The Braines have been back in Washington for a month. Politics recalled
Braine, and Braine recalled Helen. When she began to think of returning
to the Washington house where she had endured one year of absolute
wretchedness as an initiation, she was overwhelmed with distaste for the
move, but she resolved to keep her repugnance to herself, and fight the
feeling down.
She wondered once if she had rather return to the cottage in Thebes, but
dismissed the idea quickly and impatiently. She knew that the meagre,
provincial life would be intolerable to her now. She wanted the luxuries
of the Washington house, but shrank from the thought of having to go
thither to find them. She made up her mind to the inevitable, however,
and they returned as late as business would allow.
The night of her return when she first entered the house she felt faint
and weak for a moment, as a host of wretched memories arose, connected
with every portion of the place. But she brought her will to bear, and
Braine did not notice her distress.
He seemed affected differently. He seemed almost like a boy in his
enthusiasm over their return, and went from room to room, showing her
certain changes he had made surreptitiously during the summer for her
surprise.
He pauses in the library, and suddenly takes Helen in his arms. He says:
"I cannot analyze the feeling that I experience; the peculiar gladness I
have at returning here with you well and happy. Though I suffered agony
in sympathy with the suffering you endured here, the experience seems to
have endeared the place to me. You will never know what your counsel and
help during those months meant to me. Our achievements shall now begin
in earnest. Oh, Helen, Helen, the joy of striving and accomplishing for
you is the dearest one of my life. To see you honored and admired and
envied, and to know it comes through my exertions will be my supreme
happiness."
"Am _I_ not your supreme happiness?"
"Yes, and therefore less than all for you would mean supreme
wretchedness for me."
There has been a wistful note in his voice, and he is tender beyond all
imagining. They seem very near to each other this night of their return,
and this new marriage somehow lessens Helen's feeling of disquietude,
and reassures her. She finds herself looking forward with a certain
delight and satisfaction to this winter when she will establish her
social supremacy, that she may stand beside this man who is just
becoming supreme in another field, and seem worthy to share some of the
honors accorded him.
They have sat below by the library fire, far into the night. They have
discussed the situation. They have planned the details of the campaign,
and their confidence in each other, and the feeling of each that the
advancement of the other is in his or her hands, has already won the
fight.
The servants are in bed; the silence of the great house has not been
broken for hours, save by the low, earnest, wooing tones of the man and
woman in the soft light of the rare room. The woman in a half-dream of
delight, as rosy visions of the future are conjured up by the man whose
voice of the lover always intoxicates her senses; a dainty woman, a
regal woman, a woman whose least motion suggests the patrician, morally,
mentally, physically; a woman subtle in her frankness and simplicity,
dignified in her naivete; a woman perfectly matched with the man. And
he, a man whose very presence suggests power and grace of mind; a
temperament wherein reverence predominates, if audacity dominates; a man
who must lend good, even to the worst, and make the worst seem not
tolerable, but acceptable. And none in looking on him can decide whether
his mind is responsible for his charming person, or the reverse.
All the room is in shadow save where they two sit, and as he takes the
soft, shaded light in his hands, and conducts the woman to her door, my
imagination plays a sudden trick; the room is one of statelier times,
and one becomes a "bold, brave knight," the other one, "my lady."