Part 22 (1/2)

That evening, before he went to dress for dinner, he wandered into the library, where he felt certain he should find some superior bindings.

There was no one in the room and he spent a happy half-hour among treasures of old reading and triumphs of old morocco. He had a great esteem for good literature, he held that it should have handsome covers.

The daylight had begun to wane, but whenever, in the rich-looking dimness, he made out the glimmer of a well-gilded back, he took down the volume and carried it to one of the deep-set windows. He had just finished the inspection of a delightfully fragrant folio, and was about to carry it back to its niche, when he found himself face to face with Lady Demesne. He was sharply startled, for her tall slim figure, her preserved fairness, which looked white in the high brown room, and the air of serious intention with which she presented herself, all gave something spectral to her presence. He saw her countenance dimly light, however, and heard her say with the vague despair of her neutrality: ”Are you looking at our books? I'm afraid they're rather dull.”

”Dull? Why they're as bright as the day they were bound.” And he turned on her the glittering panels of his folio.

”I'm afraid I haven't looked at them for a long time,” she murmured, going nearer to the window, where she stood looking out. Beyond the clear pane the park stretched away, the menace of night already mantling the great limbs of the oaks. The place appeared cold and empty, and the trees had an air of conscious importance, as if Nature herself had been bribed somehow to take the side of county families. Her ladys.h.i.+p was no easy person for talk; spontaneity had never come to her, and to express herself might have been for her modesty like some act of undressing in public. Her very simplicity was conventional, though it was rather a n.o.ble convention. You might have pitied her for the sense of her living tied so tight, with consequent moral cramps, to certain rigid ideals.

This made her at times seem tired, like a person who had undertaken too much. She said nothing for a moment, and there was an appearance of design in her silence, as if she wished to let him know she had appealed to him without the trouble of announcing it. She had been accustomed to expect people would suppose things, to save her questions and explanations. Waterville made some haphazard remark about the beauty of the evening-in point of fact the weather had changed for the worse-to which she vouchsafed no reply. But she presently said with her usual gentleness: ”I hoped I should find you here-I should like to ask you something.”

”Anything I can tell you-I shall be delighted!” the young man declared.

She gave him a pleading look that seemed to say: ”Please be very simple-very simple indeed.” Then she glanced about her as if there had been other people in the room; she didn't wish to appear closeted with him or to have come on purpose. There she was at any rate, and she proceeded. ”When my son told me he should ask you to come down I was very glad. I mean of course we were delighted-” And she paused a moment. But she next went on: ”I want to ask you about Mrs. Headway.”

”Ah, here it is!” cried Waterville within himself. But he could show no wincing. ”Ah yes, I see!”

”Do you mind my asking you? I hope you don't mind. I haven't any one else to ask.”

”Your son knows her much better than I do.” He said this without intention of malice, simply to escape from the difficulties of the situation, but after he had spoken was almost frightened by his mocking sound.

”I don't think he knows her. She knows _him_-which is very different.

When I ask him about her he merely tells me she's fascinating. She _is_ fascinating,” said her ladys.h.i.+p with inimitable dryness.

”So I think, myself. I like her very much,” Waterville returned cheerfully.

”You're in all the better position to speak of her then.”

”To speak well of her,” the young man smiled.

”Of course-if you can. I should be delighted to hear you do that.

That's what I wish-to hear some good of her.”

It might have seemed after this that nothing could have remained but for our friend to break out in categoric praise of his fellow guest; but he was no more to be tempted into that danger than into another. ”I can only say I like her,” he repeated. ”She has been very kind to me.”

”Every one seems to like her,” said Lady Demesne with an unstudied effect of pathos. ”She's certainly very amusing.”

”She's very good-natured. I think she has no end of good intentions.”

”What do you mean by good intentions?” asked Lady Demesne very sweetly.

”Well, it strikes me she wants to be friendly and pleasant.”

”Indeed she does! But of course you have to defend her. She's your countrywoman.”

”To defend her I must wait till she's attacked,” Waterville laughed.

”That's very true. I needn't call your attention to the fact that I'm not attacking her,” his hostess observed. ”I should never attack a person staying in this house. I only want to know something about her, and if you can't tell me perhaps at least you can mention some one who will.”

”She'll tell you herself. Tell you by the hour!”