An April sky smiled over Paris on the day of Odd's return. A rather
prolonged tour had tanned his face, and completely cured his lungs.
He expected to find Katherine already in Paris; her last letters had
announced her departure from a Surrey country house, and had implied
some anxiety in regard to a prolonged illness of Mrs. Archinard's.
Katherine had written him very soon after their parting, that the
Captain had gone on a yachting trip in the Mediterranean, and that she
knew that he had left Hilda with money, so Peter need not worry. Peter
had seen to this matter before leaving Paris, and had approved of the
Captain's projected jaunt. He surmised that her father's absence would
lighten Hilda's load, and hoped that the sum he placed in the Captain's
hands--on the understanding that most of it was to be given to
Hilda--but _from_ her father, would relieve her from the necessity for
teaching. Peter called at the Rue Pierre Charron early in the afternoon,
but the servant (neither Taylor nor Wilson, but a more hybrid-looking
individual with unmistakable culinary traces upon her countenance) told
him that Mademoiselle Archinard had not yet arrived. Madame still in bed
"_toujours souffrante_," and "Mademoiselle 'Ilda"--Odd had hesitated
uncomfortably before asking for her--was out. "_Pas bien non plus,
celle-là_," she volunteered, with a kindly French familiarity that still
more strongly emphasized the contrast with Taylor and Wilson; "_Elle
s'éreinte, voyez-vous monsieur, la pauvre demoiselle_." With a sick
sense of calamity and helplessness upon him, Odd asked at what hours she
might be found. All the morning, it seemed "_Il faut bien qu'elle soigne
madame, et puis elle m'aide. Je suis seule et la besogne serait par trop
lourde_," and Rosalie also volunteered the remark that "_Madame est
très, mais très exigeante, nuit et jour; pas moyen de dormir avec une
damê comme celle-là_."
Odd looked at his watch; it was almost five. If Hilda had kept to her
days he should probably find her in the Rue d'Assas, and, with the
angriest feelings for himself and for the whole Archinard family, Hilda
excepted, he was driven there through a sudden shower that scudded in
fretful clouds across the blue above. He was none too soon, for he
caught sight of Hilda half-way up the street as they turned the corner.
The sight of him, as he jumped out of the cab and waylaid her, half
dazed her evidently.
"You? I can hardly believe it!" she gasped, smiling, but in a voice that
plainly showed over-wrought mental and physical conditions. She was
wofully white and thin; the hollowed line of her cheek gave to her lips
a prominence pathetically, heartrendingly childlike; her clothes had
reached a pitch of shabbiness that could hardly claim gentility; the
slits in her umbrella and the battered shapelessness of her miserable
little hat symbolized a biting poverty.
"Hilda! Hilda!" was all Odd found to say as he put her into the cab. He
was aghast.
"I _am_ glad to see you," she said, and her voice had a forced gayety
over its real weakness; "I haven't seen any of my people for so long,
except mamma. An illness seems to put years between things, doesn't it?
Poor mamma has been so really ill. It has troubled me horribly, for I
could not tell whether it were grave enough to bring back papa and
Katherine; but Katherine is coming. I expected her a day or two ago, and
mamma is much, _much_ better. As for papa, the last time I heard from
him he was in Greece and going on to Constantinople. I am glad now that
he hasn't been needlessly frightened, for he will get all my last
letters together, and will hear that she is almost well again. And you
are here! And Kathy coming! I feel that all my clouds are breaking."
Odd could trust his voice now; her courage, strung as he felt it to be
over depths of dreadful suffering, nerved him to a greater self-control.
"If I had known I would have come sooner," he said; "you would have let
me help you, wouldn't you?"
"I am afraid you couldn't have _helped_ me. That is the worst of
illness, one can only wait; but you would have cheered me up."
"My poor child!" Odd inwardly cursed himself. "If I had known! What have
you been doing to yourself, Hilda? You look--"
"Fagged, don't I? It is the anxiety; I have given up half my work since
you left; my pictures are accepted at the Champs de Mars. We'll all go
to the _vernissage_ together. And, as they were done, I let Miss Latimer
have the studio for the whole day. That left me my mornings free for
mamma."
"Taylor helped you, I suppose?"
"Taylor is with Katherine. She went before mamma was at all ill, and
indeed mamma insisted that Katherine must have her maid. I was glad that
she should go, for she has worked hard without a rest for so long, and,
of course, travelling about as she has been doing, Katherine needed
her." There was an explanatory note in Hilda's voice; indeed Odd's
silence, big with comment, gave it a touch of defiance. "It made double
duty for Rosalie, but she is a good, willing creature, and has not
minded."
"And Wilson?"
"He went with papa. I don't think papa could live without Wilson."
"Oh, indeed. I begin to solve the problem of your ghastly little face.
You have been housemaid, _garde-malade_, and bread-winner. Had you no
money at all?" Hilda flushed--the quick flush of physical weakness.
"Yes, at first," she replied; "papa gave me quite a lot before going,
and that has paid part of the doctor's bills, and my lessons brought in
the usual amount."
"Could you not have given up the lessons for the time being?"
"I know you think it dreadful in me to have left mamma for all those
afternoons." Her acceptation of a blame infinitely removed from his
thoughts stupefied Odd. "And mamma has thought it heartless, most
naturally. But Rosalie is trustworthy and kind. The doctor came three
times a day and I can explain to _you_"--Hilda hesitated--"the money
papa gave me went almost immediately--some unpaid bills."
"What bills?" Odd spoke sternly.
"Why, we owe bills right and left!" said Hilda.
"But what bills were these?"
"There was the rent of the apartment for one thing; we should have had
to go had that not been paid; and then, some tailors, a dressmaker; they
threatened to seize the furniture."
"Katherine's dressmaker?"
"Yes; Katherine, I know, never dreamed that she would be so impatient;
but I suppose, on hearing that Katherine had gone to England, the woman
became frightened." Peter controlled himself to silence. The very
fulness of Hilda's confidence showed the strain that had been put upon
her. "And then," she went on, as he did not speak, "some of the money
had to go to Katherine in England. Poor Kathy! To be pinched like that!
She wrote, that at one place it took her last shilling to tip the
servants and get her railway ticket to Surrey."
"Why did she not write to me? Considering all things--"
"Oh!" said Hilda--her tone needed no comment--"we have not quite come to
that." She added presently and gently, "I had money for her."
Odd took her hand and kissed it; the glove was loose upon it.
"And now," said Hilda, leaning forward and smiling at him, "you have
heard me _filer mon chapelet_. Tell me what you have been doing."
"My lazy wanderings in the sun would sound too grossly egotistic after
your story."
"Has my story sounded so dismal? _I_ have been egotistic, then. I had
hoped that perhaps you would write to me," she added, and a delicately
malicious little smile lit her face. Odd looked hard at her, with a
half-dreamy stare.
"I thought of you," he said; "I should have liked to write."
"Well, in the future do, please, when you feel like it."
Mrs. Archinard was extended on the sofa in the drawing-room when they
reached the Rue Pierre Charron. The crisp daintiness of
pseudo-invalidism had withered to a look of sickly convalescence. She
was much faded, and her little air of melancholy affectation pitifully
fretful.
"You come before my own daughter, Peter," she said; "I don't _blame_
Katherine, since Hilda tells me that she did not let her know of my
dangerous condition."
"Not _dangerous_, mamma," Hilda said, with a patient firmness not
untouched by resentment, a touch to Odd most new and pleasing. "The
doctor had perfect confidence in me, and would have told me. I should
have sent for papa and Katherine the moment he thought it advisable.
Under the circumstances they could have done nothing for you that I did
not do." Hilda had, indeed, rather distorted facts to shield Katherine.
What would Mrs. Archinard have said had she known that Katherine, in
answer to a letter begging her to return, had replied that she _could_
not? Even in Hilda's charitable heart that "_could_ not" had rankled.
Odd's despairing gloom discerned something of this truth, as he realized
that the uncharacteristic self-justification was prompted by a rebellion
against misinterpretation before _him_. Mrs. Archinard showed some
nervous surprise.
"Very well, very well, Hilda," she said, "I am sure I ask no sacrifices
on _my_ account. One may die alone as one has lived--alone. My life has
trained me in stoicism. You had better wash your face, Hilda. There is a
great smudge of charcoal on your cheek," and, as Hilda turned and walked
out, "I have looked on the face of the King of Terrors, Peter. Peter!
dear old homely name! the faithful ring in it! It is easy for Hilda to
talk! I make no complaint. She has nursed me excellently well--as far as
her nursing went. But she has a _hard_ soul! no tenderness! no sympathy!
To leave her dying mother every afternoon! To sacrifice me to her
_painting_! At such a time! Ah me!" Large tears rolled down Mrs.
Archinard's cheeks, and her voice trembled with weakness and self-pity.
Odd, in his raging resentment, could have exploded the truth upon her;
the tears arrested his impulse, and he sat moodily gazing at the floor.
Mrs. Archinard raised her lace-edged handkerchief and delicately touched
away the tears.
"I have given my whole life, my whole life, Peter, for my girls! I have
borne this long exile from my home for their sakes!" At Allersley Mrs.
Archinard had never ceased complaining of her restricted lot, and had
characterized her neighbors as "yokels and Philistines." Speaking with
her handkerchief pressed by her finger-tips upon her eyelids, she
continued, "I have asked nothing of them but sympathy; _that_ I have
craved! And in my hour of need--" Mrs. Archinard's _point de Venise_
bosom heaved once more. Odd took her hand with the unwilling yet pitying
kindness one would show towards a silly and unpleasant child.
"I don't think you are quite fair," he said; "Hilda looks as badly as
you do. She has had a heavy load to carry."
"I told her again and again to get a _garde-malade_, two if necessary."
Mrs. Archinard's voice rose to a higher key. "She has chosen to ruin her
appearance by sitting up to all hours of the night, and by working all
day in that futile studio."
"_Garde-malades_ are expensive." Odd could not restrain his voice's
edge.
"Expensive! For a dying mother! And with all that is lavished on her
studio--canvases, paints, models!"
The depths of misconception were too hopelessly great, and, as Mrs.
Archinard's voice had now become shrilly emphatic, he kept silence, his
heart shaken with misery and with pity, despairing pity for Hilda. She
re-entered presently, wearing on her face too evident signs of
contrition. She spoke to her mother in tones of gentle entreaty, humored
her sweetly, gayly even, while she made tea.
"You know I cannot touch cake, Hilda."
"There are buttered _brioches_, mamma, piping hot."
"Properly buttered, I hope. Rosalie usually places a great clot in the
centre, leaving the edges uneatable."
"Mamma is like the princess who felt the pea through all the dozens of
mattresses, isn't she?" said Hilda, smiling at Odd. "But _I_ buttered
these with scientific exactitude."
"Exactitude! Ah! the mirage of science! More milk, more milk!" Mrs.
Archinard raised herself on one elbow to watch with expectant
disapproval the concoction of her tea, and, relapsing on her cushions as
the tea was brought to her, "I suppose it _is_ milk, though I prefer
cream."
"No, it's cream." Hilda should know, as she had herself just darted
round the corner to the _crêmerie_. Odd sprang up to take his cup from
her. He thought she looked in danger of falling to the ground.
"Do sit down," he said in a low voice; "you look very, very badly."
"Have you read Meredith's last?" asked Mrs. Archinard from the sofa.
"Hilda is reading it to me in the evenings. We began it, ah! long, long
ago. I have sympathy for Meredith, an _intimité!_ It is so I feel, see
things--super-subtly. Strange how coarsely objective some minds are! Did
you order the oysters for my dinner, Hilda, and the ice from
Gagé's--_pistache?_ I hope you impressed _pistache_. You will dine with
Hilda, of course, Peter; I have my dinner here; I am not yet strong
enough to sit through a meal. And then you must talk to me about
Meredith. I always find you most suggestive--such new lights on old
things. And Verhaeren, too; do you care for Verhaeren? Morbid? Yes,
perhaps, but that is a truism--not like you, Peter. '_Les apparus dans
mes chemins_,' poor, modern, broken, bleeding soul! We must talk of
Verhaeren. Just now I feel very sleepy. You will excuse me if I simply
_sans gêne_ turn over and take a nap? I can often sleep at this hour.
Hilda, show Peter the Burne-Jones Chaucer over there. Hilda doesn't find
him limpid, sweet, healthy enough for Chaucer; but _nous sommes tous les
enfants malades_ nowadays. There is a beauty, you know, in that. Talk it
over."
Hilda and Peter sat down obediently side by side on the distant little
_canapé_ before the Burne-Jones Chaucer. They went over the pages, not
paying much attention to the woodcuts, but looking down favorite
passages together. The description of "my swete" in "The Book of the
Duchess," the complaint of poor Troilus, and, once more, Arcite's death.
The quiet room was very quiet, and they looked up from the pages now and
then to smile, perhaps a little sadly, at one another. When the dinner
was announced Hilda said, as they went into the dining-room--
"If your courage fails you, just say so frankly. I have very childish
tastes and childish fare."
Indeed, half a cold chicken and a dish of rice constituted the repast. A
bottle of claret stood by Odd's place, and there was a white jar filled
with buttercups on the table; but even Rosalie seemed depressed by the
air of meagreness, and gave them a rather _effaré_ glance as they sat
down. Odd suspected that the cold chicken was in his honor. He had come
to the conclusion that Hilda was capable of dining off rice alone.
"Delightful!" he said. The chicken and rice were indeed very good, but
Hilda saw that he ate very little.
"I make no further apologies," she said, smiling at him over the
buttercups; "your hunger be upon your own head."
"I am not hungry, dear."
Hilda had to do most of the talking, but they were both rather silent.
It was a happy silence to Hilda, full of a loving trust.
When he spoke, it was in a voice of the same gentle fatigue that his
eyes showed; but as the eyes rested upon her she felt that the past and
the present had surely joined hands.