"Quite right."
Hayden regarded his calendar approvingly. The large red and gold letters
stared at him proclaiming arrogantly: "Every day is the best day of the
year." And was it not true? Yesterday had proved indeed a day of destiny.
It had brought him the assurance of a hope, the confirmation of a
hesitant belief that the owners of the lost Mariposa were within reach
and, better still, were not entirely masters of the situation. And
yesterday, too, he had met Ydo; and, perhaps, Hayden's thoughts had been
as much occupied with her as with his discovered but not possessed
Eldorado.
But Ydo herself was a sufficient excuse for that. And this was another
day. A daring thought came to him. Why not assist Fate and make it the
best day in the year--a day that should be Marcia's. At this brilliant
idea he looked at his watch and then rushed to the telephone. Surely
Marcia, even conscientious Marcia who worked painstakingly at her pretty
Little water-colors every day, would not have left for her studio. He
would throw dice with Destiny again to-day and push his luck. With this
determination, he rang up the residence of Mrs. Oldham. There was a
moment or two of delay, and then Marcia's voice answered. Hayden
mentioned the beauty of the day--it was overcast--the charm of this soft
and mild weather--an east wind blew piercingly--and diffidently assumed
that after a day in her studio, she would as usual take the air by
walking home through the Park.
Yes-s-s-s, she probably would.
Then since he had hoped to call upon her mother that afternoon, might he
not join her and walk up with her, and would she not be leaving her
brushes and canvases early, at half-after four, for instance.
Yes-s-s, he said four o'clock, did he not? Fate again honored him, she
would be at the Plaza then calling on a friend.
Hayden had won in his dice-throwing and Fate took defeat handsomely,
granting him his desires and throwing a favor or two for lagnappe. By
four o'clock the wind had veered, the clouds no longer betokened rain,
broken spars of sunshine dazzled over the gold of the Sherman statue,
sparkled in the harness of prancing horses, and brightened the whiteness
of the great hotel. It was early in March, which, by the way, had decided
to enter like a meek little lamb this year instead of advancing with the
mien of an angry and roaring lion. The air was cool and fresh and yet
held all manner of soft, indescribable intimations of spring. The sky was
a sheet of pale gold, the trees were a purple mist against it.
Hayden drew a long breath of happiness as Marcia's steps fell in with
his; the sense of contentment and well-being which her mere presence
always afforded him seemed the more soothing and potent this afternoon
than ever before. Since yesterday, there had run high in his veins the
fever of acquisition, and Ydo's personality had disturbed and stimulated
until she had wrought in him a sort of mental confusion. But Marcia at
his side, smiling in the shadow of her plumed hat, the familiar violets
nestling in her dark furs, seemed the visible embodiment of all these
soft, sweet intimations of spring. Not yet jocund, as spring come into
her own crowned with flowers and laughing through her silver rain; but a
wistful spring still held in the thraldom of winter.
"What have you been doing that makes you look a little pale?" asked
Hayden tenderly.
"Am I pale?" She smiled at him. "I dare say. I have been painting the
greater part of every day and going out a good deal in the evening."
"What an idler I must seem to you who are always so occupied," he said.
"Not at all. I, too, take vacations. But tell me how you have been idling
lately."
"I idled, if you call it that," he said, "yesterday afternoon at the
wonderful fortune-teller's."
"Oh, you have seen Ydo?" Marcia lifted her head involuntarily, and then
meeting his surprised gaze, the color flooded her cheeks. It kept on
rolling up in waves.
Seeing her embarrassment, he was at pains to suppress his astonishment.
"Yes," he said as naturally as he possibly could under the circumstances.
"Yes, she gave me quite a long reading. Isn't that the professional word
for it--reading?"
"I--I believe so." She had not entirely recovered herself. "And are you
quite convinced of her powers?"
He gave a short laugh. "Oh, quite. More than convinced. I never should
question them. Mine is the fate of the scoffer. The most rabid persecutor
is merely the reverse side of the bigoted proselyter. Upon me rests not
the curse that follows the tolerant. They get nowhere. 'Because thou art
neither hot nor cold I spew thee from my mouth.'"
"Really!" It was plain she was a little puzzled, and took refuge in the
conveniently inexpressive "really." "Did she tell you a good fortune?"
"How can I say? Fortune is always in the future."
"You are teasing me and telling me nothing," she declared, "and you are
laughing, laughing, too, as if over some secret and mysterious joke."
"I am laughing," he said, suddenly serious, "but not over any of the
revelations of Mademoiselle Mariposa, I can assure you; and to show you
my faith in her prophecies, I am going to tell you something." He was
grave enough now. "And yet, I wonder--perhaps--"
"Perhaps what?"
"Perhaps you will find no interest in what I want to say."
She looked up at him quickly, surprise in her glance. "How absurd! I do
not see why you say such things. Why should you fancy that I would not be
interested in anything you have to tell me?"
They had turned down a narrow lane of trees, and the skies, a deeper and
more luminous gold, were in a net of bare, black twigs. The wind bore the
fragrance of Marcia's violets past Hayden's nostrils.
"But you may not feel so when I tell you that I love you, Marcia." His
voice low and unsteady thrilled her heart. "I realize the rashness of the
whole thing; but I do love you, Marcia."
There was a moment's silence, a silence when Hayden's heart-beats sounded
louder than the patter of their feet on the concrete pavement or the
distant and mighty roar of the city--and then Marcia lifted her eyes to
his.
In a moment the miracle had happened. Above them stretched the same gold
sky in its intricate and broken nets, the wind blew softly; but they two
had stepped across the boundaries of commonplace days straight into
Arcady. Flowers bloomed, birds sang, and the soul of the spring was in
their hearts. But, curiously enough, though they were in Arcady, they
were also in the Park. Hayden looked up the little lane; north and south
marched an unending line of people. They were in Arcady, but deprived of
its ancient privilege of sylvan and umbrageous solitude.
She was the first to speak. "Why is it absurd?" And her clear voice
trembled a little.
"How can it be, as things stand, anything but absurd?" he answered
bitterly. "I am simply an engineer on my vacation, who when that is over
will return to the wilds. Oh, Marcia, how can I in common decency ask you
to marry me? I can not yet, but I do ask you to let me love you, to
forgive me for telling you of my feeling for you, and believe me when I
tell you that I would not have had the courage to mention the subject if
I did not feel almost sure of a change of fortune. I don't want to tell
you just yet. I'm trying not to tell you; but dearest, loveliest Marcia,
I believe I'm on the eve of success. I can almost close my fingers around
it, and then you will let me tell you I love you, won't you, dearest?
Yes, laugh at me, I don't mind."
"But suppose, just suppose this wonderful fortune never does
materialize," she said half-teasingly but still tremulously, a smile on
her lips and a tear in her eye. "What then?"
"Never suppose it. It can't help it," he cried confidently. "Why even now
I can see particles of gold in the air. To-morrow, next day, the day
afterward, we shall have our cake. Will you eat it with me, Marcia, if
it's a nice, brown, plum-y cake?"
"You make too many conditions," she said demurely. "I don't care for very
rich cake myself. Suppose the cake should not turn out particularly well
in the baking? Wouldn't you offer me a piece anyway--Bobby?"
Again he looked up the path and down the path; people still hastening to
and fro. Arcady was infested with toilers hurrying home to supper.
"I'd try not to," he said manfully, keeping his eyes resolutely away from
hers. "Oh, Marcia, I can't be certain, I'd try not to. I couldn't bear
to see you eating underdone cake. It would only mean misery to you. Your
manner of life--"
"My manner of life!" she interrupted him scornfully. "Ah, what is my
manner of life! Do you fancy that I am deaf as a post and blind as a bat?
Do you think that I do not know some of the things that are spoken of me,
by Mrs. Ames, for instance, or Horace Penfield, or even Edith Symmes? Do
you fancy any word of that tittle-tattle escapes me? Sometimes it is
repeated, or hinted in malice; sometimes as from Bea or Kitty in fright,
as a warning, almost a prayer. I know that I lay myself open to gossip;
but I can not help it, at least at present. It is impossible for me to
alter things just now."
"I know," he murmured tenderly. "I am sure of it. I have realized
something of this from the first moment that I met you. But always since
that moment I could stake my life on this, that any--any mystery that
might seem to exist was not of your making or choosing. And I want to
assure you of something, to make you believe it if necessary; and that
is, dear, dear Marcia, if you never choose to unravel the tangle I shall
still be content."
She looked at him a moment in absolute, speechless wonder, and then
tears, happy tears brimmed in her eyes. "Oh, how glad I shall be to
unravel it!" She breathed deeply. "How glad! Wait a little--a week, a
fortnight. Ah!" She caught herself up hastily. "Come, see how late! It is
growing dark and the lights are beginning to twinkle out, and they tell
me, even if you will not, that it is time I ran home and got dressed. I'm
to dine at Bea Habersham's to-night. You must come in with me when we
reach home and let mother give you a cup of tea. You are a tremendous
favorite of hers; she says you are wonderfully witty. And then you can
drive as far as Bea's with me, and I will have the chauffeur take you on
home. Will you?"
"Will I? Will I? Thank you very much, Miss Oldham, for your amiability in
Suggesting such a thing; but I could not possibly take advantage of your
kindness." If the wit of this sally may be judged by the manner in which
it was received Hayden had just uttered one of the great bon-mots of the
ages.
"I hope," said Marcia presently, a touch of apprehension in her tone,
"that some one has been to see mother this afternoon. Poor dear! She
always feels a little aggrieved if no one comes."
"Let us appease any possible disappointment she may have suffered by
taking her a present," suggested Hayden, fired by inspiration. "Women,
children, every one likes presents, do they not? Come, let us find
shops."
"What an adventurer you are!" laughed Marcia, letting him lead her across
the street, a confusion crowded with swiftly moving vehicles and cars,
for they had now left the twilight shadows and comparative seclusion of
the Park and were walking down the noisy thoroughfare.
"You will have to make a quick decision," she added as they came upon a
region of many brilliant shops and sidewalks crowded with people. "What
will you take her, fruit or flowers?"
But Hayden was too happy to consider any topic with gravity. "We will
take her a swanboat, or one of the Hesperidian apples, or the Golden
Fleece."
And although Marcia spent herself in urging him to stick to the
conservative fruit and flowers, he insisted on following his own vagrant
fancy, and at last decided upon an elaborate French basket of pale-blue
satin covered with shirrings of fine tulle. The lid was a mass of
artificial flowers, violets and delicate pink roses, and within the
satin-lined depths was a bunch of Hamburg grapes.
This, when finally and carefully wrapped, made a huge package; but Hayden
insisted on carrying it, assuring Marcia that every one they met would be
sure that he was carrying home the turkey for their Sunday dinner. He
bore it ostentatiously, and took particular glee in any passing attention
they excited.
"You act as if you were twenty, instead of well--let me guess your age,"
looking at him with keen scrutiny. "About thirty-five," said Marcia
cruelly.
He stopped short to gaze at her with pained reproach. "I am Youth!
Incarnate Youth, just eighteen. No doubt to your dulled materialistic
vision I appear to wear a coat and hat. Is that true?" with polite,
tolerant patience.
"It certainly appears that way to me," she replied. "What do you imagine
yourself to be wearing?"
"And I dare say," he continued still patiently, "that you also fancy you
and I are strolling about in one of the shopping districts of New York?"
"Yes," nodding affirmatively. "Where else?"
"Wretched, purblind girl! Thirty-five indeed! Why, I am eighteen, and
clad in the hide of a leopard with a wreath of roses on my brow, and you,
sweet Oenone, are wandering with me on the slopes of Ida--and we are
taking your mother, not one, but a peck of golden apples."
"All things considered," said Marcia significantly, "I am glad we have
reached our own door."
They found Mrs. Oldham in good spirits in consequence of having seen a
number of people who had sufficient tact duly to admire her new costume
worn for the first time that afternoon. She had given much consideration
to all the effects of the picture she wished to create, and now sat in an
especial chair in an especial part of the room, a vision in pale gray and
orchid tints most skilfully mingled. Her feet, in orchid silk stockings,
and slippers adorned with great choux of gray chiffon, looked on their
footstool as if they were a part of the decorations of the room and had
never served the utilitarian purpose of conveyance.
"Oh, I am glad to see you!" she cried, peering past Marcia to Hayden who
followed, almost obscured by his great package. She stretched out a hand
for him to take, not disarranging her pose by rising and thus spoiling
the composition. "Marcia, you're dreadfully late, as usual," a touch of
fretfulness in her voice.
"I know," replied her daughter; "and now, I'm going to leave Mr. Hayden
to you. Give him some tea, won't you? I'm dining at the Habershams, you
know, and he will drive down with me after a while."
"Of course I'll give Mr. Hayden some tea. Send in some hot water,
Marcia." She leaned forward, still careful not to move her feet and
fussed with the tea things on the table by her side. "I am very glad to
see you," she murmured again. "Ah, Mr. Hayden, if it were not for my
friends I should be a very lonely woman. You understand, of course, that
I do not complain. Marcia is the dearest girl that ever was, so lovely
and attractive. Oh, dear, yes. But," with an upward glance of
resignation, "quite young people are apt to be thoughtless, you know, and
Marcia's social life is so much to her, and indeed, I am selfish enough
to be truly glad that it is so; it really is a great bond between dear
Wilfred and herself; but of course it leaves me much alone; and it is not
good for me to be thrown back on myself and my own sad thoughts so much.
Mr. Oldham always recognized that fact. 'Change, constant diversion is an
Absolute necessity to one of your sensitive, high-strung nature,' he
would so often say, but," with a long-drawn sigh, "no one thinks enough
about me to feel that way now."
"Don't say that," said Hayden cheerfully. "I may not be any one, but I've
been thinking about you. Look! I carried this enormous bundle through the
streets just for you. Be careful. It's heavy."
She flushed with pleasure through her delicately applied rouge, and
stretching out her hands for her gift began eagerly to unwind the various
tissue-papers which concealed it. The last of these discarded, she placed
the basket in the middle of the table and spent herself in ecstatic
phrases, melting from pose to pose of graceful admiration.
"Ah, Mr. Hayden," with one of her archest glances, "you remind me so much
of Mr. Oldham." Hayden had a swift, mental picture of that grim old
pirate of finance, as represented by his portraits and photographs, his
shrewd, rugged old face surrounded by Horace Greeley whiskers. "He never
came home without bringing me something. Sometimes it was just a flower,
or some fruit, and again it was a jewel. You can't fancy, Mr. Hayden, no
words of mine can express to you his constant thought and care for me.
You take lemon in your tea, do you not? I thought so. I always remember
those little things about my friends. And he had such faith in my
business judgment, too. He would often discuss business with me and ask
my opinion on this or that matter; and he always, without exception,
acted on my advice. He used to say--so foolish of him--that he could not
understand why he should have been so favored as to have found a
combination of beauty and brains in one woman."
"It is rare, but as I understand now, not impossible." Hayden took his
cue nobly.
"Oh, Mr. Hayden!" A reproving finger was shaken at him with the archest
coquetry. "If you talk that way I shan't give you another cup of tea, no
matter how hard you beg. But where was I? Oh, yes, I was telling you that
Mr. Oldham so often discussed business matters with me."
"And did they interest you?" asked Hayden vaguely, wondering how soon he
could possibly expect Marcia to return.
"Oh, yes, I found it more thrilling than the printed page."
"Most men do," he replied dryly. "I didn't know that women felt that
way."
"I did." Mrs. Oldham nodded her head in modest acceptation of the fact
that she was the exceptional woman. "I found it not only thrilling, but
often _so_ romantic. I do not see why people will speak of 'the dry
details of business.' I think it is full of romance."
Hayden stared at her with the amazement her mental processes always
aroused in him.
"It never seemed exactly within the range of romantic subjects to me," he
said dubiously; "but perhaps that's the way I've been looking at it."
"Certainly it is," she affirmed triumphantly. "Now I'll prove it to you.
As I often say to young people, Mr. Hayden: 'Never make an assertion
unless you can prove it.' Now, I distinctly remember Mr. Oldham telling
me of a most romantic business matter. A lost mine of almost unthinkable
value which was on an old estate somewhere in Brazil, or no, Peru. Why,
what is the matter, Mr. Hayden? Your eyes are almost popping out of your
head. You look as if you had seen a ghost."
Hayden caught himself together. "It is only that it is so interesting. Do
go on and let me hear the rest of it."
Mrs. Oldham smiled, well pleased at the tribute to her powers as a
raconteuse. "Well, there isn't much to tell. I've forgotten the details,
and they were so romantic, too; but Mr. Oldham seriously considered
buying it."
"And did he buy it?" Hayden's hands were trembling in spite of himself.
"This is so intensely interesting, one would like to hear the conclusion
of the story."
But Mrs. Oldham only shook her head. "I don't know," she said vaguely. "I
think he did; but I can't be sure."
She began another long story, but Hayden, after listening to enough of it
to assure himself that it had no bearing on The Veiled Mariposa, gave
himself up to the confused conjectures, the hopes, the dreams that
thronged his brain.
Was it a possibility that Marcia, Marcia, might be the heiress of the
great Mariposa estate? The owner, or one of the owners of it? He felt
overcome by the bare mental suggestion. But was it a possibility, even a
dim and remote one? Accepting this as a temporary hypothesis, was it not
borne out by certain facts? The butterflies, for instance. Did not those
jeweled ornaments symbolize in some delicate, fanciful way, Marcia's
way, her ownership of The Veiled Mariposa? And would not that ownership
also account for the much-questioned source of her wealth? He stopped
with a jerk up against a dead wall. The Mariposa mine had not been worked
for years; the ranches were cultivated only by the Spaniard in
possession. These facts were like a dash of cold water, extinguishing the
flame of his hopes. And yet, and yet, the butterflies! But that, he was
forced to admit, might be the merest coincidence.
On that chain of evidence he would find it necessary to regard his
cousin, Kitty Hampton, Mrs. Habersham, the London actress, a score of
women, as possible owners of his Golconda. Nevertheless, in spite of
reason, he could not escape the conviction, unfounded but persistent,
that those butterflies were in some way connected with the ownership of
that distant lost mine. And this purely intuitive belief was suddenly
strengthened by the remembrance of Marcia's embarrassment in the Park, an
hour or two before, when she had involuntarily and inadvertently spoken
of Mademoiselle Mariposa familiarly as Ydo.
"Yes, Mrs. Oldham, I quite agree with you. As you say: 'One can not be
too careful.' Oh, no, I never was more interested in my life."
Ydo! Ydo! He took up the thread of his absorbing reflections again as
Mrs. Oldham's voice purled on reciting with infinite detail all the data
of one of her Helen-like conquests. Ydo! What bond could exist between
the reserved, even haughty Marcia in spite of all her gentleness, and the
capricious, wayward, challenging Ydo? A bond sufficiently strong to
permit the affectionate familiarity of first names? He had from the
beginning believed that Ydo had some interest in the property, although
he had never been able satisfactorily to guess the nature of it. But
Marcia! The mere possibility of her being interested in what Ydo merrily
called his Eldorado had never struck him before, and his brain was
bewildered by the thousand new trains of conjecture it started.
At this point his reflections were broken in upon by the entrance of
Marcia herself. She was all in white with the big, ruby-eyed butterfly on
her bosom, and the chain of butterflies about her throat. She looked more
radiant than he had ever seen her as she stood before them drawing on her
long gloves. Her eyes, no longer sad with all regret, were like deep blue
stars, and her smile was full of a soft and girlish happiness.
"You look very well, Marcia," said her mother critically. "A new gown, of
course. How differently they are cutting the skirts!"
"It's a lovely gown," affirmed Hayden, smiling down into Marcia's eyes.
"After all, a simple white frock is the prettiest thing a woman can
wear."
"Simple!" Mrs. Oldham's mirth was high and satiric. "Isn't that like a
man? Simple is the last word to be applied to Marcia's frocks, Mr.
Hayden. It's a good thing, as I often tell her, that her father left us
so well provided for."
The lovely happiness vanished from Marcia's eyes. She looked quickly at
her mother with an almost frightened expression, and then, with eyelashes
lowered on her cheek, went silently on drawing on her gloves, two or
three tense little lines showing about her mouth.
"I think Miss Oldham is very unkind," said Hayden, with some idea of
bridging the situation gracefully, "never to have shown me any of her
pictures. She paints, paints all day long, and yet will not give one a
glimpse of the results. Kitty Hampton has been promising to show me some
of the water-colors she has, but she has not yet done so."
"Have you been talking much to Mr. Hayden of your pictures, Marcia?"
asked her mother suavely.
The tone was pleasant, even casual, and yet, Hayden, sensitive,
intuitive, had a quick, shocked sense of having blundered egregiously;
and worse, he had a further sense of Mrs. Oldham's words being fraught
with some ugly and hidden meaning. In her voice there had been manifest
an unsuspected quality which had revealed her for the moment as not all
frivolous fool or spoiled and empty-headed doll; but a tyrant and
oppressor, crueller and more menacing because infinitely weak and
unstable.
Marcia did not reply at all to her mother's question, but with her lashes
still downcast, continued to button her gloves; and Hayden stood,
miserably uncomfortable for a moment, and then was forced to doubt the
correctness of his swift, unpleasant impression; for Mrs. Oldham observed
in her usual petulant, inconsequent tones:
"I don't know that I like that necklace with that frock, Marcia. Your
turquoises would look better. I do get so tired of always seeing you with
some kind of a butterfly ornament. You never showed the slightest
interest in butterflies before your father died, and you don't, in the
least, suggest a butterfly. I can not understand it."
"Don't try, mother dear," said Marcia. "Good-by." She kissed the orchid
and gray lady lightly on the top of the head. "Have a good time with your
Hamburg grapes and your last new novel."
She slipped her arms through the long white coat Hayden held for her and,
followed by him, left the room.
"Marcia, dear, sweet Marcia," he coaxed, as they whirled through the
streets in her electric brougham. "I'm sure, almost dead sure, it's going
to be a nice, well-baked, plum-y cake. If it is won't you promise to eat
it with me? You know you didn't definitely promise this afternoon, and I
never could stand uncertainty."
"No," she said positively, drawing her hand away from his, "I will not. I
will never give you a definite answer until you offer me a share in the
cake, no matter how it turns out in the baking."
"How can I?" he groaned. "You do not know what sort of a life it would
be, the hardships, the deprivations, the necessarily long separations
when I would have to be in some place utterly impossible for you, for
months at a time. It's the very abomination of desolation. And fancy your
trying to adapt yourself to it! You, used to this!" rapping the electric.
"And this, and this!" touching lightly the ermine on her cloak and the
jewels at her throat. "No." He shook his head doggedly. "I won't. I know
what it means and you do not. Lovely butterfly"--the tenderness of his
voice stirred her heart-strings--"do you think that I could bear to see
you beaten to earth, your bright wings torn and faded by the cruel
storms? Never. But," with one of his quick, mercurial changes of mood,
"it's an alternative that we do not have to face. For it's coming out all
right in the baking--that cake. The most beautiful cake you ever saw,
Marcia, with a rich, brown crust, and more plums than you ever dreamed of
in a cake before."