Yet I found my attention wandering, and my wits wool-gathering, even in
the afternoon, when I had gone down with Julia and my mother to the new
house, to see after the unpacking of that load of furniture. I can
imagine circumstances in which nothing could be more delightful than the
care with which a man prepares a home for his future wife. The very tint
of the walls, and the way the light falls in through the windows, would
become matters of grave importance. In what pleasant spot shall her
favorite chair be placed? And what picture shall hang opposite it to
catch her eye the oftenest? Where is her piano to stand? What china, and
glass, and silver, is she to use? Where are the softest carpets to be
found for her feet to tread? In short, where is the very best and
daintiest of every thing to be had, for the best and daintiest little
bride the sun ever shone on?
There was not the slightest flavor of this sentiment in our furnishing
of our new house. It was really more Julia's business than mine. We had
had dozens of furnishing lists to peruse from the principal houses in
London and Paris, as if even there it was a well-understood thing that
Julia and I were going to be married. We had toiled through these
catalogues, making pencil-marks in them, as though they were catalogues
of an art exhibition. We had prudently settled the precise sum (of
Julia's money) which we were to lay out. Julia's taste did not often
agree with mine, as she had no eye for the harmonies of color--a
singular deficiency among us, as most of the Guernsey women are born
artists. We were constantly compelled to come to a compromise, each
yielding some point; not without a secret misgiving on my part that the
new house would have many an eyesore about it for me. But then it was
Julia's money that was doing it, and after all she was more anxious to
please me than I deserved.
That afternoon Pellet and I, like two assistants in a furnishing-house,
unrolled carpets and stretched them along the floors before the critical
gaze of my mother and Julia. We unpacked chairs and tables, scanning
anxiously for damages on the polished wood, and setting them one after
another in a row against the walls. I went about as in some dream. The
house commanded a splendid view of the whole group of the Channel
Islands, and the rocky islets innumerable strewed about the sea. The
afternoon sun was shining full upon Sark, and whenever I looked through
the window I could see the cliffs of the Havre Gosselin, purple in the
distance, with a silver thread of foam at their foot. No wonder that my
thoughts wandered, and the words my mother and Julia were speaking went
in at one ear and out at the other. Certainly I was dreaming; but which
part was the dream?
"I don't believe he cares a straw about the carpets!" exclaimed Julia,
in a disappointed tone.
"I do indeed, dear Julia," I said, bringing myself back to the carpets.
Here I had been obliged to give in to Julia's taste. She had set her
mind upon having flowers in her drawing-room carpet, and there they
were, large garlands of bright-colored blossoms, very gay, and, as I
ventured to remark to myself, very gaudy.
"You like it better than you did in the pattern?" she asked, anxiously.
I did not like it one whit better, but I should have been a brute if I
had said so. She was gazing at it and me with so troubled an expression,
that I felt it necessary to set her mind at ease.
"It is certainly handsomer than the pattern?" I said, regarding it
attentively; "very much handsomer."
"You like it better than the plain thing you chose at first?" pursued
Julia.
I was about to be hunted into a corner, and forced into denying my own
taste--a process almost more painful than denying one's faith--when my
mother came to my rescue. She could read us both as an open book, and
knew the precise moment to come between us.
"Julia, my love," she said, "remember that we wish to show Martin those
patterns while it is daylight. To-morrow is Sunday, you know."
A little tinge of color crept over Julia's tintless face as she told
Pellet he might go. I almost wished that I might be dismissed too; but
it was only a vague, wordless wish. We then drew near to the window,
from which we could see Sark so clearly, and Julia drew out of her
pocket a very large envelope, which was bursting with its contents.
They were small scraps of white silk and white satin. I took them
mechanically into my hand, and could not help admiring the pure,
lustrous, glossy beauty of them. I passed my fingers over them softly.
There was something in the sight of them that moved me, as if they were
fragments of the shining garments of some vision, which in times gone
by, when I was much younger, had now and then floated before my fancy. I
did not know any one lovely enough to wear raiment of glistening white
like these, unless--unless--. A passing glimpse of the pure white face,
and glossy hair, and deep gray eyes of my Sark patient flashed across
me.
"They are patterns for Julia's wedding-dress," said my mother, in a low,
tender voice.