Part 48 (1/2)

The other read the look in her face, and a slightly pacifying smile gathered at her lips.

”We are glad to hear that your father is better. He has been ill a long time?”

Rosalie started again, for the voice perplexed her--rather, not the voice, but the inflection, the deliberation.

She bowed, and set her lips, but, chancing to glance at her father, she saw that he was troubled by her manner. Flas.h.i.+ng a look of love at him, she adjusted the pillow under his head, and said to her questioner in a low voice: ”He is better now, thank you.”

Encouraged, the other rejoined: ”May I leave one or two books for him to read--or for you to read to him?” Then added hastily, for she saw a curious look in Rosalie's eyes: ”We can have mutual friends in books, though we cannot be friends with each other. Books are the go-betweens of humanity.”

Rosalie's heart leapt, she flushed, then grew slightly pale, for it was not tone or inflection alone that disturbed her now, but words themselves. A voice from over the hills seemed to say these things to her. A haunting voice from over the hills had said them to her--these very words.

”Friends need no go-betweens,” she said quietly, ”and enemies should not use them.”

She heard a voice say, ”By Jove!” in a tone of surprise, as though it were wonderful the girl from Chaudiere should have her wits about her.

So Rosalie interpreted it.

”Have you many friends here?” asked the cold voice, meant to be kindly and pacific. It was schooled to composure, because it gave advantage in life's intercourse, not from any inner urbanity.

”Some need many friends, some but a few. I come from a country where one only needs a few.”

”Where is your country, I wonder?” said the cold echo of another voice.

Charley had pa.s.sed out of Kathleen's life--he was dead to her, his memory scorned and buried. She loved the man to whom she supposed she was married; she was only too glad to let the dust of death and time cover every trace of Charley from her gaze; she would have rooted out every particle of a.s.sociation: yet his influence on her had been so great that she had unconsciously absorbed some of his idiosyncrasies--in the tone of his voice, in his manner of speaking. To-day she had even repeated phrases he had used.

”Beyond the hills,” said Rosalie, turning away.

”Is it not strange?” said the voice. ”That is the t.i.tle of one of the books I have just brought--'Beyond the Hills'. It is by an English writer. This other book is French. May I leave them?”

Rosalie inclined her head. It would make her own position less dignified if she refused them. ”Books are always welcome to my father,” she said.

There was an instant's pause, as though the fas.h.i.+onable lady would offer her hand; but their eyes met, and they only bowed. The lady moved on with a smile, leaving a perfume of heliotrope behind her.

”Where is your country, I wonder?”--the voice of the lady rang in Rosalie's ears. As she sat at the window again, long after the visitors had disappeared, the words, ”I wonder--I wonder--I wonder!” kept beating in her brain. It was absurd that this woman should remind her of the tailor of Chaudiere.

Suddenly she was roused by her father's voice. ”This is beautiful--ah, but beautiful, Rosalie!”

She turned towards him. He was reading the book in his hand--'Beyond the Hills'. ”Listen,” he said, and he read, in English: ”'Compensation is the other name for G.o.d. How often is it that those whom disease or accident has robbed of active life find greater inner rejoicing and a larger spiritual itinerary! It would seem that withdrawal from the ruder activities gives a clearer seeing. Also for these, so often, is granted a greater love, which comes of the consecration of other lives to theirs. And these too have their reward, for they are less encompa.s.sed by the vanities of the world, having the joy of self-sacrifice.'” He looked at Rosalie with an unnatural brightness in his eyes, and she smiled at him now and stroked his hand.

”It has been all compensation to me,” he said, after a moment. ”You have been a good daughter to me, Rosalie.”

She shook her head and smiled. ”Good fathers think they have good daughters,” she answered, choking back a sob.

He closed the book and let it lie upon the coverlet. ”I will sleep now,”

he said, and turned on his side. She arranged his pillow, and adjusted the bedclothes to his comfort.

”Good-night,” he said, as, with a faint hand, he drew her head down and kissed her. ”Good girl! Goodnight!”

She patted his hand. ”It is not night yet, father.”