"The heart is a small thing, but desireth great matters. It is not
sufficient for a kite's dinner, yet the whole world is not
sufficient for it."--HUGO DE ANIMA.
That evening Vere and I settled the business details of the developments
he had planned. Also while we three were quietly together, I launched a
discussion that had been gathering in my mind all day while I watched
Phillida.
"You are doing as efficient work as Vere," I told her. "In fact, you are
a most moderate pair! I gave you an open bank account, Phil; and you
have furnished the house for so little that I am amazed. And it is all
so gay, so freshly pretty! Being an ignorant man, the details are beyond
me. But--one servant? Aren't you working yourself too hard? I had
expected you to need several. Of course, we are not counting Vere's
outdoor force."
She turned in her low chair beside the lamp and glanced toward the
window behind her, before replying. I noticed the action, because a
moment before Vere had turned precisely the same way.
"It is good of you to think of those things, Cousin Roger," she
declared. "But, I want to be a real wife to Drawls. I do, indeed! And I
have it all to learn because I was not brought up for that. Look at this
dish-towel I am hemming. Cristina would laugh at the stitches if she
dared, yet they are better than when I began. Some day I shall sew fine
things. So it is with all my housekeeping. I think we should begin as we
mean to go on, so I have furnished the house for--us. Perhaps if it had
been for you alone, I should have chosen satin-wood and tapestry instead
of willow and cretonne. The same way about Cristina. If Ethan and I are
to save and earn this lovely place, as you offered, we cannot afford
more than one maid. You understand what I am trying to explain, don't
you?"
"Yes," I assented. "Surely! What were you looking for, just now, behind
you?"
"I? Oh, nothing! I just fancied someone had passed by the window and
stared in. I can't imagine what made me fancy that. Unless the cat----"
She hesitated.
"Bagheera is asleep under Mr. Locke's chair," Vere observed casually.
"Truly, Cousin Roger, I love the way we are living," she resumed. "It is
very miserable of me, I daresay, not to be more intellectual after all
Father and Mother labored with me. But it is so! I want to live this way
all my life; to be busy, and plan things with Ethan, and make them come
true together."
Under cover of the table she put her hand into Vere's, and silence held
us a little while. I watched Bagheera the cat, who sat beside my chair
staring with unblinking yellow eyes toward the window across the room.
Did I imagine a slight uneasiness in those eyes, a wary readiness in
gathered limbs and muscles bulking under the old cat's scant fur? Now
the tail twitched with a lashing movement.
Presently Bagheera looked away and relaxed. A moment more, and he curled
down, composing himself to sleep.
"You like the place, Phil?" I questioned. "You do not find it lonely
here, or in any way depressing?"
The candor of her surprise told me that no dweller between the worlds
had visited her.
"Cousin Roger? This darling house? Why?"
I passed that question safely, and after a few minutes bade them
good-night. They had a fashion of gazing at one another that made it a
matter of necessary kindness to leave them alone together.
As I made my solitary way upstairs, I will not deny a growing
excitement, or that dread fought with my resolution. Who would keep
tryst with me tonight? The Horror or the lady? Both; as each time
before? If so, which one would come first, and what might be my measure
of success or failure? If some trick were being played upon me, I meant
to pluck it out of the mystery.
The quietly pleasant room received me without a hint of the unusual. I
lighted the lamps and sat down to my work.
The house was still by ten o'clock, all lights out except mine. At
midnight I lay down in the dark, the pomander under my pillow. Whether I
put the gold ball there from sentiment, or from some absurd fancy about
its perfume and mystic carving being somehow a talisman against evil, or
because I feared the trinket might be taken from me during the night, I
should be troubled to answer. I did place it there, and lay lapped in
its sweet odor while the moments dragged past; heavy, slow-footed
moments of strain and dreadful expectation scarcely relieved by a hope
uneasy as fear.
The cock crowed for the first hour; and for the second. I slept, at
last. When I awoke, level sun-rays were striking across the world.
Nothing had happened.