Part 8

"How in the world could I help it?" smiling. "It was very kind of you to send your carriage. A carriage is a luxury in which I do not often indulge. I couldn't invent any excuse; I had no engagement. Besides, I would have come anyway."

She laughed, and drew two chairs to the blazing grate and motioned him to be seated.

"Do you know," he began, "but for your note I might have forgotten all about its being Christmas Eve? To what terrible depths a man falls to be able to confess such a sacrilege! But a lonely man forgets the customs of his youth. There is no Christmas spirit where there are no children, no family ties. I'm a hermit."

"Tell me all about yourself, John," she urged, cleverly seating herself so that she might see him easily, while he, to see her, would have to turn his head.

"There isn't much to say. I've just gone right on making a failure."

"There is no such thing as failure, John. Failure means effort, and effort is never failure."

"That is a pretty way of putting it. Well, then, let me say that I am still unsuccessful. Fame has knocked on my door with soft gloves, and I have not heard her; and Fortune never had me on her visiting list." He stared into the fire.

He was quite unconscious of her minute examination. How changed he was, poor boy! He was not growing old; he was aging. What had wrought this change? Work? A long series of defeats? Unrewarded toil? She leaned back in her chair, and the light in her eyes would have blinded Williard had he turned just then.

"What have you been doing this long year?" he asked presently.

"Wanderlust. I have flitted from place to place, always dissatisfied."

"Dissatisfied--you?"

"Yes, John. To be truly unhappy is to be rich and unhappy. It is the hope of some time being rich that dulls the unhappiness of the poor. Money buys only inanimate things."

"I have heard of you sometimes."

"What have you heard?"

"There was a prince or duke, I forget which."

"He wanted to marry me," lightly.

"And you?"

"It was amusing. Some busybody would always manage to introduce me as the rich Miss Wycklift; and then the comedy would begin. Perhaps I was spiteful; but I knew that it was only my money."

"Have you ever looked in your mirror?" Williard asked naively.

"I spend a part of the day before it," she confessed.

"But money is not everything. It is quite possible that these men loved you for your own sake."

"Loved for one's own sake," mused the girl. "Yes, that is how I would have it. But how in the world is a rich girl going to tell? I am superstitious. For three or four years I have been carrying this little amulet," she said, holding out for his inspection a silver, thimble-like trinket. "It represents St. Joseph, the patron saint of spinsters. An old French nurse gave it to me, and said that if I offered prayers to St. Joseph I should some day find the man I loved and who loved me. I do not want to be a spinster."

"That is a graceful sentiment."

"Not wanting to be a spinster?"

"Oh, that is not only graceful but commendable," smiling. Then he added gravely: "Have your prayers been answered?"

"Yes."

Silence.

"Well?" he said, with the slightest tremor.

"Only he hasn't said anything yet."

He moved restlessly. It was all so sad. Yet it was best so. Once he knew her to be beyond his reach he could bring to an end his foolish dream.

"I wonder how I shall begin to tell you my romance," she resumed. "Society has done so many evil things in the name of formality. It has laid down impossible and inhuman rules, destroying freedom of thought and action. To these rules we must conform or be ostracized. Might a woman tell a man she loves him, John?"

"That depends wholly upon her knowledge that he loves her."

"So if a woman knows that a man loves her she may, in the pursuit of happiness, tell that man?"

"I see no reason why not. To love is natural. Love is stronger than logic, stronger than formality. But this should always be borne in mind: for a woman to propose to a man, the man must be her equal in all things--wealth of mind and wealth of purse."

"Oh, now you are going back to the conventionality of things," she protested. "How I hate conventional mediocrity! I have hated it ever since I came to this horrid city. Don't you sometimes long for the old days, John: the sermons in stones, the good in everything?"

"Yes, sometimes."

"Well, I am going back to the old village in the spring. John," softly, "why didn't you answer my letter?"

"The little orbit around which I take my flight could scarce interest you," lamely. "There were princes and dukes in your train, and great fêtes, and bewildering cities besides."

"It hurt," she said simply.

"Hurt? Have I hurt you?" the repressed tenderness in his voice shaking him. "Oh, if I had known that you really wanted to hear from me!"

"And why should I not? Were we not boy and girl together? And you always wrote such charming letters, cheerful and hopeful and sunshiny. There never was any worldliness, nor cynicism. I have kept all your letters; and even now I find myself returning to them, as one returns to old friends."

He clasped and unclasped his hands nervously.

"Cheerful and hopeful and sunshiny," she went on. "The man I love is like that. He is good and cheerful and brave. Nobody ever hears him complain. But he is poor, John, dreadfully poor; and what makes it so hard, he is dreadfully proud. So I must put my own pride underfoot and tell him that he is wrong to spoil two lives, simply because I am rich and he is poor. And if he rejects me I shall throw away this little amulet, and lose faith in everything."

Williard had nothing to say. Rather he saw himself once more in his little hall bedroom, his face buried in packets of old letters.

"Dinner is served." The butler appeared.

Williard rose.

"Come, sir," she said as the butler went out.

Somehow her hand slid comfortably into his and she guided him through the hall. The touch of her hand was ecstasy.

"There was a time when you used to kiss my hand," she said.

With the forgotten gallantry of olden times suddenly returned, he bent his head and kissed the hand in his, to hide his dimming eyes!

They then entered the dining-room. Covers had been laid for six. There was a candle at each plate, but upon four of the plates rested books! The poet looked at the girl: ah, the brave and merry eyes that met his!

"Permit me, Mr. Williard," she said, making a courtesy, "to introduce you to the celebrities. Yonder is Mr. Thackeray, and next to him is Mr. Dickens; on the opposite side are MM. de Balzac and Dumas. Behold Mr. Esmond and Mr. Copperfield, the kindly Cousin Pons and the brave D'Artagnan! Ah, John, I was so afraid that you might invent an excuse that I took to this little subterfuge. Do you forgive me?"

"I would have come anyway."

"Why?"

"Because."

"That is a woman's answer."

"Well, because I wanted to see you."

"That is better."

What a fine dinner it was! With that tact of which only a woman of the world is capable she drew him out by degrees. He became animated, merry, witty; all the channels of his broadly educated mind loosed their currents. He was the poet and the man of letters.

"But what would you do in my place, John?" she asked finally.

"As to what?"

"As to the man whose poverty keeps him outside my gates; this man I love, whose pride is striving to cheat me out of that which is mine own?"

All the light went out of Williard's eyes. He had forgotten!

"You are sure he loves you?"

"Oh, yes!"

"Well," with a forced smile, "this is the last week of leap year; why not ask him? Custom allows such action once in four years."

"You are not laughing?"

"No, I am not laughing," truthfully enough.

"John--will you marry me?" Her voice was low, like music in a church.

How still everything suddenly grew!

"Will you marry me, John; or will you break my heart with your foolish pride?"

He stared at her dumbly. She balanced the image of St. Joseph in her hand.

"Shall I toss it into the fire?" she asked presently, a weariness stealing into her tones.

He tried to speak, but could not. She made as though to fling the image into the fire, when he leaned across the table and caught her hand.

"I'm a miserable coward," he said, choking.

"So am I, John. I was afraid I might lose you."

* * * * * *

Transcriber's note:

Throughout the document, the oe-ligature was replaced with "oe".

Throughout the dialogues, there were words used to mimic accents of the speakers. Those words were retained as-is.

The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs and so that they are next to the text they illustrate.

Errors in punctuation and inconsistent hyphenation were not corrected except that on page 210 a period was added after "He was a failure".