Part 9 (1/2)
”I must first find my affinity,” he replied evasively.
”Have you not met her yet?” said Marion, looking up with an air of astonishment.
Duncan's eyes quickly caught her glance. ”I think I have,” he replied in a way that was at once bold, insinuating, and tender. Marion turned her head away quickly and a tinge of color came into her cheeks. It was resentment, but somehow a sense of pleasure tingled amid the anger. ”You are an enigma,” she said, ashamed at having colored. ”I thought you were a cynical speculator, but now you seem a fanciful dreamer.”
”You must guess again,” he replied. ”I am neither a cynic nor a visionist.”
”What are you?” she asked abruptly.
”I am a disciple of love,” he replied.
”Then I was right in calling you a dreamer, for love itself is a fantasm inspired by hope or memory.”
”You are a Philistine,” he said softly. ”Some day you may feel, and that is to believe.”
”_Che sara sara_, but I have my doubts,” she replied. Duncan's glance was contradictory, but he did not reply. After a moment of silence he rose to leave. ”Is the truce to be granted?” he said. ”Do we dance together?”
”Yes, if you wish it so,” replied Marion.
”Then to-morrow we meet at the ball. Remember hostilities have ceased.
Good-night.” Marion extended her hand and Duncan held it for a moment.
”Don't let the hate grow too strong,” he said pleadingly.
”It couldn't,” she replied; then she quickly withdrew her hand and turned away.
When Duncan reached the street he stopped to light a cigar. As he threw the match away and returned his match-safe to his pocket, he carelessly soliloquized: ”When a moth sees a fire, it flutters around it to see what it is like, and it hasn't sense enough to keep from getting burned.
A woman is much the same: excite her curiosity by the flame called love, and it is ten to one she gets singed before she finds out what it is. I have been talking a lot of trash, but it's all in the trade. Talk sense to a woman and treat her decently, and she thinks you are a m.u.f.f; talk enigmatical bosh, and knock her about, and she loves you. They are all alike. No, by Jove! they are not; Helen Osgood outcla.s.ses them all, and she has 'hands for any sort'. Oh, well, as the Frenchman says: 'if you haven't got what you love, love what you have.' The Sanderson is a good looker, and you must have sport, Duncan, old man.” Then shoving his stick under his arm, and plunging his hands into his coat pockets, he started off at a swinging pace in search of a cab.
Marion had remained seated where she and Duncan had been together. She had listened to hear the door close behind him, and then, her face resting in both hands, she sat thinking. Her imagination rapidly created a visionary structure of dazzling possibilities, but the dismal silence which follows in the steps of revelry came, and with it unrest. Quickly her Spanish castle crumbled and faded to a lonely ruin. ”It is always so,” she thought; ”it is always so. Like children at a pantomime, who picture to their minds brilliant jewels in the fairy queen's tiara, and learn in after life that they were tawdry counterfeits, we imagine ideal gems of possibility only to find the reality of life papier mache and paint. Is love also a tinsel that tarnishes at the touch? So far mine has been so. But might it not be different? Yes, but the thought is wicked.” Marion looked hurriedly about her as though fearful that someone might have seen the thought which crept into her mind. ”He believes in love,” she continued. ”He says the right one exists. I wonder if it is true.”
Florence came into the room to say good-night. Marion usually enjoyed repeating her day's experiences, and discussing her impressions with her friend, and Florence knew that at such times she was expected to approve of every sentiment, or be called unsympathetic, but when Florence kissed her good-night Marion made no suggestion about talking over experiences, and as neither woman felt inclined for an exchange of confidences, Florence hurried away to her room. Marion's eyes followed her as she left. ”She acts strangely,” she thought; ”I wonder if her friends.h.i.+p could change? Perhaps, for we are so different. No one understands me,”
she sighed after a moment. ”If I only had someone I could trust and love.” A man stood in the doorway behind her. He heard the sigh, and he remained for a moment silently thinking of the time when she had promised to be his wife. Then he had drawn a hopeful picture of the future, a picture full of brightness and suns.h.i.+ne, with a loving wife for the central figure and happy, romping children playing about her.
That dream had flashed like a brilliant light which blazes for a moment and dies as suddenly away, leaving black, charred ashes to mark its place.
”Marion,” he said gently.
She looked up startled. ”Is it only you?” she said, with just a tone of disappointment in her voice.
”Yes, it is only I,” he answered. ”Shall I ring to have the lights turned out?”
”O, I suppose so,” she sighed.
A servant came to secure the house for the night. When he appeared, Marion slowly followed her husband upstairs, and as they pa.s.sed Florence's room, she saw a light burning. Usually Marion would have gone in to talk, but this time she went on to her own apartment.
Long after Marion had pa.s.sed that light continued to burn. With her dress loosened and her soft brown hair falling over her white shoulders Florence sat before the fire thinking. Between her hands was a picture.
It was Harold's, and as she gazed at the face she seemed to hear the words: ”Florence, I love you; if you were not my dearest friend, you might love me too.” ”Why did he say it; why did he say it,” she murmured. Then moments from her childhood came softly back to her mind, and she saw Harold, her old-time playmate, grow to manhood. ”Playmate, friend,” she thought. ”Why not more? Why not?” she repeated.
CHAPTER VII.