Part 76 (1/1)

Her lips trembled a little at the reproach in his tone; but she did not avert her eyes.

”Of course you had the right,” she acknowledged with a flash of her old frankness. ”But things were going crooked just then. It all seemed so strange, so difficult to speak of; and I thought if you were delayed it would save you from anxiety, not to know. Besides--I confess I knew it would mean . . . a great deal to you; and I wanted to win you all my own self, before I told you. There! That's the whole truth. Can you forgive me?”

”Forgive you, my darling? To-day of all days! I am at your feet.”

She drew a deep breath. ”That is quite wrong! But I can't pretend not to be proud of it; though in theory I object to pedestals as much as ever! And now----” she laid both hands upon him, her eyes full of laughter and tenderness. ”Now--don't you want to come and see--the other woman?”

At that, his gravity went to pieces.

”Woman indeed! Bless her heart. Naturally I do. Hasn't she achieved a name yet?”

”No, poor little heathen. I told her she must wait for you; though the matter was settled long ago. What else could we call her--but Honor?

And I pray she may be worthy of the name. Both the Desmonds will stand for her. I thought you would wish it; for, indeed, without their great goodness to us both she might never have found her way into the world at all! Now--come.”

He raised her to her feet, and together they entered the room where, in a railed cot, the unconscious herald of a larger joy, a more sacred intimacy, lay sleeping:--a creature of flower-soft tints and curves, who, in the sublime wisdom of babyhood, was concerned for nothing on earth but her own inspired devices for self-development.

For long the two stood speechless before that astonis.h.i.+ng, yet inevitable, third; that miracle of incorporate self-expression, whereby a man and woman behold their hidden spirits that have so pa.s.sionately clung together across the gateless barrier of individual being, 'visibly here commingled and made flesh.' Then Lenox put out a hand and caressed the small soft head, reverently, cautiously, as if to verify its actuality. At his touch the child stirred; the dark lashes lifted; and in that instant of revealing, the truth came home to him that, by his will, a living soul, a thing of mysterious and infinite potentialities, had been added to the world's sum of life.

”See--she has your eyes,” said Quita, tenderly triumphant; and for the second time she looked into his own through a mist of tears. ”My last picture pleases you even better than the other one?” she added; and stooping, he kissed her lips.

”It lifts you into a new kingdom, Quita; and doesn't he honestly seem to you worth all the rest put together?”

”But yes, _mon ami_. She is my masterpiece--our masterpiece,” she answered very low.