Don Roberto and Mr. Polk took no part in these festivities; Mrs. Yorba
and Magdaléna took less and less; the picture made by Don Roberto in his
shirt-sleeves, manipulating a hose as the char-à-banc drove off, finally
forbade his wife to riot while her husband toiled. She was angry and
resentful; but she was a woman of stern principles, and she had a
certain measure of that sort of love for her husband which duty prompts
in those who are without passion.
"I don't pretend to understand your father," she said to Magdaléna. "The
bees he gets in his bonnet are quite beyond me, but if he feels that
way, he does, and that's the end of it; and he makes me feel
uncomfortable all the time I am anywhere. I sha'n't go out again until
he gets over this. You can go with somebody else."
"I would a great deal rather stay home. I don't enjoy myself. People
work so hard to be amused. I'd much rather just sit still and do
nothing."
"You're lazy, like all the Spanish. Well, you'll have to do a good deal
of sitting still, I expect; and in a sick room, I'm afraid. Poor Hiram
looks thinner and greyer every day. Almost all our relations died of
consumption."
"I wrote to aunt how badly he was looking, but she has not answered."
"She won't, the heartless thing. She never loved him. But if he takes to
his bed with slow consumption, she'll have to come up and do her share
of the nursing. She ought to like it. Fat women always make good
nurses."
Magdaléna was more than glad to fall out of the gaieties. She was
beginning to feel that most demoralising of all sensations,--the
disintegration of will. Pride, a certain excitement, and novelty had
kept her armour locked for a time; but each time she met Trennahan, the
ordeal of facing him with platitudes, or, what was worse still, in
occasional friendly talks, and of witnessing Helena's little airs of
possession, suggested a future and signal failure. She came to have a
morbid terror that she should betray herself, and when in company with
him kept out of the very reach of his voice. She never went to the
woods, lest she meet him, with or without Helena. In those rustling
arbours of many memories, she knew that she should let fly the passion
within her. She was appalled that neither time nor will nor principle
had authority over her love. She had made up her mind that she would, if
not tear it up by the roots, at least level it to the soil from which it
had sprung, and she was quite ready to believe that love was not all;
that with her youth, intellect, and wealth there was much in life for
her. But the plant flourished and was heavy with bloom. Even while she
avoided him, she longed for the moment when he must of necessity speak
to her. She welcomed the excuse to secede from the ranks of pleasurers,
but even then she started up at every sound of wheels that might herald
his approach. She longed for the wedding to be over; but Helena would
not marry before December, that being her birth month and eminently
suitable, in her logical fancy, for her second launching. Colonel
Belmont, having satisfied himself that everyone in the little drama had
acted with honour, was well pleased with his son-in-law; but he was much
distressed at the attitude of the old friend who had hoped to fill a
similar relation to Trennahan. Don Roberto, taciturn with everybody,
refused to speak to Colonel Belmont, to return his courtly salutation.
"I suppose it is natural," said Colonel Belmont to Helena. "Don is not
only eccentric, but he would almost rather lose a hundred thousand
dollars than his own way. But I hope he'll come round in time, for it
makes me feel right lonesome in my old age. He and Hi were the only real
intimates I have had in California, and now Hi is going, poor old
fellow! and of course I can do little to cheer him up until Don thaws
out."
"Do you feel quite well yourself?" asked Helena, anxiously. "You often
look so terribly pale."
"I never was better, honey, I assure you. But remember that you must
expect to lose your old father some day. But I've been pretty good to
you, haven't I? You'll have nothing but pleasant things to remember?"
"You're the very best angel on earth. I don't even love Jack so much. I
thought I did, but I don't."
"Don't you love him?" asked her father, anxiously. He was eager for her
to marry; he knew that his blood was white.
"Of course! What a question!"