XXVIII. THE VOICE OF AN ERA
They took him home, in the stateroom of the sleeper attached to the night express from the south, although Mr. Flint, by telephone, had put a special train at his disposal. The long service of Hilary Vane was over; he had won his last fight for the man he had chosen to call his master; and those who had fought behind him, whose places, whose very luminary existences, had depended on his skill, knew that the end had come; nay, were already speculating, manoeuvring, and taking sides. Who would be the new Captain-general? Who would be strong enough to suppress the straining ambitions of the many that the Empire might continue to flourish in its integrity and gather tribute? It is the world-old cry around the palace walls: Long live the new ruler--if you can find him among the curdling factions.
They carried Hilary home that September night, when Sawanec was like a gray ghost-mountain facing the waning moon, back to the home of those strange, Renaissance Austens which he had reclaimed for a grim puritanism, and laid him in the carved and canopied bedstead Channing Austen had brought from Spain. Euphrasia had met them at the door, but a trained nurse from the Ripton hospital was likewise in waiting; and a New York specialist had been summoned to prolong, if possible, the life of one from whom all desire for life had passed.
Before sunrise a wind came from the northern spruces; the dawn was cloudless, fiery red, and the air had an autumn sharpness. At ten o'clock Dr. Harmon arrived, was met at the station by Austen, and spent half an hour with Dr. Tredway. At noon the examination was complete. Thanks to generations of self-denial by the Vanes of Camden Street, Mr. Hilary Vane might live indefinitely, might even recover, partially; but at present he was condemned to remain, with his memories, in the great canopied bed.
The Honourable Hilary had had another caller that morning besides Dr. Harmon,--no less a personage than the president of the Northeastern Railroads himself, who had driven down from Fairview immediately after breakfast. Austen having gone to the station, Dr. Tredway had received Mr. Flint in the darkened hall, and had promised to telephone to Fairview the verdict of the specialist. At present Dr. Tredway did not think it wise to inform Hilary of Mr. Flint's visit--not, at least, until after the examination.
Mr. Vane exhibited the same silent stoicism on receiving the verdict of Dr. Harmon as he had shown from the first. With the clew to Hilary's life which Dr. Tredway had given him, the New York physician understood the case; one common enough in his practice in a great city where the fittest survive--sometimes only to succumb to unexpected and irreparable blows in the evening of life.
On his return from seeing Dr. Harmon off Austen was met on the porch by Dr. Tredway.
"Your father has something on his mind," said the doctor, "and perhaps it is just as well that he should be relieved. He is asking for you, and I merely wished to advise you to make the conversation as short as possible."
Austen climbed the stairs in obedience to this summons, and stood before his father at the bedside. Hilary lay, back among the pillows, and the brightness of that autumn noonday only served to accentuate the pallor of his face, the ravages of age which had come with such incredible swiftness, and the outline of a once vigorous frame. The eyes alone shone with a strange new light, and Austen found it unexpectedly difficult to speak. He sat down on the bed and laid his hand on the helpless one that rested on the coverlet.
"Austen," said Mr. Vane, "I want you to go to Fairview."
His son's hand tightened over his own.
"Yes, Judge."
"I want you to go now."
"Yes, Judge."
"You know the combination of my safe at the office. It's never been changed since--since you were there. Open it. You will find two tin boxes, containing papers labelled Augustus P. Flint. I want you to take them to Fairview and put them into the hands of Mr. Flint himself. I--I cannot trust any one else. I promised to take them myself, but--Flint will understand."
"I'll go right away," said Austen, rising, and trying to speak cheerfully. "Mr. Flint was here early this morning--inquiring for you."
Hilary Vane's lips trembled, and another expression came into his eyes.
"Rode down to look at the scrap-heap,--did he?"
Austen strove to conceal his surprise at his father's words and change of manner.
"Tredway saw him," he said. "I'm pretty sure Mr. Flint doesn't feel that way, Judge. He has taken your illness very much to heart, I know, and he left some fruit and flowers for you."
"I guess his daughter sent those," said Hilary.
"His daughter?" Austen repeated.
"If I didn't think so," Mr. Vane continued, "I'd send 'em back. I never knew what she was until she picked me up and drove me down here. I've always done Victoria an injustice."
Austen walked to the door, and turned slowly.
"I'll go at once, Judge," he said.
In the kitchen he was confronted by Euphrasia.
"When is that woman going away?" she demanded. "I've took care of Hilary Vane nigh on to forty years, and I guess I know as much about nursing, and more about Hilary, than that young thing with her cap and apron. I told Dr. Tredway so. She even came down here to let me know what to cook for him, and I sent her about her business."
Austen smiled. It was the first sign, since his return the night before, Euphrasia had given that an affection for Hilary Vane lurked beneath the nature.
"She won't stay long, Phrasie," he answered, and added mischievously, "for a very good reason."
"And what's that?" asked Euphrasia.
"Because you won't allow her to. I have a notion that she'll pack up and leave in about three days, and that all the doctors in Ripton couldn't keep her here."
"Get along with you," said Euphrasia, who could not for the life of her help looking a little pleased.
"I'm going off for a few hours," he said more seriously. "Dr. Tredway tells me they do not look for any developments--for the worse."
"Where are you going?" asked Euphrasia, sharply.
"To Fairview," he said.
Euphrasia moved the kettle to another part of the stove.
"You'll see her?" she said.
"Who?" Austen asked. But his voice must have betrayed him a little, for Euphrasia turned and seized him by the elbows and looked up into his face.
"Victoria," she said.
He felt himself tremble at the name,--at the strangeness of its sound on Euphrasia's lips.
"I do not expect to see Miss Flint," he answered, controlling himself as well as he was able. "I have an errand for the Judge with Mr. Flint himself."
Euphrasia had guessed his secret! But how?
"Hadn't you better see her?" said Euphrasia, in a curious monotone.
"But I have no errand with her," he objected, mystified yet excited by Euphrasia's manner.
"She fetched Hilary home," said Euphrasia.
"Yes."
She couldn't have be'n kinder if she was his own daughter."
"I know--" he began, but Euphrasia interrupted.
"She sent that Englishman for the doctor, and waited to take the news to her father, and she came out in this kitchen and talked to me."
Austen started. Euphrasia was not looking at him now, and suddenly she dropped his arms and went to the window overlooking the garden.
"She wouldn't go in the parlour, but come right out here in her fine clothes. I told her I didn't think she belonged in a kitchen--but I guess I did her an injustice," said Euphrasia, slowly.
"I think you did," he said, and wondered.
"She looked at that garden," Euphrasia went on, "and cried out. I didn't callate she was like that. And the first thing I knew I was talking about your mother, and I'd forgot who I was talking to. She wahn't like a stranger--it was just as if I'd known her always. I haven't understood it yet. And after a while I told her about that verse, and she wanted to see it--the verse about the skylark, you know--"
"Yes," said Austen.
"Well, the way she read it made me cry, it brought back Sarah Austen so. Somehow, I can't account for it, she puts me in mind of your mother."
Austen did not speak.
"In more ways than one," said Euphrasia. "I didn't look to find her so natural--and so gentle. And their she has a way of scolding you, just as Sarah Austen had, that you'd never suspect."
"Did she scold you--Phrasie?" asked Austen. And the irresistible humour that is so near to sorrow made him smile again.
"Indeed she did! And it surprised, me some--coming right out of a summer sky. I told her what I thought about Hilary, and how he'd driven you out of your own mother's house. She said you'd ought to be sent for, and I said you oughtn't to set foot in this house until Hilary sent for you. She said I'd no right to take such a revenge--that you'd come right away if you knew Hilary'd had a stroke, and that Hilary'd never send for you --because he couldn't. She said he was like a man on a desert island."
"She was right," answered Austen.
"I don't know about that," said Euphrasia; "she hadn't put up with Hilary for forty years, as I had, and seen what he'd done to your mother and you. But that's what she said. And she went for you herself, when she found the doctor couldn't go. Austen, ain't you going to see her?"
Austen shook his head gently, and smiled at her.
"I'm afraid it's no use, Phrasie," he said. "Just because she has been --kind we mustn't be deceived. It's h er nature to be kind."
Euphrasia crossed the room swiftly, and seized his arm again.
"She loves you, Austen," she cried; "she loves you. Do you think that I'd love her, that I'd plead for her, if she didn't?"
Austen's breath came deeply. He disengaged himself, and went to the window.
"No," he said, "you don't know. You can't--know. I have only seen her--a few times. She lives a different life--and with other people. She will marry a man who can give her more."
"Do you think I could be deceived?" exclaimed Euphrasia, almost fiercely. "It's as true as the sun shining on that mountain. You believe she loves the Englishman, but I tell you she loves you--you."
He turned towards her.
"How do you know?" he asked, as though he were merely curious.
"Because I'm a woman, and she's a woman," said Euphrasia. "Oh, she didn't confess it. If she had, I shouldn't think so much of her. But she told me as plain as though she had spoken it in words, before she left this room."
Austen shook his head again.
"Phrasie," he said, "I'm afraid you've been building castles in Spain." And he went out, and across to the stable to harness Pepper.
Austen did not believe Euphrasia. On that eventful evening when Victoria had called at Jabe Jenney's, the world's aspect had suddenly changed for him; old values had faded,--values which, after all, had been but tints and glows,--and sterner but truer colours took their places. He saw Victoria's life in a new perspective,--one in which his was but a small place in the background of her numerous beneficences; which was, after all, the perspective in which he had first viewed it. But, by degrees, the hope that she loved him had grown and grown until it had become unconsciously the supreme element of his existence,--the hope that stole sweetly into his mind with the morning light, and stayed him through the day, and blended into the dreams of darkness.
By inheritance, by tradition, by habits of thought, Austen Vane was an American,--an American as differentiated from the citizen of any other nation upon the earth. The French have an expressive phrase in speaking of a person as belonging to this or that world, meaning the circle by which the life of an individual is bounded; the true American recognizes these circles--but with complacency, and with a sure knowledge of his destiny eventually to find himself within the one for which he is best fitted by his talents and his tastes. The mere fact that Victoria had been brought up amongst people with whom he had nothing in common would not have deterred Austen Vane from pressing his suit; considerations of honour had stood in the way, and hope had begun to whisper that these might, in the end, be surmounted. Once they had disappeared, and she loved him, that were excuse and reason enough.
And suddenly the sight of Victoria with a probable suitor--who at once had become magnified into an accepted suitor--had dispelled hope. Euphrasia! Euphrasia had been deceived as he had, by a loving kindness and a charity that were natural. But what so natural (to one who had lived the life of Austen Vane) as that she should marry amongst those whose ways of life were her ways? In the brief time in which he had seen her and this other man, Austen's quickened perceptions had detected tacit understanding, community of interest, a habit of thought and manner,--in short, a common language, unknown to him, between the two. And, more than these, the Victoria of the blissful excursions he had known was changed as she had spoken to him--constrained, distant, apart; although still dispensing kindness, going out of her way to bring Hilary home, and to tell him of Hilary's accident. Rumour, which cannot be confined in casks or bottles, had since informed Austen Vane that Mr. Rangely had spent the day with Victoria, and had remained at Fairview far into the evening; rumour went farther (thanks to Mrs. Pomfret) and declared the engagement already an accomplished fact. And to Austen, in the twilight in front of Jabe Jenney's, the affair might well have assumed the proportions of an intimacy of long standing rather than that of the chance acquaintance of an hour. Friends in common, modes of life in common, and incidents in common are apt to sweep away preliminaries.
Such were Austen's thoughts as he drove to Fairview that September afternoon when the leaves were turning their white backs to the northwest breeze. The sun was still high, and the distant hills and mountains were as yet scarce stained with blue, and stood out in startling clearness against the sky. Would he see her? That were a pain he scarce dared contemplate.
He reached the arched entrance, was on the drive. Here was the path again by which she had come down the hillside; here was the very stone on which she had stood--awaiting him. Why? Why had she done that? Well-remembered figure amidst the yellow leaves dancing in the sunlight! Here he had stopped, perforce, and here he had looked up into his face and smiled and spoken!
At length he gained the plateau across which the driveway ran, between round young maples, straight to Fairview House, and he remembered the stares from the tea-tables, and how she had come out to his rescue. Now the lawn was deserted, save for a gardener among the shrubs. He rang the stable-bell, and as he waited for an answer to his summons, the sense of his remoteness from these surroundings of hers deepened, and with a touch of inevitable humour he recalled the low-ceiled bedroom at Mr. Jenney's and the kitchen in Hanover Street; the annual cost of the care of that lawn and driveway might well have maintained one of these households.
He told the stable-boy to wait. It is to be remarked as curious that the name of the owner of the house on Austen's lips brought the first thought of him to Austen's mind. He was going to see and speak with Mr. Flint, a man who had been his enemy ever since the day he had come here and laid down his pass on the president's desk; the man who--so he believed until three days ago--had stood between him and happiness. Well, it did not matter now.
Austen followed the silent-moving servant through the hall. Those were the stairs which knew her feet, these the rooms--so subtly flower-scented--she lived in; then came the narrow passage to the sterner apartment of the master himself. Mr. Flint was alone, and seated upright behind the massive oak desk, from which bulwark the president of the Northeastern was wont to meet his opponents and his enemies; and few visitors came into his presence, here or elsewhere, who were not to be got the better of, if possible. A life-long habit had accustomed Mr. Flint to treat all men as adversaries until they were proved otherwise. His square, close-cropped head, his large features, his alert eyes, were those of a fighter.
He did not rise, but nodded. Suddenly Austen was enveloped in a flame of wrath that rose without warning and blinded him, and it was with a supreme effort to control himself that he stopped in the doorway. He was frightened, for he had felt this before, and he knew it for the anger that demands physical violence.
"Come in, Mr. Vane," said the president.
Austen advanced to the desk, and laid the boxes before Mr. Flint.
"Mr. Vane told me to say that he would have brought these himself, had it been possible. Here is the list, and I shall be much obliged if you will verify it before I go back."
"Sit down." said Mr. Flint.
Austen sat down, with the corner of the desk between them, while Mr. Flint opened the boxes and began checking off the papers on the list.
"How is your father this afternoon?" he asked, without looking up.
"As well as can be expected," said Austen.
"Of course nobody knew his condition but himself," Mr. Flint continued; "but it was a great shock to me--when he resigned as my counsel three days ago."
Austen laid his forearm on the desk, and his hand closed.
"He resigned three days ago?" he exclaimed.
Mr. Flint was surprised, but concealed it.
"I can understand, under the circumstances, how he has overlooked telling you. His resignation takes effect to-day."
Austen was silent a moment, while he strove to apply this fact to his father's actions.
"He waited until after the convention."
"Exactly," said Mr. Flint, catching the implied accusation in Austen's tone; "and needless to say, if I had been able to prevent his going, in view of what happened on Monday night, I should have done so. As you know, after his--accident, he went to the capital without informing any one."
"As a matter of honour," said Austen.
Mr. Flint looked up from the papers, and regarded him narrowly, for the tone in which this was spoken did not escape the president of the Northeastern. He saw, in fact, that at the outset he had put a weapon into Austen's hands. Hilary's resignation was a vindication of Austen's attitude, an acknowledgment that the business and political practices of his life had been wrong.
What Austen really felt, when he had grasped the significance of that fact, was relief--gratitude. A wave of renewed affection for his father swept over him, of affection and pity and admiration, and for the instant he forgot Mr. Flint.
"As a matter of honour," Mr. Flint repeated. "Knowing he was ill, Mr. Vane insisted upon going to that convention, even at the risk of his life. It is a fitting close to a splendid career, and one that will not soon be forgotten."
Austen merely looked at Mr. Flint, who may have found the glance a trifle disconcerting, for he turned to the papers again.
"I repeat," he went on presently, "that this illness of Mr. Vane's is not only a great loss to the Northeastern system, but a great blow to me personally. I have been associated with him closely for more than a quarter of a century, and I have never seen a lawyer of greater integrity, clear-headedness, and sanity of view. He saw things as they were, and he did as much to build up the business interests and the prosperity of this State as any man I know of. He was true to his word, and true to his friends."
Still Austen did not reply. He continued to look at Mr. Flint, and Mr. Flint continued to check the papers only more slowly. He had nearly finished the first box.
"A wave of political insanity, to put it mildly, seems to be sweeping over this country," said the president of the Northeastern. "Men who would paralyze and destroy the initiative of private enterprise, men who themselves are ambitious, and either incapable or unsuccessful, have sprung up; writers who have no conscience, whose one idea is to make money out of a passing craze against honest capital, have aided them. Disappointed and dangerous politicians who merely desire office and power have lifted their voices in the hue and cry to fool the honest voter. I am glad to say I believe that the worst of this madness and rascality is over; that the common sense of the people of this country is too great to be swept away by the methods of these self-seekers; that the ordinary man is beginning to see that his bread and butter depends on the brain of the officers who are trying honestly to conduct great enterprises for the benefit of the average citizen.
"We did not expect to escape in this State," Mr. Flint went on, raising his head and meeting Austen's look; "the disease was too prevalent and too catching for the weak-minded. We had our self-seekers who attempted to bring ruin upon an institution which has done more for our population than any other. I do not hesitate to speak of the Northeastern Railroads as an institution, and as an institution which has been as conscientiously and conservatively conducted as any in the country, and with as scrupulous a regard for the welfare of all. Hilary Vane, as you doubtless know, was largely responsible for this. My attention, as president of all the roads, has been divided. Hilary Vane guarded the interests in this State, and no man could have guarded them better. He well deserves the thanks of future generations for the uncompromising fight he made against such men and such methods. It has broken him down at a time of life when he has earned repose, but he has the satisfaction of knowing that he has won the battle for conservative American principles, and that he has nominated a governor worthy of the traditions of the State."
And Mr. Flint started checking off the papers again. Had the occasion been less serious, Austen could have smiled at Mr. Flint's ruse--so characteristic of the tactics of the president of the Northeastern--of putting him into a position where criticism of the Northeastern and its practices would be criticism of his own father. As it was, he only set his jaw more firmly, an expression indicative of contempt for such tactics. He had not come there to be lectured out of the "Book of Arguments" on the divine right of railroads to govern, but to see that certain papers were delivered in safety.
Had his purpose been deliberately to enter into a contest with Mr. Flint, Austen could not have planned the early part of it any better than by pursuing this policy of silence. To a man of Mr. Flint's temperament and training, it was impossible to have such an opponent within reach without attempting to hector him into an acknowledgment of the weakness of his position. Further than this, Austen had touched him too often on the quick merely to be considered in the light of a young man who held opposite and unfortunate views--although it was Mr. Flint's endeavour to put him in this light. The list of injuries was too fresh in Mr. Flint's mind--even that last conversation with Victoria, in which she had made it plain that her sympathies were with Austen.
But with an opponent who would not be led into ambush, who had the strength to hold his fire under provocation, it was no easy matter to maintain a height of conscious, matter-of-fact rectitude and implied reproof. Austen's silence, Austen's attitude, declared louder than words the contempt for such manoeuvres of a man who knows he is in the right --and knows that his adversary knows it. It was this silence and this attitude which proclaimed itself that angered Mr. Flint, yet made him warily conceal his anger and change his attack.
"It is some years since we met, Mr. Vane," he remarked presently.
Austen's face relaxed into something of a smile.
"Four, I think," he answered.
"You hadn't long been back from that Western experience. Well, your father has one decided consolation; you have fulfilled his hope that you would settle down here and practise in the State. And I hear that you are fast forging to the front. You are counsel for the Gaylord Company, I believe."
"The result of an unfortunate accident," said Austen; "Mr. Hammer died."
"And on the occasion when you did me the honour to call on me," said Mr. Flint, "if I remember rightly, you expressed some rather radical views --for the son of Hilary Vane."
"For the son of Hilary Vane," Austen agreed, with a smile.
Mr. Flint ignored the implication in the repetition.
"Thinking as mach as I do of Mr. Vane, I confess that your views at that time rather disturbed me. It is a matter of relief to learn that you have refused to lend yourself to the schemes of men like our neighbour, Mr. Humphrey Crewe, of Leith."
"Honesty compels me to admit," answered Austen, "that I did not refrain on Mr. Crewe's account."
"Although," said Mr. Flint, drumming on the table, "there was some talk that you were to be brought forward as a dark horse in the convention, and as a candidate unfriendly to the interests of the Northeastern Railroads, I am glad you did not consent to be put in any such position. I perceive that a young man of your ability and--popularity, a Vane of Camden Street, must inevitably become a force in this State. And as a force, you must retain the conservatism of the Vanes--the traditional conservatism of the State. The Northeastern Railroads will continue to be a very large factor in the life of the people after you and I are gone, Mr. Vane. You will have to live, as it were, with that corporation, and help to preserve it. We shall have to work together, perhaps, to that end--who can say? I repeat, I am glad that your good sense led you to refrain from coming as a candidate before that Convention. There is time enough in the future, and you could not have been nominated."
"On the contrary," answered Austen, quietly, "I could have been nominated."
Mr. Flint smiled knowingly--but with an effort. What a relief it would have been to him to charge horse and foot, to forget that he was a railroad president dealing with a potential power.
"Do you honestly believe that?" he asked.
"I am not accustomed to dissemble my beliefs," said Austen, gravely. "The fact that my father had faith enough in me to count with certainty on my refusal to go before the convention enabled him to win the nomination for the candidate of your railroads."
Mr. Flint continued to smile, but into his eyes had crept a gleam of anger.
"It is easy to say such things--after the convention," he remarked.
"And it would have been impossible to say their before," Austen responded instantly, with a light in his own eyes. "My nomination was the only disturbing factor in the situation for you and the politicians who had your interests in hand, and it was as inevitable as night and day that the forces of the candidates who represented the two wings of the machine of the Northeastern Railroads should have united against Mr. Crewe. I want to say to you frankly that if my father had not been the counsel for your corporation, and responsible for its political success, or if he could have resigned with honour before the convention, I should not have refused to let my name go in. After all," he added, in a lower tone, and with a slight gesture characteristic of him when a subject was distasteful, "it doesn't matter who is elected governor this autumn."
"What?" cried Mr. Flint, surprised out of his attitude as much by Austen's manner as by Austen's words.
"It doesn't matter," said Austen, "whether the Northeastern Railroads have succeeded this time in nominating and electing a governor to whom they can dictate, and who will reappoint railroad commissioners and other State officials in their interests. The practices by which you have controlled this State, Mr. Flint, and elected governors and councillors and State and national senators are doomed. However necessary these practices may have been from your point of view, they violated every principle of free government, and were they to continue, the nation to which we belong would inevitably decay and become the scorn of the world. Those practices depended for their success on one condition,--which in itself is the most serious of ills in a republic,--the ignorance and disregard of the voter. You have but to read the signs of the times to see clearly that the day of such conditions is past, to see that the citizens of this State and this country are thinking for themselves, as they should; are alive to the dangers and determined to avert it. You may succeed in electing one more governor and one more senate, or two, before the people are able to destroy the machinery you have built up and repeal the laws you have made to sustain it. I repeat, it doesn't matter in the long run. The era of political domination by a corporation, and mainly for the benefit of a corporation, is over."
Mr. Flint had been drumming on the desk, his face growing a darker red as Austen proceeded: Never, since he had become president of the Northeastern Railroads, had any man said such things to his face. And the fact that Austen Vane had seemingly not spoken in wrath, although forcefully enough to compel him to listen, had increased Mr. Flint's anger. Austen apparently cared very little for him or his opinions in comparison with his own estimate of right and wrong.
"It seems," said Mr. Flint, "that you have grown more radical since your last visit."
"If it be radical to refuse to accept a pass from a railroad to bind my liberty of action as an attorney and a citizen, then I am radical," replied Austen. "If it be radical to maintain that the elected representatives of the people should not receive passes, or be beholden to any man or any corporation, I acknowledge the term. If it be radical to declare that these representatives should be elected without interference, and while in office should do exact justice to the body of citizens on the one hand and the corporations on the other, I declare myself a radical. But my radicalism goes back behind the establishment of railroads, Mr. Flint, back to the foundation of this government, to the idea from which it sprang."
Mr. Flint smiled again.
"We have changed materially since then," he said. "I am afraid such a utopian state of affairs, beautiful as it is, will not work in the twentieth century. It is a commercial age, and the interests which are the bulwark of the country's strength must be protected."
"Yes," said Austen, "we have changed materially. The mistake you make, and men like you, is the stress which you lay on that word material. Are there no such things as moral interests, Mr. Flint? And are they not quite as important in government, if not more important, than material interests? Surely, we cannot have commercial and political stability without cominertial and political honour! if, as a nation, we lose sight of the ideals which have carried us so far, which have so greatly modified the conditions of other peoples than ourselves, we shall perish as a force in the world. And if this government proves a failure, how long do you think the material interests of which you are so solicitous will endure? Or do you care whether they endure beyond your lifetime? Perhaps not. But it is a matter of importance, not only to the nation, but to the world, whether or not the moral idea of the United States of America is perpetuated, I assure you."
"I begin to fear, Mr. Vane," said the president of the Northeastern, "that you have missed your vocation. Suppose I were to grant you, for the sake of argument, that the Northeastern Railroads, being the largest taxpayers in this State, have taken an interest in seeing that conservative men fill responsible offices. Suppose such to be the case, and we abruptly cease--to take such an interest. What then? Are we not at the mercy of any and all unscrupulous men who build up a power of their own, and start again the blackmail of the old days?"
"You have put the case mildly," said Austen, and ingeniously. "As a matter of fact, Mr. Flint, you know as well as I do that for years you have governed this State absolutely, for the purpose of keeping down your taxes, avoiding unnecessary improvements for safety and comfort, and paying high dividends--"
"Perhaps you realize that in depicting these criminal operations so graphically," cried Mr. Flint, interrupting, "you are involving the reputation of one of the best citizens the State ever had--your own father."
Austen Vane leaned forward across the desk, and even Mr. Flint (if the truth were known) recoiled a little before the anger he had aroused. It shot forth from Austen's eyes, proclaimed itself in the squareness of the face, and vibrated in every word he spoke.
"Mr. Flint," he said, "I refrain from comment upon your methods of argument. There were many years in which my father believed the practices which he followed in behalf of your railroad to be necessary--and hence justified. And I have given you the credit of holding the same belief. Public opinion would not, perhaps, at that time have protected your property from political blackmail. I merely wished you to know, Mr. Flint, that there is no use in attempting to deceive me in regard to the true colour of those practices. It is perhaps useless for me to add that in my opinion you understand as well as I do the real reason for Mr. Vane's resignation and illness. Once he became convinced that the practices were wrong, he could no longer continue them without violating his conscience. He kept his word to you--at the risk of his life, and, as his son, I take a greater pride in him to-day than I ever have before."
Austen got to his feet. He was formidable even to Mr. Flint, who had met many formidable, and angry men in his time--although not of this type. Perhaps--who can say?--he was the in the mind of the president unconscious embodiment of the Northeastern of the new forces which had arisen against him,--forces which he knew in his secret soul he could not combat, because they were the irresistible forces of things not material. All his life he had met and successfully conquered forces of another kind, and put down with a strong hand merely physical encroachments.
Mr. Flint's nature was not an introspective one, and if he had tried, he could not have accounted for his feelings. He was angry--that was certain. But he measured the six feet and more of Austen Vane with his eye, and in spite of himself experienced the compelled admiration of one fighting man for another. A thought, which had made itself vaguely felt at intervals in the past half hour, shot suddenly and poignantly through Mr. Flint's mind what if this young man, who dared in spite of every interest to oppose him, should in the apparently inevitable trend of things, become...?
Mr. Flint rose and went to the window, where he stood silent for a space, looking out, played upon by unwonted conflicting thoughts and emotions. At length, with a characteristic snap of the fingers, he turned abruptly. Austen Vane was still standing beside the desk. His face was still square, determined, but Mr. Flint noted curiously that the anger was gone from his eyes, and that another--although equally human--expression had taken its place,--a more disturbing expression, to Mr. Flint.
"It appears, Mr. Vane," he said, gathering up the papers and placing them in the boxes, "it appears that we are able to agree upon one point, at least--Hilary Vane."
"Mr. Flint," said Austen, "I did not come up here with any thought of arguing with you, of intruding any ideas--I may hold, but you have yourself asked me one question which I feel bound to answer to the best of my ability before I go. You have asked me what, in my opinion, would happen if you ceased--as you express it--to take an interest in the political, affairs of this State.
"I believe, as firmly as I stand here, that the public opinion which exists to-day would protect your property, and I base that belief on the good sense of the average American voter. The public would protect you not only in its own interests, but from an inherent sense of fair play. On the other hand, if you persist in a course of political manipulation which is not only obsolete but wrong, you will magnify the just charges against you, and the just wrath; you will put ammunition into the hands of the agitators you rightly condemn. The stockholders of your corporation, perhaps, are bound to suffer some from the fact that you have taken its life-blood to pay dividends, and the public will demand that it be built up into a normal and healthy condition. On the other hand, it could not have gone on as it was. But the corporation will suffer much more if a delayed justice is turned into vengeance.
"You ask me what I could do. I should recognize, frankly, the new conditions, and declare as frankly what the old ones were, and why such methods of defence as you adopted were necessary and justified. I should announce, openly, that from this day onward the Northeastern Railroads depended for fair play on an enlightened public--and I think your trust would be well founded, and your course vindicated. I should declare, from this day onward, that the issue of political passes, newspaper passes, and all other subterfuges would be stopped, and that all political hirelings would be dismissed. I should appeal to the people of this State to raise up political leaders who would say to the corporations, 'We will protect you from injustice if you will come before the elected representatives of the people, openly, and say what you want and why you want it.' By such a course you would have, in a day, the affection of the people instead of their distrust. They would rally to your defence. And, more than that, you would have done a service for American government the value of which cannot well be estimated."
Mr. Flint rang the bell on his desk, and his secretary appeared.
"Put these in my private safe, Mr. Freeman," he said.
Mr. Freeman took the boxes, glanced curiously at Austen, and went out. It was the same secretary, Austen recalled, who had congratulated him four years before. Then Mr. Flint laid his hand deliberately on the desk, and smiled slightly as he turned to Austen.
"If you had run a railroad as long as I have, Mr. Vane," he said, "I do you the credit of thinking that you would have intelligence enough to grasp other factors which your present opportunities for observation have not permitted you to perceive. Nevertheless, I am much obliged to you for your opinion, and I value the--frankness in which it was given. And I shall hope to hear good news of your father. Remember me to him, and tell him how deeply I feel his affliction. I shall call again in a day or two."
Austen took up his hat.
"Good day, Mr. Flint," he said; "I will tell him."
By the time he had reached the door, Mr. Flint had gone back to the window once more, and appeared to have forgotten his presence.
XXIX. THE VALE OF THE BLUE
Austen himself could not well have defined his mental state as he made his way through the big rooms towards the door, but he was aware of one main desire--to escape from Fairview. With the odours of the flowers in the tall silver vases on the piano--her piano!--the spirit of desire which had so long possessed him, waking and sleeping, returned,--returned to torture him now with greater skill amidst these her possessions; her volume of Chopin on the rack, bound in red leather and stamped with her initials, which compelled his glance as he passed, and brought vivid to his memory the night he had stood in the snow and heard her playing. So, he told himself, it must always be, for him to stand in the snow listening.
He reached the hall, with a vast relief perceived that it was empty, and opened the door and went out. Strange that he should note, first of all, as he parsed a moment at the top of the steps, that the very day had changed. The wind had fallen; the sun, well on his course towards the rim of western hills, poured the golden light of autumn over field and forest, while Sawanec was already in the blue shadow; the expectant stillness of autumn reigned, and all unconsciously Austen's blood was quickened though a quickening of pain.
The surprise of the instant over, he noticed that his horse was gone, --had evidently been taken to the stables. And rather than ring the bell and wait in the mood in which he found himself, he took the path through the shrubbery from which he had seen the groom emerge.
It turned beyond the corner of the house, descended a flight of stone steps, and turned again.
They stood gazing each at the other for a space of time not to be computed before either spoke, and the sense of unreality which comes with a sudden fulfilment of intense desire--or dread--was upon Austen. Could this indeed be her figure, and this her face on which he watched the colour rise (so he remembered afterwards) like the slow flood of day? Were there so many Victorias, that a new one--and a strange one--should confront him at every meeting? And, even while he looked, this Victoria, too,--one who had been near him and departed,--was surveying him now from an unapproachable height of self-possession and calm. She held out her hand, and he took it, scarce knowing--that it was hers.
"How do you do, Mr. Vane?" she said; "I did not expect to meet you here."
"I was searching for the stable, to get my horse," he answered lamely.
"And your father?" she asked quickly; "I hope he is not--worse."
It was thus she supplied him, quite naturally, with an excuse for being at Fairview. And yet her solicitude for Hilary was wholly unaffected.
"Dr. Harmon, who came from New York, has been more encouraging than I had dared to hope," said Austen. "And, by the way, Mr. Vane believes that you had a share in the fruit and flowers which Mr. Flint so kindly brought. If--he had known that I were to see you, I am sure he would have wished me to thank you."
Victoria turned, and tore a leaf from the spiraea.
"I will show you where the stables are," she said; "the path divides a little farther on--and you might find yourself in the kitchen."
Austen smiled, and as she went on slowly, he followed her, the path not being wide enough for them to walk abreast, his eyes caressing the stray hairs that clustered about her neck and caught the light. It seemed so real, and yet so unrealizable, that he should be here with her.
"I am afraid," he said, "that I did not express my gratitude as I should have done the evening you were good enough to come up to Jabe Jenney's."
He saw her colour rise again, but she did not pause.
"Please don't say anything about it, Mr. Vane. Of course I understand how you felt," she cried.
"Neither my father nor myself will forget that service," said Austen.
"It was nothing," answered Victoria, in a low voice. "Or, rather, it was something I shall always be glad that I did not miss. I have seen Mr. Vane all my life, but I never=-never really knew him until that day. I have come to the conclusion," she added, in a lighter tone, "that the young are not always the best judges of the old. There," she added, "is the path that goes to the kitchen, which you probably would have taken."
He laughed. Past and future were blotted out, and he lived only in the present. He could think of nothing but that she was here beside him. Afterwards, cataclysms might come and welcome.
"Isn't there another place," he asked, "where I might lose my way?"
She turned and gave him one of the swift, searching looks he recalled so well: a look the meaning of which he could not declare, save that she seemed vainly striving to fathom something in him--as though he were not fathomable! He thought she smiled a little as she took the left-hand path.
"You will remember me to your father?" she said. "I hope he is not suffering."
"He is not suffering," Austen replied. "Perhaps--if it were not too much to ask--perhaps you might come to see him, sometime? I can think of nothing that would give him greater pleasure."
"I will come--sometime," she answered. "I am going away to-morrow, but--"
"Away?" he repeated, in dismay. Now that he was beside her, all unconsciously the dominating male spirit which was so strong in him, and which moves not woman alone, but the world, was asserting itself. For the moment he was the only man, and she the only woman, in the universe.
"I am going on a promised visit to a friend of mine."
"For how long?" he demanded.
"I don't know, said Victoria, calmly; probably until she gets tired of me. And there," she added, "are the stables, where no doubt you will find your faithful Pepper."
They had come out upon an elevation above the hard service drive, and across it, below them, was the coach house with its clock-tower and weather-vane, and its two wings, enclosing a paved court where a whistling stable-boy was washing a carriage. Austen regarded this scene an instant, and glanced back at her profile. It was expressionless.
"Might I not linger--a few minutes?" he asked.
Her lips parted slightly in a smile, and she turned her head. How wonderfully, he thought, it was poised upon her shoulders.
"I haven't been very hospitable, have I?" she said. But then, you seemed in such a hurry to go, didn't you? You were walking so fast when I met you that you quite frightened me."
"Was I?" asked Austen, in surprise.
She laughed.
"You looked as if you were ready to charge somebody. But this isn't a very nice place--to linger, and if you really will stay awhile," said Victoria, "we might walk over to the dairy, where that model protege of yours, Eben Fitch, whom you once threatened with corporal chastisement if he fell from grace, is engaged. I know he will be glad to see you."
Austen laughed as he caught up with her. She was already halfway across the road.
"Do you always beat people if they do wrong?" she asked.
"It was Eben who requested it, if I remember rightly," he said. "Fortunately, the trial has not yet arrived. Your methods," he added, "seem to be more successful with Eben."
They went down the grassy slope with its groups of half-grown trees; through an orchard shot with slanting, yellow sunlight,--the golden fruit, harvested by the morning winds, littering the ground; and then by a gate into a dimpled, emerald pasture slope where the Guernseys were feeding along a water run. They spoke of trivial things that found no place in Austen's memory, and at times, upon one pretext or another, he fell behind a little that he might feast his eyes upon her.
Eben was not at the dairy, and Austen betraying no undue curiosity as to his whereabouts, they walked on up the slopes, and still upward towards the crest of the range of hills that marked the course of the Blue. He did not allow his mind to dwell upon this new footing they were on, but clung to it. Before, in those delicious moments with her, seemingly pilfered from the angry gods, the sense of intimacy had been deep; deep, because robbing the gods together, they had shared the feeling of guilt, had known that retribution would coma. And now the gods had locked their treasure-chest, although themselves powerless to redeem from him the memory of what he had gained. Nor could they, apparently, deprive him of the vision of her in the fields and woods beside him, though transformed by their magic into a new Victoria, keeping him lightly and easily at a distance.
Scattering the sheep that flecked the velvet turf of the uplands, they stood at length on the granite crown of the crest itself. Far below them wound the Blue into its vale of sapphire shadows, with its hillsides of the mystic fabric of the backgrounds of the masters of the Renaissance. For a while they stood in silence under the spell of the scene's enchantment, and then Victoria seated herself on the rock, and he dropped to a place at her side.
"I thought you would like the view," she said; "but perhaps you have been here, perhaps I am taking you to one of your own possessions."
He had flung his hat upon the rock, and she glanced at his serious, sunburned face. His eyes were still fixed, contemplatively, on the Yale of the Blue, but he turned to her with a smile.
"It has become yours by right of conquest," he answered.
She did not reply to that. The immobility of her face, save for the one look she had flashed upon him, surprised and puzzled him more and more --the world--old, indefinable, eternal feminine quality of the Spring.
"So you refused to be governor? she said presently,--surprising him again.
"It scarcely came to that," he replied.
"What did it come to?" she demanded.
He hesitated.
"I had to go down to the capital, on my father's account, but I did not go to the convention. I stayed," he said slowly, "at the little cottage across from the Duncan house where--you were last winter." He paused, but she gave no sign. "Tom Gaylord came up there late in the afternoon, and wanted me to be a candidate."
"And you refused?"
"Yes."
"But you could have been nominated!"
"Yes," he admitted; "it is probable. The conditions were chaotic."
"Are you sure you have done right?" she asked. "It has always seemed to me from what I know and have heard of you that you were made for positions of trust. You would have been a better governor than the man they have nominated."
His expression became set.
"I am sure I have done right," he answered deliberately. "It doesn't make any difference who is governor this time."
"Doesn't make any difference!" she exclaimed.
"No," he said. "Things have changed--the people have changed. The old method of politics, which was wrong, although it had some justification in conditions, has gone out. A new and more desirable state of affairs has come. I am at liberty to say this much to you now," he added, fixing his glance upon her, "because my father has resigned as counsel for the Northeastern, and I have just had a talk with--Mr. Flint."
"You have seen my father?" she asked, in a low voice, and her face was averted.
"Yes," he answered.
"You--did not agree," she said quickly.
His blood beat higher at the question and the manner of her asking it, but he felt that he must answer it honestly, unequivocally, whatever the cost.
"No, we did not agree. It is only fair to tell you that we differed --vitally. On the other hand, it is just that you should know that we did not part in anger, but, I think, with a mutual respect."
She drew breath.
"I knew," she said, "I knew if he could but talk to you he would understand that you were sincere--and you have proved it. I am glad--I am glad that you saw him." The quality of the sunlight changed, the very hills leaped, and the river sparkled. Could she care? Why did she wish her father to know that he was sincere.
"You are glad that I saw him!" he repeated.
But she met his glance steadily.
"My father has so little faith in human nature," she answered. "He has a faculty of doubting the honesty of his opponents--I suppose because so many of them have been dishonest. And--I believe in my friends," she added, smiling. "Isn't it natural that I should wish to have my judgment vindicated?"
He got to his feet and walked slowly to the far edge of the rock, where he stood for a while, seemingly gazing off across the spaces to Sawanec. It was like him, thus to question the immutable. Victoria sat motionless, but her eyes followed irresistibly the lines of power in the tall figure against the sky--the breadth of shoulder and slimness of hip and length of limb typical of the men who had conquered and held this land for their descendants. Suddenly, with a characteristic movement of determination; he swung about and came towards her, and at the same instant she rose.
"Don't you think we should be going back?" she said.
Rut he seemed not to hear her.
"May I ask you something?" he said.
"That depends," she answered.
"Are you going to marry Mr. Rangely?"
"No," she said, and turned away. "Why did you think that?"
He quivered.
"Victoria!"
She looked up at him, swiftly, half revealed, her eyes like stars surprised by the flush of dawn in her cheeks. Hope quickened at the vision of hope, the seats of judgment themselves were filled with radiance, and rumour, cowered and fled like the spirit of night. He could only gaze, enraptured.
"Yes?" she answered.
His voice was firm but low, yet vibrant with sincerity, with the vast store of feeling, of compelling magnetism that was in the man and moved in spite of themselves those who knew him. His words Victoria remembered afterwards--all of them; but it was to the call of the voice she responded. His was the fibre which grows stronger in times of crisis. Sure of himself, proud of the love which he declared, he spoke as a man who has earned that for which he prays,--simply and with dignity.
"I love you," he said; "I have known it since I have known you, but you must see why I could not tell you so. It was very hard, for there were times when I led myself to believe that you might come to love me. There were times when I should have gone away if I hadn't made a promise to stay in Ripton. I ask you to marry me, because I--know that I shall love you as long as I live. I can give you this, at least, and I can promise to protect and cherish you. I cannot give you that to which you have been accustomed all your life, that which you have here at Fairview, but I shouldn't say this to you if I believed that you cared for them above --other things."
"Oh, Austen!" she cried, "I do not--I--do not! They would be hateful to me--without you. I would rather live with you--at Jabe Jenney's," and her voice caught in an exquisite note between laughter and tears. "I love you, do you understand, you! Oh, how could you ever have doubted it? How could you? What you believe, I believe. And, Austen, I have been so unhappy for three days."
He never knew whether, as the most precious of graces ever conferred upon man, with a womanly gesture she had raised her arms and laid her hands upon his shoulders before he drew her to him and kissed her face, that vied in colour with the coming glow in the western sky. Above the prying eyes of men, above the world itself, he held her, striving to realize some little of the vast joy of this possession, and failing. And at last she drew away from him, gently, that she might look searchingly into his face again, and shook her head slowly.
"And you were going away," she said, "without a word I thought--you didn't care. How could I have known that you were just--stupid?"
His eyes lighted with humour and tenderness.
"How long have you cared, Victoria?" he asked.
She became thoughtful.
"Always, I think," she answered; "only I didn't know it. I think I loved you even before I saw you."
"Before you saw me!"
"I think it began," said Victoria, "when I learned that you had shot Mr. Blodgett--only I hope you will never do such a thing again. And you will please try to remember," she added, after a moment, "that I am neither Eben Fitch nor your friend, Tom Gaylord."
Sunset found them seated on the rock, with the waters of the river turned to wine at the miracle in the sky their miracle. At times their eyes wandered to the mountain, which seemed to regard them from a discreet distance--with a kindly and protecting majesty.
"And you promised," said Victoria, "to take me up there. When will you do it?"
"I thought you were going away," he replied.
"Unforeseen circumstances," she answered, "have compelled me to change my plans."
"Then we will go tomorrow," he said.
"To the Delectable Land," said Victoria, dreamily; "your land, where we shall be--benevolent despots. Austen?"
"Yes?" He had not ceased to thrill at the sound of his name upon her lips.
"Do you think," she asked, glancing at him, "do you think you have money enough to go abroad--just for a little while?"
He laughed joyously.
"I don't know," he said, "but I shall make it a point to examine my bank-account to-night. I haven't done so--for some time."
"We will go to Venice, and drift about in a gondola on one of those gray days when the haze comes in from the Adriatic and touches the city with the magic of the past. Sometimes I like the gray days best--when I am happy. And then," she added, regarding him critically, "although you are very near perfection, there are some things you ought to see and learn to make your education complete. I will take you to all the queer places I love. When you are ambassador to France, you know, it would be humiliating to have to have an interpreter, wouldn't it?"
"What's the use of both of us knowing the language?" he demanded.
"I'm afraid we shall be--too happy," she sighed, presently.
"Too happy!" he repeated.
"I sometimes wonder," she said, "whether happiness and achievement go together. And yet--I feel sure that you will achieve."
"To please you, Victoria," he answered, "I think I should almost be willing to try."
XXX. P.S
By request of one who has read thus far, and is still curious.
Yes, and another who, in spite of himself, has fallen in love with Victoria and would like to linger a while longer, even though it were with the paltry excuse of discussing that world-old question of hers--Can sublime happiness and achievement go together? Novels on the problem of sex nowadays often begin with marriages, but rarely discuss the happy ones; and many a woman is forced to sit wistfully at home while her companion soars.
"Yet may I look with heart unshook On blow brought home or missed-- Yet may I hear with equal ear The clarions down the List; Yet set my lance above mischance And ride the barriere-- Oh, hit or miss, how little 'tis, My Lady is not there!"
A verse, in this connection, which may be a perversion of Mr. Kipling's meaning, but not so far from it, after all. And yet, would the eagle attempt the great flights if contentment were on the plain? Find the mainspring of achievement, and you hold in your hand the secret of the world's mechanism. Some aver that it is woman.
Do the gods ever confer the rarest of gifts upon him to whom they have given pinions? Do they mate him, ever, with another who soars as high as he, who circles higher that he may circle higher still? Who can answer? Must those who soar be condemned to eternal loneliness, and was it a longing they did not comprehend which bade them stretch their wings toward the sun? Who can say?
Alas, we cannot write of the future of Austen and Victoria Vane! We can only surmise, and hope, and pray,--yes, and believe. Romance walks with parted lips and head raised to the sky; and let us follow her, because thereby our eyes are raised with hers. We must believe, or perish.
Postscripts are not fashionable. The satiated theatre goer leaves before the end of the play, and has worked out the problem for himself long before the end of the last act. Sentiment is not supposed to exist in the orchestra seats. But above (in many senses) is the gallery, from whence an excited voice cries out when the sleeper returns to life, "It's Rip Van Winkle!" The gallery, where are the human passions which make this world our world; the gallery, played upon by anger, vengeance, derision, triumph, hate, and love; the gallery, which lingers and applauds long after the fifth curtain, and then goes reluctantly home--to dream. And he who scorns the gallery is no artist, for there lives the soul of art. We raise our eyes to it, and to it we dedicate this our play;--and for it we lift the curtain once more after those in the orchestra have departed.
It is obviously impossible, in a few words, to depict the excitement in Ripton, in Leith, in the State at large, when it became known that the daughter of Mr. Flint was to marry Austen Vane,--a fitting if unexpected climax to a drama. How would Mr. Flint take it? Mr. Flint, it may be said, took it philosophically; and when Austen went up to see him upon this matter, he shook hands with his future son-in-law,--and they agreed to disagree. And beyond this it is safe to say that Mr. Flint was relieved; for in his secret soul he had for many years entertained a dread that Victoria might marry a foreigner. He had this consolation at any rate.
His wife denied herself for a day to her most intimate friends,--for it was she who had entertained visions of a title; and it was characteristic of the Rose of Sharon that she knew nothing of the Vanes beyond the name. The discovery that the Austens were the oldest family in the State was in the nature of a balm; and henceforth, in speaking of Austen, she never failed to mention the fact that his great-grandfather was Minister to Spain in the '30's,--a period when her own was engaged in a far different calling.
And Hilary Vane received the news with a grim satisfaction, Dr. Tredway believing that it had done more for him than any medicine or specialists. And when, one warm October day, Victoria herself came and sat beside the canopied bed, her conquest was complete: he surrendered to her as he had never before surrendered to man or woman or child, and the desire to live surged back into his heart,--the desire to live for Austen and Victoria. It became her custom to drive to Ripton in the autumn mornings and to sit by the hour reading to Hilary in the mellow sunlight in the lee of the house, near Sarah Austen's little garden. Yes, Victoria believed she had developed in him a taste for reading; although he would have listened to Emerson from her lips.
And sometimes, when she paused after one of his long silences to glance at him, she would see his eyes fixed, with a strange rapt look, on the garden or the dim lavender form of Sawanec through the haze, and knew that he was thinking of a priceless thing which he had once possessed, and missed. Then Victoria would close the volume, and fall to dreaming, too.
What was happiness? Was it contentment? If it were, it might endure, --contentment being passive. But could active, aggressive, exultant joy exist for a lifetime, jealous of its least prerogative, perpetually watchful for its least abatement, singing unending anthems on its conquest of the world? The very intensity of her feelings at such times sobered Victoria--alarmed her. Was not perfection at war with the world's scheme, and did not achievement spring from a void?
But when Austen appeared, with Pepper, to drive her home to Fairview, his presence never failed to revive the fierce faith that it was his destiny to make the world better, and hers to help him. Wondrous afternoons they spent together in that stillest and most mysterious of seasons in the hill country--autumn! Autumn and happiness! Happiness as shameless as the flaunting scarlet maples on the slopes, defiant of the dying year of the future, shadowy and unreal as the hills before them in the haze. Once, after a long silence, she started from a revery with the sudden consciousness of his look intent upon her, and turned with parted lips and eyes which smiled at him out of troubled depths.
"Dreaming, Victoria?" he said.
"Yes," she answered simply, and was silent once more. He loved these silences of hers,--hinting, as they did, of unexplored chambers in an inexhaustible treasure-house which by some strange stroke of destiny was his. And yet he felt at times the vague sadness of them, like the sadness of the autumn, and longed to dispel it.
"It is so wonderful," she went on presently, in a low voice, "it is so wonderful I sometimes think that it must be like--like this; that it cannot last. I have been wondering whether we shall be as happy when the world discovers that you are great."
He shook his head at her slowly, in mild reproof.
"Isn't that borrowing trouble, Victoria?" he said. "I think you need have no fear of finding the world as discerning as yourself."
She searched his face.
"Will you ever change?" she asked.
"Yes," he said. "No man can stand such flattery as that without deteriorating, I warn you. I shall become consequential, and pompous, and altogether insupportable, and then you will leave me and never realize that it has been all your fault."
Victoria laughed. But there was a little tremor in her voice, and her eyes still rested on his face.
"But I am serious, Austen," she said. "I sometimes feel that, in the future, we shall not always have many such days as these. It's selfish, but I can't help it. There are so many things you will have to do without me. Don't you ever think of that?"
His eyes grew grave, and he reached out and took her hand in his.
"I think, rather, of the trials life may bring, Victoria," he answered, "of the hours when judgment halts, when the way is not clear. Do you remember the last night you came to Jabe Jenney's? I stood in the road long after you had gone, and a desolation such as I had never known came over me. I went in at last, and opened a book to some verses I had been reading, which I shall never forget. Shall I tell you what they were?"
"Yes," she whispered.
"They contain my answer to your question," he said.
"What became of all the hopes, Words and song and lute as well? Say, this struck you 'When life gropes Feebly for the path where fell Light last on the evening slopes,
"'One friend in that path shall be, To secure my step from wrong; One to count night day for me, Patient through the watches long, Serving most with none to see.'"
"Victoria, can you guess who that friend is?"
She pressed his hand and smiled at him, but her eyes were wet.
"I have thought of it in that way, too, dear. But--but I did not know that you had. I do not think that many men have that point of view, Austen."
"Many men," he answered, "have not the same reason to be thankful as I."
There is a time, when the first sharp winds which fill the air with flying leaves have come and gone, when the stillness has come again, and the sunlight is tinged with a yellower gold, and the pastures are still a vivid green, and the mountain stained with a deeper blue than any gem, called Indian summer. And it was in this season that Victoria and Austen were married, in a little church at Tunbridge, near Fairview, by the bishop of the diocese, who was one of Victoria's dearest friends. Mr. Thomas Gaylord (for whose benefit there were many rehearsals) was best man, Miss Beatrice Chillingham maid of honour; and it was unanimously declared by Victoria's bridesmaids, who came up from New York, that they had fallen in love with the groom.
How describe the wedding breakfast and festivities at Fairview House, on a November day when young ladies could walk about the lawns in the filmiest of gowns! how recount the guests and leave out no friends--for none were left out! Mr. Jabe Jenney and Mrs. Jenney, who wept as she embraced both bride and groom; and Euphrasia, in a new steel-coloured silk and a state of absolute subjection and incredulous happiness. Would that there were time to chronicle that most amazing of conquests of Victoria over Euphrasia! And Mrs. Pomfret, who, remarkable as it may seem, not only recognized Austen without her lorgnette, but quite overwhelmed him with an unexpected cordiality, and declared her intention of giving them a dinner in New York.
"My dear," she said, after kissing Victoria twice, "he is most distinguished-looking--I had no idea--and a person who grows upon one. And I am told he is descended from Channing Austen, of whom I have often heard my grandfather speak. Victoria, I always had the greatest confidence in your judgment."
Although Victoria had a memory (what woman worth her salt has not?), she was far too happy to remind Mrs. Pomfret of certain former occasions, and merely smiled in a manner which that lady declared to be enigmatic. She maintained that she had never understood Victoria, and it was characteristic of Mrs. Pomfret that her respect increased in direct proportion to her lack of understanding.
Mr. Thomas Gaylord, in a waistcoat which was the admiration of all who beheld it, proposed the health of the bride; and proved indubitably that the best of oratory has its origin in the heart and not in the mind,--for Tom had never been regarded by his friends as a Demosthenes. He was interrupted from time to time by shouts of laughter; certain episodes in the early career of Mr. Austen Vane (in which, if Tom was to be believed, he was an unwilling participant) were particularly appreciated. And shortly after that, amidst a shower of miscellaneous articles and rice, Mr. and Mrs. Vane took their departure.
They drove through the yellow sunlight to Ripton, with lingering looks at the hills which brought back memories of boys and sorrows, and in Hanover Street bade good-by to Hilary Vane. A new and strange contentment shone in his face as he took Victoria's hands in his, and they sat with him until Euphrasia came. It was not until they were well on their way to New York that they opened the letter he had given them, and discovered that it contained something which would have enabled them to remain in Europe the rest of their lives had they so chosen.
We must leave them amongst the sunny ruins of Italy and Greece and southern France, on a marvellous journey that was personally conducted by Victoria.
Mr. Crewe was unable to go to the wedding, having to attend a directors' meeting of some importance in the West. He is still in politics, and still hopeful; and he was married, not long afterwards, to Miss Alice Pomfret.
PG EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
Fame sometimes comes in the line of duty Genius is almost one hundred percent directness In a frenzy of anticipation, garnished and swept the room It's noble, but it don't pay Treason to party he regarded with a deep-seated abhorrence Battles of selfish interests ebbed and flowed A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds His strength was his imperviousness to this kind of a remark Many a silent tear of which they knew nothing Politicians are politicians; they have always been corrupt Gratitude, however, is one of the noblest qualities of man One of your persistent fallacies is, that I'm still a boy The burden of the valley of vision Thrice-blessed State, in which there were now three reform candidates Years of regrets for that which might have been
A FAR COUNTRY
By Winston Churchill