________________________________________________
_ On Sunday afternoon Alexander remembered
Miss Burgoyne's invitation and called at her
apartment. He found it a delightful little
place and he met charming people there.
Hilda lived alone, attended by a very pretty
and competent French servant who answered
the door and brought in the tea. Alexander
arrived early, and some twenty-odd people
dropped in during the course of the afternoon.
Hugh MacConnell came with his sister,
and stood about, managing his tea-cup
awkwardly and watching every one out of his
deep-set, faded eyes. He seemed to have
made a resolute effort at tidiness of attire,
and his sister, a robust, florid woman with a
splendid joviality about her, kept eyeing his
freshly creased clothes apprehensively. It was
not very long, indeed, before his coat hung
with a discouraged sag from his gaunt shoulders
and his hair and beard were rumpled as
if he had been out in a gale. His dry humor
went under a cloud of absent-minded kindliness
which, Mainhall explained, always overtook
him here. He was never so witty or so
sharp here as elsewhere, and Alexander
thought he behaved as if he were an elderly
relative come in to a young girl's party.
The editor of a monthly review came
with his wife, and Lady Kildare, the Irish
philanthropist, brought her young nephew,
Robert Owen, who had come up from Oxford,
and who was visibly excited and gratified
by his first introduction to Miss Burgoyne.
Hilda was very nice to him, and he sat on
the edge of his chair, flushed with his
conversational efforts and moving his chin
about nervously over his high collar.
Sarah Frost, the novelist, came with her husband,
a very genial and placid old scholar who had
become slightly deranged upon the subject of
the fourth dimension. On other matters he
was perfectly rational and he was easy and
pleasing in conversation. He looked very
much like Agassiz, and his wife, in her
old-fashioned black silk dress, overskirted and
tight-sleeved, reminded Alexander of the early
pictures of Mrs. Browning. Hilda seemed
particularly fond of this quaint couple,
and Bartley himself was so pleased with their
mild and thoughtful converse that he took his
leave when they did, and walked with them
over to Oxford Street, where they waited for
their 'bus. They asked him to come to see
them in Chelsea, and they spoke very tenderly
of Hilda. "She's a dear, unworldly little
thing," said the philosopher absently;
"more like the stage people of my young days--
folk ofsimple manners. There aren't many such left.
American tours have spoiled them, I'm afraid.
They have all grown very smart. Lamb wouldn't
care a great deal about many of them, I fancy."
Alexander went back to Bedford Square
a second Sunday afternoon. He had a long
talk with MacConnell, but he got no word with
Hilda alone, and he left in a discontented
state of mind. For the rest of the week
he was nervous and unsettled, and kept
rushing his work as if he were preparing for
immediate departure. On Thursday afternoon
he cut short a committee meeting, jumped into
a hansom, and drove to Bedford Square.
He sent up his card, but it came back to
him with a message scribbled across the front.
So sorry I can't see you. Will you come and
dine with me Sunday evening at half-past seven?
H.B.
When Bartley arrived at Bedford Square on
Sunday evening, Marie, the pretty little
French girl, met him at the door and conducted
him upstairs. Hilda was writing in her
living-room, under the light of a tall desk lamp.
Bartley recognized the primrose satin gown
she had worn that first evening at Lady Walford's.
"I'm so pleased that you think me worth
that yellow dress, you know," he said, taking
her hand and looking her over admiringly
from the toes of her canary slippers to her
smoothly parted brown hair. "Yes, it's very,
very pretty. Every one at Lady Walford's was
looking at it."
Hilda curtsied. "Is that why you think it
pretty? I've no need for fine clothes in Mac's
play this time, so I can afford a few duddies
for myself. It's owing to that same chance,
by the way, that I am able to ask you to dinner.
I don't need Marie to dress me this season,
so she keeps house for me, and my little Galway
girl has gone home for a visit. I should never
have asked you if Molly had been here,
for I remember you don't like English cookery."
Alexander walked about the room, looking at everything.
"I haven't had a chance yet to tell you
what a jolly little place I think this is.
Where did you get those etchings?
They're quite unusual, aren't they?"
"Lady Westmere sent them to me from Rome
last Christmas. She is very much interested
in the American artist who did them.
They are all sketches made about the Villa
d'Este, you see. He painted that group of
cypresses for the Salon, and it was bought
for the Luxembourg."
Alexander walked over to the bookcases.
"It's the air of the whole place here that
I like. You haven't got anything that doesn't
belong. Seems to me it looks particularly
well to-night. And you have so many flowers.
I like these little yellow irises."
"Rooms always look better by lamplight
--in London, at least. Though Marie is clean
--really clean, as the French are. Why do
you look at the flowers so critically? Marie
got them all fresh in Covent Garden market
yesterday morning."
"I'm glad," said Alexander simply.
"I can't tell you how glad I am to have
you so pretty and comfortable here, and to hear
every one saying such nice things about you.
You've got awfully nice friends," he added
humbly, picking up a little jade elephant from
her desk. "Those fellows are all very loyal,
even Mainhall. They don't talk of any one
else as they do of you."
Hilda sat down on the couch and said
seriously: "I've a neat little sum in the bank,
too, now, and I own a mite of a hut in
Galway. It's not worth much, but I love it.
I've managed to save something every year,
and that with helping my three sisters now
and then, and tiding poor Cousin Mike over
bad seasons. He's that gifted, you know,
but he will drink and loses more good
engagements than other fellows ever get.
And I've traveled a bit, too."
Marie opened the door and smilingly
announced that dinner was served.
"My dining-room," Hilda explained, as
she led the way, "is the tiniest place
you have ever seen."
It was a tiny room, hung all round with
French prints, above which ran a shelf full
of china. Hilda saw Alexander look up at it.
"It's not particularly rare," she said,
"but some of it was my mother's. Heaven knows
how she managed to keep it whole, through all
our wanderings, or in what baskets and bundles
and theatre trunks it hasn't been stowed away.
We always had our tea out of those blue cups
when I was a little girl, sometimes in the
queerest lodgings, and sometimes on a trunk
at the theatre--queer theatres, for that matter."
It was a wonderful little dinner. There was
watercress soup, and sole, and a delightful
omelette stuffed with mushrooms and truffles,
and two small rare ducklings, and artichokes,
and a dry yellow Rhone wine of which Bartley
had always been very fond. He drank it
appreciatively and remarked that there was
still no other he liked so well.
"I have some champagne for you, too. I
don't drink it myself, but I like to see it
behave when it's poured. There is nothing
else that looks so jolly."
"Thank you. But I don't like it so well as
this." Bartley held the yellow wine against
the light and squinted into it as he turned the
glass slowly about. "You have traveled, you
say. Have you been in Paris much these late
years?"
Hilda lowered one of the candle-shades
carefully. "Oh, yes, I go over to Paris often.
There are few changes in the old Quarter.
Dear old Madame Anger is dead--but perhaps
you don't remember her?"
"Don't I, though! I'm so sorry to hear it.
How did her son turn out? I remember how
she saved and scraped for him, and how he
always lay abed till ten o'clock. He was the
laziest fellow at the Beaux Arts; and that's
saying a good deal."
"Well, he is still clever and lazy. They
say he is a good architect when he will work.
He's a big, handsome creature, and he hates
Americans as much as ever. But Angel--do
you remember Angel?"
"Perfectly. Did she ever get back to
Brittany and her bains de mer?"
"Ah, no. Poor Angel! She got tired of
cooking and scouring the coppers in Madame
Anger's little kitchen, so she ran away with a
soldier, and then with another soldier.
Too bad! She still lives about the Quarter,
and, though there is always a soldat, she has
become a blanchisseuse de fin. She did my blouses
beautifully the last time I was there, and was
so delighted to see me again. I gave her all
my old clothes, even my old hats, though she
always wears her Breton headdress. Her hair
is still like flax, and her blue eyes are just like
a baby's, and she has the same three freckles
on her little nose, and talks about going back
to her bains de mer."
Bartley looked at Hilda across the yellow
light of the candles and broke into a low,
happy laugh. "How jolly it was being young,
Hilda! Do you remember that first walk we
took together in Paris? We walked down to
the Place Saint-Michel to buy some lilacs.
Do you remember how sweet they smelled?"
"Indeed I do. Come, we'll have our
coffee in the other room, and you can smoke."
Hilda rose quickly, as if she wished to
change the drift of their talk, but Bartley
found it pleasant to continue it.
"What a warm, soft spring evening that
was," he went on, as they sat down in the
study with the coffee on a little table between
them; "and the sky, over the bridges, was just
the color of the lilacs. We walked on down
by the river, didn't we?"
Hilda laughed and looked at him questioningly.
He saw a gleam in her eyes that he remembered
even better than the episode he was recalling.
"I think we did," she answered demurely.
"It was on the Quai we met that woman
who was crying so bitterly. I gave her a spray
of lilac, I remember, and you gave her a
franc. I was frightened at your prodigality."
"I expect it was the last franc I had.
What a strong brown face she had, and very
tragic. She looked at us with such despair and
longing, out from under her black shawl.
What she wanted from us was neither our
flowers nor our francs, but just our youth.
I remember it touched me so. I would have
given her some of mine off my back, if I could.
I had enough and to spare then," Bartley mused,
and looked thoughtfully at his cigar.
They were both remembering what the
woman had said when she took the money:
"God give you a happy love!" It was not in
the ingratiating tone of the habitual beggar:
it had come out of the depths of the poor creature's
sorrow, vibrating with pity for their youth
and despair at the terribleness of human life;
it had the anguish of a voice of prophecy.
Until she spoke, Bartley had not realized
that he was in love. The strange woman,
and her passionate sentence that rang
out so sharply, had frightened them both.
They went home sadly with the lilacs, back
to the Rue Saint-Jacques, walking very slowly,
arm in arm. When they reached the house
where Hilda lodged, Bartley went across the
court with her, and up the dark old stairs to
the third landing; and there he had kissed her
for the first time. He had shut his eyes to
give him the courage, he remembered, and
she had trembled so--
Bartley started when Hilda rang the little
bell beside her. "Dear me, why did you do
that? I had quite forgotten--I was back there.
It was very jolly," he murmured lazily, as
Marie came in to take away the coffee.
Hilda laughed and went over to the
piano. "Well, we are neither of us twenty
now, you know. Have I told you about my
new play? Mac is writing one; really for me
this time. You see, I'm coming on."
"I've seen nothing else. What kind of a
part is it? Shall you wear yellow gowns?
I hope so."
He was looking at her round slender figure,
as she stood by the piano, turning over a
pile of music, and he felt the energy in every
line of it.
"No, it isn't a dress-up part. He doesn't
seem to fancy me in fine feathers. He says
I ought to be minding the pigs at home, and I
suppose I ought. But he's given me some
good Irish songs. Listen."
She sat down at the piano and sang.
When she finished, Alexander shook himself
out of a reverie.
"Sing `The Harp That Once,' Hilda.
You used to sing it so well."
"Nonsense. Of course I can't really sing,
except the way my mother and grandmother
did before me. Most actresses nowadays
learn to sing properly, so I tried a master;
but he confused me, just!"
Alexander laughed. "All the same, sing it, Hilda."
Hilda started up from the stool and
moved restlessly toward the window.
"It's really too warm in this room to sing.
Don't you feel it?"
Alexander went over and opened the
window for her. "Aren't you afraid to let the
wind low like that on your neck? Can't I get
a scarf or something?"
"Ask a theatre lady if she's afraid of drafts!"
Hilda laughed. "But perhaps, as I'm so warm--
give me your handkerchief. There, just in front."
He slipped the corners carefully under her shoulder-straps.
"There, that will do. It looks like a bib."
She pushed his hand away quickly and stood
looking out into the deserted square.
"Isn't London a tomb on Sunday night?"
Alexander caught the agitation in her voice.
He stood a little behind her, and tried to
steady himself as he said: "It's soft and misty.
See how white the stars are."
For a long time neither Hilda nor Bartley spoke.
They stood close together, looking out
into the wan, watery sky, breathing always
more quickly and lightly, and it seemed as if
all the clocks in the world had stopped.
Suddenly he moved the clenched hand he held
behind him and dropped it violently at
his side. He felt a tremor run through
the slender yellow figure in front of him.
She caught his handkerchief from her
throat and thrust it at him without turning
round. "Here, take it. You must go now,
Bartley. Good-night."
Bartley leaned over her shoulder, without
touching her, and whispered in her ear:
"You are giving me a chance?"
"Yes. Take it and go. This isn't fair,
you know. Good-night."
Alexander unclenched the two hands at
his sides. With one he threw down the
window and with the other--still standing
behind her--he drew her back against him.
She uttered a little cry, threw her arms
over her head, and drew his face down to hers.
"Are you going to let me love you a little, Bartley?"
she whispered. _
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