IV

This piece of strategy left me staring and made me, I must confess,

quite furious. My only consolation was that Archie, when I told him,

looked as blank as myself, and that the trick touched him more nearly,

for I was not now in love with Louisa. We agreed that we required an

explanation and we pretended to expect one the next day in the shape of

a letter satisfactory even to the point of being apologetic. When I say

"we" pretended I mean that I did, for my suspicion that he knew what had

been on foot--through an arrangement with Linda--lasted only a moment.

If his resentment was less than my own his surprise was equally great.

I had been willing to bolt, but I felt slighted by the ease with which

Mrs. Pallant had shown she could part with us. Archie professed no

sense of a grievance, because in the first place he was shy about it and

because in the second it was evidently not definite to him that he had

been encouraged--equipped as he was, I think, with no very particular

idea of what constituted encouragement. He was fresh from the wonderful

country in which there may between the ingenuous young be so little

question of "intentions." He was but dimly conscious of his own and

could by no means have told me whether he had been challenged or been

jilted. I didn't want to exasperate him, but when at the end of three

days more we were still without news of our late companions I observed

that it was very simple:--they must have been just hiding from us; they

thought us dangerous; they wished to avoid entanglements. They had found

us too attentive and wished not to raise false hopes. He appeared to

accept this explanation and even had the air--so at least I inferred

from his asking me no questions--of judging the matter might be delicate

for myself. The poor youth was altogether much mystified, and I smiled

at the image in his mind of Mrs. Pallant fleeing from his uncle's

importunities. We decided to leave Homburg, but if we didn't pursue our

fugitives it wasn't simply that we were ignorant of where they were. I

could have found that out with a little trouble, but I was deterred by

the reflexion that this would be Louisa's reasoning. She was a dreadful

humbug and her departure had been a provocation--I fear it was in that

stupid conviction that I made out a little independent itinerary with

Archie. I even believed we should learn where they were quite soon

enough, and that our patience--even my young man's--would be longer than

theirs. Therefore I uttered a small private cry of triumph when three

weeks later--we happened to be at Interlaken--he reported to me that he

had received a note from Miss Pallant. The form of this confidence was

his enquiring if there were particular reasons why we should longer

delay our projected visit to the Italian lakes. Mightn't the fear of the

hot weather, which was moreover at that season our native temperature,

cease to operate, the middle of September having arrived? I answered

that we would start on the morrow if he liked, and then, pleased

apparently that I was so easy to deal with, he revealed his little

secret. He showed me his letter, which was a graceful natural

document--it covered with a few flowing strokes but a single page of

note-paper--not at all compromising to the young lady. If, however, it

was almost the apology I had looked for--save that this should have come

from the mother--it was not ostensibly in the least an invitation. It

mentioned casually--the mention was mainly in the words at the head

of her paper--that they were on the Lago Maggiore, at Baveno; but it

consisted mainly of the expression of a regret that they had had so

abruptly to leave Homburg. Linda failed to say under what necessity they

had found themselves; she only hoped we hadn't judged them too harshly

and would accept "this hasty line" as a substitute for the omitted

good-bye. She also hoped our days were passing pleasantly and with the

same lovely weather that prevailed south of the Alps; and she remained

very sincerely and with the kindest remembrances--!

The note contained no message from her mother, and it was open to me to

suppose, as I should prefer, either that Mrs. Pallant hadn't known she

was writing or that they wished to make us think she hadn't known. The

letter might pass as a common civility of the girl's to a person with

whom she had been on easy terms. It was, however, for something more

than this that my nephew took it; so at least I gathered from the

touching candour of his determination to go to Baveno. I judged it idle

to drag him another way; he had money in his own pocket and was quite

capable of giving me the slip. Yet--such are the sweet incongruities of

youth--when I asked him to what tune he had been thinking of Linda since

they left us in the lurch he replied: "Oh I haven't been thinking at

all! Why should I?" This fib was accompanied by an exorbitant blush.

Since he was to obey his young woman's signal I must equally make out

where it would take him, and one splendid morning we started over the

Simplon in a post-chaise.

I represented to him successfully that it would be in much better taste

for us to alight at Stresa, which as every one knows is a resort

of tourists, also on the shore of the major lake, at about a mile's

distance from Baveno. If we stayed at the latter place we should have to

inhabit the same hotel as our friends, and this might be awkward in view

of a strained relation with them. Nothing would be easier than to go and

come between the two points, especially by the water, which would give

Archie a chance for unlimited paddling. His face lighted up at the

vision of a pair of oars; he pretended to take my plea for discretion

very seriously, and I could see that he had at once begun to calculate

opportunities for navigation with Linda. Our post-chaise--I had insisted

on easy stages and we were three days on the way--deposited us at Stresa

toward the middle of the afternoon, and it was within an amazingly short

time that I found myself in a small boat with my nephew, who pulled us

over to Baveno with vigorous strokes. I remember the sweetness of the

whole impression. I had had it before, but to my companion it was new,

and he thought it as pretty as the opera: the enchanting beauty of the

place and, hour, the stillness of the air and water, with the romantic

fantastic Borromean Islands set as great jewels in a crystal globe. We

disembarked at the steps by the garden-foot of the hotel, and somehow

it seemed a perfectly natural part of the lovely situation that I should

immediately become conscious of Mrs. Pallant and her daughter seated on

the terrace and quietly watching us. They had the air of expectation,

which I think we had counted on. I hadn't even asked Archie if he had

answered Linda's note; this was between themselves and in the way of

supervision I had done enough in coming with him.

There is no doubt our present address, all round, lacked a little the

easiest grace--or at least Louisa's and mine did. I felt too much the

appeal of her exhibition to notice closely the style of encounter of the

young people. I couldn't get it out of my head, as I have sufficiently

indicated, that Mrs. Pallant was playing a game, and I'm afraid she saw

in my face that this suspicion had been the motive of my journey. I had

come there to find her out. The knowledge of my purpose couldn't help

her to make me very welcome, and that's why I speak of our meeting

constrainedly. We observed none the less all the forms, and the

admirable scene left us plenty to talk about. I made no reference before

Linda to the retreat from Homburg. This young woman looked even prettier

than she had done on the eve of that manoeuvre and gave no sign of an

awkward consciousness. She again so struck me as a charming clever girl

that I was freshly puzzled to know why we should get--or should have

got--into a tangle about her. People had to want to complicate a

situation to do it on so simple a pretext as that Linda was in every way

beautiful. This was the clear fact: so why shouldn't the presumptions

be in favour of every result of it? One of the effects of that cause,

on the spot, was that at the end of a very short time Archie proposed to

her to take a turn with him in his boat, which awaited us at the foot of

the steps. She looked at her mother with a smiling "May I, mamma?" and

Mrs. Pallant answered "Certainly, darling, if you're not afraid." At

this--I scarcely knew why--I sought the relief of laughter: it must have

affected me as comic that the girl's general competence should suffer

the imputation of that particular flaw. She gave me a quick slightly

sharp look as she turned away with my nephew; it appeared to challenge

me a little--"Pray what's the matter with YOU?" It was the first

expression of the kind I had ever seen in her face. Mrs. Pallant's

attention, on the other hand, rather strayed from me; after we had been

left there together she sat silent, not heeding me, looking at the lake

and mountains--at the snowy crests crowned with the flush of evening.

She seemed not even to follow our young companions as they got into

their boat and pushed off. For some minutes I respected her mood; I

walked slowly up and down the terrace and lighted a cigar, as she had

always permitted me to do at Homburg. I found in her, it was true,

rather a new air of weariness; her fine cold well-bred face was pale;

I noted in it new lines of fatigue, almost of age. At last I stopped in

front of her and--since she looked so sad--asked if she had been having

bad news.

"The only bad news was when I learned--through your nephew's note to

Linda--that you were coming to us."

"Ah then he wrote?"

"Certainly he wrote."

"You take it all harder than I do," I returned as I sat down beside her.

And then I added, smiling: "Have you written to his mother?"

Slowly at last, and more directly, she faced me. "Take care, take care,

or you'll have been more brutal than you'll afterwards like," she said

with an air of patience before the inevitable.

"Never, never! Unless you think me brutal if I ask whether you knew when

Linda wrote."

She had an hesitation. "Yes, she showed me her letter. She wouldn't have

done anything else. I let it go because I didn't know what course was

best. I'm afraid to oppose her to her face."

"Afraid, my dear friend, with that girl?"

"That girl? Much you know about her! It didn't follow you'd come. I

didn't take that for granted."

"I'm like you," I said--"I too am afraid of my nephew. I don't venture

to oppose him to his face. The only thing I could do--once he wished

it--was to come with him."

"I see. Well, there are grounds, after all, on which I'm glad," she

rather inscrutably added.

"Oh I was conscientious about that! But I've no authority; I can neither

drive him nor stay him--I can use no force," I explained. "Look at the

way he's pulling that boat and see if you can fancy me."

"You could tell him she's a bad hard girl--one who'd poison any good

man's life!" my companion broke out with a passion that startled me.