Part 10 (2/2)

But a Monte Cristo should never explain. The conjuror who reveals his mechanism is no longer a conjuror. George Brand only laughed, and said he hoped Miss Lind would always find people ready to welcome her when she reached English sh.o.r.es.

As they rattled along through those s.h.i.+ning valleys--the woods and fields and homesteads all glowing in the afternoon sun--she had put aside her travelling-cloak and hood, for the air was quite mild. Was it the drawing off of the hood, or the stir of wind on board the steamer, that had somewhat disarranged her hair?--at all events, here and there about her small ear or the shapely neck there was an escaped curl of raven-black. She had taken off her gloves, too: her hands, somewhat large, were of a beautiful shape, and transparently white. The magazines and newspapers received not much attention--except from Mr. Lind, who said that at last he should see some news neither a week old nor fict.i.tious. As for these other two, they seemed to find a wonderful lot to talk about, and all of a profoundly interesting character. With a sudden shock of disappointment George Brand found that they were almost into London.

His hand-bag was at once pa.s.sed by the custom-house people; and he had nothing to do but say good-bye. His face was not over-cheerful.

”Well, it was a lucky meeting,” Mr. Lind said. ”Natalie ought to thank you for being so kind to her.”

”Yes; but not here,” said the girl, and she turned to him. ”Mr. Brand, people who have travelled so far together should not part so quickly: it is miserable. Will you not come and spend the evening with us?”

”Natalie will give us something in the way of an early dinner,” said Mr.

Lind, ”and then you can make her play the zither for you.”

Well, there was not much hesitation about his accepting. That drawing-room, with its rose-and-green-shaded candles, was not as other drawing-rooms in the evening. In that room you could hear the fountains plas.h.i.+ng in the Villa Reale, and the Capri fishermen singing afar, and the cattle-bells chiming on the Campagna, and the gondolas sending their soft chorus across the lagoon. When Brand left his bag in the cloak-room at the station he gave the porter half a crown for carrying thither, which was unnecessary. Nor was there any hopeless apathy on his face as he drove away with these two friends through the darkening afternoon, in the little hired brougham. When they arrived in Curzon Street, he was even good enough to a.s.sist the timid little Anneli to descend from the box; but this was in order that he might slip a tip into the hand of the coachman. The coachman scarcely said ”Thank you.” It was not until afterward that he discovered he had put half a sovereign into his breeches-pocket as if it were an ordinary sixpence.

Natalie Lind came down to dinner in a dress of black velvet, with a mob-cap of rose-red silk. Round her neck she wore a band of Venetian silver-work, from the centre of which was suspended the little old-fas.h.i.+oned locket she had received in Hyde Park. George Brand remembered the story, and perhaps was a trifle surprised that she should wear so conspicuously the gift of a stranger.

She was very friendly, and very cheerful. She did not seem at all fatigued with her travelling; on the contrary, it was probably the sea-air and the sunlight that had lent to her cheek a faint flush of color. But at the end of dinner her father said.

”Natalushka, if we go into the drawing-room, and listen to music, after so long a day, we shall all go to sleep. You must come into the smoking-room with us.”

”Very well, papa.”

”But, Miss Lind,” the other gentleman remonstrated, ”a velvet dress--tobacco-smoke--”

”My dresses must take their chance,” said Miss Lind. ”I wear them to please my friends, not to please chance acquaintances who may call during the day.”

And so they retired to the little den at the end of the pa.s.sage; and Natalie handed Mr. Brand a box of cigars to choose from, and got down from the rack her father's long-stemmed, red-bowled pipe. Then she took a seat in the corner by the fire, and listened.

The talk was all about that anarchical literature that Brand had been devouring down at Dover; and he was surprised to find how little sympathy Lind had with writing of that kind, though he had to confess that certain of the writers were personal friends of his own. Natalie sat silent, listening intently, and staring into the fire.

At last Brand said,

”Of course, I had other books. For example, one I see on your shelves there.” He rose, and took down the ”Songs before Sunrise.” ”Miss Lind,”

he said, ”I am afraid you will laugh at me; but I have been haunted with the notion that you have been teaching Lord Evelyn how to read poetry, or that he has been unconsciously imitating you. I heard him repeat some pa.s.sages from 'The Pilgrims,' and I was convinced he was reproducing something he had heard from you. Well--I am almost ashamed to ask you--”

A touch of embarra.s.sment appeared on the girl's face, and she glanced at her father.

”Yes, certainly, Natalie; why not?”

”Well,” she said, lightly, ”I cannot read if I am stared at. You must remain as you are.”

She took the book from him, and pa.s.sed to the other side of the room, so that she was behind them both. There was silence for an instant or two as she turned over the leaves.

Then the silence was broken; and if Brand was instantly a.s.sured that his surmise was correct, he also knew that here was a more pathetic cadence--a prouder ring--than any that Lord Evelyn had thrown into the lines. She read at random--a pa.s.sage here, a pa.s.sage there--but always it seemed to him that the voice was the voice of a herald proclaiming the new awakening of the world--the evil terrors of the night departing--the sunlight of liberty and right and justice beginning to s.h.i.+ne over the sea. And these appeals to England!

”Oh thou, clothed round with raiment of white waves, Thy brave brows lightening through the gray wet air, Thou, lulled with sea-sounds of a thousand caves, And lit with sea-s.h.i.+ne to thy inland lair, Whose freedom clothed the naked souls of slaves And stripped the m.u.f.fled souls of tyrants bare, Oh, by the centuries of thy glorious graves, By the live light of the earth that was thy care, Live, thou must not be dead, Live; let thy armed head Lift itself up to sunward and the fair Daylight of time and man, Thine head republican, With the same splendor on thine helmless hair That in his eyes kept up a light Who on thy glory gazed away their sacred sight.”

The cry there was in this voice! Surely his heart answered,

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