"Probably not for a month yet. There will be a good deal more wrangling
before the bill goes through. I don't like it in its present shape and
don't expect to in its ultimate; neither do a good many of us. But I
shall vote for it, because the country needs a high tariff, and
anything will be better than nothing for the present. Later, the whole
matter will be reopened and war waged on the Trusts."
"Sally says they have bought up the atmosphere."
"They may be said to have bought up several climates. I have spent a
great many hours puzzling over that question, for they have put an end
to the old days when young men could go into business with the hope of
a progressive future. Now they are swallowed up at once,
depersonalized, and the whole matter is one of the great questions
affecting the future development of the Republic."
He was not looking at Betty; he was staring out on the lake. His eyes
and mouth were hard again; he looked like a mere intellect, nothing
more.
As Betty watched him, she experienced a sudden desire to put him back
on the pedestal he had occupied in the first days of their
acquaintance, and to worship him as an ideal and forget him as a man.
That had been a period of intellectual days and quiet nights. And as he
looked now, he seemed to ask no more of any woman.
But in a moment he had turned to her again with the smile and the
peculiar concentration of gaze which made women forget he was a
statesman.
"Not another word of politics," he said. "I did not get up at four in
the morning to meet the most charming woman in America and talk
politics. Do you know that it is over three months since I saw you
last?"
"You left Washington, so, naturally, I left it too."
"I wonder, how much you mean? If I were to judge you by myself--Your
few notes were very interesting. Did you enjoy California?"
"California was made to enjoy, but I felt very much alone in it."
"Of course you did. Nature is a wicked old matchmaker. You have felt
quite as lonely up here since your return."
"Yes, I have! But I have had a good deal to occupy my mind. Sally
terrified me by asserting that Harriet and my cousin Jack Emory were in
love with each other."
"Who is Harriet?"
"Oh, you have forgotten! And you made me take her into the bosom of my
family."
"Oh--yes; I had forgotten her name. I hope she is not making trouble
for you."
"She admitted that she loves him, but insists that he does not love
her, and I don't think he does."
"Probably not. I should as soon think of falling in love with a weeping
figure on a tombstone."
"What kind of women do you fall in love with?" asked Betty,
irresistibly. She was sure of herself now. The passions of women are
often calmed by the presence of their lover. Passion is so largely
mental in them that it reaches heights in the imagination that reality
seldom justifies and mere propinquity quells. For this reason they
often are recklessly unfair to men, who are made on simpler lines.
They had floated under the spreading arms of a thicket on the water's
edge, and she was a brilliant white figure in the gloom.
"I have no recipe," he said, smiling. "Certainly not with the women
that weep, poor things!" Betty wondered what his personal attitude was
to the tears of twenty years. She knew from Sally that Mrs. North had
long attacks of depression. But his mind had been occupied; that meant
almost everything. And his heart?
"Do you love anybody now?" she broke out. "Is there a woman in your
life? Some one who makes you happy?"
The smile left his lips. It was too much to say that it had been in his
eyes, but they changed also.
"There is no woman in my life, as you put it. Why do you ask?"
"Because I want to know."
They regarded each other squarely. In a moment he said deliberately:
"The greatest happiness that I have had in the past few months has been
my friendship with you. If I were free, I should make love to you. If
you will have the truth, I can conceive of no happiness so great as to
be your husband. I have caught myself dreaming of it--and over and over
again. But as it is I am not going to make love to you. When the strain
becomes too great, I shall leave you. Until then--Ah, don't!"
Betty, who had dropped her head when he began to speak, had raised it
slowly, and her face concealed nothing.
"I, too, love you," she said in a moment. "I love you, love you, love
you. If you knew what a relief it is to say it. That is the reason I
would not go up into the forest with you just now. I was afraid. I have
been with you there too often!"
For the first time she saw the muscles of his face relax, and she
covered her face with her hands. "I shouldn't have told you," she
whispered, "I shouldn't have told you. I have made it harder. You will
go away at once."