"That is it. I used to be absurdly serious. But it is an age since we
last met. You were going to Trieste, were you not? I hope you found it
agreeable?"
"It is not an age; it is a year."
"Oh, a great deal can happen in a year," said Miss Stowe, turning away.
She was as richly dressed as ever, and not quite so plainly. Her hair
was arranged in little rippling waves low down upon her forehead, which
made her look, if not what might be called more worldly, at least more
fashionable, since previously she had worn it arranged with a simplicity
which was neither. Owing to this new arrangement of her hair, her eyes
looked larger and darker.
He continued to walk beside her for some moments, and then, as she came
upon a party of friends, he took leave.
In the evening he called upon Miss Harrison, and remained an hour. Miss
Stowe was not at home. The next day he sent to Miss Harrison a beautiful
basket of flowers.
"He knows we always keep the rooms full of them," remarked Miss Stowe,
rather disdainfully.
"All the same, I like the attention," said Miss Harrison. And she sent
him an invitation to dinner. She liked to have one guest.
He came. During the evening he asked Miss Stowe to sing. "I have lost my
voice," she answered.
"Yes," said Miss Harrison, "it is really remarkable; Margaret, although
she seems so well, has not been able to sing for months--indeed, for a
full year. It is quite sad."
"I am not sad about it, Aunt Ruth; I am relieved. I never sang well--I
had not voice enough. There was really nothing in it but expression; and
that was all pretence."
"You are trying to make us think you very artificial," said Morgan.
"I can make you think what I please, probably. I can follow several
lines of conduct, one after the other, and make you believe them all."
She spoke lightly; her general tone was much lighter than formerly, as
she herself had said.
"Do you ever walk in the Boboli Garden now?" he asked, later.
"Occasionally; but it is a dull place. And I do not walk as much as I
did; I drive with my aunt."
"Yes, Margaret has grown indolent," said Miss Harrison; "and it seems to
agree with her. She has more color than formerly; she looks well."
"Wonderfully," said Morgan. "But you are thinner than you were," he
added, turning towards her.
"And darker!" she answered, laughing. "Mr. Morgan does not admire
arrangements in black and white, Aunt Ruth; do not embarrass him." She
wore that evening a white dress, unrelieved by any color.
"I see you are bent upon being unkind," he said. It was supposed to be a
society remark.
"Not the least in the world," she answered, in the same tone.
He met her several times in company, and had short conversations with
her. Then, one afternoon, he came upon her unexpectedly in the Cascine;
she was strolling down the broad path alone.
"So you do walk sometimes, after all," he said.
"Never. I am only strolling. I drove here with Aunt Ruth, but, as she
came upon a party of American friends who are going to-morrow, I gave up
my place, and they are driving around together for a while, and no doubt
settling the entire affairs of Westchester County."
"I am glad she met them; I am glad to find you alone. I have something I
wish much to say to you."
"Such a beginning always frightens me. Pray postpone it."
"On the contrary, I shall hasten it. I must make the most of this rare
opportunity. Do you remember when you did me the honor, Miss Stowe, to
make me the subject of an experiment?"
"You insist upon recalling that piece of folly?" she said, opening her
parasol. Her tone was composed and indifferent.
"I recall it because I wish to base something upon it. I wish to ask
you--to allow yourself to be passively the subject of an experiment on
_my_ part, an experiment of the same nature."
She glanced at him; he half smiled. "Did you imagine, then, that mine
was in earnest?" she said, with a fine, light scorn, light as air.
"I never imagine anything. Imaginations are useless."
"Not so useless as experiments. Let yours go, and tell me rather what
you found to like in--Trieste."
"I suppose you know that I went to England?"
"I know nothing. But yes--I do know that you are going to--Tarascon."
"I shall not go if you will permit what I have asked."
"Isn't it rather suddenly planned?" she said, ironically. "You did not
know we were coming."
"Very suddenly. I have thought of it only since yesterday."
They had strolled into a narrow path which led by one of those patches
of underwood of which there are several in the Cascine--little bosky
places carefully preserved in a tangled wildness which is so pretty and
amusing to American eyes, accustomed to the stretch of real forests.
"You don't know how I love these little patches," said Miss Stowe.
"There is such a good faith about them; they are charming."
"You were always fond of nature, I remember. I used to tell you that art
was better."
"Ah! did you?" she said, her eyes following the flight of a bird.
"You have forgotten very completely in one year."
"Yes, I think I have. I always forget, you know, what it is not
agreeable to remember. But I must go back; Aunt Ruth will be waiting."
They turned.
"I will speak more plainly," said Morgan. "I went to England during July
last--that is, I followed Mrs. Lovell. She was in Devonshire. Quite
recently I have learned that she has become engaged in--Devonshire, and
is soon to be married there. I am naturally rather down about it. I am
seeking some other interest. I should like to try your plan for a while,
and build up an interest in--you."
Miss Stowe's lip curled. "The plans are not alike," she said. "Yours is
badly contrived. _I_ did not tell _you_ beforehand what I was
endeavoring to do!"
"I am obliged to tell you. You would have discovered it."
"Discovered what a pretence it was? That is true. A woman can act a part
better than a man. _You_ did not discover! And what am I to do in this
little comedy of yours?"
"Nothing. It is, in truth, nothing to you; you have told me that, even
when you made a great effort towards that especial object, it was
impossible to get up the slightest interest in me. Do not take a violent
dislike to me; that is all."
"And if it is already taken?"
"I shall have to conquer that. What I meant was--do not take a fresh
one."
"There is nothing like precedent, and therefore I repeat your question:
what if you should succeed--I mean as regards yourself?" she said,
looking at him with a satirical expression.
"It is my earnest wish to succeed."
"You do not add, as I did, that in case you do succeed you will of
course never see me again, but that at least the miserable old feeling
will be at rest?"
"I do not add it."
"And at the conclusion, when it has failed, shall you tell me that the
cause of failure was--the inevitable comparisons?"
"Beatrice is extremely lovely," he replied, turning his head and gazing
at the Arno, shining through an opening in the hedge. "I do not attempt
to pretend, even to myself, that she is not the loveliest woman I ever
knew."
"Since you do not pretend it to yourself you will not pretend it to me."
She spoke without interrogation; but he treated the words as a question.
"Why should I?" he said. And then he was silent.
"There is Aunt Ruth," said Miss Stowe; "I see the horses. She is
probably wondering what has become of me."
"You have not altogether denied me," he said, just before they reached
the carriage. "I assure you I will not be in the least importunate. Take
a day or two to consider. After all, if there is no one upon whom it can
really infringe (of course I know you have admirers; I have even heard
their names), why should you not find it even a little amusing?"
Miss Stowe turned towards him, and a peculiar expression came into her
eyes as they met his. "I am not sure but that I shall find it so," she
answered. And then they joined Miss Harrison.
The day or two had passed. There had been no formal question asked, and
no formal reply given; but as Miss Stowe had not absolutely forbidden
it, the experiment may be said to have been begun. It was soon reported
in Florence that Trafford Morgan was one of the suitors for the hand of
the heiress; and, being a candidate, he was of course subjected to the
searching light of Public Inquiry. Public Inquiry discovered that he was
thirty-eight years of age; that he had but a small income; that he was
indolent, indifferent, and cynical. Not being able to find any open
vices, Public Inquiry considered that he was too _blasé_ to have them;
he had probably exhausted them all long before. All this Madame Ferri
repeated to Miss Harrison, not because she was in the least opposed to
Mr. Morgan, but simply as part of her general task as gatherer and
disseminator.
"Trafford Morgan is not a saint, but he is well enough in his way,"
replied Miss Harrison. "I am not at all sure that a saint would be
agreeable in the family."
Madame Ferri was much amused by this; but she carried away the
impression also that Miss Harrison favored the suitor.
In the meantime nothing could be more quiet than the manner of the
supposed suitor when he was with Miss Stowe. He now asked questions of
her; when they went to the churches, he asked her impressions of the
architecture; when they visited the galleries, he asked her opinions of
the pictures. He inquired what books she liked, and why she liked them;
and sometimes he slowly repeated her replies.
This last habit annoyed her. "I wish you would not do that," she said,
with some irritation. "It is like being forced to look at one's self in
a mirror."
"I do it to analyze them," he answered. "I am so dense, you know, it
takes me a long time to understand. When you say, for instance, that
Romola is not a natural character because her love for Tito ceases, I,
who think that the unnatural part is that she should ever have loved
him, naturally dwell upon the remark."
"She would have continued to love him in life. Beauty is all powerful."
"I did not know that women cared much for it," he answered. Then, after
a moment, "Do not be too severe upon me," he added; "I am doing my
best."
She made no reply.
"I thought certainly you would have answered, 'By contrast?'" he said,
smiling. "But you are not so satirical as you were. I cannot make you
angry with me."
"Have you tried?"
"Of course I have tried. It would be a step gained to move you--even in
that way."
"I thought your experiment was to be all on one side?" she said. They
were sitting in a shady corner of the cloisters of San Marco; she was
leaning back in her chair, following with the point of her parasol the
lines of the Latin inscription on the slab at her feet over an old
monk's last resting-place.
"I am not so consistent as I should be," he answered, rising and
sauntering off, with his hands in the pockets of his short morning-coat,
to look at St. Peter the Martyr.
At another time they were in the Michael Angelo chapel of San Lorenzo.
It was past the hour for closing, but Morgan had bribed the custode to
allow them to remain, and the old man had closed the door and gone away,
leaving them alone with the wondrous marbles.
"What do they mean?" he said. "Tell me."
"They mean fate, our sad human fate: the beautiful Dawn in all the pain
of waking; the stern determination of the Day; the recognition of
failure in Evening; and the lassitude of dreary, hopeless sleep in
Night. It is one way of looking at life."
"But not your way?"
"Oh, I have no way; I am too limited. But genius takes a broader view,
and genius, I suppose, must always be sad. People with that endowment, I
have noticed, are almost always very unhappy."
He was sitting beside her, and, as she spoke, he saw a little flush rise
in her cheeks; she was remembering when Mrs. Lovell had used the same
words, although in another connection.
"We have never spoken directly, or at any length, of Beatrice," she
said, suddenly. "I wish you would tell me about her."
"Here?"
"Yes, here and now; Lorenzo shall be your judge."
"I am not afraid of Lorenzo. He is not a god; on the contrary, he has
all our deepest humanity on his musing face; it is for this reason that
he impresses us so powerfully. As it is the first time you have
expressed any wish, Miss Stowe, I suppose I must obey it."
"Will it be difficult?"
"It is always difficult, is it not, for a man to speak of an unhappy
love?" he said, leaning his elbow on the back of the seat, and shading
his eyes with his hand as he looked at her.
"I will excuse you."
"I have not asked to be excused. I first met Mrs. Lovell in Sicily. I
was with her almost constantly during five weeks. She is as lovable as a
rose--as a peach--as a child." He paused.
"Your comparisons are rather remarkable," said Miss Stowe, her eyes
resting upon the grand massiveness of Day.
"They are truthful. I fell in love with her; and I told her so because
there was that fatal thing, an opportunity--that is, a garden-seat,
starlight, and the perfume of flowers. Of course these were
irresistible."
"Indeed?"
"Do not be contemptuous. It is possible that you may not have been
exposed to the force of the combination as yet. She rebuked me with that
lovely, gentle softness of hers, and then she went away; the Sicilian
days were over. I wrote to her--"
He was sitting in the same position, with his hand shading his eyes,
looking at her; as he spoke the last phrase he perceived that she
colored, and colored deeply.
"You knew the story generally," he said, dropping his arm and leaning
forward. "But it is not possible you saw that letter!"
She rose and walked across, as if to get a nearer view of Day. "I admire
it so much!" she said, after a moment. "If it should stretch out that
great right arm, it could crush us to atoms." And she turned towards him
again.
As she did she saw that he had colored also; a deep, dark flush had
risen in his face, and covered even his forehead.
"I am safe--very safe!" he said. "After reading such a letter as that,
written to another woman, you are not likely to bestow much regard upon
the writer, try as he may!"
Miss Stowe looked at him. "You are overacting," she said, coldly. "It is
not in your part to pretend to care so soon. It was to be built up
gradually."
"Lorenzo understands me," he said, recovering himself. "Shall I go on?"
"I think I must go now," she answered, declining a seat; "it is late."
"In a moment. Let me finish, now that I have begun. I had thought of
returning to America; indeed, Beatrice had advised it; she thought I was
becoming expatriated. But I gave it up and remained in Italy because I
did not wish to appear too much her slave (women do not like men who
obey them too well, you know). After this effort I was consistent enough
to follow her to England. I found her in--Devonshire, lovelier than
ever; and I was again fascinated; I was even ready to accept beforehand
all the rules and embargo of the strictest respect to the memory of Mr.
Lovell."
Miss Stowe's eyes were upon Day; but here, involuntarily, she glanced
towards her companion. His face remained unchanged.
"I was much in love with her. She allowed me no encouragement. But I did
not give up a sort of vague hope I had until this recent change. Then,
of course, I knew that it was all over for me."
"I am sorry for you," replied Miss Stowe after a pause, still looking at
Day.
"Of course I have counted upon that--upon your sympathy. I knew that you
would understand."
"Spare me the quotation, 'A fellow-feeling,' and so forth," she said,
moving towards the door. "I am going; I feel as though we had already
desecrated too long this sacred place."
"It is no desecration. The highest heights of art, as well as of life,
belong to love," he said, as they went out into the cool, low hall,
paved with the gravestones of the Medici.
"Don't you always think of them lying down below?" she said. "Giovanni
in his armor, and Leonore of Toledo in her golden hair?"
"Since when have you become so historical? They were a wicked race."
"And since when have you become so virtuous?" she answered. "They were
at least successful."
Time passed. It has a way of passing rapidly in Florence; although each
day is long and slow and full and delightful, a month flies. Again the
season was waning. It was now believed that Mr. Morgan had been
successful, although nothing definite was known. It was remarked how
unusually well Miss Stowe looked: her eyes were so bright and she had so
much color that she really looked brilliant. Madame Ferri repeated this
to Miss Harrison.
"Margaret was always brilliant," said her aunt.
"Oh, extremely!" said Madame Ferri.
"Only people never found it out," added Miss Harrison.
She herself maintained a calm and uninquiring demeanor. Sometimes she
was with her niece and her niece's supposed suitor, and sometimes not.
She continued to receive him with the same affability which she had
bestowed upon him from the first, and occasionally she invited him to
dinner and to drive. She made no comment upon the frequency of his
visits, or the length of his conversations upon the little balcony in
the evening, where the plash of the fountain came faintly up from below.
In truth she had no cause for solicitude; nothing could be more tranquil
than the tone of the two talkers. Nothing more was said about Mrs.
Lovell; conversation had sunk back into the old impersonal channel.
"You are very even," Morgan said one evening. "You do not seem to have
any moods. I noticed it last year."
"One is even," she replied, "when one is--"
"Indifferent," he suggested.
She did not contradict him.
Two things she refused to do: she would not sing, and she would not go
to the Boboli Garden.
"As I am especially fond of those tall, ceremonious old hedges and
serene statues, you cut me off from a real pleasure," said Morgan.
It was on the evening of the 16th of May; they were sitting by the open
window; Miss Harrison was not present.
"You can go there after we have gone," she said, smiling. "We leave
to-morrow."
"You leave to-morrow!" he repeated. Then, after an instant, "It is
immensely kind to tell me beforehand," he said, ironically. "I should
have thought you would have left it until after your departure!"
She made no reply, but fanned herself slowly with the beautiful gray
fan.
"I suppose you consider that the month is more than ended, and that you
are free?"
"You have had all you asked for, Mr. Morgan."
"And therefore I have now only to thank you for your generosity, and let
you go."
"I think so."
"You do not care to know the result of my experiment--whether it has
been a failure or a success?" he said. "You told me the result of
yours."
"I did not mean to tell you. It was forced from me by your
misunderstanding."
"Misunderstandings, because so slight that one cannot attack them, are
horrible things. Let there be none between us now."
"There is none."
"I do not know." He leaned back in his chair and looked up at the soft
darkness of the Italian night. "I have one more favor to ask," he said,
presently. "You have granted me many; grant me this. At what hour do you
go to-morrow?"
"In the afternoon."
"Give me a little time with you in the Boboli Garden in the morning."
"You are an accomplished workman, Mr. Morgan; you want to finish with a
polish; you do not like to leave rough ends. Be content; I will accept
the intention as carried out, and suppose that all the last words have
been beautifully and shiningly spoken. That will do quite as well."
"Put any construction upon it you please," he answered. "But consent."
But it was with great difficulty that he obtained that consent.
"There is really nothing you can say that I care to hear," she declared,
at last.
"The king is dead! My time is ended, evidently! But, as there _is_
something you can say which _I_ care to hear, I again urge you to
consent."
Miss Stowe rose, and passed through the long window into the lighted
empty room, decked as usual with many flowers; here she stood, looking
at him, as he entered also.
"I have tried my best to prevent it," she said.
"You have."
"And you still insist?"
"I do."
"Very well; I consent. But you will not forget that I tried," she said.
"Good-night."
The next morning at ten, as he entered the old amphitheatre, he saw her;
she was sitting on one of the upper stone seats, under a statue of
Diana.
"I would rather go to our old place," he said, as he came up; "the seat
under the tree, you know."
"I like this better."
"As you prefer, of course. It will be more royal, more in state; but, to
be in accordance with it, you should have been clothed in something
majestic, instead of that soft, yielding hue."
"That is hardly necessary," she answered.
"By which you mean, I suppose, that your face is not yielding. And
indeed it is not."
She was dressed in cream color from head to foot; she held open, poised
on one shoulder, a large, heavily fringed, cream-colored parasol. Above
this soft drapery and under this soft shade the darkness of her hair and
eyes was doubly apparent.
He took a seat beside her, removed his hat, and let the breeze play over
his head and face; it was a warm summer morning, and they were in the
shadow.
"I believe I was to tell you the result of my experiment," he said,
after a while, breaking the silence which she did not break.
"You wished it; I did not ask it."
If she was cool, he was calm; he was not at all as he had been the night
before; then he had seemed hurried and irritated, now he was quiet. "The
experiment has succeeded," he said, deliberately. "I find myself often
thinking of you; I like to be with you; I feel when with you a sort of
satisfied content. What I want to ask is--I may as well say it at
once--Will not this do as the basis of a better understanding between
us?"
She was gazing at the purple slopes of Monte Morello opposite. "It
might," she answered.
He turned; her profile was towards him, he could not see her eyes.
"I shall be quite frank," he continued; "under the circumstances it is
my only way. You have loved some one else. I have loved some one else.
We have both been unhappy. We should therefore, I think, have a peculiar
sympathy for and comprehension of each other. It has seemed to me that
these, combined with my real liking for you, might be a sufficient
foundation for--let us call it another experiment. I ask you to make
this experiment, Margaret; I ask you to marry me. If it fails--if you
are not happy--I promise not to hold you in the slightest degree. You
shall have your liberty untrammelled, and, at the same time, all shall
be arranged so as to escape comment. I will be with you enough to save
appearances; that is all. In reality you shall be entirely free. I think
you can trust my word."
"I shall have but little from my aunt," was her answer, her eyes still
fixed upon the mountain. "I am not her heiress, as you suppose."
"You mean that to be severe; but it falls harmless. It is true that I
did suppose you were her heiress; but the fact that you are not makes no
difference in my request. We shall not be rich, but we can live; it
shall be my pleasure to make you comfortable."
"I do not quite see why you ask this," she said, with the same slow
utterance and her eyes turned away. "You do not love me; I am not
beautiful; I have no fortune. What, then, do you gain?"
"I gain," he said--"I gain--" Then he paused. "You would not like me to
tell you," he added; and his voice was changed.
"I beg you to tell me." Her lips were slightly compressed, a tremor had
seized her; she seemed to be exerting all her powers of self-control.
He watched her a moment, and then, leaning towards her while a new and
beautiful expression of tenderness stole into his eyes, "I gain,
Margaret," he said, "the greatest gift that can be given to a man on
this earth, a gift I long for--a wife who really and deeply loves me."