"You see," she continued, "I had never read any novels, or books about
life until _Jean d'Agrève_. And now I wonder sometimes if it is possible
to be really happy--really, really happy?"
"I know it is," he said; "but only in one way."
She did not dare to ask in what way. She looked down and clasped her
hands.
"I once thought," she went on, hurriedly, "that I was perfectly happy
the first time Josiah gave me two thousand francs, and told me to go out
with my maid and buy just what I wished with it; and oh, we bought
everything I could think Sarah and Clementine could want, numbers and
numbers of things, and I remember I was fearfully excited when they were
sent off to Dieppe. But I never knew if I chose well or if they liked
them all quite, and now to do that does not give me nearly so much joy."
Soon they drew up at the little café and ordered tea, which he guessed
probably would be very bad and they would not drink. But tea was
English, and more novel than coffee for Theodora, and that she must
have, she said.
She was so gracious and sweet in the pouring of it out, when presently
it came, and the elderly waiter seemed so sympathetic, and it was all
gay and bright with the late afternoon sun streaming upon them.
"The garçon takes us for a honeymoon couple," Hector said; "he sees you
have beautiful new clothes, and that we have not yet begun to yawn with
each other."
But Theodora had not this view of honeymoons. To her a honeymoon meant a
nightmare, now happily a thing of the past, and almost forgotten.
"Do not speak of it," she said, and she put out her hands as if to ward
off an ugly sight, and Hector bent over the table and touched her
fingers gently as he said:
"Forgive me," and he raged within himself. How could he have been so
gauche, so clumsy and unlike himself. He had punished them both, and
destroyed an illusion. He meant that she should picture herself and him
as married lovers, and she had only seen--Josiah Brown. They both fell
into silence and so finished their repast.
"I want you to walk now," Hector said, "through some delicious allées
where I will show you Enceladus after he was struck by the
thunders of Zeus. You will like him, I think, and there is fine
greensward around him where we can sit awhile."
"I was always sorry for him," said Theodora; "and oh, how I would like
to go to Sicily and see Ætna and his fiery breath coming forth, and to
know when the island quakes it is the poor giant turning his weary
side!"
To go to Sicily--and with her! The picture conjured up in Hector's
imagination made him thrill again.
Then he told her about it all, he charmed her fancy and excited her
imagination, and by the time they came to their goal the feeling of jar
had departed, and the dangerous sense of attraction--of nearness--had
returned.
It was nearly seven o'clock, and here among the trees all was in a soft
gloom of evening light.
"Is not this still and far away?" he said, as they sat on an old stone
bench. "I often stay the whole morning here when I spend a week at
Versailles."
"How peaceful and beautiful! Oh, I would like a week here, too!" and
Theodora sighed.
"You must not sigh, beautiful princess," he implored, "on this our happy
day."
The slender lines of her figure seemed all drooping. She reminded him
more than ever of the fragment of Psyche in the Naples Museum.
"No, I must not sigh," she said. "But it seems suddenly to have grown
sad--the air--what does it mean? Tell me, you who know so many things?"
There was a pathos in her voice like a child in distress.
It communicated itself to him, it touched some chords in his nature
hitherto silent. His whole being rushed out to her in tenderness.
"It seems to me it is because the time grows nearer when we must go back
to the world. First to dinner with the others, and then--Paris. I would
like to stay thus always--just alone with you."
She did not refute this solution of her sadness. She knew it was true.
And when he looked into her eyes, the blue was troubled with a mist as
of coming tears.
Then passion--more mighty than ever--seized him once more. He only felt
a wild desire to comfort her, to kiss away the mist--to talk to her. Ah!
"Theodora!" he said, and his voice vibrated with emotion, while he bent
forward and seized both her hands, which he lifted to his face--she had
not put on her gloves again after the tea--her cool, little, tender
hands! He kissed and kissed their palms.
"Darling--darling," he said, incoherently, "what have I done to make
your dear eyes wet? Oh, I love you so, I love you so, and I have only
made you sad."
She gave a little, inarticulate cry. If a wounded dove could sob, it
might have been the noise of a dove, so beseeching and so pathetic. "Oh,
please--you must not," she said. "Oh, what have you done!--you have
killed our happy day."
And this was the beginning of his awakening. He sat for many moments
with his head buried in his hands. What, indeed, had he done!--and they
would be turned out of their garden of Eden--and all because he was a
brute, who could not control his passion, but must let it run riot on
the first opportunity.
He suffered intensely. Suffered, perhaps, for the first time in his
life.
She had not said one word of anger--only that tone in her voice reached
to his heart.
He did not move and did not speak, and presently she touched his hands
softly with her slender fingers, it seemed like the caress of an angel's
wing.
"Listen," she said, so gently. "Oh, you must not grieve--but it was too
good to be true, our day. I ought to have known to where we were
drifting, I am wicked to have let you say all you have said to-day, but
oh, I was asleep, I think, and I only knew that I was happy. But now you
have shown me--and oh, the dream is broken up. Come, let us go back to
the world."
Then he raised his eyes to her face, and they were haggard and
miserable.
How her simple speech, blaming herself who was all innocent, touched his
heart and filled him with shame at his unworthiness.
"Oh, forgive me!" he pleaded. "Oh, please forgive me! I am mad, I think,
I love you so--and I had to tell you--and yes, I will say it all now,
and then you can punish me. From the first moment I looked into your
angel eyes it has been growing, you are so true and so sweet, and so
miles beyond all other women in the world. Each minute I have loved you
more--and all the time I thought to win you. Yes, you may well turn
away, and shrink from me now that you know the brute I am. I thought I
would make you love me, and you would forgive me then. But I have
suddenly seen your soul, my darling, and I am ashamed, and I can only
ask you to forgive me and let me worship you and be your slave--I will
not ask for any return--only to worship you and be your slave--that I
may show you I am not all brute and may earn your pardon."
And then Theodora's blindness fell from her and she knew that she loved
him--she had faced the fact at last. And all over her being there
thrilled a mad, wild joy. It surged up and crushed out fear and
pain--for just one moment--and then she too, in her turn, covered her
face with her hands.
"Oh, hush! hush!" she said. "What have you done--what have we both
done!"
It was characteristic of her that now she realized she loved him she did
not fence any longer, she never thought of concealing it from him or of
blaming him. They were sinners both, he and she equally guilty.
Another woman might have argued, "He is fooling me; perhaps he has said
these things before--I must at least hide my own heart," but not
Theodora. Her trust was complete--she loved him--therefore he was a
perfect knight--and if he was wicked she was wicked too.
Her gentian eyes were full of tears as she let fall her hands and looked
at him. "Oh yes, I have been asleep--I should have known from the
beginning why, why I wanted to see you so much--I should never have
come--and I should have understood in the wood that we could not leave
it without bringing Love with us--and now we may not be happy any more."
And then it was his turn to be exalted with wild joy.
"Do you know what you have said," he whispered, breathless. "Your words
mean that you love me--Theodora--darling mine." And once again passion
blazed in his eyes, and he would have taken her in his arms; but she put
up her hands and gently pushed him from her.
"Yes," she said, simply, "I love you, but that only makes it all the
harder--and we must say good-bye at once, and go our different ways. You
who are so strong and know so much--I trust you, dear--you must help me
to do what is right."
She never thought of reproaching him, of telling him, as she very well
could have done, that he had taken cruel advantage of her
unsophistication. All her mind was full of the fact that they were both
very sad and wicked and must help each other.
"I _cannot_ say good-bye," he said, "now that I know you love me,
darling; it is impossible. How can we part--what will the days be--how
could we get through our lives?"
She looked at him, and her eyes were the eyes of a wounded thing--dumb
and pitiful, and asking for help.
Then the something that was fine and noble in Hector Bracondale rose up
in him--the crust of selfishness and cynicism fell from him like a mask.
He suddenly saw himself as he was, and she--as she was--and a
determination came over him to grow worthy of her love, obey her
slightest wish, even if it must break his heart.
He dropped upon his knees beside her on the greensward, and buried his
face in her lap.
"Darling--my queen," he said. "I will do whatever you command--but oh,
it need not be good-bye. Don't let me sicken and die out of your
presence. I swear, on my word of honor, I will never trouble you. Let me
worship you and watch over you and make your life brighter. Oh, God!
there can be no sin in that."
"I trust you!" she said, and she touched the waves of his hair. "And now
we must not linger--we must come at once out of this place. I--I cannot
bear it any more."
And so they went--into an _allée_ of close, cropped trees, where the
gloom was almost twilight; but if there was pain there was joy too, and
almost peace in their hearts.
All the anguish was for the afterwards. Love, who is a god, was too near
to his kingdom to admit of any rival.
"Hector," she whispered, and as she said his name a wild thrill ran
through him again. "Hector--the Austrian Prince at Armenonville said
life was a current down which our barks floated, only to be broken up on
the rocks if it was our fate; and I said if we tried very hard some
angel would steer us past them into smooth waters beyond; and I want you
to help me to find the angel, dear--will you?"
But all he could say was that she was the angel, the only angel in
heaven or earth.
And so they came at last to the Bason de Neptune, and on through the
side door into the Réservoirs--and there was the widow's automobile that
moment arrived.