In the doorway below she paused a moment, a little startled at the
scene. The bowed heads, the bit of folded tissue, the laughing, eager
tones, the look in Miss Stone’s face held her. She swept aside the
drapery and entered--the stately lady of the house.
The bowed heads were lifted. The child sprang to her feet. “Mother-dear!
It is my friend! He has come!” The words sang.
Mrs. Philip Harris held out a gracious hand. She had not intended to
offer her hand. She had intended to be distant and kind. But when the
man looked up she somehow forgot. She held out the hand with a quick
smile.
The Greek was on his feet, bending above it. “It is an honour,
madame--that you come.”
“I have come to ask a favour,” she replied, slowly, her eyes travelling
over the well-brushed clothes, the clean linen, the slender feet of the
man. Favour was not what she had meant to say--privilege was nearer it.
But there was something about him. Her voice grew suave to match the
words.
“My daughter has told me of you--” Her hand rested lightly on the
child’s curls--a safe, unrumpled touch. “Her visit to you has enchanted
her. She speaks of it every day, of the Parthenon and what you told
her.”
The eyes of the man and the child met gravely.
“I wondered whether you would be willing to tell some friends of
mine--here--now--”
He had turned to her--a swift look.
She replied with a smile. “Nothing formal--just simple things, such as
you told the child. We should be very grateful to you,” she added, as if
she were a little surprised at herself.
He looked at her with clear eyes. “I speak--yes--I like always--to speak
of my country. I thank you.”
The child, standing by with eager feet, moved lightly. Her hands danced
in softest pats. “You will tell them about it--just as you told me--and
they will love it!”
“I tell them--yes!”
“Come, Miss Stone.” The child held out her hand with a little gesture of
pride and loving. “We must go now. Good-bye, Mr. Achilles. You will come
again, please.”
“I come,” said Achilles, simply. He watched the quaint figure pass
down the long rooms beside the shimmering grey dress, through an arched
doorway at the end, and out of sight. Then he turned to his hostess
with the quick smile of his race. “She is beautiful, madame,” he said,
slowly. “She is a child!”
The mother assented, absently. She was not thinking of the child, but of
the fifty members of the Halcyon Club in the library. “Will you come?”
she said. “My friends are waiting.”
He spread his hands in quick assent. “I come--as you like. I give
pleasure--to come.”
She smiled a little. “Yes, you give pleasure.” She was somehow at ease
about the man. He was poor--illiterate, perhaps, but not uncouth.
She glanced at him with a little look of approval as they went up the
staircase. It came to her suddenly that he harmonised with it, and
with all the beautiful things about them. The figure of Professor Trent
flashed upon her--short and fat and puffing, and yearning toward the top
of the stair. But this man. There was the grand air about him--and yet
so simple.
It was almost with a sense of eclat that she ushered him into the
library. The air stirred subtly, with a little hush. The president
was on her feet, introducing Mr. Achilles Alexandrakis, who, in the
unavoidable absence of Professor Trent, had kindly consented to speak to
them on the traditions and customs of modern Greek life.
Achilles’s eyes fell gently on the lifted faces. “I like to tell you
about my home,” he said, simply. “I tell you all I can.”
The look of strain in the faces relaxed. It was going to be an easy
lecture--one that you could know something about. They settled to soft
attention and approval.
Achilles waited a minute--looking at them with deep eyes. And suddenly
they saw that the eyes were not looking at them, but at something far
away--something beautiful and loved.
It is safe to say that the members of the Halcyon Club had never
listened to anything quite like the account that Achilles Alexandrakis
gave them that day, in the gloomy room of the red-fronted house
overlooking the lake, of the land of his birth. They scarcely listened
to the actual words at first, but they listened to him all lighted up
from far away. There was something about him as he spoke--a sweeping
rhythm that flew as a bird, reaching over great spaces, and a simple joy
that lilted a little and sang.
He drew for them the Parthenon--the glory of Athens--in column and
statue and mighty temple and crumbling tomb.... A sense of beauty and
wonder and still, clear light passed before them.
Then he paused... his voice laughed a little, and he spoke of his
people.... Nobody could have quite told what he said to them about his
people. But flutes sang. The sound of feet was on the grass--touching
it in tune--swift-flitting feet that paused and held a rhythmic measure
while it swung. Quick-beating feet across the green. Shadowy forms.
The sway of gowns, light-falling, and the call of voices low and sweet.
Greek youth and maid in swiftest play. They flung the branches wide and
trembled in the voiceless light that played upon the grass. The foot
of Achilles half-beat the time. The tones filled themselves and lifted,
slowly, surely. The voice quickened--it ran with faster notes, as one
who tells some eager tale. Then it swung in cradling-song the twilight
of Athens--and the little birds sang low, twittering underneath the
leaves--in softest garb--at last--rose leaves falling--the dusky
bats around her roof-tops, and the high-soaring sky that arches
all--mysterious and deep. Then the voice sank low, and rang and held
the note--stern, splendid--Athens of might. City of Power! Glory, in
changing word, and in the lift of eye. Athens on her hills, like great
Jove enthroned--the shout, the triumph, the clash of steel, and the feet
of Alaric in the streets. The voice of the Greek grew hoarse now, tiny
cords swelled on his forehead. Athens, city of war. Desolation, fire,
and trampling--! His eye was drawn in light. Vandal hand and iron
foot!...
Who shall say how much of it he told--how much of it he spoke, and how
much was only hinted or called up--in his voice and his gesture and his
eye. They had not known that Athens was like this! They spoke in lowered
voices, moving apart a little, and making place for the silver trays
that began to pass among them. They glanced now and then at the dark man
nibbling his biscuit absently and looking with unfathomable eyes into a
teacup.
A large woman approached him, her ample bust covered with little beads
that rose and fell and twinkled as she talked. “I liked your talk, Mr.
Alexis, and I am going over just as soon as my husband can get away from
his business.” She looked at him with approval, waiting for his.
He bowed with deep, grave gesture. “My country is honoured, madame.”
Other listeners were crowding upon them now, commending the fire-tipped
words, felicitating the man with pretty gesture and soft speech,
patronising him for the Parthenon and his country and her art. ... The
mistress of the house, moving in and out among them, watched the play
with a little look of annoyance.... He would be spoiled--a man of that
class. She glanced down at the slip of paper in her hand. It bore the
name, “Achilles Alexandrakis,” and below it a generous sum to his order.
She made her way toward him, and waited while he disengaged himself
from the little throng about him and came to her, a look of pleasure and
service in his face.
“You speak to me, madame?”
“I wanted to give you this.” She slipped the check into the thin
fingers. “You can look at it later--”
But already the fingers had raised it with a little look of pleased
surprise.... Then the face darkened, and he laid the paper on the
polished table between them. There was a quick movement of the slim
fingers that pushed it toward her.
“I cannot take it, madame--to speak of my country. I speak for the
child--and for you.” He bowed low. “I give please to do it.”
The next moment he had saluted her with gentle grace and was gone from
the room--from the house--between the stone lions and down the Lake
Shore Drive, his free legs swinging in long strides, his head held high
to the wind on the opal lake.
A carriage passed him, and he looked up. Two figures, erect in the sun,
the breath of a child’s smile, a bit of shimmer and grey, the flash and
beat of quick hoofs--and they were gone. But the heart of Achilles sang
in his breast, and the day about him was full of light.