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Old Rose and Silver

by Myrtle Reed · English · Gutenberg #5401 · 432,937 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Old Rose and Silver

Author: Myrtle Reed


        
Release date: April 1, 2004 [eBook #5401]
                Most recently updated: December 28, 2020

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5401

Credits: Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD ROSE AND SILVER ***




Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team





OLD ROSE AND SILVER

BY MYRTLE REED




Author's Note

The music which appears in the following pages is from an unpublished
piano arrangement, by Grant Weber, of Wilson G. Smith's
"Entreaty," published by G. Schirmer, New York.


CONTENTS

I      A FALLING STAR

II     WELCOME HOME

III    THE VOICE OF THE VIOLIN

IV     THE CROSBY TWINS

V      AN AFTERNOON CALL

VI     THE LIGHT ON THE ALTAR

VII    FATHER AND SON

VIII   "THE YEAR'S AT THE SPRING"

IX     A KNIGHT-ERRANT

X      "SWEET-AND-TWENTY"

XI     KEEPING THE FAITH

XII    AN ENCHANTED HOUR

XIII   WHITE GLOVES

XIV    THE THIRTIETH OF JUNE

XV     "HOW SHE WILL COME TO ME"

XVI    HOW ISABEL CAME

XVII   PENANCE

XVIII  "LESS THAN THE DUST"

XIX    OVER THE BAR

XX     RISEN FROM THE DEAD

XXI    SAVED--AND LOST

XXII   A BIRTHDAY PARTY

XXIII  "TEARS, IDLE TEARS"

XXIV   THE HOUSE WHERE LOVE LIVED





I

A FALLING STAR

[Illustration: Musical Notation]

The last hushed chord died into silence, but the woman lingered,
dreaming over the keys. Firelight from the end of the room brought red-
gold gleams into the dusky softness of her hair and shadowed her profile
upon the opposite wall. No answering flash of jewels met the questioning
light--there was only a mellow glow from the necklace of tourmalines,
quaintly set, that lay upon the white lace of her gown.

She turned her face toward the fire as a flower seeks the sun, but her
deep eyes looked beyond it, into the fires of Life itself. A haunting
sense of unfulfilment stirred her to vague resentment, and she sighed as
she rose and moved restlessly about the room. She lighted the tall
candles that stood upon the mantel-shelf, straightened a rug, moved a
chair, and gathered up a handful of fallen rose-petals on her way to the
window. She was about to draw down the shade, but, instead, her hand
dropped slowly to her side, her fingers unclasped, and the crushed
crimson petals fluttered to the floor.

Outside, the purple dusk of Winter twilight lay soft upon the snow.
Through an opening in the evergreens the far horizon, grey as mother-of-
pearl, bent down to touch the plain in a misty line that was definite
yet not clear. At the left were the mountains, cold and calm, veiled by
distances dim with frost.

There was a step upon the stair, but the strong, straight figure in
white lace did not turn away from the window, even when the door opened.
The stillness was broken only by the cheerful crackle of the fire until
a sweet voice asked:

"Are you dreaming, Rose?"

Rose turned away from the window then, with a laugh. "Why, I must have
been. Will you have this chair, Aunt Francesca?"

She turned a high-backed rocker toward the fire and Madame Bernard
leaned back luxuriously, stretching her tiny feet to the blaze. She wore
grey satin slippers with high French heels and silver buckles. A bit of
grey silk stocking was visible between the buckle and the hem of her
grey gown.

Rose smiled at her in affectionate appreciation. The little old lady
seemed like a bit of Dresden china; she was so dainty and so frail. Her
hair was lustreless, snowy white, and beautifully, though simply,
dressed in a bygone fashion. Her blue eyes were so deep in colour as to
seem almost purple in certain lights, and the years had been kind to
her, leaving few lines. Her hands, resting on the arms of her chair, had
not lost their youthful contour, but around her eyes and the corners of
her mouth were the faint prints of many smiles.

"Rose," said Madame Bernard, suddenly, "you are very lovely to-night."

"I was thinking the same of you," responded the younger woman, flushing.
"Shall we organise ourselves into a mutual admiration society?"

"We might as well, I think. There seems to be nobody else."

A shadow crossed Rose's face and her beauty took on an appealing
wistfulness. She had been sheltered always and she hungered for Life as
the sheltered often do. Madame Bernard, for the thousandth time, looked
at her curiously. From the shapely foot that tapped restlessly on the
rug beneath her white lace gown, to the crown of dusky hair with red-
gold lights in it, Rose was made for love--and Madame wondered how she
had happened to miss it.

"Aunt Francesca," said Rose, with a whimsical sadness, "do you realise
that I'm forty to-day?"

"That's nothing," returned the other, serenely. "Everybody has been
forty, or will be, if they live."

"I haven't lived yet," Rose objected. "I've only been alive."

"'While there's life there's hope,'" quoted Madame lightly. "What do you
want, dear child? Battle, murder, and sudden death?"

"I don't know what I want."

"Let's take an inventory and see if we can find out. You have one
priceless blessing--good health. You have considerably more than your
share of good looks. Likewise a suitable wardrobe; not many clothes, but
few, and those few, good. Clothes are supposed to please and satisfy
women. You have musical talent, a love of books and flowers, a fine
appreciation of beauty, a host of friends, and that one supreme gift of
the gods--a sense of humour. In addition to all this, you have a
comfortable home and an income of your own that enables you to do
practically as you please. Could you ask for more?"

"Not while I have you, Aunt Francesca. I suppose I'm horrid."

"You couldn't be, my dear. I've left marriage out of the question,
since, if you'd had any deep longing for it, you'd have chosen some one
from the horde that has infested my house for fifteen years and more.
You've surely been loved."

Rose smiled and bit her lip. "I think that's it," she murmured. "I've
never cared for anybody--like that. At least, I don't think I have."

"'When in doubt, don't,'" resumed the other, taking refuge in a
platitude. "Is there any one of that faithful procession whom you
particularly regret?"

"No," answered Rose, truthfully.

"Love is like a vaccination," continued the little lady in grey, with
seeming irrelevance. "When it takes, you don't have to be told."

Her tone was light, almost flippant, and Rose, in her turn, wondered at
the woman and her marvellous self-control. At twenty-five, Madame
Bernard married a young French soldier, who had chosen to serve his
adopted country in the War of the Rebellion. In less than three months,
her gallant Captain was brought home to her--dead.

For a long time, she hovered uncertainly between life and death. Then,
one day, she sat up and asked for a mirror. The ghost of her former self
looked back at her, for her colour was gone, her hair was quickly
turning grey, and the light had vanished from her eyes. Yet the valiant
spirit was not broken, and that day, with high resolve, she sent her
soul forward upon the new way.

"He was a soldier," she said, "and I, his wife, will be a soldier too.
He faced Death bravely and I shall meet Life with as much courage as God
will give me. But do not, oh, do not even speak his name to me, or I
shall forget I am a soldier and become a woman again."

So, gradually, it became understood that the young soldier's name was
not to be mentioned to his widow. She took up her burden and went on,
devoting herself to the army service until the war was over. Then she
ceased to labour with lint and bandages and betook herself to new
surroundings. Her husband's brother offered her a home, but she was
unable to accept, for the two men looked so much alike that she could
not have borne it. Sometimes, even now, she turned away in pain from
Rose, who resembled her father.

"'Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief,'" Madame Bernard was saying. "I
seem to run to conversational antiques tonight. 'Doctor, lawyer,
merchant, chief--' which will you have, Rose? If I remember rightly,
you've had all but the thief already. Shall I get you a nice embezzler,
or will a plain burglar do?"

"Neither," laughed Rose. "I'm safe from embezzlers, I think, but I live
in nightly fear of being burgled, as you well know."

"None the less, we've got to take the risk. Isabel will not be contented
with you and me. She'll want other hats on the rack besides the
prehistoric relic we keep there as a warning to burglars."

"I'd forgotten Isabel," answered Rose, with a start. "What is she
doing?"

"Dressing for dinner. My dear, that child brought three trunks with her
and I understand another is coming. She has enough clothes to set up a
modest shop, should she desire to 'go into trade' as the English say."

"I'd forgotten Isabel," said Rose, again. "We must find some callow
youths to amuse her. A girl of twenty can't appreciate a real man."

"Sometimes a girl of forty can't, either," laughed Madame, with a sly
glance at Rose. "Cheer up, my dear--I'm nearing seventy, and I assure
you that forty is really very young."

"It's scarcely infantile, but I'll admit that I'm young--comparatively."

"All things are comparative in this world, and perhaps you and Isabel,
with your attendant swains, may enable me to forget that I'm no longer
young, even comparatively."

The guest came in, somewhat shyly. She was a cousin of Rose's, on the
mother's side, and had arrived only that afternoon on a visit.

"Bless us," said Madame Bernard; "how pretty we are! Isabel, you're a
credit to the establishment."

Isabel smiled--a little, cool smile. She was almost as tall as Rose and
towered far above the little lady in grey who offered her a welcoming
hand and invited her to sit by the fire. Isabel's gown was turquoise
blue and very becoming, as her hair and eyes were dark and her skin was
fair. Her eyes were almost black and very brilliant; they literally
sparkled when she allowed herself to become interested in anything.

"I'm not late, am I?" she asked.

"No," answered Rose, glancing at the clock. "It's ten minutes to seven."

"I couldn't find my things. It was like dressing in a dream, when, as
soon as you find something you want, you immediately lose everything
else."

"I know," laughed Rose. "I had occasion to pack a suit-case myself last
night, during my troubled slumbers."

A large yellow cat appeared mysteriously out of the shadows and came,
yawning, toward the fire. He sat down on the edge of Madame's grey gown,
and blinked.

Isabel drew her skirts away. "I don't like cats," she said.

"There are cats and cats," remarked Madame Bernard in a tone of gentle
rebuke. "Mr. Boffin is not an ordinary cat. He is a gentleman and a
scholar and he never forgets his manners."

"I've wondered, sometimes," said Rose, "whether he really knows
everything, or only pretends that he does. He looks very wise."

"Silence and reserve will give anyone a reputation for wisdom," Madame
responded. She bent down to stroke the yellow head, but, though Mr.
Boffin gratefully accepted the caress, he did not condescend to purr.
Presently he stalked away into the shadows, waving his yellow tail.

"What a lovely room this is," observed Isabel, after a pause.

"It's comfortable," replied Madame. "I couldn't live in an ugly place."

Everything in the room spoke eloquently of good taste, from the deep-
toned Eastern rug at the hearth to the pictures upon the grey-green
walls. There was not a false note anywhere in the subtle harmony of
line, colour, and fabric. It was the sort of room that one comes back
to, after long absence, with renewed appreciation.

"I love old mahogany," continued Isabel. "I suppose you've had this a
long, long time."

"No, it's new. To me--I mean. I have some beautiful old French mahogany,
but I don't use it."

Her voice was very low at the end of the sentence. She compressed her
lips tightly and, leaning forward, vigorously poked the fire. A stream
of sparks went up the chimney and quick flames leaped to follow.

"Don't set the house on fire, Aunt Francesca," cautioned Rose. "There's
the dinner gong."

The three went out, Madame Bernard a little ahead and the two younger
women together. Rose sat opposite the head of the table and Isabel was
placed at Madame's right. In a single glance, the guest noted that the
table was perfectly appointed. "Are you making company of me?" she
asked.

"Not at all," smiled Madame. "None the less, there is a clear
distinction between eating and dining and we endeavour to dine."

"If Aunt Francesca were on a desert island," said Rose, "I believe she
would make a grand affair of her solitary dinner, and have her coffee in
the morning before she rolled out of the sand."

The little old lady dimpled with pleasure. "I'd try to," she laughed. "I
think I'd--"

She was interrupted by a little exclamation of pleasure from Rose, who
had just discovered a small white parcel at her plate. She was untying
it with eager fingers, while her colour came and went. A card fluttered
out, face upward. "To my dear Rose, with love from Aunt Francesca," was
written in a small, quaint hand.

It was a single magnificent ruby set in a ring which exactly fitted.
Rose seldom wore rings and wondered, vaguely, how Aunt Francesca knew.

"I filled a finger of one of your gloves," said Madame, as though she
had read the thought, "and had it fitted. Simple, wasn't it?"

"Oh," breathed Rose, "it's beautiful beyond words! How shall I ever
thank you!"

"Wear it, dear. I'm so glad you're pleased!"

"It's lovely," said Isabel, but the tone was cold and she seemed to
speak with an effort. With a swift little stab at the heart, Rose saw
that the girl envied her the gift.

"It reconciles me to my years," Rose went on, quickly. "I'm willing to
be forty, if I can have a ring like this."

"Why, Cousin Rose!" cried Isabel, in astonishment. "Are you forty?"

"Yes, dear. Don't be conventional and tell me I don't look it, for I
feel it--every year."

"I should never have thought it," Isabel murmured.

Rose turned the ring slowly upon her finger and the ruby yielded the
deep crimson glow of its heart to the candlelight that softly filled the
room. "I've never had a ruby," she said, "and yet I feel, someway, as
though I'd always had this. It seems as if it belonged to me."

"That's because it suits you," nodded Madame Bernard. "I hope that
sometime our civilisation may reach such a point of advancement that
every woman will wear the clothes and jewels that suit her personality,
and make her home a proper setting for herself. See how women break
their hearts for diamonds--and not one woman in a hundred can wear
them."

"Could I wear diamonds?" asked Isabel. She was interested now and her
eyes sparkled.

Madame Bernard studied her for a moment before replying. "Yes," she
admitted, "you could wear them beautifully, but they do not belong to
Rose, or to me."

"What else could I wear?"

"Turquoises, if they were set in silver."

"I have one," Isabel announced with satisfaction. "A lovely big
turquoise matrix set in dull silver. But I have no diamonds."

"They'll come," Rose assured her, "if you want them. I think people
usually get things if they want them badly enough."

Isabel turned to Madame Bernard. "What stones do you wear?" she
inquired, politely.

"Only amethysts," she laughed. "I have a pearl necklace, but it doesn't
quite 'belong,' so I don't wear it. I won't wear anything that doesn't
'belong.'"

"How can you tell?"

"By instinct." "I can walk into a shop, look around for a moment, and
say: 'please bring me my hat.' The one I ask for is always the right
one. It is invariably becoming and suitable, and it's the same with
everything else."

"It's a wonderful experience to go shopping with Aunt Francesca," put in
Rose. "She knows what she wants and goes straight to it, without loss of
time. Utterly regardless of fashion, for its own sake, she always
contrives to be in the mode, though I believe that if hoop skirts were
suited to her, she'd have the courage of her crinoline, and wear one."

"Let us be thankful they're not," remarked Madame. "It's almost
impossible to believe it, but they must have looked well upon some
women. Every personality makes its own demand for harmony and it is
fascinating to me to observe strange people and plan for them their
houses and clothes and belongings. You can pick out, from a crowd, the
woman who would have a crayon portrait of herself upon an easel in her
parlour, and quite properly, too, since her nature demands it. After you
are experienced, you can identify the man who eats sugar and vinegar on
lettuce, and group those who keep parrots--or are capable of it."

The seventy years sat lightly upon Madame Francesca now. Her deep eyes
shone with inward amusement, and little smiles hovered unexpectedly
about the corners of her mouth. A faint pink tint, like a faded rose,
bloomed upon her cheeks. Rose watched her with adoring eyes, and
wondered whether any man in the world, after fifteen years of close
association, could be half so delightful.

Coffee was brought into the living-room, when they went back, preceded
by Mr. Boffin, emanating the dignified satisfaction of a cat who has
supped daintily upon chicken and cream. He sat down before the fire and
methodically washed his face.

"I believe I envy Mr. Boffin his perfect digestion," remarked Madame, as
she sipped her coffee from a Royal Canton cup. She and Rose stood for
half an hour after dinner, always.

Isabel finished her coffee and set the cup upon the table. She slipped
the Sheffield tray from under the embroidered doily and took it to the
light, where she leaned over it, studying the design. Rose thought that
the light from the tray was reflected upon the girl's face, she became
at once so brilliant, so sparkling.

"Speaking of harmony--" said Madame Bernard, in a low tone, glancing at
Rose and inclining her head toward Isabel.

"Yes," replied Isabel, returning the tray to its place; "it is a lovely
one, isn't it?"

Madame turned toward the window to hide a smile. Rose followed, and drew
the little grey lady into the circle of her strong arm.

"Dear Aunt Francesca!" she said softly. "I thank you so much!"

The older woman patted the hand that wore the ruby, then turned to
Isabel. "Come," she said, "and be glad you're indoors."

The three women stood at the wide window, looking out across the snow,
lighted only by the stars and a ghostly crescent of moon. The evergreens
were huddled closely together as though they kept each other warm.
Beyond, the mountains brooded in their eternal sleep, which riving
lightnings and vast, reverberating thunders were powerless to change.

Suddenly, across the purple darkness between the pale stars, flamed a
meteor--an uncharted voyager through infinite seas of space. It left a
trail of fire across the heavens, fading at last into luminous mist, the
colour of the stars. When the light had quite died out, Madame Bernard
spoke.

"A passing soul," she sighed.

"A kiss," breathed Rose, dreamily.

"Star-dust!" laughed Isabel.





II

WELCOME HOME

"Great news, my dears, great news!" cried Madame Bernard, gaily waving an
open letter as she came into the room where Rose was sewing and Isabel
experimenting with a new coiffure. "I'll give you three guesses!"

"Somebody coming for a visit?" asked Isabel.

"Wrong!"

"Somebody coming, but not for a visit?" queried Rose.

"You're getting warmer."

"How can anybody come, if not for a visit?" inquired Isabel, mildly
perplexed. "That is, unless it's a messenger?"

"The old Kent house is to be opened," said Madame, "and we're to open
it. At last we shall have neighbours!"

"How exciting," Rose answered. She did not wholly share the old lady's
pleasure, and wondered with a guilty consciousness of the long hours she
spent at her music, whether Aunt Francesca had been lonely.

"Listen, girls!" Madame's cheeks were pink with excitement as she sat
down with the letter, which had been written in Paris.

"MY DEAR MADAME FRANCESCA:

"'At last we are coming home--Allison and I. The boy has a fancy to see
Spring come again on his native heath, so we shall sail earlier than we
had otherwise planned.

"'I wonder, my dear friend, if I dare ask you to open the house for us?
I am so tired of hotels that I want to go straight back. You have the
keys and if you will engage the proper number of servants and see that
the place is made habitable, I shall be more than ever your debtor. I
will cable you when we start.

"'Trusting that all is well with you and yours and with many thanks,
believe me, my dear Madame,

"'Most faithfully yours,

"'RICHARD KENT.'"

"How like a man," smiled Rose. "That house has been closed for over ten
years, and he thinks there is nothing to be done but to unlock the front
door and engage two or three servants who may or may not be
trustworthy."

"What an imposition!" Isabel said. "Aunt Francesca, didn't I meet
Allison Kent when I was here before?"

"I've forgotten."

"Don't you remember? Mother brought me here once when I was a little
tot. We stayed about a week and the roses were all in bloom. I can see
the garden now. Allison used to come over sometimes and tell me fairy
stories. He told me that the long, slender gold-trimmed bottles filled
with attar of roses came from the roots of the rose bushes--don't you
remember? And I pulled up rose bushes all over the garden to find out."

"Dear me, yes," smiled Aunt Francesca. "How time does fly!"

"You were very cross with Allison--that is, as cross as you ever could
be. It seemed so queer for you to be angry at him and not at me, for I
pulled up the bushes."

"You were sufficiently punished, Isabel. I believe the thorns hurt your
little hands, didn't they?"

"They certainly did," responded the girl, with a little shudder at the
recollection. "I have a scar still. That was--let me see--why, it was
fifteen years ago!"

"Just before I came to live with Aunt Francesca," said Rose. "You and
your mother went away the same day."

"Yes, we went in the morning," Isabel continued, "and you were to come
in the afternoon. I remember pleading with my mother to let me stay long
enough to see 'Cousin Wose.'"

"Fifteen years!" Madame repeated. "Allison went abroad, then, to study
the violin, and the house has been open only once since. Richard came
back for a Summer, to attend to some business, then returned to Europe.
How the time goes by!"

The letter fell to the floor and Francesca sat dreaming over the
interlude of years. Colonel Kent had been her husband's best friend, and
after the pitiless sword had cleaved her life asunder, had become hers.
At forty the Colonel had married a young and beautiful girl. A year
later Francesca had gone to him with streaming eyes, carrying his new-
born son in her arms, to tell him that his wife was dead.

Drawn together by sorrow, the two had been as dear to each other as
friends may be but seldom are. Though childless herself, Francesca had
some of the gifts of motherhood, and, at every step, she had aided and
counselled the Colonel in regard to his son, who had his mother's eyes
and bore his mother's name. Discerning the boy's talent, long before his
father suspected it, she had chosen the violin for him rather than the
piano, and had herself urged the Colonel to take him abroad for study
though the thought of separation caused her many a pang.

When the two sailed away, Francesca had found her heart strangely empty;
her busy hands strangely idle. But Life had taught her one great lesson,
and when one door of her heart was closed, she opened another, as
quickly as possible. So she sent for Rose, who was alone in the world,
and, for fifteen years, the two women had lived happily together.

As she sat there, thinking, some of her gay courage failed her. For the
moment her mask was off, and in the merciless sunlight, she looked old
and worn. Rose, looking at her with tender pity, marvelled at the
ignorance of man, in asking a frail little old lady to open and make
habitable, in less than a fortnight, a house of fifteen large rooms.

"Aunt Francesca," she said, "let me open the house. Tell me what you
want done, and Isabel and I will see to it."

"Certainly," agreed Isabel without enthusiasm. "We'll do it."

"No," Madame replied stubbornly. "He asked me to do it."

"He only meant for you to direct," said Rose. "You surely don't think he
meant you to do the scrubbing?"

Madame smiled at that, and yielded gracefully. "There must be infinite
scrubbing, after all these years. I believe I'll superintend operations
from here. Then, when it's all done, I'll go over and welcome them
home."

"That is as it should be. Isabel and I will go over this afternoon, and
when we come back, we can tell you all about it."

"You'd better drive--I'm sure the paths aren't broken."

So, after luncheon, the two started out with the keys, Madame waving
them a cheery good-bye from the window.

"Everything about this place seems queer to me," said Isabel. "It's the
same, and yet not the same."

"I know," Rose answered. "Things are much smaller, aren't they?"

"Yes. The rooms used to be vast and the ceilings very far away. Now,
they're merely large rooms with the ceilings comfortably high. The
garden used to seem like a huge park, but now it's only a large garden.
There used to be a great many steps in the stairway, and high ones at
that. Now it's nothing compared with other flights. Only Aunt Francesca
remains the same. She hasn't changed at all."

"She's a saint," said Rose with deep conviction, as the carriage turned
into the driveway.

The house, set far back from the street, was of the true Colonial type,
with stately white pillars at the dignified entrance. The garden was a
tangled mass of undergrowth--in spite of the snow one could see that--
but the house, being substantially built, had changed scarcely at all.

"A new coat of paint will freshen it up amazingly," said Rose, as they
went up the steps. She was thrilled with a mysterious sense of adventure
which the younger woman did not share. "I feel like a burglar," she
continued, putting the key into the rusty lock.

"I feel cold," remarked Isabel, shivering in her furs.

At last the wide door swung on its creaking hinges and they went into
the loneliness and misery of an empty house. The dust of ages had
settled upon everything and penetrated every nook and cranny. The floors
groaned dismally, and the scurrying feet of mice echoed through the
walls. Cobwebs draped the windows, where the secret spinners had held
high carnival, undisturbed. An indescribable musty odour almost stifled
them and the chill dampness carried with it a sense of gloom and
foreboding.

"My goodness!" Isabel exclaimed. "Nobody can ever live here again."

"Don't be discouraged," laughed Rose. "Soap, water, sunshine, and fire
can accomplish miracles."

At the end of the hall a black, empty fireplace yawned cavernously.
There was another in the living-room and still another in the library
back of it. Isabel opened the door on the left. "Why, there's another
fireplace in the dining-room," she said. "Do you suppose they have one
in the kitchen, too?"

"Go in and see, if you like."

"I'm afraid to go alone. You come, too."

There was no fireplace in the kitchen, but the rusty range was sadly in
need of repair.

"I'm going down cellar," Rose said. "Are you coming?"

"I should say not. Hurry back, won't you?"

Rose went cautiously down the dark, narrow stairway. The light was dim
in the basement but she could see that there was no coal. She went back
and forth several times from bin to window, making notes in a small
memorandum book. She was quite determined that Aunt Francesca should be
able to find no fault with her housekeeping.

When she went back, there were no signs of Isabel. She went from room to
room, calling, then concluded that she had gone back to the carriage,
which was waiting outside.

Rose took measurements for new curtains in all the rooms on the lower
floor, then climbed the creaking stairway. She came upon Isabel in the
sitting-room, upstairs, standing absorbed before an open desk. In her
hand she held something which gleamed brightly, even in the gathering
shadow.

"Isabel!" she cried, in astonishment.

The girl turned and came forward. Her eyes were sparkling. "Look!
There's a secret drawer in the desk and I found this in it. I love
secret drawers, don't you?"

"I never have looked for them in other people's houses," Rose answered,
coldly.

"I never have either," retorted Isabel, "except when I've been invited
to clean other people's houses."

There was something so incongruous in the idea of Isabel cleaning a
house that Rose laughed and the awkward moment quickly passed.

"Look," said Isabel, again.

Rose took it from her hand--a lovely miniature framed in brilliants. A
sweet, old-fashioned face was pictured upon the ivory in delicate
colours--that of a girl in her early twenties, with her smooth, dark
hair drawn back over her ears. A scarf of real lace was exquisitely
painted upon the dark background of her gown. The longing eyes held Rose
transfixed for an instant before she noted the wistful, childish droop
of the mouth. The girl who had posed for the miniature, if she had been
truthfully portrayed, had not had all that she asked from life.

"Look at this," Isabel continued.

She offered Rose a bit of knitting work, from which the dust of years
fell lightly. It had once been white, and the needles were still there,
grey and spotted with rust. Rose guessed that the bit had been intended
for a baby's shoe, but never finished. The little shoe had waited, all
those years, for hands that never came back from the agony in which they
wrung themselves to death in the room beyond.

The infinite pity of it stirred Rose to quick tears, but Isabel was
unmoved. "Here's something else," she said.

She shook the dust from an old-fashioned daguerreotype case, then opened
it. On the left side was a young soldier in uniform, full length--a
dashing, handsome figure with one hand upon a drawn sword. Printed in
faded gilt upon the dusty red satin that made up the other half of the
case, the words were still distinct: "To Colonel Richard Kent, from his
friend, Jean Bernard."

"Jean Bernard!" Isabel repeated, curiously. "Who was he?"

"Aunt Francesca's husband," answered Rose, with a little catch in her
voice, "and my uncle. He died in the War."

"Oh," said Isabel, unmoved. "He was nice looking, wasn't he? Shall we
take this to Aunt Francesca?"

"You forget that it isn't ours to take," Rose reminded her. "And, by the
way, Isabel, you must never speak to Aunt Francesca of her husband. She
cannot bear it."

"All right," assented the girl. "What is this?"

From the back of the drawer she took out a bronze medal, with a faded
ribbon of red, white, and blue attached to it. She took it to the light,
rubbed it with her handkerchief, and slowly made out the words: "Awarded
to Colonel Richard Kent, for conspicuous bravery in action at
Gettysburg."

"Put the things back," Rose suggested, gently. This tiny, secret drawer,
Colonel Kent's holy of holies, symbolised and epitomised the best of a
man's life. The medal for military service, the miniature of his wife,
the picture of his friend, and the bit of knitting work that
comprehended a world of love and anguish and bereavement--these were the
hidden chambers of his heart.

Isabel took up the miniature again before she closed the drawer. "Do you
suppose those are diamonds?"

"No; only brilliants."

"I thought so. If they'd been diamonds, he would never have left them
here."

"On the contrary," answered Rose, "I'm very sure he would." She had met
Colonel Kent only a few times, years ago, during the Summer he had spent
at home while Allison was still abroad, but she knew him now,
nevertheless.

They went on through the house, making notes of what was needed, while
their footsteps echoed and re-echoed through the empty rooms. "I'm glad
there are no carpets, except on the stairs," said Rose, "for rugs are
much easier to clean. It resolves itself simply into three C's--coal,
curtains, and cleaning. It won't take long, if we can get enough people
to work at it."

It was almost dusk when they went downstairs, but the cold slanting
sunbeams of a Winter afternoon came through the grimy windows and
illumined the gloomy depths of the open fireplace in the hall. Motes
danced in the beam, and the house somehow seemed less despairing, less
alone. A portrait of Colonel Kent, in uniform, hung above the great
mantel. Rose smiled at it with comprehension, but the painted lips did
not answer, nor the unseeing eyes swerve from their steady searching of
Beyond.

"How was it?" asked Madame, when they reached home. "Dirty and bad?"

"Rather soiled," admitted Rose.

"And colder than Greenland," Isabel continued, warming her hands at the
open fire.

"We'll soon change all that," Madame said. "I've ordered coal and
engaged people to do the cleaning since you've been gone, and I have my
eye upon two permanent retainers, provided their references are
satisfactory."

"I've measured for all the curtains," Rose went on. "Shall we make them
or buy them?"

"We'll make them. If we have help enough we can get them done in time."

The following day a small army, with Rose at the head of it, took
possession of the house. Every night she came home exhausted, not from
actual toil, but from the effort to instill the pride of good service
into unwilling workers who seemed to rejoice in ignorance.

"I'm tired," Rose remarked, one night. "I've cerebrated all day for
seven bodies besides my own and I find it wearing."

"I don't wonder," answered Madame. "I'll go over to-morrow and let you
rest."

"Indeed you won't," declared Rose, with emphasis. "I've begun it and I'm
going to finish it unless the Seven Weary Workers fail me absolutely."

At last the task was completed, and even Rose could find no speck of
dust in the entire establishment. The house was fresh with the smell of
soap-suds and floor wax and so warm that several windows had to be kept
open. The cablegram had come while the curtains were being made, but
everything was ready two days before the wayfarers could possibly reach
home.

On the appointed day, Rose and Isabel were almost as excited as Madame
Bernard herself. She had chosen to go over alone to greet the Colonel
and his son. They were expected to arrive about four in the afternoon.

At three, Madame set forth in her carriage. She wore her best gown, of
lavender crepe, trimmed with real lace, and a bunch of heliotrope at her
belt. Rose had twined a few sprays of heliotrope into her snowy hair and
a large amethyst cross hung from her neck by a slender silver chain. She
wore no other jewels except her wedding ring.

Fires blazed cheerily in every fireplace on the lower floor, and there
was another in the sitting-room upstairs. She had filled the house with
the flowers of Spring--violets, daffodils, and lilies of the valley. A
silver tea-kettle with a lamp under it waited on the library table.

When she heard the wheels creaking in the snowy road, Madame lighted the
lamp under the kettle with her own hands, then opened the door wide.
Followed by their baggage, the two men came up the walk--father and son.

The Colonel was a little older, possibly, but still straight and tall--
almost as tall as the son who walked beside him, carrying a violin case
under his arm. He wore the familiar slouch hat, the same loose overcoat,
and the same silvery goatee, trimmed most carefully. His blue eyes
lighted up warmly at the sight of the figure in the doorway.

"Welcome home!" cried Madame Francesca, stretching a hand toward each.
"Welcome home!"

Allison only smiled, taking the little hand in his strong young clasp,
but his father bent, hat in hand, to kiss the one she offered him.

"Oh," cried Madame, "I'm so glad to see you both. Come in!"

They entered their own hospitable house, where fires blazed and the
kettle sang. "Say," said Allison, "isn't this great! Why did we ever
leave it? Isn't it fine, Father?"

But "father" still had his eyes upon the dainty little lady who had
brought forth the miracle of home from a wilderness of dust and ashes.
He bent again over the small, white hand.

"A woman, a fire, and a singing kettle," he said. "All the dear,
familiar spirits of the house to welcome us home."






III

THE VOICE OF THE VIOLIN

Madame Bernard and Isabel had not yet come down when Rose entered the
living-room, half an hour before dinner. The candles were lighted, and
in the soft glow of the reading lamp was a vase of pink roses, sent by
Colonel Kent to his old friend. The delicate sweetness filled the room
and mingled with the faint scent of attar of roses and dried rose petals
which, as always, hung about the woman who stood by the table, idly
rearranging the flowers.

The ruby ring caught the light and sent tiny crimson gleams dancing into
the far shadows. Her crepe gown was almost the colour of the ruby; warm
and blood-red. It was cut low at the throat, and an old Oriental
necklace of wonderfully wrought gold was the only ornament she wore,
aside from the ring. The low light gave the colour of the gown back to
her face, beautiful as always, and in her dusky hair she had a single
crimson rose.

Aunt Francesca had said that the Colonel was very much pleased with the
house and glad to be at home again. She had sent over her own cook to
prepare their first dinner, which, however, she had declined to share,
contenting herself with ordering a feast suited to the Colonel's taste.
To-night, they were to dine with her and meet the other members of her
household.

Madame came in gowned in lustreless white, with heliotrope at her belt
and in her hair. She wore a quaintly wrought necklace of amethysts set
in silver, and silver buckles, set with amethysts, on her white shoes.
More than once Rose had laughingly accused her of being vain of her
feet.

"Why shouldn't I be vain?" she had retorted, in self-defence. "Aren't
they pretty?"

"Of course they are," smiled Rose, bending down to kiss her. "They're
the prettiest little feet in all the world."

Madame's fancy ran seriously to shoes and stockings, of which she had a
marvellous collection. Silk stockings in grey and white, and in all
shades of lavender and purple, embroidered and plain, with shoes to
match in satin and suede, occupied a goodly space in her wardrobe. At
Christmas-time and on her birthday, Rose always gave her more, for it
was the one gift which could never fail to please.

"How lovely the house is," said Madame, looking around appreciatively.
"I hope the dinner will be good."

"I've never known it to be otherwise," Rose assured her.

"Am I all right? Is my skirt even?"

"You are absolutely perfect, Aunt Francesca."

"Then play to me, my dear. If my outward semblance is in keeping, please
put my mind into a holiday mood."

Rose ran her fingers lightly over the keys. "What shall I play?"

"Anything with a tune to it, and not too loud."

Smiling, Rose began one of the simple melodies that Aunt Francesca
loved:

[Illustration: musical notation]

Suddenly, she turned away from the piano. Her elbow, falling upon the
keys, made a harsh dissonance. "Isabel, my dear!" she cried. "Aren't you
almost too gorgeous?"

The girl stood in the open door, framed like a portrait, against the
dull red background of the hall. Her gown was white net, shot and
spangled with silver, over lustrous white silk. A comb, of filagree
silver, strikingly lovely in her dark hair, was her only ornament except
a large turquoise, set in dull silver, at her throat.

"I'm not overdressed, am I?" she asked, with an eager look at Madame.

"Not if it suits you. Come here, dear."

Isabel obeyed, turning around slowly for inspection. Almost instantly it
was evident that Madame approved. So did Rose, after she saw how the
gown made Isabel's eyes sparkle and brought out the delicate fairness of
her skin.

"You do suit yourself; there's no question about that, but you're
gorgeous, nevertheless." Thus Rose made atonement for her first
impulsive speech.

Mr. Boffin came in, with a blue ribbon around his neck, and helped
himself to Aunt Francesca's chair. Isabel rocked him and he got down,
without undue haste. He marched over to a straight-backed chair with a
cushion in it; glared at Isabel for a moment with his inscrutable topaz
eyes, then began to purr.

The clock chimed seven silvery notes. Madame Bernard waved her white
lace fan impatiently. "It's the psychological moment," Rose observed.
"Why don't they come?"

"It's Allison's fault, if they're late," Madame assured her. "I could
always set my watch by the Colonel. He--there, what did I tell you?" she
concluded triumphantly, as footsteps sounded outside.

When the guests were ushered in, Madame advanced to meet them. The
firelight had brought a rosy glow to her lovely face, and her deep eyes
smiled. Allison put his violin case in a corner before he spoke to her.

"Did you really?" asked Madame. "How kind you are!"

"I brought it," laughed the young man, "just because you didn't ask me
to."

"Do you always," queried Rose, after he had been duly presented to her,
"do the things you're not asked to do?"

"Invariably," he replied.

"Allison," said Madame, "I want you to meet my niece once removed--Miss
Ross." The Colonel had already bowed to Isabel and was renewing his old
acquaintance with Rose.

"Not Isabel," said Allison, in astonishment.

"Yes," answered the girl, her eyes sparkling with excitement, "it's
Isabel."

"Why, little playmate, how did you ever dare to grow up?"

"I had nothing else to do." "But I didn't want you to grow up," he
objected.

"You've grown up some yourself," she retorted.

"I suppose I have," he sighed. "What a pity that the clock won't stand
still!"

Yet, to Madame, he did not seem to have changed much. He was taller, and
more mature in every way, of course. She noted with satisfaction that he
had gained control of his hands and feet, but he had the same boyish
face, the same square, well-moulded chin, and the same nice brown eyes.
Only his slender, nervous hands betrayed the violinist.

"Well, are you pleased with me?" he asked of Madame, his eyes twinkling.

"Yes," she answered with a faint flush. "If you had worn long hair and a
velvet collar, I should never have forgiven you."

Colonel Kent laughed outright. "I should never have dared to bring him
back to you, Francesca, if he had fallen so low. We're Americans, and
please God, we'll stay Americans, won't we, lad?"

"You bet," answered Allison, boyishly, going over to salute Mr. Boffin.
"'But in spite of all temptations to belong to other nations, I'm an Am-
er-i-can,'" he sang, under his breath. Through the mysterious workings
of some sixth sense, Mr. Boffin perceived approaching trouble and made a
hurried escape.

"Will you look at that?" asked Allison, with a hearty laugh. "I hadn't
even touched him and he became suspicious of me."

"As I remember," Madame said, "my cats never got on very well with you."

"I don't like them either," put in Isabel.

"I like 'em," Allison said. "I like 'em a whole lot, but it isn't
mutual, and I never could understand why."

At dinner, it seemed as though they all talked at once. Madame and the
Colonel had a separate conversation of their own, while Allison
"reminisced" with Isabel, as he said, and asked numerous questions of
Rose in regard to the neighbours.

"Please tell me," he said, "what has become of the Crosby twins?"

"They're flourishing," Rose answered.

"You don't mean it! What little devils they were!"

"Are," corrected Rose.

"Who are the Crosby twins?" inquired Isabel.

"They'll probably call on you," Rose replied, "so I won't spoil it by
endeavouring to describe them. The language fails to do them justice."

"What were their names?" mused Allison. "Let me see. Oh, yes, Romeo and
Juliet."

"'Romie' and 'Jule' by affectionate abbreviation, to each other," Rose
added. Did you know that an uncle died in Australia and left them a
small fortune ?"

"No, I didn't. What are they doing with it?"

"Do you remember, when you were a child, how you used to plan what you'd
do with unlimited wealth?"

Allison nodded.

"Well," Rose resumed, "that's just what they're doing with it. They have
only the income now, but this Fall, when they're twenty-one, they'll
come into possession of the principal. I prophesy bankruptcy in five
years."

"Even so," he smiled, "they'll doubtless have pleasant memories."

"What satisfaction do you think there will be in that?" queried Isabel.

"I can't answer just now," Allison replied, "but the minute I'm
bankrupt, I'll come and tell you. It's likely to happen to me at any
time."

Meanwhile Colonel Kent was expressing the pleasure he had found in his
well-appointed household. "Was it very much trouble, Francesca?"

"None at all--to me."

"You always were wonderful."

"You see," she smiled, "I didn't do it. Rose did everything. I merely
went over at the last to arrange the flowers, make the tea, and receive
the credit."

"And to welcome us home," he added. "They say a fireplace is the heart
of a house, but I think a woman is the soul of it."

"Then the soul of it was there, waiting, wasn't it?"

"But only for a little while," he sighed. "I am very lonely sometimes,
in spite of the boy."

Francesca's blue eyes became misty. "When a door in your heart is
closed," she said, "turn the key and go away. Opening it only brings
pain."

"I know," he answered, clearing his throat. "You've told me that before
and I've often thought of it. Yet sometimes it seems as though all of
life was behind that door."

"Ah, but it isn't. Your son and at least one true friend are outside.
Listen!"

"No," Allison was saying, "I got well acquainted with surprisingly few
people over there. You see, I always chummed with Dad."

"Bless him," said Francesca, impulsively.

"Have I done well?" asked the Colonel, anxiously. "It was hard work,
alone."

"Indeed you have done well. I hear that he is a great artist."

"He's more than that--he's a man. He's clean and a good shot, and he
isn't afraid of anything. Someway, to me, a man who played the fiddle
always seemed, well--lady-like, you know. But Allison isn't."

"No," answered Francesca, demurely, "he isn't. Do I infer that it is a
disgrace to be ladylike?"

"Not for a woman," laughed the Colonel. "Why do you pretend to
misunderstand me? You always know what I mean."

After dinner, when the coffee had been served, Allison took out his
violin, of his own accord. "You haven't asked me to play, but I'm going
to. Who is going to play my accompaniment? Don't all speak at once."

Rose went to the piano and looked over his music. "I'll try. Fortunately
I'm familiar with some of this."

His first notes came with a clearness and authority for which she was
wholly unprepared. She followed the accompaniment almost perfectly, but
mechanically, lost as she was in the wonder and delight of his playing.
The exquisite harmony seemed to be the inmost soul of the violin,
speaking at last, through forgotten ages, of things made with the world
--Love and Death and Parting. Above it and through it hovered a spirit of
longing, infinite and untranslatable, yet clear as some high call.

Subtly, Rose answered to it. In some mysterious way, she seemed set free
from bondage. Unsuspected fetters loosened; she had a sense of
largeness, of freedom which she had never known before. She was
quivering in an ecstasy of emotion when the last chord came.

For an instant there was silence, then Isabel spoke. "How well you
play!" she said politely.

"I ought to," Allison replied, modestly. "I've worked hard enough."

"How long have you been studying?"

"Thirty years," he answered. "That is, I feel as if I had been at work
all my life."

"How funny!" exclaimed Isabel. "Are you thirty?"

"Just," he said.

"Then Cousin Rose and I are like steps, with you half way between us.
I'm twenty and she's forty," smiled Isabel, with childlike frankness.

Rose bit her lips, then the colour flamed into her face. "Yes," she
said, to break an awkward pause, "I'm forty. Old Rose," she added, with
a forced smile.

"Nonsense," said Allison quickly. "How can a rose be old?"

"Or," continued the Colonel, with an air of old-world gallantry, "how
can earth itself be any older, having borne so fair a rose upon its
breast for forty years?"

"Thank you both," responded Rose, her high colour receding. "Shall we
play again?"

While they were turning over the music Madame grappled with a temptation
to rebuke Isabel then and there. "Not fit for a parlour yet," she
thought. "Ought to be in the nursery on a bread and milk diet and put to
bed at six."

For her part, Isabel dimly discerned that she had said something
awkward, and felt vaguely uncomfortable. She was sorry if she had made a
social mistake and determined to apologise afterward, though she
disliked apologies.

Allison was playing again, differently, yet in the same way. Through the
violin sounded the same high call to Rose. Life assumed a new breadth
and value, as from a newly discovered dimension. She had been in it, yet
not of it, until now. She was merged insensibly with something vast and
universal, finite yet infinite, unknown and undreamed-of an hour ago.

She was quite pale when they finished. "You're tired," he said. "I'm
sorry."

"I'm not," she denied, vigorously.

"But you are," he insisted. "Don't you suppose I can see?" His eyes met
hers for the moment, clearly, and, once more, she answered an unspoken
summons in some silent way. The room turned slowly before her; their
faces became white spots in a mist.

"You play well," Allison was saying. "I wish you'd let me work with
you."

"I'll be glad to," Rose answered, with lips that scarcely moved.

"Will you help me work up my programs for next season?"

"Indeed I will. Don't stop now, please--really, I'm not tired."

While she was still protesting, he led her away from the piano to an
easy chair. "Sit there," he said, "and I'll do the work. Those
accompaniments are heavy."

He went back to his violin, tightened a string, and began to play,
alone. The melody was as delicate in structure as the instrument itself,
yet strangely full of longing. Slowly the violin gave back the music of
which it was made; the wind in the forest, the sound of many waters,
moonlight shimmering through green aisles of forest, the mating calls of
Spring. And again, through it all, surged some great question to which
Rose thrilled in unspoken answer; a great prayer, which, in some secret
way, she shared.

It came to an end at last when she felt that she could bear no more.
"What is it?" she forced herself to ask.

"I haven't named it," he replied, putting down his violin.

"Is--is it--yours?"

"Of course. Why not?"

Isabel came to the piano and took up the violin. "May I look at it?"

"Certainly."

She stroked the brown breasts curiously and twanged the strings as
though it were a banjo. "What make is it?"

"Cremona. Dad gave it to me for Christmas, a long time ago. It belonged
to an old man who died of a broken heart."

"What broke his heart?" queried Isabel, carelessly.

"One of his hands was hurt in some way, and he could play no more."

"Not much to die of," Isabel suggested, practically.

"Ah, but you don't know," he answered, shaking his head.

Francesca had leaned forward and was speaking to Colonel Kent in a low
tone. "I think that somewhere, in the House not Made with Hands, there
is a young and lovely mother who is very proud of her boy to-night."

The Colonel's fine face took on an unwonted tenderness. "I hope so. She
left me a sacred trust."

Francesca crossed the room, drew the young man's tall head down, and
kissed him. "Well done, dear foster-child. Your adopted mother, once
removed, is fully satisfied with you, and very much pleased with
herself, being, vicariously, the parent of a great artist."

"I hope you don't consider me 'raised,'" replied Allison. "You're not
going to stop 'mothering' me, are you?"

"I couldn't," was her smiling assurance. "I've got the habit."

He seemed very young as he looked down at her. Woman-like she loved him,
through the man that he was, for the child that he had been.

"Come, lad," the Colonel suggested, "it's getting late and we want to be
invited again."

Allison closed his violin case with a snap, said good-night to Aunt
Francesca, then went over to Rose. "I don't feel like calling you 'Miss
Bernard," he said. "Mayn't I say 'Cousin Rose,' as we rejoice in the
possession of the same Aunt?"

"Surely," she answered, colouring faintly.

"Then good-night, Cousin Rose. I'll see you soon again, and we'll begin
work. Your days of leisure are over now."

Isabel offered him a small, cool hand. Her eyes were brilliant, brought
out by the sparkling silver of her gown. She glittered even in the low
light of the room. "Good-night, Silver Girl," he said. "You haven't
really grown up after all."

When the door closed, Rose gathered up the music he had forgotten, and
put it away. Isabel came to her contritely. "Cousin Rose, I'm so sorry I
said that! I didn't think!"

"Don't bother about it," Rose replied, kindly. "It was nothing at all,
and, besides, it's true."

"'Tell the truth and shame the--family,'" misquoted Madame Bernard. "Age
and false hair are not things to be flaunted, Isabel, remember that."

Isabel flushed at the rebuke, and her cheeks were still burning when she
went to her room.

"I don't care," she said to herself, with a swift change of mood. "I'm
glad I told him. They'd never have done it, and it's just as well for
him to know."

Madame Bernard and Rose soon followed her example, but Rose could not
sleep. Through the night the voice of the violin sounded through her
consciousness, calling, calling, calling--heedless of the answer that
thrilled her to the depths of her soul.






IV

THE CROSBY TWINS

The Crosby twins were making a formal call upon Isabel. They had been
skating and still carried their skates, but Juliet wore white gloves and
had pinned her unruly hair into some semblance of order while they
waited at the door. She wore a red tam-o'-shanter on her brown curls and
a white sweater under her dark green skating costume, which was short
enough to show the heavy little boots, just now filling the room with
the unpleasant odour of damp leather.

"Won't you take off your coat?" asked Isabel. "You'll catch cold when
you go out, if you don't take it off."

"Thanks," responded Juliet, somewhat stiffly. Then she stretched out
both hands to her hostess, laughing as she did so. "Look!" The sweater
sleeves had crept up to her elbows, displaying several inches of bare,
red arm between the sleeves and the short white gloves.

"That's just like us," remarked Romeo. "If we try to be elegant,
something always happens."

The twins looked very much alike. They were quite tall and still
retained the dear awkwardness of youth, in spite of the near approach of
their twenty-first birthday. They had light brown curly hair, frank blue
eyes that met the world with interest and delight, well-shaped mouths,
not too small, and stubborn little chins. A high colour bloomed on their
cheeks and they fairly radiated the joy of living.

"Can you skate?" inquired Romeo.

"No," smiled Isabel.

"Juliet can. She can skate as far as I can, and almost as fast."

"Romie taught me," observed Juliet, with becoming modesty.

"Do you play hockey? No, of course you don't, if you don't skate," he
went on, answering his own question. "Can you swim?"

"No," responded Isabel, sweetly.

"Jule's a fine swimmer. She saved a man's life once, two Summers ago."

"Romie taught me," said Juliet, beaming at her brother.

"Can you row?" he asked, politely.

"No," replied Isabel, shortly. "I'm afraid of the water."

"Juliet can row. She won the women's canoe race in the regatta last
Summer. The prize was twenty-five dollars in gold."

"Romie taught me," put in Juliet.

"We'll teach you this Summer," said Romeo, with a frank, boyish smile
that showed his white teeth.

"Thank you," responded Isabel, inwardly vowing that they wouldn't.

"Juliet can do most everything I can," went on Romeo, with the teacher's
pardonable pride in his pupil. "She can climb a tree in her knickers,
and fish and skate and row and swim and fence, and play golf and tennis,
and shoot, and dive from a spring board, and she can ride anything that
has four legs."

"Romeo taught me," chanted Juliet, in a voice surprisingly like his own.

There was an awkward pause, then Romeo turned to his hostess. "What can
you do?" he asked, meaning to be deferential. Isabel thought she
detected a faint trace of sarcasm, so her answer was rather tart.

"I don't do many of the things that men do," she said, "but I speak
French and German, I can sing and play a little, sew and embroider, and
trim hats if I want to, and paint on china, and do two fancy dances. And
when I go back home, I'm going to learn to run an automobile."

The twins looked at each other. "We never thought of it," said Juliet,
much crestfallen.

"Wonder how much they cost," remarked Romeo, thoughtfully.

"Where can you buy 'em?" Juliet inquired. "Anywhere in town?"

"I suppose so," Isabel assented. "Why?"

"Why?" they repeated together. "We're going to buy one and learn to run
it!"

"You must have lots of money," said Isabel, enviously.

"Loads," replied Romeo, with the air of a plutocrat. "More than we can
spend."

"We get our income the first day of every month," explained Juliet, "and
put it into the bank, but when the next check comes, there's always some
left." They seemed to consider it a mild personal disgrace.

"Why don't you save it?" queried Isabel.

"What for?" Romeo demanded, curiously.

"Why, so you'll have it if you ever need it."

"It keeps right on coming," Juliet explained, pulling down her sweater.
"Uncle died in Australia and left it to us. He died on the thirtieth of
June, and we always celebrate."

"Why don't you celebrate his birthday?" suggested Isabel, "instead of
the day he died?"

"His birthday was no good to us," replied Romeo, "but his death-day
was."

"But if he hadn't been born, he couldn't have died," Isabel objected,
more or less logically.

"And if he hadn't died, his being born wouldn't have helped us any,"
replied Juliet, with a dazzling smile.

There was another pause. "Will you have some tea?" asked Isabel.

"With rum in it?" queried Juliet.

"I don't think so," said Isabel, doubtfully. "Aunt Francesca never
does."

"We don't, either," Romeo explained, "except when it's very cold, and
then only a teaspoonful."

"The doctor said we didn't need stimulants. What was it he said we
needed, Romie?"

"Sedatives."

"Yes, that was it--sedatives. I looked it up in the dictionary. It means
to calm, or to moderate. I think he got the word wrong himself, for we
don't need to be calmed, or moderated, do we, Romie?"

"I should say not!"

The twins sipped their tea in silence and nibbled daintily at wafers
from the cracker jar. Then, feeling that their visit was over, they rose
with one accord.

"We've had a dandy time," said Juliet, crushing Isabel's hand in hers.

"Bully," supplemented Romeo. "Come and see us."

"I will," Isabel responded, weakly. "How do you get there?"

"Just walk up the main road and turn to the left. It's about three
miles."

"Three miles!" gasped Isabel. "I'll drive out."

"Just so you come," Romeo said, graciously. "It's an awful old place.
You'll know it by the chimney being blown over and some of the bricks
lying on the roof. Good-bye."

Juliet turned to wave her hand at Isabel as they banged the gate, and
Romeo awkwardly doffed his cap. Their hostess went up-stairs with a sigh
of relief. She had the sensation of having quickly closed a window upon
a brisk March wind.

The twins set their faces toward home. The three-mile walk was nothing
to them, even after a day of skating. The frosty air nipped Juliet's
cheeks to crimson and she sniffed at it with keen delight.

"It's nice to be out," she said, "after being in that hot house. What do
you think of her, Romie?"

"Oh, I don't know," he replied carelessly. "Say, how did she have her
hair done up?"

"She had rats in it, and it was curled on a hot iron."

"Rats? What in thunder is--or are--that, or they?"

"Little wads of false hair made into cushiony rolls."

"Did she tell you?"

"No," laughed Juliet. "Don't you suppose I can see a rat?"

"I thought rats had to be smelled."

"Not this kind."

"She smelled of something kind of sweet and sticky. What was it?'

"Sachet powder, I guess, or some kind of perfume."

"I liked the smell. Can we get some?"

"I guess so--we've got the price."

"Next time you see her, ask her what it is, will you?"

"All right," answered Juliet, unperturbed by the request.

The rest of the way was enlivened by a discussion of automobiles. Romeo
had a hockey match on for the following day, which was Saturday, so they
were compelled to postpone their investigations until Monday. It seemed
very long to wait.

"It's no good now, anyhow," said Romeo. "We can't run it until the roads
melt and dry up."

"That's so," agreed his twin, despondently. "Why did she tell us now?
Why couldn't she wait until we had some chance?"

"I guess we can learn something about it before we try to run it," he
observed, cheerfully. "If we can get it into the barn, we can take it
all apart and see how it's put together."

"Oh, Romie!" cried Juliet, with a little skip. "How perfectly
fascinating! And we'll read all the automobile literature we can get
hold of. I do so love to be posted!"

Upon the death of their father, several years ago, the twins had
promptly ceased to go to school. The kindly old minister who had been
appointed executor of their father's small estate and guardian of the
tumultuous twins had been unable to present any arguments in favour of
systematic education which appealed to them even slightly.

"What good is Latin?" asked Romeo, apparently athirst for information.

"Why--er--mental discipline, mostly," the harassed guardian had
answered.

"Isn't there anything we'd like that would discipline our minds?"
queried Juliet.

"I fear not," replied the old man, who lacked the diplomacy necessary to
deal with the twins. Shortly after that he had died with so little
warning that he had only time to make out a check in their favour for
the balance entrusted to him. The twins had held high carnival until the
money was almost gone. The bequest from the Australian uncle had reached
them just in time, so, with thankful hearts, they celebrated and had
done so annually ever since.

Untrammelled by convention and restraint, they thrived like weeds in
their ancestral domicile, which was now sadly in need of repair.
Occasionally some daring prank set the neighbourhood by the ears, but,
for the most part, the twins behaved very well and attended strictly to
their own affairs. They ate when they were hungry, slept when they were
sleepy, and, if they desired to sit up until four in the morning,
reading, they did so. A woman who had a key to the back door came in
every morning, at an uncertain hour, to wash the dishes, sweep, dust,
and to make the beds if they chanced to be unoccupied.

As Romeo had said, the chimney had blown down and several loose bricks
lay upon the roof. They had a small vegetable garden, fenced in, and an
itinerant gardener looked after it, in Summer, but they had no flowers,
because they maintained a large herd of stray dogs, mostly mongrels,
that would have had no home had it not been for the hospitable twins.
Romeo bought the choicest cuts of beef for them and fed them himself.
Occasionally they added another to their collection and, at the last
census, had nineteen.

Their house would have delighted Madame Bernard--it was so eminently
harmonious and suitable. The ragged carpets showed the floor in many
places, and there were no curtains at any of the windows. Romeo
cherished a masculine distaste for curtains and Juliet did not trouble
herself to oppose him. The furniture was old and most of it was broken.
The large easy chair in the sitting room was almost disembowelled, and
springs showed through the sofa, except in the middle, where there was a
cavernous depression. Several really fine paintings adorned the walls,
and the dingy mantel was glorified by exquisite bits of Cloisonne and
iridescent glass, for which Juliet had a pronounced fancy.

"Set the table, will you, Romie?" called Juliet, tying a large blue
gingham apron over her sweater. "I'm almost starved."

"So'm I, but I've got to feed the dogs first."

"Let 'em wait," pleaded Juliet. "Please do!"

"Don't be so selfish! They're worse off than we are, for they haven't
even had tea."

While the pack fought, outside, for rib bones and raw steak, Juliet
opened a can of salmon, fried some potatoes, put a clean spoon into a
jar of jam, and cut a loaf of bread into thick slices. When Romeo came
in, he set the table, made coffee, and opened a can of condensed milk.
They disdained to wash dishes, but cleared off the table, after supper,
lighted the lamp, and talked automobile until almost midnight.

In less than an hour, Romeo had completed the plans for remodelling the
barn. They had no horse, but as a few bits of harness remained from the
last equine incumbent, they usually alluded to the barn as "the bridle
chamber."

"We'll have to name the barn again," mused Juliet, "and we can name the
automobile, too."

"Wait until we get it. What colour shall we have?"

"They're usually red or black, aren't they?" she asked, doubtfully.

"I guess so. We want ours different, don't we?"

"Sure. We want something that nobody ever had before--something bright
and cheerful. Oh, Romie," she continued, jumping up and down in
excitement, "let's have it bright yellow and call it 'The Yellow
Peril'!"

Her twin offered her a friendly hand. "Jule," he said solemnly, "you're
a genius!"

"We'll have brown leather inside, and get brown clothes to match. Brown
hats with yellow bands on 'em--won't it be perfectly scrumptious?"

"Scrumptious is no word for it. Shall we have two seats or four?"

"Four, of course. A two-seated automobile looks terribly selfish."

"Stingy, too," murmured Romeo, "and we can afford the best."

"Do you know," Juliet suggested, after deep thought, "I think it would
be nice of us if we waited to take our first ride until we celebrate for
Uncle?"

"It would," admitted Romeo, gloomily, "but it's such a long time to
wait."

"We can learn to run it here in the yard--there's plenty of room. And on
the thirtieth of June, we'll take our first real ride in it. Be a sport,
Romie," she urged, as he maintained an unhappy silence.

"All right--I will," he said, grudgingly. "But I hope Uncle appreciates
what we're doing for him."

"That's settled, then," she responded, cheerfully. "Then, on our second
ride, we'll take somebody with us. Who shall we invite?"

"Oughtn't she to go with us the first time?"

"She? Who's 'she'?"

"Miss Ross--Isabel. She suggested it, you know. We might not have
thought of it for years."

Juliet pondered. "I don't believe she ought to go the first time,
because the day that Uncle died doesn't mean anything to her, and it's
everything to us. But we'll take her on the second trip. Shall I write
to her now and invite her?"

"I don't believe," Romeo responded, dryly, "that I'd stop to write an
invitation to somebody to go out four months from now in an automobile
that isn't bought yet."

"But it's as good as bought," objected Juliet, "because our minds are
made up. We may forget to ask her."

"Put it on the slate," suggested Romeo.

In the hall, near the door, was a large slate suspended by a wire. The
pencil was tied to it. Here they put down vagrant memoranda and things
they planned to acquire in the near future.

Juliet observed that there was only one entry on the slate: "Military
hair brushes for R." Underneath she wrote: "Yellow automobile, four-
seated. Name it 'The Yellow Peril.' Brown leather inside. Get brown
clothes to match and trim with yellow. First ride, June thirtieth, for
Uncle. Second ride, July first, for ourselves. Invite Isabel Ross."

"Anything else?" she asked, after reading it aloud.

"Dog biscuit," yawned Romeo. "They're eating too much meat."

It was very late when they went up-stairs. Their rooms were across the
hall from each other and they slept with the doors open. The attic had
been made into a gymnasium, where they exercised and hardened their
muscles when the weather kept them indoors. A trapeze had been recently
put up, and Juliet was learning to swing by her feet.

She lifted her face up to his and received a brotherly peck on the lips.
"Good-night, Jule."

"Good-night, Romie. Pleasant dreams."

It was really morning, but there was no clock to tell them so, for the
timepieces in the Crosby mansion were seldom wound.

"Say," called Romeo.

"What?"

"What do you think of her?"

"Who?"

"Miss--you know. Isabel."

"Oh, I don't know," responded Juliet, sleepily. "I guess she's kind of a
sissy-girl."






V

AN AFTERNOON CALL

"Aunt Francesca," asked Isabel, "is Colonel Kent rich?"

"Very," responded Madame. She had a fine damask napkin stretched upon
embroidery hoops and was darning it with the most exquisite of stitches.

"Then why don't they live in a better house and have more servants? That
place is old and musty."

"Perhaps they like to live there, and, again, perhaps they haven't
enough money to change. Besides, that has been Colonel Kent's home ever
since he was married. Allison was born there."

Isabel fidgeted in her chair. "If they're very rich, I should think
they'd have enough money to enable them to move into a better house."

"Oh," replied Madame, carefully cutting her thread on the underside, "I
wasn't thinking of money when I spoke. I don't know anything about their
private affairs. But Colonel Kent has courage, sincerity, an old-
fashioned standard of honour, many friends, and a son who is a great
artist."

The girl was silent, for intangible riches did not appeal to her
strongly.

"Allison is like him in many ways," Madame was saying. "He is like his
mother, too."

"When is he going away?"

"In September or October, I suppose--the beginning of the season."

"Is he going to play everywhere?"

"Everywhere of any importance."

"Perhaps," mused Isabel, "he will make a great deal of money himself."

"Perhaps," Madame responded, absently. "I do hope he will be
successful." She had almost maternal pride in her foster son.

"Is Cousin Rose going, too?"

"Going where? What do you mean, dear?"

"Why, nothing. Only I heard him ask her if she would go with him on his
concert tour and play his accompaniments, providing you or the Colonel
went along for chaperone, and Cousin Rose laughed and said she didn't
need a chaperone--that she was old enough to make it quite respectable."

"And---" suggested Madame.

"Allison laughed, too, and said: 'Nonsense!'"

"If they are going," said Madame, half to herself, "and decide to take
me along, I hope they'll give me sufficient time to pack things
decently."

"Would the Colonel go, if you went?"

"I hardly think so. It wouldn't be quite so proper."

"I don't understand," remarked Isabel, wrinkling her pretty brows.

"I don't either," Madame replied, confidentially. "However, I've lived
long enough to learn that the conventions of society are all in the
interests of morality. If you're conventional, you'll be good, in a
negative sense, of course."

"How do you mean, Aunt Francesca?"

"Perfect manners are diametrically opposed to crime. For instance, it is
very bad form for a man to shoot a lady, or even to write another man's
name on a check and cash it. It saves trouble to be conventional, for
you're not always explaining things. Most of the startling items we read
in the newspapers are serious lapses from conventionality and good
manners."

"The Crosbys aren't very conventional," Isabel suggested.

"No," smiled Madame, "they're not, but their manners proceed from the
most kindly and friendly instincts, consequently they're seldom in
error, essentially."

"They have lots of money, haven't they?"

"I have sometimes thought that the Crosbys had more than their age and
social training fitted them to use wisely, but I've never known them to
go far astray. They've done foolish things, but I've never known either
to do a wrong or selfish thing. Money is a terrible test of character,
but I think the twins will survive it."

"I suppose they've done lots of funny things with it."

Madame's eyes danced and little smiles wrinkled the corners of her
mouth. "On the Fourth of July, last year, they presented every orphan in
the Orphans' Home with two dollars' worth of fireworks, carefully
chosen. Of course the inevitable happened and the orphans managed to set
fire to the home, but, after two hours of hard work, the place was
saved. Some of the children were slightly injured during the
celebration, but that didn't matter, because as Juliet said, they'd had
a good time, anyway, and it would give them something to talk about in
years to come."

"It would have been better to spend the money on shoes, wouldn't it?"

"I don't know, my dear. The finest gift in the world is pleasure.
Sometimes I think it's better to feed the soul and let the body fast.
There is a time in life when one brief sky-rocket can produce more joy
than ten pairs of shoes."

Isabel smiled and glanced at Madame Bernard's lavender satin slipper.
The old lady laughed and the soft colour came into her pretty face.

"I frankly admit that I've passed it," she said. "Better one pair of
shoes than ten sky-rockets, if the shoes are the sort I like."

"Do they come often?" queried Isabel, reverting to the subject of the
twins.

"Not as often as I'd like to have them, but it doesn't do to urge them.
I can only keep my windows open and let the wind from the clover field
blow in as it will."

"Do they live near a clover field?" inquired Isabel, perplexed.

"No, but they remind me of it--they're so breezy and wholesome, so free
and untrammelled, and, at heart, so sweet."

"I hope they'll come again soon."

"So do I, for I don't want you to be lonely, Isabel. It was good of your
mother to let you come."

"Mamma doesn't care what I do," observed Isabel, placidly. "She's always
busy."

Madame Bernard checked the sharp retort that rose to her lips. What
Isabel had said was quite true. Mrs. Ross was so interested in what she
called "The New Thought" and "The Higher World Service" that she had
neither time nor inclination for the old thought and simple service that
make--and keep--a home.

From the time she could dress herself and put up her own hair, Isabel
had been left much to herself. Her mother supplied her liberally with
money for clothes and considered that her duty to her daughter ended
there. They lived in an apartment hotel and had their coffee served in
their rooms in the morning. After that, Isabel was left to her own
devices, for committees and directors' meetings without number claimed
her mother.

More often than not, Isabel dined alone in the big dining-room
downstairs, and spent a lonely evening with a novel and a box of
chocolates. On pleasant days, she amused herself by going through the
shops and to the matinee. She did not make friends easily and the
splendid isolation common to hotels and desert islands left her
stranded, socially. She had been very glad to accept Aunt Francesca's
invitation, and the mother, looking back through her years of "world
service" to the quiet old house and dream-haunted garden, had thought it
would be a good place for Isabel for a time, and had hoped she might not
find it too dull to endure.

Madame Bernard had no patience with Mrs. Ross. When she had come for a
brief holiday, fifteen years before, bringing her child with her, she
had just begun to be influenced by the modern feminine unrest. Later she
had definitely allied herself with those whose mission it is to
emancipate Woman--with a capital W--from her chains, forgetting that
these are of her own forging, and anchor her to the eternal verities of
earth and heaven.

A single swift stroke had freed Mrs. Ross from her own "bondage."
Isabel's father had died, while her mother was out upon a lecturing
tour--in a hotel, which is the most miserable place in the world to die
in. The housekeeper and chambermaids had befriended Isabel until the
tour came to its triumphant conclusion. Mrs. Ross had seemed to consider
the whole affair a kindly and appropriate recognition of her abilities,
on the part of Providence. She attempted to fit Isabel for the duties of
a private secretary, but failed miserably, and, greatly to Isabel's
relief, gave up the idea.

Madame Bernard had looked forward to Isabel's visit with a certain
apprehension, remembering Mrs. Ross's unbecoming gowns and careless
coiffures. But the girl's passion for clothes, amounting almost to a
complete "reversion to type," had at once relieved and alarmed her. "If
I can strike a balance for her," she had said to herself in a certain
midnight musing, "I shall do very well."

As yet, however, Isabel had failed to "balance." She dressed for morning
and luncheon and afternoon, and again for dinner, changing to street
gowns when necessary and doing her hair in a different way for each
gown. Still, as Rose had said, she "suited herself," for she was always
immaculate, beautifully clad, and a joy to behold.

Madame Bernard greatly approved of the lovely white wool house gown
Isabel was wearing. She had no fault to find with the girl's taste, but
she wished to subordinate, as it were, the thing to the spirit; the
temple to the purpose for which it was made.

Isabel smiled at her sweetly as she folded up her work--a little
uncomprehending smile. "Are you going away now for your 'forty winks,'
Aunt Francesca?"

"Yes, my dear. Can you amuse yourself for an hour or so without playing
upon the piano?"

"Certainly. I didn't know that you and Cousin Rose were asleep
yesterday, or I wouldn't have played."

"Of course not." Madame leaned over her and stroked the dark hair, waved
and coiled in quite the latest fashion. "There are plenty of books and
magazines in the library."

Madame went upstairs, followed at a respectful distance by Mr. Boffin,
waving his plumed tail. He, too, took his afternoon nap, curled up
cosily upon the silken quilt at the foot of his mistress's couch. In the
room adjoining, Rose rested for an hour also, though she usually spent
the time with a book.

Left to herself, Isabel walked back and forth idly, greatly allured by
the forbidden piano. She looked over, carelessly, the pile of violin
music Allison had left there. Some of the sheets were torn and had been
pasted together, all were marked in pencil with hieroglyphics, and most
of them were stamped, in purple, "Allison Kent," with a Berlin or Paris
address written in below.

Isabel had met very few men, in the course of her twenty years. For this
reason, possibly, she remembered every detail of the two weeks she had
spent at Aunt Francesca's and the hours with Allison, on the veranda,
when he chose to amuse himself with the pretty, credulous child. It
seemed odd to have him coming to the house again, though, unless he came
to dinner, he usually spent the time playing, to Rose's accompaniment.
She had not seen him alone.

She surveyed herself in the long, gilt-framed mirror, and was well
pleased with the image of youth and beauty the mirror gave back. The
bell rang and she pinned up a stray lock carefully. It was probably
someone to see Aunt Francesca, but there was a pleasing doubt. It might
be the twins, though she had not returned their call.

Presently Allison came in, his cheeks glowing from his long walk in the
cold. "Silver Girl," he smiled, "where are the spangles, and are you
alone?"

"The spangles are upstairs waiting for candlelight," answered Isabel, as
he took her small, cool hand, "and I'm very much alone--or was."

"Where are the others?"

"Taking naps."

"I hope I haven't tired Rose out," said Allison, offering Isabel a
chair. He had unconsciously dropped the prefix of "Cousin." "We've been
working hard lately."

"Is she going with you on your tour?"

"I don't know. I wish she could go, but I haven't the heart to drag
father or Aunt Francesca along with us, and otherwise, it would be--
well, unconventional, you know. The conventions make me dead tired," he
added, with evident sincerity.

"And yet," said Isabel, looking into the fire, "they are all in the
interests of morality. If you're conventional, you'll be good,
negatively. It isn't good manners for a man to shoot a lady or to sign a
check with another man's name and get it cashed. If you're conventional,
you're not always explaining things."

"Very true," laughed Allison, "but sometimes 'the greatest good for the
greatest number' bears heavily upon the few."

"Of course," Isabel agreed, after a moment's pause. "Your friends, the
Crosby twins, have called," she continued.

"Really?" Allison asked, with interest. "How do you like them?"

"I wish they'd come often," she smiled. "They remind me of a field of
red clover, they're so breezy and so wholesome."

"I must hunt 'em up," he returned, absently. "They used to be regular
little devils. It's a shame for them to have all that money."

"Why?"

"Because they'll waste it. They don't know how to use it."

"Perhaps they do, in a way. One Fourth of July they gave every orphan in
the Orphans' Home two dollars' worth of fireworks. Anybody else would
have wasted the money on shoes, or hats."

"I see you haven't grown up. Would you rather have fireworks than
clothes?"

"There is a time in life when one sky-rocket can give more pleasure than
a pair of shoes, and the gift of pleasure is the finest gift in the
world."

Allison was agreeably surprised, for hitherto Isabel's conversation had
consisted mainly of monosyllables and platitudes, or the hesitating echo
of someone's else opinion. Now he perceived that it was shyness; that
Isabel had a mind of her own, and an unusual mind, at that. He looked at
her quickly and the colour bloomed upon her pale, cold face.

"Tell me, little playmate, what have the years done for you since you
went out and pulled up the rose bushes to find the scent bottles?"

"Nothing," she answered, not knowing what else to say.

"Still looking for the unattainable?"

"Yes, if you like to put it that way."

"Where's your mother?"

"Out lecturing."

"What about?"

"The Bloodless Revolution, or the Gradual Emancipation of Woman," she
repeated, parrot-like.

"Her work must keep her away from home a great deal," he ventured, after
a pause.

"Yes. I seldom see her."

"You must be lonely."

She turned her dark eyes to his. "I live in a hotel," she said.

In the simple answer, Allison saw an unmeasured loneliness, coupled with
a certain loyalty to her mother. He changed the subject.

"You like it here, don't you?"

"Yes, indeed. Aunt Francesca is lovely and so is Cousin Rose. I wish,"
she went on, with a little sigh as she glanced about the comfortable
room, "that I could always stay here." The child-like appeal in her tone
set Allison's heart to beating a little faster.

"I wish you could," he said. Remorsefully, he remembered the long hours
he had spent with Rose at the piano, happily oblivious of Isabel.

"Are you fond of music?" he asked.

"Yes, indeed! I always sit outside and listen when you and Cousin Rose
play."

"Come in whenever you want to," he responded, warmly.

"Won't I be in the way? Won't I be a bother?"

"I should say not. How could you be?"

"Then," Isabel smiled, "I'll come sometimes, if I may. It's the only
pleasure I have."

"That's too bad. Sometime we'll go into town to the theatre, just you
and I. Would you like to go?"

"I'd love to," she answered, eagerly.

The clock ticked industriously, the fire crackled merrily upon the
hearth, and the wind howled outside. In the quiet room, Allison sat and
studied Isabel, with the firelight shining upon her face and her white
gown. She seemed much younger than her years.

"You're only a child," he said, aloud; "a little, helpless child."

"How long do you think it will be before I'm grown up?"

"I don't want you to grow up. I can remember now just how you looked the
day I told you about the scent bottles. You had on a pink dress, with a
sash to match, pink stockings, little white shoes with black buttons,
and the most fetching white sunbonnet. Your hair was falling in curls
all round your face and it was such a warm day that the curls clung to
your neck and annoyed you. You toddled over to me and said: 'Allison,
please fix my's turls.' Don't you remember?"

She smiled and said she had forgotten. "But," she added, truthfully,
"I've often wondered how I looked when I was dressed up."

"Then," he continued, "I told you how the scent bottles grew on the
roots of the rose bushes, and, after I went home, you went and pulled up
as many as you could. Aunt Francesca was very angry with me."

"Yes, I remember that. I felt as though you were being punished for my
sins. It was years afterward that I saw I'd been sufficiently punished
myself. Look!"

She leaned toward him and showed him a narrow white line on the soft
flesh between her forefinger and her thumb, extending back over her
hand.

"A thorn," she said. "I shall carry the scar to my dying day."

With a little catch in his throat, Allison caught the little hand and
pressed it to his lips. "Forgive me!" he said.






VI

THE LIGHT ON THE ALTAR

Colonel Kent had gone away on a short business trip and Allison was
spending his evenings, which otherwise would have been lonely, at Madame
Bernard's. After talking for a time with Aunt Francesca and Isabel, it
seemed natural for him to take up his violin and suggest, if only by a
half-humorous glance, that Rose should go to the piano.

Sometimes they played for their own pleasure and sometimes worked for
their own benefit. Neither Madame nor Isabel minded hearing the same
thing a dozen times or more in the course of an evening, for, as Madame
said, with a twinkle in her blue eyes, it made "a pleasant noise," and
Isabel did not trouble herself to listen.

Both Rose and Allison were among the fortunate ones who find joy in
work. Rose was so keenly interested in her music that she took no count
of the hours spent at the piano, and Allison fully appreciated her. It
had been a most pleasant surprise for him to find a good accompanist so
near home.

The discouraging emptiness of life had mysteriously vanished for Rose.
Her restlessness disappeared as though by magic and her indefinite
hunger had been, in some way, appeased. She had unconsciously emerged
from one state into another, as the tiny dwellers of the sea cast off
their shells. She had a sense of freedom and a large vision, as of
dissonances resolved into harmony.

Clothes, also, which, as Madame had said, are "supposed to please and
satisfy women," had taken to themselves a new significance. Rose had
made herself take heed of her clothes, but she had never had much real
interest. Now she was glad of the time she had spent in planning her
gowns, merely with a view to pleasing Aunt Francesca.

To-night, she wore a clinging gown of deep green velvet, with a spray of
green leaves in her hair. Her only ornament was a pin of jade, in an
Oriental setting. Allison looked at her admiringly.

"There's something about you," he said, "that I don't know just how to
express. I have no words for it, but, in some way, you seem to live up
to your name."

"How so?" Rose asked, demurely.

"Well, I've never seen you wear anything that a rose might not wear.
I've seen you in red and green and yellow and pink and white, but never
in blue or purple, or any of those soft-coloured things that Aunt
Francesca wears."

"That only means," answered Rose, flushing, "that blue and grey and tan
and lavender aren't becoming to me."

"That isn't it," Allison insisted, "for you'd be lovely in anything.
You're living up to your name."

"Go on," Rose suggested mischievously. "This is getting interesting."
"You needn't laugh. I assure you that men know more about those things
than they're usually given credit for. Your jewels fit in with the whole
idea, too. That jade pin, for instance, and your tourmaline necklace,
and your ruby ring, and the topazes you wear with yellow, and the faint
scent of roses that always hangs about you."

"What else?" she smiled.

"Well, I had a note from you the other day. It was fragrant with rose
petals and the conventionalised rose, in gold and white, that was
stamped in place of a monogram, didn't escape me. Besides, here's this."

He took from his pocket a handkerchief of sheerest linen, delicately
hemstitched. In one corner was embroidered a rose, in palest shades of
pink and green. The delicate, elusive scent filled the room as he shook
it out.

"There," he continued, with a laugh. "I found it in my violin case the
other day. I don't know how it came there, but it was much the same as
finding a rose twined about the strings."

Aunt Francesca was on the other side of the room, by the fire. Her face,
in the firelight, was as delicate as a bit of carved ivory. Her thoughts
were far away--one could see that. Isabel sat near her, apparently
absorbed in a book, but, in reality, listening to every word.

"I wish," Allison was saying, "that people knew how to live up to
themselves. That's an awkward phrase, but I don't know of anything
better. Even their names don't fit 'em, and they get nicknames."

"'Father calls me William,'" murmured Rose.

"'And Mother calls me Will,'" Allison went on. "That's it, exactly. See
how the 'Margarets' are adjusted to themselves by their friends. Some
are 'Margie' and more of 'em are 'Peggy.' 'Margaret' who is allowed to
wear her full name is very rare."

"I'm glad my name can't be changed, easily," she said, thoughtfully.

"It could be 'Rosie,' with an 'ie,' and if you were that sort, it would
be. Take Aunt Francesca, for instance. She might be 'Frances' or 'Fanny'
or even 'Fran,' but her name suits her, so she gets the full benefit of
it, every time."

Madame turned away from the fire, with the air of one who has been away
upon a long journey. "Did I hear my name? Did someone speak to me?"

"Only of you," Allison explained. "We were talking of names and
nicknames and saying that yours suited you."

"If it didn't," observed Madame Bernard, "I'd change it. When we get
civilised, I believe children will go by number until they get old
enough to choose their own names. Fancy a squirming little imp with a
terrible temper being saddled with the name of 'William,' by authority
of Church and State. Except to his doting parents, he'll never be
anything but 'Bill.'"

"Does my name fit me?" queried Isabel, much interested.

"It would," said Allison, "if you weren't quite so tall. Does my name
fit me?"

He spoke to Madame Bernard but he looked at Rose. It was the older woman
who answered him. "Yes, of course it does. How dare you ask me that when
I named you myself?"

"I'd forgotten," Allison laughed. "I can't remember quite that far
back."

They began to play once more and Isabel, pleading a headache, said good-
night. She made her farewells very prettily and there was a moment's
silence after the door closed.

"I'm afraid," said Madame, "that our little girl is lonely. Allison,
can't you bestir yourself and find some young men to call upon her? I
can't think of anybody but the Crosby twins."

"What's the matter with me?" inquired Allison, lightly. "Am I not
calling? And behold, I give her a headache and she goes to bed."

"You're not exactly in her phase of youth," Madame objected. "She's my
guest and she has to be entertained."

"I'm willing to do my share. I'll take her into town to the theatre some
night, and to supper afterward, in the most brilliantly lighted place I
can find."

"That's very nice of you," responded Rose, with a look of friendly
appreciation. "I know she would enjoy the bright lights."

"We all do, in certain moods," he said. "Are you ready now?"

The voice of the violin rose to heights of ecstasy, sustained by full
chords in the accompaniment. Mingled with the joy of it, like a breath
of sadness and longing, was a theme in minor, full of question and
heartbreak; of appeal that was almost prayer. And over it all, as
always, hovering like some far light, was the call to which Rose
answered. Dumbly, she knew that she must always answer it, though she
were dead and the violin itself mingled with her dust.

Madame Bernard, still seated by the fire, stirred uneasily. Something
had come into her house that vaguely troubled her, because she had no
part in it. The air throbbed with something vital, keen, alive; the room
trembled as from invisible wings imprisoned.

Old dreams and memories came back with a rush, and the little old lady
sitting in the half light looked strangely broken and frail. The sound
of marching and the steady beat of a drum vibrated through her
consciousness and the singing violin was faint and far. She saw again
the dusty street, where the blue column went forward with her Captain at
the head, his face stern and cold, grimly set to some high Purpose that
meant only anguish for her. The picture above the mantel, seen dimly
through a mist, typified, to her, the ways of men and women since the
world began--the young knight riding forward in his quest for the Grail,
already forgetting what lay behind, while the woman knelt, waiting,
waiting, waiting, as women always have and always must.

At last the music reached its end in a low chord that was at once a
question and a call. Madame rose, about to say good-night, and go up-
stairs where she might be alone. On the instant she paused. Her heart
waited almost imperceptibly, then resumed its beat.

Still holding the violin, Allison was looking at Rose. Subconsciously,
Madame noted his tall straight figure, his broad well-set shoulders, his
boyish face, and his big brown eyes. But Rose had illumined as from some
inward light; her lovely face was transfigured into a beauty beyond all
words.

Francesca slipped out without speaking and went, unheard, to her own
room. She felt guilty because she had discerned something of which Rose
herself was as yet entirely unconscious. With the instinctive sex-
loyalty that distinguishes fine women from the other sort, Madame hoped
that Allison did not know.

"And so," she said to herself, "Love has come back to my house, after
many years of absence. I wonder if he cares? He must, oh, he must!"
Francesca had no selfish thought of her own loneliness, if her Rose
should go away. Though her own heart was forever in the keeping of a
distant grave, she could still be glad of another's joy.

Rose turned away from the piano and Allison put his violin into the
case. "It's late," he said, regretfully, "and you must be tired."

"Perhaps I am, but I don't know it."

"You respond so fully to the music that it is a great pleasure to play
with you. I wish I could always have you as my accompanist."

"I do, too," murmured Rose, turning her face away. The deep colour
mounted to the roots of her hair and he studied her impersonally, as he
would have studied any other lovely thing.

"Why?" he began, then laughed.

"Why what?" asked Rose, quickly.

"I was about to ask you a very foolish question."

"Don't hesitate," she said. "Most questions are foolish."

"This is worse--it's idiotic. I was going to ask you why you hadn't
married."

With a sharp stab at the heart, Rose noted the past tense. "Why haven't
you?" she queried, forcing a smile.

"There is only one answer to that question, and yet people keep on
asking it. They might as well ask why you don't buy an automobile."

"Well?" continued Rose, inquiringly.

"Because 'the not impossible she,' or 'he,' hasn't come, that's all."

"Perhaps only one knows," she suggested.

"No," replied Allison, "in any true mating, they both know--they must."

There was a long pause. A smouldering log, in the fireplace, broke and
fell into the embers. The dying flame took new life and the warm glow
filled the room.

"Is that why people don't buy automobiles?" queried Rose, chiefly
because she did not know what else to say.

"The answer to that is that they do."

"Sounds as if you might have taken it from Alice in Wonderland," she
commented. "Maybe they've had to give each other up," she concluded,
enigmatically.

"People who will give each other up should be obliged to do it," he
returned. "May I leave my violin here? I'll be coming again so soon."

"Surely. I hope you will."

"Good-night." He took her hand for a moment, in his warm, steady clasp,
and subtly, Rose answered to the man--not the violin. She was deathly
white when the door closed, and she trembled all the way up-stairs.

When she saw herself in the mirror, she was startled, for, in her
ghostly pallor, her deep eyes burned like stars. She knew, now. The
woman who had so hungered for Life had suddenly come face to face with
its utmost wonder; its highest gift of joy--or pain.

 The heart of a man is divided into many compartments, mostly isolated.
Sometimes there is a door between two of them, or even three may be
joined, but usually, each one is complete in itself. Within the
different chambers his soul sojourns as it will, since immeasurably
beyond woman, he possesses the power of detachment, of intermittence.

Once in a lifetime, possibly, under the influence of some sweeping
passion, all the doors are flung wide and the one beloved woman may
enter in. Yet she is wise, with the wisdom of the Sphinx, if she refuses
to go. Let her say to him: "Close all these doors, except that which
bears my name. In that chamber and in that alone, we shall dwell
together." For, with these words, the memories housed in the other
chambers crumble to dust and ashes, blown only by vagrant winds of Fate.

In the heart of a woman there are few chambers and still fewer doors.
Instead of business-like compartments, neatly labelled, there are long,
labyrinthine passages, all opening into one another and inextricably
bound together. To shut out one, or even part of one, requires the
building of a wall, but it takes a long time and the barrier is never
firm.

At a single strain of music, the scent of a flower, or even one glimpse
of a path of moonlight lying fair upon a Summer sea, the barriers
crumble and fall. Through the long corridors the ghosts of the past walk
unforbidden, hindered only by broken promises, dead hopes, and dream-
dust.

Even while the petals of long-dead roses rustle through the winding
passages, where the windows are hung with cobwebs, greyed at last from
iridescence to despairing shadows, a barrier may fall at the sound of a
talismanic name, for the hands of women are small and slow to build and
the hearts of women are tender beyond all words.

Hidden in the centre of the labyrinth is one small secret chamber, and
the door may open only at the touch of one other hand. The woman herself
may go into it for peace and sanctuary, when the world goes wrong, but
always alone, until the great day comes when two may enter it together.

As Theseus carried the thread of Ariadne through the labyrinth of Crete,
there are many who attempt to find the secret chamber, but vainly, for
the thread will always break in the wrong heart.

When the door is opened, at last, by the one who has made his way
through the devious passages, there is so little to be seen that
sometimes even the man himself laughs the woman to scorn and despoils
her of her few treasures.

The secret chamber is only a bare, white room, where is erected the high
altar of her soul, served through life, by her own faith. Upon the altar
burns steadfastly the one light, waiting for him who at last has come
and consecrated in his name. The door of the sanctuary is rock-ribbed
and heavy, and he who has not the key may beat and call in vain, while
within, unheeding, the woman guards her light.

Pitifully often the man does not care. Sometimes he does not even
suspect that he has been admitted into the inmost sanctuary of her
heart, for there are men who may never know what sanctuary means, nor
what the opening of the door has cost. But the man who is worthy will
kneel at the altar for a moment, with the woman beside him, and
thereafter, when the outside world has been cruel to him, he may go in
sometimes, with her, to warm his hands at those divine fires and kindle
his failing courage anew.

When the sanctuary is not profaned by him who has come hither, its
blessedness is increased ten-fold; it takes on a certain divinity by
being shared, and thereafter, they serve the light together.

And yet, through woman's eager trustfulness, the man who opens the door
is not always the one divinely appointed to open it. Sometimes the light
fails and the woman, weeping in the darkness, is left alone in her
profaned temple, never to open its door again, or, after many years, to
set another light high upon the altar, and, in the deepening shadows,
pray.

So, because the door had never been opened, and because she knew the man
had come at last who might enter the sanctuary with her, Rose lifted her
ever-burning light that night to the high altar of her soul, and set
herself to wait until he should find his way there.






VII

FATHER AND SON

The house seemed very quiet, though steadily, from a distant upper room,
came the sound of a violin. For more than an hour, Allison had worked
continuously at one difficult phrase. Colonel Kent smiled whimsically as
he sat in the library, thinking that, by this time, he could almost play
it himself.

Looking back over the thirty years, he could see where he had made
mistakes in moulding the human clay entrusted to his care, yet, in the
end, the mistakes had not mattered. Back in the beginning, he had
formulated certain cherished ideals for his son, and had worked steadily
toward them, unmindful of occasional difficulties and even failures.

Against his own judgment, he had yielded to Francesca in the choice of
the boy's career. "Look at his hands," she had said. "You couldn't put
hands like his at work in an office. If he isn't meant for music, we'll
find it out soon enough."

But Allison had gone on, happily, along the chosen path, with never a
question or doubt of his ultimate success. Just now, the Colonel was
deeply grateful to Francesca, for the years abroad had been pleasant
ones, and would have been wholly impossible had Allison been working in
an office.

With a sigh, he began to pace back and forth through the hall, his hands
in his pockets, and his grey head bowed. Before him was his own
portrait, in uniform, his hand upon his sword. The sword itself, hanging
in a corner of the hall, was dull and lifeless now. He had a curious
sense that his work was done.

The tiny stream, rising from some cool pool among the mountains, is not
unlike man's own beginning, for, at first, it gives no hint of its
boundless possibilities. Grown to a river, taking to itself the water
from a thousand secret channels, it leaps down the mountain, heedless of
rocky barriers, with all the joy of lusty youth.

The river itself portrays humanity precisely, with its tortuous
windings, its accumulation of driftwood, its unsuspected depths, and its
crystalline shallows, singing in the Summer sun. Barriers may be built
across its path, but they bring only power, as the conquering of an
obstacle is always sure to do. Sometimes when the rocks and stone-clad
hills loom large ahead, and eternity itself would be needed to carve a
passage, there is an easy way around. The discovery of it makes the
river sing with gladness and turns the murmurous deeps to living water,
bright with ripples and foam.

Ultimately, too, in spite of rocks and driftwood, of endless seeking for
a path, of tempestuous nights and days of ice and snow, man and the
river reach the eternal sea, to be merged forever with the Everlasting.

Upstairs the music ceased. A door opened, then closed, and presently
Allison came down, rubbing his hands. "It's a little cool up there," he
said, "and yet, by the calendar, it's Spring. I wish this climate could
be averaged up."

"Even then, we wouldn't be satisfied," the Colonel returned. "Who wants
all his days to be alike?"

"Nobody. Still, it's a bit trying to freeze your nose one day and be
obliged to keep all the windows open the next."

There was a long pause. The Colonel tapped his fingers restlessly upon
the library table. Allison went over to the open fire and stood with his
back to it, clasping his hands behind him. "What have you been doing all
the morning, Dad?"

"Nothing. Just sitting here, thinking."

"Pretty hopeless occupation unless you have something in particular to
think about."

"It's better to have nothing to think about than to be obliged to think
of something unpleasant, isn't it?"

"I don't know," Allison responded, smothering a yawn. "Almost anything
is better than being bored."

"You're not bored, are you?" asked the Colonel, quickly.

"Far from it, but I have my work. I was thinking of you."

"I can work, too," the Colonel replied. "I think as soon as the ground
thaws out, I'll make a garden. A floral catalogue came yesterday and the
pictures are very inspiring."

"Does it give any directions for distinguishing between the flowers and
weeds?"

"No," laughed the Colonel, "but I've thought of trying the ingenious
plan of the man who pulled up the plants and carefully watered the
weeds, expecting the usual contrary results."

Luncheon was announced and they went out together, shivering at the
change in temperature between the library and the dining-room, where
there would be no cheerful open fire until the dinner hour.

"What are you going to do this afternoon?" queried the Colonel.

"Why, work, I suppose--at least until I get too tired to work any more."

"You seem to believe in an eight-hour day."

Something in the tone gave Allison an inkling of the fact that his
father was lonely and restless in the big house. When they were abroad,
he had managed to occupy himself pleasantly while Allison was busy, and,
for the first time, the young man wondered whether it had been wise to
come back.

The loneliness of the great rooms was evident, if one looked for it, and
the silence was literally to be felt, everywhere. It is difficult for
two people to be happy in a large house; they need the cosiness
established by walls not too far apart, ceilings not too high, and the
necessary furniture not too widely separated. A single row of books,
within easy reach, may hint of companionship not possible to the great
bookcase across a large room.

"I think," said Allison, "that perhaps this house is too large for us.
Why should we need fifteen rooms?"

"We don't, but what's the use of moving again just now, when we're all
settled."

"It's no trouble to move," returned the young man.

"It might be, if we did it ourselves. I fancy that Miss Rose could give
us a few pointers on the subject of opening an old house."

"There may be something in that," admitted Allison. "What charming
neighbours they are!" he added, in a burst of enthusiasm.

"Madame Bernard," replied the Colonel, with emphasis, "is one of the
finest women I have ever had the good fortune to meet. Miss Rose is like
her, but I have known only one other of the same sort."

"And the other was--"

"Your mother."

The Colonel pushed back his plate and went to the window. Beyond the
mountains, somewhere in "God's acre," was the little sunken grave still
enfolding a handful of sacred dust. With a sudden throb of pain, Allison
realised, for the first time in his life, that his father was an old
man. The fine, strong face, outlined clearly by the pitiless afternoon
sun, was deeply lined: the broad shoulders were stooped a little, and
the serene eyes dimmed as though by mist. In the moment he seemed to
have crossed the dividing line between maturity and age.

Allison was about to suggest that they take a walk after luncheon,
having Madame Bernard's household in mind as the ultimate object, but,
before he could speak, the Colonel had turned away from the window.

"Some day you'll marry, lad," he said, in a strange tone.

Allison smiled and shrugged his shoulders doubtfully.

"And then," the Colonel continued, with a little catch in his voice,
"the house will be none too large for two--for you two."

Very rarely, and for a moment only, Allison looked like his mother. For
an instant she lived again in her son's eyes, then vanished.

"Dad," he said, gently, "I'm sure you wouldn't desert me even if I did
marry. You've stood by me too long."

The stooped shoulders straightened and the Colonel smiled. "Do you mean
that--if you married, you'd still--want me?"

"Most assuredly."

"She wouldn't."

"If she didn't," returned Allison, lightly, "she wouldn't get me. Not
that I'm any prize to be wrangled over by the fair sex, individually or
collectively, but you and I stand together, Dad, and don't you forget
it."

The Colonel cleared his throat, tried to speak, then stopped abruptly.
"I have been thinking," he continued, with a swift change of mood and
subject, "that we might manage a dinner party. We're much indebted to
Madame Bernard."

"Good idea! I don't know what sort of party it would prove to be, but,
if we did our best, it would be all right with them. Anyhow, Aunt
Francesca would give an air to it."

"So would the others, Miss Rose especially."

"I wonder why Aunt Francesca didn't marry again," mused Allison.

"Because her heart is deep enough to hold a grave."

"You knew her husband, didn't you?"

"He was my best friend," answered the Colonel, a little sadly. "How the
years separate and destroy, and blot out the things that count for the
most!"

"I wonder how she happened to be named 'Francesca.' It isn't an American
name."

"She wasn't. Her name was 'Mary Frances,' and he changed it to 'Marie
Francesca.' So she has been 'Marie Francesca' ever since, though she
never uses the 'Marie.' That was his name for her."

"The change suits her someway. Queer idea she has about names fitting
people, and yet it isn't so queer, either, when you come to think of it.
Rose might have been named Abigail or Jerusha, yet I believe people
would have found out she was like a rose and called her by her proper
name."

Colonel Kent flashed a quick glance at him, but the expression of his
face had not changed. "And Isabel?" he queried, lightly.

"Isabel's only a kid and it doesn't matter so much whether things fit
her or not. I've promised to take her to the theatre," he continued,
irrelevantly, "because Aunt Francesca wants her guest to be amused. I'm
also commissioned to find some youths about twenty and trot 'em round
for Isabel's inspection. Do you know of anybody?"

"I've seen only one who might do. There's a lanky boy with unruly hair
and an expansive smile whom I've seen at the post-office a time or two.
He usually has a girl with him, but she may be his sister. They look
astonishingly alike."

"Bet it's the Crosby twins. I'd like to see the little devils, if
they've grown up."

"They're grown up, whoever they are. The boy is almost as tall as I am
and his sister doesn't lack much of it."

"I must hunt 'em up. They've already called on Isabel, and perhaps, when
she returns the call, she'll take me along."

"Who brought them up?" asked the Colonel idly.

"They've brought themselves up, for the last five or six years, and I'm
of the opinion that they've always done it."

"Let's invite them to the dinner party."

Allison's eyes danced at the suggestion. "All right, but we'll have to
see 'em first. They may not want to come."

"I've often wondered," mused the Colonel, "why it is so much more
pleasant to entertain than it is to be entertained. I'd rather have a
guest any day than to be one."

"And yet," returned Allison, "if you are a guest, you can get away any
time you want to, within reasonable limits. If you're entertaining,
you've got to keep it going until they all want to go."

"In that case, it might be better for us if we went to Crosbys'."

"We can do that, too. I think it would be fun, though, to have 'em here.
We need another man in one sense, though not in another."

"I have frequently had occasion to observe," remarked the Colonel, "that
many promising dinners are wholly spoiled by the idea that there must be
an equal number of men and women. One uncongenial guest can ruin a
dinner more easily than a poor salad--and that is saying a great deal."

"Your salad days aren't over yet, evidently."

"I hope not."

The hour of talk had done the Colonel a great deal of good, and he was
quite himself again. Some new magazines had come in the afternoon mail
and lay on the library table. He fingered the paper knife absently as he
tore off the outer wrappings and threw them into the fire.

"I believe I'll go up and work for a couple of hours," said Allison,
"and then we'll go out for a walk."

"All right, lad. I'll be ready."

Even after the strains of the violin sounded faintly from upstairs,
accompanied by a rhythmic tread as Allison walked to and fro, Colonel
Kent did not begin to cut the leaves.

Instead, he sat gazing into the fire, thinking. Quite unconsciously, for
years, he had been carrying a heavy burden--the fear that Allison would
marry and that his marriage would bring separation. Now he was greatly
reassured. "And yet," he thought, "there's no telling what a woman may
do."

The sense that his work was done still haunted him, and, resolutely, he
tried to push it aside. "While there's life, there's work," he said to
himself. He knew, however, as he had not known before, that Allison was
past the need of his father, except for companionship.

The old house seemed familiar, yet as though it belonged to another
life. He remembered the building of it, when, with a girl's golden head
upon his shoulder, they had studied plans together far into the night.
As though it were yesterday, their delight at the real beginning came
back. There was another radiant hour, when the rough flooring for the
first story was laid, and, with bare scantlings reared, skeleton-like,
all around them, they actually went into their own house.

One by one, through the vanished years, he sought out the links that
bound him to the past. The day the bride came home from the honeymoon,
and knelt, with him, upon the hearth-stone, to light their first fire
together; the day she came to him, smiling, to whisper to him the secret
that lay beneath her heart; the long waiting, half fearful and half
sweet, then the hours of terror that made an eternity of a night, then
the dawn, that brought the ultimate, unbroken peace which only God can
change.

Over there, in front of the fireplace in the library, the little mother
had lain in her last sleep. The heavy scent of tuberoses, the rumble of
wheels, the slow sound of many feet, and the tiny, wailing cry that
followed them when he and she went out of their house together for the
last time--it all came back, but, mercifully, without pain.

Were it not for this divine forgetting, few of us could bear life. One
can recall only the fact of suffering, never the suffering itself. When
a sorrow is once healed, it leaves only a tender memory, to come back,
perhaps, in many a twilight hour, with tears from which the bitterness
has been distilled.

Slowly, too, by the wonderful magic of the years, unknown joys reveal
themselves and stand before us, as though risen from the dead. At such
and such a time, we were happy, but we did not know it. In the midst of
sorrow, the joy comes back, not reproachfully, but to beckon us on, with
clearer sight, to those which lie on the path beyond.

He remembered, too, that after the first sharp agony of bereavement was
over; when he had learned that even Death does not deny Love, he had
seemed to enter some mysterious fellowship. Gradually, he became aware
of the hidden griefs of others, and from many unsuspected sources came
consolation. Even those whom he had thought hard and cold cherished some
holy of holies--some sacred altar where a bruised heart had been healed
and the bitterness taken away.

He had come to see that the world was full of kindness; that through the
countless masks of varying personalities, all hearts beat in perfect
unison, and that joy, in reality, is immortal, while pain dies in a day.

"And yet," he thought, "how strange it is that life must be nearly over,
before one fully learns to live."

The fire crackled cheerily on the hearth, the sunbeams danced gaily
through the old house, spending gold-dust generously in corners that
were usually dark, and the uncut magazine slipped to the floor. Above,
the violin sang high and clear. The Colonel leaned back in his chair and
closed his eyes.

When Allison came down, he was asleep, with the peace of Heaven upon his
face, and so quiet that the young man leaned over him, a little
frightened, to wait for the next deep breath. Reassured, he did not wake
him, but went for his walk alone.






VIII

"THE YEAR'S AT THE SPRING"

Outside, in the grey darkness, the earth was soft with snow. Upon the
illimitable horizon beyond the mountain peaks were straying gleams of
dawn, colourless, but none the less surely a promise of daybreak.

Rose had been awake for some time, listening to the ice-clad branches
that clattered with every passing breeze. A maple bough, tapping on her
window as ghostly fingers might, had first aroused her from a medley of
dreams.

She went to the window, shivering a little, and, while she stood there,
watching the faint glow in the East, the wind changed in quality, though
it was still cool. Hints of warmth and fragrance were indefinably
blended with the cold, and Rose laughed as she crept back to bed, for
she had chanced upon the mysterious hour when the Weaver of the Seasons
changed the pattern upon the loom.

Having raised another window shade, she could see the dawn from where
she lay. Tints of gold and amethyst came slowly upon the grey and made
the horizon delicately iridescent, like mother-of-pearl. Warm and soft
from the Southland, the first wind of Spring danced merrily into Madame
Francesca's sleeping garden, thrilling all the life beneath the sod.
With the first beam of sun, the ice began to drip from the imprisoned
trees and every fibre of shrub and tree to quiver with aspiration, as
though a clod should suddenly find a soul.

In the watcher's heart, too, had come another Spring, for once in time
and tune with the outer world. The heart's seasons seldom coincide with
the calendar. Who among us has not been made desolate beyond all words
upon some golden day when the little creatures of the air and meadow
were life incarnate, from sheer joy of living? Who among us has not come
home, singing, when the streets were almost impassable with snow, or met
a friend with a happy, smiling face, in the midst of a pouring rain?

The soul, too, has its own hours of Winter and Spring. Gethsemane and
Calvary may come to us in the time of roses and Easter rise upon us in a
December night. How shall we know, in our own agony, of another's
gladness, or, on that blessed to-morrow when the struggle is over, help
someone else to bear our own forgotten pain?

True sympathy is possible only when the season of one soul accords with
that of another, or else when memory, divinely tender, brings back a
vivid, scarlet hour out of grey, forgotten days, to enable us to share,
with another, his own full measure of sorrow or of joy.

Ah, but the world was awake at last! Javelin-like, across a field of
melting snow, went a flash of blue wings, and in Madame Francesca's own
garden a robin piped his cheery strain upon the topmost bough of a
dripping tree.

The woman, too, was awake, in every fibre of body and soul. Even her
finger-tips seemed sentient and alive; her heart was strangely lifted,
as though by imprisoned wings. She had no doubt of the ultimate hour,
when he would know also, yet, half-afraid, she shrank from it, as she
would not have shrunk from pain.

Madame had once remarked that civilisation must have begun not earlier
than nine in the morning, or later than noon. She had a horror of the
early breakfast, when the family, cold, but clean, gathers itself around
the board which only last night was festive and strives valiantly to be
pleasant. It was almost an axiom with her that human, friendly
conversation was not possible before nine in the morning.

So, as there was no one else to be pleased, the three women breakfasted
when and where they chose. If Rose preferred to robe herself
immaculately in white linen and have her coffee in the dining-room at
seven, she was at liberty to do so. If she wanted it in her own room, at
ten, that also was easily managed, but this was the only "movable feast"
Madame would permit. Luncheon and dinner went precisely by tae clock,
year in and year out.

Too happy to sleep and yearning to be outdoors, Rose dressed quietly and
tiptoed down-stairs. She smiled whimsically as the heavy front door
slammed behind her, wondering if it would wake the others and if they,
too, would know that it was Spring.

Tips of green showed now and then where the bulbs were planted, and,
down in the wild garden, when she brushed aside the snow, Rose found a
blushing hepatica in full bloom. "How indiscreet," she thought, then
added, to herself, "but what sublime courage it must take to blossom
now!"

The plump robin, whose winter had evidently been pleasant, hopped about
the garden after her, occasionally seeking shelter on the lower bough of
a tree if she turned, or came too near. "Don't be afraid," she called,
aloud, then laughed, as with a farewell chirp and a flutter of wings,
the robin took himself beyond the reach of further conversational
liberties.

Her pulses leaped with abundant life; the wet road lured her eager feet.
She went out, leaving the gate open, and turned toward the woods, where
a flock of wild geese, breasting the chill winds far above the river,
was steadily cleaving a passage to the friendly North.

When she reached the woods, where the white birches stood like shy
dryads among the oaks, she heard once more the robin's flutelike call.
It was answered by another, exactly upon the same notes, yet wholly
different as to quality. Presently, among the trees, she caught a
glimpse of a tall man, and she paused for an instant, frightened. Then
her heart leaped and her cheeks burned, as she saw who it was.

"Boy!" she called, clearly. "Oh, Boy!"

Allison turned, startled, then came to her, smiling, hat in hand. "Upon
my word," he said. "I didn't think there was anyone else mad enough to
come out at this hour."

"Why it's Spring! Didn't you know?"

"Yes. It came this morning just before sunrise."

"Were you awake?"

"Yes, were you?"

"Of course," she answered. "I couldn't stay in."

"Nor could I."

    "The year's at the spring,
     And day's at the morn;
     Morning's at seven;
     The hill-side's dew-pearled,"

Rose quoted. "You know the rest, don't you?"

"The rest doesn't matter. 'Morning waits at the end of the world--Gypsy,
come away!'"

"I'll go," she breathed, her eyes fixed on his, "anywhere!"

"To the river, then. The last time I saw it, ice and snow had hidden it
completely."

The path was narrow until they got out of the woods, so Rose went ahead.
"I don't believe I fooled that robin by whistling to him," Allison
continued. "He pretended I did, but I believe he was only trying to be
polite."

"He wasn't, if it was the same robin I saw in our garden this morning. I
spoke to him most pleasantly and told him not to be afraid of me, but he
disappeared with a very brief, chirpy good-bye."

"Don't hurry so," he said, as he came up beside her and assisted her
over a fallen tree. "We've got the whole day, haven't we?"

"We have all the time there is," laughed Rose. "Everybody has, for that
matter."

"Have you had your breakfast?"

"No, have you?"

"Far from it. Everybody was asleep when I came out."

"Then you'll have breakfast with me," she said, quickly.

"Thank you," he smiled, "for taking the hint."

"But won't your father miss you?" she queried, with mock seriousness.

"He pays no attention whatever to my irregular habits, and I think
that's one reason why we get on so well together. It's a wise father who
knows his own child."

"Especially if it is a wise child," she replied. Her eyes were dancing
with mirth, a scarlet signal burned on either cheek, and her parted lips
were crimson. She seemed lovelier to him than ever before.

"Honestly, Rose, you seem to get prettier every day."

"Then," she smiled, "if I were younger, I might eventually become
dangerous."

"Rose--"

"Old Rose," she interrupted. The high colour faded from her face as she
spoke and left her pale.

Allison put his hand on her arm and stopped. "Rose, please don't. You're
not a day older than I am."

"Ten years," she insisted stubbornly, for women are wont to lean upon
the knife that stabs them and she was in a reckless mood. "When you're
forty, I'll be fifty."

A shadow crossed his face. "It hurts me, someway, to have you talk so. I
don't know how--nor why."

In a single swift surge her colour came back. "All right," she answered,
quietly, "hereafter I'm thirty, also. Thanking you for giving me ten
more years of life, for I love it so!"

The sun was well up in the heavens when they came to the river, and the
dark, rippling surface gave back the light in a thousand little dancing
gleams. The ice was broken, the snow was gone, and fragments of
shattered crystal went gently toward the open sea, lured by the song of
the river underneath.

"It doesn't look deep," remarked Rose.

"But it is, nevertheless. I nearly drowned myself here when I was a kid,
trying to dive to the bottom."

"I'm glad you didn't succeed. What a heavy blow it would have been to
your father!"

"Dear old Dad," said Allison, gently. "I'm all he has."

"And all he wants."

"It's after eight," Allison complained, looking at his watch, "and I'm
starving."

"So am I. Likewise my skirts are wet, so we'd better go."

When they reached Madame Bernard's, Rose ordered breakfast in the
dining-room, for two, then excused herself to put on dry clothing.
Allison waited before the open fire until she came down, fresh and
tailor-made, in another gown and a white linen collar.

"I thought women always wore soft, fluffy things in the morning," he
observed, as they sat down.

"Some do--the fluffy ones, always."

"Who, for instance, are the fluffy ones?"

"Aunt Francesca for one and Isabel for another."

"How long is the kid going to stay?"

"Until she gets ready to go home, I suppose."

"I thought she had no home."

"She hasn't. Poor Isabel is a martyr to the Cause of Woman."

"How so?"

"Her mother is Emancipated, with a large E, and has no time for trifles
like a daughter. She devotes herself to what she calls the Higher World
Service."

"So Isabel is stranded, on a desert island."

"Yes, except for us."

"How good you are!" he exclaimed, with honest admiration.

"It was Aunt Francesca," returned Rose, flushing slightly. "I had
nothing to do with it. She took me from a desert island, too."

"Is Isabel emancipated?"

"Not in the sense that her mother is."

"I don't see but what she is free."

"She is. She can do exactly as she pleases and there is no one to say
her nay."

"I thought all women did as they please."

"They do, in the sense that we all do as we please. If you make a
sacrifice, you do it because you can get more pleasure out of making it
than you would otherwise."

"You've been reading Spencer."

"I plead guilty," she laughed.

"If it's true," he went on, after a moment's pause, "a genuine New
England conscience must be an unholy joy to its proud possessor."

"It's unholy at all events. One lump, or two?" she asked, as the coffee
was brought in.

"Two, please."

It seemed very pleasant to Allison to sit there in the warm, sunny room,
with Rose opposite him, pouring his coffee. There was an air of cosiness
and domestic peace about it hitherto outside his experience. For the
first time he was conscious of the peculiar graciousness and sense of
home that only a home-loving woman may give to a house.

"I like this," he said, as he took the steaming cup. "I'd like to do it
often."

"We'd like to have you," she returned, hospitably.

"I thought you all had breakfast together at some fixed hour, and early
at that."

"How little you know Aunt Francesca! You can have breakfast in this
house in any room you choose, at any hour before noon, all the year
round. Sometimes we're all together, sometimes only two. Usually,
however I'm alone, as I seem to get up a little earlier than the
others."

"I think I'll drop in occasionally, then. It looks as if there'd always
be somebody to bear me company. Perhaps I'll bring Dad, too. He'd like
to have you pour his coffee."

There was no mistaking the admiration in Allison's eyes and Rose turned
hers away. He sat with his back to the dining-room door and she, across
from him, faced it squarely. For the merest fraction of a second Isabel,
in a pink silk negligee, stood in the doorway, then vanished, as
noiselessly as she had come. Her eyes were full of mysterious meaning
that Rose was powerless to translate.

"I'd enjoy it," Rose said quickly. "I love to pour the coffee and Aunt
Francesca always lets me on the rare occasions when we breakfast
together."

If her colour was a little brighter, if her voice was in a higher key,
if her eyes had changed their expression, Allison did not notice it.
Yet, in the instant, she had attained a certain dual consciousness--
there seemed to be two of her. One was the woman of the world, well-
schooled in self-control, tactful, watchful, ready to smooth any
awkwardness, and, at every point, to guard her guest. The other was
Primitive Woman; questioning, curious, and watchful in the sense of
rivalry. She put it resolutely aside to think about later, and was very
glad that Allison did not know.

She was greatly relieved when he went home, promising to return later
for a few hours of work upon a difficult concerto. "We'll do it again,"
he said, laughing, as he went down the steps. "Ask Aunt Francesca to
give me a meal ticket, to be used solely for breakfasts, will you?"

Rose only smiled in answer, but waved her hand to him as he went out of
the gate. She stood pensively in the hall for a moment or two after she
had closed the door, and would have gone up to her own room had she not
heard a step at the head of the stairs.

Isabel was coming down, also fresh and tailor-made, with a white linen
collar and a dashing crimson tie. Rose strolled into the library, took
up a magazine, sat down, and pretended to read.

"I'm so sorry to be late to breakfast," remarked Isabel, following her.
"But perhaps it's just as well, as I wasn't invited."

"Nobody was invited," returned Rose, coolly. "I went out for an early
walk, chanced to meet Mr. Kent, and he invited himself here to
breakfast."

"I didn't know you were in the habit of taking early walks."

"I'm trying to acquire the habit," answered Rose, with icy sweetness.

"It won't be hard," Isabel said, maliciously, "if they're all equally
pleasant." She slammed the door as she went out, shutting Rose in the
library.

For an instant Rose was angry, then her sense of humour triumphed and
she laughed quietly until the tears came. There was no need now to
meditate upon that mysterious look in the girl's eyes, for she had
translated it herself.

"The idea," said Rose to herself. "That foolish little child!" She tried
to recall the conversation at the breakfast table, and remembered, with
regret, that they had discussed Isabel quite freely. The thought that
Isabel might have been listening before she made her presence known came
forward persistently, though Rose hated herself for it.

Then, with swift resolution, she put all annoying thoughts aside to
dwell, happily, upon the perfect hour that nothing could ever change or
spoil. She went into the hall by another door opening out of the
library, thus avoiding Isabel, and sought her own room, singing to
herself:

"The year's at the spring,
  And day's at the morn,
 The morning's at seven,
   The hillside's dew-pearled,
 The lark's on the wing,
   The snail's on the thorn;
 God's in His heaven--
   All's right with the world!"






IX

A KNIGHT-ERRANT

Another mongrel had been added to the Crosby collection, so the canine
herd now numbered twenty, all in the best of health and spirits. Some
unpleasantness had been caused at the breakfast table by a gentle hint
from Juliet to the effect that the dog supply seemed somewhat in excess
of the demand. She had added insult to injury by threatening to
chloroform the next dog her brother brought home.

"Huh!" Romeo sneered, "they're as much yours as mine. You brought home
the spotted one yourself."

"That was only because the boys were teasing him. I didn't want him."

"I've never brought home any without good reasons, and you know it.
Besides, we've got room here for forty dogs, and they're all fenced in.
They don't bother anybody."

"Except by barking," complained Juliet.

"They don't bark much unless somebody goes by, and there aren't any
neighbours near enough to hear 'em, even then."

"They do bark," Juliet put in fretfully. "They bark all the time at
something. They bark when they're hungry and when they've eaten too
much, and they bark at the sun and moon and stars, and when they're not
barking, some or all of 'em are fighting. They drive me crazy."

"Jule," said Romeo, sternly, "I don't see what's the matter with you
lately. You act like a sissy girl. Go up into the attic and work on the
trapeze for an hour or two, and you'll feel better. It wouldn't surprise
me now if you got so sissy that you were afraid of mice and snakes."

Juliet's anger rose to the point of tears. "I'm not afraid of mice," she
sobbed, "and you know it. And I'll hold a little green snake by the tail
just as long as you will, so there!"

Man-like, Romeo hated tears. "Shut up, Jule," he said, not unkindly,
"and we'll arbitrate."

When her sobs ceased and she had washed her face in cold water, they
calmly argued the question at issue. Romeo candidly admitted that twenty
dogs might well be sufficient for people of simple tastes and Juliet did
not deny that only a "sissy girl" would be annoyed by barking.
Eventually, Romeo promised not to bring home any more dogs unless the
present supply should be depleted by disappearance or accident, and
Juliet promised not to chloroform any without his consent. With one
accord, they decided to fit out the dogs with brown leather collars
trimmed with yellow and to train the herd to follow the automobile.

"They ought to be trained by the thirtieth of June," observed Romeo. "It
would make more of a celebration for Uncle if we took 'em along."

"Did you order the monogram put on the automobile?"

"Sure. I told 'em to put 'The Yellow Peril' on each door and on the
back, and the initials, 'C. T.' above it everywhere." The twins had
adopted a common monogram, signifying "Crosby Twins." It adorned their
stationery and their seal, but, as they seldom wrote letters, it had not
been of much use.

"We might have the initials put on the dogs' collars, too," Juliet
suggested.

"Sure," assented Romeo, cordially. "Then, if we lose any of 'em on the
road, we can identify 'em when they're found, and get 'em back."

Juliet saw that she had made a mistake and hoped Romeo would forget
about it, but vainly, for he lounged over and made a memorandum on the
slate that hung in the hall.

"I wonder," continued Romeo, thoughtfully, "if the yard is big enough to
train 'em in. We ought not to go out on the road until the thirtieth."

"That's easy enough," Juliet answered, with a superior air.

"How'd you go about it?" he demanded.

"If they were my dogs and I wanted 'em to follow me in an automobile,
I'd let 'em fast for a day or two and fill the back seat of the machine
with raw meat. They'd follow quick enough and be good and lively about
it, too. They wouldn't need to be trained."

"Jule," said Romeo, solemnly, "will you please forgive me for calling
you a 'sissy girl'?"

"Sure!" Juliet had learned long before she was twenty, that "forgive
me," from a man's lips, indicates the uttermost depths of abasement and
devotion.

"The fasting won't hurt 'em," Romeo continued, eager to change the
subject. "They're all in good condition now."

"Except the last one. You can see some of his ribs yet."

"You can't by June."

"No, I guess not. Say, Romie, oughtn't she to be coming to see us by
now?"

"Who?"

"Isabel--what's-her-name. You know, up at Bernard's."

Happy-hearted comrade though she was, Juliet had a secret longing for
feminine association, at rare intervals. It would be pleasant she
thought, to go skating sometimes with a girl or two instead of the usual
crowd of boys. She hated herself fiercely for disloyalty, but the idea
recurred persistently.

"I'm not up on etiquette," Romeo replied, casually, "but I should think,
if she wanted to come, she could do it by now. We made a polite call as
far as I know."

"We didn't leave any cards."

"Cards? What kind of cards?"

"Why, little cards with our names on 'em. People always leave 'em, in
the books, when they make calls."

Romeo went over to the slate again and made another memorandum. "I'll
get 'em. What'll we have on 'em?"

"We always go together," Juliet suggested, "so I think one will do. Just
put on it 'The Crosby Twins,' with our address."

"No need of the address. Everybody who knows us knows where we live."

"Perhaps," Juliet went on, meditatively, "she doesn't like me."

"If she doesn't," Romeo retorted, "I'll know the reason why. Do you
remember what I did to the red-headed boy from the Ridge who said he
wouldn't skate with the crowd if there was a girl in it?"

Juliet nodded with satisfaction. "But you know, Romie, you can't hit a
girl."

"That's so," he admitted disconsolately. "That fresh kid had to wear
beefsteak over one eye for almost a week."

Juliet laughed at the idea of Isabel with beefsteak bandaged over one
eye. "We won't worry about things we can't help," she said,
philosophically. "We've done the proper thing and now it's up to her. If
she doesn't come before we get the automobile, she doesn't get invited
to go out in it."

"You bet she doesn't."

The talk quickly turned to the unfailing subject of automobiles. "The
Yellow Peril" had been ordered and half paid for, but there was delay in
delivery. The brown clothes trimmed with tan leather had also been
ordered, as well as the brown felt hats, exactly alike, with yellow
ribbon bands. They had the goggles and enjoyed glaring fiercely at each
other through them, especially at meals. Juliet had thought of making a
veil of yellow chiffon, but Romeo had objected violently. He thought
they should look as much alike as possible, so she had yielded.

They had decided to make a wide track through the yard and around the
barn to practise on. Suitable space for the, automobile had already been
set aside in the barn and safely fenced in beyond the reach of canine
interference. Romeo had not seen the necessity of the fence until Juliet
had pointed out that some of the dogs would want to sleep on the leather
cushions. "It would make it smell so doggy," she had said, "that we'd
have to call it 'The Yellow Dog' instead of 'The Yellow Peril.'"

Romeo, with true masculine detachment, could talk automobile with
unfailing enthusiasm, and yet think continually about something else.
The thought that Isabel might not like Juliet had not occurred to him.
It seemed impossible that anybody should not like Juliet, for, in the
fond eyes of her twin, she was the most sane and sensible girl in the
world.

"Anyhow," thought Romeo as he went to sleep that night, "if Jule wants
her to come here, she's got to do it, that's all."

He meditated upon the problem for several days without reaching any
satisfactory conclusion. At last he determined to go up to see Isabel
himself, and, as he phrased it in his own mind, "see how the land lays."
It would be difficult to elude Juliet, but, in Romeo's experience, the
things one determined to do could nearly always be done.

It was an easy matter to make an errand to the City, "to poke 'em up a
bit about the machine," and to get the visiting cards, which had
promptly been ordered by mail. Juliet rather insisted upon going along,
but was easily dissuaded by the fact that "there might be a row, and
anyway, it's a man's job."

He came home about dusk with several packages, one of which he carefully
concealed under a pile of leaves in the fence corner just inside the
yard. He could easily reach through the palings and lift it over the
fence as he passed.

Juliet admired the cards, was delighted with a box of chocolates and two
new novels, and condescended to approve of Romeo's new red tie. He had
gloves in his pocket, but feared to show them to her, gloves being her
pet object of scorn.

After they had cleared off the table, Romeo strolled over to the window.
Five of the dogs were gathered about some small object and the yard was
littered with bits of white. Under his breath Romeo said something that
sounded like profanity, and Juliet pricked up her ears.

"What's the matter?" she demanded.

"I brought home some flowers," explained Romeo, carefully, for it was
written in the covenant that the twins should never, under any
circumstances, lie to each other, "and I must have dropped 'em. The dogs
have torn 'em to pieces, box and all."

Juliet clapped her hands gleefully. "I'm glad of it!"

"Why?" he asked quickly, with an uneasy sense that she was a mind-
reader.

"Because we've got so many dogs."

Romeo chose to take offence at the innocent remark and relapsed into
gloomy silence. Disdaining to speak, Juliet curled up on the decrepit
sofa with a book and the chocolates, and presently went to sleep.

"Fortune favours the brave," he quoted to himself, as he tiptoed into
the kitchen, cautiously closing the door. A subtle perfume filled the
room and he sniffed appreciatively. An open bottle of vanilla extract
stood on the kitchen table, where a pan of fudges was cooling, marked
off into neat squares. He wrapped the pan in a newspaper, anointed his
handkerchief liberally with the fragrant extract, and softly stole out
into the night.

The dogs followed him to the back fence, but did not bark. Only a few
soft whines followed him as he sped down the road, thrilled with a sense
of adventure and romance. If Juliet should happen to wake, she would
think he had gone away because he was angry, and never need know that
like some misunderstood knight of old, he was merely upon an errand of
chivalry for her. The fudges would do as well as the calla lilies,
probably, though he felt instinctively that they were not quite as
elegant.

It was a long way to Madame Bernard's, and Juliet's knight-errant was
weary, after an exhausting day in town. He paused outside the gate long
enough to clean the dust from his shoes with the most soiled of his two
handkerchiefs, then went boldly up the steps and rang the bell.

He was embarrassed to find Colonel Kent and Allison there, though the
younger man's tact speedily set him at ease again, and enabled him to
offer Isabel the pan of fudges with unwonted grace of manner. Then he
went over to Madame Bernard.

"Juliet couldn't come to-night," he said, "but here's our card."

Madame could not repress a smile as she read "The Crosby Twins" engraved
in the fashionable script of the moment. "How very original," she said,
kindly. "Nobody but you and Juliet would have thought of it."

"Jule thought of it," he replied, with evident pride. "She's more up on
etiquette than I am."

"If it's proper for husband and wife to have their names engraved on the
same card," Madame went on, "it must be all right for twins."

"It's more proper," Romeo returned, "because nobody is so much related
as twins are. Husband and wife are only relatives by marriage."

Colonel Kent laughed appreciatively. "Good! May I have some of Miss
Isabel's candy?"

Isabel, convulsed with secret mirth, informally passed the pan, and only
Romeo refused. "I can have 'em any time," he said, generously. "Doesn't
Jule make dandy fudges, though?"

Everybody agreed that she did. Madame Francesca expressed something more
than conventional regret that Juliet had not been able to come. "She was
asleep," Romeo explained, with studied indifference.

"After she wakes," suggested Colonel Kent, "we'd like very much to have
you both come to our house to dinner."

"Thank you," replied Romeo, somewhat stiffly. "We'd be very much
pleased." Then to himself, he added: "That was a lie, but it wasn't to
Jule, so it doesn't matter."

Rose made friendly inquiries about the dogs and told Allison that Romeo
was said to have the finest collection of fishing tackle in the State.
Much gratified, Romeo invited Allison to go fishing with him as soon as
the season opened, and, as an afterthought, politely included the
Colonel.

"I've never been fishing," remarked Isabel, as she could think of
nothing else to say.

"Girls are an awful bother in a boat," Romeo returned, with youthful
candour. "That is, except Juliet."

Isabel flushed faintly and bit her lips. To relieve an awkward pause,
Madame Francesca asked Allison to play something.

"Yes," said Romeo, "go on and play." He meant to be particularly
courteous, but his tone merely indicated that he would not be seriously
annoyed by music.

As the first strains came from the piano and violin, Romeo established
himself upon the couch beside Isabel, and, in a low, guarded tone, began
to talk automobile. Isabel was so much interested that she wholly forgot
Aunt Francesca's old-fashioned ideas about interrupting a player, and
the conversation became animated.

Both Rose and Allison had too much good sense to be annoyed, but
occasionally, until the last chord, they exchanged glances of amusement.
When they stopped, Isabel was saying: "Your suits must be just lovely."

Romeo turned with a lordly wave of the hand. "You don't need to stop. Go
on!"

"How can you expect us to play properly?" inquired Rose, tactfully,
"when you're talking about automobiles? We'd much rather listen to you."

"Begin over again, won't you?" asked Allison. He added, with a trace of
sarcasm wholly lost upon Romeo: "We've missed a good deal of it."

Thus encouraged, Romeo began again, thoughtfully allowing Isabel the
credit of the original suggestion. He dwelt at length upon the fine
points involved in the construction of "The Yellow Peril," described the
brown leather and the specially designed costumes, and was almost
carried away by enthusiasm when he pictured the triumphant progress of
the yellow car, followed by twenty dogs in appropriate collars.

"Can you," he inquired of Allison, "think of anything more like a
celebration that we could do for Uncle?"

"No," replied Allison, choking back a laugh, "unless you went out at
night, too, and had fireworks."

Romeo's expressive face indicated displeasure. "Uncle was such a good
man," he said, in a tone of quiet rebuke, "that I don't believe it would
be appropriate."

Allison coughed and Colonel Kent hastily went to the window. Madame hid
her face for an instant behind her fan and Isabel laughed openly. "I'm
sure he was," said Rose, quickly. "Can you remember him at all?"

"No," Romeo responded, "we've never seen him, but he was a brick all the
same."

"Are you going to run the car yourself?" queried Rose.

"Of course. Some day I'll take you out," he suggested, kindly, then
turned to Isabel and played his highest trump. "Juliet said something
about asking you to go with us the second time we went out. Of course
it's her place to do it."

"I'd love to go," murmured Isabel.

"She'll ask you when you come out to return her call," Romeo continued.

"I've been meaning to come, but I've been waiting for good roads."

"When you come," he answered, "don't say anything about my having been
here. It might make her feel bad to think I went out calling and left
her asleep."

"All right--I won't."

As soon as it was possible, without obvious effort, Romeo made his
escape, after shaking hands with everyone and promising to come again
very soon. "I'll bring Jule next time. Good-night!"

Once outside, he ran toward home like a hunted wild animal, hoping with
all his heart that Juliet was still asleep. It was probable, for more
than once she had slept on the sofa all night.

But the kindly fate that had hitherto guided him suddenly failed him
now. When he reached home, panting and breathless, having discovered
that it was almost midnight, a drooping little figure in a torn kimona
opened the door and fell, weeping into his arms.

"Oh, Romie! Romie!" cried Juliet, hysterically. "Where have you been?"

"There," he said, patting her shoulder awkwardly. "Don't take on so,
Jule. You were asleep, so I went out for a walk. I met Colonel Kent and
Allison and I've been with them all the evening. I'm sorry I stayed so
long."

"I haven't lied," he continued, to himself, exultantly. "Every word is
the literal truth."

"Oh, Romie," sobbed Juliet, with a fresh burst of tears, "I don't care
where you've been as long as I've got you back! We're twins and we've
got to stand by each other!"

Romeo gently extricated himself from her clinging arms, then stooped to
kiss her wet cheek. "You bet!" he whispered.






X

SWEET-AND-TWENTY

Contrary to the usual custom of woman, Isabel was ready fully an hour
before the appointed time. She stood before the fire, buttoning a new
glove with the sense of abundant leisure that new gloves demand. The
dancing flames picked out flashes of light from the silver spangles of
her gown and sent them into the farthest corners of the room. A long
white plume nestled against her dark hair and shaded her face from the
light, but, even in the shadow, she was brilliant, for her eyes sparkled
and the high colour bloomed upon her cheeks.

Madame Bernard and Rose sat near by, openly admiring her. She was almost
childish in her delight at the immediate prospect and could scarcely
wait for Allison to call for her. She went to the window and peered
eagerly into the darkness, waiting.

"Isabel, my dear," said Madame, kindly, "never wait at the window for an
unmarried man. Nor," she added as an afterthought, "for a married man,
unless he happens to be your own husband."

Isabel turned back into the room, smiling, her colour a little brighter
than before. "Why not?"

"Men keep best," returned Madame, somewhat enigmatically, "in a cool,
dry atmosphere. If you'll remember that fact, it may save you trouble in
the years to come."

"Such worldly wisdom," laughed Rose, "from such an unworldly woman!"

"I do love the theatre," Isabel sighed, "and I haven't seen a play for a
long time."

"I'm afraid we haven't done as much as we might to make it pleasant for
you," Madame continued, regretfully, "but we'll try to do better and
doubtless can, now that the weather is improving."

"It's been lots nicer than staying alone in a hotel," the girl answered.
"I used to go to the matinee a good deal, but I didn't know very many
people and it's no fun to go alone. Don't you and Rose ever go, Aunt
Francesca?"

"I go sometimes," said Rose, "but I can't even get her started."

The little grey lady laughed and tapped the arm of her chair with her
folded fan. "I fully agree with the clever man who said that 'life would
be very endurable were it not for its pleasures.' Far back, somewhere,
there must be a strain of Scotch ancestry in me, for I 'take my pleasure
sadly.'"

"Which means," commented Rose, "that the things other people find
amusing do not necessarily amuse you."

"Possibly," Madame assented, with a shrug of her delicate shoulders,
"but unless I'm obliged to, I won't sit in an uncomfortable chair, in a
crowd, surrounded by many perfumes unhappily mixed, be played to by a
bad orchestra, walked on at will by rude men, and, in the meantime,
watch the exaggerated antics of people who cannot make themselves heard,
even in a room with only three sides to it."

"I took her to a 'musical comedy' once, in a frivolous moment,"
explained Rose, "and she's never forgiven me."

"Why remind me of it?" questioned Madame. "I've been endeavouring for
years to forget it."

Isabel's eyes wandered anxiously to the clock. She had a strong impulse
to go to the window again, but remembered that Madame would not approve.

Presently there was the sound of wheels outside, and Allison, very
handsome in his evening clothes, came in with an apology for his
tardiness. After greeting Madame Bernard and Rose, he bowed to Isabel,
with a mock deference which, none the less, contained subtle flattery.

"Silver Girl," he said, "you do me too much honour. I'm not at all sure
that one escort is sufficient for so much loveliness."

Isabel smiled, then dimpled irresistibly. She had a secret sense of
triumph which she did not stop to analyse.

"Come," he said. "In the words of the poet, 'the carriage waits.'"

They said good-night to the others, and went out. There was silence in
the room until the sound of wheels had quite died away, then Rose
sighed. With a swift pang, she envied Isabel's glorious youth, then the
blood retreated from her heart in shame.

Madame sighed too, but for a different reason. "I suppose I shouldn't
say it," she remarked, "but it's a relief to have that dear child out of
the house for a little while."

"It's kind of Allison to take her," Rose answered, trying not to wish
that she might change places with Isabel.

"Very kind. The Kents are singularly decent about everything. I suppose
it was Allison who managed to have Romeo Crosby call upon her the other
evening."

"I hardly think so. You remember that Allison hadn't seen him since he
grew up."

"Shot up, you mean. How rapidly weeds grow!"

"Are the twins weeds?"

"I think so. Still, they're a wholesome and stimulating sort, even
though they have done just as they pleased."

The fire died down into embers. The stillness would have been unbearable
had it not been for the steady ticking of the clock. Madame leaned back
in her chair and closed her eyes. Rose tried to read, but could not
concentrate her mind upon the page.

Her thoughts were far away, with the two who had so recently left the
house. In fancy she saw the brilliantly lighted streets, the throng of
pleasure seekers and pretty women in gay attire. She heard the sound of
wheels, the persistent "honk-honk" of motor cars, and, in the playhouse,
the crash of cymbals and drums. Somewhere in the happy crowd were
Allison and Isabel, while she sat in silence at home.

Madame Francesca stirred in her chair. "I've been asleep, I think."

"You're not going to wait until they come home, are you?"

"Why should I? Isabel has a key."

Rose remembered how Aunt Francesca had invariably waited for her, when
some gallant cavalier had escorted her to opera or play, and was
foolishly glad, for no discoverable reason.

"I was dreaming," Madame went on, drowsily, "of the little house where
Love lived."

"Where was it?" asked Rose gently.

"You know. I've told you of the little house in the woods where I went
as a bride, when I was no older than Isabel. When we turned the key and
went away, we must have left some of our love there. I've never been
back, but I like to think that some of the old-time sweetness is still
in the house, shut away like a jewel of great price, safe from meddling
hands."

Only once before, in the fifteen years they had lived together, had
Madame Bernard spoken of her brief marriage, yet Rose knew, by a
thousand little betrayals, that the past was not dead, but vitally
alive.

"I can bear it," said Madame, half to herself, "because I have been his
wife. If he had been taken away before we were married, I should have
gone, too. But now I have only to wait until God brings us together
again."

Outwardly, Rose was calm and unperturbed; inwardly, tense and unstrung.
She wondered if, at last, the sorrow had been healed enough for speech.
Upstairs there was a room that was always locked. No one but Aunt
Francesca ever entered it, and she but rarely. Once or twice, Rose had
chanced to see her coming through the open door, transfigured by some
spiritual exaltation too great for words. For days afterward there was
about her a certain uplift of soul, fading gradually into her usual
serenity.

Mr. Boffin stalked in, jumped into Madame's lap, and began to purr
industriously. She laughed as she stroked his tawny head and the purr
increased rapidly in speed and volume.

"Don't let him burst himself," cautioned Rose, welcoming the change of
mood. "I never knew a cat to purr so--well, so thoroughly, did you?"

"He's lost his hold of the brake," Madame answered. "Are you going to
wait until Isabel comes home?"

"Of course not."

"Then let's go up and read for a little while."

Rose waited until Madame was half way up the long flight before she
turned down the lights and followed her. It made a pretty picture--the
little white-haired lady in grey on the long stairway, with the yellow
cat upon her shoulder, looking back with the inscrutable calmness of the
Sphinx.

Rose felt that, for herself, sleep would be impossible until Isabel
returned. She hoped that Aunt Francesca would not want her to read
aloud, but, as it chanced, she did. However, the chosen book was of the
sort which banishes insomnia, and, in less than an hour, Madame was
sound asleep, with Mr. Boffin purring in his luxurious silk-lined basket
at the foot of her bed.

Alone in her own room, Rose waited, frankly jealous of her young cousin
and fiercely despising herself for it. She recalled the happy hours she
and Allison had spent with their music and berated herself bitterly for
her selfishness, but to no avail. As the hours dragged by, every moment
seemed an eternity. Worn by her unaccustomed struggle with self, she
finally slept.

Meanwhile, Isabel was the gayest of the gay. The glittering lights of
the playhouse formed a fitting background for her, and Allison watched
her beautiful, changing face with an ever-increasing sense of delight.
The play itself was an old story to him, but the girl was a new
sensation, and while she watched the mimic world beyond the footlights,
he watched her.

The curtain of the first act descended upon a woman, waiting at the
window for a man who did not come, and, most happily, Isabel remembered
the conversation at home in the earlier part of the evening.

"Foolish woman," she said, "to wait at the window."

"Why?" asked Allison, secretly amused.

"I wouldn't wait at the window for an unmarried man, nor for a married
man, either, unless he was my own husband."

"Why?" he asked, again.

"Because men keep best in a cool dry atmosphere. Didn't you know that?"

"How did you happen to discover it, Sweet-and-Twenty?"

Isabel answered with a smile, which meant much or little, as one chose.
Presently she remembered something else that happened to be useful.

"Look," she said, indicating a man in the front seat who had fallen
asleep. "He's taking his pleasure sadly."

"Perhaps he's happier to be asleep. He may not care for the play."

"Somebody once said," she went on hastily, seeing that she was making a
good impression, "that life would be very endurable were it not for its
pleasures."

Allison laughed. He had the sense of discovering a bright star that had
been temporarily overshadowed by surrounding planets.

"I didn't know you could talk so well," he observed, with evident
admiration.

Isabel flushed with pleasure--not guilt. She had no thought of sailing
under false colours, but reflected the life about her as innocently as a
mirror might, if conveniently placed.

Repeated curtain calls for the leading woman, at the end of the third
act, delayed the final curtain by the few minutes that would have
enabled them to catch the earlier of the two theatre trains. Allison was
not wholly displeased, though he feared that Aunt Francesca and Rose
might be unduly anxious about Isabel. As they had more than an hour and
a half to wait, before the last train, he suggested going to a popular
restaurant.

Thrilled with pleasure and excitement, she eagerly consented.
Fortunately, she did not have to talk much, for the chatter of the gay
crowd, and the hard-working orchestra made conversation difficult, if
not impossible.

"I've never been in a place like this before," she ventured. "So late, I
mean."

"But you enjoy it, don't you?"

"Oh, yes! So much!" The dark eyes that turned to his were full of happy
eagerness, like a child's.

Allison's pulses quickened, with man's insatiable love of Youth. "We'll
do it again," he said, "if you'll come with me."

"I will, if Aunt Francesca will let me."

"She's willing to trust you with me, I think. She's known me ever since
I was born and she helped father bring me up. Aunt Francesca has been
like a mother to me."

"She says she doesn't care for the theatre," resumed Isabel, who did not
care to talk about Aunt Francesca, "but I love it. I believe I could go
every night."

"Don't make the mistake of going too often to see what pleases you, for
you might tire of it. Perhaps plays 'keep best in a cool, dry
atmosphere,' as you say men do."

"You're laughing at me," she said, reproachfully.

"Indeed I'm not. I knew a man once who fell desperately in love with a
woman, and, as soon as he found that she cared for him, he started for
the uttermost ends of the earth."

"What for?"

"That they might not risk losing their love for each other, through
satiety. You know it's said to die more often of indigestion than
starvation."

"I don't know anything about it," she murmured with downcast eyes.

"You will, though, before long. Some awkward, half-baked young man about
twenty will come to you, bearing the divine fire."

"I don't know any," she answered.

"How about the pleasing child who called upon you the other night, with
the imported bonbons?" Allison's tone was not wholly kind, for he had
just discovered that he did not like Romeo Crosby.

Isabel became fairly radiant with smiles.

"Wasn't he too funny?"

"He's all right," returned Allison, generously, "I'm afraid, however,
that he'll be taking you out so much that I won't have a chance."

"Oh, no!" said Isabel, softly. Then she added with frankness utterly
free from coquetry, "I like you much better."

"Really? Why, please?"

"Oh, I don't know. You're so much more, well, grown-up, you know, and
more refined."

"Thank you, I'm glad the slight foreign polish distinguishes me
somewhat"

"Cousin Rose said you were very distinguished." She watched him narrowly
as she spoke.

"So is Cousin Rose. In fact, no one could be more so," he answered, with
evident approval.

"Is she going to play your accompaniments for you, when you begin the
season?"

A shadow crossed his face. "I'm afraid not. I wish she could."

"Why can't she?"

"On account of Madame Grundy. It wouldn't be proper."

"I don't see why," objected Isabel, daringly. "She's ten years older
than you are."

Allison bit his lips and the expression of his face subtly changed.
"You're ten years younger," he replied, coldly, "and I couldn't take
you. That doesn't make any difference."

Seeing that she had made a mistake, Isabel sat quietly in her chair and
watched the people around her until it was time to go. Greatly to her
delight, they went to the station in an automobile.

"Isn't this glorious!" she cried. "I'm so glad the Crosbys are going to
have one. I hope they'll take me often."

With the sure instinct of Primitive Woman, she had said the one thing
calculated to make Allison forget his momentary change of mood.

"I'm sorry I have none," he said. "'Romeo Romeo, wherefore art thou
Romeo?' How times have changed! The modern Lochinvar has a touring-car,
and some day you'll be eloping in the most up-to-date fashion."

"What makes you talk to me about him?" queried Isabel, with uplifted
eyes. "You know I don't like him."

"All right," he answered, good-naturedly. "I won't. I hope Aunt
Francesca won't be worried about you because we're so late in getting
back."

"I don't see why she should mind. Mamma never cares what I do. She's
often been away for weeks, lecturing, and I've been in the hotel alone."

He repressed the uncharitable comment that was upon his lips and
reverted to the subject of the play. "I'm glad you've enjoyed it. I
wanted you to have a good time."

"I've had the best time I ever had in my life," she responded, with
evident sincerity. "Isn't it wonderful what they can do with a room that
has only three sides?"

"It surely is. I've had a good time, too, Silver Girl. Thank you for
coming."

"You're welcome," she returned sweetly.

The carriage was waiting at the station, and Isabel was very quiet all
the way home. Thinking that she must be tired, Allison said little until
they reached Madame Bernard's, and he had seen her safely into the
house. He insisted upon taking off her gloves and coat and would have
extended his friendly services to her hat, had she not laughingly
forbade him to touch it.

"Good-night," he said. "We'll go again soon."

"All right. Good-night, and thank you ever so much."

The sound of the key in the lock had wakened Rose from her uneasy sleep.
She heard their laughter, though she could not distinguish what they
said, and recognised a new tone in Allison's voice. She heard the door
close, the carriage roll away, and, after a little, Isabel's hushed
footsteps on the stairs. Then another door closed softly and a light
glimmered afar into the garden until the shade was drawn.

Wide-eyed and fearful, she slept no more, for the brimming Cup of Joy,
that had seemed within her reach, was surely beyond it now. Oppressed
with loss and pain, her heart beat slowly, as though it were weary of
living. Until daybreak she wondered if he, too, was keeping the night
watch, from a wholly different point of view.

But, man-like, Allison had long ago gone to sleep, in the big Colonial
house beyond the turn in the road, idly humming to himself:

  Come and kiss me, Sweet-and-Twenty;
  Youth's a stuff will not endure!






XI

KEEPING THE FAITH

Colonel Kent and Allison critically surveyed the table, where covers
were laid for seven. "Someway it lacks the 'grand air' of Madame
Bernard's," commented the Colonel, "yet I can't see anything wrong, can
you?"

"Not a thing," Allison returned. "The 'grand air' you allude to comes, I
think, from Aunt Francesca herself. When she takes her place opposite
you, I'm sure we shall compare very favourably with our neighbours."

The Crosby twins arrived first, having chartered the station hack for
the evening. As the minds of both were above such minor details as
clothes, their attire was of the nondescript variety, but their
exuberant youth and high spirits gallantly concealed all defects and the
tact of their hosts quickly set them both at their ease.

Romeo somewhat ostentatiously left their card upon the mantel, so placed
that all who came near might read in fashionable script: "The Crosby
Twins." Having made this concession to the conventionalities, he lapsed
at once into an agreeable informality that amused the Colonel very much.

Soon the Colonel was describing some of the great battles in which he
had taken part, and Romeo listened with an eager interest which was all
the more flattering because it was so evidently sincere. In the library,
meanwhile, Allison was renewing his old acquaintance with Juliet.

"You used to be a perfect little devil," he smiled.

"I am yet," Juliet admitted, with a frank laugh. "At least people say
so. Romie and I aren't popular with our neighbours."

"That doesn't speak well for the neighbours. Were they never young
themselves?"

"I don't believe so. I've thought, sometimes, that lots of people were
born grown-up."

"They say abroad, that there are no children in America--that they are
merely little people treated like grown-ups."

"The modern American child is a horror," said Juliet, unconsciously
quoting from an article in a recent magazine. "They're ill bred and they
don't mind, and there's nobody who wants to make 'em mind except people
who have no authority to do it."

"Why is it?" inquired Allison, secretly amused.

"Because spanking has gone out of fashion," she answered, in all
seriousness. "It takes so much longer for moral suasion to work. Romie
and I never had any 'moral suasion,'--we were brought up right."

Juliet's tone indicated a deep filial respect for her departed parents
and there was a faraway look in her blue eyes which filled Allison with
tender pity.

"You must be lonely sometimes," he said, kindly.

"Lonely?" repeated Juliet in astonishment; "why, how could I ever be
lonely with Romie?"

"Of course you couldn't be lonely when he was there, but you must miss
him when he's away from you."

"He's never away," she answered, with a toss of her curly head. "We're
most always together, unless he goes to town--or up to your house," she
added, as an afterthought.

Allison was about to say that Romeo had never been there before, but
wisely kept silent.

"Twins are the most related of anybody," Juliet went on. "An older
brother or sister may get ahead of you and be so different that you
never catch up, but twins have to trot right along together. It's just
the difference between tandem and double harness."

"Suppose Romeo should marry?" queried Allison, carelessly.

"I'd die," replied Juliet, firmly, her cheeks burning as with flame.

"Or suppose you married?"

"Then Romie would die," she answered, with conviction. "We've both
promised not to get married and we always keep our promises to each
other."

"And to other people, too?"

"Not always. Sometimes it's necessary to break a promise, or to lie, but
never to each other. If Romie asks me anything I don't want to tell him,
I just say 'King's X,' and if I ask him anything, he says 'it's none of
your business,' and it's all right. Twins have to be square with each
other."

"Don't you ever quarrel?"

"We may differ, and of course we have fought sometimes, but it doesn't
last long. We can always arbitrate. Say, do you know Isabel Ross?"

"I have that pleasure. She's coming to dinner to-night, with Aunt
Francesca and Miss Rose."

"Oh," said Juliet, in astonishment. "If I'd known that, I'd have dressed
up more. I thought it was just us."

"It is 'just us,'" he assured her, kindly; "a very small and select
party composed of our most charming neighbours, and believe me, my dear
Miss Juliet, that nobody could possibly be 'dressed up more.'"

Juliet bloomed with pleasure and her eyes sparkled. "Isabel came out to
see us," she continued, "and I don't think she had a good time. We
showed her all our fishing rods, and let her help us make fudges, and we
did stunts for her on the trapeze in the attic, and Romie told her she
could have any one of our dogs, but she said she didn't want it, and she
wouldn't stay to supper. I guess she thought I couldn't cook just
because she can't. Romie said if I'd make another chocolate cake like
the one I made the day after she was there, he'd take it up to her and
show her whether I could cook or not."

"I believe he would," returned Allison, with a trace of sarcasm which
Juliet entirely missed. Then he laughed at the vision of Romeo bearing
the proof of his twin's culinary skill into Madame Bernard's living
room.

"You come out and see us," urged Juliet, hospitably.

"I will, indeed. May I have a dog?"

"They're Romie's and I can't give 'em away, but I guess he could spare
you one. Would you rather have a puppy or a full-grown dog?"

"I'd have to see 'em first," he replied, tactfully steering away from
the danger of a choice. He had not felt the need of a dog and was merely
trying to be pleasant.

"There's plenty to see," she went on, with a winning smile. "I like dogs
myself but we fought once because I thought we had too many. We've named
'em all out of an old book we found in the attic. There's Achilles, and
Hector, and Persephone, and Minerva, and Circe and Juno, and Priam, and
Eurydice, and goodness knows how many more. Romie knows all their names,
but I don't."

Hearing the sound of wheels outside, Colonel Kent, with a certain old-
fashioned hospitality to which our generation might happily return, went
to open the door himself for his expected guests. Juliet went hastily to
the mirror to make sure that her turbulent curls were in order, and
Romeo intercepted Allison on his way to the door.

"I heard what she said," Romeo remarked, in a low tone, "about my having
been up here, but I didn't tell her I was here. I don't lie to Jule, but
I'm responsible only for what I say, not for what she thinks."

Allison smiled with full understanding of the situation. "We men have to
be careful what we say to women," he replied, with an air of caution and
comradeship that made his young guest feel like a full-fledged man of
the world.

"Sure," assented Romeo, with a broad grin and a movement of one eyelid
which was almost--but not quite--a wink.

Presently the three other guests came in, followed by the Colonel.
Madame Francesca was in white silk over which violets had been scattered
with a lavish hand, then woven into the shining fabric. She wore violets
in her hair and at her belt, and a single amethyst at her throat. Isabel
was in white, with flounces of spangled lace, and Rose was unusually
lovely in a gown of old gold satin and a necklace of palest topaz. In
her dark hair was a single yellow rose.

Juliet was for the moment aghast at so much magnificence and painfully
conscious of her own white muslin gown. Madame Francesca, reading her
thought, drew the girl's tall head down and kissed her. "What a clover
blossom you are," she said, "all in freshest white, with pink cheeks and
sunshiny curls!"

Thus fortified, Juliet did not mind Isabel's instinctive careful
appraisement of her gown, and she missed, happily, the evident
admiration with which Romeo's eyes followed Isabel's every movement.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Allison was asking Rose, "so I could have
ransacked the town for golden roses?"

"I've repeatedly done it myself," laughed Rose, "without success. I
usually save my yellow gowns for June when all the yellow rose bushes in
the garden may lavish their wealth upon me."

"Happy rose," Allison returned, lightly, "to die in so glorious a
cause."

The twins were almost at the point of starvation when dinner was
announced, though they had partaken liberally of bread and butter and
jam just before leaving home. Romeo had complained a little but had not
been sufficiently Spartan to refuse the offered refreshment.

"I don't see why you want to feed me now and spoil my dinner," he
grumbled, as he reached out for a second slice.

"I don't want to spoil your dinner," Juliet had answered, with her mouth
full. "Can't you see I'm eating, too? We don't want to be impolite when
we're invited out, and eat too much."

"You've been reading the etiquette book," remarked Romeo, with unusual
insight, "and there's more foolish things in that book than in any other
we've got. When we're invited out to eat, why shouldn't we eat? They may
have been cooking for days just to get ready for us and they won't like
it if we only pick at things."

"Maybe they want some left," Juliet replied, brushing aside the crumbs.
"I remember how mad Mamma was once when the minister ate two pieces of
pie and she had to make another the next day or divide one piece between
you and me."

"I'll bet she made another. She always fed us, and I remember that the
kids around the corner couldn't even have bread and molasses between
meals."

On the way to the dining-room, Juliet drew her brother aside and
whispered to him: "watch the others, then you'll be sure of getting the
right fork."

"Huh!" he returned, resentfully, having been accustomed to only one fork
since he and Juliet began to keep house for themselves.

When he saw the array of silver at his plate, however, he blessed her
for the hint. As the dinner progressed by small portions of oysters,
soup, and fish, he gratefully remembered the bread and jam. The twins
noted that the others always left a little on their plates, but proudly
disdained the subterfuge for themselves.

Madame Francesca sat opposite the Colonel and Rose was at his right.
Romeo sat next to her and across from them was Allison, between Isabel
and Juliet.

Somewhat subdued by the unfamiliar situation, the twins said very little
during dinner. Juliet took careful note of the appointments of the table
and dining-room, and of the gowns the other women wore. When Romeo was
not occupied with his dinner and the various forks, he watched Isabel
with frank admiration, and wondered what made the difference between her
and Juliet.

Everybody tried to produce general conversation, but could extract only
polite monosyllables from the twins. Questions addressed directly to
them were briefly answered by "yes" or "no," or "I don't know," or, more
often, by a winning smile which included them all.

Had it not been for Madame Francesca, gallantly assisted by the Colonel,
the abnormal silence of the younger guests might have reacted
unfavourably upon the entertainment, for Isabel was as quiet as she
usually was, in the presence of her aunt and cousin, Allison became
unable to think of topics of general interest, and Rose's efforts to
talk pleasantly while her heart was aching were no more successful than
such efforts usually are.

But Madame Francesca, putting aside the burden of her seventy years,
laughed and talked and told stories with all the zest of a girl.
Inspired by her shining example, the Colonel dragged forth a few musty
old anecdotes and offered them for inspection. They were new to the
younger generation, and Madame affected to find them new also.

Rose wondered at her, as often, envying her the gift of detachment. The
fear that had come upon Rose at midnight was with her still, haunting
her, waking or sleeping, like some evil thing. Proudly she said to
herself that she would seek no man, though her heart should break for
love of him; that though her soul writhed in anguish, neither he nor the
woman who took him from her should ever even suspect she cared.

She forced herself to meet Allison's eyes with a smile, to answer his
questions, and to put in a word, now and then, when Madame or the
Colonel paused. Yet, with every sense at its keenest, she noted Isabel's
downcast eyes, the self-conscious air with which Allison spoke to her,
and the exaggerated consideration of Juliet which he instinctively
adopted as a shield. She saw, too, that Isabel was secretly annoyed
whenever Allison spoke to Juliet, and easily translated the encouraging
air with which Isabel met Romeo's admiring glances. Once, when he
happened to turn quickly enough to see, a shadow crossed Allison's face,
and he bit his lips.

"How civilised the world has become," Madame was saying, lightly. "The
mere breaking of bread together precludes all open hostility. Bitter
enemies may meet calmly at the dinner table of a mutual friend, and I
understand that, in the higher circles in which we do not care to move,
a man may escort his divorced wife out to dinner, and, without
bitterness, congratulate her upon her approaching marriage."

"I've often thought," returned the Colonel, more seriously, "that the
modern marriage service should be changed to read 'until death or
divorce do us part.' It's highly inconsistent as it stands."

"'Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,'" she quoted.
"Inconsistency goes as far toward making life attractive as its
pleasures do toward spoiling it."

"What do you call pleasure?" queried Allison.

"The unsought joy. If you go out to hunt for it, you don't often get it.
When you do, you've earned it and are entitled to it. True pleasure is a
free gift of the gods, like a sense of humour."

By some oblique and unsuspected way, the words brought a certain comfort
to Rose. Without bitterness, she remembered that Allison had once said:
"In any true mating, they both know." Over and over again she said to
herself, stubbornly: "I will have nothing that is not true--nothing that
is not true."

It was a wise hostess who discovered the fact that changing rooms may
change moods; that many a successful dinner has an aftermath in the
drawing-room as cold and dismal as a party call. Madame Francesca had
once characterised the hour after dinner as "the stick of a sky-rocket,
which never fails to return and bring disillusion with it." Hence she
postponed it as long as she could, but the Colonel himself gave the
signal by moving back his chair.

An awkward pause followed, which lasted until Rose went to the piano of
her own accord and began to play. At length she drifted into the running
chords of a familiar accompaniment and Allison took his violin and
joined in. As he stood by Rose, the mere fact of his nearness brought
her a strange peace. Had she looked up, she would have seen that though
he stood so near her, he had eyes only for Isabel and was playing to her
alone.

Isabel did not seem to care. She sat with her hands folded idly in her
lap, occasionally glancing at the twins who sat together on a sofa
across the room. Madame Bernard and the Colonel had gone out on the
balcony that opened off of the library.

The night was cool, yet had in it the softness of May. Every wandering
wind brought a subtle, exquisite fragrance from orchards blooming afar.
High in the heavens swung the pale gold moon of Spring.

"What a night," said Madame, almost in a whisper. "It seems almost as if
there never had been another Spring."

"And as if there never would be another."

"That may be true, for one or both of us," she replied, with unwonted
sadness.

"My work is done," sighed the Colonel. "I have only to wait now."

"Sometimes I think that all of Life is waiting," she went on, with a
little catch in her voice, "and yet we never know what we were waiting
for, unless--when all is done--"

A warm, friendly hand closed over hers. "Do not question too much, dear
friend, for the God who ordained the beginning can safely be trusted
with the end, as well as with all that lies between. Do you know," he
continued, in a different tone, "a night like this always makes me think
of those wonderful lines:

  "'The blessed damozel leaned out
      From the gold bar of Heaven;
    Her eyes were deeper than the depth
      Of waters stilled at even;
    She had three lilies in her hand
      And the stars in her hair were seven.'"

Francesca's eyes filled and the stars swam before her, for she
remembered the three white lilies the Colonel had put into the still
hands of his boy's mother, just before the casket was closed. "I
wonder," she breathed, "if--they--know."

"I wonder, too," he said.

The strains of the violin floated out upon the scented night, vibrant
with love and longing, with passion and pain. Something had come into
the music that was never there before, but only Rose knew it.

"Richard," said Francesca, suddenly, "if you should go first, and it
should be as we hope and pray it may be--if people know each other
there, and can speak and be understood, will you tell him that I am
keeping the faith; that I have only been waiting since we parted?"

"Yes. And if it should be the other way, will you tell her that I, too,
am waiting and keeping the faith, and that I have done well with our
boy?"

"I will," she promised.

The last chord of violin and piano died into silence. Colonel Kent bent
down and lifted Madame's hand to his lips, then they went in together.






XII

AN ENCHANTED HOUR

The days dragged on so wearily that, to Rose, the hours seemed unending.
Allison came to the house frequently, but seldom spoke of his music; for
more than a week, he did not ask her to play at all. On the rare
occasions when he brought his violin with him, the old harmony seemed
entirely gone. The pianist's fingers often stumbled over the keys even
though Allison played with new authority and that magical power that
goes by the name of "inspiration," for want of a better word.

Once she made a mistake, changing a full chord into a dissonance so
harsh and nerve-racking that Allison shuddered, then frowned. When they
had finished, he turned to her, saying, kindly: "You're tired, Rose.
I've been a selfish brute and let you work too hard."

Quick denial was on her lips, but she stopped in time and followed his
lead gracefully. "Yes, and my head aches, too. If all of you will excuse
me, I'll go up and rest for a little while."

Evening after evening, she made the same excuse, longing for her own
room, with a locked and bolted door between her and the outer world.
Lonely and miserable though she was, she had at least the sense of
shelter. Pride, too, sustained her, for, looking back to the night they
met, months ago, she could remember no word nor act, or even a look of
hers that had been out of keeping.

Over and over again she insisted to herself, stubbornly: "I will have
nothing that is not true,--nothing that is not true." In the midnight
silences, when she lay wide awake, though all the rest of the world
slept, the words chimed in with her heart-beats: "Nothing that is not
true--nothing--that is--not true."

Madame Francesca, loving Rose dearly, became sorely troubled and
perplexed. She could not fail to see and understand, and, at times,
feared that Allison and Isabel must see and understand also. She watched
Rose faithfully and shielded her at every possible point. When Isabel
inquired why Rose was always tired in the evening, Madame explained that
she had been working too hard and that she had made her promise to rest.

Rose spent more time than usual at the piano but she neglected her own
work in favour of Allison's accompaniments. When she was alone, she
could play them creditably, even without the notes, but if, by any
chance, he stood beside her, waiting until the prelude was finished, she
faltered at the first sound of the violin.

At last she gave it up and kept more and more to her own room. Madame
meditated upon the advisability of sending Isabel away, providing it
could be done gracefully, or even taking her on some brief journey, thus
leaving Rose in full possession of the house.

Yet, in her heart, she knew that it would be only a subterfuge; that it
was better to meet the issues of Life squarely than to attempt to hide
from them, since inevitably all must be met. She could not bear to see
Rose hurt, nor could she endure easily the spectacle of her beloved
foster son upon the verge of a lifelong mistake. Several times she
thought of talking to Colonel Kent, and, more rarely, of speaking to
Allison himself, but she had learned to apply to speech the old maxim
referring to letter-writing: "When in doubt, don't."

It happened that Allison came late one afternoon, when Isabel had gone
to town in search of new finery and Rose was in her own room. Madame had
just risen from her afternoon nap, and, after he had waited a few
moments, she came down.

"Where's Isabel?" he asked, as he greeted her.

"Shopping," smiled Madame.

"I know, but I thought she'd be at home by this time. She told me she
was coming out on the earlier train."

"She may have met someone and gone to the matinee. It's Wednesday."

"She didn't need to do that. I'll take her whenever she wants to go and
she knows it."

"I didn't say she had gone--I only said she might have gone. She may be
waiting for the trimming of a hat to be changed, or for an appointment
with tailor or dressmaker or manicure, or any one of a thousand other
things. When you see her, she can doubtless give a clear account of
herself."

"Did Rose go with her?" he asked, after a brief pause.

"No, she's asleep," sighed Madame. "Allison, I'm worried about Rose and
have been for some time. She isn't well."

"I thought something was wrong," he replied, without interest. "She
can't seem to play even the simplest accompaniment any more, and she
used to do wonders, even with heavy work."

"I think," ventured Madame, cautiously, "that she needs to get out more.
If someone would take her for a walk or a drive every day, it would do
her good."

"Probably," assented Allison, with a faraway look in his eyes. "If you
want to borrow our horses at any time, Aunt Francesca, when yours are
not available, I hope you'll feel free to telephone for them. They're
almost eating their heads off and the exercise would do them good."

"Thank you," she answered, shortly. Allison noted the veiled sharpness
of her tone and wondered why anyone should take even slight offence at
the friendly offer of a coach and pair.

"It must be nearly time for the next train," he resumed. "Is there
anyone at the station to meet Isabel?"

"Nobody but the coachman and the carriage," returned Madame, dryly. "I'm
not in the habit of being asked whether or not I have made proper
provision for my guests."

"I beg your pardon, Aunt Francesca. I would have known, of course, if I
had stopped to think."

"How is your father?" she put in, abruptly.

"All right, I guess. He's making a garden and the whole front yard is
torn up as though sewer pipes were about to be put in."

Madame's heart softened with pity, for she knew that only loneliness
would have set the Colonel to gardening. "I must go over and see it,"
she said, in a different tone. "My valuable advice hasn't been asked,
but I think I could help a little."

"Undoubtedly. Your own garden is one of the loveliest I have ever seen.
Isn't that the train?"

"I think so. If Isabel comes, I believe I'll leave you to entertain her
while I drive over to inspect the new garden."

She was oppressed, as never before, by the necessity of speech, and, of
all those around her, Colonel Kent was the only one to whom it would be
possible for her to say a word. She did not stop to consider what she
could accomplish by it, for in her heart, she knew that she was
helpless--also that a great deal of the trouble in the world has not
been caused by silence.

Allison drummed on the arm of his chair until he heard the rumble of
wheels, then went to the window. "It's Isabel," he announced, joyously.
"I'll go down and help her out--she may have parcels."

Presently they came in together, laughing. Isabel's face was flushed and
Allison was heavily laden with packages, both small and large. "I feel
like Santa Claus," he cried, gaily, to Madame, as she passed them on the
way out.

She smiled, but did not take the trouble to speak. "Colonel Kent's," she
called to the driver, as she closed the carriage door with a resounding
bang, "and please hurry."

The Colonel was on the veranda when she arrived, superintending the
gardening operations from there. He greeted her with surprise, for it
was not her way to drive over there alone. "I am deeply honoured," he
said, as he assisted her up the steps. "May I order tea?"

"No, thank you," she answered, somewhat primly. It was evident that she
was ill at ease. "I understood from Allison that you were doing all this
yourself. Instead, I find you sitting on the veranda like a landed
proprietor, in command of an army of slaves."

"Two Irishmen don't make an army," he laughed, "though I'll admit that,
if angry, they would make a formidable force. I helped to dig for a
while this morning, but it didn't seem to agree with me, so I quit. My
work seems to be done," he continued, with a sigh.

"No, it isn't," she returned, sharply. "There's work to be done, but
whether you or I or both together can do it, is extremely doubtful."

"What do you mean, Francesca?"

Madame leaned toward him confidentially. "Richard," she said, in a low
tone, "has it ever occurred to you that Allison might marry?"

A shadow crossed his face, then vanished in a smile. "Yes. Why?"

"Have you ever seen a woman you would be willing for him to marry?"

"Only one."

"And she--?"

"Rose," said the Colonel, softly. "Your Rose."

"I've felt that way, too," whispered Madame. There was silence for the
space of a heart-beat, then she cried out sharply: "But it isn't Rose--
it's Isabel!"

"What?" he cried, startled for once out of his usual calm. "That child?"

"'That child' is past twenty, and he is only ten years older. There was
fifteen years' difference between you and--" Madame forebore to speak
the name of the dead and beloved wife.

Colonel Kent turned his dim blue eyes toward the hills. Behind them the
sun was setting, and he could guess that the gold of the Spring
afternoon was scattered like star dust over the little sunken grave. He
left Madame and went to the end of the veranda, where he stood for a few
moments, facing the West. Then he came back.

"Francesca," he said, slowly, "you and I are on the Western slope and
have been for a long time. The Valley of the Shadow lies at the foot of
the hill and the descent is almost made. But the boy is young, and most
of the journey lies before him. You chose for yourself, and so did I.
Shall we not grant him the same right?"

"Yes, but Rose--"

"Rose," interrupted the Colonel, "is too good for any man--even my own
son, though, as I said before, she is the only woman I would willingly
see him marry. You stand almost in his mother's place to him, but
neither you nor I can shield him now. We must try to remember that his
life is his--to make or mar."

"I know," she sighed, "I've thought it all out."

"Besides," he went on, "what could we do? Separation wouldn't last long,
if he wants her, and talking would only alienate him from us. Perhaps
you could bear it, but I--I couldn't."

"Nor I," she returned, quickly. "When we come to the sundown road, we
need all the love we have managed to take with us from the summit of the
hill. I hadn't meant to say anything to anyone," she went on, in a
changed tone, "but my heart was full, and you are--"

"Your best friend, Francesca, as you are mine. It seems to take a
lifetime for us to learn that wisdom consists largely in a graceful
acceptance of things that do not immediately concern us."

"How like you," she responded, with a touch of her old manner. "I ask
for comfort and you give me an epigram."

"Many people find satisfaction in epigrams," he reminded her. "Sometimes
a snap-shot is better than an oil painting."

"Or a geometrical design, or even a map," she continued, catching his
mood. The talk drifted to happier themes and Madame was quite herself
again at dusk, when she rose to go.

On the way back, she passed Allison, returning home to dinner by a well-
worn path, but he was thinking of something else and did not see her at
all.

The lilac-scented midnight was starred here and there with white blooms
when May went out and June came in. Drifts of "bridal wreath" were
banked against the side of the house and a sweet syringa breathed out a
faint perfume toward the hedge of lilacs beyond. Blown petals of pink
and white died on the young grass beneath Madame's wild crab-apple tree,
transplanted from a distant woodland long ago to glorify her garden.

The hour was one of enchantment, yet to Rose, leaning out into the
moonless night, the beauty of it brought only pain. She wondered, dully,
if she should ever find surcease; if somewhere, on the thorny path
ahead, there might not be some place where she could lay the burden of
her heartache down. Her pride, that had so long sustained her, was
beginning to fail her now. It no longer seemed more vital than life
itself that Allison should not know.

She had the hurt woman's longing for escape, but could think of no
excuse for flight. She knew Aunt Francesca would manage it, in some way,
should she ask, and that she would be annoyed by no troublesome
questions, yet loyalty held her fast, for she knew how lonely the little
old lady would be without her.

Day by day, the tension increased almost to the breaking point. June
filled the garden with rosebuds, but their pale namesake in the big
white house took no heed of them. She no longer concerned herself about
her gowns, but wore white almost constantly, that her pallor might not
show.

The roses broke from their green sheaths, then bloomed, opening their
golden hearts to every wandering bee. The house was full of roses. Aunt
Francesca wore them even on her morning gowns and Isabel made wreaths of
red roses to twine in her dark hair. Every breeze brought fragrance to
the open windows and scattered it through the house.

Madame's heart ached for Rose, but still she said no word, though it
seemed to her that the blindness of the others could not last much
longer. She could not take Rose away unless she took Isabel also, and,
should she do that, things would soon be just as they were now.

As Rose faded, Isabel blossomed into the full flower of her youth. Her
high, bird-like laugh echoed constantly through the house and garden,
whether anyone was with her or not. With sinking heart, Rose envied her
even a tithe of her abundant joy.

As the moon approached its full, the roses had begun to drop their
petals. Under every bush was a scattered bit of fragrance that meant
both death and resurrection. Far down in the garden, where the sunken
lily-pool mirrored the stars, the petals of golden roses drifted idly
across the shining surface.

Rose had worn white at dinner, as she always did, now, the night the
June moon came to its full. Isabel, too, was in white, but with a
difference, for as surely as the older woman's white was mourning, her
silver spangles were donned for joy. At the table, Madame had done most
of the talking, for Isabel's conversational gifts were limited, at best,
and Rose was weary beyond all words.

After dinner she went to the piano and struck a few aimless chords.
Isabel, with a murmured excuse, went up to her own room. "Nothing that
is not true," said Rose to herself, steadily; "nothing that is not
true."

Presently a definite thought took shape in her mind. To-morrow she would
tell Aunt Francesca, and see if it could not be arranged for her to go
away somewhere, anywhere, alone. Or, if not to-morrow, at least the day
after, as soon as she had seen him again. She wanted one last look to
take with her into the prison-house, where she must wrestle with her
soul alone.

[Illustration: musical notation.]

Her stiff fingers shaped the melody that Aunt Francesca loved, and into
it went all her own longing, her love, and her pain. The notes thrilled
with an ecstasy of renunciation, and the vibrant chords trembled far out
into the night.

[Illustration: musical notation.]

A man entered the gate very quietly, paused, then turned into the
garden, to soothe his wildly beating heart for a few moments with the
balm of scent and sound. Upstairs, behind the shelter of the swaying
curtain, a shining figure drew back into the shadow. Smiling, and with
an agreeable sense of adventure, Isabel tiptoed down the back stairs,
and entered the garden, unheard, by a side door.

With assumed carelessness, yet furtively watching, she made the circuit
of the lily-pool, humming to herself. A quick leap and a light foot on
the grass startled her for an instant, then she laughed, for it was only
Mr. Boffin, playing with his own dancing shadow.

[Illustration: musical notation.

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