Julia Magruder

“ She knew it was impossible. She knew that Harold would never marry; and she even realized that if he could love again, after the manner in which he had loved one woman, he would, by that fact, compel her to lower her standard either of love or of him.
And yet Martha felt that the meeting and blending of these two lives would, if she could have seen it, have satisfied every need of her heart. She believed that her pleasure and contentment in looking on at such a union as this would give her the greatest joy that could be for her—would indeed, in a way, give her the feeling of satisfied love. ”

“ When they were seated in the princess’s coupé, a little later, driving past the Arc de Triomphe, Martha saw her companion turning her head to look at it with lingering, earnest eyes.
“I always look at the Arc whenever I can,” she said; “and it always has something to say to me. Its expression of strong beauty and repose always makes me feel that what is, is right. If I am happy, it makes me feel that joy is both good and permanent; and even when in times of unhappiness it makes me feel that sadness is permanent, it somehow seems to tell me that that too is good. ”

“ Love ought always to be a regeneration,” he went on, as if putting into shape the thoughts that were rising out of the recent chaos in his mind. “It’s easy enough to keep true when the love, the joy, the equal give and take, go on unbroken. It’s when a man actually turns and walks out of heaven, and the gates shut behind him forever, that he finds out the stuff that’s in him. Sometimes, when I think about it, I try to fancy what would be my humiliation if I found I had grown to love her less.”
Martha was silent a moment. ”

“ The beautiful young woman on whom her eyes rested had stepped back from her easel, and with her head turned sidewise, and her eyelids drawn up, was looking at her picture. She held a brush in one hand, with the fingers delicately poised, and in the other her palette, laid with brilliant dabs of color. Her lips were pursed critically, and her whole attitude and expression showed such absorption in her work that Martha felt it would be absurd to imagine that she or her behavior could have any part in that beautiful lady’s consciousness. ”

“ Her consent must have shown itself in her eyes, however, for the princess went on:
“I can’t call you Martha unless you call me by my name, too. Will you? I have a fancy to hear you say it now. Will you call me by my little Russian name—Sonia?”
It was evident that the girl’s silence did not offend her. She must have understood its basis, for she said, with an encouraging smile:
“Say it. Say ‘Sonia.’”
“Oh, you are too good to me!” exclaimed Martha. “You spoke of knowing that I liked you. I don’t like you—I love you! I don’t love you—I adore you! ”

“ It was after a short silence between them that the princess said:
“There are one or two things that it will be necessary for you to know—that is, if you like me well enough to come to see me, as I hope you do. I am living in the Rue Presbourg, and when you come to see me, you are to ask for the apartment of the Princess Mannernorff. You will come, will you not?”
“Oh, if you will only let me, it will be my greatest happiness!” said Martha. “I can’t understand what has made you so good to me!”
“Simply, I like you. It isn’t hard to understand. ”

“ He longed only to help and comfort her. He could not speak, but at least he could let her know that he was near; and then it was that he had made the sound which Sonia had heard.
That sound was followed by silence. Was she perhaps indignant, he asked himself, that he should dare to make this demand upon her attention? She would have a right to be; for he could make no pretense that he had not deliberately intended to do this. Yet she was alone there, sad and troubled, and he was close at hand, with a heart that ached to comfort her. ”

“ Then he turned his face toward the window again; but his glance was so vague that Martha felt that he saw some picture in his mind, rather than the scene below. “The service was the same,” he said, clasping his hands behind his head, and narrowing his eyes as if to get the perspective. “The music was the same—and those roses! And that was not all. Vivid as she always is to me in every other respect, I have not always been able to hold on to her voice; but to-day I heard it perfectly, saying, ‘I, Sophia, take thee, Harold,’ and all the rest.” ”

“ The princess smiled.
“One would like to get a look at him,” she said. “An absolutely faultless being must be interesting to look at.”
“Don’t laugh at me!” cried Martha. “If it were any one but you I could not bear it; but I know you would say or do nothing that could hurt me really. I don’t wish you to understand that I think Harold faultless. He is not. But to one who understands him as I do, his very faults are part of his greatness. They all have their seat in something noble, and to see how he fights to conquer them is a thing that thrills me. He is now off in America hard at work. ”

“ Sometimes she would look quite happy for an instant, as if a thought of joy had forced its way uppermost. Then again deep pain would come into her face, and shadows of doubt, perplexity, and hopelessness.
She sat so for a long time. Inkling had had a deep and peaceful sleep on the soft folds of her gown, from which he was startled by a knock at the door. His mistress sprang up suddenly, rolling him over, and he began to bark furiously, while Sonia, with an attitude of studious absorption, took her place at the easel, and seized her bit of charcoal. ”

“ I should think a real man friend would be such a comfort to you. You seem made for that sort of camaraderie, as well as for love. And what a comfort the friendship of such a woman as you would be to Harold! I feel myself at times so inadequate to him, and I have the very same feeling, sometimes, with you. I will confess to you, Sonia, that I did have a hope once, even though you are a princess and he just a simple American gentleman, that you and Harold might some time, after years, come to be something to each other ”

“ Then it looks like a magnificent image of beneficence, stretching out two great arms to take in all those people, in carriages and on foot, who are thronging the Champs-Élysées, its body vague and distant in the clouds. That’s a sufficiently fantastic thought for you, if you like; but it is one that has comforted me. I love Paris. It is the only city that has ever seemed to me to be lovable. Its streets are so gay and clean, and the faces of the people one meets, along here at least, are so good-humored and intelligent. ”

“ Smartly dressed men and women stood about in groups, and now and then a hum arose as some great man, decorated with orders, and smiling with confident good humor, passed along, bowing to right and left, and receiving compliments—too familiar to be anything but gently stimulating—on the beauty of his latest pictures.
There were groups, larger or smaller, before many of the canvases; and in one of these groups, standing a little apart from the rest, were Harold and Martha Keene. ”

“ I could talk to you about it better than to any one on earth; but there are some things one cannot speak of even to one’s own heart. That is the trouble now. If I were to let myself indulge freely in imaginings and regrets, I should satisfy the want of the moment, but it would undo me utterly. My great temptation is regret, and I must be strong enough not to regret.”
“Oh, how sad life is!” cried Martha. “I have always thought that you at least ought to be happy. I gave you the name of ‘The Happy Princess,’ out of Tennyson. ”

“ Instead of this, however, came the brief announcement of their separation, which almost broke Martha’s heart. She had put aside any natural feeling of deprivation and pain, to throw herself, heart and soul, into the delight of Harold’s romantic marriage, and as the young couple dreamed their way up the old Nile, she dreamed it with them. It is probable that few people in the world get the intense joy out of their personal experiences of love that this ardent and impassioned girl derived from the mere imagination of her brother’s happiness. ”

“ Looking carefully, Martha discovered that there was a separate family of mourners to each little bier; and as the whole procession was under the command of a tall old man, who held his shoulders very erect, as if to atone for a limp in one leg, she comprehended that this bedizened old undertaker, with the ragged crape on his cocked hat and the dirty bunches of black and white ribbons on the end of his long staff of office, had consolidated his duties, probably at a slight and very welcome discount to his poor patrons, and was burying the dead of two families at once. ”

“ It was not surprising that Martha’s ideal had been so repeatedly unrealized, for it was a difficult one. She had suffered acutely from her former disappointments, and had even resolved never to pin her faith and hope on another woman. But the princess was not to be resisted. Martha felt that even if her goddess never spoke to her again, she was worthy of all adoration. ”

“ And yet how can I dare to hope?”
“Listen, Martha,” said the princess in a matter-of-fact tone, as she drew the other down to a seat beside her on the lounge; “let us take each other quite simply, and not promise anything. We will just agree to be perfectly natural with each other—just to be ourselves. If you continue to like me, and I you, it is all right. ”

“ One reason that I have so entirely given up society is that they fret me so with their offers of what you and they call friendship. I did have men friends once, and I know what they amount to. While I was married, my—I mean the man I married—was my friend. Since I lost him I have never had another.”
As she ended, she rose and walked across the room. Her tone was so decided that Martha felt that she could say nothing more, and so, with a sigh, she gave up this dream too.
In a moment the princess returned, bringing two photographs, which she had taken from a drawer. ”

“ She was such a strong and resolute woman that he had imagined her, after the stern ordeal of the first few months of separation, going resolutely on, with her life adjusted to its new conditions; and although he was certain that her marriage, separation, and the coming divorce would make too deep marks in her womanly consciousness for her ever to think of marrying again, he quite believed that she was the calm and self-poised woman for which he knew nature had intended her. ”

“ I shall never own the picture as long as I live; and I have the solemn pledge of both you and Etienne not to betray me. You know it was against my will that I consented to exhibit it, and I could not endure to have it known that a melodramatic thing like that (for that is what it will be called) had been painted and exhibited by me. Did your brother laugh at it? Tell me the truth. If he laughed at it, I wish to know it.”
She had raised herself in the bed, and sat upright, looking at Martha with commanding eyes.
“Laugh at it, Sonia? Could any one laugh at that picture—least of all Harold? ”

“ No sooner was Martha gone than she rose quickly, rang for her maid, and began to dress, regardless of the fact that her head felt light, and her limbs were trembling. She put on a long cloak and a large black hat; and, ordering her carriage, had herself driven to the Palais de l’Industrie. ”

“ I refuse to take from you a smaller thing. It is easier to give you up than to face that thought.”
“But Sonia! Darling! You have got that love! I tell you it is just the same!”
She shook her head.
“It cannot be,” she said. “You would feel that what had been once might be again. You could never feel secure for even one moment. I could not bear it. You must remember what I felt in that one embrace. Oh, Harold, I want you to remember that! ”

“ Sonia, during that same time, was shut within her room, thinking as intensely as he. She had been able, by dint of enormous will-power, to control herself in all other points while indulging herself in one. She had said to herself during those crucial minutes in the cab, while she consciously threw open the windows of her soul to this man in that clear and unrestricted gaze, that she would neither speak nor stir, though the effort should kill her. ”

“ One of those great rushes of passionate tenderness which the sight of the man she loves can sometimes bring to a woman’s heart came over me. At that moment the photographer got the instantaneous impression. I don’t know why I should tell you all this, except that you saw it all there. To other people there never seemed any special significance in the picture.”
She reached out her hand to take back the photographs, but Martha handed her only the first.
“Oh, Sonia, let me keep this!” she begged. “It is such delight to me to look at it!” ”

“ Sonia could see the very expressions of their faces as they would look up for direction to the sisters as they passed, lifting their meek and timid glances with an air of solemnity{169} which in some instances struggled with a sense of pride in their unwonted paraphernalia. Somehow, the sight of so much ignorance, trust, and innocence, and the thought that each one of them possessed a woman’s heart, with all its capacity for suffering, for hoping, for loving, for regretting, absolutely overcame her. ”

“ She knew she could not be many years older than herself, and she wondered, with burning interest, whether she was or was not married. Sometimes she would hold to one opinion for days, and then something—a mere turn of expression, perhaps—would convert her to the opposite one. She wanted her to be unmarried, so that she might be free to construct from her imagination a beautiful{8} future for her; and yet she dreaded to find out that she was married. There was certainly a look about the princess which contradicted Martha’s ideal of her as the possessor of a fair, unwritten life-page. ”

“ If I like you, and want to see more of you, and you have the same feeling toward me, why should we not indulge ourselves? Very well! So we will!” and she bent, and kissed Martha on the cheek.
The girl’s heart quivered with joy; but she could find no words in which to express it, so she was quite silent. She felt herself very stupid as she let the princess take off her wraps and hat, and lead her to a seat.{32}
“Now,” said the lovely lady, “as I am one of those people who must be comfortable before they can be happy, I am going to put on a loose gown. ”