Part 11 (1/2)

”Not that I know of. Will you go?”

”It is rather sudden,” said the Doctor reflectively.

”You must make up your mind one way or the other, or you will spoil the Duke's arrangements.”

”Barker,” said Claudius seriously, ”do you suppose the Countess knows who are going?”

”My dear boy,” replied the other, peeling a peach which he had impaled on a fork, ”it is not likely the Duke would ask a lady to go with him without telling her who the men were to be. Be calm, however; I have observed your habits, and in two hours and twenty-three minutes your mind will be at rest.”

”How so?”

”It is now thirty-seven minutes past nine. Do you mean to say you have failed once for weeks past to be at the Countess's as the clock strikes twelve?”

Claudius was silent. It was quite true; he went there daily at the same hour; for, as appeared in the beginning of this tale, he was a regular man. But he reflected just now that the Countess would not be likely to speak of the party unless she knew that he was to be one. He had not accepted his invitation yet, and the Duke would certainly not take his acceptance as a foregone conclusion. Altogether it seemed probable that he would be kept in suspense. If he then accepted without being sure of the Countess, he was binding himself to leave her. Claudius had many things to learn yet.

”If I were you,” said Barker, ”I would write at once and say 'Yes.' Why can't you do it now?”

”Because I have not made up my mind.”

”Well, a bird in the hand is the soul of business, as the good old proverb says. I have accepted for myself, anyhow; but I would be sorry to leave you on this side.”

So Claudius went to the Countess as usual, and found her in her morning-room awaiting him. He bent over her hand, but as he took it he thought it was a trifle colder than usual. It might have been imagination, but he fancied her whole manner was less cordial than before. And he said to himself, ”She has heard I am going, and she is annoyed, and is not glad to see me.” There was a preternatural solemnity about their conversation which neither of them could break through, and in a few minutes they both looked as though they had not smiled for years.

Now Claudius was entirely mistaken. Margaret had not heard that he was going. If she had, she would have spoken frankly, as was her nature to do always, if she spoke at all. Margaret had accepted the Duke's invitation, and intended to keep her word, and she had no suspicion whatever of who the other guests might be. She foresaw that such a journey would break up her acquaintance with Claudius, and she regretted it; and especially she regretted having allowed the Doctor so much intimacy and so many visits. Not that he had taken advantage of the footing on which he was received, for any signs of such a disposition on his part would have abruptly terminated the situation; he had been the very model of courtesy from the first. But she knew enough of men to perceive that this gentle homage clothed a more sincere admiration than lay at the root of the pus.h.i.+ng attentions of some other men she had known. Therefore she made up her mind that as there were yet three weeks before sailing, after the expiration of which she would never be likely to see Claudius again, she would let him down easily, so to speak, that there might be no over-tender recollections on his part, nor any little stings of remorse on her own. He had interested her; they had spent a couple of pleasant months; she had given him no encouragement, and he was gone without a sigh: that was the way in which Countess Margaret hoped to remember Dr. Claudius by that time next month. And so, fearing lest she might inadvertently have been the least shade too cordial, she began to be a little more severe, on this hot morning when Claudius, full of indecision, followed her out to their favourite reading-place under the trees. It was the same spot where they had sat when Barker first brought him to see her. Margaret had no particular feeling about the little nook under the trees. It was merely the most convenient place to sit and work; that was all. But to Claudius the circle of green sward represented the temple of his soul, and Margaret was to him Rune Wife and prophetess as well as divinity. In such places, and of such women, his fair-haired forefathers, bare-armed and sword-girt, had asked counsel in trouble, and song-inspiration in peace.

Here they sat them down, she determined to do the right by him, and thinking it an easy matter; he utterly misunderstanding her. Without a smile, they set to work at their reading. They read for an hour or more, maintaining the utmost gravity, when, as luck would have it, the word ”friends.h.i.+p” occurred in a pa.s.sage of the book. Claudius paused a moment, his broad hand laid flat on the open page.

”That is one of the most interesting and one of the most singularly misunderstood words in all languages,” he said.

”What word?” inquired Margaret, looking up from her work, to which she had attentively applied herself while he was reading.

”Friends.h.i.+p.”

”Will you please define what it means?” said she.

”I can define what I myself mean by it, or rather what I think I mean by it. I can define what a dozen writers have meant by it. But I cannot tell what it really means, still less what it may ultimately come to mean.”

”You will probably be best able to explain what you mean by it yourself,” answered Margaret rather coldly. ”Will you please begin?”

”It seems to me,” Claudius began, ”that the difficulty lies in the contradiction between the theory and the fact. Of course, as in all such cases, the theory loses the battle, and we are left groping for an explanation of the fact which we do not understand. Perhaps that is a little vague?” Claudius paused.

”A little vague--yes,” said she.

”I will try and put it more clearly. First take the fact. No one will deny that there have occasionally in the world's history existed friends.h.i.+ps which have stood every test and which have lasted to the very end. Such attachments have been always affairs of the heart, even between man and man. I do not think you can name an instance of a lasting friends.h.i.+p on a purely intellectual basis. True friends.h.i.+p implies the absence of envy, and the vanity of even the meanest intellect is far too great to admit of such a condition out of pure thought-sympathy.”

”I do not see any contradiction, even admitting your last remark, which is cynical enough.” Margaret spoke indifferently, as making a mere criticism.

”But I believe most people connect the idea of friends.h.i.+p, beyond ordinary liking, with intellectual sympathy. They suppose, for instance, that a man may love a woman wholly and entirely with the best kind of love, and may have at the same time a friend with whom he is in entire sympathy.”

”And why not?” she asked.