Miss Burton's bearing toward Van Berg was very friendly, but he
failed to detect in her manner the slightest proof that she had ever
thought of him otherwise than as a friend. There was no sudden
drooping of her eyelashes, or heightening of color when he spoke to
her, or permitted his eyes to dwell upon her face with an expression
that was rather more than friendly. He could detect no furtive
glances, nothing to indicate that she had caught a glimpse of that
secret so interesting to every woman that she would look again,
though cold as ice toward the man cherishing it. Nor was there the
slightest trace of the constraint and reserve by which all women
who are not coquettes seek to check, as with an early frost, the
first growth of an unwelcome regard. Her manner was simply what
would be natural toward a gentleman she thoroughly respected and
liked, with whom her thoughts, for no hidden cause, were especially
preoccupied.
Why then had she looked at him so strangely the preceding evening?
Why had she apparently shrunk from the expression of his face, as
if she had seen there a revelation so sudden and overwhelming that
she trembled at it as a shy, sensitive maiden might in recognizing the
fact that a strong, resolute man was seeking entrance to the very
citadel of her heart? He felt himself utterly unable to explain
her action.
What was more, he was puzzled at himself. The sympathy he felt
for Miss Burton the previous evening had not by any means left him,
but it was no longer a strong and absorbing emotion. His pulse
was as calm and quiet as the breathless summer morning. He was
conscious of no premonitory chills and thrills, which, according to
his preconceived notions of the "grand passion," ought to be felt
even in its incipiency. He even found himself criticising her
face, and wondering how features so ordinary in themselves could
combine in so winning and happy an effect; and then he mentally
cursed his cold-bloodedness, and positively envied Stanton in whose
manner, in spite of his efforts at concealment, an ardent affection
began to manifest itself.
During the day it occurred to him more than once that her course
was changing toward Stanton. There was no less return on her part
of his light bantering style of conversation. Indeed, she seemed
to take great pains to give a humorous twist to everything he said,
as if she regarded even the words in which he tried to unfold his
deeper thoughts as mere jests. But Van Berg imagined she began to
make herself more inaccessible to Stanton. She entrenched herself
among other guests in the parlor; she took pains to be so occupied
as to make him feel that his approach would be an interruption; and
whenever they did meet at the table and elsewhere, it appeared as
if she were trying to teach him by a smiling, friendly indifference
that he was not in her thoughts at all.
The positive coldness and aversion Ida sought to manifest toward Van
Berg would not have been so disheartening as Miss Burton's device
of seeming to be so agreeably preoccupied with other people that
she could not or would not see the offering Stanton was eager to
lay at her feet.
He felt this keenly, and chafed under it; but her woman's tact made
her shining armor invulnerable. She persisted in regarding him as
the gay, self-seeking, pleasure-loving man of the world that she
had recognized him to be on the fist day of their acquaintance. He
imagined that a great and radical change had taken place in his
nature, but she gave him no opportunity of telling her so. At
first she had, with laughing courtesy, ignored his gallantry, as if
it were only a fashion of his towards any woman who for the time
happened to take his fancy; but so far from shunning him she had
seemed inclined to employ what she regarded as a caprice or a bit
of male coquetry, as the means of adding to the enjoyment of as
many as possible; and Van Berg had often smiled to see his languid
friend of yore seconding Miss Burton's efforts with an apparent
zeal that was quite marvellous. To Stanton's infinite relief, Van
Berg did not twit him concerning this surprising departure from his
old ways. Indeed, Miss Burton had become too delicate and sacred
a theme in both of their minds to permit of their old banter. They
had been friends and were so still, yet each recognized the fact
that events were coming that would sorely test and perhaps destroy
their friendship. While they gradually fell aloof, as men will who
are learning that their dearest interests are destined to conflict,
they each tried nevertheless to maintain an honorable rivalry, and
their bearing toward each other, although tinged with a growing
reticence and dignity, was genuinely kind and courteous.
As the week drew to a close, however, it gave Van Berg pleasure--though
not by any means in the same degree that it caused Stanton pain--to
observe that Miss Burton was shunning the latter's society as far
as politeness permitted.
At the same time, while she evidently enjoyed his companionship,
Van Berg observed that she did not seem to specially crave it; nor
in truth did he find himself when away from her "distrait," vacant,
and miserable, as was manifestly the case with his friend. He
concluded that it was difference of temperament--that it was his
nature to be governed by judgment and taste, as it was that of Stanton
to be swayed by feeling and passion. All the higher faculties of
his mind gave their voice for this woman with increasing emphasis.
His heart undoubtedly would slowly and surely gravitate in the same
direction.
How to win her therefore was gradually becoming the one interesting
and most difficult question he had to solve. Although she was
poor and alone in the world, it was evident that mere wealth and
position would count but little with her. Stanton was handsome,
rich, well-connected, and intelligent; but it seemed clear, as she
recognized the sincerity of his suit, she withdrew from it. Some
coarse, ill-natured people in the house, who at first, with
significant nods, had intimated that "the little school-ma'am" was
bent on bettering her fortunes, were soon nonplussed by her course.
Thus far Van Berg's name had not been associated with hers in any
such manner as Stanton's. His cooler head, or heart more correctly,
had enabled him to act very prudently. He would enjoy a walk or
conversation with her, and there it would end. Neither by lingering
glances nor steps did he show that he could not interest himself in
other people and things. He did not attend the excursions or rides
to which Stanton invited her, and others to please her, because
he knew his friend "doted on his absence." He felt too that the
occasion was Stanton's private property, and that it would be mean
not to leave him the full advantage of the device, which might
cause him more effort in a forenoon or an evening than he had been
accustomed to put forth in a week.
But poor Stanton soon learned that his labors of love were destined
to be very promiscuous. He never could manage to carry her off
alone in a light skiff upon the lake; he could never inveigle her
into the narrow seat of his buggy, nor could his most wily strategy
long separate her from their companions on a picnic that had offered
to his ardent fancy a chance for a stroll into some favoring solitude
by themselves. Had she been a princess of the blood, surrounded
by a guard of watchful duennas, she could not have been more
unapproachable to lover-like advances. Yet, with a vexation akin
to that of old Tantalus himself, he constantly cursed his stupidity
for not making better progress toward securing the smiling affable
maiden, who by every law of his pas experience ought to second his
efforts to win her.
Van Berg, who remained at the hotel, or went off by himself on
rambles and sketching expeditions, would watch his opportunity and
quietly and naturally join her on the piazza or in the parlor, as
he might approach any other lady. As a result they had long animated
conversations, and found they had much in common to talk about.
Stanton would gnaw his lip with envy at these interviews and wonder
how Van Berg brought them about so easily, but found he could not
secure them, save in the immediate presence of others. Thus it came
about that Van Berg practically enjoyed much more of Miss Burton's
society than the one who made such untiring efforts to obtain it.
In Stanton's too eager suit, Van Berg thought he saw the danger
he must avoid, and he complacently congratulated himself that
he possessed a temperament which permitted thoughtful and wary
approaches. He would not frighten this shy bird by too hasty
advances. Through unobtrusive companionship he would first grow
familiar to her thoughts; and then, if possible, would make himself
inseparable from them.
He reached this conclusion during a ramble on Saturday morning,
and with elastic tread returned to the hotel to carry out his well
digested policy. As he mounted the steps he saw Miss Burton in
the parlor, and at once entered through an open window. She was
seated in a corner of the room with two or three little girls around
her, and was dressing dolls.
"Do you enjoy that?" he asked, incredulously.
"I'm not a star," she replied looking up with a quiet smile, "but
only a planet--one of the smaller asteroids--and shine with borrowed
light. These little women enjoy this hugely; and I receive a pale
reflection of their pleasure."
"You are certainly happy in your answer, if not in your work," he
remarked.
"Mr. Van Berg," said one of the children emphatically, "Miss Burton
is the best lady that ever lived."
"I agree with you, my dear," responded the artist, with answering
emphasis.
"Yes, children," said Miss Burton, her eyes dancing with mischief,
"and I want you to appreciate Mr. Van Berg's genius too. He is the
greatest artist that ever lived, and there never were such pictures
as he paints."
"Miss Burton, I beg off," interrupted Van Berg, laughing. "You
always get the better of one. No, children," he continued in answer
to their looks of wonder, "I know less about painting pictures, in
comparison, than you do of dressing dolls."
"But Miss Burton always tells us the truth," persisted the child.
"Now you see the result of our folly," said the young lady,
shaking her head at him. "We have given this child an example of
insincerity. We were jesting, my dear. Mr. Van Berg and I did
not mean what we said."
"But I did mean what I said," replied the child, earnestly.
"Since only downright honesty," the artist resumed with a laugh,
"is permitted in this little group, so near nature's heart, I think
I must follow this small maiden's example, and stick to my original
statement. For once, Miss Burton, we have won the advantage over
you, and have proved that yours are the only insincere words that
have been spoken. But I know that if I stay another moment I shall
be worsted. So I shall leave the field before victory is exchanged
for another reverse."
As he turned laughingly away he saw--what he had not observed
before--that Ida Mayhew was sitting near. She was ostensibly
reading; but even his brief glance assured him that her downcast
eyes were not following the lines. Her face was so pale, so rigid,
so like a sculptured ideal of some kind of suffering he could not
understand, that it haunted him.
He had given but little thought to her for the past two days, and
indeed had rarely seen her. She had managed to take her meals when
he was not present, and on one or two occasions had had them sent
to her room, pleading illness as the reason. Indeed her flagging
appetite and altered appearance did not make much feigning on her
part necessary.
She had evidently heard the conversation just narrated; and she
believed that Van Berg had echoed the child's belief in regard to
Miss Burton more in truth than in jest.
The ruling passion of the artist was aroused. A plain woman might
have looked unutterable things, and he would have passed on with a
shrug, or but a thought of commiseration. But that oval, downcast
face followed him. Its sadness and pain interested him because
conveyed to his eye by a perfect contour.
"Was it a trick?" he thought, "or a fortuitous combination of the
features themselves, that enabled them to express so much! It must
be so, for surely the shallow coquette had not much to express."
"A plague on the perversity of nature," he exclaimed, "to give the
girl such features. If Jennie Burton had them, she would be the
ideal woman of the world."
The practical result, however, was that he half forgot during dinner
that she was "the best woman that ever lived" in his furtive effort
to study Ida's face in its present aspect; and that he also spent
most of the afternoon in his room sketching it from memory.