Miss Fairfax

“ She had been in grey when he had first seen her on the day of the unveiling of the monument. Fairfax passed his hand across his eyes, as though to brush away a vision which, like a mist, was still between them. He put his hand down over hers on the pedestal.
"I love you," he said very low. "That is the matter. That is the trouble. I love you. I want you to know it. I dare love you. I am perfectly penniless and I am glad of it. I want to owe everything to my art, to climb through the thorns to where I shall some day reach. ”

“ He soothed her, made her sit on his bed and dried her tears, as he had dried them when she had cried over the blackbird.
"Who is with you, honey? Who brought you here?"
As though she had stored up all her sorrow, as though she had waited with a child's loyal tenderness for this moment, she wound her arms around Fairfax's neck and brought her face close to his cheek.
"I miss him perfectly dreadfully, Cousin Antony. Nobody took care of him much but me. Now father is broken-hearted. You loved him, didn't you? He perfectly worshipped you."
"There, Bella, you choke me, honey. I can't breathe. ”

“ Emmeline sent him her thimble, her lace collar, her wedding ring and a lock of her hair, shining still and without a touch of grey. The packet, wrapped up in soft paper and folded by jasmine leaves and buds, whose withered petals were like a faded dress, Fairfax put away in his trunk and did not untie; he did not wish to open his wound. And his face, thinner from his illness and his loss, looked ten years older. The early happy ecstasy of youth was gone, and a bitter, mature recklessness took its place, and there was no hand to soothe him but Molly's, and she had gone back to Troy. ”

“ On the way out to Versailles from the top of the tram, lifted high above Paris and the river, alongside of the vulgar head, alongside of the strange little English girl, Fairfax listened to the outpouring of her heart. She took his interest for granted. With an appreciative understanding of human nature, and as though she had been bearing a burden for years which she had never let slip, she rested it now, and her blue eyes on his, her hands in the old woollen gloves, which she had slipped on before they started, clasped in her lap, she talked to Fairfax. ”

“ Far down at the end of the alley they could see other strollers, but where they stood they were quite alone. The excitement of the unusual outing, the pleasure of companionship, brought the colour to their cheeks, a light to their eyes. The girl's helplessness, the human struggle so like to his own, her admiration and her frankness, appealed to him greatly. His late agitation, useless, hopeless, perilous moreover, and which he felt he must overcome because it could have neither issue nor satisfaction, made Fairfax turn here for satisfaction and repose. ”

“ Fairfax's presence. With it came the paralyzing fear of her husband's discovery of her secret. Secure as she had been in her dull belief that he had in some way wronged her by marrying her, she for the first time began to doubt if this condoned the deceit she had practiced on him. The tribute Mrs. Fairfax had paid him—this appreciation of his integrity and honesty by an enemy and a woman like herself—troubled her, frightened her, and filled her with her first jealousy! What if this woman should tell him all; what if she should make use of him as Marion had of her! ”

“ The mysterious lodger enclosed, moreover, a week's board in advance, but no address; nor had the coloured man any information for Nut Street, and a decided antipathy existed between George Washington and Mary Kenny. She was pale when she packed up Fairfax's belongings and cried into his trunk, as she laid the drawing of Bella Carew next to the unopened packet of his mother's treasures. She was unconscious of what sacred thing she touched, but she was cut to the heart, as was poor Falutini. Peter Rainsford, who had not gone far in his friendship with the elusive Fairfax, was only disappointed. ”

“ Fairfax looked at her earnestly. "You must not mind if you feel that you have got it in you. Don't seek to hear others' opinions, just go boldly, courageously on. What I say has no meaning."
He dropped her hands and the colour came back somewhat into her face.
"What you say has importance, though," she answered. "I have the feeling that you are somebody. Anyhow, I have watched you every time you came. I think you know things. I believe you must be a great artist. I should believe you—I do believe you. I see you don't think I'm any good. ”

“ The ball-room was thronged, and the two without could hear, close to the casement, the swish of brocaded robes on the shining oaken floor. From the raised gallery came the slow air of a minuet, the fiddlers' strains blending with the tones of the flute and the sweet tinkle of a harp.
The loiterers on the terrace had not taken many turns before Sir John Fairfax joined them.
'I may but stay a moment,' he said. 'The house should not be left thus.'
'The house is very well, dear lad,' said his wife serenely. 'My guests are never dull, for the reason that dull folk are never my guests. ”

“ When after toilsome journeys up and down the stairs of the four-storied house, the things had been fetched, Fairfax mixed his plaster, eagerly watched by the children. Perched on the edge of the divan, Bella brooded over the foaming, marvellous concoction, into whose milky bubbles she saw art fall like a star—a genius blossom like a flower. She gazed at Antony's hands as they plunged in and came out dripping; gazed as though she expected him to bring forth some peerless image his touch had called to life. ”

“ Fairfax, who was not going slow over his breakfast, indicated the opera hat behind the door and the bromide.
"Hurrah for you and Alphonse," exclaimed the young fellow, who prepared himself a pick-me-up eagerly, and without invitation seated himself at Fairfax's table.
A good-looking young man of twenty-five, not more, with a cheerful, intelligent face in sober moments, now pale, with parched lips and eyes not clear yet. ”

“ To Fairfax's senses it brought no consolation but the sharp suffering that any beauty brings to the poet and the seer. It was a new day—he was too young to be crushed out of life because he had an empty pocket, and faint as he was, hungry as he was, the visions began to rise again in his brain. The crimson glory, as it swam over the railroad yards, over the bridge, over the unsightly buildings, was peopled by his ideals—his breath came fast and his heart beat. ”

“ He knew that such peace could only come to him through the companionship of a woman.
No commonplace woman would satisfy Fairfax now.
Money and position meant absolutely nothing to him. If Bella Carew were a rich and brilliant heiress it would probably alienate him from her. His need called for a woman who could work at his side with a kindred interest, a woman who knew beauty, who loved art, whose appreciation and criticism could not leave him cold. ”

“ As Fairfax leant down to break the model Bella helped him bravely.
"Now, might I put on my stocking, Cousin Antony?"
He had been pouring the warm plaster into the mould and had forgotten her, and was reproached.
The twilight gathered and made friends with the storm as they waited for the cast to harden. Old Ann came in and lighted the gas above the group on the old divan.
"Be the hivenly powers! Mr. Fairfax, ye've here a power of a dirt." ”

“ The ringing of the bells, the crying note of the whistles, had become musical to Fairfax.
There was no reason why he should not marry the Irish girl who doled out coffee to railroad hands.... Was there none? The figure of his mother rose before him, beautiful, proud, ambitious Mrs. Fairfax. She was waiting for his brilliant success, she was waiting to crown [Pg 118] him when he should bring his triumphs home. The ugly yards blurred before his eyes, he almost fancied that a spray of jasmine blew across the pane. ”

“ We must consider what Miss Fairfax quits, before we condemn her taste for what she goes to.” ”

“ You’re quite perfect, Miss Fairfax.
Gwendolen. Oh! I hope I am not that. It would leave no room for developments, and I intend to develop in many directions. ”

“ Young Fairfax seemed so perfectly to represent the traditions of his family, and his future seemed so secure; and Mary Ellen herself, tall and slender, bound to be stately and of noble grace, seemed so eminently fit to be a Beauchamp beauty and a Fairfax bride.
For the young people themselves it may be doubted if there had yet awakened the passion of genuine, personal love. ”

“ Carew's latchkey scratched in the door, Bella flew upstairs to the top story, Antony and Gardiner followed more slowly; Mrs. Carew shut her piano, and took the cars again to forget her restlessness in the purchase of silks and dry goods and house decorations, and was far from guessing the emotion she had aroused in the breast of her nephew—"Flow gently, sweet Afton." Nothing flowed gently in Fairfax's impetuous breast. Nothing flowed gently on the tide of events that drifted past slowly, leaving him unsuccessful, without any opening into fame. ”

“ Many's the time when there's a hard thing to do he seems to open the door and I go through, and it's not so hard."
She was imaginative, Fairfax knew it. She was superstitious, like the people of her country. The things she said were often full of fancy, like the legends and stories of the Celts; but now he hardly heard her, for he was working, and she went back to her task by the lamp, and, under the quiet of her presence and its companionship, his modelling grew. ”

“ Bella's new outfit was complete, a deeper colour glowed on the robin-red dress she wore, and Fairfax felt shabby between them as he limped along into the Park under the budding trees, a child's hand on either arm.
"Cousin Antony, why are there such delicious smells to-day?"
Bella sniffed them. The spring was at work under the turf, the grass was as fragrant as a bouquet.
"Breathe it in, Cousin Antony! It makes you wish to do heaps of things you oughtn't to!" ”

“ Bella's were dark eyes, superb and shadowy. They held something of the Spanish mystery, caught from the strain that ran through the Carew family from the Middle Ages, when the Carez were nobles in Andalusia.
"I am angry with myself, Bella; I am a fool."
"Oh no, you're not," she breathed devotedly, "you're a genius."
The tension of Fairfax's heart relaxed. The highest praise that any woman could have found, this child, in her naïveté, gave him.
"Why don't you make some figures and sell them, Cousin Antony? Are you worried about money troubles?" She had heard these terms often. ”

“ He wrote her that he should not be able to go to Versailles. He deserted his day's work at Barye's and remained at home modelling. And Dearborn, seeing Fairfax's distraction, went out early and did not return until dark. Fairfax found himself alone again, alone with his visions, alone with his pride, alone with powerful and new emotions.
Sometimes in January, in the middle of the month, days come that surprise the Parisians with their inconstancy and their softness. The sun shone out suddenly and the sky was as blue as in Italy. ”

“ Her ardent thirst for knowledge, her assiduous application to study, and her eminent proficiency in literature, and in science and the fine arts, have procured her a celebrity rarely attained by any of her sex; but she never displays any pretensions to superiority, while the affability of her temper and the gentleness of her manners afford constant resources of gratification to her family and intimate friends."
At Edinburgh, on the 28th June, 1804, Miss Fairfax was married to her cousin, Captain Samuel Greig, of the Russian Navy. ”

“ Ellice's attention tautened. George's idea was good. After all, clever men had their uses. She overlooked in her approval the scrawny bodies of the Melcombe girls, recognized and bitterly criticised from church pews.
"Yes," George's assent this time was doubtful. "I hardly designed a local affair. I was thinking I might assist you in another way. I might get Miss Estelle Fairfax."
"Miss Fairfax!" Mrs. Mowbray woke up, deserting parish and bells and the narrow confines of Cradley. "You mean Miss Fairfax the actress?" ”

“ Miss Fairfax, ever since I met you I have admired you more than any girl . ”

“ Her morning's outing, the tramp and the excitement, were an unusual strain to Molly, not to speak of her emotions, and she cried herself to sleep. [Pg 97]
Fairfax sat every Sunday in the same pew. The seat was to the left of the altar, and he sang with an ardour and a mellowness that was lost neither on the people near him nor on the choir-master. All arts were sympathetic to him: his ear was good and his voice agreeable. ”

“ He never touched a drop as long as our mother was living. He was always so sorry for our mother, and so good to her, though she was only a poor ignorant woman, who couldn’t read or write, and Fairfax was so smart. The teacher in our school wanted Fairfax to study to be a minister or a doctor, but he never would. He said he thought the more colored people try to raise themselves, the worse they get treated. He felt so bad, always, about the way colored people were treated. He said white folks wanted them to be low-down, so he was going to be. ”

“ He gave a cry, and as he was about again to embrace her they heard Dearborn's step upon the stairs.
Mrs. Faversham was in the window looking out upon Paris, and Fairfax was modelling on his study when the playwright came in with a can of milk, some madeleines and a pot of jam.
After she had gone he wanted to escape and be alone, but Dearborn chatted, pacing the studio, whilst Fairfax dressed and shaved, praising the visitor.
"She's a great lady, Tony. What breeding and race! And she's not what the books call 'indifferent' to you." ”