|IT was the middle of January. Felicia stood at the salon window and
looked out at the snow falling, falling in the deserted street. She was
oppressed by the dead silence of things. There was not even a cheerful
fire to crackle in the room, which was heated by the cold white
porcelain stove in the corner. All the ladies had retired to their
rooms, for their usual afternoon siesta, and there was not a sound in
the house. She caught sight of a cab passing down the street, but it
moved with a deathlike noiselessness over the snow. She half wished the
driver would crack his whip, although she hated the maniacal pastime,
dear to Genevese cabmen, as much as Schopenhauer himself. But he passed
on, a benumbed, silent spectre, huddled up on his box.
Nothing but stillness, dreariness, and desolation. The house seemed
empty, the street empty, the world empty.
Raine Chetwynd had come and gone. For a brief season his hearty voice
and cheery face had gladdened the little pension. He had come with
his robustness of moral fibre, his culture, his broad knowledge of the
world, and his vigorous manhood, and the pulse of the community seemed
to beat stronger for it. In spite of the old man's warning, they had
all expected to see in the young “professor” a pale image of his father,
minus the softening charm of age. But, instead, they had been presented
with a type of blond, Anglo-Saxon comeliness--tall, deep-chested,
fresh-coloured, with an open, attractive face, blue-eyed and
fair-moustached, which, at first sight, seemed to belong to a thousand
men who rowed and cricketed, and lived honest, unparticularized lives,
but on closer examination showed itself to be that of a man who could
combine thought and action, the scholar and the athlete, the man of
intellectual breath and refinement, and the cheery, practical man of the
world. He was a man, in the specific feminine sense. He had brought into
the pension the influence that Mrs. Stapleton had insisted on, with such
passionate bitterness, as being needful in a woman's life. Each of the
women had brightened under it, exhibiting instinctively the softer
side of her nature. Mme. Popea had kept hidden from view the shapeless
wrapper, adorned with cheap soiled lace, in which, much to Frau
Schultz's annoyance, she would now and then appear at déjeuner, and had
tidied and curled her hair betimes, instead of leaving it till the late
afternoon. In Frau Schultz a dignified urbanity had taken the place of
peevish egotism. Little Miss Bunter had perked up like a frozen sparrow
warmed into life, and had chirruped merrily to her canaries. The only
friction that his presence had caused, had arisen between Mme. Boccard
and Frâulein Klinkhardt, who had broadly hinted a request to be placed
next to him at table. A pretty quarrel had resulted from Mme. Boccard's
refusal; after which Frâulein Klinkhardt went to bed for a day, and
Mme. Boccard called her softly, under her breath, a German crane, which
appeared to afford her much relief.
It had been pleasant and comfortable to see a man again in the salon. It
had broken the sense of isolation they carried with them, like lead in
their hearts, all through the winter. Then, too, he had been a man whom
one and all could honestly respect. He had been open-hearted, frank with
them all, showing, in a younger, fresher way, the charm of courtesy that
distinguished his father. But naturally he had brought himself nearer
to them, had not seemed placed in such remote moral and intellectual
spheres.
Besides, there had been a few festivities. Old Mr. Chetwynd had given,
in honour of his son's visit, a Christmas dinner, which had won him the
heart of Frau Schultz. Frâulein Klinkhardt and herself had lavished more
than their usual futile enthusiasm on a Christmas tree, which, owing to
Raine, had something better than its customary _succès d'estime_. He had
taken them to the theatre, made up skating parties at Villeneuve, at
the other side of the lake. Some friends of his at Lausanne had given
a large dance, to which he had managed to escort Felicia and Katherine,
under his father's protection. A couple of undergraduates of his own
college were there; they came a few days afterwards to Geneva to see
him; and that was another merry evening at the pension.
Katherine Stapleton had brightened, too, under the gaiety, and her eyes
had lost for the time the touch of weariness that saddened her face in
her gentler moods, and her laugh had rung true and fresh. There were
many evident points of contact between herself and him, much that was
complementary in each to the other.
One day he had said to her laughingly,--
“I have come round to the opinion---which I had not at first--that you
are the most incomprehensibly feminine thing I know.”
“And I,” she had replied, “to the after-opinion that you are the most
comprehensibly masculine one.”
“Is that why we get on so well together?”
“That is what I had meant to convey,” she had answered with a light
laugh.
The rest of which conversation lingered long after his departure in
Katherine's memory.
Now he had gone, and life at the pension resumed its dreary, monotonous
round. Raine Chetwynd would have been surprised had he known the change
wrought by his departure.
Felicia obviously shared in the general depression, and, like
Katherine, had memories of bright hours in which the sun seemed to
shine exclusively for her own individual benefit. She thought of them
wretchedly, as she stood by the window watching the flakes fall through
the grey air.
A voice behind her caused her to start, though the words seemed to come
out of some far distance. It was old Mr. Chetwynd. He had been somewhat
ailing the last day or two, unable to go out. In a fit of restlessness,
he had wandered down to the salon.
“Lost in the snow?” he asked, coming to her side.
“Yes,” she replied, with a half sigh. “I think so. Quite. I was
beginning to doubt whether I should find my way safe home again, and to
grow almost tearful.”
“You have no business with low spirits, my dear,” he replied, with a
smile. “You should leave that to old people. Their hearts get lost in
the snow sometimes, and when they feel them gradually getting stone-cold
and frozen, then they may be excused for despairing.”
“What is to prevent it from being the same with young hearts?”
“The warm blood of their youth.”
“That may keep them warm, but it doesn't prevent their being lost,”
said Felicia, argumentatively.
“Well, what does it signify if you do go out of your way a little, when
your legs are strong and your blood circulates vigorously?” he said
cheerfully.
“But the young heart _can_ get lost,” said Felicia.
“I won't chop logic with you, young lady. I am trying to teach you that
youth is a glorious thing and ought to be its own happiness. I suppose
it is attempting to teach the unlearnable. Ah me! How beautiful it would
be to be three and thirty again!”
“Three and thirty! Why, that is quite old!”
He looked at her with a touch of sadness and amusement, his head on one
side.
“I suppose it is for you. I was forgetting. To me it is youth, the full
prime of a man's life, when the world is at his feet. Later on he begins
to feel it is on his shoulders. But at thirty-three--I was thinking of
Raine. That is his age.”
“Have you heard from Mr. Chetwynd?” asked Felicia, after a longish
pause.
“Oh, yes. He never keeps me long without news of him. There are only the
two of us.”
“You seem very fond of one another,” said Felicia.
“I am proud of my son, my dear, and he is foolish enough to be proud of
his poor old daddy.”
His voice had grown suddenly very soft, and he spoke with the simplicity
of old age.
His eyes looked out into the distance, their brightness veiled with a
strange tenderness. Felicia was touched, felt strongly drawn to him. She
lost sense of the scholar of profound learning in that of the old man
leaning on his son's strong arm. And the son's manhood grew in her eyes
as the father's waned.
“It is not many men,” he continued musingly, “that would have given up a
Christmas vacation and come all this way just to see an old, broken-down
fellow like me.”
Felicia stared out of the window, but she no longer saw the snow.
“You must miss him dreadfully.”
“I always do. We are much together in Oxford. He always gives me at
least a few minutes of his day.”
“How good of him. It must be beautiful for you.”
“A great happiness--yes, a great happiness!”
He too was looking out of the window, by Felicia's side, his hands
behind his back, and likewise saw nothing. A spell of wistfulness was
over them both--bound them unconsciously together.
“A tender-hearted fellow,” said the old man. “Wonderfully sympathetic.”
“He seems to understand everyone so.”
“Yes; that is Raine's way--he gets behind externals. I have missed him
sadly since he left.”
“Yes,” said Felicia, softly.
“And I have been wishing for him all day.”
“So have I!” said Felicia, under the spell.
Her tone suddenly awakened the old man. His eyes flashed into
intelligence as a darkened theatre can leap into light. The girl
met them, recoiled a step at their brilliance, and shrank as if a
search-light had laid bare her soul.
She had scarcely known what she had been saying. A quivering second. Was
there time to recover? She struggled desperately. If the tears had not
come, she would have won. But they rose in a flood, and she turned away
her head sharply, burning with shame.
The old man laid his thin hand on her shoulder, and bent round to look
into her face.
“My dear little girl--my poor child!” he said gently, patting her
shoulder.
For all her shrinking, she felt the tenderness of the touch. To have
withdrawn from it would have been to repulse. But it added to her
wretchedness. She could not speak, only cry, with the helpless
consciousness that every second's silence and every tear were issues
whence oozed more and more of her secret.
“Does Raine know?” whispered the old man.
Then she turned quickly, her brown eyes glistening, and found speech.
“He know? Know what? Oh, you must never tell him--never, never, never!
He would think--and I couldn't bear him to, although he will never
see me again. And, please, Mr. Chetwynd, don't think I have told you
anything--I haven't. Of course, I only miss him--as every one does.”
Felicia moved softly towards the door, longing for retreat. The old man
followed at her side.
“Forgive me, my dear,” he said, with a shadow of a smile round his lips.
“I have been indiscreet, and leapt to wrong conclusions. Raine is so
bright that we all miss him--equally.”
She glanced at him. The smile found a watery reflection in her eyes. In
another moment she was on the stairs, fleeing to the comfort of her own
room.
The old man, left to himself, kicked open the door of the stove, drew up
a chair, and spread his hands out before the glow.
“Louis Chetwynd,” he said to himself, “you are no better than an old
fool.”
The subject was never touched upon again, but it seemed always
afterwards to be in their thoughts when together. At first Felicia was
shy--felt the blood rise to her cheeks whenever the old man's bright
eyes were fixed upon her. But her involuntary admission had stirred a
great tenderness in his heart. Somehow he had always thought sadly of
the possibility of Raine marrying, although he had urged him to it many
times. Up to now he had been the first--or thought he had, which comes
to the same thing--in Raine's affections, and he could not yield that
first place without a pang. And it would be to a woman not good enough
for Raine; that was certain. If he could only choose for him the paragon
that was his equal, then the surrender would be less hard. But Raine
would choose for himself. It was a way even the most loving of sons
had--one of the perversities of the scheme of things. Now, Felicia's
confession and his own feelings towards her supplied him with a happy
solution to this vexed question. Why should not Raine marry Felicia?
He used to argue it out with himself when his intellectual conscience
told him he ought to be criticizing Calvin's condemnation of Servetus,
and pulverizing the learned Beza. But he soothed it by reflecting
that he was pursuing a philosophical method of inquiry. He put it
syllogistically. Girls do not fall in love with a man until he has given
them good reason. Felicia was in love with Raine. Therefore he had given
her good reason. Again, an honourable man does not give a girl such
reasons unless he loves her.
Raine was an honourable man. Therefore he loved her. Which was extremely
satisfactory; and had it not been for the uneasy suspicion of a fallacy
in his first major, he would have written off to Raine there and then.
In spite of the fallacy, however, he wove his old man's web of romance,
saw Felicia married to Raine, and surrendered his first place with great
gladness. For he would be second in the hearts of two, which common
arithmetic shows to be equal to first in the heart of one. And when he
had definitely settled all this in his mind, he revoked the judgment he
had previously passed upon himself, and felt distinctly gratified at his
own tact and shrewdness. So the liking that he had conceived for Felicia
developed into a tenderer sentiment, of whose existence she gradually
became aware, though naturally she remained in ignorance of its cause.
She fought fierce battles with herself during the next few weeks. If she
were ever going to see him again, there would have been a fearful joy,
a strange mingling of shame and dizzying hope to keep her heart excited.
But as he had gone for ever out of her path, her common sense coming to
the aid of her ashamedness strove to crush her futile fancies. They took
a great deal of killing, however, especially as she found the friendship
between Raine's father and herself growing daily stronger. She longed
for the day of her release to come, when she could join her uncle and
aunt in Bermuda.