IX
There was a young wife behind the footlights explaining to a young manwho was not her husband that her marriage vows need not be too seriouslyconsidered if he, the young man, found them too inconvenient. Whichscared the young man, who was plainly a purveyor of heated air and ashort sport. And, although she explained very clearly that if he neededher in his business he had better say so quick, the author's inventiongave out just there and he called in the young wife's husband to helphim out.
And all the while the battery of round blue eyes gazed on unwinking; thepoet's dewlaps quivered with stored emotion, and the spellbound audiencebreathed as people breathe when the hostess at table attempts to smoothover a bad break by her husband.
"Is _that_ life?" whispered Cybele to Lethbridge, her sensitive mouthaquiver. "Did the author actually know such people? Do _you_? Isconscience really only an attitude? Is instinct the only guide? Am_I_--really--bad----"
"No, no," whispered Lethbridge; "all that is only a dramatist'sattitude. Don't--don't look grieved! Why, every now and then some mandiscovers he can attract more attention by standing on his head. That isall--really, that is all. Barnard Haw on his feet is not amusing; butthe same gentleman on his head is worth an orchestra-chair. When a manwears his trousers where other men wear their coats, people are bound toturn around. It is not a new trick. Mystes, the Argive comic poet, andthe White Queen, taught this author the value of substituting 'is' for'is not,' until, from standing so long inverted, he himself forgets whathe means, and at this point the eminent brothers Rogers take up theimportant work.... Please, please, Cybele, _don't_ take it seriously!...If you look that way--if you are unhappy, I--I----"
A gentle snore from the poet transfixed the firing-line, but the snorewoke up the poet and he mechanically pinched an atom out of theatmosphere, blinking at the stage.
"Precious--very, very precious," he murmured drowsily. "Thank you--thankeverybody--" And he sank into an obese and noiseless slumber as the grayand silver curtain slowly fell. The applause, far from rousing him,merely soothed him; a honeyed smile hovered on his lips which formed thewords "Thank you." That was all; the firing-line stirred, breatheddeeply, and folded twelve soft white hands. Chlorippe, twelve, andPhilodice, thirteen, yawned, pink-mouthed, sleepy-eyed; Dione, fourteen,laid her golden head on the shoulder of Aphrodite, fifteen.
The finger-tips of Lissa and Harrow still touched, scarcely clinging;they had turned toward one another when the curtain fell. But the play,to them, had been a pantomime of silhouettes, the stage, a void edgedwith flame--the scene, the audience, the theater, the poet himself asunreal and meaningless as the shadowy attitudes of the shapes thatvanished when the phantom curtain closed its folds.
And through the subdued light, turning noiselessly, they peered at oneanother, conscious that naught else was real in the misty, golden-tintedgloom; that they were alone together there in a formless, soundlesschaos peopled by shapes impalpable as dreams.
"_Now_ tell me," she said, her lips scarcely moving as the soft voicestirred them like carmine petals stirring in a scented breeze.
"Tell you that it is--love?"
"Yes, tell me."
"That I love you, Lissa?"
"Yes; that!"
He stooped nearer; his voice was steady and very low, and she leanedwith bent head to listen, clear-eyed, intelligent, absorbed.
"So _that_ is love--what you tell me?"
"Yes--partly."
"And the other part?"
"The other part is when you find you love me."
"I--do. I think it must be love, because I can't bear to have you goaway. Besides, I wish you to tell me--things."
"Ask me."
"Well--when two--like you and me, begin to love--what happens?"
"We confess it----"
"I do; I'm not ashamed.... Should I be? And then?"
"Then?" he faltered.
"Yes; do we kiss?... For I am curious to have you do it--I am so certainI shall adore you when you do.... I wish we could go away somewheretogether.... But we can't do that until I am a bride, can we? Oh--do youreally want me?"
"Can you ask?" he breathed.
"Ask? Yes--yes.... I love to ask! Your hand thrills me. We can't go awaynow, can we? It took Iole so long to be permitted to go away with Mr.Wayne--all that time lost in so many foolish ways--when a girl is soimpatient.... Is it not strange how my heart beats when I look into youreyes? Oh, there can be no doubt about it, I am dreadfully in love....And so quickly, too. I suppose it's because I am in such splendidhealth; don't you?"
"I--I--well----"
"Oh, I _do_ want to get up at once and go away with you! _Can't_ we?I could explain to father."
"Wait!" he gasped, "he--he's asleep. Don't speak--don't touch him."
"How unselfish you are," she breathed. "No, you are not hurting myfingers. Tell me more--about love and the blessed years awaiting us, andabout our children--oh, is it not wonderful!"
"Ex--extremely," he managed to mutter, touching his suddenly dampenedforehead with his handkerchief, and attempting to set his thoughts insome sort of order. He could not; the incoherence held him speechless,dazed, under the magic of this superb young being instinct with the softfire of life.
Her loveliness, her innocence, the beautiful, direct gaze, the childlikefulness of mouth and contour of cheek and throat, left him spellbound.The very air around them seemed suffused with the vital glow of heryouth and beauty; each breath they drew increased their wonder, till thewhole rosy universe seemed thrilling and singing at their feet, and theytwo, love-crowned, alone, saw Time and Eternity flowing like a goldentide under the spell of Paradise.
"Jim!"
The hoarse whisper of Lethbridge shook the vision from him; he turned aflushed countenance to his friend; but Cybele spoke:
"We are very tired sitting here. We would like to take some tea atSherry's," she whispered. "What do you think we had better do? It seemsso--so futile to sit here--when we wish to be alone together----"
"You and Henry, too!" gasped Harrow.
"Yes; do you wonder?" She leaned swiftly in front of him; a fragrantbreeze stirred his hair. "Lissa, I'm desperately infatuated with Mr.Lethbridge. Do you see any use in our staying here when I'm simply dyingto have him all to myself somewhere?"
"No, it is silly. I wish to go, too. Shall we?"
"You need not go," began Cybele; then stopped, aware of the new magic inher sister's eyes. "Lissa! Lissa!" she said softly. "_You_, too! Oh, mydear--my dearest!"
"Dear, is it not heavenly? I--I--was quite sure that if I ever had agood chance to talk to a man I really liked something would happen. Andit has."
"If Philodice might awaken father perhaps he would let us go now,"whispered Cybele. "Henry says it does not take more than an hour----"
"To become a bride?"
"Yes; he knows a clergyman very near----"
"Do you?" inquired Lissa. Lethbridge nodded and gave a scared glance atHarrow, who returned it as though stunned.
"But--but," muttered the latter, "your father doesn't know who weare----"
"Oh, yes, he does," said Cybele calmly, "for he sent you the tickets andplaced us near you so that if we found that we liked you we might talkto you----"
"Only he made a mistake in your name," added Lissa to Harrow, "for hewrote 'Stanley West, Esq.' on the envelope. I know because I mailed it."
"Invited West--put _you_ where you could--good God!"
"What is the matter?" whispered Lissa in consternation; "have--have Isaid anything I should not?" And, as he was silent: "What is it? Have Ihurt you--I who----"
There was a silence; she looked him through and through and, after awhile, deep, deep in his soul, she saw, awaking once again, all he haddeemed dead--the truth, the fearless reason, the sweet and faultlessinstinct of the child whose childhood had become a memory. Then, oncemore spiritually equal, they smiled at one another; and Lissa, pausingto gather up her ermine stole, passed noiselessly out to the aisl
e,where she stood, perfectly self-possessed, while her sister joined her,smiling vaguely down at the firing-line and their lifted battery ofblue, inquiring eyes.
The poet--and whether he had slumbered or not nobody but himself isqualified to judge--the poet pensively opened one eye and peeped atHarrow as that young man bent beside him with Lethbridge at his elbow.
"In sending those two tickets you have taught us a new creed," whisperedHarrow; "you have taught us innocence and simplicity--you have taught usto be ourselves, to scorn convention, to say and do what we believe.Thank you."
"Dear friend," said the poet in an artistically-modulated whisper,"I have long, long followed you in the high course of your career. To methe priceless simplicity of poverty: to you the responsibility formillions. To me the daisy, the mountain stream, the woodchuck and myArt! To you the busy mart, the haunts of men, the ship of finance ladenwith a nation's wealth, the awful burden of millions for which you areanswerable to One higher!" He raised one soft, solemn finger.
The young men gazed at one another, astounded. Lethbridge's startledeyes said, "He still takes you for Stanley West!"
"Let him!" flashed the grim answer back from the narrowing gaze ofHarrow.
"Daughters," whispered the poet playfully, "are you so soon tired of thebrilliant gems of satire which our master dramatist scatters with alavish----"
"No," said Cybele; "we are only very much in love."
The poet sat up briskly and looked hard at Harrow.
"Your--your friend?" he began--"doubtless associated with you in thehigh----"
"We are inseparable," said Harrow calmly, "in the busy marts."
The sweetness of the poet's smile was almost overpowering.
"To discuss this sudden--ah--condition which so--ah--abruptly confrontsa father, I can not welcome you to my little home in the wild--which Icall the House Beautiful," he said. "I would it were possible. There allis quiet and simple and exquisitely humble--though now, through thegrace of my valued son, there is no mortgage hanging like the brand ofDamocles above our lowly roof. But I bid you welcome in the name of myson-in-law, on whom--I should say, _with_ whom--I and my babes aresojourning in this clamorous city. Come and let us talk, soul to soul,heart to heart; come and partake of what simples we have. Set the day,the hour. I thank you for understanding me."
"The hour," replied Harrow, "will be about five P.M. on Mondayafternoon.... You see, we are going out now to--to----"
"To marry each other," whispered Lissa with all her sweet fearlessness."Oh, dear! there goes that monotonous piano and we'll be blockingpeople's view!"
The poet tried to rise upon his great flat feet, but he was wedged tootightly; he strove to speak, to call after them, but the loud thumpingnotes of the piano drowned his voice.
"Chlorippe! Dione! Philodice! Tell them to stop! Run after them and staythem!" panted the poet.
"_You_ go!" pouted Dione.
"No, I don't want to," explained Chlorippe, "because the curtain isrising."
"I'll go," sighed Philodice, rising to her slender height and moving upthe aisle as the children of queens moved once upon a time. She cameback presently, saying: "Dear me, they're dreadfully in love, and theyhave driven away in two hansoms."
"Gone!" wheezed the poet.
"Quite," said Philodice, staring at the stage and calmly folding hersmooth little hands.