BOOK I

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[Illustration:

"THERE MAY BE SOME DIFFERENCE IN MEN, BUT

ALL HUSBANDS ARE ALIKE"]

THE SPELL

BY

WILLIAM DANA ORCUTT

AUTHOR OF

"THE FLOWER OF DESTINY" "ROBERT CAVELIER"

"THE PRINCESS KALLISTO" ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY

GERTRUDE DEMAIN HAMMOND, R. I.

[Illustration]

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS

NEW YORK AND LONDON

MCMIX

Copyright, 1909, by HARPER & BROTHERS.

_All rights reserved._

Published January, 1909.

TO

MY FRIEND

GUIDO BIAGI OF FLORENCE

MODERN HUMANIST

NEITHER MASTER OF FATE NOR VICTIM OF FATE

BUT CO-PARTNER WITH NATURE IN SOLVING

HIS OWN PERSONAL PROBLEM, THIS BOOK IS

AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED

ILLUSTRATIONS

"THERE MAY BE SOME DIFFERENCE IN MEN,

BUT ALL HUSBANDS ARE ALIKE"

(See page 14) Frontispiece

SLOWLY THE SPELL BEGAN TO WORK UPON

INEZ' BRAIN. SHE WAS NO LONGER IN

THE PRESENT--SHE WAS A WOMAN OF ITALY OF

FOUR CENTURIES BACK Facing p. 54

"BECAUSE 'BEAUTIFUL PAINTINGS' DO NOT

POSSESS HUSBANDS," REPLIED THE CONTESSA,

SAGELY. " 192

SO JACK HAD SENT HIM TO PLEAD HIS CAUSE,

HELEN TOLD HERSELF; AND IN HER

HEART SHE RESENTED THE INTERFERENCE " 334

BOOK I

MASTER OF FATE

THE SPELL

I

"Now, Jack, here is a chance to put your knowledge of the classics to

some practical use."

Helen Armstrong paused for a moment before a Latin inscription cut in

the upper stones of the boundary wall, and leaned gratefully upon her

companion's arm after the steep ascent. "What does it mean?"

Her husband smiled. "That is an easy test. The ancient legend conveys

the cheering intelligence that 'from this spot Florence and Fiesole,

mother and daughter, are equi-distant.'"

The girl released her hold upon the man's arm and, pushing back a few

stray locks which the wind had loosened, turned to regard the panorama

behind her. It was a charmingly picturesque and characteristic Italian

roadway which they had chosen for their day's excursion. On either side

stood plastered stone walls, which bore curious marks and circles,

made--who shall say when or by whom?--remaining there as an atavistic

suggestion of Etruscan symbolism. The whiteness of the walls was

relieved by tall cypresses and ilexes which rose high above them, while

below the branches, and reclining upon the stone top, a profusion of

wild roses shed their petals and their fragrance for the benefit of the

passers-by. In the distance, through the trees, showed the shimmering

green of olive-groves and vineyards--covering the hillsides, yet

yielding occasionally to a gay-blossoming garden; and, as if to complete

by contrast, the streaked peaks of Carrara gave a faint suggestion of

their marble richness. In front, Fiesole rose sheer and picturesque,

while villas, scattered here and there, some large and stately, some

small, some antiquated and others modernized, gave evidence that the

ancient Via della Piazzola still expressed its own individuality as in

the days when the bishops of old trod its paths in visiting their see at

the top of the hill, and Boccaccio and Sacchetti, with their kindred

spirits, made its echoes ring with merry revelling. But, inevitably

turning again, the modern pilgrims saw far below them, and most

impressive of all, the languorous City of Flowers, peacefully dreaming

on either side of the silver Arno.

All this was a familiar sight to John Armstrong, whose five years'

residence in Florence, just before entering Harvard, made him feel

entirely at home in its outskirts. He preferred, therefore, to fix his

eyes upon the face of the girl beside him. She was tall and fair, with

figure well proportioned, yet the characteristic which left the deepest

impress was her peculiar sweetness of expression. Among her Vincent Club

friends she was universally considered beautiful, and a girl's verdict

of another girl's beauty is rarely exaggerated. Her deep, merry, gray

eyes showed whence came the vivacity which ever made her the centre of

an animated group, while the sympathy and understanding which shone from

them explained her popularity.

The announcement of her engagement to Jack Armstrong was the greatest

surprise of a sensational Boston season, not because of any unfitness in

the match,--for the Armstrong lineage was quite as distinguished as the

Cartwrights',--but because Helen had so persistently discouraged all

admiration beyond the point of friendship and comradeship, that those

who should have known pronounced her immune.

But that was because her friends had read her character even less

correctly than they had Armstrong's. They would have told you that she

was distinctly a girl of the twentieth century; he discovered that while

tempered by its progressiveness, she had not been marred by its

extremes. They would have said that her character had not yet found

opportunity for expression, since her every wish had always been

gratified; he would have explained that the fact that she had learned to

wish wisely was in itself sufficient expression of the character which

lay beneath.

He watched her in the midst of the social life to which they both

belonged, entering naturally, as he did, into its conventionalities as a

matter of course, and he rejoiced to find in her, beyond the enjoyment

of those every-day pleasures which end where they begin, a response to

the deeper thoughts which controlled his own best expression. He could

see that these new subjects frightened her a little by their immensity,

as he tried to explain them; he sympathized with her momentary despair

when she found herself beyond her depth; but he was convinced that the

understanding and the interest were both there, as in an undeveloped

negative.

This same power of analysis which enabled him to discover what all could

not surmise had separated Armstrong, in Helen's mind, from other men,

nearer her own age, whom she had known. She could hardly have put in

words what the difference was, but she felt that it existed, and this

paved the way for his ultimate success. His personal attributes,

inevitably tempered by the early Italian influence, marked him as one

considerably above the commonplace. At college he had won the respect of

his professors by his strength of mind and tenacity of application, and

the affection of his fellow-students by his skill in athletics and his

general good-fellowship. Now, eight years out of college, he had already

made his place at the Boston bar, and was regarded as a successful man

in his profession. But beyond all this, unknown even to himself,

Armstrong was an extremist. The seed had been sown during that residence

in Florence years before, when unconsciously he had assimilated the

enthusiasm of an erudite librarian for the learning and achievements of

the master spirits of the past. Latin and Greek at college had thus

meant much more to him than dead languages; in them he found living

personalities which inspired in him the liveliest ambition for

emulation.

These were some of the subjects to which he introduced Helen. Little by

little he told her of the fascination they possessed for him, of the

treasures hidden beneath their austere exterior. But the girl was

perhaps more interested by the charm of his presentation than by the

possibilities she saw in the subjects themselves. She felt that she

could understand him, and admitted her respect for the objects of his

enthusiasm, but she was convinced that these were beyond her

comprehension, and frankly rebelled at the necessity of going back into

dead centuries for them.

"I love the present, and all that it contains," she replied to him one

day when something suggested the subject during one of the many walks

they took together; "I love the sky, the air, the sunshine, and the

flowers. Why should I go back to the past, made up of memories only,

when I may enjoy all this beautiful world around me? And you, Jack--I

should not have you if I had lived in the past!"

As her friends had said, she possessed strong ideas about marriage, and

expressed them without reserve. Until Armstrong's irresistible wooing,

she had decided, as a result both of observation and of conclusion, that

admiration and attention from many were far to be preferred to the

devotion of any single one, and that matrimony was neither essential nor

desirable except under ideal conditions.

"There are so many things which seem more interesting to me than a

husband," Helen asserted. "I'm afraid that I agree too much with that

wise old cynic who said that 'love is the wine of life, and marriage the

dram-drinking.' I insist on remaining a teetotaler."

Thus Armstrong felt himself entitled to enjoy a certain degree of pride

and satisfaction in that he had succeeded in convincing her at last that

the ideal conditions she demanded had been met.

Even on board the steamer, at the start of their wedding journey, as

the familiar sky-line of New York became less and less distinct,

Armstrong read in his wife's eyes, still gazing back at the vanishing

city, the thoughts which inevitably forced themselves upon her--a last

remnant of her former doubt. When she turned and saw him looking at her,

she smiled guiltily.

"We are leaving the old life behind us," she said. "With all the

philosophy you have tried to teach me, I have not fully realized until

now what a change it means."

"Do you regret it?" he asked her, half rebellious that even a passing

shadow should mar the completeness of their happiness.

Helen quickly became herself again, and threw back her head with a merry

laugh at the seriousness of his interrogation. "Regret it! How foolish

even to ask such a question! But you cannot wonder that the importance

of the event should force itself upon me, now that we are actually

married, even if it never did before. It makes so much more of a change

in a woman's life than in a man's."

Helen sighed, and then looked mischievously into his face. "With you

superior beings," she continued, "it simply signifies a new latch-key, a

new head to your household, and the added companionship of a woman whom

you have selected as absolutely essential to your happiness. You keep

your old friends, give up for a time a few of your bad habits, and

transfer a part of your affections from your clubs to your home. To the

woman, it means a complete readjustment. New duties and responsibilities

come to her all at once. From her earliest memory she has been taught to

depend upon the counsel and guidance of her parents, but suddenly she

finds herself freed from this long-accustomed habit, with a man standing

beside her, only a few years her senior, who is convinced that he can

serve in this capacity far better than any one else ever did. Even with

a husband as superior as yourself, Mr. John Armstrong, is it not natural

that one should recognize the passing of the old life, while welcoming

the coming of the new?"

After landing, they had lingered for a fortnight in Paris, but, beneath

the keen enjoyment of the attractions there, Armstrong had felt an

impatience, unacknowledged even to himself, to reach Florence, which

contained for him so much of interest, and whither his memory--let him

give it sway--ever recalled him. He felt that his _dei familiares_ were

patiently waiting for him there, indulgent in spite of his long absence,

yet insistent that their rights again be recognized. Having dropped his

engrossing law-practice, he yearned to take advantage of this

opportunity, now near at hand, to devote himself to the girl he had won,

and at the same time to gratify this long-cherished wish to study more

deeply into the work of those early humanists who had foreshadowed and

brought about that mighty thought revolution, the wonderful

breaking-away from the deadly pall of ignorance into the light and

joyousness and richness of intellectual life known as the Renaissance.

Helen would no longer fail to understand them when she saw them face to

face. He would lead her gently, even as Cerini the librarian had led

him; and together they would draw from the old life those principles

which made it what it was, incorporating them into their new existence,

which would thus be the richer and better worth the living. So now that

he had actually reached his goal, it was natural that his contentment at

finding himself in Florence with his wife was intensified by the joy of

being again amid the scenes and personages which his imagination had

taken out from the indefiniteness of antiquity, and invested with a

living actuality.

The sharp contrast of his two great devotions came to John Armstrong as

he stood at the cross-roads on the edge of San Domenico. The one had

exerted so powerful an influence on what he was to-day--the other must

influence his future to an extent even greater. The one, in spite of the

personality with which he had clothed it, was as musty and antiquated as

the ancient tomes he loved to study; the other, as she stood there, her

cheeks aglow after the brisk walk, her face animated with enthusiastic

delight, seemed the personification of present reality. What a force the

two must make when once joined together, contributing, each to the

other, those qualities which would else be lacking!

"I must take you yet a little higher," Armstrong urged at length; "these

walls still cut off much of the glorious view."

In a few moments more they had partly ascended the Via della Fiesolana,

which at this hour was wholly deserted. With a sigh, half from

satisfaction and half from momentary fatigue, Helen turned to her

companion. She caught the admiration which his face so clearly

reflected, but, womanlike, preferred to feign ignorance of its origin.

Glancing about her, she discovered a rock, half hidden by the tall grass

and wild poppies, which offered an attractive resting-place. Seating

herself, she plucked several of the brilliant blossoms, and began to

weave the stems together. At last she broke the silence.

"Why are you so quiet, Jack?"

"For three reasons," he replied, promptly. "This walk has made me

romantic, poetic, and hungry."

Helen laughed heartily. "I am glad you added the third reason, for by

that I know that you are mortal. This wonderful air and the marvellous

view affect me exactly as a fairy-story used to, years ago. When I

turned I fully expected to find a fairy prince beside me. You confess

that you are romantic, which is becoming in a five-weeks'-old husband,

but why poetic?"

"'Poetry is but spoken painting,'" quoted Armstrong, smiling; "and I

should be pleased indeed were I able to put on canvas the picture I now

see before me."

"Since you cannot do that, suppose you write a sonnet."

Armstrong met her arch smile firmly. The girlish abandon under the

influence of new surroundings awoke in him a side of his nature which he

had not previously realized he possessed. Stooping, he gently held her

face between his hands and looked deep into her responsive eyes before

replying:

"'_Say from what vein did Love procure the gold

To make those sunny tresses? From what thorn

Stole he the rose, and whence the dew of morn,

Bidding them breathe and live in Beauty's mould?

What depth of ocean gave the pearls that told

Those gentle accents sweet, tho' rarely born?

Whence came so many graces to adorn

That brow more fair than summer skies unfold?

Oh! say what angels lead, what spheres control

The song divine which wastes my life away?

(Who can with trifles now my senses move?)

What sun gave birth unto the lofty soul

Of those enchanting eyes, whose glances stray

To burn and freeze my heart--the sport of Love?_'"

Helen made no reply for several moments after Armstrong ceased

speaking. Then she held out her hand to him and looked up into his face.

"I never knew before that you were a real poet," she said, quietly.

"I wish I were--and such a poet! My precious Petrarch, for whom you

profess so little fondness, is responsible for that most splendid

tribute ever paid to woman."

Helen was incredulous.

"That sanctimonious old gentleman with the laurel leaves on his head and

the very self-confident expression on his face?"

Armstrong nodded.

"Who spent all his life making love to another man's wife from a safe

distance?"

"Yes; this is one of his love-letters."

"Then if I accept those lines you just repeated with so much feeling, I

must be Laura?"

"But not another man's wife."

"I should have been if you had acted like that, Jack. Let me see how you

look with a laurel wreath made of poppies."

She drew his head down and tied the flowers about his forehead. Then,

pushing him away from her, she clapped her hands with delight.

"There! if the noble Petrarch had looked like that, Madonna Laura could

surely never have resisted him."

"Had Madonna Laura resembled Madonna Helen, the worthy Petrarch would

have had her in his arms before she had the chance," laughed Armstrong,

improving his opportunity as he spoke.

"Very gallant, Jack, but very improper." Helen pursed her lips and

looked up at him mischievously. "But let us forget your musty old

antiquities and talk of the present. Do you realize that this is the end

of our honeymoon?"

"No," he replied, holding her more closely and laughing down at her; "it

has only just begun."

"Of course," assented Helen, disengaging herself, "but to-morrow we are

to exchange the very romantic titles of 'bride' and 'bridegroom' for the

much more commonplace 'host' and 'hostess.'"

"Oh! I am relieved that you are not going to divorce me at once."

Armstrong was amused at her seriousness. "But it was your idea to invite

them to join us, was it not?"

"I know it was--and now I must make a confession to you. I thought that

in five weeks we both would be glad enough to have some little break in

our love-making. But I did not realize how rapidly five weeks could

pass. Still"--Helen sighed--"what is the use of having a villa in

Florence unless you can invite your friends to see it?"

"Then you have not become tired of your husband as soon as you thought

you would?"

"Nor you of your wife?" Helen retorted, quickly. "Mamma suggested it

first. She said that so long a wedding trip as we had planned was sure

to end with one or both of us becoming hopelessly bored unless we

introduced other characters into our Garden of Eden."

"Did she say 'Garden of Eden'? That family party included a serpent, if

rumor be correct."

The girl laughed.

"But there could not be one in ours, because I would never give you the

chance to say, 'The woman did it.'"

"Your mother forgets that we are exceptions."

"She says there may be some difference in men, but that all husbands are

alike."

"Trite and to the point, as always with mamma." Armstrong paused and

smiled. "Well, I think even she will be satisfied with the success of

her suggestion. How many do our guests number at present?"

Helen dropped the flower she was idly swinging and began to count upon

her fingers.

"Let me see. There is Inez Thayer--I am glad that she could visit us, so

that at last you can know her. It is strange enough that you should not

have met her until the wedding. You cannot help liking each other, for

she is interested in all those serious things you love so well. The

girls used to make sport of our devotion at school because our

dispositions are so unlike: she is thoughtful, while I am impulsive; she

is carried away with anything which is deep and learned, while I, as you

well know, have nothing more important in life than you and my music."

Helen paused for a moment thoughtfully. "Sometimes I wish I could really

interest myself in those ancient deities you worship."

"You could if you only knew them as I do," he urged, quietly. "The

present is the evolution of the past, but it has been evolved so fast

that many of the old-time treasures have been forgotten in the mad pace

of every-day life."

"But we can't remember everything," Helen replied; "there are not hours

enough in the day. I can't even find time to read our modern writers as

much as I wish I could, and I think one ought to do that before going

back to the ancients."

"All modern literature is based upon what has gone before," insisted

Armstrong.

"Wait a moment." Helen's face again became thoughtful. "I have it!" she

cried, triumphantly. "'The gardens of Sicily are empty now, but the bees

still fetch honey from the golden jars of Theocritus.' That is what you

mean, is it not? I remember that from something of Lowell's I read at

school."

"Splendid!" he laughed, with delight. "Who dares to say that you are not

in sympathy with the past?" He bent his head down close to hers. "Would

you not prefer to hold those 'golden jars' in your very hands,

sweetheart, rather than merely read about them?"

"But, Jack, 'the gardens of Sicily are empty now.' Think how lonesome we

should be." Helen threw back her head and drew in a long breath of the

exhilarating air.

Armstrong was still insistent. "I wish I could make you see it as I do,"

he said. "The present of to-day is bound to be the past of to-morrow.

What I want to do is to assimilate all that the past can give me, so

that I may do my part, however small, toward giving it out again, made

stronger and more effective because of its modern application, thus

helping this present to become worthy of being considered by those who

come after us."

Helen looked up at him with undisguised admiration. "Oh, Jack, that

sounds so wonderful, and I wish I could enter into it with you, but I

simply cannot do it. Inez will be just the one. At school, as I told

you, she went in for the classics and all that, while I--well, I was

sent there to be 'finished.' Don't look so disappointed, Jack. Truly I

would if I could."

"I shall not give you up yet," he answered, smiling at Helen's

intensity, notwithstanding his genuine regret. "Tell me something more

about Miss Thayer, since you insist upon her becoming your substitute."

"Inez is a darling, in spite of her superiority," Helen replied, gayly,

"and I simply could not have been married without her for a bridesmaid.

She would have sailed two weeks earlier except for our wedding. As it

was, she came over with her cousins, and has been travelling with them

until time to join us here at the villa."

"De Peyster is still devoted, I judge?"

"Poor Ferdinand! His persistency has quite won my sympathy. He simply

will not take 'no' for an answer, but travels back and forth between

Boston and Philadelphia like any commercial traveller. Going over, he

has a bunch of American Beauties under one arm and a box of bonbons

under the other; returning, nothing but another refusal to add to those

Inez has already given him."

"He is not a bad sort of chap at all, when you get past his

peculiarities," Armstrong added.

"Ferdy is a splendid fellow, in his own way," assented Helen, warmly,

"and any girl might do a great deal worse than marry him; but he is not

Inez' style at all. I believe her trip to Europe is really to get away

from him. I know he thinks that is the reason, and is simply

inconsolable."

"De Peyster would be a good match," remarked Armstrong, thoughtfully.

"He has plenty of money and plenty of leisure, and he ought to be able

to make his wife fairly comfortable."

"But that is not what Inez wants. She has great ideas about affinities,

and Ferdy does not answer to the description."

"Then there is your uncle Peabody," Armstrong prompted, helpfully.

"Yes, there is dear Uncle Peabody. You will enjoy him immensely."

"Does he live up to his reputation of a man with an 'ism'?"

"Oh, Jack! Some one has been maligning him to you. That is because he is

the only original member of our family, and really the most useful."

"Indeed! If that is your estimate of him, it shall also be mine. I was

prepared for a well-developed specimen of the _genus_ crank."

"Wait till you see him." Helen laughed at her husband's mental picture.

"He is a crank, in a way, but he is a mighty cheerful one to have

around."

"He believes in making an air-plant of one's self, in order to help him

forget his other troubles, does he not?"

"Who has been making fun of dear Uncle Peabody? I must have him tell you

about his work himself. It is true that he believes most people overeat,

and it is true that he is devoting his life and his fortune to finding

out what the basis of proper nutrition really is; but as for

starving--wait till you see him!"

"You have relieved me considerably," Armstrong replied, gravely. "From

what I had heard of your uncle I had expected nothing less than to be

made an example of for the sake of science--and you have already

discovered that I am really partial to my meals."

"You can be just as partial to them as ever, Jack. But, seriously, I

know you will find him most interesting, and I shall be surprised if his

theories do not give you something new to think about."

"His theories will not do for me," said Armstrong, assuming a position

of mock importance, "for I have always been taught that a touch of

indigestion is absolutely essential to genius."

"Splendid!" cried Helen. "That will be just the argument to start the

conversation at our first dinner and keep it from being commonplace. I

have been trying to think how we could get Uncle Peabody interested. It

is only that first dinner which I dread, and you have helped me out

nobly."

"That makes two," suggested Jack.

"Yes, two. Then there are the Sinclair girls, who have been studying

here in Florence for nearly a year. They will come up from their

_pension_. That makes four--and the others, you know, are Phil Emory and

Dick Eustis, who arrive in Florence from Rome to-night. I don't need to

tell you anything about them."

"There is a whole lot you might tell me about Emory if you chose."

Armstrong looked slyly into his wife's face.

"Shame on you, Jack!" Helen cried, flushing; "the idea of being jealous

on your wedding trip!"

"I am not jealous _now_." He emphasized the last word.

"Well, I am glad you are over it."

"It looks like a very jolly party," he hastened to add, seeing that

Helen's annoyance was genuine, "and I can see where we become old

married folk to-morrow. You and Uncle Peabody will act as chaperons, I

presume, Phil and Dick will look after the Sinclair girls, while I am to

devote myself to Inez Thayer. Is that the programme?"

"Exactly. I am so anxious that Inez should appreciate what a talented

husband I have. She has heard great stories about your learning and

erudition, so now you must live up to the picture."

"Then suppose we start for home if you are quite rested. It is plainly

incumbent on me to make sure that my knowledge of the classics proves

equal to the test."

II

The Armstrongs had installed themselves in the Villa Godilombra, near

Settignano. The date for the wedding was no sooner settled than Jack

cabled to secure what had always seemed to him to be the most glorious

location around Florence. Years before, his favorite tramp had been out

of the ancient city through the Porta alla Croce to La Mensola, whence

he delighted to ascend the hill of Settignano. Every villa possessed a

peculiar fascination for him. The "Poggio Gherardo"--the "Primo Palagio

del Refugio" of the _Decameron_--made Boccaccio real to him. The Villa

Buonarroti, whither Michelangelo was sent as a baby, after the Italian

custom, to be nursed in a family of _scarpellini_, always attracted him,

and times without number he had stood admiringly before the wall in one

of the rooms, gazing at the figure of the satyr which the infant prodigy

drew with a burning stick taken from the fire. In those days he had been

seized with a secret yearning to become an artist, and often he had

tried to reproduce the satyr from memory, but always the ugly visage

assumed a mocking, sneering aspect which caused him to relinquish his

cherished ambition in despair.

But the Villa Godilombra appealed to Armstrong for a different reason.

It stood high up on the hill, affording a wonderful view of the village

of Settignano and the wide-spreading valley of the Arno. The villa

itself, with its overhanging eaves, coigned angles, and narrow windows,

set on heavy consoles, was essentially Tuscan, and impressive far out of

proportion to its size. It would have seemed too massive but for an

arcade at either end, the one connecting the house itself with its

chapel, the other leading from the first floor through a spiral stairway

in one pier of the arcade to what originally, in the days of the

Gamberelli, had been an old fish-pond and herb-garden. In front of the

villa a row of antiquated stone vases shared the honors with equally

dilapidated stone dogs along a grassy terrace held up by a low wall,

while beyond this and the house was the vineyard.

Armstrong had studied the plans of the house and grounds from a

distance, because, after his disappointing experience with

Michelangelo's satyr, he had firmly determined to become an architect

and to build Italian houses in America. He had walked up and down the

long bowling-green behind the villa, carefully noting the number of

statues set upon the high retaining wall and figuring the height of the

hedges. One day old Giuseppe, the sun-baked gardener who had watched the

boy first with suspicion and then with interest, invited him to enter,

and his joy had been complete. Giuseppe showed him the fish-pond and the

grotto, lying in the shadow of the ancient cypresses, made up of

varicolored shells and stones, with shepherds and nymphs occupying

niches around a trickling fountain. He led him to the balustrade at the

end of the bowling-green, and pointed out the panorama which terminated

in the hills beyond the southern bank of the river.

Parallel with the back of the villa was another wall which supported a

terrace of cypress and ilex trees. Behind this was the _salvatico_,

without which no self-respecting Italian villa could maintain its

dignity, with stone seats beneath the heavy foliage offering a grateful

relief from the glare of the sun. And here and there were white statues

of classic goddesses, to relieve the loneliness had it existed. An iron

gate, let into the wall opposite the main doorway of the villa, led into

a small garden, this leading in turn into another grotto, which, with

its fountain and statues, formed an extension of the _vista_. On either

side a balustraded flight of steps led up to an artificial height--the

Italians' beloved _terrazza_--flanked by rows of orange and lemon trees,

growing luxuriantly in their red earthen pots; while against the wide

balustrades rested the heavily scented clusters of the camellia and the

rose-tinted oleander.

Twelve years is a short space of time in Italy, where age is reckoned

by the millennial, so it seemed perfectly natural, when Armstrong

arrived in Florence, to find Giuseppe still at his old post and included

in the lease as a part of the Villa Godilombra. The old man expressed no

surprise, no delight--yet at heart he was well pleased. The previous

tenants of the villa had been the unimaginative family of a

German-American brewer, and their preference for beer over the wonderful

_vino rosso_ which he himself had pressed out from the luscious grapes

in the vineyard filled his heart with sorrow. He confided to Annetta,

the red-lipped maid Armstrong had engaged for Helen, that he "was glad

to serve an 'Americano molto importante' rather than a _porco_." And

Giuseppe took great satisfaction in placing upon that last word all the

emphasis needed to express six months' accumulated disgust.

From the moment the Armstrongs arrived, Giuseppe's admiration for Helen

knew no bounds. To him she was the personification of all that was

perfection. Not that he expressed it, even to Annetta--he would have

forgotten mass on Good Friday sooner than so forget his place. It was

rather that devotion which is born and not made--occasionally, but not

often, found in those who enter so intimately into the life of those

they serve, yet who must always feel themselves apart from it. Hardly a

day had passed since the Armstrongs had assumed possession of the villa

that Helen had not found the choicest _fragole_ at her plate, each juicy

berry carefully selected and resting upon a bed of its own leaves at the

bottom of the little basket. Her room was ever redolent with the odor of

the flowers he smuggled in, always unobserved; and his instructions to

the more frivolous Annetta as to her duties toward the _nobile donna_

were such as to cause that young woman to throw her head haughtily on

one side, with the observation that she was probably as well acquainted

with the requirements of a lady's maid as any gardener was apt to be,

even though he _were_ old enough to be her grandfather.

This particular tiff had taken place while Armstrong and his wife were

making their excursion to Fiesole. On their return they had found

Giuseppe in a morose mood, which quickly vanished when Helen told him,

in her broken Italian, that she expected guests upon the morrow, and

depended upon him to see that every room was properly decorated, as he

alone could do it. The old man could hardly wait to arrange the chairs

upon the veranda, so eager was he to seek revenge upon his youthful

tormentor.

"Did she ask you to arrange the flowers, young peacock-feather?" asked

Giuseppe of Annetta when he found her in the kitchen. "Did she trust you

even to bring the message to old Giuseppe? No. With her own lips the

_Eccellenza_ praised the one servant on whom she can rely."

"She knows you are good for nothing else," Annetta retorted, with a

scornful laugh and a toss of her pretty head; "and she wishes to get you

out of the way while we attend to the really important matters. See,"

she cried, as the tinkling of the maids' bell punctuated her remarks,

"the _nobile donna_ will now give _me_ commands."

Giuseppe could not so far forget his dignity as to reply to such an

outrageous slander, so he contented himself with casting upon Annetta

his most withering glances as she hastily brushed past him, holding back

her skirts lest they be defiled by touching the old man. He watched her

angrily until she vanished through the door, then, with the choicest

maledictions at his command, he shuffled into the garden--into his own

domain, where the present generation of ill-bred servants, as he

explained to himself, could vex him not.

* * * * *

Mrs. John Armstrong's first dinner at the Villa Godilombra was an

unqualified success. Uncle Peabody had arrived early that morning; his

optimism had set its seal of approval upon the evident happiness of the

bridal couple, and he had already established himself as chief reflector

of the concentrated joy which he saw about him. Inez Thayer was received

into Helen's welcoming arms soon after luncheon, and was at once

installed in the best guest-chamber for an extended visit. Two dusty

_vetture_ brought the Sinclair girls, Emory and Eustis, in time for

dinner, each driver striving to deliver his passengers first in

anticipation of an extra _pourboire_. The company was therefore

complete, and each member quite in the spirit of the occasion.

The great candelabra cast their light upon the animated party seated

about the table in such a manner that the old paintings hanging upon the

walls of the high room were but dimly visible. The long windows were

open, and the light breeze just cooled the air enough to mellow the

temperature, without so much as causing the candle-flames to flicker.

Giuseppe's choicest flowers, deftly arranged upon the table by Helen's

skilful hands, contrasted pleasantly with the antique silver and china

which had once been the pride of the original owner of the villa; and

the menu itself, wisely intrusted by Helen to the old Italian cook, was

rife with constant surprises for the American palate. Even the wines

were new--if not in name, at least in flavor, for Italian vintages leave

behind them their native richness and aroma when transplanted. Never was

any _vino rosso_ so delicious as that which Giuseppe made, even though

unappreciated by his former master; never such _lacrima Christi_ as that

which Armstrong secured in a little wine-shop near the Bargello; never

such _Asti spumante_ as that which sparkled in the glasses, eager to

share its own bubbling happiness in return for the privilege of touching

the fair lips of the beautiful _donne Americane_.

"We had a friend of yours on board ship, Miss Thayer," said Emory,

speaking to his left-hand neighbor as they seated themselves.

"A friend of mine?" queried Inez. "I can't think who it could be."

"Ferdy De Peyster," replied Emory.

Inez cast a quick glance at Helen. "Really?" she asked. "I thought he

was going to spend the summer at Bar Harbor."

"Changed his mind at the last moment," he said. "Could not resist the

charms of Italy. Do you know, Helen"--Emory addressed himself to his

hostess--"De Peyster has developed a mania for art."

Helen laughed. "No," she replied, "that is news indeed. It is a side of

Ferdy's nature which even his best friends had not suspected. Is he

coming to Florence?"

"Can't say; but he is evidently planning to leave Rome. We left him at

the Vatican, in the Pinacoteca, standing before Raphael's

'Transfiguration.'"

"With a Baedeker in his hand?" queried Jack.

"No, studying Cook's Continental Time-table."

"What a detective you would make, Mr. Emory," suggested Mary Sinclair as

the laughter subsided.

"I have a better story about De Peyster than that."

Eustis waited to be urged.

"Give it to us, Dick," said Jack, helpfully.

"It was at Gibraltar," began Eustis. "We were in the same party going

over the fortifications. De Peyster, you know, enlisted at the time of

the Spanish war. Some family friend in the Senate obtained for him a

berth as second lieutenant, and his company got as far as Key West. He

rather prides himself on his military knowledge, and he confided to me

that he had his uniform with him in case he was invited to attend any

Court functions. Well, all the way around De Peyster explained

everything to us. The Tommy Atkins who was our guide was as serious as a

mummy, but confirmed everything Ferdy said. When you reach the gallery

at the top, you remember, the guide points out the parade-ground below,

and it happened that there was a battalion going through its

evolutions."

"'Ah!' said De Peyster, 'this is very interesting.'" Then he described

each movement, giving it the technical military name. At last he turned

to our guide and said, patronizingly: 'I'm a bit disappointed, sergeant,

after all I have heard of the precision of the English army. I have

often seen American soldiers go through those same movements--just as

well as that.'

"The sergeant saluted respectfully and gravely. 'Quite likely, sir,' he

said, 'quite likely. These are raw recruits--arrived yesterday, sir!'"

"De Peyster was a sport, though," added Emory. "When he saw that the

joke was on him he handed Tommy a shining sovereign and said: 'Here,

sergeant, have this on me, and drink a health to our two armies--may

comparisons never be needed.'"

Helen clapped her hands. "Good for Ferdy! He is all right if people

would only leave him alone."

"Too bad he has so much money!" Eustis was reflective. "If De Peyster

had to get out and hustle a bit you would find he had a whole lot of

stuff in him."

"Of course he has," Uncle Peabody agreed.

"Do you know Mr. De Peyster?" Inez asked, surprised.

"No," replied Uncle Peabody, "I don't need to after hearing Mr. Eustis's

summary. On general principles, every one has 'a whole lot of stuff in

him.' The trouble is that people don't give it a chance to come out."

"Your confidence is evidently based upon your general optimism?"

Armstrong remembered that Helen had mentioned this as a cardinal

characteristic.

"Yes, but proved by a thousand and one experiments. Our present

subject, who now becomes No. 1002, is apparently handicapped by the

misfortune of inherited leisure. It is rarely that a man of possession

reaches his fullest development without the spur of necessity. More

frequently we see one extreme or the other--too much possession or too

much necessity."

"That is all very well as a theory, but does it really prove anything as

regards De Peyster?" questioned Armstrong. "Personally I think optimism

is a dangerous thing. This confidence that everything is coming out

right is what makes criminals out of bank cashiers."

"There is a vast difference between real and false optimism," replied

Uncle Peabody. "I knew a man once who called himself a cheerful

pessimist, because every time he planted a seed it grew down instead of

up. He came to expect this, so it did not worry him any. He was a real

optimist, even though he did not know it."

"What would be your prescription for a case like Mr. De Peyster's?"

queried Bertha Sinclair.

"A good wife, possessed of ambition, sympathy, and tact," Uncle Peabody

replied, promptly. "This, my dear Miss Sinclair, is your opportunity to

assist me in proving my argument. Will you be my accomplice?"

"I? Why, I don't even know Mr. De Peyster," Bertha protested. "You must

find some one else."

"Very well," sighed Mr. Cartwright. "You see how difficult it is for

science to assert its laws."

Helen caught sight of Inez' cheeks and hastened to her friend's relief.

"Uncle Peabody, do you know that you are responsible for the first

difference of opinion which has arisen between my husband and me?"

"My gracious, no! Can it be possible?"

"It is a fact. I stated to him only yesterday that perfect digestion was

the only basis on which health and happiness can possibly rest. You

taught me that, but Jack asserts that a touch of indigestion is

absolutely essential to genius."

"How does he know? Has he a touch of indigestion?"

"Not a touch," laughed Armstrong, "and that proves my statement. I

really believe I might have been a genius if my digestion had not always

been so disgustingly strong."

"Don't despair, my dear boy."

Uncle Peabody looked at Jack over his spectacles. "Genius is a germ, and

sometimes develops late in life. If your theory is correct, a few more

gastronomic orgies such as this will make you eligible."

"But is there not something in what I say?" Armstrong persisted,

seriously. "Is it not true that good health is against intellectual

progression? Is not good health the supremacy of the physical over the

mental? The healthy man is an animal--he eats and sleeps too much. Pain

and suffering have not developed the nervous side, which is so closely

connected with the intellectual. When the physical side becomes

weakened, then the brain begins to act."

Uncle Peabody listened attentively and then removed his spectacles. "My

dear Jack Armstrong," he said, at last, "I can see some fun ahead for

both of us, and Helen has placed me still further in her debt by her

choice of a husband. Your argument is not a new one. It was invented a

great many years ago in France by some clever person who wished to have

an excuse for late nights, absinthe, and cigarettes. Do you mean

seriously to advance a theory which, if logically carried through to the

end, would credit hospitals and homes for the hopelessly depraved with

being the highest intellectual establishments in the world?"

"But look at the examples which can be cited," Armstrong continued,

undisturbed. "Zola produced nothing of importance after he adopted the

simple life, and Swinburne's poetry lost all its fire as soon as he

'reformed.'"

"Can you prove in either case that the question of nutrition or

digestion entered into the matter at all?"

"Oh, it may have been a coincidence, of course; but many other cases

might be added."

Uncle Peabody was silent for a moment. "Let me give you a simple

problem," he said, at length. "Helen tells me that you have an

automobile now on its way to Florence?"

Armstrong assented.

"When it arrives I presume you will engage a chauffeur?"

"What has an automobile to do with nutrition, Mr. Cartwright?" demanded

Mary Sinclair. "Surely an automobile has no digestion."

"My application is near at hand. When you engage that chauffeur I

presume you will insist that he knows the mechanism of the machine,

understands the application of the motive power and other details which

enter into safe and successful handling of the car?"

"Naturally," replied Jack. "I am not introducing my machine here for

the purpose either of murder or suicide."

"Exactly. That is just what I wanted you to say. Now, every human

stomach is an engine which requires at least as intelligent handling as

that of an automobile. Upon its successful working depends the

mechanical action of the body. We may disregard the additional

dependence of the brain. Petroleum in the automobile is replaced by what

we call food in the human engine. Too much of either, unintelligently

applied, produces the same unfortunate result. Now I ask you, John

Armstrong, would you engage as chauffeur for your automobile a man who

knew no more about the mechanism of its engine, or how to feed and

handle it properly, than you yourself know about your own body engine?"

"No," Armstrong admitted, frankly, "I would not."

"But which is more serious--a damage resulting from his ignorance or

from your own?"

"Look here, Mr. Cartwright," said Jack, laughingly, "you promised that

there was fun ahead for us both. At present it seems to be mostly for

you and our friends."

"Who started the discussion?"

"Helen; but I admit my error in being drawn into it. I had not expected

to be convicted upon my own evidence."

Helen rose. "I must rescue my husband from the calamity I have brought

upon him. Come, let us have our coffee in the garden."

III

If one could have looked within Uncle Peabody's room after the other

guests had snuffed out their candles, he would have discovered its

inmate seated beside the flickering light with an open letter in his

hand. He had read it over many times since its receipt nearly three

months earlier, announcing in Helen's characteristic way her engagement

and approaching marriage. No one else had ever come so closely into his

life, and he felt a certain responsibility to satisfy himself that the

girl had made no mistake in the important step which she had taken. Now

that he had actually met her husband, he again perused the lines which

had introduced his new nephew to him.

"_It has actually happened at last_," the letter began, "_and your

favorite wager of 'a thousand to one on the unexpected' has really won.

In other words, I, Helen Cartwright, condemned (by myself) to live and

die an old maid as penalty for being so critical of the genus homo, now

confess myself completely, hopelessly in love, and so happy in my new

estate that I wonder why I ever hesitated._

"_It is all so curious. The things which interested me before now seem

so commonplace compared to the events to come in connection with this

broader existence which is opening up before me. How infinitely more

gratifying it is to feel myself living for and a part of another's life,

how comforting to know that some other personality, whom I can love and

respect, feels himself to be living for and a part of my life. It adds

to the seriousness of it all, but how it increases the satisfaction!_

"_I wish I could describe John Armstrong to you, but now that I am about

to make the attempt I realize how difficult a task I have undertaken. He

is eight years older than I, but sometimes he seems to be years younger,

while again I feel almost like a child beside him. No, Uncle Peabody, it

is not a similar case to that little Mrs. Johnson whom you quoted when

you were last home as saying that a woman feels as old as the way her

husband treats her. I know this will pop into your mind, so I will

promptly head you off. The fact is that Jack is a very remarkable man.

He is handsome, with great strength of character showing in every

feature, he is tall and athletic,--but it is his wonderful mental

ability which will most impress you. Think of a man playing on the

Harvard 'Varsity eleven, rowing on the crew, and yet graduating with a

=summa cum laude=!_

"_Jack is a superb dancer, thus disproving the common belief that a man

can't be clever at both ends; and at the Assemblies, even before we were

engaged, I used to anticipate those numbers which he had taken more than

all the others. Besides this, his conversation was always so

original,--touching frequently upon topics which were new to me. His

particular fad is what he calls 'humanism' and his particular loves the

great writers of the past,--his 'divinities,' as he calls them. You

probably understand just what all this means, but, alas! most of it is

beyond my comprehension! What he tells me interests me, of course,--it

even fascinates me. I can follow him up to a certain point; then we

reach my limitations, and I am forced to admit my lack of understanding.

That is when I feel so like an infant beside him. He is as patient as

can be, and insists that when once I am in Florence, where the air

itself is heavy with the learning of the past, I shall be able to

comprehend it all, and it will mean the same to me that it does to him.

I wish I felt as confident!_

"_We are to be married in April, and Jack has taken the Villa Godilombra

in Settignano for the season. We expect to arrive there early in May,

and we want you to come to us for just as long a visit as you can

arrange. You won't disappoint me, will you, dear Uncle Peabody? We all

have been broken-hearted that you have so long delayed your return, and

one of the events in our plans for Florence to which I am looking

forward with the greatest eagerness is this visit with you. Write and

tell me how your work progresses, but don't say 'I told you so.' This

would show that you really expected it all the time, and your favorite

argument would lose its force. Just say that you will come to us at

Settignano._"

The letter itself showed that Helen had changed much during the months

which had elapsed since he had last seen her. There was a more serious

undertone and a broader outlook,--due undoubtedly to Armstrong's

influence. Uncle Peabody wondered whether Helen could have been

attracted to this man by her admiration for his mental strength rather

than by any real sentiment, perhaps mistaking the one for the other.

This was the point he wished to settle in his own mind, and this was why

he had studied them both, from the moment of his arrival, much more

carefully than either one of them realized.

Armstrong was a remarkable man, as Helen had said. Even in the few hours

he had known him, Uncle Peabody found much to admire. It was true that

his manner toward Helen showed indulgence, almost as to a child rather

than to a wife; but his devotion was entirely obvious, and this relation

was to be expected after reading Helen's letter. Still, Mr. Cartwright

told himself, the existence of this relation necessitated a certain

readjustment before a perfection of united interests could be attained.

Armstrong was bound to be the dominating force, and Helen must

inevitably respond to this new influence, strange as it now seemed to

her. His knowledge of her sympathetic and intuitive grasp of his own pet

theories gave him confidence to believe that this response would be

equally prompt and comprehensive.

Henry Peabody Cartwright was distinctly a citizen of the world. Boston

had been his birthplace, Boston had been the base of his eminently

successful business operations, and his name still figured in the list

of the city's "largest taxpayers." Beyond this, the city of his early

activity had, during the past twenty years, seen him only as a visitor

at periodic intervals. He had emerged from his commercial environment at

the age of forty, with a firm determination to gratify his ideals.

Fortunately for him, and for mankind as well, his ideals were not fully

crystallized when he set out to gratify them. Boston was entirely

satisfactory to him as an abiding-place, but he felt a leaven at work

within him which demanded a larger arena than even the outlying

territory of Greater Boston covered. He started, therefore, in the late

eighties for a trip around the world, with the definite purpose, as he

himself announced, of "giving things a chance to happen to him."

"I have no schedule and no plans," he said to those who questioned him.

"I shall 'hitch my wagon to a star,' but always with my grip near at

hand, so that I may change stars upon a moment's notice."

There were no immediate family ties to interfere with the carrying-out

of what seemed to his friends to be rather quixotic ideas. There may

have been some youthful romance, but, if so, no one ever succeeded in

learning anything of it from him.

"It is all perfectly simple," he once good-naturedly replied to a

persistent relative. "The girls I was willing to marry would not have

me, and those who would have me I was not willing to marry. I used to

think that I would become more attractive as I grew older, but I have

given up that idea now. Once I tried to rub a freckle off with

sand-paper and pumice-stone and found blood under the skin; but the

freckle--the same old freckle--is there to this day."

His devotion to women in the composite was consistent and sincere; the

fondness which existed between himself and his brother's family was such

that his departure had left a distinct void, and his visits home were

events circled with red ink in the family calendar. He enjoyed these

visits no less than they; but with never more than a day or two of

warning he would announce his intention of leaving for Egypt or India or

some spot more or less remote in his quest for the unexpected. To the

reproaches which were levelled at him, he replied, with a smile which

defied controversy:

"I am just as sorry not to be with you all as you can possibly be to

have me away; but I have educated myself to the separation, and have

thus overcome the necessity for personal propinquity."

On that first trip around the world Uncle Peabody found one of his

ideals, although he did not realize its vast importance until several

years later. Japan appealed to him, and the longer he remained there the

more impressed he became with certain of the national characteristics.

First of all, he marvelled at the evenness of temper which the people

displayed, at their endurance, their patience. He watched the

carefulness with which they weighed the importance of each problem

before accepting its responsibility, and their utter abandon in carrying

it through when once undertaken. This was twenty years before the

Russo-Japanese war, and he had come among them with the existing

Occidental estimate of their paganism and barbarity. It may have been a

species of incredulity leading to curiosity which induced him to remain

among them, but as a result of his sojourn he discovered that they were

philosophers rather than fatalists, geniuses rather than barbarians.

He questioned his new hosts, when he came to know them better, and was

told quite seriously and quite naturally that they never became angry,

because anger produced poison in the system and retarded digestion; that

upon digestion depended health; that upon health depended happiness, and

upon happiness depended personal efficiency and life itself. They

explained that forethought was one of the cardinal factors of their

creed, but added that its antithesis, fear-thought, was equally

important as an element to be eliminated. They called his attention to

the fact that they did not live upon what they ate, but upon what they

digested, and that by masticating their food more thoroughly than he did

they secured from the smaller quantity the same amount of nourishment

without needlessly overloading their systems with undigested food which

could not possibly be assimilated.

This last theory did not altogether appeal to Peabody Cartwright at

first. His friends at the Somerset Club still held memories of his

epicurean proclivities, and they were not weary even yet of recalling

the time when he had won a goodly wager by naming, blindfolded, five

different vintages of Burgundy and Bordeaux. But the more he thought it

over the more convinced he became that the something to which he had

promised to give a chance had really happened to him. He pondered, he

experimented--but he still continued to eat larger quantities of food

than the Japanese.

A year later he was in Italy, and in Venice Mr. Cartwright suddenly

discovered that he had found the geographical centre of the civilized

world. With Venice as the starting-point, one could reach London or

Constantinople, St. Petersburg or New York, with equal exertion. Venice,

therefore, became his adopted home, although it could claim no more of

his presence than any one of a dozen other cities in the four quarters

of the globe. During the twenty years, he had succeeded in making

himself a part of each one--had become a veritable citizen of the world,

but by no means a man without a country.

Italy served to drive home the truths which Japan had first shown him.

Three years after his experience there, a dingy, second-hand book-store

in Florence had placed him in possession of Luigi Cornaro's _Discorsi

della Vita Sobria_. He read it with amazement. Here in his hand, written

by a Venetian nobleman more than three hundred years before, at the age

of eighty-three, was the text-book of the theories of life which he had

accepted from the Japanese as new and untried except among this alien

people! It gave him a start, and he journeyed to Turin, Berne, Berlin,

Brussels, Paris, London, St. Petersburg, and even back to Boston,

seeking to interest the famous physiologists in his discovery, which he

believed was destined to exterminate disease and to transform those

practising the medical profession into hygienic engineers.

Mr. Cartwright's name and personality preserved him from a sanitarium,

but his theories as to self-control, forethought, and fear-thought

received ample opportunity for personal experiment. He was as tenacious

as if his future depended upon the outcome. A good-natured indulgence

here, and an incredulous sympathy there, gave him his first

opportunities for demonstration. He not only drew upon his fortune, but

freely contributed himself as a subject for experiment. It had been

slow, but he had learned patience from the Japanese. Disbelief gradually

changed into doubt, doubt into question, question into half-belief, and

half-belief into conviction. Quietly, surely, his own faith was

assimilated by those high in the physiological ranks, and almost against

their will, and before they realized the importance of their

concessions, he had forced them to prove him right by their own

analyses.

The last five years had been a steady triumph. He had found his ideals,

but he had not attained them. He knew what his life-work was, and had

the gratification of counting among his friends and collaborators the

highest authorities the world recognized. The habits of generations

could not be changed in a moment--some of them could never be changed;

but the ball had been started and was gaining in size with each

revolution. It no longer needed his gentle, persuasive push; it had its

own momentum now, and he found it only necessary to guide its advance

and to watch its growth.

Uncle Peabody's thoughts reverted to his work as he folded Helen's

letter and placed it again in his pocket, where he had so long carried

it. He regretted having his labors interrupted just now, but he found

himself keenly interested to watch Helen's approaching evolution. His

wagon was firmly hitched to this new star, and he had no notion of

changing stars. So, with a murmured "Bless you, my children. May you

live forever, and may I come to your funeral," he sought the repose

which the others had already found.

IV

Mary and Bertha Sinclair were just completing a year's study in

Florence, upon which they were depending to perfect their musical

education; but both girls were sufficiently homesick after their two

years' absence from Boston to be more than eager to exchange their

_pension_ for a week's visit with Helen, who brought to them a fresh

budget of home news,--for which their eagerness increased as the date

for their return to America drew nearer. Emory and Eustis, too, added

familiar faces, so the days following the first dinner at the villa

proved to be full of interest and enjoyment to all concerned.

The guests became familiar with each portion of the house and grounds,

the mysteries of Italian house-keeping were contrasted with the

limitations of boarding, and numerous topics of common import succeeded

each other without surcease.

During the morning following the arrival of the guests, Armstrong

touched tentatively upon the subject of visiting the library.

"We went there when we first came to Florence," Mary Sinclair replied;

"and we saw everything there was."

Armstrong smiled indulgently, thinking of the little they had really

seen.

"You know we are not very literary," explained Bertha, catching the

expression upon his face.

"They are really more hopeless cases even than I," Helen added,

sympathetically.

"Why don't you try Phil and me?" inquired Emory. "We went through the

Vatican library, so we are experts. At least they said it was a library.

The only books we saw there were a few in show-cases--the rest they kept

out of sight."

"You would not recognize a real book if you saw it, Emory," Armstrong

replied, with resignation. "There is no hurry. Perhaps Miss Thayer will

go with me some day soon."

"Indeed I will," Inez responded, with enthusiasm. "There is nothing I

wish so much to do."

"Good." His appreciation was sincere. "I shall take real delight in

introducing to you my old-time friends, with whom I often differ but,

never quarrel."

"Are they so real to you as that?" Inez asked, impressed by his tone.

"They are indeed," Armstrong replied, seriously. "I visit and talk with

them just as I would with you all. But they have an aggravating

advantage over me, for, no matter how laboriously I argue with them,

their original statement stands unmoved there upon the written page, as

if enjoying my feeble effort to disturb its serenity, and defying me to

do my worst."

"I would much prefer to give them an absent treatment," asserted Eustis.

"Inez is clearly the psychological subject," Helen added. "At school

she was forever putting us girls to shame by her mortifying familiarity

with the classics. It is only fair that she should now be paid in her

own coin."

"I accept both the invitation and the challenge," replied Inez, bowing

to her hostess, and, walking over to the low wall on which Helen had

seated herself, she threw her arm affectionately about her neck. "But

you must not embarrass me with such praise, or your husband will suffer

a keen disappointment. To study Latin and Greek out of school-books is

one thing; to meet face to face the personalities one has regarded as

divinities--even reading their very handwriting--is another. It makes

one wonder if she ever did know anything about them before."

"That is exactly the spirit in which to approach the shrine, Miss

Thayer!" cried Armstrong, enthusiastically. "Let us frame a new

beatitude: 'Blessed is she who appreciates the glories of antiquity, for

she shall inherit the riches of the past.'"

The contrast of the two girls in the rich Italian morning light was so

striking that Uncle Peabody paused in his approach after a successful

attack upon the rose-bushes, touched Armstrong upon the shoulder, and

nodded admiringly in their direction. They were separated a little from

the others, and were busily engaged in a conversation of their own, in

which no man hath a part, quite oblivious to the attention they

attracted. Inez was standing, and, even though seated, Helen's superb

head reached quite to her companion's shoulder, and the fair hair and

complexion were clearly defined against the darker hue of the face and

head bent down to meet her own. Her eyes, looking out into the distance

even as she spoke, reflected the calm, satisfied contentment of the

moment, while in the brown depths of the other's one could read an

ungratified ambition, an uncertainty not yet explained. Inez Thayer's

face was attractive, Helen's was beautiful--that beauty which one feels

belongs naturally to the person possessing it without the necessity of

analysis.

Armstrong was evidently pleased with this comparison, as he had been

with all previous ones. Italy, it seemed to him, formed just the

background to set off to best advantage his wife's personal attractions.

Uncle Peabody smiled contentedly at the undisguised satisfaction which

was so clearly indicated in the younger man's face.

"If there had been any girls in Boston who looked like that when I was

of sparking age," he whispered to Armstrong, "I should certainly have

married and settled down, as I ought to have done."

"And allowed the world to perish of indigestion?" queried Armstrong,

smiling.

"Scoffer! you do not deserve your good-fortune. Come, these roses are

becoming all thorns. Young ladies, may I intrude upon your _tete-a-tete_

long enough to present you with the trophies of my after-breakfast

hunt?"

"A thousand apologies, Uncle," cried Helen, taking the roses in her arms

and burying her face in their fragrant petals. "Oh! how beautiful! And

how idiotic ever to leave this Garden of Paradise and immure yourselves

within that musty old library. Do you not repent?"

"I place the decision wholly in Miss Thayer's hands," said Armstrong;

but he glanced at Inez with evident expectancy.

"Then I decide to go," replied the girl. "I am quite impatient to meet

the friends in whose good company Mr. Armstrong revelled before his

present reincarnation."

"When?" asked Armstrong, quickly.

"Now!"

"Splendid! I will order the carriage at once."

"There is rapid transit for you!" exclaimed Eustis. "Jack believes in

striking while the iron is hot."

"What a narrow escape we have had," murmured Mary Sinclair, with a sigh

of relief.

"Very well," said Helen, resignedly. "It may be just as well to have it

over. Jack has been looking forward to this ever since he turned his

face toward Florence, and he will be quite miserable until he has

actually gratified his anticipation.--But don't be away long, will you,

Jack?"

"Miss Thayer will very likely find the staid company which we plan to

keep quite as stupid as the rest of you anticipate," replied Armstrong,

"so we may be home sooner than you expect."

Inez had already disappeared in-doors to put on her hat, and Armstrong

started out to call a carriage. Helen intercepted him as he crossed the

veranda.

"You won't mind if I don't go with you to-day, will you, Jack? If it

were just to see the treasures at the library I would urge them all to

go; but I know what is in your mind, dear. Truly, I will go with you

some time, and you shall try your experiment upon me; but I am not in

the mood for it just now. I ought not to leave the others, anyway."

"It is all right, of course," he answered. "I wish you did feel like

going, but your substitute seems to be enthusiastic enough to make up

for your antipathy."

"Don't call it that," Helen answered, half-reproachfully; "it is simply

that I am ashamed to have my ignorance exposed,--and it will give you

such a splendid chance really to know Inez. Now run along and have a

good time, and tell me all about it when you come home."

* * * * *

The little one-horse victoria soon left the villa behind, and was well

along on the narrow descending road before either of its occupants broke

the silence. As if by mutual consent, each was thinking what neither

would have spoken aloud. Helen had not seen the expression of

disappointment which passed over her husband's face as she spoke. He

would have given much if it might have been his wife beside him. He had

studied the girl carefully, and had found in her an intuitive sympathy

with the very subjects concerning which she disclaimed all knowledge. At

first he had thought that she exaggerated her limitations because of his

deeper study, but he soon discovered her absolute sincerity. It was a

lack of confidence in herself, he inwardly explained, and when once in

Florence he would give her that confidence which was the only element

lacking to her complete understanding. But as yet he had been unable to

get her inside the library, or even within range of the necessary

atmosphere.

Inez Thayer's thoughts were upon the same subject, but from a different

standpoint. Her last words to Helen, when Uncle Peabody had interrupted

their conversation, framed a mild reproach. "If I had won a man like

Jack Armstrong," Inez whispered to her, "I would not allow any one, not

even you, to take my place on an excursion such as this, upon which he

has so set his whole heart."

"You are a sweet little harmonizer, Inez," Helen had answered,

smilingly, "but you are a silly child none the less. Jack and I

understand each other perfectly. He knows my limitations, and, if I

went, I should only spoil his full enjoyment. You will understand it and

revel in it, and he will be supremely happy. If you were not so much

better fitted naturally for this sort of thing, of course I should go

rather than disappoint him, but, truly, the arrangement is much better

as it is."

Inez had no opportunity to continue the conversation, but Helen had not

convinced her. Hers was an intense nature, and she had much more of the

romantic in her soul than her best friends gave her credit for. Her one

serious love-affair had proved only an annoyance and mortification.

Ferdinand De Peyster was in many ways a desirable _parti_, as mammas

with marriageable daughters were quite aware. He was possessed of a

handsome competency, was not inconvenienced by business

responsibilities, and his devotion to Inez Thayer was only whetted to a

greater degree of constancy by the opposition it received from its

particular object. He was not lacking in education, having spent four

years in the freshman class at Harvard; he was not unattractive, in his

own individual way, and his one great desire, not even second to his

striving for blue ribbons with his fine stable of blooded horses, was to

have her accept the position of head of his household.

But Inez was repelled by the very subserviency of his devotion. Her

love rested heavily upon respect, and this could be won only by a man

who commanded it. John Armstrong fulfilled her ideal, and she wondered

why Fate had not fashioned the man whom she had attracted in a similar

mould.

Armstrong looked up from his reverie half guiltily, and for a moment his

eyes met those of his companion squarely. Inez could not match the frank

glance--it seemed to her as if he must have read her thoughts; but the

heartiness of his words relieved her apprehension.

"What a bore you must think me, Miss Thayer! I have not spoken a word

since we left the house."

"I must assume my share of responsibility for the silence," Inez

replied, regaining her composure. "The seriousness of our quest must

have had a sobering effect upon us both."

"But you won't find these old fellows so serious as you think,"

Armstrong hastened to say. "They were humanists and products of the

movement which marked the breaking away from the ascetic severity

preceding them. But, after all, they were the first to realize that life

could be even better worth living if it contained beauty and happiness."

"You see how little I know about them, in spite of Helen's attempt to

place me on a pedestal."

"Why, if it had not been for their work," he continued,

enthusiastically, "the classics might still have remained as dead to us

as they were to those who lived in the thirteenth century. Instead of

studying Virgil and Homer, we should have been brought up on theological

literature and the 'Holy Fathers.'"

"I feel just as I did at my coming-out party," Inez replied--"that same

feeling of awe and uncertainty. I am eager to go with you, yet I dread

it somehow. It is not a presentiment exactly,--it is--"

"I know just what you mean," Armstrong interrupted, sympathetically;

"and, if you feel like that now, just wait until you see old Cerini, the

librarian. It is he who is responsible for my passion for this sort of

thing. Why, I remember, when I was here years ago and used to run in to

see him at the Laurenziana, I never regarded him as a mortal at all; and

I don't believe my reverence and veneration for the old man have abated

a whit in the twelve years gone by."

The light vehicle had passed through the Porta alla Croce, and was

swaying from side to side like a ship at sea, rattling over the stones

of the narrow city streets at such a rate that conversation was no

longer a pleasure.

"Just why Florentine cabmen are content to drive at a snail's pace on a

good road and feel impelled to rush at breakneck speed over bad ones is

a phase of Italian character explained neither by Baedeker nor by Hare,"

remarked Armstrong, leaning nearer to Inez to make himself heard.

With a loud snap of his whip and a guttural "Whee-oop," the _cocchiere_

rounded the statue of John of the Black Bands, just missed the ancient

book-stand immortalized by Browning in the _Ring and the Book_, and came

to a sudden stop before the unpretentious entrance to the Biblioteca

Laurenziana.

"You have been here before, of course?" he asked his companion as they

passed through the wicket-gate into the ancient cloisters of San

Lorenzo.

"Once, with Baedeker to tell me to go on, and with the tall Italian

custodian to stop me when I reached the red velvet rope stretched across

the room, which I suppose marks the Dante division between Purgatory and

Paradise."

"This time you shall not only enter Paradise, but you shall behold the

Beatific Vision," laughed Armstrong.

Passing by the main entrance of the library at the head of the stone

stairs, Armstrong led the way along the upper cloister to a small door,

where he pressed a little electric button--an accessory not included in

Michelangelo's original plans for the building. A moment later they

heard the sound of descending footsteps, and presently a bearded face

looked out at them through the small grated window. The inspection was

evidently satisfactory, for the heavy iron bar on the inside was

released and the door opened.

"Good-morning, Maritelli," said Armstrong in Italian. "Is the

_direttore_ disengaged?"

"He is in his study, signore, awaiting your arrival."

Maritelli dropped the iron bar back into place with a loud clang and

then led the way up the short flight of stone steps to the librarian's

study. Armstrong detained Inez a moment at the top.

"I brought you in this way because I want you to see Cerini in his

frame. It is a picture worthy the brush of an old master."

Maritelli knocked gently on the door and placed his ear against it to

hear the response. Then he opened it quietly and bowed as Armstrong and

his companion entered.

"Buon' giorno, padre." Armstrong gravely saluted the old man as he

looked up. "I have brought to you another seeker after the gold in your

treasure-house."

Cerini's face showed genuine delight as he rose and extended both hands

to Inez. "Your wife!" he exclaimed; "I am glad indeed to greet her."

Armstrong flushed. "No, padre, not my wife, but her dearest friend, Miss

Thayer."

The old man let one arm fall to his side with visible disappointment,

which he vainly sought to conceal.

"I am sorry," he said, simply, taking Inez' hand in his own. "I have

known this dear friend for many years, and have loved him for the love

he gave to my work. I had hoped to greet his wife here, and to find that

the _literae humaniores_ were to her the elixir of life that they are to

me--and to him."

"When I tell her of my visit she will be eager to come to you as I

have," said Inez, strangely touched by the keenness of his

disappointment. "To-day she could not leave her guests."

"Will you first show Miss Thayer the illuminations and the rarest of the

incunabula?" asked Armstrong, eager to change the subject; "and then

will you let us come back here to talk with you?"

"With pleasure, my son, with pleasure. What shall I show her first?"

"That little 'Book of Hours' illuminated by Francesco d'Antonio, padre."

Cerini pulled up the great bunch of keys suspended from the end of his

girdle and unlocked one of the drawers in the ancient wooden desk in

front of him.

"I always wonder how you dare keep so priceless a treasure in that desk,

and why it is not put on exhibition where visitors may see it,"

Armstrong queried.

Cerini laughed quietly. "There are many other treasures, my son, equally

precious, as you know well, scattered about in these desks and drawers,

where I alone can find them."

"How dare you take the risk?"

Cerini's face showed a gentle craftiness. "We are in Italy, my son. If

any one could find these gems, any one could be librarian"--and the old

man chuckled quietly to himself.

Inez' eyes were fastened upon a little purple velvet case inlaid with

jewels. Cerini opened it carefully, exposing a small volume similarly

bound and similarly adorned. Armstrong eagerly watched the interest in

the girl's face as the full splendor of the masterpiece impressed itself

upon her--the marvellous delicacy of design, the gorgeousness of color,

the magnificence of the decoration and the miniatures. Inez drew in her

breath excitedly and bent nearer to the magnifying-glass which it was

necessary to use in tracing the intricacy of the work.

"Wonderful!" she cried, and then was silent.

"It belonged to Lorenzo the Magnificent, and represents the finest of

the _quattrocento_ work, my daughter," explained the old man, pleased as

was Armstrong by her unfeigned admiration. "The patrons of the book in

the fifteenth century considered gems of thought as the most precious of

all jewels. The page containing them must be written upon the finest and

the rarest parchment. They could not inlay costly stones, so they

employed the most famous artists to place upon the page in beaten gold

and gorgeous colors a representation of the jewels and miniatures as

perfect as art at its highest could produce. Can you wonder, my

daughter, that men brought up in the school of neo-Platonism should look

upon the invention of printing as an evil and an innovation to be

opposed?"

Inez would not permit Cerini to close the volume until she had feasted

her eyes upon every page.

"Have you not prepared me for an anti-climax?" she asked, with a sigh,

as Armstrong suggested a visit to the room of illuminations. "Surely

there is nothing else here to surpass what I have just seen."

The librarian answered. "Nothing to surpass it, truly, but other volumes

equally interesting."

The old man led them into a larger room filled with wooden cases whose

glass tops were covered with faded green curtains. Costly tapestries

lined the walls, but Inez' attention was quickly taken from them as

Cerini pulled aside the curtains and disclosed the resplendent wealth

beneath. Heavy choir-books, classic manuscripts, books of hours,

breviaries embellished by Lorenzo Monaco, master of Fra Angelico, by

Benozzo Gozzoli, whose frescos still make the Riccardi famous, and other

artists whose names have long since been forgotten, but whose work

remains as an everlasting monument to a departed art. Magnificent

examples of every school, from the early Byzantine to the decadent style

of the sixteenth century, combined to teach the present the omnipotence

of the past.

From case to case they passed, their guide indicating the variations

and the significance of the different schools, out into the great

library itself, in which, with its noble yet simple proportions as laid

down by Michelangelo, Inez found a relief after the gorgeousness and

grandeur of the last hour. Armstrong pointed out to her the _plutei_

upon which the great books rested, and to which they now remained

chained as in the olden days, four centuries back, when they began their

eternal vigil. Life outside the old walls had changed mightily since

Cosimo de' Medici, the first grand-duke, laid their foundations. Cosimo,

"_pater patriae_," the real founder of the collection, Pietro and

Giovanni de' Medici had come and gone; Lorenzo il Magnifico had lived

and died, bequeathing to them his illustrious name; Charles VIII. of

France had destroyed the power of the house of the Medici, the Medici

had again regained their own, the house of Lorraine had succeeded them,

the separate states had been merged into a great kingdom--and still the

volumes held their places at the end of their chains, as if to prove the

immutability of learning as compared with the changeability of princes.

At Armstrong's suggestion, Cerini led them back into his study, where

the old man again took his place at his desk, as his visitors seated

themselves where they could best watch him and listen to his words. It

was, indeed, as Armstrong had expressed it, a picture for an old master.

Cerini was clad in the black silk soutane of his learned order, with the

_biretta_ upon his head. He was spare, and the skin upon his face and

hands was as dried and colored as the ancient parchment of the books

with which he lived. The dim light coming through the stained-glass

window enhanced the weirdness of his aspect, and as one looked he seemed

the personification of the ancient written manuscript vivified and

speaking the words which one would have expected to read upon the page.

[Illustration:

SLOWLY THE SPELL BEGAN TO WORK UPON INEZ'

BRAIN. SHE WAS NO LONGER IN THE PRESENT--SHE

WAS A WOMAN OF ITALY OF FOUR CENTURIES BACK]

"My daughter," he was saying to Inez, "you, too, are a humanist, as my

young friend and I are, or you could not manifest so true an

understanding as you do. For humanism, my daughter, is not only the love

of antiquity: it is the worship of it--a worship carried so far that it

is not limited to adoration alone, but which forces one to reproduce. By

the same token the humanist is the man who not only knows intimately the

ancients and is inspired by them: it is he who is so fascinated by their

magic spell that he copies them, imitates them, rehearses their lessons,

adopts their models and their methods, their examples and their gods,

their spirit and their tongue."

Then Cerini passed on in his conversation to the old-time writers

themselves. The little study was poorly ventilated, and the air was

heavy. The ancient tomes exuded their peculiar odor, and the low,

sing-song voice of the speaker seemed far removed from the life they had

just left outside. Slowly the spell began to work upon Inez' brain. She

was no longer in the present--she was a woman of Italy of four centuries

back. Petrarch, with his laurel-crowned head, rose up before her and

recited verses written for Laura; Politian gave to her of his wisdom;

Machiavelli discussed Florentine politics with her. It was not the voice

of Cerini the librarian which she heard--it was the veritable voice from

the dead and buried past. She furtively glanced at Armstrong and saw in

his face a light which she knew Helen had never seen there, and in her

heart she felt a guilty joyousness at the advantage she had gained. It

was Leonardo sitting at the old desk now--Leonardo the master of art, of

sculpture, the forerunner, the man-god against the god-man. She pressed

her hand to her head; it was dripping moisture. Would he never stop? It

was becoming fearsome, unbearable. Her eyes were fixed upon the aged

priestly clad figure before her; she could not move them. What power

held her, what magic controlled even her thoughts? She tried to speak to

Armstrong, to tell him that she was ill, but her mouth seemed parched

and she could not speak. She looked at Cerini's chair again. The old man

was no longer there. Machiavelli had taken his place and was uttering

diatribes against the state. She must cry out--she could not. She

started to her feet--then she fell back, and all became a blank. When

she revived, a few moments later, it was in the sunny enclosure of the

cloister garden, whither Armstrong had anxiously carried her, and where

the fresh air served to relieve the tension and to counteract the

influence which had so overpowered her.

V

By mutual consent, Miss Thayer and Armstrong decided not to mention the

rather dramatic finale to their first excursion to the library. Inez

experienced the deepest mortification, while Jack blamed himself

severely that he had not watched his companion more carefully. If he had

done this, he repeated to himself, he might easily have anticipated and

avoided the unpleasant climax to an otherwise thoroughly enjoyable

morning. Miss Thayer, however, would not listen to his apologies: he had

accepted her as a comrade, and she had proved herself unequal to the

test. Armstrong tried to reassure her, but his efforts were not

eminently successful.

The whole affair, in spite of their disclaimers, made a considerable

impression upon them both. Armstrong knew that it had not been weakness

alone; for even his brief acquaintance with her told him that strength

was a salient point in her character. She was impressionable--he

realized that--but surely not to the extent of losing all control over

herself. Was it--and Armstrong feared lest Inez should read his mind as

the thought came to him--was it that same irresistible influence of

those ancient spirits, coming out from the past to her as they had so

many times to him, recognizing her as a reincarnation of themselves, and

claiming her, even for that, brief moment of unconsciousness, as a part

of what had gone before?

Inez pleaded a headache upon reaching the villa, and asked that her

lunch be sent to her room; but it was long after Annetta had left the

tray upon the table that she was able to taste, even sparingly, the

tempting delicacies which were placed before her. What can be more

searching than a woman's self-examination? She had told Armstrong that

she blamed herself for her weakness; so she did, but it was not wholly

the weakness of losing consciousness. Who was this man, and what this

influence which had so suddenly entered into her life and assumed such

immediate control over her? She felt that she could resist either

separately, but together they produced a power which she questioned her

ability to oppose. And the strange part of it all was that no one was

forcing it upon her. She knew perfectly well that she need never go to

the library again unless she chose; but she knew equally well what her

choice must inevitably be, if the opportunity were offered her.

Even as she recalled her experience, a thrill half of delight, half of

apprehension, passed over her. What did it all mean? Armstrong compelled

her respect, but it was ridiculous even to wonder whether or not the

sentiments he inspired were of a more serious nature. The subjects in

which he was interested appealed to her highest self and fascinated her,

but beyond this what possible force could they possess to render her so

immediately subservient to their demands? What was there about it all

which made it seem so inexpressively delicious? And what of him, of this

man above whose head the ancients had already placed the halo of their

approval, who stood to her as the personification of ideal manhood?

These were some of the questions Inez Thayer asked herself that

afternoon, wrestling within and striving honestly to decide her course;

but even as she did so she found her thoughts again centering themselves

upon Armstrong as she closed her eyes and allowed herself to be carried

back to the experiences of the morning. She had no reasonable excuse to

leave Florence, which instinctively she felt to be the safest thing to

do; and, besides this, her spirit revolted at the thought that she could

not meet the problem face to face and master it. She must do it, she

would do it; and, having finally arrived at this determination, she came

down, just before dinner, and joined her friends in the garden, where

they were enjoying the soft close of the perfect Italian day.

"There you are!" Helen welcomed her with outstretched arms. "Is your

headache better?"

"Yes, thank you," Inez replied, forcing a smile; "the air was very close

in the library, and then, too, I found so much to make me thoughtful."

"Then you were not disappointed?" Emory asked.

"Disappointed? It was wonderful. You don't know how much you all

missed."

"You look as if Jack had shown you some spooks," remarked Eustis; "you

are as white as one yourself."

The color quickly returned to Inez' face. "I am always like that when I

have one of these wretched headaches," she explained. "But, truly, I

never had such a remarkable experience. I can quite understand Mr.

Armstrong's devotion. I never knew before how fascinating such learning

really is."

"Did he actually conjure up those old fellows and put them through their

paces for you?" Emory asked.

Miss Thayer was in no mood for bantering. "It is not possible for you to

understand without experiencing it yourself," she said, quietly.

"Or even afterward, I suspect," Bertha Sinclair added, slyly.

"I am so glad that you enjoyed it," said Helen. "I couldn't get much out

of Jack, and I was afraid that you had passed a stupid morning and that

the headache was the natural result."

"I shall never forget it--never!" Inez murmured.

Helen regarded her attentively for a moment. "I had no idea it would

make so strong an impression on you," she said at length. "Now that it

is over, you and Jack will both feel better satisfied."

"You must see Cerini, Helen, and let him show you those wonderful books

and explain everything, just as he did to us."

"So I will, sometime," Helen smiled. "Perhaps he could bring out my

dormant possibilities."

"It is time we dressed for dinner," remarked Mary Sinclair, rising. "You

and Inez are already _en grande tenue_, but the rest of us are

shockingly unconventional."

As the Sinclair girls hurried into the house, closely followed by the

men, Helen leaned against the balustrade at the end of the bowling-green

and watched the deepening color which touched alike the spires of Santa

Croce and the turret of the Palazzo Vecchio, gleamed on the dome of the

Cathedral and Giotto's tower, and spread like wine over the placid

surface of the Arno. Beyond the river rose the basilica of San Miniato,

its ancient pediment sharply outlined against the sky. Helen's thoughts

wandered even farther away than her eyes. Inez watched her for several

moments before slipping her arm about her waist.

"Oh, Inez!" Helen was startled for an instant. "Did you ever see such a

wonderful spot as this?" she continued, recovering herself. "Some new

beauty discloses itself uninvited hour by hour. Every time I come into

the garden I find some lovely flower I never saw before, or meet some

sweet odor which makes me shut my eyes and just draw it in with delight.

Each time I look toward Florence the view is different, and each new

view more beautiful than the last. Oh, Inez darling, is it an enchanted

palace that Jack has brought me to, or is it just because I am so

blissfully, supremely, foolishly happy?" Helen embraced her friend

enthusiastically.

"Let us call it the enchanted palace, dear," Inez answered as Helen

released her, "and you the modern Circe, with power to make all about

you as beautiful and as happy as the ancient Circe to cast malign

influences."

Helen laughed. "Why not take it further and say that the transformation

of the ancient Circe is the final triumph of Uncle Peabody's labors? Had

his theories been in force among the friends of Ulysses, the fair lady

could never have turned them into swine. But tell me, did you not find

Jack a very different person from what you had expected after seeing him

here at home?"

"I did, indeed," assented Inez, soberly.

"Is he not simply splendid?" Helen's face beamed with pride. "It was

just as much of a surprise to me. Of course, I have always known that he

was interested in all these things, but it has only been since we were

married that I have realized how much he actually knows.--I wish I

thought there was even the slightest chance of his being able to lead me

up to his heights, he is so eager for it. I shall give him an

opportunity to try his experiment, of course, but the trouble is that in

spite of the interest and fascination which I do feel, his hobby always

seems to me to be hemmed in with needless limitations. For my part, I

don't see why we can't take the best these master spirits of the past

can give us, just as Jack says, but without ourselves becoming a part of

the past.--You see how absolutely hopeless I am. I wonder how in the

world he ever came to be attracted to me."

"You are the only one who wonders."

"Oh, I know that my hair is not red, and that I don't squint, and all

that, but Jack is so fascinated by everything scholarly that I don't see

why he didn't select an intellectual wife. Why, I don't even wear

glasses!"

Inez smiled at the picture Helen drew. "The rest of us girls understand

why he made just the selection he did, Helen."

"I never wanted to be intellectual before. Until now I have always

considered the caricatures of the Boston Browning woman as typical of

the highly educated species; but you are showing me that a girl can be

human and intellectual at the same time."

"I wish I could show you that you make too much of a mountain out of

this intellectual bugbear," Inez replied, candidly. "Your husband is a

very unusual man. His interest in the humanities is beyond anything one

can appreciate without seeing him as I saw him this morning. He longs to

take you with him into this life, and if I were in your place I should

let him be the one to discover my lack of understanding, if I really did

lack it, instead of insisting upon it as a foregone conclusion. For

myself, I don't take much stock in it. I remember too well how quick a

certain Miss Cartwright was at school to grasp new ideas, and I have not

noticed any serious retrogression since."

Helen pondered carefully over her friend's criticism before replying. "I

suppose it does seem like obstinacy," she said, finally--"to him as well

as to you; yet to myself it appears perfectly consistent. The one thing

which gives me an idea of the extent of his devotion is my music. You

know how I adore it, how much a part of my life it has always been--yet

it means nothing to Jack, and he therefore takes no particular interest

in it. He went to the Symphonies and the Opera with me while we were

engaged, and to concerts and recitals, but I knew all the time that it

was just to please me. I made up my mind that when we were married I

would keep up my interest in this 'devotion' of mine only as much as I

could without having it interfere with those things which he cared for

or which we could enjoy together. But the fact that music means less to

him than it means to me does not make me love him any the less."

"But you don't enter into this particular interest of his, even to

please him, as he did to please you."

"Because I appreciate from the experience I have just mentioned how

little real satisfaction it would give either one of us. Looking back, I

feel that I was positively selfish to let him go to those concerts with

me, and I shall never inflict them on him again. I am sure that he knows

how I feel, and I think he ought to be grateful for my consideration."

Inez pressed Helen's hand. "You ought to know best, dear," she answered.

"You both possess such wonderful possibilities that it would be a shame

not to combine them. It seems to me that you might come to an

appreciation of each other's interests by becoming familiar with

them.--I wonder if you realize what a man your husband is?"

Helen leaned over and kissed her impulsively. "I realize more than I

ever intend to let him know, dear child. He would become unbearably

conceited were he even to guess how much he has already become to me. I

really did not want to marry him--or to marry any one--but he swept away

every objection, just as he always does, and now I find myself wondering

how in the world I ever existed without him. Oh, Inez"--Helen's face

became tense in her earnestness--"we girls think we know a whole lot

about marriage. We anticipate it--we dread it; but, when one actually

enters into her new estate, she knows how infinitely more it is to be

anticipated, if happy, than her fondest dream. But if unhappy--then her

dread must have been infinitesimal compared with the reality."

"'Marriage is either a complete union or a complete isolation,'" quoted

Inez.

"As I tell you, Jack and I understand each other perfectly," Helen

continued, confidently, "and that means so much to a girl. One of the

first things I told him, after we became engaged, was that if our

affection stood for anything it must stand for everything. If at any

time while we were engaged, or even after we were married, he felt that

he had made a mistake in thinking me the one woman in the world for him,

he was to come to me frankly and say so, and together we would plan how

best to meet the situation. Suppose, for instance, that Jack met some

one whom he really loved better than me. It would be an awful

experience, but how much less of a tragedy to recognize the fact than to

live on, a hollow, miserable existence, such as we see in so many

instances around us."

"And he has not confessed to you yet?"

"Not yet," Helen laughed, "and we shall have been married six weeks

to-morrow. That is a pretty good start, is it not?"

"But how about yourself--have you the same privilege?"

"Of course; but that is not important, for I shall never see any one fit

to ride in the same automobile with Jack."

"What did you say about my automobile? Has it arrived?"

Armstrong's face was filled with eager expectation as he came up behind

Helen, followed by Uncle Peabody. He drew her affectionately toward him.

"You wretch!" cried Helen, "you have been eavesdropping."

"Not an eavesdrop," protested Jack, "and I can prove it by a witness.

When I came down-stairs I looked for my beloved spouse upon the terrace

and found her not. The gentle Annetta confided to me that you and the

Signorina Thayer were in the garden; I set out upon my quest and found

you here discussing my automobile or some one else's. Again I ask you,

have you news of its arrival?"

"No, Jack--no news as yet; and you make out so good a case that I must

absolve you. Since you insist on knowing, we were discussing the very

prosaic subject of matrimony."

"Why discourage Miss Thayer from making the attempt simply because of

your own sad case?" Armstrong queried, releasing his wife and seating

himself beside her on the edge of the balustrade. "Marriage is a

lottery--so saith the philosopher. We all know the preponderance of

blanks and small prizes, yet each one feels certain that he will be the

lucky one. Once in a while a chap pulls out the capital prize, and that

encourages the others, though it ought to discourage them, because it

lessens the chances just so much. But what I object to is the growling

afterward, when each should realize that he is getting exactly what he

ought to have expected."

"But it is not fair that both you and Helen should have drawn the lucky

numbers," Inez declared. "It makes it so hopeless for the rest of us."

"There, Sir Fisher," cried Helen, "you have gained the compliment for

which you strove. Art satisfied?"

"No one has drawn me yet," suggested Uncle Peabody, "and I am a capital

prize--I admit it."

"It is a shame to throw cold water on Miss Thayer's beautiful

sentiment," continued Armstrong. "Such thoughts are so rare that they

should be encouraged; but the facts of the case are that the capital

prizes in the men's lottery were discontinued long ago. No--among the

girls they are still to be won at rare intervals, but the only way to

distinguish the men is by looking up their rating in Bradstreet's, or

their mother's family name in the Social Register. Other than this, one

man is as bad as another, if not worse."

Inez looked at Armstrong for a moment with a puzzled expression, but

failed to find any suggestion that he was speaking lightly. And

yet--what a change in attitude from the morning! She hesitated to turn

the subject upon what seemed to her to be forbidden ground, yet she

could not resist opposing his expressions, even though they might be

uttered flippantly. Her voice contained a reproach.

"You spoke differently of men this morning."

Armstrong turned to her quickly. "This morning?" he repeated. "Oh, but I

was referring to the humanists, and to ancient ones at that. I am

talking now of men in general, rather than of those rare exceptions,

ancient or modern, who have succeeded in separating themselves from

their commonplace contemporaries. Of course, my respect for the

old-timers is supreme, because their great accomplishments were in the

face of so much greater obstacles. Since then the world has had five

hundred years in which to degenerate."

"Don't pay any attention to him, Inez," Helen interrupted, complacently.

"He is simply trying to start an argument, and he does not believe a

word he says. He really looks upon men as infinitely superior beings in

the past, present, and future, and this self-abnegation on the part of

himself and his sex is only a passing conceit."

"I refuse to be side-tracked," Armstrong insisted. "I grant that the

conversation started more in jest than in earnest, but I maintain my

position, none the less. Modern civilization has brought to us a

wonderful material development, but intellectual advance, instead of

keeping abreast of the material, has positively retrograded."

"You really make me feel ashamed to be living in such an abominable

age," suggested Uncle Peabody.

Inez was serious. "I am quite incompetent to carry on this discussion

with you, Mr. Armstrong," she said, disregarding the others, "and I

admire, as you know, the marvellous accomplishments of these

'old-timers,' as you call them, wondering at their power to overcome the

obstacles which we know existed. Yet I like to believe that the ages

which have passed have marked an advance on all sides rather than a

retrogression."

"So should I like to," assented Armstrong, "if I could; but look at the

facts. William James has just succeeded in making philosophy popular,

but Plato and Aristotle gave it to us before the birth of Christ. We

enthuse over Shakespeare and Dante and Milton, but Homer and Virgil gave

us the grandest of poetry two thousand years ago. The _quattrocento_,

that period which so fires me with enthusiasm, gave us Raphael as an

artist, together with Leonardo and Michelangelo as the foremost examples

of humanists. Whom have we had since to equal them?"

"All this is beyond argument," Inez admitted. "But is this the fault of

the men or of the times? Conditions are so changed that the same kind of

work can never be done again. The telephone, the telegraph, railroad

trains, fast steamships, the daily papers--everything distracts the

modern worker from devoting himself wholly and absolutely to his single

purpose; but with this distraction is it not also true that the modern

worker gives to the world what the world really needs most under the

present conditions? In other words, would not these same great men, if

set down in the twentieth century, produce work very similar to what

modern great men have given and are giving us?"

"I should be sorry enough to think so," affirmed Jack. "What a pity it

would be!"

Uncle Peabody's mood had changed from amusement to interest. "If I

really thought you were sincere in the attitude you take," he said,

addressing Armstrong, "I could prescribe no better cure for your

complaint than to force you to subject yourself, for one single week, to

those same conditions which you seem to admire so much."

"If you refer to conveniences, Mr. Cartwright," interrupted Armstrong,

"I will admit without argument that you are right. These are wholly the

result of material development."

"Let us confine ourselves to intellectual achievements if you choose,"

continued Uncle Peabody. "Without an intellect, could one harness steam

and electricity and make them obedient to the human will? Is not a

wireless message an echo from the brain? What is the telephone if not a

product of thought?"

"You and Miss Thayer are arguing my case far better than I can do it

myself," replied Armstrong, undisturbed. "The triumphs of Watt and

Edison and Marconi and Bell are all intellectual, even though

utilitarian. Each of these men has proved himself humanistic, in that he

has given to the world the best that is in him, and not simply modified

or readapted some previous achievement. If they were not limited by

living in an age of specialization they might even have been humanists.

Right here in Italy you see the same thing to-day. The Italians are

beyond any other race intellectually fit to rule the world now as they

once did, and it is simply because they have been unable to withstand

materialism that they have not reclaimed their own."

"Just what do you mean by 'humanism,' Jack?" Helen asked, abruptly.

"The final definition of modern humanism will not be written for several

years," Armstrong answered. "The world is not yet ready for it, and I am

afraid Cerini's creed of ancient humanism would strike you as being

rather heavy."

"Let me see if I could comprehend it." Helen looked across to Inez, and

the eyes of the two girls met with mutual understanding. "Can you repeat

it?"

"I know it word for word," her husband replied, eagerly, delighted to

have Helen manifest an interest. "It was the first lesson the old man

taught me, years ago. 'The humanist,' Cerini says, 'is the man who not

only knows intimately the ancients and is inspired by them: it is he who

is so fascinated by their magic spell that he copies them, imitates

them, rehearses their lessons, adopts their models and their methods,

their examples and their gods, their spirit and their tongue.'"

Helen was visibly disappointed. "I thought I had an idea," she said,

slowly, "but I was wrong. Inez used the word 'humanities' a few moments

ago, and I once heard President Eliot say that this was simply another

name for a liberal education--teaching men to drink in the inspiration

of all the ages and to seek to make their age the best."