Contrary to the usual custom of woman, Isabel was ready fully an hour before the appointed time. She stood before the fire, buttoning a new glove with the sense of abundant leisure that new gloves demand. The dancing flames picked out flashes of light from the silver spangles of her gown and sent them into the farthest corners of the room. A long white plume nestled against her dark hair and shaded her face from the light, but, even in the shadow, she was brilliant, for her eyes sparkled and the high colour bloomed upon her cheeks.
Madame Bernard and Rose sat near by, openly admiring her. She was almost childish in her delight at the immediate prospect and could scarcely wait for Allison to call for her. She went to the window and peered eagerly into the darkness, waiting.
"Isabel, my dear," said Madame, kindly, "never wait at the window for an unmarried man. Nor," she added as an afterthought, "for a married man, unless he happens to be your own husband."
Isabel turned back into the room, smiling, her colour a little brighter than before. "Why not?"
"Men keep best," returned Madame, somewhat enigmatically, "in a cool, dry atmosphere. If you'll remember that fact, it may save you trouble in the years to come."
"Such worldly wisdom," laughed Rose, "from such an unworldly woman!"
"I do love the theatre," Isabel sighed, "and I haven't seen a play for a long time."
"I'm afraid we haven't done as much as we might to make it pleasant for you," Madame continued, regretfully, "but we'll try to do better and doubtless can, now that the weather is improving."
"It's been lots nicer than staying alone in a hotel," the girl answered.
"I used to go to the matinee a good deal, but I didn't know very many
people and it's no fun to go alone. Don't you and Rose ever go, Aunt
Francesca?"
"I go sometimes," said Rose, "but I can't even get her started."
The little grey lady laughed and tapped the arm of her chair with her folded fan. "I fully agree with the clever man who said that 'life would be very endurable were it not for its pleasures.' Far back, somewhere, there must be a strain of Scotch ancestry in me, for I 'take my pleasure sadly.'"
"Which means," commented Rose, "that the things other people find amusing do not necessarily amuse you."
"Possibly," Madame assented, with a shrug of her delicate shoulders, "but unless I'm obliged to, I won't sit in an uncomfortable chair, in a crowd, surrounded by many perfumes unhappily mixed, be played to by a bad orchestra, walked on at will by rude men, and, in the meantime, watch the exaggerated antics of people who cannot make themselves heard, even in a room with only three sides to it."
"I took her to a 'musical comedy' once, in a frivolous moment," explained Rose, "and she's never forgiven me."
"Why remind me of it?" questioned Madame. "I've been endeavouring for years to forget it."
Isabel's eyes wandered anxiously to the clock. She had a strong impulse to go to the window again, but remembered that Madame would not approve.
Presently there was the sound of wheels outside, and Allison, very handsome in his evening clothes, came in with an apology for his tardiness. After greeting Madame Bernard and Rose, he bowed to Isabel, with a mock deference which, none the less, contained subtle flattery.
"Silver Girl," he said, "you do me too much honour. I'm not at all sure that one escort is sufficient for so much loveliness."
Isabel smiled, then dimpled irresistibly. She had a secret sense of triumph which she did not stop to analyse.
"Come," he said. "In the words of the poet, 'the carriage waits.'"
They said good-night to the others, and went out. There was silence in the room until the sound of wheels had quite died away, then Rose sighed. With a swift pang, she envied Isabel's glorious youth, then the blood retreated from her heart in shame.
Madame sighed too, but for a different reason. "I suppose I shouldn't say it," she remarked, "but it's a relief to have that dear child out of the house for a little while."
"It's kind of Allison to take her," Rose answered, trying not to wish that she might change places with Isabel.
"Very kind. The Kents are singularly decent about everything. I suppose it was Allison who managed to have Romeo Crosby call upon her the other evening."
"I hardly think so. You remember that Allison hadn't seen him since he grew up."
"Shot up, you mean. How rapidly weeds grow!"
"I think so. Still, they're a wholesome and stimulating sort, even though they have done just as they pleased."
The fire died down into embers. The stillness would have been unbearable had it not been for the steady ticking of the clock. Madame leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. Rose tried to read, but could not concentrate her mind upon the page.
Her thoughts were far away, with the two who had so recently left the house. In fancy she saw the brilliantly lighted streets, the throng of pleasure seekers and pretty women in gay attire. She heard the sound of wheels, the persistent "honk-honk" of motor cars, and, in the playhouse, the crash of cymbals and drums. Somewhere in the happy crowd were Allison and Isabel, while she sat in silence at home.
Madame Francesca stirred in her chair. "I've been asleep, I think."
"You're not going to wait until they come home, are you?"
"Why should I? Isabel has a key."
Rose remembered how Aunt Francesca had invariably waited for her, when some gallant cavalier had escorted her to opera or play, and was foolishly glad, for no discoverable reason.
"I was dreaming," Madame went on, drowsily, "of the little house where
Love lived."
"Where was it?" asked Rose gently.
"You know. I've told you of the little house in the woods where I went as a bride, when I was no older than Isabel. When we turned the key and went away, we must have left some of our love there. I've never been back, but I like to think that some of the old-time sweetness is still in the house, shut away like a jewel of great price, safe from meddling hands."
Only once before, in the fifteen years they had lived together, had Madame Bernard spoken of her brief marriage, yet Rose knew, by a thousand little betrayals, that the past was not dead, but vitally alive.
"I can bear it," said Madame, half to herself, "because I have been his wife. If he had been taken away before we were married, I should have gone, too. But now I have only to wait until God brings us together again."
Outwardly, Rose was calm and unperturbed; inwardly, tense and unstrung. She wondered if, at last, the sorrow had been healed enough for speech. Upstairs there was a room that was always locked. No one but Aunt Francesca ever entered it, and she but rarely. Once or twice, Rose had chanced to see her coming through the open door, transfigured by some spiritual exaltation too great for words. For days afterward there was about her a certain uplift of soul, fading gradually into her usual serenity.
Mr. Boffin stalked in, jumped into Madame's lap, and began to purr industriously. She laughed as she stroked his tawny head and the purr increased rapidly in speed and volume.
"Don't let him burst himself," cautioned Rose, welcoming the change of mood. "I never knew a cat to purr so—well, so thoroughly, did you?"
"He's lost his hold of the brake," Madame answered. "Are you going to wait until Isabel comes home?"
"Then let's go up and read for a little while."
Rose waited until Madame was half way up the long flight before she turned down the lights and followed her. It made a pretty picture—the little white-haired lady in grey on the long stairway, with the yellow cat upon her shoulder, looking back with the inscrutable calmness of the Sphinx.
Rose felt that, for herself, sleep would be impossible until Isabel returned. She hoped that Aunt Francesca would not want her to read aloud, but, as it chanced, she did. However, the chosen book was of the sort which banishes insomnia, and, in less than an hour, Madame was sound asleep, with Mr. Boffin purring in his luxurious silk-lined basket at the foot of her bed.
Alone in her own room, Rose waited, frankly jealous of her young cousin and fiercely despising herself for it. She recalled the happy hours she and Allison had spent with their music and berated herself bitterly for her selfishness, but to no avail. As the hours dragged by, every moment seemed an eternity. Worn by her unaccustomed struggle with self, she finally slept.
Meanwhile, Isabel was the gayest of the gay. The glittering lights of the playhouse formed a fitting background for her, and Allison watched her beautiful, changing face with an ever-increasing sense of delight. The play itself was an old story to him, but the girl was a new sensation, and while she watched the mimic world beyond the footlights, he watched her.
The curtain of the first act descended upon a woman, waiting at the window for a man who did not come, and, most happily, Isabel remembered the conversation at home in the earlier part of the evening.
"Foolish woman," she said, "to wait at the window."
"Why?" asked Allison, secretly amused.
"I wouldn't wait at the window for an unmarried man, nor for a married man, either, unless he was my own husband."
"Because men keep best in a cool dry atmosphere. Didn't you know that?"
"How did you happen to discover it, Sweet-and-Twenty?"
Isabel answered with a smile, which meant much or little, as one chose.
Presently she remembered something else that happened to be useful.
"Look," she said, indicating a man in the front seat who had fallen asleep. "He's taking his pleasure sadly."
"Perhaps he's happier to be asleep. He may not care for the play."
"Somebody once said," she went on hastily, seeing that she was making a good impression, "that life would be very endurable were it not for its pleasures."
Allison laughed. He had the sense of discovering a bright star that had been temporarily overshadowed by surrounding planets.
"I didn't know you could talk so well," he observed, with evident admiration.
Isabel flushed with pleasure—not guilt. She had no thought of sailing under false colours, but reflected the life about her as innocently as a mirror might, if conveniently placed.
Repeated curtain calls for the leading woman, at the end of the third act, delayed the final curtain by the few minutes that would have enabled them to catch the earlier of the two theatre trains. Allison was not wholly displeased, though he feared that Aunt Francesca and Rose might be unduly anxious about Isabel. As they had more than an hour and a half to wait, before the last train, he suggested going to a popular restaurant.
Thrilled with pleasure and excitement, she eagerly consented. Fortunately, she did not have to talk much, for the chatter of the gay crowd, and the hard-working orchestra made conversation difficult, if not impossible.
"I've never been in a place like this before," she ventured. "So late, I mean."
"But you enjoy it, don't you?"
"Oh, yes! So much!" The dark eyes that turned to his were full of happy eagerness, like a child's.
Allison's pulses quickened, with man's insatiable love of Youth. "We'll do it again," he said, "if you'll come with me."
"I will, if Aunt Francesca will let me."
"She's willing to trust you with me, I think. She's known me ever since I was born and she helped father bring me up. Aunt Francesca has been like a mother to me."
"She says she doesn't care for the theatre," resumed Isabel, who did not care to talk about Aunt Francesca, "but I love it. I believe I could go every night."
"Don't make the mistake of going too often to see what pleases you, for you might tire of it. Perhaps plays 'keep best in a cool, dry atmosphere,' as you say men do."
"You're laughing at me," she said, reproachfully.
"Indeed I'm not. I knew a man once who fell desperately in love with a woman, and, as soon as he found that she cared for him, he started for the uttermost ends of the earth."
"That they might not risk losing their love for each other, through satiety. You know it's said to die more often of indigestion than starvation."
"I don't know anything about it," she murmured with downcast eyes.
"You will, though, before long. Some awkward, half-baked young man about twenty will come to you, bearing the divine fire."
"I don't know any," she answered.
"How about the pleasing child who called upon you the other night, with the imported bonbons?" Allison's tone was not wholly kind, for he had just discovered that he did not like Romeo Crosby.
Isabel became fairly radiant with smiles.
"He's all right," returned Allison, generously, "I'm afraid, however, that he'll be taking you out so much that I won't have a chance."
"Oh, no!" said Isabel, softly. Then she added with frankness utterly free from coquetry, "I like you much better."
"Oh, I don't know. You're so much more, well, grown-up, you know, and more refined."
"Thank you, I'm glad the slight foreign polish distinguishes me somewhat"
"Cousin Rose said you were very distinguished." She watched him narrowly as she spoke.
"So is Cousin Rose. In fact, no one could be more so," he answered, with evident approval.
"Is she going to play your accompaniments for you, when you begin the season?"
A shadow crossed his face. "I'm afraid not. I wish she could."
"On account of Madame Grundy. It wouldn't be proper."
"I don't see why," objected Isabel, daringly. "She's ten years older than you are."
Allison bit his lips and the expression of his face subtly changed. "You're ten years younger," he replied, coldly, "and I couldn't take you. That doesn't make any difference."
Seeing that she had made a mistake, Isabel sat quietly in her chair and watched the people around her until it was time to go. Greatly to her delight, they went to the station in an automobile.
"Isn't this glorious!" she cried. "I'm so glad the Crosbys are going to have one. I hope they'll take me often."
With the sure instinct of Primitive Woman, she had said the one thing calculated to make Allison forget his momentary change of mood.
"I'm sorry I have none," he said. "'Romeo Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?' How times have changed! The modern Lochinvar has a touring-car, and some day you'll be eloping in the most up-to-date fashion."
"What makes you talk to me about him?" queried Isabel, with uplifted eyes. "You know I don't like him."
"All right," he answered, good-naturedly. "I won't. I hope Aunt Francesca won't be worried about you because we're so late in getting back."
"I don't see why she should mind. Mamma never cares what I do. She's often been away for weeks, lecturing, and I've been in the hotel alone."
He repressed the uncharitable comment that was upon his lips and reverted to the subject of the play. "I'm glad you've enjoyed it. I wanted you to have a good time."
"I've had the best time I ever had in my life," she responded, with evident sincerity. "Isn't it wonderful what they can do with a room that has only three sides?"
"It surely is. I've had a good time, too, Silver Girl. Thank you for coming."
"You're welcome," she returned sweetly.
The carriage was waiting at the station, and Isabel was very quiet all the way home. Thinking that she must be tired, Allison said little until they reached Madame Bernard's, and he had seen her safely into the house. He insisted upon taking off her gloves and coat and would have extended his friendly services to her hat, had she not laughingly forbade him to touch it.
"Good-night," he said. "We'll go again soon."
"All right. Good-night, and thank you ever so much."
The sound of the key in the lock had wakened Rose from her uneasy sleep. She heard their laughter, though she could not distinguish what they said, and recognised a new tone in Allison's voice. She heard the door close, the carriage roll away, and, after a little, Isabel's hushed footsteps on the stairs. Then another door closed softly and a light glimmered afar into the garden until the shade was drawn.
Wide-eyed and fearful, she slept no more, for the brimming Cup of Joy, that had seemed within her reach, was surely beyond it now. Oppressed with loss and pain, her heart beat slowly, as though it were weary of living. Until daybreak she wondered if he, too, was keeping the night watch, from a wholly different point of view.
But, man-like, Allison had long ago gone to sleep, in the big Colonial house beyond the turn in the road, idly humming to himself:
Come and kiss me, Sweet-and-Twenty;
Youth's a stuff will not endure!