Part 11 (2/2)
Algarcife frowned. ”I am sick of it,” he said--”sick to death. To please you, I plodded away at theology for three solid years. To please you, I weighed a.s.sumptions as light as air. To please you, I read all the rot of all the Fathers--and I am sick of it. I shall live my own life in my own way.”
”And may G.o.d help you!” said the elder man; and then, ”Where will you go?”
”To Egypt--to India--to the old civilizations.”
”And then?”
”I do not know. I shall work and I shall succeed--with or without the help of G.o.d.”
And he had gone. During the next few years he travelled in Africa and Asia, when the sudden loss of his income recalled him to America.
Finding it fruitless to rebel, he resigned himself philosophically, secured a position as instructor in a woman's college, made up an annual deficit by writing for the scientific reviews, and continued his studies. His physical nature he believed he had rendered quiescent.
Some days after his encounter with Mariana he came upon her again. He had just entered the park at the Seventy-second Street entrance, on his way from his lecture at the Bodley College. The battered bonnet of a beggar-woman had blown beneath the horses' hoofs in the drive, and he had stopped to rescue it, when he heard his name called, and saw Mariana beside him.
She spoke impulsively.
”I have been watching you,” she said.
He looked at her in perplexity.
”Indeed! And what have you discovered?”
”I discovered that you are a gentleman.”
He laughed outright.
”Your powers of intuition are positively miraculous,” he replied.
She upbraided him with a glance.
”You are unkind,” she said.
”Am I?”
”You are unkind to me.” Her manner had grown subtly personal. He felt suddenly as if he had known her from the beginning of time and through various transmigrations.
”You laugh at me,” she added. ”You were kinder to that woman--”
He broke in upon her, perplexity giving place to amus.e.m.e.nt.
”Oh!” he said; ”so that is what you mean! Why, if you were to lose your hat, I shouldn't laugh, I a.s.sure you.”
Mariana walked on silently. Her eyes were bent upon the gray sidewalk, there was a faint flush in her face. A line of men seated upon the benches beside the way surveyed her with interest.
”Miss Musin!”
Her face quickened.
”I have a confession to make.”
<script>