The ubiquitous handmaiden promptly appeared, and Archer heard
Madame Olenska say, in an Italian that she seemed to pronounce
with intentional deliberateness in order that he might follow it:
"Here--throw this into the dustbin!" and then, as Nastasia stared
protestingly: "But no--it's not the fault of the poor flowers. Tell
the boy to carry them to the house three doors away, the house of Mr.
Winsett, the dark gentleman who dined here. His wife is ill--they may
give her pleasure ... The boy is out, you say? Then, my dear one, run
yourself; here, put my cloak over you and fly. I want the thing out of
the house immediately! And, as you live, don't say they come from me!"
She flung her velvet opera cloak over the maid's shoulders and turned
back into the drawing-room, shutting the door sharply. Her bosom was
rising high under its lace, and for a moment Archer thought she was
about to cry; but she burst into a laugh instead, and looking from the
Marchioness to Archer, asked abruptly: "And you two--have you made
friends!"
"It's for Mr. Archer to say, darling; he has waited patiently while you
were dressing."
"Yes--I gave you time enough: my hair wouldn't go," Madame Olenska
said, raising her hand to the heaped-up curls of her chignon. "But
that reminds me: I see Dr. Carver is gone, and you'll be late at the
Blenkers'. Mr. Archer, will you put my aunt in the carriage?"
She followed the Marchioness into the hall, saw her fitted into a
miscellaneous heap of overshoes, shawls and tippets, and called from
the doorstep: "Mind, the carriage is to be back for me at ten!" Then
she returned to the drawing-room, where Archer, on re-entering it,
found her standing by the mantelpiece, examining herself in the mirror.
It was not usual, in New York society, for a lady to address her
parlour-maid as "my dear one," and send her out on an errand wrapped
in her own opera-cloak; and Archer, through all his deeper feelings,
tasted the pleasurable excitement of being in a world where action
followed on emotion with such Olympian speed.
Madame Olenska did not move when he came up behind her, and for a
second their eyes met in the mirror; then she turned, threw herself
into her sofa-corner, and sighed out: "There's time for a cigarette."
He handed her the box and lit a spill for her; and as the flame flashed
up into her face she glanced at him with laughing eyes and said: "What
do you think of me in a temper?"
Archer paused a moment; then he answered with sudden resolution: "It
makes me understand what your aunt has been saying about you."
"I knew she'd been talking about me. Well?"
"She said you were used to all kinds of things--splendours and
amusements and excitements--that we could never hope to give you here."
Madame Olenska smiled faintly into the circle of smoke about her lips.
"Medora is incorrigibly romantic. It has made up to her for so many
things!"
Archer hesitated again, and again took his risk. "Is your aunt's
romanticism always consistent with accuracy?"
"You mean: does she speak the truth?" Her niece considered. "Well, I'll
tell you: in almost everything she says, there's something true and
something untrue. But why do you ask? What has she been telling you?"
He looked away into the fire, and then back at her shining presence.
His heart tightened with the thought that this was their last evening
by that fireside, and that in a moment the carriage would come to carry
her away.
"She says--she pretends that Count Olenski has asked her to persuade
you to go back to him."
Madame Olenska made no answer. She sat motionless, holding her
cigarette in her half-lifted hand. The expression of her face had not
changed; and Archer remembered that he had before noticed her apparent
incapacity for surprise.
"You knew, then?" he broke out.
She was silent for so long that the ash dropped from her cigarette. She
brushed it to the floor. "She has hinted about a letter: poor darling!
Medora's hints--"
"Is it at your husband's request that she has arrived here suddenly?"
Madame Olenska seemed to consider this question also. "There again: one
can't tell. She told me she had had a 'spiritual summons,' whatever
that is, from Dr. Carver. I'm afraid she's going to marry Dr. Carver
... poor Medora, there's always some one she wants to marry. But
perhaps the people in Cuba just got tired of her! I think she was with
them as a sort of paid companion. Really, I don't know why she came."
"But you do believe she has a letter from your husband?"
Again Madame Olenska brooded silently; then she said: "After all, it
was to be expected."
The young man rose and went to lean against the fireplace. A sudden
restlessness possessed him, and he was tongue-tied by the sense that
their minutes were numbered, and that at any moment he might hear the
wheels of the returning carriage.
"You know that your aunt believes you will go back?"
Madame Olenska raised her head quickly. A deep blush rose to her
face and spread over her neck and shoulders. She blushed seldom and
painfully, as if it hurt her like a burn.
"Many cruel things have been believed of me," she said.
"Oh, Ellen--forgive me; I'm a fool and a brute!"
She smiled a little. "You are horribly nervous; you have your own
troubles. I know you think the Wellands are unreasonable about your
marriage, and of course I agree with you. In Europe people don't
understand our long American engagements; I suppose they are not as
calm as we are." She pronounced the "we" with a faint emphasis that
gave it an ironic sound.
Archer felt the irony but did not dare to take it up. After all, she
had perhaps purposely deflected the conversation from her own affairs,
and after the pain his last words had evidently caused her he felt that
all he could do was to follow her lead. But the sense of the waning
hour made him desperate: he could not bear the thought that a barrier
of words should drop between them again.
"Yes," he said abruptly; "I went south to ask May to marry me after
Easter. There's no reason why we shouldn't be married then."
"And May adores you--and yet you couldn't convince her? I thought her
too intelligent to be the slave of such absurd superstitions."
"She _is_ too intelligent--she's not their slave."