CHAPTER VII

“A TRUE HEART LOVES BUT ONCE”

The day for which Phil had waited so impatiently was come at last—the day of the _chasse à courre_. Ethel left the hunt and came back alone to the glade where grandma, a little tired and seated in the great break, was waiting for the return of the hunters. She got down from her horse and tossed the reins to a valet. The sun lighted up the tops of the lofty trees, leaving all the rest in the shade. From afar they heard the voices of the hounds. The hunting-horn filled the forest with a far-away melody.

“Poor little doe!” said Ethel, “it is nearly an hour since she left the thicket, followed by the hounds. She must be by this time in the pretty valley I christened the other day the Forest of Arden—you remember?—when I was reading there Shakspere’s ‘As You Like It.’ They must have lost the scent—her mate is leading the dogs away from her, no doubt. But it is not for that I have come back, grandma. I wish to speak with you.”

“Why don’t you follow the hunt?” grandma asked. “Has anything happened to you, Ethel?”

“Nothing at all, grandma. My horse was in splendid form, and I, too; but, while taking a ditch, she lost a shoe. She’s limping a little, I think. And then—and then I couldn’t see you alone yesterday at the château, and I have something to say to you. But let us not stay here; they might overhear us,” Ethel added, glancing at the lackeys, who were loading into a van the champagne-baskets and other remains of the picnic.

“I will get down,” said grandma. Leaning on Ethel’s arm, she got out of the break and they crossed the open space.

“Let us go over there,” Ethel said, pointing to one of those graceful edifices called _nymphées_, which are the necessary ornament of every self-respecting park. It consisted of a bench, green with the mold of time and surrounded by a colonnade covered with moss and ivy. It gave this corner of the forest a mythological note. It was like one of those rustic shrines where, in the shadow of the sacred grove, goddesses were appeased by the offering of victims.

“Who would not say this is a scene of Shakspere’s fancy?” said Ethel. “Listen to the hunting-horn—you might believe you were in an enchanted forest. But,” she added, as grandma sat down, “there is no question now of Will the Great, but only of our own dear Will, and of Mlle. Yvonne.”

“She’s very nice,” said grandma. “She’ll profit a great deal by your company, between Will and you. From being a doll, Yvonne will soon become a woman.”

“Mlle. Yvonne is already a woman—a true one,” Ethel went on, gravely. “She has an upright mind and a strong and resolute heart; and I love her.”

“She’s going to marry Will?” grandma exclaimed, starting up. “That dear little Yvonne?”

“No, grandma, Yvonne will never be Will’s wife. She has refused.”

“What did I say?” grandma replied. “She’s a doll—she doesn’t know what she wants! Does a young girl let herself be buried alive like that? Why shouldn’t she show herself as she is and say: ‘I will!’ when her happiness is at stake? She has much in common with Will, I am sure. But in this country no one dares to say what she thinks; people don’t look each other squarely in the face. If you wish, Ethel, we’ll leave for America to-morrow!”

“Wait a bit, grandma, and then you’ll love Yvonne with all your heart.”

“After what she has done? Never!”

“Because of what she has done? Sit down again, grandma, and I will tell you everything.”

“You will waste your breath, Ethel.”

“Wait,” Ethel continued. “Will was very much taken with Yvonne—I am sure that now he would be much more so if he were only allowed. The fact that he has been refused shows him so much better the woman he is losing. It has been a revelation to us. He was conquered by Yvonne as Desdemona by Othello. In a way he pitied the young girl’s lot—it was so childish; there was so little society for her. One ball a year,—a poor little ball, next to nothing,—a life passed in the dim light of curtains half drawn, near a deserted street, the strong contrast with Will’s stormy life in Chicago.”

“That is real life!” said grandma.

“Well,” Ethel continued, “everything took hold of Will, just as a man deafened with the noise of machinery loves the murmur of bees.”

“Oh, it is France Will’s in love with,” grandma said. “It was his auto journey from Paris and our excursions round the camp that he was going to marry—it’s only a fancy already passed.”

“No; it will never pass!” answered Ethel. “It is true all his impressions were personified in Yvonne; but she shows such sterling qualities that she has no need to personify anything to be loved.”

“You must tell me everything, Ethel,” said grandma.

“This is the way it happened. Of course, it was impossible for Will to speak alone with Yvonne, especially on such subjects. Besides, he never had the opportunity; and then—it isn’t done! In France, when a young man sees a young girl that pleases him, he asks her parents for her; and her parents accept or refuse.”

“How dreadful!” said grandma.

“Will,” Ethel kept on, “was speaking about it one day to Mme. Riçois.”

“Mme. Riçois? What has she got to do with it?”

“Why, everything, grandma; everything! If it had not been for Mme. Riçois we should have gone off to Morgania without anything being decided. Will passed his young days between our mines in Montana and the Chicago Stock Exchange, and never had time to be in love. Mme. Riçois opened his eyes. I ought to tell you that she is the most inveterate marrier of the town.”

“A marrier? I thought she was a banker’s wife!”

“Oh, she has to do something,” replied Ethel. “Mme. Riçois makes matches to please herself. The little woman delights in it. I can imagine her embroidering on her sleeve, like an officer’s stripes, the number of marriages she has brought about.”

“How dreadful!” said grandma.

“She and Will are great friends. Would you believe it, grandma?—last month she said to him point-blank: ‘Mr. Rowrer, I must find a match for you!’ Will only laughed. ‘Now, don’t say No!’ Mme. Riçois added mysteriously; ‘I have a great scheme in my head.’ ‘What is your scheme?’ Will asked, more and more amused. ‘But you mustn’t tell anybody! I wish to bring about a Franco-American alliance!’ Will didn’t answer, but I saw he understood, for I was present.”

“And what then?” asked grandma.

“Naturally they began talking about marriage. Mme. Riçois told us how she takes hold of the matter; the measures she takes for the parents: ‘I’ve found a young man who is quite in your line; this is his situation.’ Thereupon a family council is held, and the young girl is consulted as a matter of form. Oh, there’s a whole minute and complicated diplomacy.”

“And yet it would be so simple for the young folks to explain matters to each other!” grandma exclaimed.

“That is what Will answered; but Mme. Riçois objected that this is never done. I thought as much, but I know France. It was quite new to Will; and he kept repeating: ‘Is it possible? Is it possible? For my part, I’d like to be better acquainted with the girl I marry! I shall certainly never get married in France.’ Then Mme. Riçois spoke up: ‘The main thing is that you should please the parents.’ ‘But it’s the young girl I want to please, and to know if I am pleasing her,’ Will said obstinately. ‘M. Rowrer,’ Mme. Riçois said, ‘I have made twenty marriages and they’re all happy; and I myself married my husband without being acquainted with him. That was thirty years ago, and our honeymoon is not over yet!’ ‘Perhaps she is right,’ Will said when Mme. Riçois was gone. ‘Marriages seem to me as happy here as anywhere. Different countries have different manners, but at bottom they’re all the same.’ I’m persuaded, grandma, that from that day the Franco-American alliance began. I mean that the remembrance of Mlle. Yvonne was crystallized in his heart.”

While Ethel was speaking the shadows had grown darker beneath the trees. A purple haze softened the outlines of the glade. There was deep silence, with now and then an echo of the hunting-horns, light as the humming of a fly. Again the hunt found its way, and the doe, abandoned by her cowardly mate, turned back toward her haunts. Soon the hallali would push her to the thicket from which she had started, and where, at the end of her strength, she would take shelter to die.

“Listen,” Ethel said to grandma, “Will, Phil, and every one are out there, forgetful of care and trouble, chasing to its death a poor, innocent animal. Isn’t it sad?” Then, taking up her interrupted conversation, she continued: “From that day, especially, Will thought of Mlle. Yvonne. He saw her again several times and fell more and more under her charm, in spite of their commonplace interviews. Each time he discovered new qualities in her. When I praised her, Will was glad to listen; and Mme. Riçois was always after him with the scheme of the alliance. You can imagine that it didn’t please Will much to be obliged to win the parents in order to get the girl. Well! he won over everybody. As to grand’mère, who is the Egeria of the family, the one that decides difficult cases without appeal from her judgment—”

“Grand’mère said no for Yvonne?” grandma asked.

“Grand’mère said yes!”

“But if mother and grandmother, uncles and aunts, and Mme. Riçois say yes, who is it says no?”

“Yvonne says no.”

“Well, I declare!” grandma exclaimed, in amazement. It was not the first time she had declared since she was in France, but never with such energy. In her voice there were astonishment and anger and admiration and, most of all, curiosity.

“How did it happen, Ethel? Tell me all!” and she turned her face toward her granddaughter with an expression of anxiety.

“Ah!” Ethel replied, “who would ever suspect that Yvonne had a romance in her life?”

“A romance in Yvonne’s life! What are you telling me, Ethel? Watched as she is, a romance! It must have been with another doll!—when she was ten years old—or when she was playing husband and wife with some child of her own age!”

“Exactly so,” Ethel answered, with a serious look. “Listen! Yesterday I went in the auto to the Grojeans’, to say good day as I passed. I suspected nothing. Everything was shut up, as usual. I knocked and was let in. The door of the salon opened, and Yvonne, who had recognized my voice, came toward me with outstretched hands, and said: ‘Oh, it’s you! How glad I am! Come in!’”

Grandma was immensely interested, and listened, with her eyes fixed on those of Ethel, with a scarcely perceptible movement of her lips, as if, in her anxiety to lose nothing, she were repeating the words to herself.

“By the way in which Yvonne took my hand,” Ethel went on, in a low voice, “I understood something was happening. The Grojean ladies were there, silent and much embarrassed, and there was Mme. Riçois, as red as possible. I looked at Yvonne. ‘My dear friend,’ Yvonne said to me, ‘I am glad you came. Perhaps you know what is going on. For me it’s my first news of it. They have just told me of a great scheme,—an offer so honorable and so flattering—’ That moment, grandma, I understood they had just communicated to Yvonne Will’s intentions. By the way in which the ladies listened to Yvonne, I also learned that she had not yet given her answer. She was going to speak in my presence.

“‘The offer is so flattering,’ Yvonne said, looking me squarely in the face, ‘and I should have been so very happy to call you my sister; the marriage would overwhelm every one here with joy’ (I had only to look at the beaming faces to see that they expected Yvonne to say ‘I accept’)—‘the marriage would overwhelm us all with joy; but there is some one—one only—who would have too great pain from it. I am not free—I have given my word to another!’

“I wish you had been there, grandma, to judge of the consternation caused by the word ‘another’! Mme. de Grojean arose, pale as death.

“‘Yvonne, you have given your word to another? Without your mother knowing it? To whom? Answer!’

“‘To my cousin Henri,’ answered Yvonne.

“Mme. de Grojean breathed again: ‘To your cousin Henri! But he is only a child-sweetheart, my dear daughter; every one has that in her life. Now you must act like a woman. That was not in earnest. Henri will give you back your word!’

“‘But I shall not take it back!’ said Yvonne.

“‘What are you thinking of! Your cousin Henri—nothing but an employee at the Riçois bank, with no substantial situation and with no future; do you compare him with Monsieur Rowrer, for whom, besides, you have a sentiment? Avow it!—it is nothing to blush for.’

“‘I do not blush for it,’ Yvonne said; ‘but I have a sentiment for Henri also; and, moreover, he has my word. If he is not rich, he will work. Monsieur Rowrer is too rich! What an opinion Henri would have of me if he thought I would marry another just because he is worth millions, and would abandon him because he is poor! Surely he would believe so! I would never dare look him in the face. Henri counts on me,—I shall be his wife!’”

“Oh, brave little Yvonne!” said grandma. “Did she say that?”

“Yes, grandma, she said that; and she was radiant with beauty as she said it, I can assure you. ‘My dear Ethel,’ she told me afterward, ‘you see there is nothing to wound Monsieur Rowrer’s self-love. Tell him I have the greatest esteem for him, and would have been so glad to call you my sister, Ethel. But what would you have done in my place?’

“Yvonne must have seen in my looks how deeply I was moved, and how much I admired her.”

“What about the family council—what did it say?” grandma asked.

“‘Is that your final decision?’ Mme. de Grojean demanded of Yvonne.

“‘It is my final decision,’ said Yvonne.

“‘Come, then, Yvonne, and be happy!’ and the mother pressed her to her bosom.”

“But the grandmother—that terrible grand’mère?”

“Grand’mère kissed Yvonne on the forehead, and said to her, ‘You’ve done well, my child,’—and then I came away. That is all, grandma.”

The evening was creeping over the forest. The high clumps of trees stood out in somber masses against the deep sky. Ethel and grandma had completely forgotten the hunt; but the sound of the horns drew near. The exhausted doe was returning, followed close by the hounds.

“Let us go away; the dew is falling,” grandma said pensively. “Let us go back to the breaks; the hunters will soon be here.”

“Go on alone, grandma; I will wait for them here. I shall return to the château on horseback.”

Ethel remained on the stone bench. When she separated herself from the hunt the branch of a tree in a narrow alley had ruffled her hair. She took off her hat, to put it in order. She was just finishing, when a hunter, who had doubtless left his horse at the rendezvous and seemed to be looking for some one, crossed the glade and passed before her.

“Monsieur Phil!” Ethel said, rising.

Phil turned his head toward her. Ethel stood upright in the ruined colonnade. Her blond hair shone bright against the dark background of ivy-covered rock. With her black gown, she might have been a nymph in mourning, staying some passing wanderer, in the depths of a sacred grove.

Phil was dazzled. He knew he should find her at this place, for he had seen her leave the hunt near the spot of the hallali. He wished to see Ethel. He had gathered in haste a nosegay of wild flowers to offer her. Miss Rowrer was to see that he had come back for her,—that he had gathered the flowers for her, that he was thinking of her. She might, too, see his emotion when he should offer his simple gift. She would thank him. He would say he knew not what,—but she would know! He had sworn to himself to act; the time had come. Nature herself pushed him forward. There was gladness in this beautiful evening. The wind stirred the lofty trees and Phil listened to the hunting-horn as the soldier sharpens his courage by the rolling of the drums. He advanced respectfully toward Ethel, hiding the flowers with which he wished to surprise her.

“You have something on your mind, Monsieur Phil,” Ethel said.

“Is it as plain as that?” Phil asked, in an uncertain voice.

Like a true lover, he thought he could already read in her face the feelings which moved himself. He was almost sorry to have come. He would have been glad to escape, and he tried to hide his trouble by indifferent remarks.

“You, Miss Rowrer, are radiant this evening.”

“It is because I am so happy, Monsieur Phil. Oh, so happy!”

“The evening is so fine,” Phil began; “you—”

“I saw yesterday something finer and sweeter than all that,” Ethel interrupted, with a gesture which took in the forest and the sumptuous sky. “I saw some one yesterday repulse with disdain a fortune, to remain faithful to a childhood love.”

Phil stopped short.

“It was a young girl,” Ethel went on, slowly, as if to communicate to him her own conviction,—“a young girl who believes in the sanctity of promises made when one is young, when the heart is as clear as the sky,—a young girl who believes in loyalty to her word once given, and to oaths exchanged later, when she knew what she was doing—at the age when one still sees in love only love itself.”

“It might be for me and Helia!” Phil thought. “Yet, she knows nothing about it.”

“That is why I look radiant,” Ethel continued. “Ah, it refreshes me after what we see so often,—vile hearts and cowardly consciences.”

“This is my punishment,” thought Phil.

In full daylight, Ethel would certainly have noticed his fearful pallor. He stammered out: “One is not always master of his own heart!”

“A true heart,” replied Ethel, “loves but once. There are not different oaths for each different age of life.”

All this was a lightning-flash to Phil’s soul. Ethel had never seemed more friendly to him, and she was radiant and gay. But he no longer thought of her. He was face to face with himself.

“Yet, in spite of one’s self,” Phil answered, in a hesitating voice, “the sacrifice of first love may be made to a later one—it sometimes happens.”

“It happens every day,” said Ethel; “money talks!”

Phil let his nosegay of wild-flowers fall behind him to the ground.

“I won’t keep you, Monsieur Phil,” she said, believing that she was preventing him from taking part in the hallali. “Go, now!” she continued pleasantly, “they’re only waiting for you to cut the doe’s throat—listen, they’re sounding the death!”

Indeed, the forest near them was full of a rising tumult; lackeys were carrying torches; cries and calls were heard, and the barking of the hounds grew savage. The poor doe had come back to her sleeping-place to die. There was despair in her gasp; and the flaring horns set up the triumphal song of the hallali.

“Really, Phil, I do not wish to deprive you of such pleasure. Go. But you had something in your hand just now—some flowers, I think. Put them on this bench. You will find them when you return.”

“I have nothing, Miss Ethel,” Phil answered, showing his empty hands.

Every word Ethel had said wounded him cruelly, though he felt sure she knew nothing of his relations with Helia. It seemed to him they applied to his own troubles. They thrilled him to the bottom of his heart.

He plunged into the night of the forest, toward the blood-red glow lighting up the slaughter.