A CONTRETEMPS
More days passed and Mr. Heatherbloom continued to linger in his last
position. It promised to be a record-making situation from the
standpoint of longevity; he had never "lasted" at any one task so long
before. Miss Van Rolsen, to his consternation, seemed to unbend somewhat
before him, as if she were beginning--actually!--to be more prepossessed
in his favor. These evidences that he was rising in the stern lady's
good graces filled Mr. Heatherbloom with new dismay; destiny certainly
seemed to be making a mock of him.
A week went by; two weeks--three, and still twice a day he continued to
march to and from the park with his charges. The faces of all the
nurse-maids and others who frequented the big parallelogram of green
became familiar to him; he learned to know by sight the people who rode
in the park and had a distant acquaintance with the squirrels.
He became, for the first time, aware one day, from the perusal of a
certain newspaper he always purchased now, that the prince had returned
to Russia. Although Miss Dalrymple refused to be interviewed, or to
confirm or deny any statement, it was generally understood (convenient
phrase!) that the wedding would take place in the fall at the old Van
Rolsen home. The prince had left America in his yacht--the _Nevski_--for
St. Petersburg, announced the society editor. After a special interview
with the czar and a few necessary business arrangements, the nobleman
would return at once for his bride. And, perhaps, he--Mr.
Heatherbloom--would still be at his post of duty at the Van Rolsen
house!
Since the day the prince had been with Miss Dalrymple in the
conservatory, Mr. Heatherbloom had not seen, or rather heard, that
gentleman at the house. But then he--Mr. Heatherbloom--belonged in the
rear, and, no doubt, the prince had continued to be a daily, or twice,
or three-times-a-day visitor to Miss Van Rolsen's elegant, if somewhat
stiff, reception rooms. Now, however, he would come no more until he
came finally to "take with him the bride--"
The thought was in Horatio's mind when for a third time he encountered
her, face to face, on a landing, near a stair, or somewhere in the
house, he couldn't afterward just exactly recall where, only that she
looked through him, without recognition, speech or movement of an
eyelash, as if he had been a thing of thin air! But a thing that became
suddenly imbued with real life; inspired with purpose! She had permitted
him to remain in the house, knowing his professed helplessness in the
matter--she _must_ have divined that--playing with him as a tigress with
a victim (yes; a tigress! Mr. Heatherbloom wildly, on the spur of the
moment, compared her in his mind to that fierce beautiful creature). He
would force her to tell him to go; she would certainly not suffer him
to remain there another day if he told her--
"Miss Dalrymple, there is something I ought to say. I could not help
overhearing you and the prince, one day, several weeks ago, in the
conservatory."
After he said it, he asked himself what excuse he had for saying it. If
he had stopped to analyze the impulse, he would have seen how absurd,
unreasonable and uncalled for his words were. But he had no time to
analyze; like a diver who plunges suddenly, on some mad impulse, into a
whirlpool, he had cast himself into the vortex.
She looked at him and there was nothing _in nubibus_ to her about his
presence now. The violet eyes saw a substance--such as it was;
recognized a reality--of its kind! Before the clouds gathering in their
depths, Mr. Heatherbloom felt inclined to excuse himself and go on; but
instead, he waited. There was even a furtive smile on his lips that
belied a quick throbbing in his breast; he thrust one hand as debonairly
as possible into his trousers pocket. His attitude might have been
interpreted to express indifference, recklessness, or one or more of the
synonymous feelings. She thought so badly of him already that she
couldn't think much worse, and--
"So,"--had she been paler than her wont, or had excess of passion sent
the color from her face?--"you are a spy as _well!_"
His head shot back a little at the accent on the "well", but he thrust
his hand yet deeper into the pocket and strove not to lose that assumed
expression of ease.
"I--a spy? I did not intend to--you--" He paused; if he wished to set
himself right in her eyes, why should he have spoken at all? Mr.
Heatherbloom saw he had not quite argued out this matter as he should
have done; his bearing became less assured.
"Is there"--her voice low and tense--"anything despicable, mean, paltry
enough that you are not?"
Mr. Heatherbloom moistened his lips; he strove to think of a reply,
sufficiently comprehensive to cover all the features of the case, but
not finding one at once apologetic and yet not so, remained silent. He
made, however, a little gesture with his hand--the one that wasn't in
the pocket. That seemed to imply something; he didn't quite know what.
She came slightly closer and his heart began to pound harder. A breath
of perfume seemed to ascend between them; the arrows in her eyes darted
into his. "How much--_what_ did you hear?" she demanded.
"I--am really not sure--" Was it the orchids which perfumed the air? He
had always heard they were odorless. The question intruded; his brain
seemed capable of a dual capacity, or of a general incapacity of
simultaneous considerations. He might possibly have stepped back a
little now but there was a wall, the broad blank wall behind him. He
wished he were that void she had first seemed to see--or not to see--in
him. "I didn't hear very much--the first part, I imagine--"
"The first part?" Roses of anger burned on her cheek. "And
afterward?--spy!" Her little hands were tight against her side.
He hesitated; her foot moved; all that was passionate, vibrant in her
nature seemed concentrated on him.
"I don't think I caught much; but I heard him say something about fate,
or destiny, and men coming into their own--that old Greek kind of talk,
don't you know--" He spoke lightly. Why not? There was no need of being
melodramatic. What had to be must be. He couldn't alter her, or what she
would think. "Then--then I was too busy to catch more--that is, if I had
wanted to--which I didn't!" He was forced to add the last; it burst from
his lips with sudden passion; then they curved a little as if to ask
excuse for a superfluity.
She continued to look at him, and he looked at her now, squarely; a
strange calm descended upon him.
"And that," he said, "is all I heard, or knew, until this morning, when
I saw in the paper," dreamily, "he was coming back in the fall for--"
The color concentrated with sudden swift brightness in her cheeks. "You
saw that--any one--every one saw--Oh--"
She started to speak further, then bit her lip, while the lace stirred
beneath the white throat. Mr. Heatherbloom had not followed what she
said, was cognizant only of her anger. Her eyes were fastened on
something beyond him, but returned soon, very soon.
"Oh," she said, "I might have known--if I let you stay, through pity,
you would--"
"Pity!" said Mr. Heatherbloom.
"Because I did not want to turn you out into the street--"
She spoke the words fiercely. Mr. Heatherbloom seemed now quite
impervious to stab or thrust.
"I permitted you to remain for"--she stopped--"remembering what you once
were; who your people were! What"--flinging the words at him--"you might
have been. Instead--of what you are!"
Mr. Heatherbloom gazed now without wincing; an unnatural absence of
feeling seemed to have passed over his features, making them almost
mask-like. It was as if he stood in some new pellucid atmosphere of his
own.
"Of course," he said, as half speaking to himself, "I must have earned
my salary, or Miss Van Rolsen wouldn't have retained me. So I am not a
recipient of charity. Therefore,"--did the word suggest far-away
school-boy lessons on syllogisms and sophistries--"I have no right to
feel offended in that you let me remain, you say, 'through pity', when
as a matter of fact it was impossible for me to tender my resignation,
in view of--" He finished the rest of a rather involved logical
conclusion to himself, taking his hand out of his pocket now and passing
it lightly, in a somewhat dragging fashion, over his eyes. Then he gazed
momentarily beyond, as if he saw something appertaining to the "auld
lang syne", but recalled himself with a start to the beautiful face, the
threads of gold, the violet eyes.
"You will see to it now, of course"--his manner became brisk, almost
businesslike--"that I, as a factor, am eliminated here? That, I may
conclude, is your intention?"
"Perhaps," said the girl, a sibyl for intentness now, "you would prefer
to go? To be asked to! You would find the streets"--with swift
discerning contempt--"more profitable for your purpose than here, where
you are known."
"Perhaps," assented Mr. Heatherbloom. He spoke quite airily; then
suddenly stiffened.
At his words, the sight of him as he uttered them, she came abruptly yet
nearer; her breath swept and seemed to scorch his cheek.
"I should think," she said, "you would be ashamed to live!"
"Ashamed?" he began; then stopped. There was no need of speaking further
for she had gone.