Florence L. Barclay

“ Helen! What does one say to a very young baby?"
Helen followed him upstairs, laughing.
"That entirely depends upon circumstances. One usually says: 'Did it?' 'Is it then?' or 'Was it?' But I almost think present conditions require a more definite statement of fact. I fancy one would say: 'How do you do, baby? I am your papa!' ... This way, Ronnie, in my own old nurseries. Oh, darling, I am afraid I am going to cry! But you must not mind. They will only be tears of unutterable joy. Think what it will be to me, to see my baby in his father's arms!" ”

“ You are such a veritable boy sometimes, and it soothes the yearning for a little son of yours to cuddle in her arms, when she plays that her big boy is something of a baby."
Ronald took her left hand from about his neck, and kissed it tenderly.
This was his only answer, but his silence meant more to Helen than speech. Words flowed so readily to express his surface thoughts; but when words suddenly and unexpectedly failed, a deeper depth had been reached; and in that silence, his wife found comfort and content.
Ronnie was not all ripples. There was more beneath than the shifting shallows. ”

“ Then, looking past the figure in the chair, he marked behind him, where in the reflection of the studio should have been the door, heavy black curtains hanging in sombre folds. And, even as Ronnie noticed these, they parted; and the lovely face of a woman looked in.
As Ronnie saw that face he remembered many things—things of exquisite joy, things of poignant sorrow; things inexpressible except in music, unutterable except in tone.
The 'cello sobbed, and wailed, and sang itself slowly into a minor theme; yet the passion of the minor was more subtle, sweeter far, than the triumph of the major. ”

“ He will continue to disappoint you.
"Helen, you loved me once; and when a woman loves once, she loves for always.
"Helen, if he could leave you alone during seven months, in order to get local scenery for a wretched manuscript, he will leave you again, and again, and yet again. He married you for your money; he has practically admitted it to me; but now that he is making a yearly income larger than your own, he has no more use for you.
"Oh, my beloved—my queen—my only Love—don't stay with a man who is altogether unworthy of you! If a man disappoints a woman she has a right to leave him. ”

“ In hoc vince!
"Helen," he said, "I want to go to Central Africa."
Helen looked at him in silence, during a moment of immense astonishment.
Then she lifted his hat and gloves, laid them upon a table, seated herself in her easy-chair, and carefully flicked some specks of dust from her riding-habit.
"That is a long way to want to go, darling," she said, quietly. "But I can see you think something of imperative importance is calling you there. Sit down and tell me all about it, right from the beginning. It is a far cry from our happy, beautiful life here, to Central Africa. ”

“ Helen said you were a wonderful person to turn to in trouble. There is no one in the world quite like you. Well, now's your chance to prove it; for surely nobody ever came to you in more desperate trouble. If you wish to be really kind and comforting, talk to me of my wife. Say how sweet and lovely she is. Say that her arms are tender, her eyes gentle and kind. I am the thirsty traveller in the desert, who sights pure water, hastens eagerly forward, and finds—a mirage! But a deadly stream flows from the roots of the Upas—Hullo! Here comes Aubrey Treherne. ”

“ Oh, Helen—my lovely one—he is altogether unworthy of you! I saw a letter of yours long ago, in which you said he was like a young sun-god. Handsome he is, I admit. He says he has never felt fitter in his life, and he looks it. But surely a woman wants more than mere vitality and vigour and outward beauty of appearance? Heart—he has none. The wonderful news in your letter has left him unmoved. He thinks more of a 'cello he has just bought than he does of your little son. ”

“ But Helen had laughed and said: "I should think he lived before the time of blotters, dear! No doubt the morning sun was shining on the glass, Ronnie, as he stood at the window. It was of the cross gleaming in the sunlight, that he wrote: In this conquer. If we could but remember it, the path of self-sacrifice and clear shining is always the way to victory."
Helen invariably stood up for her ancestors, which was annoying to a very modern young man who, not being aware of possessing any, considered ancestors unnecessary and obsolete. ”

“ Oh, Ronnie, you will be so nearly home, by then! How shall I wait?"
"I shall love to feel I have something to do for you in Leipzig," said Ronnie; "and I enjoy poking about among crowds of queer instruments. I should like to have played in Nebuchadnezzar's band. I should have played the sackbut, because I haven't the faintest notion how you work the thing—whether you blow into it, or pull it in and out, or tread upon it; nor what manner of surprising sound it emits, when you do any or all of these things. I love springing surprises on myself and on other people ”

“ Smash the mirror; burn the chair; brain the Infant!"
Helen laughed. "No, no, Dick!" she said. "I can do none of those things. I must take tenderest care of Ronnie's Infant. I have had his valuable old chair carefully mended; and I must not let him think I fear the mirror."
"You're a brave woman," said Dick. "Believing what you do, you're a brave woman to live in the house with that mirror. Or, perhaps, it comes of believing so much. A certainty of confidence, which asks no questions, must be to some extent a fortifying thing. ”

“ It had been such a cheery glimpse of home, through the lodge window, before the red blind shut it in. Simpkins was a lucky fellow. Mrs. Simpkins looked so kind and comfortable, with the baby's head nestling against her capacious bosom.
Ronnie turned to look back at the brightly-lighted cottage. The ruddy glow from the blind, fell on the snow. He wondered whether there was a Upas tree in that humble home. Surely not! A Upas tree and a Christmas-tree could hardly find place in the same home. The tree of Light and Love, would displace the tree of subtle poison. ”

“ I never feel really myself when it happens. I seem to be listening to somebody else playing, and trying to remember something I have hopelessly forgotten. It gives me a strained, uncanny feeling, Helen."
"Does it, darling? Then let us talk of something else. Oh, Ronnie, you must promise me to take care of your health out in that climate! I believe you are going at the very worst time of year."
"I have to know it at its worst and at its hottest," he said. "But I shall be all right. I'm strong as a horse, and sound in wind and limb." ”

“ Ronald's feverish flush deepened. His eyes grew more burningly bright.
"What an extraordinary idea!" he said. "I don't think Helen would like it, and I am perfectly certain Helen would not believe it."
"You cannot refuse to believe a truth because it does not happen to appeal to your wife," said Aubrey. "Grasp it clearly yourself; then educate her up to a proper understanding of the matter. All of us who are worth anything in this world have lived before—not once, nor twice, but many times. ”

“ Helen will await me there. But why do you call it 'moated'? We do not boast a moat."
Aubrey laughed. "I suppose my thoughts had run to 'Mariana.' You remember? 'He cometh not,' she said; the young woman who grew tired of waiting. They do, sometimes, you know! I believe her grange was moated. All granges should be moated; just as all old manors should be haunted. What a jolly time you and Helen must have in that lovely old place. I knew it well as a boy."
"You must come and stay with us," said Ronnie, with an effort. ”

“ The deep full tones of a 'cello, reached them where they stood; tones so rich, so plaintively sweet, so full of passion and melody, that, to the anxious listeners in the dimly lighted corridor, they gave the sense of something weird, something altogether uncanny in its power, unearthly in its beauty.
They each spoke at the same moment.
"It cannot be Ronnie," they said.
"It must be Ronnie," amended Helen. "There is no one else in the house."
"You go in," whispered Dick. "I will wait here. Call, if you want me. Don't startle him. Go in very softly. Be very—er—you know?" ”

“ Ronnie raised his eyes and looked into the mirror.
He saw therein reflected, the 'cello and the Italian chair; but the figure of a man sat playing, and that man was not himself; that figure was not his own.
A grave, white face, set off by straight black hair, a heavy lock of which fell over the low forehead; long white fingers gliding up and down the strings, lace ruffles falling from the wrists. The knees, gripping the 'cello, were clad in black satin breeches, black silk stockings were on the shapely legs; while on the feet, planted firmly upon the floor, gleamed diamond shoe-buckles. ”

“ You have bucked me up splendidly, Helen. Seven months seem nothing; and my whole mind is bounding forward into my story. I really must give you an outline of the plot." He followed her into the hall. "Helen! Do come back for a minute."
But Helen was half way up the stairs. He heard her laugh as she reached the landing.
"I am hungry, dear," she called over the banisters, "and so are you, only you don't know it! Crawl out of your long grass, and make yourself presentable before the gong sounds; or I shall send bananas for one, to your study!" ”