Part 21 (2/2)

”As to my learning, you flatter me,” said Winter. ”I am no scholar; but an enthusiast will study the history of his subject Did I remark that the great Dr. Johnson, in these matters so sceptical, admits (in a romance, it is true) the possibility of artificial flight? The artisan of the Happy Valley expected to solve the problem in one year's time.

'If all men were equally virtuous,' said this artist, 'I should with equal alacrity teach them all to fly.'”

”And you will keep your secret, like Dr. Johnson's artist?”

”To _you_ I do not mind revealing this much. The vans or wings of my machine describe elliptic figures of eight.”

”I've seen them do _that_, said Barton.

”Like the wings of birds; and have the same forward and downward stroke, by a direct piston action. The impetus is given, after a descent in air--which I effected by starting from a height of six feet only--by a combination of heated naphtha and of india rubber under torsion. By steam alone, in 1842, Philips made a model of a flying-machine soar across two fields. Penaud's machine, relying only on india rubber under torsion, flies for some fifty yards. What a model can do, as Bishop Wilkins well observes, a properly weighted and proportioned flying-machine, capable of carrying a man, can do also.”

”But yours, when I first had the pleasure of meeting you, was not carrying you at all.”

”Something had gone wrong with the mechanism,” answered Winter, sighing.

”It is always so. An inventor has many things to contend against.

Remember Ark-wright, and how he was puzzled hopelessly by that trifling error in the thickness of the valves in his spinning machine. He had to give half his profits to Strutt, the local blacksmith, before Strutt would tell him that he had only to chalk his valves! The thickness of a coating of chalk made all the difference. Some trifle like that, depend on it, interfered with my machine. You see, I am obliged to make my experiments at night, and in the dark, for fear of being discovered and antic.i.p.ated. I have been on the verge--nay, _over_ the verge--of success. 'No imaginable invention,' Bishop Wilkins says, 'could prove of greater benefit to the world, or greater glory to the author.' A few weeks ago that glory was mine!”

”Why a few weeks ago?” asked Barton. ”Was your machine more advanced then than when I met you?”

”I cannot explain what had happened to check its motion,” said Winter, wearily; ”but a few weeks ago my _machine acted_, and I may say that I knew the sensations of a bird on the wing.”

”Do you mean that you actually _flew_?”

”For a very short distance, I did indeed, sir!”

Barton looked at him curiously: two currents of thought--one wild and credulous, the other practical and professional--surged and met in his brain. The professional current proved the stronger for the moment.

”Good-night,” he said. ”You are tiring and over-exciting yourself. I will call again soon.”

He _did_ call again, and Winter told him a tale which will be repeated in its proper place.

CHAPTER XIV.--Found.

”All precious things, discovered late, To those that seek them issue forth; For Love, in sequel, works with Fate, And draws the veil from hidden worth.”

--The Sleeping Beauty.

That Margaret and Barton were losing their hearts to each other could not, of course, escape the keen eye of Mrs. St. John Deloraine. She noticed that Margaret, though perfectly restored to health, and lacking only the clear brown over the rose of her cheeks, was by no means so light of heart as in the very earliest days of her recovery. Love makes men and women poor company, and, to speak plainly, takes the fun out of them. Margaret was absent-minded, given to long intervals of silence, a bad listener--all of them things hateful to Mrs. St. John Delo-raine, but pardoned, in this instance, by the benevolent lady. Margaret was apt to blush without apparent cause, to start when a knock came to the door, to leave the room hurriedly, and need to be sought and brought back, when Barton called. Nor was Barton himself such good company as he had been. His manner was uncertain and constrained; his visits began to be paid at longer intervals; he seemed to have little to say, or talked in fits and starts; and yet he did not know how to go away.

Persons much less clear-sighted than Mrs. St John Deloraine could have interpreted, without difficulty, this awkward position of affairs.

Now, like most women of her kindly and impulsive character (when it has not been refined away into nothing by social hypocrisies), Mrs. St. John Deloraine was a perfectly reckless match-maker. She believed in love with her whole heart; it was a joy to her to mark the beginnings of inclination in two young souls, and she simply revelled in an ”engagement.” All considerations of economy, prudence, and foresight melted away before the ardor of her enthusiasm: to fall in love first, to get engaged next, and to be married as soon as possible afterward, without regard to consequences of any kind, were, in this lady's mind, heroic actions, and almost the whole duty of men and women.

In her position, and with her opportunities, she soon knew all that was to be known about Margaret's affections, and also about Barton's.

”He's as much in love with you as a man can be, my dear,” she said to Margaret ”Not worthy of him? Your past a barrier between you and him?

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