Henry Handel Richardson

“ Louise answered hurriedly. “No, no. And please go! I shall be all right. I’m sorry.—I had enjoyed it so much. I will tell you another time, how much. Good night, and thank you. No . . . PLEASE!> . . . yes, a delightful evening.” Her words were almost inaudible.
“Delightful indeed!” said Herries with warmth. Then he stood aside, raised his hat, and let them pass.
Maurice had his hand on her wrist, and he dragged her after him, over the frozen pavements, far more quickly than she could in comfort go, hampered as she was by snow-boots and by her heavy cloak. ”

“ Dove let down his umbrella, and carried it stiffly, at some distance from him, by reason of its dampness. “Believe me, Miss Madeleine,” he said, as he emerged from beneath it. “Believe me, I make all allowance for your feelings, which do you credit. A woman’s way of looking at these things is, thank God, humaner than ours. But it’s a man’s duty not to let his feelings run away with him. ”

“ Until now, he had not regarded Maurice and Maurice’s doings from this point of view. By nature, Dove was opposed to excess of any kind; his was a clean, strong mind, which caused him instinctively to draw back from everything, in morals as in art, that passed a certain limit. Nothing on earth would have persuaded him to discuss his quondam friend’s backsliding with Madeleine Wade; he was impregnated with the belief that such matters were unfit for virtuous women’s ears, and he applied his conviction indiscriminaetely. ”

“ One can only be thankful, I suppose, that he’s more or less of an exception—among his own countrymen, I mean, of course. Englishmen are not, as a rule, given to that kind of thing.”
“Thank God they’re not!” said Dove with emotion.
“We’ll, our ways part here,” said Madeleine, and halted. As she took her music from him, she asked: “By the way, when shall we be at liberty to congratulate you?”
It was not at all “by the way” to Dove. However, he only smiled; for he had grown wiser, and no longer wore his heart on his coat-sleeve. ”

“ Dove was obliged to be of the utmost circumspection in his behaviour; for the old couple, uprooted violently from their native soil, lived in a mild but constant horror at the iniquity of foreign ways. They held the pro fession of music to be an unworthy one, and threw up their hands in dismay at the number of young people here complacently devoting themselves to such a frivolous object. It was necessary for Dove to prove to them that a student of music might yet be a man of untarnished principles and blame less honour. ”

“ Maurice went a shade paler; he was clear, now, as to the object of Dove’s visit. But he answered in an off-hand way. “Oh, there’s time enough yet.”
“No. That’s a mistaken point of view, if I may say so,” replied Dove in his blandest manner. “Time requires to be taken by the forelock, you know.”
“Does it?” Maurice allowed the smile that was expected of him to cross his face.
“Most emphatically—And we fellow-students of yours are not the only people who have noticed a certain—what shall I say?—a certain abatement of energy on your part. Schwarz sees it, too—or I am much mistaken.” ”

“ But he loved her, loved her: all the dead weight of his physical craving for her was on him again, confounding, overmastering. None the less, she had left him; she had no need for him; and the hours would come, oftener and oftener, when she could do without him, when, as now, she voluntarily sought the company of other men. ”

“ One does indulge in these fancy pictures of one’s friends—a strong man, helping with tact and example. And here you go, toppling my picture over, without the least remorse.—Well, you know your own business best, I suppose, but it’s unkind of you, all the same, to destroy an illusion. One has few enough of them in this world.—Ta-ta!”
She laughed satirically, and turned on her heel, regardless of the effect of her words.
But Dove was not offended; on the contrary, he felt rather flattered. He did not, of course, care in the least about what Madeleine called her illusions ”

“ Do you think I should “—“bother with you,” was on her tongue. She checked herself, and subtituted—“trouble you about it, if it were? But Maurice was once a friend of ours—you don’t deny it, I hope?” she threw in challengingly; for Dove muttered something to himself. “And I want to get at the truth about him. I’m sorrier than I can say, to hear, on all sides, what a fool he’s making of himself.”
Dove was suavely silent.
“Of course,” continued Madeleine with a sarcastic inflection—“of course, I can’t expect you to see it as I do. Men look at these things differently, I know. ”

“ As she spoke, she nodded to the old woman who opened the door to say that the droschke waited below. A lace scarf was lying on the table; Louise twisted it mechanically round her head, and began to struggle with an evening cloak. Just as she had succeeded in getting it over her shoulders, Maurice took her by the arms and bent her backwards, so that the cloak fell to the floor.
“You shall not go!”
She stemmed her hands against him, and determinedly, yet. with caution, pushed herself free.
“My dress—my hair! How dare you!”
“What do I care for your dress or your hair? You make me mad!” ”

“ Maurice laughed. “Oh, certainly not! Most awfully good of you to trouble.”
“No trouble at all,” Dove assured him. He flicked some dust from his trouser-knee before he spoke again. “I . . . er . . . that is, I had some talk the other day with Miss Wade.”
“Indeed!” replied Maurice, and was now able accurately to gauge the motor origin of Dove’s appearance. “How is she? How is Madeleine?” ”