Byrd, I warn you that my well-known critical faculty
+needs stimulation; I mean to drop in at the studio ere long to slam the
+latest masterpiece. So long," and he grinned himself out before Stefan's
+rising irritation had a chance to explode.
+
+"Why do you let that great tomfool call you by your first name, Mary?"
+he demanded, almost before the front door was shut.
+
+"Wallace is one of the kindest men alive, and I'm quite devoted to him.
+I admit, though, that he seems to enjoy teasing you."
+
+"Teasing me!" Stefan scoffed; "it's like an elephant teasing a fly. He
+obliterates me."
+
+"Well, don't be an old crosspatch," she smiled, determined now they were
+alone again to make the most of him.
+
+"You are a good sort, Mary," he said, smiling in reply; "it's restful
+to be with you. Sing to me, won't you?" He stretched luxuriously on the
+sofa.
+
+She obeyed, glad enough of the now rare opportunity of pleasing him.
+Farraday had brought her some Norse ballads not long before; their sad
+elfin cadences had charmed her. She sang these now, touching the piano
+lightly for fear of waking the sleeping baby overhead. Turning to Stefan
+at the end, she found him sound asleep, one arm drooping over the sofa,
+the nervous lines of his face smoothed like a tired child's. For some
+reason she felt strangely pitiful toward him. "He must be very tired,
+poor boy," she thought.
+
+Crossing to the kitchen, she warned Lily not to enter the sitting room,
+and herself slipped upstairs to the baby. Stefan slept till dinner time,
+and for the rest of the evening was unusually kind and quiet.
+
+As they went up to bed Mary turned wistfully to him.
+
+"Wouldn't you like to look at Elliston? You haven't seen him for a long
+time."
+
+"Bless me, I suppose I haven't--let's take a peep at him."
+
+Together they bent over the cradle. "Why, he's looking quite human. I
+think he must have grown!" his father whispered, apparently surprised.
+"Does he make much noise at night nowadays, Mary?"
+
+"No, hardly any. He just whimpers at about two o'clock, and I get up and
+nurse him. Then he sleeps till after six."
+
+"If you don't mind, then," said Stefan, "I think I will sleep with you
+to-night. I feel as if it would rest me."
+
+"Of course, dearest." She felt herself blushing. Was she really going to
+be loved again? She smiled happily at him.
+
+When they were in bed Stefan curled up childishly, and putting one arm
+about her, fell asleep almost instantly, his head upon her shoulder.
+Mary lay, too happy for sleep, listening to his quiet breathing, until
+her shoulder ached and throbbed under his head. She would not move for
+fear of waking him, and remained wide-eyed and motionless until her
+baby's voice called to her.
+
+Then, with infinite care, she slipped away, her arm and shoulder numb,
+but her heart lighter than it had been for many weeks.
+
+She had forgotten to put out her dressing gown, and would not open the
+closet door, because it creaked. Little Elliston was leisurely over his
+repast, and she was stiff with cold when at last she stole back into
+bed. Stefan lay upon his side. She crept close, and in her turn put an
+arm about him. He was here again, her man, and her child was close at
+hand, warm and comforted from her breast. Love was all about her, and
+to-night she was not mocked. Warm again from his touch, she, too, fell
+at last, with all the dreaming house, asleep.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Stefan stayed at home for several days, sleeping long hours, and
+seemingly unusually subdued. He would lie reading on the sofa while Mary
+wrote, and often she turned from her manuscript to find him dozing. They
+took a few walks together, during which he rarely spoke, but seemed glad
+of her silent company. Once he called with her on Mrs. Farraday, and
+actually held an enormous skein of wool for the old lady while she,
+busily winding, told them anecdotes of her son James, and of her
+long dead husband. He made no effort to talk, seeming content to sit
+receptive under the soothing flow of her reminiscences.
+
+"Thee is a good boy," said the little lady, patting his hand kindly as
+the last shred of wool was wound.
+
+"I'm afraid not, ma'am," said he, dropping quaintly into the address
+of his childhood. "I'm just a rudderless boat staggering under topheavy
+sails."
+
+"Thee has a sure harbor, son," she answered, turning her gentle eyes on
+Mary.
+
+He seemed about to say more, but checked himself. Instead he rose and
+kissed the little lady's hand.
+
+"You are one of those who never lose their harbor, Mrs. Farraday. We're
+all glad to lower sail in yours."
+
+On the way home Mary linked her arm in his.
+
+"You were so sweet to her, dear," she said.
+
+"You're wondering why I can't always be like that, eh, Mary!"
+
+She laughed and nodded, pressing his arm.
+
+"Well, I can't, worse luck," he answered, frowning.
+
+That evening, while they sat in the dining room over their dessert, the
+telephone bell rang. Stefan jumped hastily to answer it, as if he felt
+sure it was for him, and he proved right.
+
+"Yes, this is I," he replied, after his first "hello," in what seemed to
+Mary an artificial voice.
+
+There was a pause; then she heard him say, "You can?" delightedly,
+followed by "To-morrow morning at ten? Hurrah! No more wasted time; we
+shall really get on now." Another pause, then, "Oh, what does it matter
+about the store?" impatiently--and at last "Well, to-morrow, anyway.
+Yes. Good-bye." The receiver clicked into place, and Stefan came
+skipping back into the room radiant, his languor of the last few days
+completely gone.
+
+Mary's heart sank like a stone. It was too obvious that he had stayed
+at home, not to be with her, but merely because his sitter was
+unobtainable.
+
+"Cheers, Mary; back to work to-morrow," he exclaimed, attacking his
+dessert with vigor. "I've been slacking shamefully, but Felicity is
+so wrapped up in that store of hers I can't get her half the time. Now
+she's contrite, and is going to sit to-morrow."
+
+Mary, remembering his remark about McEwan, longed to say, "Why do you
+call that little vulgarian by her first name?" but retaliatory methods
+were impossible to her. She contented herself with asking if he would be
+home the next evening.
+
+"Why, yes, I expect so," he answered, looking vague, "but don't
+absolutely count on me, Mary. I've been very good this week."
+
+She saw that he was gone again. His return had been more in the body
+than the spirit, after all. If that had been wooed a little back to her
+it had winged away again at the first sound of the telephone. She told
+herself that it was only his work calling him, that he would have been
+equally eager over any other sitter. But she was not sure.
+
+"Brace up, Mary," he called across at her, "you're not being deserted.
+Good heavens, I must work!" His impatient frown was gathering. She
+collected herself, smiled cheerfully, and rose, telling Lily they would
+have coffee in the sitting room.
+
+He spent the evening before the fire, smoking, and making thumbnail
+sketches on a piece of notepaper. She sang for some time, but without
+eliciting any comment from him. When they went up to bed he stopped at
+his own door.
+
+"I think I'll sleep alone to-night, dear. I want to be fresh to-morrow.
+Good night," and he kissed her cheek.
+
+When she came down in the morning he had already gone. Lying on the
+sitting room table, where it had been placed by the careful Lily, lay
+the scrap of notepaper he had been scribbling on the night before. It
+was covered with tiny heads, and figures of mermaids, dancing nymphs,
+and dryads. All in face or figure suggested Felicity Berber.
+
+She laid it back on the table, dropping a heavy book over it. A little
+later, while she was giving Elliston his bath, it suddenly occurred
+to Mary that her husband had never once during his stay alluded to her
+manuscript, and never looked at the baby except when she had asked him
+to. She excused him to herself with the plea of his temperament, and his
+absorption in his art, but nevertheless her heart was sore.
+
+For the next few weeks Stefan came and went fitfully, announcing at one
+point that Miss Berber had ceased to pose for his fantastic study of
+her, called "The Nixie," but had consented to sit for a portrait.
+
+"She's slippery--comes and goes, keeps me waiting interminably," he
+complained. "I can never be sure of her, but she's a wonderful model."
+
+"What do you do while you're waiting for her?" asked Mary, who could not
+imagine Stefan enduring with equanimity such a tax upon his patience.
+
+"Oh, there's tremendous work to be done on the Nixie still," he
+answered. "It's only her part in it that is finished."
+
+One evening he came home with a grievance.
+
+"That fool McEwan came to the studio to-day," he complained. "It was all
+I could do not to shut the door in his face. Of all the chuckleheads!
+What do you think he called the Nixie? 'A tricky piece of work!'
+Tricky!" Stefan kicked the fire disgustedly. "And it's the best thing
+I've done!"
+
+"As for the portrait, he said it was 'fine and dandy,' the idiot. And
+the maddening thing was," he went on, turning to Mary, and uncovering
+the real source of his offense, "that Felicity positively encouraged
+him! Why, the man must have sat there talking with her for an hour.
+I could not paint a stroke, and he didn't go till I had said so three
+times!" completed Stefan, looking positively ferocious. "What in the
+fiend's name, Mary, did she do it for?" He collapsed on the sofa beside
+her, like a child bereft of a toy. Mary could not help laughing at his
+tragic air.
+
+"I suppose she did it to annoy, because she knew it teased," she
+suggested.
+
+"How I loathe fooling and play-acting!" he exclaimed disgustedly. "Thank
+God, Mary, you are sincere. One knows where one is with you!"
+
+He seemed thoroughly upset. Miss Berber's pin-prick must have been
+severe, Mary thought, if it resulted in a compliment for her.
+
+The next evening, Mary being alone, Wallace dropped in. For some time
+they talked of Jamie and Elliston, and of Mary's book.
+
+He was Scotch to-night, as he usually was now when they were alone
+together. Cheerful as ever, his cheer was yet slow and solid--the
+comedian was not in evidence.
+
+"Hae ye been up yet to see the new pictures?" he asked presently. She
+shook her head.
+
+"Ye should go, bairn, they're a fine key. Clever as the devil, but
+naething true about them. After the Danae-piff!" and he snapped his
+fingers. "Ye hae no call to worry, you're the hub, Mary--let the wheel
+spin a wee while!"
+
+She blushed. "Wallace, I believe you're a wizard--or a detective."
+
+"The Scottish Sherlock, eh?" he grinned. "Weel, it's as I tell ye--tak
+my word for't. Hae ye seen Mrs. Elliot lately?"
+
+"No, Constance went up to their place in Vermont in June, you know. She
+came down purposely for Elliston's christening, the dear. She writes me
+she'll be back in a few days now, but says she's sick of New York, and
+would stay where she is if it weren't for suffrage."
+
+"But she would na'," said McEwan emphatically.
+
+"No, I don't think so, either. But she sees more of Theodore while she
+stays away, because he feels it his duty to run up every few days and
+protect her against savage New England, whereas when she's in town she
+could drive her car into the subway excavations and he'd never know it.
+I'm quoting verbatim," Mary laughed.
+
+McEwan nodded appreciatively. "She's a grand card."
+
+"She pretends to be flippant about husbands," Mary went on, "but as
+a matter of fact she cares much more for hers than for her sons, or
+anything in the world, except perhaps the Cause."
+
+"That's as it should be," the other nodded.
+
+"I don't know." There was a puzzled note in Mary's voice. "I can't
+understand the son's taking such a distinctly second place."
+
+McEwan's face expanded into one of his huge smiles. "It's true, ye could
+not. That's the way God made ye, and I'll tell ye about that, too, some
+day," he said, rising to go.
+
+"Good-bye, Mr. Holmes," she smiled, as she saw him out.
+
+Before going to bed that night Mary examined her conscience. Why had
+she not been to town to see Stefan's work? She knew that the baby--whose
+feeding times now came less frequently--was no longer an adequate
+excuse. She had blamed Stefan in her heart for his indifference to her
+work--was she not becoming guilty of the same neglect? Was she not in
+danger of a worse fault, the mean and vulgar fault of jealousy? She felt
+herself flushing at the thought.
+
+Two days later Mary put on her last year's suit, now a little shabby,
+kissed the baby, importuned the beaming Lily to be careful of him, and
+drove to the train in one of the village livery stable's inconceivably
+decrepit coupes.
+
+It was about twelve o 'clock when she arrived at the studio, and,
+ringing the bell, mounted the well-known stairs with a heart which, in
+spite of herself, beat anxiously. Stefan opened the door irritably, but
+his frown changed to a look of astonishment, followed by an exuberant
+smile, as he saw who it was.
+
+"Here comes Demeter," he cried, calling into the room behind him. "Why,
+Mary, I'm honored. Has Elliston actually released his prisoner at last?"
+He drew her into the studio, and kissed her almost with ostentation.
+
+"Let's suspend the sitting, Felicity," he cried, "and show our work."
+
+Mary looked about her. Her old home was almost unchanged. There was the
+painted bureau, the divan, the big easel, the model throne where she
+had posed as Danae. It was unchanged, yet how different. From the
+throne stepped down a small svelt figure-it rippled toward her, its
+gown shimmering like a fire seen through water. It was Felicity, and her
+dress was made from the great piece of oriental silk Stefan had bought
+when they were first married, and which they had used as a cover for
+their couch.
+
+Mary recognized it instantly--there could be no mistake. She stared
+stupidly, unable to find speech, while Miss Berber's tones were wafted
+to her like an echo from cooing doves.
+
+"Ah, Mrs. Byrd," she was saying, "how lovely you look as a matron. We
+are having a short sitting in my luncheon hour. This studio calms me
+after the banal cackling of my clients. I almost think of ceasing
+to create raiment, I weary so of the stupidities of New York's four
+hundred. Corsets, heels"--her hands fluttered in repudiation. She
+sank full length upon the divan, lighting a cigarette from a case of
+mother-of-pearl. "Your husband is the only artist, Mrs. Byrd, who has
+succeeded in painting me as an individual instead of a beauty. It's
+relieving"--her voice fainted--"very"--it failed--her lids drooped, she
+was still.
+
+Stefan looked bored. "Why, Felicity, what's the matter? I haven't seen
+you so completely lethargic for a long time. I thought you kept that
+manner for the store."
+
+Mary could not help feeling pleased by this remark, which drew no
+response from Felicity save a shadowy but somewhat forced smile.
+
+"Turn round, Mary," went on Stefan; "the Nixie is behind you."
+
+Mary faced the canvas, another of his favorite underwater pictures. The
+Nixie sat on a rock, in the green light of a river-bed. Green river-weed
+swayed and clung about her, and her hair, green too, streamed out to
+mingle with it. In the ooze at her feet lay a drowned girl, holding a
+tiny baby to her breast. This part of the picture was unfinished, but
+the Nixie stood out clearly, looking down at the dead woman with an
+expression compounded of wonder and sly scorn. "Lord, what fools these
+mortals be," she might have been saying.
+
+The face was not a portrait--it was Felicity only in its potentialities,
+but it was she, unmistakably. The picture was brilliant, fantastic, and
+unpleasant. Mary said so.
+
+"Of course it is unpleasant," he answered, "and so is life. Isn't it
+unpleasant that girls should kill themselves because of some fool man?
+And wouldn't sub-humans have a right to ribald laughter at a system
+which fosters such things!"
+
+"He has painted me as a sub-human, Mrs. Byrd," drawled Felicity through
+her smoke, "but when I hear his opinion of humans I feel complimented."
+
+"It seems to me," said Mary, "that she's not laughing at humans in
+general, but at this particular girl, for having cared. That's what
+makes it unpleasant to me."
+
+"I dare say she is," said Stefan carelessly. "In any case, I'm glad you
+find it unpleasant--in popular criticism the word is only a synonym for
+true."
+
+To Mary the picture was theatrical rather than true, but she did not
+care to argue the point. She turned to the portrait, a clever study
+in lights keyed to the opalescent tones of the silk dress, and showing
+Felicity poised for the first step of a dance. The face was still
+in charcoal--Stefan always blocked in his whole color scheme before
+beginning a head--but even so, it was alluring.
+
+Mary said with truth that it would be a fine portrait.
+
+"Yes, I like it. Full of movement. Nothing architectural about that," he
+said, glancing by way of contrast at the great Demeter drowsing from the
+furthest wall. "The silk is interesting, isn't it?"
+
+Mary's throat ached painfully. He was utterly unconscious of any hurt to
+her in the transfer of this first extravagance of theirs. If he had done
+it consciously, with intent to wound, she thought it might have hurt her
+less.
+
+"It's very pretty," she said conventionally.
+
+"Bare, perhaps, rather than pretty," murmured Miss Berber behind her
+veil of smoke.
+
+Mary flushed. This woman had a trick of always making her appear gauche.
+She looked at her watch, not sorry to see that it was already time to
+leave.
+
+"I must go, Stefan, I have to catch the one o'clock," she said, holding
+out her hand.
+
+"What a shame. Can't you even stay to lunch?" he asked dutifully. She
+shook her head, the ache in her throat making speech difficult. She
+seemed very stiff and matter-of-fact, he thought, and her clothes were
+uninteresting. He kissed her, however, and held the door while she shook
+hands with Felicity, who half rose. The transom was open, and through it
+Mary, who had paused on the landing to button her glove, overheard Miss
+Berber's valedictory pronouncement.
+
+"The English are a remarkable race--remarkable. Character in them is
+fixed--in us, fluid."
+
+Mary sped down the first flight, in terror of hearing Stefan's reply.
+
+All that evening she held the baby in her arms--she could hardly bring
+herself to put him down when it was time to go to bed.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+On November the 1st Mary received their joint bank book. The figures
+appalled her. She had drawn nothing except for the household bills, but
+Stefan had apparently been drawing cash, in sums of fifty or twenty-five
+dollars, every few days for weeks past. Save for his meals and a little
+new clothing she did not know on what he could have spent it; but as
+they had made nothing since the sale of his drawings in the spring,
+their once stout balance had dwindled alarmingly. One check, even while
+she felt its extravagance, touched her to sympathy. It was drawn to
+Henrik Jensen for two hundred dollars. Stefan must have been helping
+Adolph's brother to his feet again; perhaps that was where more of the
+money had gone.
+
+Stefan came home that afternoon, and Mary very unwillingly tackled the
+subject. He looked surprised.
+
+"I'd no idea I'd been drawing so much! Why didn't you tell me sooner?"
+he exclaimed. "Yes, I've given poor old Henrik a bit from time to time;
+I thought I'd mentioned it to you."
+
+"You did in the summer, now I come to think of it, but I thought you
+meant a few dollars, ten or twenty."
+
+"Much good that would have done him. The poor old chap was stranded.
+He's all right now, has a new business. I've been meaning to tell
+you about it. He supplies furniture on order to go with Felicity's
+gowns--backgrounds for personalities, and all that stuff. I put it up
+to her to help find him a job, and she thought of this right off." He
+grinned appreciatively. "Smart, eh? We both gave him a hand to start
+it."
+
+"You might have told me, I should have been so interested," said Mary,
+trying not to sound hurt.
+
+"I meant to, but it's only just been arranged, and I've had no chance to
+talk to you for ages."
+
+"Not my doing, Stefan," she said softly.
+
+"Oh, yes, the baby and all that." He waved his arm vaguely, and began to
+fidget. She steered away from the rocks.
+
+"Anyhow, I'm glad you've helped him," she said sincerely.
+
+"I knew you would be. Look here, Mary, can we go on at the present
+rate--barring Jensen--till I finish the Nixie? I don't want Constantine
+to have the Demeter alone, it isn't good enough."
+
+"I think it is as good as the Nixie," she said, on a sudden impulse. He
+swung round, staring at her almost insolently.
+
+"My dear girl, what do you know about it?" His voice was cold.
+
+The blood rushed to her heart. He had never spoken to her in that tone
+before. As always, her hurt silenced her.
+
+He prowled for a minute, then repeated his question about their
+expenses.
+
+"I don't want to have to think in cents again unless I must," he added.
+
+Mary considered, remembering the now almost finished manuscript in her
+desk.
+
+"Yes, I think we can manage, dear."
+
+"That's a blessing; then we won't talk about it any more," he exclaimed,
+pinching her ear in token of satisfaction.
+
+The next day Mary sent her manuscript to be typed. In a week it had gone
+to Farraday at his office, complete all but three chapters, of which she
+enclosed an outline. With it she sent a purely formal note, asking, in
+the event of the book being accepted, what terms the Company could
+offer her, and whether she could be paid partly in advance. She put
+the request tentatively, knowing nothing of the method of paying for
+serials. In another week she had a typewritten reply from Farraday,
+saying that the serial had been most favorably reported, that the
+Company would buy it for fifteen hundred dollars, with a guarantee to
+begin serialization within the year, on receipt of the final chapters,
+that they enclosed a contract, and were hers faithfully, etc. With this
+was a personal note from her friend, congratulating her, and explaining
+that his estimate of her book had been more than borne out by his
+readers.
+
+"I don't want you to think others less appreciative than I," was his
+tactful way of intimating that her work had been accepted on its merits
+alone.
+
+The letters took Mary's breath away. She had no idea that her work
+could fetch such a price. This stroke of fortune completely lifted her
+financial anxieties, but her spirits did not rise correspondingly. Six
+months ago she would have been girlishly triumphant at such a success,
+but now she felt at most a dull satisfaction. She hastened, however, to
+write the final chapters, and deposited the check when it came in her
+own bank, drawing the next month's housekeeping money half from that and
+half from Stefan's rapidly dwindling account. That she was able to do
+this gave her a feeling of relief, no more.
+
+Mary had now nursed her baby for over four months, and began to feel a
+nervous lassitude which she attributed--quite wrongly--to this fact.
+As Elliston still gained weight steadily, however, she gave her own
+condition no thought. But the last leaves had fallen from the trees, sea
+and woods looked friendless, and the evenings were long and lonely. The
+neighbors had nearly all gone back to the city. Farraday only came
+down at week-ends, Jamie was busy with his lessons, and Constance still
+lingered in Vermont. As for Stefan, he came home late and left early;
+often he did not come at all. She began to question seriously if she
+had been right to remain in the cottage. Her heart told her no, but her
+pride said yes, and her pride was strong; also, it was backed by reason.
+Her steady brain, which was capable of quite impersonal thinking, told
+her that Stefan would be actively discontented just now in company with
+his family, and that this discontent would eat into his remaining love
+for her.
+
+But her heart repudiated this mental cautioning, crying out to her to
+go to him, to pour out her love and need, to capture him safely in her
+arms. More than once she nerved herself for such an effort, only to
+become incapable of the least expression at his approach. Emotionally
+inarticulate even in happiness, Mary was quite dumb in grief. Her
+conversation became trite, her sore heart drew a mantle of the
+commonplace over its wound; Stefan found her more than ever "English."
+
+So lonely was she at this time that she would have asked little Miss
+Mason to stay with her, but for the lack of a spare bedroom. Of all her
+friends, only Mrs. Farraday remained at hand. Mary spent many hours at
+the old lady's house, and rejoiced each time the pony chaise brought
+her to the Byrdsnest. Mrs. Farraday loved to drive up in the morning
+and watch the small Elliston in his bath, comparing his feats with her
+memories of her own baby. She liked, too, to call at the cottage for
+mother and child, and take them for long rambling drives behind her
+ruminant pony.
+
+But the little Quakeress usually had her house full of guests--quaint,
+elderly folk from Delaware or from the Quaker regions of
+Pennsylvania--and could not give more than occasional time to these
+excursions. She had become devoted to Mary, whom she secretly regarded
+as her ideal of the woman her James should marry. That her son had not
+yet met such a woman was, after the loss of her husband, the little
+lady's greatest grief.
+
+In the midst of this dead period of graying days, Constance Elliot
+burst one morning--a God from the Machine--tearing down the lane in
+her diminutive car with the great figure of Gunther, like some Norse
+divinity, beside her. She fell out of her auto, and into an explanation,
+in one breath, embracing Mary warmly between sentences.
+
+"You lovely creature, here I am at last! Theodore hadn't been up for a
+week, so I came down, to find Mr. Gunther thundering like Odin because
+I had promised to help him arrange sittings with you, and had forgotten
+it. I had to bring him at once. He says his group is all done but the
+two heads, and he must have yours and the baby's. But he'll tell you
+all about it. Where is he? Elliston, I mean. I've brought him some short
+frocks. Where are they, Mr. Gunther? If he's put them in his pockets,
+he'll never find them--they are feet long--the pockets, I mean. Bless
+you, Mary Byrd, how good it is to see you! Come into the house, every
+one, and let me rest."
+
+Mary was bubbling with laughter.
+
+"Constance, you human dynamo, we'll go in by all means, and hold our
+breaths listening to your 'resting'!"
+
+"Don't sass your elders, naughty girl. Oh, my heavens, I've been five
+months in New England, and have behaved like a perfect gentlewoman all
+the time! Now I'm due for an attack of New Yorkitis!" Constance rushed
+into the sitting room, pulled off her hat and patted her hair into
+shape, ran to the kitchen door to say hello to Lily, and was back in her
+chair by the time the others had found theirs. Her quick glance traveled
+from one to the other.
+
+"Now I shall listen," she said. "Mary, tell your news. Mr. Gunther,
+explain your ideas."
+
+
+Mary laughed again. "Visitors first," she nodded to the Norwegian who,
+as always, was staring at her with a perfectly civil fixity.
+
+He placed a great hand on either knee and prepared to state his case.
+With his red-gold beard and piercing eyes, he was, Mary thought, quite
+the handsomest, and, after Stefan, the most attractive man she had ever
+seen.
+
+"Mrs. Byrd," he began, "I am doing, among other things, a large group
+called 'Pioneers' for the Frisco exhibition. It is finished in the
+clay--as Mrs. Elliot said--all but two heads, and is already roughly
+blocked in marble. I want your head, with your son's--I must have them.
+Six sittings will be enough. If you cannot, as I imagine, come to the
+city, I will bring my clay here, and we will work in your husband's
+studio. These figures, of whom the man is modeled from myself, do not
+represent pioneers in the ordinary sense. They embody my idea of those
+who will lead the race to future greatness. That is why I feel it
+essential to have you as a model."
+
+He spoke quite simply, without a trace of flattery, as if he were merely
+putting into words a self-evident truth. A compliment of such staggering
+dimensions, however, left Mary abashed.
+
+"You may wonder," he went on, seeing her silent, "why I so regard you.
+It is not merely your beauty, Mrs. Byrd, of which as an artist I can
+speak without offense, it is because to my mind you combine strong
+mentality and morale with simplicity of temperament. You are an
+Apollonian, rather than a Dionysian. Of such, in my judgment, will the
+super-race be made." Gunther folded his arms and leaned back.
+
+He was sufficiently distinguished to be able to carry off a
+pronouncement which in a lesser man would have been an impertinence, and
+he knew it.
+
+Constance threw up her hands. "There, Mary, your niche is carved. I
+don't quite know what Mr. Gunther means, but he sounds right."
+
+Mary found her voice. "Mr. Gunther honors me very much, and, although
+of course I do not deserve his praise, I shall certainly not refuse his
+request."
+
+Gunther bowed gravely from the hips in the Continental manner, without
+rising.
+
+"When may I come," he asked; "to-morrow? Good! I will bring the clay out
+by auto."
+
+"You lucky woman," exclaimed Constance. "To think of being immortalized
+by two great artists in one year!"
+
+"Her type is very rare," said Gunther in explanation. "When does one see
+the classic face with expression added? Almost always, it is dull."
+
+"Now, Mary, produce the infant!" Constance did not intend the whole
+morning to be devoted to the Olympian discourse of the sculptor.
+
+The baby was brought down, and the rest of the visit pivoted about
+him. Mary glowed at the praises he received; she looked immeasurably
+brighter, Constance thought, than when they arrived.
+
+On the way home Gunther unbosomed himself of a final pronouncement. "She
+does not look too happy, but her beauty is richer and its meaning deeper
+than before. She is what the mothers of men should be. I am sorry," he
+concluded simply, "that I did not meet her more than a year ago."
+
+Constance almost gasped. What an advantage, she thought, great physical
+gifts bring. Even without this man's distinction in his art, it was
+obvious that he had some right to assume his ability to mate with
+whomever he might choose.
+
+Early the next morning the sculptor drove up to the barn, his tonneau
+loaded with impedimenta. Mary was ready for him, and watched with
+interest while he lifted out first a great wooden box of clay, then a
+small model throne, then two turntables, and finally, two tin buckets.
+These baffled her, till, having installed the clay-box, which she
+doubted if an ordinary man could lift, he made for the garden pump and
+watered his clay with the contents of the buckets.
+
+He set up his three-legged turntables, each of which bore an angle-iron
+supporting a twisted length of lead pipe, stood a bucket of water
+beneath one, and explained that in a few minutes he would be ready
+to begin. Donning a linen blouse, he attacked the mass of damp clay
+powerfully, throwing great pieces onto the skeleton lead-pipe, which he
+explained had been bent to the exact angle of the head in his group.
+
+"The woman's figure I modeled from ideal proportions, Mrs. Byrd, and
+this head will be set upon its shoulders. My statue will then be a
+living thing instead of a mere symbol."
+
+When Mary was posed she became absorbed in watching Gunther's work grow.
+He modeled with extraordinary speed, yet his movements had none of
+the lightning swoops and darts of Stefan's method. Each motion of his
+powerful hands might have been preordained; they seemed to move with
+a deliberate and effortless precision, so that she would hardly have
+realized their speed had the head and face not leaped under them into
+being. He was a silent worker, yet she felt companioned; the man's
+presence seemed to fill the little building.
+
+"After to-day I shall ask you to hold the child, for as long as it will
+not disturb him. I shall then have the expression on your face which I
+desire, and I will work at a study of the boy's head at those moments
+when he is awake."
+
+Mary sincerely enjoyed her sittings, which came as a welcome change in
+her even days. Gunther usually stayed to lunch, Constance joining them
+on one occasion, and Mrs. Farraday on another. Both these came to watch
+the work, Gunther, unlike Stefan, being oblivious of an audience; and
+once McEwan came, his sturdy form appearing insignificant beside the
+giant Norseman. Wallace hung about smoking a pipe for half an hour or
+more. He was at his most Scotch, appeared well pleased, and ejaculated
+"Aye, aye," several times, nodding a ponderous head.
+
+"Wallace, what are you so solemnly aye-ayeing about? Why so mysterious?"
+enquired Mary.
+
+"I'm haeing a few thochts," responded the Scot, his expression divided
+between an irritating smile and a kindly twinkle.
+
+"Well, don't be annoying, and stay to lunch," said Mary, dispensing even
+justice to both expressions.
+
+Stefan, returning home one afternoon half way through the sittings,
+expressed a mild interest in the news of them, and, going out to the
+barn, unwrapped the wet cloths from the head.
+
+"He's an artist," said he; "this has power and beauty. Never sit to a
+second-rater, Mary, you've had the best now." And he covered the head
+again with a craftsman's thoroughness.
+
+Mary was sorry when the sittings came to an end. On the last day the
+sculptor brought two men with him, who made the return journey in the
+tonneau, each guarding a carefully swathed bust against the inequalities
+of the road. Gunther bowed low over her hand with a word of thanks at
+parting, and she watched his car out of sight regretfully.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+The week's interlude over, Mary's days reverted to their monotonous
+tenor. As November drew to a close, she began to think of Christmas,
+remembering how happy her last had been, and wondering if she could
+summon enough courage for an attempt to engage Stefan's interest in some
+kind of celebration. She now admitted to herself that she was actively
+worried about her relations with him. He was quite agreeable to her when
+in the house, but she felt this was only because she made no demands
+on him. Let her reach out ever so little for his love, and he instantly
+became vague or restless. Their intercourse was friendly, but he
+appeared absolutely indifferent to her as a woman; she might have been a
+well-liked sister. Under the grueling strain of self-repression Mary
+was growing nervous, and the baby began to feel the effects. His weekly
+gains were smaller, and he had his first symptoms of indigestion.
+
+She redoubled the care of her diet, and lengthened her daily walks, but
+he became fretful, and at last, early in December, she found on weighing
+him that he had made no gain for a week. Terrified, she telephoned for
+Dr. Hillyard, and received her at the door with a white face. It was a
+Sunday morning, and McEwan had just dropped in with some chrysanthemums
+from the Farradays' greenhouse. Finding Mary disturbed he had not
+remained, and was leaving the house as the doctor drove up.
+
+Dr. Hillyard's first words were reassuring. There was absolutely nothing
+to fear in a week's failure to gain, she explained. "It always happens
+at some stage or other, and many babies don't gain for weeks."
+
+Still, the outcome of her visit was that Mary, with an aching heart,
+added a daily bottle to Elliston's regime. In a week the doctor came
+again, gave Mary a food tonic, and advised the introduction of a second
+bottle. Elliston immediately responded, palpably preferring his bottle
+feedings to the others. His fretfulness after these continued, he turned
+with increased eagerness to his bottle, and with tears of disappointment
+Mary yielded to his loudly voiced demands. By Christmas time he was
+weaned. His mother felt she could never forgive herself for failing him
+so soon, and a tinge of real resentment colored for the first time her
+attitude toward Stefan, whom she knew to be the indirect cause of her
+failure.
+
+The somewhat abrupt deterioration of Mary's magnificent nervous system
+would have been unaccountable to Dr. Hillyard had it not been for a
+chance encounter with McEwan after her first visit. The Scotchman had
+hailed her in the lane, asking for a lift to a house beyond the village,
+where he had some small errand. During a flow of discursive remarks he
+elicited from the doctor, without her knowledge, her opinion that Mary
+was nervously run down, after which he rambled at some length about the
+value of art, allowing the doctor to pass his destination by a mile or
+more.
+
+With profuse thanks for her kindness in turning back, he continued
+his ramblings, and she gathered the impression that he was a dull,
+inconsequential talker, that he considered young couples "kittle
+cattle," that artists were always absorbed in their work, that females
+had a habit of needless worrying, and that commuting in winter was
+distracting to a man's labors. She only half listened to him, and
+dropped him with relief, wondering if he was an anti-suffragist. Some
+memory of his remarks must, however, have remained with her, for after
+her next visit to Mary she found herself thinking that Mr. McEwan was
+probably neither an anti-suffragist, nor dull.
+
+A little before Christmas McEwan called on Constance, and found her
+immersed in preparations for a Suffrage bazaar and fete.
+
+"I can't talk to any one," she announced, receiving him in a chaos of
+boxes, banners, paper flowers, and stenographers, in the midst of which
+she appeared to be working with two voices and six hands. "Didn't the
+maid warn you off the premises?"
+
+"She did, but I sang 'Take back the lime that thou gavest' in such honey
+tones that she complied," said Mac.
+
+"Just for that, you can give the fete a two-inch free ad in The
+Household Magazine," Constance implacably replied.
+
+He grinned. "I raise the ante. Three inches, at the risk of losing my
+job, for five minutes alone with you."
+
+"You lose your job!" scoffed Constance, leading the way into an
+empty room, and seating herself at attention, one eye on her watch.
+"Proceed--I am yours."
+
+Mac sat opposite her, and shot out an emphatic forefinger.
+
+"The Berber girl's middle name is Mischief," he began, plunging in
+medias res; "Byrd's is Variability; for the last five months the Mary
+lady's has been Mother. Am I right?"
+
+Constance's bright eyes looked squarely at him.
+
+"Wallace McEwan, you are," she said.
+
+His finger continued poised. "Very well, we are 'on,' and _our_ middle
+name is Efficiency, eh?"
+
+"Yes," Constance nodded doubtfully, "but--"
+
+McEwan's hand slapped his knee. "Here's the scheme," he went on rapidly.
+"Variable folk must have variety, either in place or people. If we
+don't want it to be people, we make it place, see? Is your country house
+closed yet?"
+
+"No, I fancied I might go there to relax for a week after the fete."
+
+"A1 luck. You won't relax, you'll have a week's house-party, sleighing,
+skating, coasting, all that truck. The Byrds, Farraday (I'll persuade
+him he can leave the office), a couple of pretty skirts with no
+brains--me if you like. Get me?"
+
+Constance gasped, her mind racing. "But Mary's baby?" she exclaimed,
+clutching at the central difficulty.
+
+"You're the goods," replied McEwan admiringly. "She couldn't shine as
+Queen of the Slide if she was tied to the offspring--granted. Now then."
+He leant forward. "She's had to wean him--you didn't know that. Your
+dope is to talk up the house-party, tell her she owes it to herself to
+get a change, and make her leave the boy with a trained nurse. The Mary
+lady's no fool, she'll be on."
+
+Constance's eyes narrowed to slits, she fingered her beads, and nodded
+once, twice.
+
+"More trouble," she said, "but it's a go. Second week in January."
+
+He grasped her hand. "Votes for Women," he beamed.
+
+She looked at her watch. "Five minutes exactly. Three inches, Mr.
+McEwan!"
+
+"Three inches!" he called from the door.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+Christmas was a blank period for Mary that year. Stefan came home on
+Christmas eve in a mood of somewhat forced conviviality, but Mary had
+had no heart for festive preparations. Stefan had failed her and she had
+failed her baby--these two ever present facts shadowed her world. She
+had bought presents for Lily and the baby, a pair of links for Stefan,
+books for Mrs. Farraday and Jamie, and trifles for Constance and Miss
+Mason, but the holly and mistletoe, the tree, the new frock and the
+Christmas fare which normally she would have planned with so much joy,
+were missing. Stefan's gift to her--a fur-lined coat--was so extravagant
+that she could derive no pleasure from it, and she had the impression
+that he had chosen it hurriedly, without much thought of what would
+best please her. From Constance she received a white sweater of very
+beautiful heavy silk, with a cap and scarf to match, but she thought
+bitterly that pretty things to wear were of little use to her now.
+
+It was obvious that Stefan's conscience pricked him. He spent the
+morning hanging about her, and even played a little with his son, who
+now sat up, bounced, crowed with laughter, clutched every article within
+reach, and had two teeth. Mary's heart reached out achingly to Stefan,
+but he seemed to her a strange man. The contrast between this and their
+last Christmas smote her intolerably.
+
+In the afternoon they walked over to the Farradays', where there was
+a tree for Jamie and a few friends, including the chauffeur's and
+gardener's children. Here Stefan prowled into the picture gallery,
+while Mary, surrounded by children, was in her element. Returning to the
+drawing room, Stefan watched her playing with them as he had watched her
+on the Lusitania fifteen months before. She was less radiant now, and
+her figure was fuller, but as she smiled and laughed with the children,
+her cheeks pink and her hair all a-glitter under the lights, she looked
+very lovely, he thought. Why did the sight of her no longer thrill him?
+Why did he enjoy more the society of Felicity Berber, whom he knew to be
+affected and egotistic, and suspected of being insincere, than that of
+this beautiful, golden woman of whose truth he could never conceive a
+doubt?
+
+A feeling of deep sadness, of unutterable regret, swept through him.
+Better never to have married than to have outlived so soon the magic of
+romance. Which of them had lost the key? When Mary had furled her wings
+to brood over her nest he had thought it was she; now he was not so
+sure.
+
+Walking home through the dark woods he stopped suddenly, and drew her to
+him.
+
+"Mary, my Beautiful, I'm drifting, hold me close," he whispered. Her
+breath caught, she clung to him, he felt her face wet with tears. No
+more words were spoken, but they walked on comforted, groping their way
+under the damp fingers of the trees. Stefan felt no passion, but his
+tenderness for his wife had reawakened. For her part, tears had thawed
+her bitterness, without washing it away.
+
+The next morning Constance drove over.
+
+"Children," she said, hurrying in from the cold air, "what a delicious
+scene! I invite myself to lunch."
+
+Mary was playing with Elliston on a blanket by the fire, Stefan
+sketching them, the room full of sun and firelight. The two greeted her
+delightedly.
+
+"Now," she said, settling herself on the couch, "let me tell you why
+I came," and she proceeded to unfold her plans for a house-party
+at Burlington. "You've never seen our winter sports, Mary, they're
+glorious, and you need a change from so much domesticity. As for
+you, Mr. Byrd, it will give you a chance to learn that America can be
+attractive even outside New York."
+
+Both the Byrds were looking interested, Stefan unreservedly, Mary with a
+pucker of doubt.
+
+"Now, don't begin about Elliston," exclaimed Constance, forestalling
+objections. "We've heaps of room, but it would spoil your fun to bring
+him. I want you to get a trained nurse for the week--finest thing in the
+world to take a holiday from maternity once in a while." She turned to
+Stefan as a sure ally. "Don't you agree, Mr. Byrd?"
+
+"Emphatically," beamed he, seizing her hand and kissing it. "A glorious
+idea! Away with domesticity! A real breath of freedom, eh, Mary?"
+
+Constance again forestalled difficulties.
+
+"We are all going to travel up by night, ten of us, and Theodore is
+engaging a compartment car with rooms for every one, so there won't
+be any expense about that part of it, Mary, my dear. Does it seem too
+extravagant to ask you to get a trained nurse? I've set my heart on
+having you free to be the life of the party. All your admirers are
+coming, that gorgeous Gunther, my beloved James, and Wallace McEwan.
+I baited my hooks with you, so you simply _can't_ disappoint me!" she
+concluded triumphantly.
+
+Stefan pricked up his ears. Here was Mary in a new guise; he had not
+thought of her for some time as having "admirers." Yet he had always
+known Farraday for one; and certainly Gunther, who modeled her, and
+McEwan, who dogged her footsteps, could admire her no less than the
+editor. The thought that his wife was sought after, that he was probably
+envied by other men, warmed Stefan's heart pleasantly, just as Constance
+intended it should.
+
+"It sounds fascinating, and I certainly think we must come," Mary was
+saying, "though I don't know how I shall bring myself to part with
+Elliston," and she hugged the baby close.
+
+"You born Mother!" said Constance. "I adored my boys, but I was always
+enchanted to escape from them." She laughed like a girl. "Now you grasp
+the inwardness of my Christmas present--it is a coasting outfit. Won't
+she look lovely in it, Mr. Byrd?"
+
+"Glorious!" said Stefan, boyishly aglow; and "I don't believe two and
+two do make four, after all," thought Constance.
+
+All through luncheon they discussed the plan with animation, Constance
+enlisting Mary's help at the Suffrage Fete the first week in January
+in advance payment, as she said, for the house-party. "Why not get your
+nurse a few days earlier to break her in, and be free to give me as much
+time as possible?" she urged.
+
+"Good idea, Mary," Stefan chimed in. "I'll stay in town that week and
+lunch with you at the bazaar, and you could sleep a night or two at the
+studio."
+
+"We'll see," said Mary, a little non-committal. She knew she should
+enjoy the Fete immensely, but somehow, she did not feel she could bring
+herself to sleep in the little studio, with Felicity the Nixie sneering
+down at her from one wall, and Felicity the Dancer challenging from the
+other.
+
+But it was a much cheered couple that Constance left behind, and Stefan
+came home every afternoon during the week that remained till the opening
+of the bazaar.
+
+Being in the city for this event, Mary, in addition to engaging a nurse,
+indulged in some rather extravagant shopping. She had made up her mind
+to look her best at Burlington, and though Mary was slow to move,
+when she did take action her methods were thorough. She realized with
+gratitude that Constance, whom she suspected of knowing more than she
+indicated, had given her a wonderful opportunity of renewing her
+appeal to her husband, and she was determined to use it to the full.
+Incapable--as are all women of her type--of coquetry, Mary yet knew the
+value of her beauty, and was too intelligent not to see that both it and
+she had been at a grave disadvantage of late. She understood dimly that
+she was confronted by one of the fundamental problems of marriage, the
+difficulty of making an equal success of love and motherhood. She could
+not put her husband permanently before her child, as Constance had done,
+and as she knew most Englishwomen did, but she meant to do it completely
+for this one week of holiday, at least.
+
+Meanwhile, amidst the color and music of the great drill-hall where the
+suffragists held their yearly Fete, Mary, dispensing tea and cakes in
+a flower-garlanded tent, enjoyed herself with simple whole-heartedness.
+All Constance's waitresses were dressed as daffodils, and the high cap,
+representing the inverted cup of the flower, with the tight-sheathed
+yellow and green of the gown, was particularly becoming to Mary. She
+knew again the pleasure, which no one is too modest to enjoy, of being
+a center of admiration. Stefan dropped in once or twice, and waxed
+enthusiastic over Constance's arrangements and Mary's looks.
+
+On one of these occasions Miss Berber suddenly appeared in the tent,
+dressed wonderfully in white panne, with a barbaric mottle of black and
+white civet-skins flung over one shoulder, and a tight-drawn cap of the
+fur, apparently held in place by the great claws of some feline mounted
+in heavy gold. She wore circles of fretted gold in her ears, and carried
+a tall ebony stick with a gold handle, Louis Quatorze fashion. From
+her huge civet muff a gold purse dangled. She looked at once more
+conventional and more dynamic than Mary had seen her, and her rich dress
+made the simple effects of the tent seem amateurish.
+
+Neither Mary nor she attempted more than a formal salutation, but she
+discoursed languidly with Constance for some minutes. Stefan, who had
+been eating ice cream like a schoolboy with two pretty girls at the
+other side of the tent, came forward on seeing the new arrival, and
+after a good deal of undecided fidgeting, and a "See you later" to
+Mary, wandered off with Miss Berber and disappeared for the rest of the
+afternoon. In spite of her best efforts, Mary's spirits were completely
+dashed by this episode, but they rose again when Stefan met her at the
+Pennsylvania Station and traveled home with her. As they emerged from
+the speech-deadening roar of the tunnel he said casually, "Felicity
+Berber is an amusing creature, but she's a good deal of a bore at
+times." Mary took his hand under the folds of their newspaper.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+On the evening of their departure Mary parted from her baby with a pang,
+but she knew him to be in the best of hands, and felt no anxiety as
+to his welfare. The nurse she had obtained was a friend of Miss
+McCullock's, and a most efficient and kindly young woman.
+
+Their journey up to town reminded Mary of their first journey from
+Shadeham, so full of spirits and enthusiasm was Stefan. The whole
+party met at the Grand Central, and boarded the train amid laughter,
+introductions, and much gay talk. Constance scintillated. The solid Mr.
+Elliot was quite shaken out of his sobriety, McEwan's grin was at its
+broadest, Farraday's smile its pleasantest, and the three young women
+whom Constance had collected bubbled and shrilled merrily.
+
+Only Gunther appeared untouched by the holiday atmosphere. He towered
+over the rest of the party calm and direct, disposing of porters and
+hand-baggage with an unruffled perfection of address. Mary, watching
+him, pulled Stefan's sleeve.
+
+"Look," she said, pointing to two long ribbons of narrow wood lashed to
+some other impedimenta of Gunther's. "Skis, Stefan, how thrilling! I've
+never seen them used."
+
+Stefan nodded. "I'd like to get a drawing of that chap in action. His
+lines are magnificent," Mary had never been in a sleeping car before,
+and was fascinated to see the sloping ceilings of the state-rooms change
+like pantomime trick into beds under the deft handling of the porter.
+She liked the white coat of this autocrat of the road, and the smart,
+muslin trimmings of the colored maid. She and Stefan had the compartment
+next their host's; Farraday and McEwan shared one beyond; Gunther and
+his skis and Walter, the Elliot's younger son, completely filled the
+next; Mrs. Thayer, a cheerful young widow, and Miss Baxter and Miss Van
+Sittart, the two girls of the party, occupied the remaining three. The
+drawing room had been left empty to serve as a general overflow. To
+this high-balls, coffee, milk and sandwiches were borne by white-draped
+waiters from the buffet, and set upon a magically installed table. Mrs.
+Thayer, Constance, and the men fell upon the stronger beverages, while
+Mary and the girls divided the milk.
+
+Under cover of the general chatter McEwan raised his glass to Constance.
+
+"I take off my hat to you, Mrs. Elliot, for a stage manager," he
+whispered, glancing at the other women. "A black-haired soubrette, a
+brown pony, and a redheaded slip; no rivals to the leading lady in this
+show!"
+
+Their train reached Burlington in a flurry of snow, and they were
+bundled into big, two-seated sleighs for the drive out of the city.
+
+Mary, wrapped in her fur-lined coat and covered with a huge bearskin,
+watched with interest the tidy, dignified little town speed by. Even
+Stefan was willing to admit it had some claims to the picturesque, but a
+little way beyond, when they came to the open country, he gave almost a
+whoop of satisfaction. Before them stretched tumbled hills, converging
+on an icebound lake. Their snowy sides glittered pink in the sun and
+purple in the shadows; they reared their frosted crests as if in welcome
+of the morning; behind them the sky gleamed opalescent. Stefan leant
+forward in the speeding sleigh as if to urge it with the sway of his
+body, the frosty air stung his nostrils, the breath of the horses
+trailed like smoke, the road seemed leading up to the threshold of the
+world. The speed of their cold flight was in tune with the frozen dance
+of the hills--Stefan whooped again, intoxicated, the others laughed
+back at him and cheered, Mary's face glowed with delight, they were like
+children in their joy.
+
+The Elliot house lay in a high fold of the hills, overlooking the lake,
+and almost out of sight of other buildings. Within, all was spacious
+warmth and the crackle of great wood fires; on every side the icy view,
+seen through wide windows, contrasted with the glowing colors of the
+rooms. A steaming breakfast waited to fortify the hastily drunk coffee
+of the train. After it, when the Byrds found themselves in their cozy
+bedroom with its old New England furniture and blue-tiled bathroom,
+Stefan, waltzing round the room, fairly hugged Mary in excited glee.
+
+"What fun, Beautiful, what a lovely place, what air, what snow!" She
+laughed with him, her own heart bounding with unwonted excitement.
+
+The six-day party was a marked success throughout. Even the two young
+girls were satisfied, for Constance contrived the appearance of several
+stalwart youths of the neighborhood to help her son leaven the group
+of older men. Mrs. Thayer flirted pleasantly and wittily with whoever
+chanced to be at hand, Mr. Elliot hobnobbed with Farraday and made
+touchingly laborious efforts to be frivolous, and McEwan kept the
+household laughing at his gambols, heavy as those of a St. Bernard pup.
+
+Constance darted from group to group like a purposeful humming-bird, but
+did not lack the supreme gift of a hostess--that of leaving her guests
+reasonably alone. All the women were inclined to hover about Byrd, who,
+with Gunther, represented the most attractive male element. As the women
+were sufficiently pretty and intelligent, Stefan enjoyed their notice,
+but Gunther stalked away from them like a great hound surrounded by
+lap-dogs. He was invariably courteous to his hostess, but had eyes only
+for Mary. Never seeming to follow her, and rarely talking to her
+alone, he was yet always to be found within a few yards of the spot she
+happened to occupy. Farraday would watch her from another room, or talk
+with her in his slow, kind way, and Wallace always drew her into his
+absurd games or his sessions at the piano. But Gunther neither watched
+nor chattered, he simply _was_, seeming to draw a silent and complete
+satisfaction from her nearness. Of the men he took only cursory notice,
+talking sometimes with Stefan on art, or with Farraday on life, but
+never seeking their society.
+
+Indoors Gunther seemed negative, outdoors he became godlike. The Elliots
+possessed a little Norwegian sleigh they had brought from Europe. It was
+swan-shaped, stood on low wooden runners, and was brightly painted
+in the Norse manner. This Gunther found in the stable, and, promptly
+harnessing to it the fastest horse, drove round to the house. Striding
+into the hall, where the party was discussing plans for the day, he
+planted himself before Mary, and invited her to drive. The others,
+looking out of the window, exclaimed with pleasure at the pretty little
+sleigh, and Mary gladly threw on her cap and coat. Gunther tucked her
+in and started without a word. They were a mile from the house before he
+broke silence.
+
+"This sleigh comes from my country, Mrs. Byrd; I wish I could drive you
+there in it."
+
+He did not speak again, and Mary was glad to enjoy the exhilarating air
+in silence. By several roads they had gradually climbed a hillside. Now
+from below they could see the house at some distance to their right, and
+another road running in one long slope almost straight to it from where
+they sat. Gunther suddenly stood up in the sleigh, braced his feet, and
+wrapped a rein round each arm.
+
+"Now we will drive," said he. They started, they gathered speed, they
+flew, the horse threw himself into a stretching gallop, the sleigh
+rocked, it leapt like a dashing wave. Gunther half crouched, swaying
+with it. The horse raced, his flanks stretched to the snow. Mary clung
+to her seat breathless and tense with excitement--she looked up at the
+driver. His blue eyes blazed, his lips smiled above a tight-set jaw, he
+looked down, and meeting her eyes laughed triumphantly. Expanding his
+great chest he uttered a wild, exultant cry--they seemed to be rushing
+off the world's rim. She could see nothing but the blinding fume of the
+upflung snow. She, too, wanted to cry aloud. Then their pace slackened,
+she could see the road, black trees, a wall, a house. They drove into
+the courtyard and stopped.
+
+The hall door was flung open. They were met by a group of faces excited
+and alarmed. Gunther, his eyes still blazing, helped her down and,
+throwing the reins to a waiting stable-boy, strode silently past the
+guests and up to his room.
+
+"Good heavens! you might have been killed," fussed Mr. Elliot. Farraday
+looked pale, the women laughed excitedly.
+
+"Mary," cried Stefan, his face flashing with eagerness, "you weren't
+frightened, were you?"
+
+She shook her head, still breathless.
+
+"It was glorious, you were like storm gods. I've never seen anything so
+inspiring." And he embraced her before them all.
+
+After this episode Gunther resumed his impassive manner, nor did any
+other of their outdoor sports draw from him the strange, exultant look
+he had given Mary in the sleigh. But his feats on the toboggan slide and
+with his skis were sufficiently daring to supply the party with liberal
+thrills. His obvious skill gained him the captaincy of the toboggan, but
+after his exhibition of driving, most of the women hesitated at first
+to form one of his crew. Mary, however, who was quite fearless and
+fascinated by this new sport, dashed down with him and the other men
+again and again, and was, with her white wraps and brilliant pink
+cheeks, as McEwan had prophesied, "the queen of the slide."
+
+Stefan was intoxicated by the tobogganing, and though he was only less
+new to it than Mary he soon became expert. But on his skis the great
+Norwegian was alone, the whole party turning out to watch whenever
+he strapped them to his feet. His daring leaps were, Stefan said,
+the nearest thing to flying he had ever seen. "For I don't count
+aeroplanes--they are mere machinery."
+
+"Ah, if the lake were frozen enough for ice-boating," replied Gunther,
+"I could show you something nearer still. But they tell me there is
+little chance till February for more than in-shore skating."
+
+Only in this last named sport had Gunther a rival, Stefan making up in
+grace what he lacked in practice. Beside his, the Norwegian's skating
+was powerful, but too unbending.
+
+Mary, owing to the open English winters, had had less experience than
+any one there, but she was so much more graceful and athletic than the
+other women that she soon outstripped them. She skated almost entirely
+with Stefan, only once with Gunther, who, since his strange look in the
+sleigh, a little troubled her. On that one occasion he tore round the
+clear ice at breakneck speed, halting her dramatically, by sheer weight,
+a few inches from the bank, where she arrived breathless and thrilled.
+
+Seeing her thus at her best, happy and admired, and full of vigorous
+life, Stefan found himself almost as much in love as in the early weeks
+of their marriage.
+
+"You are more beautiful than ever, Mary," he exclaimed; "there is an
+added life and strength in you; you are triumphant."
+
+It was a joy again to feel her in his arms, to know that they were each
+other's. After his troubled flights he came back to her love with a
+feeling of deep spiritual peace. The night, when he could be alone with
+her, became the happy climax of the day.
+
+The amusements of the week ended in an impromptu dance which Constance
+arranged by a morning at the telephone. For this, Mary donned her main
+extravagance, a dress of rainbow colored silk gauze, cut short to the
+ankle, and worn with pale pink slippers. She had found it "marked
+down" at a Fifth Avenue house, and had been told it was a model dubbed
+"Aurora." With it she wore her mother's pearl ornaments. Stefan was
+entranced by the result, and Constance almost wept with satisfaction.
+
+"Oh, Mary Byrd," she cried, hugging her daintily to avoid crushing the
+frock; "you are the best thing that has happened in my family since my
+mother-in-law quit living with me."
+
+That night Stefan was at his best. Delighted with all his surroundings,
+he let his faunlike spirits have full play, and his keen, brown face and
+green-gold eyes flashed apparently simultaneously from every corner
+of the room. Gunther did not dance; Farraday's method was correct but
+quiet, and none of the men could rival Stefan in light-footed grace.
+Both he and Mary were ignorant of any of the new dances, but Constance
+had given Mary a lesson earlier in the day, and Stefan grasped the
+general scheme with his usual lightning rapidity. Then he began to
+embroider, inventing steps of his own which, in turn, Mary was quick
+to catch. No couple on the floor compared with them in distinction
+and grace, and they danced, to the chagrin of the other men and girls,
+almost entirely together.
+
+Whatever disappointment this caused, however, was not shared by their
+hostess and McEwan. After enduring several rounds of Mac's punishing
+dancing, Constance was thankful to sit out with him and watch the
+others. She was glad to be silent after her strenuous efforts as a
+hostess, and McEwan was apparently too filled with satisfaction to have
+room left for speech. His red face beamed, his big teeth glistened,
+pleasure radiated from him.
+
+"Aye, aye," he chuckled, nodding his ponderous head, and again "Aye,
+aye," in tones of fat content, as the two Byrds swung lightly by.
+
+"Aye, aye, Mr. McEwan," smiled Constance, tapping his knee with her fan.
+"All this was your idea, and you are a good fellow. From this moment, I
+intend to call you by your first name."
+
+"Aye, aye," beamed McEwan, more broadly than before, extending a huge
+hand; "that'll be grand."
+
+The dance was the climax of the week. The next day was their last,
+leave-takings were in the air, and toward afternoon a bustle of packing.
+Stefan was in a mood of slight reaction from his excitement of the night
+before. While Mary packed for them both he prowled uncertainly about the
+house, and, finding the men in the library, whiled away the time in an
+utterly impossible attempt to quarrel with McEwan on some theory of art.
+
+They all left for the train with lamentations, and arrived in New York
+the next morning in a cheerless storm of wet snow.
+
+But by this time Mary's regret at the ending of their holiday was lost
+in joy at the prospect of seeing her baby. She urged the stiff and tired
+Stefan to speed, and, by cutting short their farewells and jumping for a
+street car, managed to make the next train out for Crab's Bay. She could
+hardly sit still in the decrepit cab, and it had barely stopped at their
+gate before she was out and tearing up the stairs.
+
+Stefan paid the cab, carried in their suitcase, and wandered, cold
+and lonely, to the sitting room. For him their home-coming offered no
+alleviating thrill. Already, he felt, Mary's bright wings were folding
+again above her nest.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+Refreshed, in spite of his natural reaction of spirits, by the week's
+holiday, Stefan turned to his work with greater content in it than he
+had felt for some time. His content was, to his own surprise, rather
+increased than lessened by the discovery that Felicity Berber had left
+New York for the South. Arriving at his studio the day after their
+return from Vermont, he found one of her characteristic notes, in
+crimson ink this time, upon snowy paper.
+
+"Stefan," it read, "the winter has found his strength at last in storms.
+But our friendship dallies with the various moods of spring. It leaves
+me restless. The snow chills without calming me. My designing is beauty
+wasted on the blindness of the city's overfed. A need of warmth and
+stillness is upon me--the south claims me. The time of my return is
+unrevealed as yet. Felicity."
+
+Stefan read this epistle twice, the first time with irritation, the
+second with relief. "Affected creature," he said to himself, "it's a
+good job she's gone. I've frittered away too much time with her as it
+is."
+
+At home that evening he told Mary. His devotion during their holiday
+had already obscured her memory of the autumn's unhappiness, and his
+carefree manner of imparting his tidings laid any ghost of doubt that
+still remained with her. Secure once more in his love, she was as
+uncloudedly happy as she had ever been.
+
+In his newly acquired mood of sanity, Stefan faced the fact that he had
+less work to show for the last nine months than in any similar period of
+his career, and that he was still living on his last winter's success.
+What had these months brought him? An expensive and inconclusive
+flirtation at the cost of his wife's happiness, a few disturbing
+memories, and two unfinished pictures. Out of patience with himself,
+he plunged into his work. In two weeks of concentrated effort he had
+finished the Nixie, and had arranged with Constantine to exhibit it
+and the Demeter immediately. This last the dealer appeared to admire,
+pronouncing it a fine canvas, though inferior to the Danae. About the
+Nixie he seemed in two minds.
+
+"We shall have a newspaper story with that one, Mr. Byrd, the lady being
+so well known, and the subject so dramatic, but if you ask me will it
+sell--" he shrugged his fat shoulders--"that's another thing."
+
+Stefan stared at him. "I could sell that picture in France five times
+over."
+
+Constantine waved his pudgy fingers.
+
+"Ah, France! V'la c' qui est autre chose,'s pas? But if we fail in New
+York for this one I think we try Chicago."
+
+The reception of the pictures proved Constantine a shrewd prophet.
+The academic Demeter was applauded by the average critic as a piece of
+decorative work in the grand manner, and a fit rebuke to all Cubists,
+Futurists, and other anarchists. It was bought by a committee from a
+western agricultural college, which had come east with a check from the
+state's leading politician to purchase suitable mural enrichments for
+the college's new building. Constantine persuaded these worthies that
+one suitable painting by a distinguished artist would enrich their
+institution more than the half dozen canvases "to fit the auditorium"
+which they had been inclined to order. Moreover, he mulcted them of two
+thousand dollars for Demeter, which, in his private estimation, was more
+than she was worth. He achieved the sale more readily because of the
+newspaper controversy aroused by the Nixie. Was this picture a satire
+on life, or on the celebrated Miss Berber? Was it great art, or merely
+melodrama? Were Byrd's effects of river-light obtained in the old
+impressionist manner, or by a subtler method of his own? Was he a master
+or a poseur?
+
+These and other questions brought his name into fresh prominence,
+but failed to sell their object. Just, however, as Constantine was
+considering a journey for the Nixie to Chicago, a purchaser appeared
+in the shape of a certain Mr. Einsbacher. Stefan happened to be in the
+gallery when this gentleman, piloted by Constantine himself, came in,
+and recognized him as the elderly satyr of the pouched eyes who had been
+so attentive to Felicity on the night of Constance's reception. When,
+later, the dealer informed him that this individual had bought the Nixie
+for three thousand, Stefan made no attempt to conceal his disgust.
+
+"Thousand devils, Constantine, I don't paint for swine of that type,"
+said he, scowling.
+
+The dealer's hands wagged. "His check is good," he replied, "and who
+knows, he may die soon and leave the picture to the Metropolitan."
+
+But Stefan was not to be mollified, and went home that afternoon in a
+state of high rebellion against all commercialism. Mary tried to console
+him by pointing out that even with the dealer's commission deducted,
+he had made more than a year's income from the two sales, and could now
+work again free from all anxiety.
+
+"What's the good," he exclaimed, "of producing beauty for sheep to bleat
+and monkeys to leer at! What's the good of producing it in America at
+all? Who wants, or understands it!"
+
+"Oh, Stefan, heaps of people. Doesn't Mr. Farraday understand art, for
+instance?"
+
+"Farraday," he snorted, "yes!--landscapes and women with children. What
+does he know of the radiance of beauty, its mystery, the hot soul of
+it? Oh, Mary," he flung himself down beside her, and clutched her hand
+eagerly, "don't be wise; don't be sensible, darling. It's March, spring
+is beginning in Europe. It's a year and a half since I became an exile.
+Let's go, beloved. You say yourself we have plenty of money; let's take
+ship for the land where beauty is understood, where it is put first,
+above all things. Let's go back to France, Mary!"
+
+His face was fired with eagerness; he almost trembled with the passion
+to be gone. Mary flushed, and then grew pale with apprehension. "Do you
+mean break up our home, Stefan, for good?"
+
+"Yes, darling. You know I've counted the days of bondage. We couldn't
+travel last spring, and since then we've been too poor. What have these
+last months brought us? Only disharmony. We are free now, there is
+nothing to hold us back. We can leave Elliston in Paris, and follow the
+spring south to the vineyards. A progress a-foot through France, each
+day finding colors richer, the sun nearer--think of it, Beautiful!" He
+kissed her joyously.
+
+Her hands were quite cold now, "But, Stefan," she temporized, "our
+little house, our friends, my work, the--the _place_ we've been making?"
+
+"Dearest, all these we can find far better there."
+
+She shook her head. "I can't. I don't speak French properly, I don't
+understand French people. I couldn't sell my stories there or--or
+anything," she finished weakly.
+
+He jumped up, his eyes blank, hands thrust in his pockets.
+
+"I don't get you, Mary. You don't mean--you surely can't mean, that you
+don't want to go to France _at all_? That you want to _live_ here?"
+
+She floundered. "I don't know, Stefan. Of course you've always talked
+about France, and I should love to go there and see it, and so on, but
+somehow I've come to think of the Byrdsnest as home--we've been so happy
+here--"
+
+"Happy?" he interrupted her. "You say we've been happy?" His tone was
+utterly confounded.
+
+"Yes, dear, except--except when you were so--so busy last autumn--"
+
+He dropped down by the table, squaring himself as if to get to the
+bottom of a riddle.
+
+"What is your idea of happiness, Mary, of _life_ in fact?" he asked,
+in an unusually quiet voice. She felt glad that he seemed so willing to
+talk things over, and to concede her a point of view of her own.
+
+"Well," she began, feeling for her words, "my idea of life is to have a
+person and work that you love, and then to build--both of you--a place,
+a position; to have friends--be part of the community--so that your
+children--the immortal part of you--may grow up in a more and more
+enriching atmosphere." She paused, while he watched her, motionless. "I
+can't imagine," she went on, "greater happiness for two people than to
+see their children growing up strong and useful--tall sons and daughters
+to be proud of, such as all the generations before us have had.
+Something to hand our life on to--as it was in the beginning--you know,
+Stefan--" She flushed with the effort to express.
+
+"Then,"--his voice was quieter still; she did not see that his hands
+were clenched under the flap of the table--"in this scheme of life of
+yours, how many children--how many servants, rooms, all that sort of
+thing--should you consider necessary?"
+
+She smiled. "As for houses, servants and things, that just depends on
+one's income. I hate ostentation, but I do like a beautifully run house,
+and I adore horses and dogs and things. But the children--" she flushed
+again--"why, dearest, I think any couple ought to be simply too thankful
+for all the children they can have. Unless, perhaps," she added naively,
+"they're frightfully poor."
+
+"Where should people live to be happy in this way?" he asked, still in
+those carefully quiet tones.
+
+She was looking out of the window, trying to formulate her thoughts.
+"I don't think it matters very much _where_ one lives," she said in her
+soft, clear tones, "as long as one has friends, and is not too much in
+the city. But to own one's house, and the ground under one, to be able
+to leave it to one's son, to think of _his_ son being born in it--that
+I think would add enormously to one's happiness. To belong to the place
+one lives in, whether it's an old country, or one of the colonies, or
+anywhere."
+
+"I see," said Stefan slowly, in a voice low and almost harsh. Startled,
+she looked at him. His face was knotted in a white mask; it was like the
+face of some creature upon which an iron door has been shut. "Stefan,"
+she exclaimed, "what--?"
+
+"Wait a minute," he said, still slowly. "I suppose it's time we talked
+this thing out. I've been a fool, and judged, like a fool, by myself.
+It's time we knew each other, Mary. All that you have said is horrible
+to me--it's like a trap." She gave an exclamation. "Wait, let me do
+something I've never done, let me _think_ about it." He was silent, his
+face still a hard, knotted mask. Mary waited, her heart trembling.
+
+"You, Mary, told me something about families in England who live as you
+describe--you said your mother belonged to one of them. I remember that
+now." He nodded shortly, as if conceding her a point. "My father was a
+New Englander. He was narrow and self-righteous, and I hated him, but
+he came of people who had faced a hundred forms of death to live
+primitively, in a strange land."
+
+"I'm willing to live in a strange country, Stefan," she almost cried to
+him.
+
+"Don't, Mary--I'm still trying to understand. I'm not my father's son,
+I'm my mother's. I don't know what she was, but she was beautiful and
+passionate--she came of a mixed race, she may have had gipsy blood--I
+don't know--but I do know she had genius. She loved only color and
+movement. Mary--" he looked straight at her for the first time, his eyes
+were tortured--"I loved you because you were beautiful and free. When
+your child bound you, and you began to collect so many things and people
+about you, I loved you less. I met some one else who had the beauty of
+color and movement, and I almost loved her. She told me the name Berber
+wasn't her own, that she had taken it because it belonged to a tribe
+of wanderers--Arabs. I almost loved her for that alone. But, Mary, you
+still held me. I was faithful to you because of your beauty and the
+love that had been between us. Then you rose from your petty little
+surroundings"--he cast a look of contempt at the pretty furnishings of
+the room--"I saw you like a storm-spirit, I saw you moving among other
+women like a goddess, adored of men. I felt your beautiful body yield to
+me in the joy of wild movement, in the rhythm of the dance. You were my
+bride, alive, gloriously free--once more, you were the Desired. I loved
+you, Mary." He rose and put his hands on her shoulders. Her face was as
+white as his now. His hands dropped, he almost leapt away from her, the
+muscles of his face writhed. "My God, Mary, I've never wanted to _think_
+about you, only to feel and see you! Now I must think. This--this
+existence that you have described! Is that all you ask of life? Are you
+sure?"
+
+"What more could one ask!" she uttered, dazed.
+
+"What _more?_" he cried out, throwing up his arms. "What _more,_ Mary!
+Why, it isn't life at all, this deadly, petty intricate day by day,
+surrounded by things, and more things. The hopeless, unalterable
+tameness of it!" He began to pace the room.
+
+"But, my dear, I don't understand you. We have love, and work, and if
+some part of our life is petty, why, every one's always has been, hasn't
+it?"
+
+She was deeply moved by his distress, afraid again for their happiness,
+longing to comfort him. Yet, under and apart from all these emotions,
+some cool little faculty of criticism wondered if he was not making
+rather a theatrical scene. "Daily life must be a little monotonous,
+mustn't it?" she urged again, trying to help him.
+
+"No!" he almost shouted, with a gesture of fierce repudiation. "Was
+Angelo's life petty? Was da Vinci's? Did Columbus live monotonously,
+did Scott or Peary? Does any explorer or traveler? Did Thoreau surround
+himself with _things_--to hamper--did George Borrow, or Whitman, or
+Stevenson? Do you suppose Rodin, or de Musset, or Rousseau, or Millet,
+or any one else who has ever _lived_, cared whether they had a position,
+a house, horses, old furniture? All the world's wanderers, from Ulysses
+down to the last tramp who knocked at this door, have known more of life
+than all your generations of staid conventional county families!
+Oh, Mary"--he leant across the table toward her, and his voice
+pleaded--"think of what life _should_ be. Think of the peasants in
+France treading out the wine. Think of ships, and rivers, and all the
+beauty of the forests. Think of dancing, of music, of that old viking
+who first found America. Think of those tribes who wander with their
+tents over the desert and pitch them under stars as big as lamps--all
+the things we've never seen, Mary, the songs we've never heard. The
+colors, the scents, and the cruel tang of life! All these I want to
+see and feel, and translate into pictures. I want you with me,
+Mary--beautiful and free--I want us to drink life eagerly together, as
+if it were heady wine." He took her hand across the table. "You'll come,
+Beloved, you'll give all the little things up, and come?"
+
+She rose, her face pitifully white. They stood with hands clasped, the
+table between them.
+
+"The boy, Stefan?"
+
+He laughed, thinking he had won her. "Bring him, too, as the Arab women
+carry theirs, in a shawl. We'll leave him here and there, and have him
+with us whenever we stay long in one place."
+
+She pulled her hand away, her eyes filled with tears. "I love you,
+Stefan, but I can't bring my child up like a gipsy. I'll live in France,
+or anywhere you say, but I must have a home--I can't be a wanderer."
+
+"You shall have a home, sweetheart, to keep coming back to." His face
+was brightening to eagerness.
+
+"Oh, you don't understand. I can't leave my child; I can't be with him
+only sometimes. I want him always. And it isn't only him. Oh, Stefan,
+dear"--her voice in its turn was pleading--"I don't believe I can
+come to France just now. I think, I'm almost sure, we're going to have
+another baby."
+
+He straightened, they faced each other in silence. After a moment
+she spoke again, looking down, her hands tremblingly picking at her
+handkerchief.
+
+"I was so happy about it. It was the sign of your renewed love. I
+thought we could build a little wing on the cottage, and have a nurse."
+Her voice fell to a whisper. "I thought it might be a little girl, and
+that you would love her better than the boy. I'll come later, dear, if
+you say so, but I can't come now." She sank into her chair, her head
+drooping. He, too, sat down, too dazed by this new development to find
+his way for a minute through its implications.
+
+"I'm sorry, Mary," he said at last, dully. "I don't want a little girl.
+If she could be put away somewhere till she were grown, I should not
+mind. But to live like this all through one's youth, with a house, and
+servants, and people calling, and the place cluttered up with babies--I
+don't think I can do that, possibly."
+
+She was frankly crying now. "But, dear one, can't we compromise? After
+this baby is born, I'll give up the house. We'll live in France--I'll
+travel with you a little. That will help, won't it?"
+
+He sighed. "I suppose so. We shall have to think out some scheme. But
+the ghastly part is that we shall both have to be content with half
+measures. You want one thing of life, Mary, I another. No amount of
+self-sacrifice on either side alters that fact. We married, strangers,
+and it's taken us a year and a half to find it out. My fault, of course.
+I wanted love and beauty, and I got it--I didn't think of the cost,
+and I didn't think of _you_. I was just a damned egotistical male, I
+suppose." He laughed bitterly. "My father wanted a wife, and he got the
+burning heart of a rose. I--I never wanted a wife, I see that now, I
+wanted to snare the very spirit of life and make it my own--you looked
+a vessel fit to carry it. But you were just a woman like the rest. We've
+failed each other, that's all."
+
+"Oh, Stefan," she cried through her tears, "I've tried so hard. But
+I was always the same--just a woman. Only--" her tears broke out
+afresh--"when you married me, I thought you loved me as I was."
+
+He looked at her, transfixed. "My God," he whispered, "that's what I
+heard my mother say more than twenty years ago. What a mockery--each
+generation a scorn and plaything for the high Gods! Well, we'll do the
+best we can, Mary. I'm utterly a pagan, so I'm not quite the inhuman
+granite my Christian father was. Don't cry, dear." He stooped and kissed
+her, and she heard his light, wild steps pass through the room and out
+into the night. She sat silent, amid the ruins of her nest.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+
+For a month Stefan brooded. He hung about the house, dabbled at a little
+work, and returned, all without signs of life or interest. He was kind
+to Mary, more considerate than he used to be, but she would have given
+all his inanimate, painstaking politeness for an hour of his old, gay
+thoughtlessness. They had reached the stage of marriage in which, all
+being explained and understood, there seems nothing to hope for. Alone
+together they were silent, for there was nothing to say. Each condoned
+but could not comfort the other. Stefan felt that his marriage had been
+a mistake, that he, a living thing, had tied about his neck a dead mass
+of institutions, customs and obligations which would slowly crush his
+life out. "I am twenty-seven," he said to himself, "and my life is
+over." He did not blame Mary, but himself.
+
+She, on the other hand, felt she had married a man outside the pale of
+ordinary humanity, and that though she still loved him, she could no
+longer expect happiness through him. "I am twenty-five," she thought,
+"and my personal life is over. I can be happy now only in my children."
+As those were assured her, she never thought of regretting her marriage,
+but only deplored the loss of her dream. Nor did she judge Stefan. She
+understood the wild risk she had run in marrying a man of whom she knew
+nothing. "He is as he is," she thought; "neither of us is to blame."
+Lonely and grieved, she turned for companionship to her writing, and
+began a series of fairy tales which she had long planned for very
+young children. The first instalment of her serial was out, charmingly
+illustrated; she had felt rather proud on seeing her name, for the first
+time, on the cover of a magazine. She engaged a young girl from the
+village to take Elliston for his daily outings, and settled down to a
+routine of work, small social relaxations, and morning and evening care
+of the baby. The daily facts of life were pleasant to Mary; if some hurt
+or disappointed, her balanced nature swung readily to assuage itself
+with others. She honestly believed she felt more deeply than her
+husband, and perhaps she did, but she was not of the kind whom life
+can break. Stefan might dash himself to exhaustion against a rock round
+which Mary would find a smooth channel.
+
+While her work progressed, Stefan's remained at a standstill.
+Disillusioned with his marriage and with his whole way of life he
+fretted himself from his old sure confidence to a mood of despair. Their
+friends bored him, his studio like his house became a cage. New York
+appeared in her old guise of mammoth materialist, but now he had no
+heart to satirize her dishonor. He wanted only to be gone, but told
+himself that in common decency he must remain with Mary till her child
+was born. He longed for even the superficial thrill of Felicity's
+presence, but she still lingered in the South. So fretting, he tossed
+himself against the bars through the long snows of an unusually severe
+March, until April broke the frost, and the road to the Byrdsnest became
+a morass of running mud.
+
+In the last two weeks Stefan had begun a portrait of Constance, but
+without enthusiasm. She was a fidgety sitter, and was moreover so busy
+with her suffrage work that she could never be relied on for more than
+an hour at a time. After a few of these fragmentary sittings his ragged
+nerves gave out completely.
+
+"It's utterly useless, Constance!" he exclaimed, throwing down his
+pallette and brushes, as the telephone interrupted them for the third
+time in less than an hour. "I can't paint in a suffrage office. This is
+a studio, not the Club's headquarters. If you can't shut these people
+off and sit rationally, please don't trouble to come again."
+
+"I know, my dear boy, it's abominable, but what can I do? Our bill has
+passed the Legislature; until it is submitted next year I can't be my
+own or Theodore's, much less yours. As for you, you look a rag. This
+winter has about made me hate my country. I don't wonder you long for
+France."
+
+Her eyes narrowed at him, she dangled her beads reflectively, and
+perched on the throne again without attempting to resume her pose. "My
+dear boy," she said suddenly, "why stay here and be eaten by devils--why
+not fly from them?"
+
+"I wish to God I could," he groaned.
+
+"You can. Mary was in to see our shop yesterday; she looked dragged. You
+are both nervous. Do what I have always done--take a holiday from each
+other. There's nothing like it as a tonic for love."
+
+"Do you really think she wouldn't mind?" he exclaimed eagerly. "You know
+she--she isn't very well."
+
+"Chtt," shrugged Constance, "_that's_ only being more than usually well.
+You don't think Mary needs coddling, do you? She's worried because
+you are bored. If you aren't there, she won't worry. I shall take
+your advice--I shan't come here again--" and she settled her hat
+briskly--"and you take mine. Go away--" Constance threw on her coat--"go
+anywhere you like, my dear Stefan--" she was at the door--"except
+south," she added with a mischievous twinkle, closing it.
+
+Stefan, grinning appreciatively at this parting shot, unscrewed his
+sketch of Constance from the easel, set it face to the wall in a corner,
+cleaned his brushes, with the meticulous care he always gave to his
+tools, and ran for the elevated, just in time to catch the next train
+for Crab's Bay. At the station he jumped into a hack, and, splashing
+home as quickly as the liquid road bed would allow, burst into the house
+to find Mary still lingering over her lunch.
+
+"What has happened, Stefan?" she exclaimed, startled at his excited
+face.
+
+"Nothing. I've got an idea, that's all. Let me have something to eat and
+I'll tell you about it."
+
+She rang for Lily, and he made a hasty meal, asking her unwonted
+questions meantime about her work, her amusements, whether many of the
+neighbors were down yet, and if she felt lonely.
+
+"No, I'm not lonely, dear. There are only a few people here, but they
+are awfully decent to me, and I'm very busy at home."
+
+"You are sure you are not lonely?" he asked anxiously, drinking his
+coffee, and lighting a cigarette.
+
+"Yes, quite sure. I'm not exactly gay--" and she smiled a little
+sadly--"but I'm really never lonely."
+
+"Then," he asked nervously, "what would you say if I suggested going off
+by myself for two or three months, to Paris." He watched her intently,
+fearful of the effect of his words. To his unbounded relief, she
+appeared neither surprised nor hurt, but, after twisting her coffee cup
+thoughtfully for a minute, looked up with a frank smile.
+
+"I think it would be an awfully good thing, Stefan dear. I've been
+thinking so for a month, but I didn't like to say anything in case you
+might feel--after our talk--" her voice faltered for a moment--"that
+I was trying to--that I didn't care for you so much. It isn't that,
+dear--" she looked honestly at him--"but I know you're not happy, and it
+doesn't help me to feel I am holding you back from something you want. I
+think we shall be happier afterwards if you go now."
+
+"I do, too," said he, "but I was so afraid it would seem cruel in me to
+suggest it. I don't want to grow callous like my father." He shuddered.
+"I want to do the decent thing, Mary." His eyes were pleading.
+
+"I know, dearest, you've been very kind. But for both our sakes, it will
+be far better if you go for a time." She rose, and, coming round
+the table, kissed his rough hair. He caught her hand, and pressed it
+gratefully. "You are good to me, Mary."
+
+The matter settled, Stefan's spirit soared. He rang up the French Line
+and secured one of the few remaining berths for their next sailing,
+which was in three days. He telephoned an ecstatic cable to Adolph.
+Then, hurrying to the attic, he brought down his friend's old Gladstone,
+and his own suitcase, and began to sort out his clothes. Mary, anxious
+to quell her heartache by action, came up to help him, and vetoed his
+idea of taking only the barest necessities.
+
+"I know," she said, "you want to get back to your old Bohemia. But
+remember you are a well-known artist now--the celebrated Stefan Byrd,"
+and she courtesied to him. "Suppose you were to meet some charming
+people whom you wanted to see something of? Do take a dinner-jacket at
+least."
+
+He grinned at her. "I shall live in a blouse and sleep in my old attic
+with Adolph. That's the only thing I could possibly want to do. But I
+won't be fractious, Mary. If it will please you to have me take dress
+clothes I'll do it--only you must pack them yourself!"
+
+She nodded smilingly. "All right, I shall love to." She had failed to
+make her husband happy in their home, she thought; at least she would
+succeed in her manner of speeding him from it. It was her tragedy that
+he should want to go. That once faced, she would not make a second
+tragedy of his going.
+
+She spent the next morning, while he went to town to buy his ticket, in
+a thorough overhauling of his clothes. She found linen bags to hold
+his shoes and a linen folder for his shirts. She pressed his ties and
+brushed his coats, packed lavender bags in his underwear, and slipped
+a framed snapshot of herself and Elliston into the bottom of the
+Gladstone. With it, in a box, she put the ring she had given him, with
+the winged head, which he had ceased to wear of late. She found some new
+poems and a novel he had not read, and packed those. She gave him her
+own soapbox and toothbrush case. She cleaned his two bags with shoe
+polish. Everything she could think of was done to show that she sent him
+away willingly, and she worked so hard that she forgot to notice how her
+heart ached. In the afternoon she met him in town and they had dinner
+together. He suggested their old hotel, but she shook her head. "No
+dear, not there," she said, smiling a little tremulously. They went to a
+theatre, and got home so late that she was too tired to be wakeful.
+
+"By the by," she said next morning at breakfast, "don't worry about
+my being alone after you've gone. I thought it might be triste for the
+first few days, so I've rung up the Sparrow, and she's coming to occupy
+your room for a couple of weeks. She's off for her yearly trip abroad at
+the end of the month. Says she can't abide the Dutch, but means to see
+what there is to their old Rhine, and come back by way of Tuscany and
+France." Mary gurgled. "Can't you see her in Paris, poor dear, 'doing'
+the Louvre, with her nose in a guidebook. Why! Perhaps you may!"
+
+"The gods forbid," said Stefan devoutly.
+
+He had brought his paints and brushes home the night before, and after
+breakfast Mary helped him stow them away in the Gladstone, showing
+him smilingly how well she had done his packing. While he admired, she
+remembered to ask him if he had obtained a letter of credit. He burst
+out laughing.
+
+"Mary, you wonder! I have about fifty dollars in my pocket, and should
+have entirely forgotten to take more if you hadn't spoken of it. What a
+bore! Can't I get it to-morrow?"
+
+"You might not have time before sailing. I think you'd better go up
+to-day, and then you could call on Constance to say good-bye."
+
+"I don't like to leave you on our last day," he said uneasily,
+
+"Oh, that will be all right, dear," she smiled, patting his hand. "I
+have oceans to do, and I think you ought to see Constance. Get your
+letter of credit for a thousand dollars, then you'll be sure to have
+enough."
+
+"A thousand! Great Scott, Adolph would think I'd robbed a bank if I had
+all that."
+
+"You don't need to spend it, silly, but you ought to have it behind you.
+You never know what might happen."
+
+"Would there be plenty left for you?"
+
+"Bless me, yes," she laughed; "we're quite rich."
+
+While he was gone Mary arranged an impromptu farewell party for him, so
+that instead of spending a rather depressing evening alone with her,
+as he had expected, he found himself surrounded by cheerful
+friends--McEwan, the Farradays, their next neighbors, the Havens, and
+one or two others. McEwan was the last to leave, at nearly midnight, and
+pleading fatigue, Mary kissed Stefan good night at the door of her room.
+She dared not linger with him lest the stifled pain at her heart should
+clamor for expression too urgently to be denied. But by this time
+he himself began to feel the impending separation. Ready for bed, he
+slipped into her room and found her lying wide-eyed in a swathe of
+moonlight. Without a word he lay down beside her and drew her close.
+Like children lost in the dark, they slept all night in each other's
+arms.
+
+Next day Mary saw him off. New York ended at the gangway. Across it,
+they were in France. French decorations, French faces, French gaiety,
+the beloved French tongue, were everywhere.
+
+"Listen to it, Mary," he cried exultingly, and she smiled a cheerful
+response.
+
+When the warning bell sounded he suddenly became grave.
+
+"Say good-bye again to Elliston for me, dear," he said, holding her hand
+close. "I hope he grows up like you."
+
+Her eyes were swimming now, in spite of herself. "Mary," he went on,
+"this separation makes or mars us. I hope, dear, I believe, it will make
+us. God bless you." He kissed her, pressed her to him. Suddenly they
+were both trembling.
+
+"Why are we parting?" he cried, in a revulsion of feeling.
+
+She smiled at him, wiping away her tears. "It's better, dearest," she
+whispered; "let me go now." They kissed again; she turned hurriedly
+away. He watched her cross the gangway--she waved to him from the
+dock--then the crowd swallowed her.
+
+For a moment he felt bitterly bereaved. "How ironic life is," he
+thought. Then a snatch of French chatter and a gay laugh reached him.
+The gangway lifted, water widened between the bulwarks and the dock.
+As the ship swung out he caught the sea breeze--a flight of gulls swept
+by--he was outbound!
+
+With a deep breath Stefan turned a brilliant smile upon the deck ...
+Freedom!
+
+Mary, hurrying home with aching heart and throat, let the slow tears
+run unheeded down her cheeks. From the train she watched the city's
+outskirts stream by, formless and ugly. She was very desolate. But when,
+tired out, she entered her house, peace enfolded her. Here were her
+child, the things she loved, her birds, her pleasant, smiling servant.
+Here were white walls and gracious calm. Her mate had flown, but the
+nest remained. Her heart ached still, but it was no longer torn.
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+
+The day after Stefan sailed Felicity Berber returned from Louisiana. The
+South had bored her, without curing her weariness of New York. She drove
+from the Pennsylvania Station to her studio, looked through the books,
+overhauled the stock, and realized with indifference that her business
+had suffered heavily through her absence. She listened lazily while her
+lieutenants, emphasizing this fact, implored her to take up the work
+again.
+
+"What does it matter," she murmured through her smoke. "The place still
+pays. Your salaries are all secure, and I have plenty of money. I may
+come back, I may not. In any event, I am bored." She rippled out to
+her landaulette, and drove home. At her apartment, her Chinese maid was
+already unpacking her trunks.
+
+"Don't unpack any more, Yo San. I may decide to go away again--abroad
+perhaps. I am still very bored--give me a white kirtle and telephone Mr.
+Marchmont to call in an hour."
+
+With her maid's help she undressed, pinned her hair high, and slipped
+on a knee-high tunic of heavy chiffon. Barefooted, she entered a large
+room, walled in white and dull silver--the end opposite the windows
+filled by a single mirror. Between the windows stood a great tank of
+gold and silver fish swimming among water lilies.
+
+Two enormous vases of dull glass, stacked with lilies against her
+homecoming, stood on marble pedestals. The floor was covered with a
+carpeting of dead black. A divan draped in yellow silk, a single ebony
+chair inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and a low table in teakwood were the
+sole furniture. Here, quite alone, Felicity danced away the stiffness
+of her journey, danced away the drumming of the train from her ears, and
+its dust from her lungs. Then she bathed, and Yo San dressed her in
+a loose robe of silver mesh, and fastened her hair with an ivory comb
+carved and tinted to the model of a water lily. These rites complete,
+Felicity slowly partook of fruit, coffee and toast. Only then did
+she re-enter the dance room, where, on his ebony chair, the dangling
+Marchmont had been uncomfortably waiting for half an hour.
+
+She gave him her hand dreamily, and sank full length on the divan.
+
+"You are more marvelous than ever, Felicity," said he, with an adoring
+sigh.
+
+She waved her hand. "For all that I am not in the mood. Tell me the
+news, my dear Marchmont--plays, pictures, scandals, which of my clients
+are richer, which are bankrupt, who has gone abroad, and all about my
+friends."
+
+Marchmont leant forward, and prepared to light a cigarette, his thin
+mouth twisted to an eager smile, his loose hair wagging.
+
+"Wait," she breathed, "I weary of smoke. Give me a lily, Marchmont." He
+fetched one of the great Easter lilies from its vase. Placing this on
+her bosom, she folded her supple hands over it, closed her eyes, and lay
+still, looking like a Bakst version of the Maid of Astolat. Felicity's
+hints were usually sufficient for her slaves. Marchmont put away his
+cigarette, and proceeded with relish to recount the gossip with which,
+to his long finger-tips, he was charged.
+
+"Well," said he, after an hour's general survey of New York as they both
+knew it, "I think that about covers the ground. There is, as I said,
+no question that Einsbacher is still devoted. My own opinion is he will
+present you with the Nixie. I suppose you received the clippings I sent
+about the picture? Constance Elliot has only ordered two gowns from the
+studio since you left--but you will have seen that by the books. She
+says she is saving her money for the Cause." He snickered. "The fact is,
+she grows dowdy as she grows older. Gunther has gone to Frisco with
+his group. Polly Thayer tells me his adoration of the beautiful Byrd
+is pathetic. So much in love he nearly broke her neck showing off his
+driving for her benefit." Marchmont snickered again. "As for your friend
+Mr. Byrd--" he smiled with a touch of sly pleasure--"you won't see him,
+he sailed for France yesterday, alone. His name is in this morning's
+list of departures." And he drew a folded and marked newspaper from his
+pocket.
+
+A shade of displeasure had crept over the immobile features of Miss
+Berber. She opened her eyes and regarded the lank Marchmont with
+distaste. Her finger pressed a button on the divan. Slowly she raised
+herself to her elbow, while he watched, his pale eyes fixed on her with
+the expression of a ratting dog waiting its master's thanks after a
+catch.
+
+"All that you have told me," said Felicity at last, a slight edge to her
+zephyr-like voice, "is interesting, but I wish you would remember that
+while you are free to ridicule my clients, you are not free as regards
+my friends. Your comment on Connie was in poor taste. I am not in
+the mood for more conversation this morning. I am fatigued. Good-day,
+Marchmont." She sank to her pillows again--her eyes closed.
+
+"Oh, I say, Felicity, is that all the thanks I get?" whined her visitor.
+
+"Good-day, Marchmont," she breathed again. The door opened, disclosing
+Yo San. Marchmont's aesthetic veneer cracked.
+
+"Oh, shucks," he said, "how mean of you!" and trailed out, his cutaway
+seeming to hang limp like the dejected tail of a dog.
+
+The door closed, Felicity bounded up and, running across the room,
+invoked her own loveliness in the mirror.
+
+"Alone," she whispered to herself, "alone." She danced a few steps,
+swayingly. "You've never lived, lovely creature, you've never lived
+yet," she apostrophized the dancing vision in the glass.
+
+Still swaying and posturing to some inward melody, she fluttered down
+the passage to her bedroom. "Yo San," she called, her voice almost full,
+"we shall go to Europe." The stolid little maid nodded acquiescence.
+
+For the next three days Felicity Berber, creator of raiment, shut in
+her pastoral fitting room and surrounded by her chief acolytes, sat at
+a table opposite Stefan's dancing faun, and designed spring gowns.
+Felicity the idle, the somnolent, the alluring, gave place to Felicity
+the inventor, and again to Felicity the woman of business. Scissors
+clipped, typewriters clicked, colored chalks covered dozens of sheets
+with drawings.
+
+The staff became first relieved, then enthusiastic. What a spring
+display they were to have! On the third day hundreds of primrose-yellow
+envelopes, inscribed in green ink to the studio's clients, poured into
+the letter-chute. Within them an announcement printed in flowing green
+script read, under Felicity's letterhead, "I offer twenty-one original
+designs for spring raiment, created by me under the inspiration of a
+sojourn in the South. Each will be modified to the wearer's personality,
+and none will be duplicated. I am about to travel in Europe, there
+to gain atmosphere for my fall creations." After her signature, was
+stamped, by way of seal, a tiny woodcut of Stefan's faun.
+
+The last design was complete by Friday, and on Saturday Felicity sailed
+on the Mauretania, her suite of three rooms a wilderness of flowers.
+Marchmont, calling at the apartment to escort her to the boat, found the
+dance-room swathed in sheeting, its heavy carpet rolled into a corner.
+Evidently, this was to be no brief "sojourn." The heavy Einsbacher was
+at the dock to see her off, together with a small pack of nondescript
+young men. Constance was not there, and Marchmont guessed that she had
+not been told of her friend's departure.
+
+Einsbacher had the last word with Felicity. "I hope you will like the
+vlowers," he whispered gutturally. "Let me know if I may make you a
+present of the Nixie," and he gave a thick smile.
+
+"You know my rule," she murmured, her lids heavy, a bored droop at the
+corners of her mouth. "Nothing worth more than five dollars, except
+flowers. Why should I break it--" her voice hovered--"for you?"--it
+sank. She turned away, melting into the crowd. Marchmont, with malicious
+pleasure, watched Einsbacher's discomfited retreat.
+
+In her cabin Felicity collected all the donors' cards from her flowers
+and, stepping outside, with a faint smile dropped them into the sea.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+
+It was the end of April, and Paris rustled gaily in her spring dress.
+Stefan and Adolph, clad in disreputable baggy trousers topped in one
+case by a painter's blouse and in the other by an infinitely aged alpaca
+jacket, strolled homeward in the early evening from their favorite cafe.
+
+Adolph was in the highest spirits, as he had been ever since Stefan's
+arrival three weeks before, but the other's face wore a rather moody
+frown. He had begun to weary a little of his good friend's ecstatic
+pleasure in their reunion.
+
+He was in Paris again, in his old attic; it was spring, and his beloved
+city as beautiful as ever. He had expected a return of his old-time
+gaiety, but somehow the charm lacked potency. He wanted to paint, but
+his ideas were turgid and fragmentary. He wanted excitement, but the
+city only seemed to offer memories. The lapse of a short eighteen months
+had scattered his friends surprisingly. Adolph remained, but Nanette was
+married. Louise had left Paris, and Giddens, the English painter, had
+gone back to London. Perhaps it was the spring, perhaps it was merely
+the law which decrees that the past can never be recaptured--whatever
+the cause, Stefan's flight had not wholly assuaged his restlessness.
+Of adventures in the hackneyed sense he had not thought. He was too
+fastidious for the vulgar sort, and had hitherto met no women who
+stirred his imagination. Moreover, he harbored the delusion that the
+failure of his great romance had killed his capacity for love. "I am
+done with women," he said to himself.
+
+Mary seemed very distant. He thought of her with gratitude for her
+generosity, with regret, but without longing.
+
+"Never marry," he said to Adolph for the twentieth time, as they turned
+into the rue des Trois Ermites; "the wings of an artist must remain
+unbound."
+
+"Ah, Stefan," Adolph replied, sighing over his friend's disillusionment,
+"I am not like you. I should be grateful for a home, and children. I am
+only a cricket scraping out my little music, not an eagle."
+
+Stefan snorted. "You are a great violinist, but you won't realize it.
+Look here, Adolph, chuck your job, and go on a walking tour with me.
+Let's travel through France and along the Riviera to Italy. I'm sick
+of cities. There's lots of money for us both, and if we run short, why,
+bring your fiddle along and play it--why not?"
+
+At their door the concierge handed Adolph some letters.
+
+"My friend," said he, holding up a couple of bills, "one cannot slip
+away from life so easily. How should I pay my way when we returned?"
+
+"Hang it," said Stefan impatiently, "don't you begin to talk
+obligations. I came to France to get away from all that. Have a little
+imagination, Adolph. It would be the best thing that could happen to you
+to get shaken out of that groove at the Opera--be the making of you."
+
+They had reached the attic, and Adolph lit a lamp.
+
+"We'll talk of it to-morrow, my infant, now I must dress--see, here is a
+letter for you."
+
+He handed Stefan a tinted envelope, and began leisurely to don his
+conventional black. Holding the note under the lamp, Stefan saw with a
+start that it was from Felicity, and had been left by hand. Excited,
+he tore it open. It was written in ordinary ink, upon pale pink paper,
+agreeably scented.
+
+    "My dear friend," he read in French, "I am in Paris, and
+    chancing to remember your old address--("I swear I never told
+    her the number," he thought)--send this in search of you.
+    How pleasant it would be to see you, and to have a little converse
+    in the sweet French tongue. You did not know that it
+    was my own, did you? But yes, I have French-Creole blood.
+    One is happy here among one's own kind. This evening I shall
+    be alone. Felicity."
+
+So, she was a Creole--of the race of Josephine! His pulses beat.
+Cramming the note into his pocket he whirled excitedly upon his friend.
+
+"Adolph," he cried, "I'm going out--where are my clothes?" and began
+hastily to rummage for his Gladstone amidst a pile of their joint
+belongings. Throwing it open, he dragged out his dress suit--folded
+still as Mary had packed it--and strewed a table with collars, ties,
+shirts, and other accessories.
+
+"Hot water, Adolph! Throw some sticks into the stove--I must shave,"
+he called, and Adolph, amazed at this sudden transformation, hastily
+obeyed.
+
+"Where do you go?" he asked, as he filled the kettle.
+
+"I'm going to see a very attractive young woman," Stefan grinned.
+"Wow, what a mercy I brought some decent clothes, eh?" He was already
+stripped, and shaking out a handful of silk socks. Something clicked to
+the floor, but he did not notice it. The dressing proceeded in a whirl,
+Adolph much impressed by the splendors of his friend's toilet. A fine
+shirt of tucked linen, immaculate pumps, links of dull gold--his comrade
+in Bohemia had completely vanished.
+
+"O la, la!" cried he, beaming, "now I see it is true about all your
+riches!"
+
+"I'm going to take a taxi," Stefan announced as he slipped into his
+coat; "can I drop you?"
+
+He stood ready, having overtaken Adolph's sketchy but leisured dressing.
+
+"What speed, my child! One moment!" Adolph shook on his coat, found his
+glasses, and was crossing to put out the lamp when his foot struck a
+small object.
+
+"What is this, something of yours?" He stooped and picked up a framed
+snapshot of a girl playing with a baby. "How beautiful!" he exclaimed,
+holding it under the lamp.
+
+"Oh, yes," said Stefan with a slight frown, "that's Mary. I didn't know
+I had it with me. Come on, Adolph," and he tossed the picture back into
+the open Gladstone.
+
+While Adolph found a taxi, Stefan paused a moment to question the
+concierge. Yes, monsieur's note had been left that afternoon, Madame
+remembered, by une petite Chinoise, bien chic, who had asked if Monsieur
+lived here. Madame's aged eyes snapped with Gallic appreciation of a
+possible intrigue.
+
+Stefan was glad when he had dropped Adolph. He stretched at ease along
+the cushions of his open taxi, breathing in the warm, audacious air of
+spring, and watched the faces of the crowds as they emerged under the
+lights to be lost again mysteriously in the dusk.
+
+Paris, her day's work done, was turning lightly, with her entrancing
+smile, to the pursuit of friendship, adventure, and love. All through
+the scented streets eyes sought eyes, voices rose in happy laughter or
+drooped to soft allurement. Stefan thrilled to the magic in the air. He,
+too, was seeking his adventure.
+
+The taxi drew up in the courtyard of an apartment house. Giving his
+name, Stefan entered a lift and was carried up one floor. A white door
+opened, and the small Yo San, with a salutation, took his hat, and
+lifted a curtain. He was in a long, low room, yellow with candlelight.
+Facing him, open French windows giving upon a balcony showed the
+purpling dusk above the river and the black shapes of trees. Lights
+trickled their reflection in the water, the first stars shone, the scent
+of flowers was heavy in the air.
+
+All this he saw; then a curtain moved, and a slim form appeared from the
+balcony as silently as a moth fluttering to the light.
+
+"Ah, Stefan, welcome," a voice murmured.
+
+The setting was perfect. As Felicity moved toward him--her gown
+fluttering and swaying in folds of golden pink as delicately tinted as
+the petals of a rose--Stefan realized he had never seen her so alluring.
+Her strange eyes shone, her lips curved soft and inviting, her cheeks
+and throat were like warm, white velvet.
+
+He took her outstretched hand--of the texture of a camelia--and it
+pulsed as if a heart beat in it.
+
+"Felicity," he half whispered, holding her hand, "how wonderful you
+are!"
+
+"Am I?" she breathed, sighingly. "I have been asleep so long, Stefan.
+perhaps I am awake a little now."
+
+Her eyes, wide and gleaming as he had never seen them, held him. A
+mysterious perfume, subtle and poignant, hung about her. Her gauzy dress
+fluttered as she breathed; she seemed barely poised on her slim feet.
+He put out his arm as if to stay her from mothlike flight, and it fell
+about her waist. He pressed her to him. Her lips met his--they were
+incredibly soft and warm--they seemed to blossom under his kisses.
+
+      *       *       *       *       *
+
+Adolph, returning from the opera at midnight, donned his old jacket and
+a pair of slippers and, lighting his pipe, settled himself with a paper
+to await Stefan's coming. Presently first the paper, then the burnt-out
+pipe, fell from his hands--he dozed, started awake, and dozed again.
+
+At last he roused himself and stretched stiffly. The lamp was burning
+low--he looked at his watch--it was four o'clock. Stefan's Gladstone bag
+still yawned on a chair beside the table. In it, the dull glow of the
+lamp was reflected from a small silver object lying among a litter of
+ties and socks. Adolph picked it up, and looked for some moments at the
+face of Mary, smiling above her little son. He shook his head.
+
+"Tch, tch! Quel dommage-what a pity!" he sighed, and putting down the
+picture undressed slowly, blew out the lamp, and went to bed.
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+
+On a Saturday morning at the end of June, Mary stood by the gate of the
+Byrdsnest, looking down the lane. McEwan, who was taking a whole holiday
+from the office, had offered to fetch her mail from the village. Any
+moment he might be back. It was quite likely, she told herself, that
+there would be a letter from France this morning--a steamer had
+docked on Thursday, another yesterday. Surely this time there would be
+something for her. Mary's eyes, as they strained down the lane, had lost
+some of their radiant youth. A stranger might have guessed her older
+than the twenty-six years she had just completed--she seemed grave and
+matronly--her face had a bleak look. Mary's last letter from France had
+come more than a month ago, and a face can change much in a month of
+waiting. She knew that last letter--a mere scrap--by heart.
+
+    "Thank you for your sweet letters, dear," it read. "I am
+    well, and having a wonderful time. Not much painting yet;
+    that is to come. Adolph admires your picture prodigiously.
+    I have found some old friends in Paris, very agreeably. I may
+    move about a bit, so don't expect many letters. Take care of
+    yourself. Stefan."
+
+No word of love, nothing about Elliston, or the child to come; just a
+hasty word or two dashed off in answer to the long letters which she
+had tried so hard to make amusing. Even this note had come after a two
+weeks' silence. "Don't expect many letters--" she had not, but a month
+was a long time.
+
+There came Wallace! He had turned the corner--he had waved to her--but
+it was a quiet wave. Somehow, if there had been a letter from France,
+Mary thought he would have waved his hat round his head. She had never
+spoken of her month-long wait, but Wallace always knew things without
+being told. No, she was sure there was no letter. "It's too hot here in
+the sun," she thought, and walked slowly into the house.
+
+"Here we are," called McEwan cheerily as he entered the sitting room.
+"It's a light mail to-day. Nothing but 'Kindly remit' for me, and one
+letter for you--looks like the fist of a Yankee schoolma'am."
+
+He handed her the letter, holding it with a big thumb over the
+right-hand corner, so that she recognized Miss Mason's hand before she
+saw the French stamp.
+
+"Mind if I hang round on the stoop and smoke a pipe?" queried McEwan,
+pulling a newspaper from his pocket.
+
+"Do," said Mary, opening her letter. It was a long, newsy sheet written
+from Paris and filled with the Sparrow's opinions on continental hotels,
+manners, and morals. She read it listlessly, but at the fourth page
+suddenly sat upright.
+
+    "I thought as long as I was here I'd better see what there is
+    to see," Miss Mason's pen chatted; "so I've been doing a play
+    or the opera every night, and I can say that not understanding
+    the language don't make the plays seem any less immoral.
+    However, that's what people go abroad to get, so I guess we
+    can't complain. The night before last who was sitting in the
+    orchestra but your husband with that queer Miss Berber? I
+    saw them as plain as daylight, but they couldn't see me away up
+    in the circle. When I was looking for a bus at the end I
+    saw them getting into an elegant electric. I must say she
+    looked cute, all in old rose color with a pearl comb in her hair.
+    I think your husband looked real well too--I suppose they
+    were going to some party together. It's about time that young
+    man was home again with you, it seems to me, and so I should
+    have told him if I could have got anywhere near him in the
+    crowd. All I can say is, _I've_ had enough of Europe. I'm thinking
+    of going through to London for a week, and then sailing."
+
+At the end of the letter Mary turned the last page back, and slowly
+read this paragraph again. There was a dull drumming in her ears--a hand
+seemed to be remorselessly pressing the blood from her heart. She sat
+staring straight before her, afraid to think lest she should think too
+much. At last she went to the window.
+
+"Wallace," she called. He jumped in, paper in hand, and saw her standing
+dead white by her chair.
+
+"Ye've no had ill news, Mary?" he asked with a burr.
+
+She shook her head. "No, Wallace; no, of course not. But I feel rather
+rotten this morning. Talk to me a little, will you?"
+
+Obediently he sat down, and shook out the paper. "Hae ye been watching
+the European news much lately, Mary?" he began.
+
+"I always try to, but it's difficult to find much in the American
+papers."
+
+"It's there, if ye know where to look. What would ye think o' this
+assassination o' the Grand Duke now?" He cocked his head on one side, as
+if eagerly waiting for her opinion. She began to rally.
+
+"Why, it's awful, of course, but somehow I can't feel much sympathy for
+the Austrians since they took Bosnia and Herzegovina."
+
+"What would ye think might come of it?"
+
+"I don't know, Wallace--what would you!"
+
+"Weel," he said gravely, "I think something's brewing down
+yonder--there'll be trouble yet."
+
+"Those poor Balkans, always fighting," she sighed.
+
+"I'm feered it'll be more than the Balkans this time. Watch the papers,
+Mary--I dinna' like the looks o' it mesel'."
+
+They talked on, he expounding his views on the menace of Austria's
+near-east aspirations as opposed to Russia's friendship for the Slavic
+races. Mary tried to listen intelligently--the effort brought a little
+color to her face.
+
+"Wallace," she said presently, "do you happen to know where Miss Berber
+is this summer?"
+
+"I do not," he said, his blue eyes steadily watching her. "But Mrs.
+Elliot would ken maybe--ye might ask her."
+
+"Oh, it doesn't matter," said Mary. "I just wondered."
+
+When McEwan had gone Mary read Miss Mason's letter for the third time,
+and again the cold touch of fear assailed her. She took a camp stool and
+sat by the edge of the bluff for a long time, watching the water. Then
+she went indoors again to her desk.
+
+    "Dear Stefan," she wrote, "I have only had one note from
+    you in six weeks, and am naturally anxious to know how you
+    are getting on. I am very well, and expect our baby about
+    the tenth of October. Elliston is beautiful; imagine, he is a
+    year old now! I think he will have your eyes. I am sorry
+    you are not getting on well with your work, but perhaps that
+    has changed by now. Dear, I had a letter from Miss Mason
+    this morning, and she writes of having seen you and Miss
+    Berber together at the opera. You didn't tell me she was in
+    Paris, and I can't help feeling it strange that you should not
+    have done so, and should leave me without news for so long.
+    I trust you, dear Stefan, and believe in our love in spite of the
+    difficulties we have had. And I think you did rightly to take
+    a holiday abroad. But you have been gone three months, and
+    I have heard so little. Am I wrong still to believe in our love?
+    Only six months ago we were so happy together. Do you wish
+    our marriage to come to an end? Please write me, dear, and
+    tell me what you really think, for, Stefan, I don't know how
+    I shall bear the suspense much longer. I'm trying to be brave,
+    dear--and I _do_ believe still.
+
+    "Your
+
+    "Mary."
+
+Her hand was trembling as she finished writing. She longed to cry out,
+"For God's sake, come back to me, Stefan"--she longed to write of the
+wild ache at her heart--but she could not. She could not plead with him.
+If he did not feel the pain in her halting sentences it would be true
+that he no longer loved her. She sealed and stamped the letter. "I must
+still believe," she kept repeating to herself. There was nothing to do
+but wait.
+
+In the weeks that followed it seemed to Mary that her friends were more
+than ever kind to her. Not only did James Farraday continually send his
+car to take her driving, and Mrs. Farraday appear in the pony carriage,
+but not a day passed without McEwan, Jamie, the Havens, or other
+neighbors dropping in for a chat, or planning a walk, a luncheon, or a
+sail. Constance, too, immersed in work though she was, ran out several
+times in her car and spent the night. Mary was grateful--it made her
+waiting so much less hard--while her friends were with her the constant
+ache at her heart was drugged asleep. Knowing Wallace, she suspected his
+hand in this widespread activity, nor was she mistaken.
+
+The day after the arrival of Miss Mason's letter McEwan had dropped in
+upon Constance in the evening, when he knew she would be resting after
+her strenuous day's work at headquarters. By way of a compliment on her
+gown he led the conversation round to Felicity Berber, and elicited the
+information that she was abroad.
+
+"In Paris, perhaps?" he suggested.
+
+"Now you mention it, I think they did say Paris when I was last in the
+shop."
+
+"Byrd is in Paris, you know," said McEwan, meeting her eyes.
+
+"Ah!" said Constance, and she stared at him, her lids narrowing. "I
+hadn't thought of that possibility." She fingered her jade beads.
+
+"I wonder if you ever write her?" he asked.
+
+"I never write any one, my dear man, and, besides, what could I say?"
+
+"Well," said he, "I had a hunch you might need a new rig for the summer
+Votes campaign, or something. I thought maybe you'd want the very latest
+Berber styles, and would ask her to send a tip over. Then I thought
+you'd string her the local gossip, how Mrs. Byrd's baby will be born in
+October, and you don't think her looking as fit as she might. You want a
+cute rattle for it from Paris, or something. Get the idea?"
+
+"You think she doesn't know?"
+
+"I think the kid's about as harmless as a short-circuited wire, but I
+think she's a sport at bottom. My dope is, _if_ there's anything to this
+proposition, then she doesn't know." He rose to go.
+
+"Wallace, you are certainly a bright boy," said Constance, holding out
+her hand. "The missive shall be despatched."
+
+"Moreover," said Mac, turning at the door, "Mary's worried--a little
+cheering up won't hurt her any."
+
+"I'll come out," said Constance'. "What a shame it is--I'm so fond of
+them both."
+
+"Yes, it's a mean world--but we have to keep right on smiling. Good
+night," said he.
+
+"Good night," called Constance. "You dear, good soul," she added to
+herself.
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+
+Adolph was practising some new Futurist music of Ravel's. Its
+dissonances fatigued and irritated him, but he was lured by its horrible
+fascination, and grated away with an enraged persistence. Paris was hot,
+the attic hotter, for it was July. Adolph wondered as he played how long
+it would be before he could get away to the sea. He was out of love
+with the city, and thought longingly of a possible trip to Sweden.
+His reflections were interrupted by Stefan, who pushed the door open
+listlessly, and instantly implored him to stop making a din.
+
+"What awful stuff--it's like the Cubist horrors," said he, petulantly.
+
+"Yes, my friend, yet I play the one, and you go to see the other," said
+Adolph, laying down his fiddle and mopping his head and hands.
+
+"Not I," contradicted Stefan, wandering over to his easel. On it was an
+unfinished sketch of Felicity dancing--several other impressions of her
+stood about the room.
+
+"Rotten work," he said, surveying them moodily. "All I have to show
+for over three months here. Adolph," he flung himself into a chair, and
+rumpled his hair angrily, "I'm sick of my way of life. My marriage was a
+mistake, but it was better than this. I did better work with Mary than I
+do with Felicity, and I didn't hate myself."
+
+"Well, my infant," said Adolph, with a relieved sigh, "I'm glad to hear
+you say it. You've told me nothing, but I am sure your marriage was a
+better thing than you think. As for this little lady--" he shrugged his
+shoulders--"I make nothing of this affair."
+
+Stefan's frown was moodier still.
+
+"Felicity is the most alluring woman I have ever known, and I believe
+she is fond of me. But she is affected, capricious, and a perfect mass
+of egotism."
+
+"For egotism you are not the man to blame her," smiled his friend.
+
+"I know that," shrugged Stefan. "I've always believed in egotism, but I
+confess Felicity is a little extreme."
+
+"Where is she?"
+
+"Oh, she's gone to Biarritz for a week with a party of Americans. I
+wouldn't go. I loathe mobs of dressed-up spendthrifts. We had planned to
+go to Brittany, but she said she needed a change of companionship--that
+her soul must change the color of its raiment, or some such piffle." He
+laughed shortly. "Here I am hanging about in the heat, most of my money
+gone, and not able to do a stroke of work. It's hell, Adolph."
+
+"My boy," said his friend, "why don't you go home?"
+
+"I haven't the face, and that's a fact. Besides, hang it, I still want
+Felicity. Oh, what a mess!" he growled, sinking lower into his chair.
+Suddenly Adolph jumped up.
+
+"I had forgotten; there is a letter for you," and he tossed one into his
+lap. "It's from America."
+
+Stefan flushed, and Adolph watched him as he opened the letter. The
+flush increased--he gave an exclamation, and, jumping up, began walking
+feverishly about the room.
+
+"My God, Adolph, she's heard about Felicity!" Adolph exclaimed in his
+turn. "She asks me about it--what am I to do?"
+
+"What does she say; can you tell me?" enquired the Swede, distressed.
+
+"Tiens, I'll read it to you," and Stefan opened the letter and hastily
+translated it aloud. "She's so generous, poor dear," he groaned as he
+finished. Adolph's face had assumed a deeply shocked expression. He was
+red to the roots of his blonde hair.
+
+"Is your wife then enceinte, Stefan!"
+
+"Yes, of course she is--she cares for nothing but having children."
+
+"_But_, Stefan!" Adolph's hands waved helplessly--he stammered. "It
+cannot be--it is impossible, _impossible_ that you desert a beautiful
+and good wife who expects your child. I cannot believe it."
+
+"I _haven't_ deserted her," Stefan retorted angrily. "I only came away
+for a holiday, and the rest just happened. I should have been home by
+now if I hadn't met Felicity. Oh, you don't understand," he groaned,
+watching his friend's grieved, embarrassed face. "I'm fond of
+Mary--devoted to her--but you don't know what the monotony of marriage
+does to a man of my sort."
+
+"No, I don't understand," echoed his friend. "But now, Stefan," and he
+brought his fist down on the table, "now you will go home, will you not,
+and try to make her happy?"
+
+"I don't think she will forgive this," muttered Stefan.
+
+"This!" Adolph almost shouted. "This you will explain away, deny, so
+that it troubles her no more!"
+
+"Oh, rot, Adolph, I can't lie to Mary," and Stefan began to pace the
+room once more.
+
+"For her sake, it seems to me you must," his friend urged.
+
+"Stop talking, Adolph; I want to think!" Stefan exclaimed. He walked in
+silence for a minute.
+
+"No," he said at last, "if my marriage is to go on, it must be on a
+basis of truth. I can't go back to Mary and act and live a lie. If she
+will have me back, she must know I've made some sacrifice to come,
+I'll go, if she says so, because I care for her, but I _can't_ go as a
+faithful, loving husband--it would be too grotesque."
+
+"Consider her health, my friend," implored Adolph, still with his
+bewildered, shocked air; "it might kill her!"
+
+"Can't! She's as strong as a horse--she can face the truth like a man."
+
+"Then think of the other woman; you must protect her."
+
+"Pshaw! she doesn't need protection! You don't know Felicity; she'd be
+just as likely as not to tell Mary herself."
+
+"I always thought you so honorable, so generous," Adolph murmured,
+dejectedly.
+
+"Oh, cut it, Adolph. I'm being as honorable and generous as I know how.
+I'll write to Mary now, and offer to come back if she says the word, and
+never see Felicity again. I can't do more."
+
+He flung himself down at the desk, and snatched a pen.
+
+    "My dearest girl:" he wrote rapidly, "your brave letter has
+    come to me, and I can answer it only with the truth. All that
+    you feared when you heard of F.'s being with me is true. I
+    found her here two months ago, and we have been together
+    most of the time since. It was not planned, Mary; it came to
+    me wholly unexpectedly, when I thought myself cured of love.
+    I care for you, my dear, I believe you the noblest and most
+    beautiful of women, but from F. I have had something which
+    a woman of your kind could never give, and in spite of the
+    pain I feel for your grief, I cannot say with truth that I regret
+    it. There are things--in life and love of which you, my
+    beautiful and clear-eyed Goddess, can know nothing--there is
+    a wild grape, the juice of which you will never drink, but which
+    once tasted, must ever be desired. Because this draught is so
+    different from your own milk and honey, because it leaves my
+    tenderness for you all untouched, because drinking it has assuaged
+    a thirst of which you can have no knowledge, I ask you
+    not to judge it with high Olympian judgment. I ask you
+    to forgive me, Mary, for I love you still--better now than when
+    I left you--and I hold you above all women. The cup is still
+    at my lips, but if you will grant me forgiveness I will drink
+    no more. I agonize over your grief--if you will let me I will
+    return and try to assuage it. Write me, Mary, and if the word
+    is forgive, for your sake I will bid my friend farewell now and
+    forever. I am still your husband if you will have me--there
+    is no woman I would serve but you.
+
+    "Stefan."
+
+He signed his name in a dashing scrawl, blotted and folded the letter
+without rereading it, addressed and stamped it, and sprang hatless down
+the stairs to post it.
+
+An enormous weight seemed lifted from him. He had shifted his dilemma to
+the shoulders of his wife, and had no conception that in so doing he was
+guilty of an act of moral cowardice. Returning to the studio, he pulled
+out a clean canvas and began a vigorous drawing of two fauns chasing
+each other round a tree. Presently, as he drew, he began to hum.
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+
+It was the fourth of August.
+
+Stefan and Felicity sat at premier dejeuner on the balcony of her
+apartment. About them flowers grew in boxes, a green awning hung over
+them, their meal of purple fruit, coffee, and hot brioches was served
+from fantastic green china over which blue dragons sprawled. Felicity's
+negligee was of the clear green of a wave's concavity--a butterfly of
+blue enamel pinned her hair. A breeze, cool from the river, fluttered
+under the awning.
+
+It was an attractive scene, but Felicity's face drooped listlessly, and
+Stefan, hands deep in the pockets of his white trousers, lay back in his
+wicker chair with an expression of nervous irritability. It was early,
+for the night had been too hot for late sleeping, and Yo San had not
+yet brought in the newspapers and letters. Paris was tense. Germany and
+Russia had declared war. France was mobilizing. Perhaps already the axe
+had fallen.
+
+Held by the universal anxiety, Stefan and Felicity had lingered on in
+Paris after her return from Biarritz, instead of traveling to Brittany
+as they had planned.
+
+Stefan had another reason for remaining, which he had not imparted to
+Felicity. He was waiting for Mary's letter. It was already overdue, and
+now that any hour might bring it he was wretchedly nervous as to the
+result. He did not yet wish to break with Felicity, but still less did
+he wish to lose Mary. Without having analyzed it to himself, he would
+have liked to keep the Byrdsnest and all that it contained as a warm and
+safe haven to return to after his stormy flights. He neither wished to
+be anchored nor free; he desired both advantages, and the knowledge
+that he would be called upon to forego one frayed his nerves. Life was
+various--why sacrifice its fluid beauty to frozen forms?
+
+"Stefan," murmured Felicity, from behind her drooping mask, "we have had
+three golden months, but I think they are now over."
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked crossly.
+
+"Disharmony"--she waved a white hand--"is in the air. Beauty--the
+arts--are to give place to barbarity. In a world of war, how can we
+taste life delicately? We cannot. Already, my friend, the blight has
+fallen upon you. Your nerves are harsh and jangled. I think"--she
+folded her hands and sank back on her green cushions--"I shall make a
+pilgrimage to China."
+
+"All of which," said Stefan with a short laugh, "is an elaborate way of
+saying you are tired of me."
+
+Her eyebrows raised themselves a fraction.
+
+"You are wonderfully attractive, Stefan; you fascinate me as a panther
+fascinates by its lithe grace, and your mind has the light and shade of
+running brooks."
+
+Stefan looked pleased.
+
+"But," she went on, her lids still drooping, "I must have harmony. In an
+atmosphere of discords I cannot live. Of your present discordant mood,
+my friend, I _am_ tired, and I could not permit myself to continue to
+feel bored. When I am bored, I change my milieu."
+
+"You are no more bored than I am, I assure you," he snapped rudely.
+
+"It is such remarks as those," breathed Felicity, "which make love
+impossible." Her eyes closed.
+
+He pushed back his chair. "Oh, my dear girl, do have some sense of
+humor," he said, fumbling for a cigarette.
+
+Yo San entered with a folded newspaper, and a plate of letters for
+Felicity. She handed one to Stefan. "Monsieur Adolph leave this," she
+said.
+
+Disregarding the paper, Felicity glanced through her mail, and
+abstracted a thick envelope addressed in Constance's sprightly hand.
+Stefan's letter was from Mary; he moved to the end of the balcony and
+tore it open. A banker's draft fell from it.
+
+    "Good-bye, Stefan," he read, "I can't forgive you. What you
+    have done shames me to the earth. You have broken our marriage.
+    It was a sacred thing to me--now it is profaned. I ask
+    nothing from you, and enclose you the balance of your own
+    money. I can make my living and care for the children, whom
+    you never wanted."
+
+The last three words scrawled slantingly down the page; they were
+in large and heavier writing--they looked like a cry. The letter was
+unsigned, and smudged. It might have been written by a dying person.
+The sight of it struck him with unbearable pain. He stood, staring at it
+stupidly.
+
+Felicity called him three times before he noticed her--the last time she
+had to raise her voice quite loudly. He turned then, and saw her sitting
+with unwonted straightness at the table. Her eyes were wide open, and
+fixed.
+
+"I have a letter from Connie." She spoke almost crisply. "Why did you
+not tell me that your wife was enceinte?"
+
+"Why should I tell you?" he asked, staring at her with indifference.
+
+"Had I known it I should not have lived with you. I thought she had let
+you come here alone through phlegmatic British coldness. If she lost
+you, it was her affair. This is different. You have not played fair with
+us."
+
+"Mary was never cold," said Stefan dully, ignoring her accusation.
+
+"That makes it worse." She sat like a ramrod; her face might have been
+ivory; her hands lay folded across the open letter.
+
+"What do you know--or care--about Mary?" he said heavily; "you never
+even liked her."
+
+"Your wife bored me, but I admired her. Women nearly always bore me, but
+I believe in them far more than men, and wish to uphold them."
+
+"You chose a funny way of doing so this time," he said, dropping into
+his chair with a hopeless sigh.
+
+She looked at him with distaste. "True, I mistook the situation.
+Conventions are nothing to me. But I have a spiritual code to which I
+adhere. This affair no longer harmonizes with it. I trust--" Felicity
+relaxed into her cushions--"you will return to your wife immediately."
+
+"Thanks," he said ironically. "But you're too late. Mary knows, and has
+thrown me over."
+
+There was silence for several minutes. Then Stefan rose, picked up the
+draft from the floor, looked at it idly, refolded it into Mary's letter,
+and put both carefully away in his inside pocket. His face was very
+pale.
+
+"Adieu, Felicity," he said quietly. "You are quite right about it." And
+he held out his hand.
+
+"Adieu, Stefan," she answered, waving her hand toward his, but not
+touching it. "I am sorry about your wife."
+
+Turning, he went in through the French window.
+
+Felicity waited until she heard the thud of the apartment door, then
+struck her hands together. Yo San appeared.
+
+"A kirtle, Yo San. I must dance away a wound. Afterwards I will think.
+Be prepared for packing. We may leave Paris. It is time again for work."
+
+Stefan, walking listlessly toward his studio, found the streets filled
+with crowds. Newsboys shrieked; men stood in groups gesticulating; there
+were cries of "Vive la France!" and "A bas l'Allemagne!" Everywhere was
+seething but suppressed excitement. As he passed a great hotel he found
+the street, early as it was, blocked with departing cabs piled high with
+baggage.
+
+"War is declared," he thought, but the knowledge conveyed nothing to his
+senses. He crossed the Seine, and found himself in his own quarter. At
+the corner of the rue des Trois Ermites a hand-organ, surrounded by
+a cosmopolitan crowd of students, was shrilly grinding out the
+Marseillaise. The students sang to it, cheering wildly.
+
+"Who fights for France?" a voice yelled hoarsely, and among cheers a
+score of hands went up.
+
+"Who fights for France?" Stefan stood stock still, then hurried past the
+crowd, and up the stairs to his attic.
+
+There, in the midst of gaping drawers and fast emptying shelves, stood
+Adolph in his shirt sleeves, methodically packing his possessions into
+a hair trunk. He looked up as his friend entered; his mild face was
+alight; tears of excitement stood in his eyes.
+
+"Ah, my infant," he exclaimed, "it has arrived! The Germans are across
+the frontier. I go to fight for France."
+
+"Adolph!" cried Stefan, seizing and wringing his friend's hand. "Thank
+God there's something great to be done in the world after all! I go with
+you."
+
+"But your wife, Stefan?"
+
+Stefan drew out Mary's letter. For the first time his eyes were wet.
+
+"Listen," he said, and translated the brief words.
+
+Hearing them, the good Adolph sat down on his trunk, and quite frankly
+cried. "Ah, quel dommage! quel dommage!" he exclaimed, over and over.
+
+"So you see, mon cher, we go together," said Stefan, and lifted his
+Gladstone bag to a chair. As he fumbled among its forgotten contents, a
+tiny box met his hand. He drew out the signet ring Mary had given him,
+with the winged head.
+
+"Ah, Mary," he whispered with a half sob, "after all, you gave me
+wings!" and he put the ring on. He was only twenty-seven.
+
+      *       *       *       *       *
+
+Later in the day Stefan went to the bank and had Mary's draft endorsed
+back to New York. He enclosed it in a letter to James Farraday, in which
+he asked him to give it to his wife, with his love and blessing, and to
+tell her that he was enlisting with Adolph Jensen in the Foreign Legion.
+
+That night they both went to a vaudeville theatre. It was packed to the
+doors--an opera star was to sing the Marseillaise. Stefan and Adolph
+stood at the back. No one regarded the performance at all till the
+singer appeared, clad in white, the French liberty cap upon her head,
+a great tricolor draped in her arms. Then the house rose in a storm of
+applause; every one in the vast audience was on his feet.
+
+"'_Allons, enfants de la patrie_,'" began the singer in a magnificent
+contralto, her eyes flashing. The house hung breathless.
+
+"'_Aux armes, citoyens!_'" Her hands swept the audience. "'_Marchons!
+Marchons!_'" She pointed at the crowd. Each man felt her fiery glance
+pierce to him--France called--she was holding out her arms to her sons
+to die for her--
+
+"'_Qu'un sang impur abreuve nos sillons!_'"
+
+The singer gathered the great flag to her heart. The tears rolled down
+her cheeks; she kissed it with the passion of a mistress. The house
+broke into wild cheers. Men fell upon each other's shoulders; women
+sobbed. The singer was dumb, but the drums rolled on--they were calling,
+calling. The folds of the flag dazzled Stefan's eyes. He burst into
+tears.
+
+      *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next morning Stefan Byrd and Adolph Jensen were enrolled in the
+Foreign Legion of France.
+
+
+
+
+PART V
+
+THE BUILDER
+
+I
+
+
+It was spring once more. In the garden of the Byrdsnest flowering shrubs
+were in bloom; the beds were studded with daffodils; the scent of lilac
+filled the air. Birds flashed and sang, for it was May, high May, and
+the nests were built. Mary, warm-cheeked in the sun, and wearing a
+broad-brimmed hat and a pair of gardening gloves, was thinning out a
+clump of cornflowers. At one corner of the lawn, shaded by a flowering
+dog-wood, was a small sand-pit, and in this a yellow-haired two-year-old
+boy diligently poured sand through a wire sieve. In a white perambulator
+lay a pink, brown-haired, baby girl, soundly sleeping, a tiny thumb held
+comfortably in her mouth. Now and then Mary straightened from her task
+and tiptoed over to the baby, to see that she was still in the shade, or
+that no flies disturbed her.
+
+Mary's face was not that of a happy woman, but it was the face of one
+who has found peace. It was graver than of old, but lightened whenever
+she looked at her children with an expression of proud tenderness. She
+was dressed in the simplest of white cotton gowns, beneath which the
+lines of her figure showed a little fuller, but strong and graceful
+as ever. She looked very womanly, very desirable, as she bent over the
+baby's carriage.
+
+Lily emerged from the front door, and set a tea-tray upon the low porch
+table. She lingered for a moment, glancing with pride at the verandah
+with its green rocking chairs, hammock, and white creeping-rug.
+
+"My, Mrs. Byrd, don't our new porch look nice, now it's all done?" she
+exclaimed, beaming.
+
+"Yes," said Mary, dropping into a rocking-chair to drink her tea,
+and throwing off her hat to loosen the warm waves of hair about her
+forehead, "isn't it awfully pretty? I don't know how we should have
+managed without it on damp mornings, now that Baby wants to crawl
+all the time. Ah, here is Miss Mason!" she exclaimed, smiling as that
+spinster, in white shirtwaist and alpaca skirt, dismounted from a smart
+bicycle at the gate.
+
+"Any letters, Sparrow?"
+
+Miss Mason, extracting several parcels from her carrier, flopped
+gratefully into a rocker, and drew off her gloves.
+
+"One or two," she said. "Here, Lily; here's your marmalade, and here's
+the soap, and a letter for you. There are a few bills, Mary, and a
+couple of notes--" she passed them across--"and here's an afternoon
+paper one of the Haven youngsters handed me as I passed him on the road.
+He called out something about another atrocity. I haven't looked at it.
+I hate to open the things these days."
+
+"I know," nodded Mary, busy with her letters, "so do I. This is from Mr.
+Gunther, from California. He's been there all the winter, you know.
+Oh, how nice; he's coming back! Says we are to expect a visit from
+him soon," Mary exclaimed, with a pleased smile. "Here's a line from
+Constance," she went on. "Everything is doing splendidly in her garden,
+she says. She wants us all to go up in June, before she begins her auto
+speaking trip. Don't you think it would be nice!"
+
+"Perfectly elegant," said the Sparrow. "I'm glad she's taking a little
+rest. I thought she looked real tired this spring."
+
+"She works so frightfully hard."
+
+"Land sakes, work agrees with _you_, Mary! You look simply great.
+If your new book does as well as the old one I suppose porches won't
+satisfy you--you'll be wanting to build an ell on the house?"
+
+"That's just what I do want," said Mary, smiling. "I want to have a
+spare room, and proper place for the babies. We're awfully crowded. Did
+I tell you Mr. Farraday had some lovely plans that he had made years
+ago, for a wing?"
+
+"You don't say!"
+
+"Yes, but I'm afraid we'll have to wait another year for that, till I
+can increase my short story output."
+
+"My, it seems to me you write them like a streak."
+
+Mary shook her head. "No, after Baby is weaned I expect to work faster,
+and ever so much better."
+
+"Well, if you do any better than you are doing, Frances Hodgson Burnett
+won't be in it; that's all I can say."
+
+"Oh, Sparrow!" smiled Mary, "she writes real grown-up novels, too, and I
+can only do silly little children's things."
+
+"They're not silly, Mary Byrd, I can tell you that," sniffed Miss Mason,
+shaking out her paper.
+
+"My gracious!" She turned a shocked face to Mary. "What do you suppose
+those Germans have done now? Sunk the Lusitania!"
+
+"The Lusitania?" exclaimed Mary, incredulously.
+
+"Yes, my dear; torpedoed her without warning. My, ain't that terrible?
+It says they hope most of the passengers are saved--but they don't know
+yet."
+
+"Let me see!" Mary bent over her shoulder. "The Lusitania gone!" she
+whispered, awed.
+
+"No, no!" exclaimed the Sparrow suddenly, hurrying off the porch. "Ellie
+not pour sand over his head! No, naughty!"
+
+Mary sank into her chair with the paper. There was the staring black
+headline, but she could hardly believe it. The Lusitania gone? The great
+ship she knew so well, on which she and Stefan had met, gone! Lying in
+the ooze, with fish darting above the decks where she had walked with
+Stefan. Those hundreds of cabins a labyrinth for fish to lose their way
+in--all rotting in the black sea currents. The possible loss of life had
+not yet come home to her. It was inconceivable that there would not have
+been ample time for every one to escape. But the ship, the great English
+ship! So swift--so proud!
+
+Dropping the paper, she walked slowly across the garden and the lane,
+and found her way to a little seat she had made on the side of the bluff
+overlooking the water. Here, her back to a tree trunk, she sat immobile,
+trying to still the turmoil of memories that rose within her.
+
+The Lusitania gone!
+
+It seemed like the breaking of the last link that bound her to the past.
+All the belief, all the wonder of that time were already gone, and now
+the ship, her loveship, was gone, too, lost forever to the sight of men.
+
+She saw again its crowded decks, saw the lithe, picturesque figure of
+the young artist with the eager face bending over her--
+
+"Won't you be perfectly kind, and come for a walk?"
+
+She saw the saloon on her engagement night when she sang at the ship's
+concert. What were the last words she had sung?
+
+    "Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty--
+    Love's a stuff will not endure."
+
+Alas, how unconsciously prophetic she had been. Nothing had endured,
+neither love, nor faith, nor the great ship of their pilgrimage herself.
+
+Other memories crowded. Their honeymoon at Shadeham, the sweet early
+days of their studio life, her glorious pride in his great painting
+of love exalted.... The night of Constance's party, when, after her
+singing, her husband had left his place by Miss Berber and crossed the
+room so eagerly to her side. Their first weeks at the Byrdsnest--how
+happy they had been then, and how worshipfully he had looked at her the
+morning their son was born. All gone. She had another baby now, but he
+had never seen it--never would see it, she supposed. Her memory traveled
+on, flitting over the dark places and lingering at every sunny peak of
+their marriage journey. Their week in Vermont! How they had skated and
+danced together; how much he seemed to love her then! Even the day he
+sailed for France he seemed to care for her. "Why are we parting?"
+he had cried, kissing her. Yes, even then their marriage, for all the
+clouds upon it, had seemed real--she had never doubted in her inmost
+heart that they were each other's.
+
+With a stab of the old agony, Mary remembered the day she got his letter
+admitting his relations with Felicity. The unbelievable breakdown of her
+whole life! His easy, lightly made excuses. He, in whose arms she had
+lain a hundred times, with whom she had first learnt the sacrament of
+love, had given himself to another woman, had given all that most close
+and sacred intimacy of love, and had written, "I cannot say with truth
+that I regret it." How she had lived through the reading of those words
+she did not know. Grief does not kill, or surely she would have died
+that hour. Her own strength, and the miracle of life within her, alone
+stayed her longing for death. It was ten months ago; she had lived down
+much since then, had schooled herself daily to forgetfulness; yet now
+again the unutterable pang swept over her--the desolation of loss, and
+the incapacity to believe that such loss could be.
+
+She rebelled against the needlessness of it all now, as she had
+done then, in those bitter days before her little Rosamond came to
+half-assuage her pain.
+
+Well, he had redeemed himself in a way. The day James Farraday came to
+tell her that Stefan had enlisted, some part of her load was eased. The
+father of her children was not all ignoble.
+
+Mary mused on. How would it end? Would Stefan live? Should she--could
+she--ever see him again? She thanked God he was there, serving the
+country he loved. "The only thing he ever really loved, perhaps," she
+thought. She supposed he would be killed--all that genius lost like
+so much more of value that the world was scrapping to-day--and then it
+would all be quite gone--
+
+Through the trees dropped the insistent sound of a baby's cry to its
+mother. She rose; the heavy clouds of memory fell away. The past was
+gone; she lived for the future, and the future was in her children.
+
+      *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next morning Mary had just bathed the baby, and was settling her in
+her carriage, when the Sparrow, who, seated on the porch with Elliston,
+was engaged in cutting war maps from the papers and pasting them in an
+enormous scrapbook, gave a warning cough.
+
+"Here comes Mr. McEwan," she whispered, in the hushed voice reserved by
+her simple type for allusions to the afflicted.
+
+"Oh, poor dear," said Mary, hurrying across the lawn to meet him. She
+felt more than ever sympathetic toward him, for Mac's wife had died in
+a New Hampshire sanitarium only a few weeks before, and all his hopes
+of mending her poor broken spirit were at an end. Reaching the gate, she
+gave an involuntary cry.
+
+McEwan was stumbling toward her almost like a drunken man. His face was
+red, his eyes bloodshot; a morning paper trailed loosely from his hand.
+
+"Mary," he cried, "I came back from the station to see ye--hae ye heard,
+my girl?"
+
+"Wallace!" she exclaimed, frightened, "what is it? What has happened?"
+She led him to a seat on the porch; he sank into it unresisting. Miss
+Mason pushed away her scrapbook, white-faced.
+
+"The Lusitania! They were na' saved, Mary. There's o'er a thousand
+gone. O'er a hundred Americans--hundreds of women and little bairns,
+Mary--like yours--Canadian mithers and bairns going to be near their
+brave lads--babies, Mary." And the big fellow dropped his rough head on
+his arms and sobbed like a child.
+
+"Oh, Wallace; oh, Wallace!" whispered Mary, fairly wringing her hands;
+"it can't be! Over a thousand lost?"
+
+"Aye," he cried suddenly, bringing his heavy fist down with a crash on
+the wicker table, "they drooned them like rats--God damn their bloody
+souls."
+
+His face, crimson with rage and pity, worked uncontrollably. Mary
+covered her eyes with her hands. The Sparrow sat petrified. The little
+Elliston, terrified by their strange aspects, burst into loud wails.
+
+"There, darling; there, mother's boy," crooned Mary soothingly, pressing
+her wet cheek to his.
+
+"Little bairns like that, Mary," McEwan repeated brokenly. Mary gathered
+the child close into her arms. They sat in stunned horror.
+
+"Weel," said McEwan at last, more quietly. "I'll be going o'er to
+enlist. I would ha' gone long sine, but that me poor girl would ha'
+thocht I'd desairted her. She doesna' need me now, and there's eno' left
+for the lad. Aye, this is me call. I was ay a slow man to wrath, Mary,
+but now if I can but kill one German before I die--" His great fist
+clenched again on the table.
+
+"Oh, don't, dear man, don't," whispered Mary, with trembling lips,
+laying her cool hand over his. "You're right; you must go. But don't
+feel so terribly."
+
+His grip relaxed; his big hand lay under hers quietly.
+
+"I could envy you, Wallace, being able to go. It's hard for us who have
+to stay here, just waiting. My poor sister has lost her husband already,
+and I don't know whether mine is alive or dead. And now you're going!
+Elliston's pet uncle!" She smiled at him affectionately through her
+tears.
+
+"I'll write you if I hear aught about the Foreign Legion, Mary," he
+said, under his breath.
+
+She pressed his hand in gratitude. "When shall you go?" she asked.
+
+"By the next boat."
+
+"Go by the American Line."
+
+His jaw set grimly. "Aye, I will. They shall no torpedo me till I've had
+ae shot at them!"
+
+Mary rose. "Now, Wallace, you are to stay and lunch with us. You must
+let us make much of the latest family hero while we have him. Eh,
+Sparrow?"
+
+"Yes," nodded Miss Mason emphatically, "I've hated the British ever
+since the Revolution--I and my parents and my grandparents--but I guess
+I'm with them, and those that fight for them, from now on."
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+On the Monday following the sinking of the Lusitania, James Farraday
+received a letter from the American Hospital in Paris, written in French
+in a shaky hand, and signed Adolph Jensen.
+
+New York was still strained and breathless from Saturday's horror. Men
+sat idle in their offices reading edition after edition of the papers,
+rage mounting in their hearts. Flags were at half mast. Little work was
+being done anywhere save at the newspaper offices, which were keyed to
+the highest pitch. Farraday's office was hushed. Those members of his
+staff who were responsible for The Child at Home--largely women, all
+picked for their knowledge of child life--were the worst demoralized.
+How think of children's play-time stories when those little bodies were
+being brought into Queenstown harbor? Farraday himself, the efficient,
+the concentrated, sat absent-mindedly reading the papers, or drumming
+a slow, ceaseless tap with his fingers upon the desk. The general gloom
+was enhanced by their knowledge that Mac, their dear absurd Mac, was
+going. But they were all proud of him.
+
+By two o'clock Farraday had read all the news twice over, and Adolph's
+letter three times.
+
+Telephoning for his car to meet him, he left the office and caught an
+early afternoon train home. He drove straight to the Byrdsnest and found
+Mary alone in the sitting room.
+
+She rose swiftly and pressed his hand:
+
+"Oh, my dear friend," she murmured, "isn't it terrible?"
+
+He nodded. "Sit down, Mary, my dear girl." He spoke very quietly,
+unconsciously calling her by name for the first time. "I have something
+to tell you."
+
+She turned white.
+
+"No," he said quickly, "he isn't dead."
+
+She sat down, trembling.
+
+"I have a letter from Adolph Jensen. They are both wounded, and in the
+American Hospital in Paris. The Foreign Legion has suffered heavily.
+Jensen is convalescent, and returns to the front. He was beside your
+husband in the trench. It was a shell. Byrd was hit in the back. My dear
+child--" he stopped for a moment. "Mary--"
+
+"Go on," she whispered through stiff lips.
+
+"He is paralyzed, my dear, from the hips down."
+
+She stared at him.
+
+"Oh, no, James--oh, no, James--oh, no!" she whispered, over and over.
+
+"Yes, my poor child. He is quite convalescent, and going about the wards
+in a wheeled chair. But he will never be able to walk again."
+
+"Why," said Mary, wonderingly, "he never used to be still--he always
+ran, and skipped, like a child." Her breast heaved. "He always ran,
+James--" she began to cry--the tears rolled down her cheeks--she ran
+quickly out of the room, sobbing.
+
+James waited in silence, smoking a pipe, his face set in lines of
+inexpressible sadness. In half an hour she returned. Her eyes were
+swollen, but she was calm again.
+
+"I'm sorry to have kept you waiting so long," she said, with a pitiful
+attempt at a smile. "Please read me the letter, will you?"
+
+James read the French text. Stefan had been so brave in the trenches,
+always kept up a good heart. He used to sing to the others. A shell had
+struck the trench; they were nearly all killed or wounded. Stefan knew
+he would walk no more, but he was still so brave, with a smile for every
+one. He was drawing, too, wonderful pencil drawings of the front. Adolph
+thought they were much more wonderful than anything he had ever done.
+All the nurses and wounded asked for them. Adolph would be going back in
+a month. He ventured to ask Mr. Farraday to lay the affair before Mrs.
+Byrd. Stefan had no money, and no one to take care of him when he left
+the hospital. He, Adolph, would do all that was possible, but he was
+sure that his friend should go home. Stefan often, very often, spoke of
+his wife to Adolph. He wore a ring of hers. Would Mr. Farraday use his
+good offices?
+
+James folded the letter and looked at Mary.
+
+"I must go and fetch him," she said simply.
+
+"Mrs. Byrd--Mary--I want you to let me go. Mac has offered to do it
+before enlisting, but I don't think your husband cared for Mac, and he
+always liked me. It wouldn't be fair to the baby for you to go, and it
+would be very painful for you. But it will give me real happiness--the
+first thing I've been able to do in this awful business."
+
+"Oh, no, James, I couldn't let you. Your work--it is too much
+altogether."
+
+"The office can manage without me for three weeks. I want you to let me
+do this for you both--it's such a small thing."
+
+"I feel I ought to go, James," she reiterated, "I ought to be there."
+
+"You can't take the baby--and she mustn't suffer," he urged. "There will
+be any amount of red tape. You really must let me go."
+
+They discussed it for some time, and at last she agreed, for the sake of
+the small Rosamond. She began to see, too, that there would be much
+for her to do at this end. With her racial habit of being coolest in an
+emergency, Mary found herself mentally reorganizing the regime of the
+Byrdsnest, and rapidly reviewing one possible means after another of
+ensuring Stefan's comfort. She talked over her plans with James, and
+before he left that afternoon their arrangements were made. On one point
+he was obliged to give way. Stefan's money, which he had returned to
+Mary before enlisting, was still intact, and she insisted it should be
+used for the expenses of the double journey. Enough would be left to
+carry out her plans at this end, and Stefan would know that he was in no
+sense an object of charity.
+
+James, anxious as he was to help his friends in all ways, had to admit
+that she was right. He was infinitely relieved that the necessity for
+practical action had so completely steadied her. He knew now that she
+would be almost too busy in the intervening weeks for distress.
+
+The next day James engaged his passage, sent a long cable to Adolph, and
+performed prodigies of work at the office. By means of some wire-pulling
+he and Mac succeeded in securing a cabin together on the next American
+liner out.
+
+Meanwhile, Mary began her campaign. At breakfast she expounded her plans
+to Miss Mason, who had received the news overnight.
+
+"You see, Sparrow," she said, "we don't know how much quiet he will
+need, but we couldn't give him _any_ in this little cottage, with the
+babies. So I shall fit up the studio--a big room for him, a small one
+for the nurse, and a bath. The nurse will be the hardest part, for I'm
+sure he would rather have a man. The terrible helplessness"--her voice
+faltered for a second--"would humiliate him before a woman. But it must
+be the right man, Sparrow, some one he can like--who won't jar him--and
+some one we can afford to keep permanently. I've been thinking about it
+all night and, do you know, I have an idea. Do you remember my telling
+you about Adolph Jensen's brother?"
+
+"The old one, who failed over here?"
+
+"Yes. Stefan helped him, you know, and I'm sure he was awfully grateful.
+When the Berber shop changed hands in January, I wondered what would
+become of him; I believe Miss Berber was only using him out of kindness.
+It seems to me he might be just the person, if we could find him."
+
+"You're a smart girl, Mary, and as plucky as they make 'em," nodded the
+spinster.
+
+"Oh, Sparrow, when I think of his helplessness! He, who always wanted
+wings!" Mary half choked.
+
+"Now," said Miss Mason, rising briskly, "we've got to act, not think.
+Come along, child, and let's go over to the barn." Gratefully Mary
+followed her.
+
+Enquiries at the now cheapened and popularized Berber studio elicited
+Jensen's old address, and Mary drove there in a taxi, only to find that
+he had moved to an even poorer quarter of the city. She discovered his
+lodgings at last, in a slum on the lower east side. He was out, looking
+for a job, the landlady thought, but Mary left a note for him, with a
+bill inside it, asking him to come out to Crab's Bay the next morning.
+She hurried back to Rosamond, and found that the excellent Sparrow had
+already held lively conferences with the village builders and plumbers.
+
+"I told 'em they'd get a bonus for finishing the job in three weeks, and
+I guess I got the whole outfit on the jump," said she with satisfaction.
+"Though the dear Lord knows," she added, "if the plumbers get through on
+schedule it'll be the first time in history."
+
+When Henrik Jensen arrived next day Mary took an instant liking to him.
+He was shabbier and more hopeless than ever, but his eyes were kind, his
+mouth gentle, and when she spoke of Stefan his face lighted up.
+
+She told him the story of the two friends, of his brother's wound and
+Stefan's crippling, and saw that his eyes filled with tears.
+
+"He was wonderful to me, Mrs. Byrd, he gave me a chance. I was making
+good, too, till Miss Berber left and the whole scheme fell to pieces.
+I'm glad Adolph is with him; it was very gracious of you to let me hear
+about it."
+
+"Are you very busy now, Mr. Jensen?"
+
+He smiled hopelessly.
+
+"Yes, very busy--looking for work. I'm down and out, Mrs. Byrd."
+
+She unfolded her scheme to him. Stefan would need some one near him
+night and day. He would be miserable with a servant; he would--she
+knew--feel his helplessness more keenly in the presence of a woman. She
+herself could help, but she had her work, and the children. Mr. Jensen
+would be one of the family. She could offer him a home, and a salary
+which she hoped would be sufficient for his needs--
+
+"I have no needs, Mrs. Byrd," he interrupted at this point, his eyes
+shining with eagerness. "Enough clothes for decency, that's all. If
+I could be of some use to your husband, to my friend and Adolph's, I
+should ask no more of life. I'm a hopeless failure, ma'am, and getting
+old--you don't know what it is like to feel utterly useless."
+
+Mary listened to his gentle voice and watched his fine hands--hands used
+to appraising delicate, beautiful things. The longer they talked, the
+more certain she felt that here was the ideal person, one bound to her
+husband by ties of gratitude, and whose ministrations could not possibly
+offend him.
+
+She rang up Mrs. Farraday, put the case to her, and obtained her
+offer of a room to house Mr. Jensen while the repairs were making. She
+arranged with him to return next day with his belongings, and advanced
+a part of his salary for immediate expenses. Mary wanted him to come to
+her at once, both out of sympathy for his wretched circumstances, and
+because she wished thoroughly to know him before Stefan's return.
+
+Luckily, the Sparrow took to Jensen at once, so there was nothing to
+fear on that score. For the Sparrow was now a permanent part of Mary's
+life. She had a small independent income, but no home--her widowed
+sister having gone west to live with a daughter--and she looked upon
+herself as the appointed guardian of the Byrdsnest. Not only did she
+relieve Mary of the housekeeping, and help Lily with the household
+tasks, which she adored, but she had practically taken the place of
+nurse to the children, leaving Mary hours of freedom for her work which
+would otherwise have been unattainable.
+
+The competency of the two friends achieved the impossible in the
+next few weeks, as it had done on the memorable first day of Mary's
+housekeeping. Mr. Jensen, with his trained taste, was invaluable for
+shopping expeditions, going back and forth to the city with catalogues,
+samples, and orders.
+
+In a little over three weeks Stefan's old studio had been transformed
+into a bed-sitting-room, with every comfort that an invalid could
+desire, and the further end of it had been partitioned into a bathroom
+and a small bedroom for Mr. Jensen, with a separate outside entrance.
+
+"Oh, if only I had the new wing," sighed Mary.
+
+"This will be even quieter for him, Mrs. Byrd, and the chair can be
+wheeled so quickly to the house," replied Mr. Jensen.
+
+The back window of Mary's sitting room had been enlarged to glass doors,
+and from these a concrete path ran to the studio entrance. Mary planned
+to make it a covered way after the summer.
+
+The day the wheeled chair arrived it was hard for her to keep back the
+tears. It was a beautifully made thing of springs, cushions, and rubber
+tires. It could be pushed, or hand-propelled by the occupant. It could
+be lowered, heightened, or tilted. It was all that a chair could be--but
+how to picture Stefan in it, he of the lithe steps and quick, agile
+movements, the sudden turns, and the swift, almost running walk? Her
+heart trembled with pity at the thought.
+
+They had already received an "all well" cable from Paris, and three
+weeks after he had sailed, James telegraphed that they were starting. He
+had waited for the American line--he would have been gone a month.
+
+As the day of landing approached, Mary became intensely nervous. She
+decided not to meet the boat, and sent James a wireless to that effect.
+She could not see Stefan first among all those crowds; her instinct told
+her that he, too, would not wish it.
+
+The ship docked on Saturday. The day before, the last touches had been
+put to Stefan's quarters. They were as perfect as care and taste could
+make them. Early on Saturday morning Mr. Jensen started for the city,
+carrying a big bunch of roses--Mary's welcome to her husband. While the
+Sparrow flew about the house gilding the lily of cleanliness, Mary, with
+Elliston at her skirts, picked the flowers destined for Stefan's room.
+These she arranged in every available vase--the studio sang with
+them. Every now and then she would think of some trifle to beautify it
+further--a drawing from her sitting room--her oldest pewter plate for
+another ashtray--a pine pillow from her bedroom. Elliston's fat legs
+became so tired with ceaselessly trotting back and forth behind her that
+he began to cry with fatigue, and was put to bed for his nap. Rosamond
+waked, demanding dinner and amusement.
+
+The endless morning began to pass, and all this while Mary had not
+thought!
+
+At lunch time James telephoned. They would be out by three o'clock.
+Stefan had stood the journey well, was delighted with the roses, and to
+see Jensen. He was wonderfully brave and cheerful.
+
+Mary was trembling as she hung up the receiver. He was here, he was on
+the way; and still, she had not thought!
+
+Both children asleep, the last conceivable preparation made, Mary
+settled herself on the porch at last, to face what was coming.
+
+The Sparrow peeped out at her.
+
+"I guess you'd as soon be left alone, my dear," she said, tactfully.
+
+"Yes, please, Sparrow," Mary replied, with a nervous smile. The little
+spinster slipped away.
+
+What did she feel for Stefan? Mary wondered. Pity, deep pity? Yes. But
+that she would feel for any wounded soldier. Admiration for his courage?
+That, too, any one of the war's million heroes could call forth.
+Determination to do her full duty by this stricken member of her family?
+Of course, she would have done that for any relative. Love? No. Mary
+felt no love for Stefan. That had died, nearly a year ago, died in agony
+and humiliation. She could not feel that her lover, her husband, was
+returning to her. She waited only for a wounded man to whom she owed the
+duty of all kindness.
+
+Suddenly, her heart shook with fear. What if she were unable to show
+him more than pity, more than kindness? What if he, stricken, helpless,
+should feel her lack of warmth, and tenderness, should feel himself a
+stranger here in this his only refuge? Oh, no, no! She must do better
+than that. She must act a part. He must feel himself cared for, wanted.
+Surely he, who had lost everything, could ask so much for old love's
+sake? ... But if she could not give it? Terror assailed her, the terror
+of giving pain; for she knew that of all women she was least capable of
+insincerity. "I don't know how to act," she cried to herself, pitifully.
+
+A car honked in the lane. They were here. She jumped up and ran to the
+gate, wheeling the waiting chair outside it. Farraday's big car rounded
+the bend--three men sat in the tonneau. Seeing them, Mary ran suddenly
+back inside the gate; her eyes fell, she dared not look.
+
+The car had stopped. Through half-raised lids she saw James alight. The
+chauffeur ran to the chair. Jensen stood up in the car, and some one
+was lifted from it. The chair wheeled about and came toward her. It was
+through the gate--it was only a yard away.
+
+"Mary," said a voice. She looked up.
+
+There was the well-known face, strangely young, the eyes large and
+shadowed. There was his smile, eager, and very anxious now. There were
+his hands, those finely nervous hands. They lay on a rug, beneath which
+were the once swift limbs that could never move again. He was all hers
+now. His wings were broken, and, broken, he was returning to the nest.
+
+"Mary!"
+
+She made one step forward. Stooping, she gathered his head to her
+breast, that breast where, loverlike, it had lain a hundred times. Her
+arms held him close, her tears ran down upon his hair.
+
+"My boy!" she cried.
+
+Here was no lover, no husband to be forgiven. Cradled upon her heart
+there lay only her first, her most wayward, and her best loved child.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Mary never told Stefan of those nightmare moments before his arrival.
+From the instant that her deepest passion, the maternal, had answered to
+his need, she knew neither doubt nor unhappiness.
+
+She settled down to the task of creating by her labor and love a home
+where her three dependents and her three faithful helpmates could find
+the maximum of happiness and peace.
+
+The life of the Byrdsnest centered about Stefan; every one thought first
+of him and his needs. Next in order of consideration came Ellie and
+little Rosamond. Then Lily had to be remembered. She must not be
+overworked; she must take enough time off. Henrik, too, must not be
+over-conscientious. He must allow Mary to relieve him often enough.
+As for the Sparrow, she must not wear herself out flying in three
+directions at once. She must not tire her eyes learning typewriting. But
+at this point Mary's commands were apt to be met with contempt.
+
+"Now, Mary Byrd," the Sparrow would chirp truculently, "you 'tend to
+your business, and let me 'tend to mine. Anybody would think that we
+were all to save ourselves in this house but you. As for my typing, it's
+funny if I can't save you something on those miserable stenographers'
+bills."
+
+Mary was wonderfully happy in these days--happier in a sense than she
+had ever been, for she had found, beyond all question, the full work for
+hands to do. And to her love for her children there was added not merely
+her maternal tenderness for Stefan, but a deep and growing admiration.
+
+For Stefan was changed not only in the body, but in the spirit.
+Everybody remarked it. The fierce fires of war seemed to have burnt away
+his old confident egotism. In giving himself to France he had found more
+than he had lost; for, by a strange paradox, in the midst of death he
+had found belief in life.
+
+"Mary, my beautiful," he said to her one day in September, as he worked
+at an adjustable drawing board which swung across his knees, "did you
+ever wonder why all my old pictures used to be of rapid movement, nearly
+all of running or flying?"
+
+"Yes, dearest, I used to try often to think out the significance of it."
+
+They were in the studio. Mary had just dropped her pencil after a couple
+of hours' work on a new serial she was writing. She often worked now in
+Stefan's room. He was busy with a series of drawings of the war. He had
+tried different media--pastel, ink, pencils, and chalks--to see which
+were the easiest for sedentary work.
+
+"It's good-bye to oils," he had said, "I couldn't paint a foot from the
+canvas."
+
+Now he was using a mixture of chalk and charcoal, and was in the act
+of finishing the sixth drawing of his series. The big doors of the barn
+were opened wide to the sunny lawn, gay with a riot of multicolored
+dahlias.
+
+"It's odd," said Stefan, pushing away his board and turning the wheels
+of his chair so that he faced the brilliant stillness of the garden,
+"but I seem never to have understood my work till now. I used always
+to paint flight partly because it was beautiful in itself but also, I
+think, with some hazy notion that swift creatures could always escape
+from the ugliness of life."
+
+Mary came and sat by him, taking his hand.
+
+"It seems to me," he went on, "that I spent my life flying from what I
+thought was ugly. I always refused to face realities, Mary, unless
+they were pleasant. I fled even from the great reality of our marriage
+because it meant responsibilities and monotony, and they seemed ugly
+things to me. And now, Mary," he smiled, "now that I can never shoulder
+responsibilities again, and am condemned to lifelong monotony"--she
+pressed his hand--"neither seems ugly any more. The truth is, I thought
+I fled to get away from things, and it was really to get away from
+myself. Now that I've seen such horrors, such awful suffering, and such
+unbelievable sacrifice, I have something to think about so much more
+real than my vain, egotistical self. I know what my work is now,
+something much better than just creating beauty. I gave my body to
+France--that was nothing. But now I have to give her my soul--I have to
+try and make it a voice to tell the world a little of what she has done.
+Am I too vain, dearest, in thinking that these really say something
+big?"
+
+He nodded toward his first five drawings, which hung in a row on the
+wall.
+
+"Oh, Stefan, you know what I think of them," she said, her eyes shining.
+
+"Would you mind pinning up the new one, Mary, so that we can see them
+all together?"
+
+She rose and, unfastening the drawing from its board, pinned it beside
+the others. Then she turned his chair to face them, and they both looked
+silently at the pictures.
+
+They were drawings of the French lines, and the peasant life behind
+them. Dead soldiers, old women by a grave, young mothers following the
+plow--men tense, just before action. The subjects were already familiar
+enough through the work of war correspondents and photographers, but
+the treatment was that of a great artist. The soul of a nation was
+there--which is always so much greater than the soul of an individual.
+The drawings were not of men and women, but of one of the world's
+greatest races at the moment of its transfiguration.
+
+For the twentieth time Mary's eyes moistened as she looked at them.
+
+The shadows began to lengthen. Shouts came from the slope, and presently
+Ellie's sturdy form appeared through the trees, followed by the somewhat
+disheveled Sparrow carrying Rosamond, who was smiting her shoulder and
+crowing loudly.
+
+"I'll come and help you in a few minutes, Sparrow," Mary called, as the
+procession crossed the lawn, her face beaming love upon it.
+
+"Can you spare the few minutes, dear?" Stefan asked, watching her.
+
+"Yes, indeed, they won't need me yet."
+
+The light was quite golden now; the dahlias seemed on fire under it.
+
+"Mary," said Stefan, "I've been thinking a lot about you lately."
+
+"Have you, dear?"
+
+"Yes, I never tried to understand you in the old days. I had never met
+your sort of woman before, and didn't trouble to think about you except
+as a beautiful being to love. I was too busy thinking about myself,"
+he smiled. "I wondered, without understanding it, where you got your
+strength, why everything you touched seemed to turn to order and
+helpfulness under your hands. I think now it is because you are always
+so true to life--to the things life really means. Every one always
+approves and upholds you, because in you the race itself is expressed,
+not merely one of its sports, as with me."
+
+She looked a little puzzled. "Do you mean, dearest, because I have
+children?"
+
+"No, Beautiful, any one can do that. I mean because you have in perfect
+balance and control all the qualities that should be passed on to
+children, if the race is to be happy. You are so divinely normal, Mary,
+that's what it is, and yet you are not dull."
+
+"Oh, I'm afraid I am," smiled Mary, "rather a bromide, in fact."
+
+He shook his head, with his old brilliant smile.
+
+"No, dearest, nobody as beautiful and as vital as you can be dull to any
+one who is not out of tune with life. I used to be that, so I'm afraid I
+thought you so, now and then."
+
+"I know you did," she laughed, "and I thought you fearfully erratic."
+
+He laughed back. They had both passed the stage in which the truth has
+power to hurt.
+
+"I remember Mr. Gunther talking to me a little as you have been doing,"
+she recalled, "when he came to model me. I don't quite understand either
+of you. I think you're just foolishly prejudiced in my favor because you
+admire me."
+
+"What about the Farradays, and Constance, and the Sparrow and Lily and
+Henrik and McEwan and the Havens and Madame Corriani and--"
+
+"Oh, stop!" she laughed, covering his mouth with her hand.
+
+"And even in Paris," he concluded, holding the hand, "Adolph, and--yes,
+and Felicity Berber. Are they all 'prejudiced in your favor'?"
+
+"Why do you include the last named?" she asked, rather low. It was the
+first time Felicity had been spoken of between them.
+
+"She threw me over, Mary, the hour she discovered how it was with you,"
+he said quietly.
+
+"That was rather decent of her. I'm glad you told me that," she answered
+after a pause.
+
+"All this brings me to what I really want to say," he continued, still
+holding her hand in his. "You are so alive, you _are_ life; and yet
+you're chained to a half-dead man."
+
+"Oh, don't, dearest," she whispered, deeply distressed.
+
+"Yes, let me finish. I shan't last very long, my dear--two or three
+years, perhaps--long enough to say what I must about France. I want you
+to go on living to the full. I want you to marry again, Mary, and have
+more beautiful, strong children."
+
+"Oh, darling, don't! Don't speak of such things," she begged, her lips
+trembling.
+
+"I've finished, Beautiful. That's all I wanted to say. Just for you to
+remember," he smiled.
+
+Her arms went round him. "You're bad," she whispered, "I shan't
+remember."
+
+"Here comes Henrik," he replied. "Run in to your babies."
+
+He watched her swinging steps as, after a farewell kiss, she sped down
+the little path.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+Stefan's moods were not always calm. He had his hours of fierce
+rebellion, when he felt he could not endure another moment with his
+deadened carcass; when, without life, it seemed so much better to
+die. He had days of passionate longing for the world, for love, for
+everything he had lost. Mary fell into the habit of borrowing the
+Farradays' car when she saw such a mood approaching, and sending Stefan
+for long drives alone. The rushing flight seldom failed to carry him
+beyond the reach of his black mood. Returning, he would plunge into
+work, and the next day would find him calm and smiling once again.
+He suffered much pain from his back, but this he bore with admirable
+patience.
+
+"It's nothing," he would say, "compared to the black devils."
+
+Stefan's courage was enormously fortified by the success of his
+drawings, which created little less than a sensation. Reproductions of
+them appeared for some weeks in The Household Review, and were recopied
+everywhere. The originals were exhibited by Constantine in November.
+
+    "Here," wrote one of the most distinguished critics in New
+    York, himself a painter of repute, "we have work which outranks
+    even Mr. Byrd's celebrated Danae, and in my judgment
+    far surpasses any of the artist's other achievements. I have
+    watched the development of this young American genius with
+    the keenest interest. I placed him in the first rank as a technichian,
+    but his work--with the exception of the Danae--appeared
+    to me to lack substance and insight. It was brilliant,
+    but too spectacular. Even his Danae, though on a surprising
+    inspirational plane, had a quality high rather than profound,
+    I doubted if Mr. Byrd had the stuff of which great art is made,
+    but after seeing his war drawings, I confess myself mistaken.
+    If I were to sum up my impression of them I should say that
+    on the battlefield Mr. Byrd has discovered the one thing his
+    work lacked--soul."
+
+Stefan read this eulogy with a humorous grin.
+
+"I expect the fellow's right," he said. "I don't think my soul was
+as strong on wings in the old days as my brush was. Without joking,
+though," he went on, suddenly grave, "I don't know if there is such a
+thing as a soul, but if there is, such splendid ones were being spilled
+out there that I think, perhaps, Mary, I may have picked a bit of one
+up."
+
+"Dearest," said Mary, with a kiss of comprehension, "I'm so proud of
+you. You are great, a great artist, and a great spirit." And she kissed
+him again, her eyes shining.
+
+If the Byrdsnest was proud in November of its distinguished head,
+it positively bristled with importance in December, when Constantine
+telephoned that the trustees of the Metropolitan were negotiating for
+Stefan's whole series. This possibility had already been spoken of
+in the press, though the family had not dared hope too much from the
+suggestion.
+
+The Museum bought the drawings, and Stefan took his place as one of
+America's great artists.
+
+"Mary, I'm so glad I can be useful again, as well as ornamental," he
+grinned, presenting to her with a flourish a delightfully substantial
+cheque.
+
+His courage, and his happiness in his success, were an increasing joy to
+Mary. She blossomed in her pride of him, and the old glowing look came
+back to her face.
+
+Only one thing--besides her anxiety for his health--troubled her. With
+all his tenderness to her, and his renewed love, he still remained a
+stranger to his children. He seemed proud of their healthy beauty, and
+glad of Mary's happiness in them; but their nearness bored and tired
+him, and they, quick to perceive this, became hopelessly unresponsive in
+his presence. Ellie would back solemnly away from the approaching chair,
+and Rosamond would hang mute upon her mother's shoulder. "It's strange,"
+Mary said to the Sparrow, who was quick to notice any failure to
+appreciate her adored charges; "they're his own, and yet he hasn't the
+key to them. I suppose it's because he's a genius, and too far apart
+from ordinary people to understand just little human babies."
+
+The thought stirred faintly the memory of her old wound.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+That Christmas, for the first time in its history, the Byrdsnest held
+high festival. House and studio were decorated, and in the afternoon
+there was a Christmas-tree party for all the old friends and their
+children.
+
+The dining-room had been closed since the night before in order to
+facilitate Santa Clans' midnight spiritings.
+
+When all the guests had arrived, and Stefan had been wheeled in from the
+studio, the mysterious door was at last thrown open, revealing the tree
+in all its glory, rooted in a floor of glittering snow, with its topmost
+star scraping the ceiling.
+
+With shouts the older children surrounded it; Ellie followed more
+slowly, awed by such splendor; and Rosamond crept after, drawn
+irresistibly by a hundred glittering lures.
+
+Crawling from guest to guest, her tiny hands clutching toys as big as
+herself, her dark eyes brilliant, her small red mouth emitting coos of
+rapture, she enchanted the men, and drew positive tears of delight from
+Constance.
+
+"Oh, Walter!" she cried, shaking her son with viciousness, "how could
+you have been so monotonous as to be born a boy?"
+
+After a time Mary noticed that Stefan was being tired by the hubbub,
+and signaled an adjournment to the studio for tea and calm. The elders
+trooped out; the children fell upon the viands; and Miss Mason caught
+Rosamond by the petticoat as she endeavored to creep out after Gunther,
+whose great size seemed to fascinate her.
+
+The sculptor had given Mary a bronze miniature of his now famous
+"Pioneers" group. It was a beautiful thing, and Constance and James were
+anxious to know if other copies were to be obtained.
+
+"No," Gunther answered them laconically, "I have only had three cast.
+One the President wished to have, the second is for myself, and Mrs.
+Byrd, as the original of the woman, naturally has the third."
+
+"Couldn't you cast one or two more?" Constance pleaded.
+
+"No," he replied, "I should not care to do so."
+
+Stefan examined the bronze with interest, his keen eyes traveling from
+the man's figure to the woman's.
+
+"It's very good of you both," he said, looking from Gunther to Mary,
+with a trace of his old teasing smile. Mary blushed slightly. For some
+reason which she did not analyze she was a trifle embarrassed at seeing
+herself perpetuated in bronze as the companion of the sculptor.
+
+When the guests began to leave, Mary urged the Farradays to remain a
+little longer. "It's only five o'clock," she reminded them.
+
+Mrs. Farraday settled herself comfortably, and drew out her
+khaki-colored knitting. James lit his pipe, and Stefan wheeled forward
+to the glow of the fire, fitting a cigarette into his new amber holder.
+
+"I have a letter from Wallace," said James, "that I've been waiting to
+read you. Shall I do so now?"
+
+"Oh, do!" exclaimed Mary, "we shall love to hear it. Wait a moment,
+though, while I fetch Rosamond--the Sparrow can't attend to them both at
+once _and_ help Lily."
+
+She returned in a moment with the sleepy baby.
+
+"I'll have to put her to bed soon," she said, settling into a low
+rocking chair, "but it isn't quite time yet. I suppose Jamie has heard
+his father's letter?"
+
+"Oh, yes," said James, "and has dozens of his own, too."
+
+"He's such a dear boy," Mary continued, "he's playing like an angel with
+Ellie in there, while the Sparrow flits."
+
+James unfolded Mac's closely written sheets, and read his latest
+accounts of the officers' training corps with which he had been for the
+last six months, the gossip that filtered to them from the front, and
+his expectation of being soon gazetted to a Highland Regiment.
+
+    "The waiting is hard, but when once I get with our own
+    lads in the trenches I'll be the happiest man alive," wrote Mac.
+    "Meanwhile, I think a lot of all you dear people. I'm more
+    than happy in what you tell me of Byrd's success and of the
+    bairns' and Mary's well being. Give them all my love and
+    congratulations."
+
+James turned the last page, and paused. "I think that's about all," he
+said.
+
+But it was not all. While the others sat silent for a minute, their
+thoughts on the great struggle, Farraday's eyes ran again down that last
+page.
+
+    "Poor Byrd," Mac wrote, "so you say he'll not last many
+    years. Well, life would have broken him anyway, and it's
+    grand he's found himself before the end. He's not the lasting
+    kind, there's too much in him, and too little. She wins, after
+    all, James; life won't cheat her as it has him. She is here just
+    to be true to her instincts--to choose the finest mate for her
+    nest-building. She'll marry again, though the dear woman
+    doesn't know it, and would be horrified at the thought. But
+    she will, and it won't be either of us--we are too much her kind.
+    It will be some other brilliant egoist who will thrill her, grind
+    her heart, and give her wonderful children. She is an instrument.
+    As I think I once heard poor Byrd say, she is not merely
+    an expression of life, she is life."
+
+James folded the letter and slipped it into his pocket.
+
+"Come, son, we must be going," murmured Mrs. Farraday, putting up her
+knitting.
+
+"Rosamond is almost asleep," smiled Mary.
+
+"Don't rise, my dear," said the little lady, "we'll find our own way."
+
+"Good-bye, Farraday," said Stefan, "and thank you for everything."
+
+Mary held out her hand to them both, and they slipped quietly out.
+
+"What a good day it has been, dearest. I hope you aren't too tired," she
+said, as she rocked the drowsy baby.
+
+"No, Beautiful, only a little."
+
+He dropped his burnt-out cigarette into the ash-tray at his side. The
+rocker creaked rhythmically.
+
+"Mary, I want to draw Rosamond," said Stefan thoughtfully.
+
+"Oh, do you, dearest? That _will_ be nice!" she exclaimed, her face
+breaking into a smile of pleasure.
+
+"Yes. Do you know, I was watching the little thing this afternoon, when
+Gunther and all the others were playing with her. It's very strange--I
+never noticed it before--but it came to me quite suddenly. She's exactly
+like my mother."
+
+"Is she really?" Mary murmured, touched.
+
+"Yes, it's very wonderful. I felt suddenly, watching her eyes and smile,
+that my mother is not dead after all. Will you--" he seemed a little
+embarrassed--"could you, do you think, without disturbing her, let me
+hold the baby for a little while?"
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Nest Builder, by Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
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