It was a perfect moment; one of those rare and delicate spaces of time
in which Fate's fingers seem to strike a chord at once poignant and
satisfying, faint and far-reaching. The lamp-lit room, the open window
and, beyond, the balcony veiled in the obscurity of the night! It was a
fair setting for romance; and romance, young, beautiful, gracious as in
the fairy-tale, had emerged from it into Blake's life. A smile, a
word--and an atmosphere had been created! The things of the past were
obscured, and the things of the present made omnipotent.
"What a brother this is of mine!" Maxine smiled again with a little
quiver of humor that set her eyes alight. "Is it not like him to invite
me to criticise my portrait, and leave me to receive his friend?"
She spoke, not in the English which Max invariably used, but in French;
and the sound of her voice entangled Blake's senses. It seemed the boy's
voice at its lowest and tenderest, but touched with new inflections
tantalizing as they were delightful. Self-consciousness fled before it;
he was at one with the sister as he had been at one with the brother on
the crisp white morning when comradeship had been sealed to the marching
of soldiers' feet and the rattle of fife and drum.
"Princess," he said, "I shall be as frank as Max himself would be! The
situation is overwhelming; do with me what you will! If I intrude,
dismiss me! I know how fascinating solitude on this balcony can be."
She smiled again, but gravely with a hint of the portrait's mystery.
"Solitude is an excellent thing, monsieur, but to-night I think I need
the solace of a fellow-being. Will you not stay and keep me company?"
He looked at the smiling lips, the serious, searching eyes, and he spoke
his thoughts impulsively.
"I shall be the most honored man in Paris!"
"That is well! Then we will talk, and watch the stars."
Here the naïve imperiousness of the boy gleamed out, familiar and
reassuring, and Maxine walked across the room, turning at the window to
look back for Blake.
"He is not without appreciation--this little brother of mine?" She put
the question softly, tentatively, as she and Blake leaned over the
balcony railing.
"He is an artist, princess."
"You think so?" Her voice warmed and vibrated; through the vague
darkness he felt her eyes search his face.
"Undoubtedly."
"Ah, you love him?" The voice dropped to a great gentleness--a
gentleness that touched him in a strange degree.
"It would be difficult to tell you what he has been to me," he said.
"Our friendship has been a thing of great value. Has he ever told you
how we met?"
"He has told me!" Her tone was still low--still curiously attractive.
"And he appreciates very highly, monsieur, the affection you have given
him."
She paused; and Blake, looking down upon Paris, was conscious of that
pause as of something pregnant and miraculous. It filled the moment,
combining, with the soft texture of her garments and the faint scent
from her hair, to weave a spell subtle as it was intangible.
"There is nothing to appreciate," he made answer. "I am merely a
commonplace mortal who found in him something uncommon. The appreciation
is mine entirely--the appreciation of the youth, the vitality he
expresses."
"Ah, but you do yourself an injustice!" She spoke impulsively and, as if
alarmed at her own eagerness, broke off and began anew in a soberer
voice. "I mean, monsieur, that friendship is not a solitary affair.
Whatever you discerned in Max, Max must equally have discerned in you."
"I wonder!" He turned his gaze from the lights of the city to the
rustling trees of the plantation. The hour was magical, the situation
beyond belief. Standing there upon the balcony, suspended as it were
between heaven and earth, companioned by this wonderful, familiar,
unfamiliar being, he seemed to see his own soul--to see it from afar off
and with a great lucidity. "I wonder!" he said again; and the sadness,
the discontent that stalked him in lonely moments touched him briefly,
like the shadow of a travelling cloud.
"What do you wonder, monsieur?"
"The meaning of it all, princess! Existence is such a chase. I, perhaps,
hunt friendship--and find Max; I, perhaps, dream that I have found my
goal, while to him I may be but a wayside inn--a place to linger in and
leave! We both follow the chase, but who can say if we mark the same
quarry? It's a puzzling world!"
"Monsieur, it is sometimes a glorious world!" So swift was her change of
voice, so impulsive the gesture with which she turned to him, that the
vividness of a suggested Max startled him. She was infinitely like to
Max--Max when life intoxicated him, when he threw out both arms to
embrace it.
"When you look like that, princess," he cried, "I could forget
everything--I could take your hand, and show you all my heart, for you
literally _are_ the boy!"
There was another pause--a pause fraught with poignant things. Standing
there, between heaven and earth, they were no longer creatures of
conventionality, fettered by individual worlds. They were two souls
conscious of an affinity.
Briefly, sweetly, Maxine's fingers touched his hand and then withdrew.
"Monsieur, in moments I _am_ Max!"
Nothing of surprise, nothing of question came to him. He only knew that
a touch, infinitely desired, had lighted upon him--that a comprehension
born of immaterial things was luring him whither he knew not.
"You are Max, princess," he said, swiftly, "but Max suddenly made
possessor of a soul! I've always fancied Max a mythical being--a
creature of eternal youth, fascinating as he is elusive--a faun-like
creature, peeping into the world from some secret grove, ready to dart
back at any human touch. Max's lips were made for laughter; his eyes are
too bright for tears."
"And I, monsieur? What am I?"
"You are the miracle! You are the elusive creature deserting the green
groves--stepping voluntarily into the mortal world."
"Yet if you know of me at all, you must know that I have left the mortal
world and am seeking the secret groves."
"I have been told that."
"And you disbelieve?"
"I am afraid, princess, I do." He turned and looked at her--at the slim
body wrapped in its long, smooth cloak of velvet--at the shadowed,
questioning eyes. "I know I am greatly daring, but there are moments
when we are outside ourselves--when we know and speak things of which we
can give no logical account. You have put life behind you; yet what is
life but a will-o'-the-wisp? Who can say where the light may not break
forth again?"
"But have we not power over our senses, monsieur? Can we not shut our
eyes, even if the light does break forth?"
"No, princess, we cannot! Because nature will inevitably say, 'I have
given you eyes with which to see. Open those eyes'!"
"Ah, there we differ, monsieur!"
Blake laughed. "There, princess, you are the boy! He, too, thinks he can
cheat nature; but I preach my gospel to him, I tell him Nature will have
her own. If we will not bend to her, she will take and break us. Ah, but
listen to that!"
His discourse broke off; they both involuntarily raised their heads and
looked toward the windows of the neighboring _appartement_.
"Princess!" he said, delightedly. "I wouldn't have had you miss this for
ten thousand pounds! Has Max described his neighbor, M. Cartel? I tell
you you will have a little of heaven when M. Cartel plays _Louise_!"
Very delicately, with a curious human clarity of sound, the violin of M.
Cartel executed the first notes of Louise's declaration in the duet with
Julian--'_Depuis le jour où je me suis donnée!'_ One caught the whole
intention of the composer in the few crystal notes--one figured the
whole scene--the little house of love, the lovers in their Garden of
Eden, and below Paris--symbolic Paris!
"You know _Louise_, princess?"
"Yes, monsieur, I know _Louise_."
All was clear, all was understood in that brief reply. A wide
contentment, vitalized by excitement, lifted the soul of Blake. Leaning
over the balcony railing, drinking in the music of M. Cartel, more than
a little of heaven opened to him; a unique emotion thrilled him--a
consciousness of sublimity, a sense of being part of some unfathomable
yet perfect scheme. The music wove its story; the lovers became one with
his own existence, as he himself was one with the stars above him and
the lights below. He followed every note, and in his own brain was spun
the subtle thread that bound Julian and Louise; his own fancy ran the
gamut of their emotions from mere human reminiscence to overwhelming
passion.
As he listened, his first hearing of M. Cartel's fiddle crept back upon
the feet of memory, and with it the recollection of the boy's rapture,
the boy's wayward breaking of the spell and denial of the truth of love.
Cautiously he moved his head and stole a glance at his companion,
summing up the contrast between the present and the past.
Maxine was leaning forward, in thrall to the music: her gray cloak had
fallen slightly back, displaying her white dress--her white neck; her
hands were clasped, her eyes--the woman's eyes, the eyes of
mystery--gazed into profound space.
He held himself rigid; he dared not stir, lest he should brush her
cloak; he scarce dared breathe, lest he should break her dream. A
feeling akin to adoration awakened in him, and as if in expression of
the emotion, the violin of M. Cartel cried out the supreme confession of
the lovers, Louise's enraptured '_C'est le Paradis! C'est une féerie_!',
and Julian's answer, intoxicating as wine, '_Non! C'est la vie!
l'Eternelle, la toute-puissante vie_!'
And there, with the whimsicality of the artist, the bow of M. Cartel was
lifted, and sharp, pregnant silence fell upon the night.
Blake turned to Maxine; and Maxine, with lips parted, eyes dark with
thought, met his regard.
For one second her impulse seemed to sway to words, her body to yield to
some gracious, drooping enchantment; then, swiftly as M. Cartel had
called up silence, she recalled herself--straightened her body and
lifted her head.
"Monsieur," she said, with dignity, "I thank you for your kindness and
for your companionship--and I bid you good-night!"
The swiftness of his dismissal scarcely touched Blake. Already she was
his sovereign lady--her look a command, her word paramount.
"As you will, princess!"
She held out her hand; and taking, he bowed over, but did not kiss it.
She smiled, conceiving his desire and his restraint.
"I shall convey to Max how charmingly you have entertained me, monsieur
and, perhaps--" Her voice dropped to its softest note.
Blake looked up.
"Perhaps, princess--?"
She smiled again, half diffidently. "Nothing, monsieur! Good-night!"
"Good-night!"
He left her to the gray mystery of the stars, and passed back through
the quiet, lamp-lit room and down the slippery stairs that led to the
mundane world; and with each step he took, each breath he drew, the
words from _Louise_ repeated themselves, justifying all things,
glorifying all things: '_C'est la vie! l'Eternelle, la toute-puissante
vie_!'