Part 13 (1/2)
”Will you at least shake hands, Yanna?” he asked, coming to her side.
Then she looked into his face, and he held her a moment to his heart, as with kisses on her sweet, sad mouth, he murmured, ”_Yanna! Yanna!_”
ere he went hastily away.
And as soon as he was gone, a quick realization of all she had lost, or resigned, reproached her. The most beautiful points in Harry's character came to the front--his love, his generous temper, his kindness to women, his cheerfulness, his physical beauty and grace, his fine manners! Oh, he had been in so many respects a most charming lover! No other could ever fill his place. Even his fault towards her had sprung from a virtue, and though in its development it showed him to be lacking in just perceptions and strength of character, were these indeed unpardonable faults?
This was the trend of her feeling in the first moments of her misery; and it was followed by a sentiment very like anger. She sat still as if turned into stone. All her life seemed to be suddenly behind her, and her future only a blank darkness. ”And it is my own fault!” she thought pa.s.sionately. ”The bird that sang in my heart all summer long has flown away; but it was my own hand that sent it out into the world, and there, doubtless, some other woman, more loving and less wise, will open her heart to its song. Alas! alas!” And a great wave of love drifted her off her feet; she lost all control of her feelings, and sobbed as despairingly as the weakest and most loving of her s.e.x could have done.
In the meantime, Harry was making himself utterly wretched in much the same manner. The presence of a servant being intolerable, he sent his man on a message to the express office, and then, as he drove homeward, deliberately tortured himself with a consideration of all the sweet beauty, and all the sweet nature, he had lost. ”And what for?” he asked, with that quick temper which is one of the first symptoms of disappointed love. ”That Rose may have more dances, and a little more _eclat_, and that I may play the elegant host at my mother's teas. Father ought to do the civil thing in his own house. It is too bad that he does not do so. It is not fair to him. People must talk about it. As for writing a book! Pshaw! n.o.body considers that any excuse for neglecting social duties--and it is not!”
He shook the reins impatiently to this decision, and then suddenly became aware of a bit of vivid coloring among the leafless trees. It was dusk, but not too dark to distinguish Rose's figure, wrapped in her red cloak, with the bright hood drawn over her head. She was leaning on Antony Van Hoosen, and Harry walked his horses and watched the receding figures. Their att.i.tude was lover-like, and they were so absorbed in each other that they were blind and deaf to his approach.
”Oh--h--h! So that is the way the wind blows! What a shame for Rose to take a heart like that of Antony Van Hoosen's for a summer plaything!
I know exactly how she is tormenting the poor fellow--telling him that she loves him, but that this, and that, and the other, prevent the possibility, etc., etc.,--killing a man while he looks up adoringly, and thanks her for it. Poor Antony! Such a good, straightforward fellow! And I know Rose means no more than she means when she pets her poodle. Well, thank goodness! Yanna did not try to make a fool of me.
She is, at least, above that kind of meanness. She has a heart. And she is suffering to-night, as much as I am--and I hope she is! She ought to!--Well, Thomas, how did you get here before me? Been at the express office?”
”Yes, sir. Nothing there, sir. I met Jerry coming from the mail, and he gave me a lift.”
Then Harry threw down the reins, and went into the house. It looked very desolate, wanting the precious Lares and ornaments which Mrs.
Filmer took with her wherever she meant to dwell for any time. She was accustomed to say that ”there were certain things in every family which took on the family character, and which gave the family distinction to their home.” ”It is the miniatures and the carved ivories, and the little odds and ends of old furniture and of our own handiwork, that give the _Filmer-y look_ to the house,” she had said that afternoon to Rose, who was fretting at the ”uselessness of dragging the old-fas.h.i.+oned things to and from the city, when they had now a home of their own in the country.”
The whole tone of the house was fretful and restless; the halls were crowded with trunks; the dinner was belated; and Mrs. Filmer had a nervous headache, and was weary and suffering. She looked reproachfully at Harry when he came to the table, and Harry understood the look. He had been needed, and he had not been present, and the newly roused sense of his father's responsibility made him answer the look relatively.
”It is too bad that you have everything to do, mother. Why do you let father sneak away to the city?”
”Do not talk absurdly, Harry. Your father did not 'sneak away.' You know I begged him to go. The disturbance of the ball and the packing after it would have knocked him to pieces for the whole winter.”
At this moment Rose entered. She was radiant and innocent-looking, and full of apologies for her three minutes' tardiness; and she answered Harry's keen, interrogative look with one of such guileless listlessness that Harry was compelled to wonder whether it really had been his sister in the wood at that hour. All dinner time his thoughts wandered round this uncertainty and the certainty that Antony, at least, was a positive case. And then, if it was not Rose, whom could Antony have been making love to? For Harry had no doubts as to the occupation of the couple.
When they were alone, Harry suddenly turned to his sister and asked: ”What were you doing in the wood so late this evening, Rose?”
”Me! In the wood?”
”Were you not in the wood with Antony Van Hoosen?”
She shrugged her shoulders scornfully and answered: ”Mamma can tell you what I have been doing all afternoon.”
”Indeed, I can, Harry. Rose has had to look after many things you might have attended to for her; but then, Rose,” added Mrs. Filmer, turning her head languidly to her daughter, ”there were the Van Hoosens to look after. Your brother is mad that way. If he cannot see the girl, he fancies he sees her brother. Thank heaven, we shall be rid of them to-morrow!”
”Oh, mamma! I think you too have Yanna and Antony on your brain.”
”Well, Rose, I have undergone them all summer; and I may now say frankly that I do not like them.”
”You have a sick headache, dear mamsie. Do go to bed. Shall I help you? No? Well, then, I will go myself. For I am tired, and so forth.”
She went off with a kiss, and an airy recommendation to follow her good example; and Harry rose as if to obey it. His mother opened her heavy eyes and said: ”Wait a few minutes, Harry, my dear. You look miserable. You eat nothing. You have been to see Yanna. Can you not let that girl alone?”
”The girl has let me alone. She has refused even to write to me. I _am_ miserable. And I do not feel as if anything, as if anything on earth, can atone for the loss of Yanna's love.”
”Not even my love?”