The days dragged on so wearily that, to Rose, the hours seemed unending. Allison came to the house frequently, but seldom spoke of his music; for more than a week, he did not ask her to play at all. On the rare occasions when he brought his violin with him, the old harmony seemed entirely gone. The pianist's fingers often stumbled over the keys even though Allison played with new authority and that magical power that goes by the name of "inspiration," for want of a better word.
Once she made a mistake, changing a full chord into a dissonance so harsh and nerve-racking that Allison shuddered, then frowned. When they had finished, he turned to her, saying, kindly: "You're tired, Rose. I've been a selfish brute and let you work too hard."
Quick denial was on her lips, but she stopped in time and followed his lead gracefully. "Yes, and my head aches, too. If all of you will excuse me, I'll go up and rest for a little while."
Evening after evening, she made the same excuse, longing for her own room, with a locked and bolted door between her and the outer world. Lonely and miserable though she was, she had at least the sense of shelter. Pride, too, sustained her, for, looking back to the night they met, months ago, she could remember no word nor act, or even a look of hers that had been out of keeping.
Over and over again she insisted to herself, stubbornly: "I will have nothing that is not true,—nothing that is not true." In the midnight silences, when she lay wide awake, though all the rest of the world slept, the words chimed in with her heart-beats: "Nothing that is not true—nothing—that is—not true."
Madame Francesca, loving Rose dearly, became sorely troubled and perplexed. She could not fail to see and understand, and, at times, feared that Allison and Isabel must see and understand also. She watched Rose faithfully and shielded her at every possible point. When Isabel inquired why Rose was always tired in the evening, Madame explained that she had been working too hard and that she had made her promise to rest.
Rose spent more time than usual at the piano but she neglected her own work in favour of Allison's accompaniments. When she was alone, she could play them creditably, even without the notes, but if, by any chance, he stood beside her, waiting until the prelude was finished, she faltered at the first sound of the violin.
At last she gave it up and kept more and more to her own room. Madame meditated upon the advisability of sending Isabel away, providing it could be done gracefully, or even taking her on some brief journey, thus leaving Rose in full possession of the house.
Yet, in her heart, she knew that it would be only a subterfuge; that it was better to meet the issues of Life squarely than to attempt to hide from them, since inevitably all must be met. She could not bear to see Rose hurt, nor could she endure easily the spectacle of her beloved foster son upon the verge of a lifelong mistake. Several times she thought of talking to Colonel Kent, and, more rarely, of speaking to Allison himself, but she had learned to apply to speech the old maxim referring to letter-writing: "When in doubt, don't."
It happened that Allison came late one afternoon, when Isabel had gone to town in search of new finery and Rose was in her own room. Madame had just risen from her afternoon nap, and, after he had waited a few moments, she came down.
"Where's Isabel?" he asked, as he greeted her.
"I know, but I thought she'd be at home by this time. She told me she was coming out on the earlier train."
"She may have met someone and gone to the matinee. It's Wednesday."
"She didn't need to do that. I'll take her whenever she wants to go and she knows it."
"I didn't say she had gone—I only said she might have gone. She may be waiting for the trimming of a hat to be changed, or for an appointment with tailor or dressmaker or manicure, or any one of a thousand other things. When you see her, she can doubtless give a clear account of herself."
"Did Rose go with her?" he asked, after a brief pause.
"No, she's asleep," sighed Madame. "Allison, I'm worried about Rose and have been for some time. She isn't well."
"I thought something was wrong," he replied, without interest. "She can't seem to play even the simplest accompaniment any more, and she used to do wonders, even with heavy work."
"I think," ventured Madame, cautiously, "that she needs to get out more. If someone would take her for a walk or a drive every day, it would do her good."
"Probably," assented Allison, with a faraway look in his eyes. "If you want to borrow our horses at any time, Aunt Francesca, when yours are not available, I hope you'll feel free to telephone for them. They're almost eating their heads off and the exercise would do them good."
"Thank you," she answered, shortly. Allison noted the veiled sharpness of her tone and wondered why anyone should take even slight offence at the friendly offer of a coach and pair.
"It must be nearly time for the next train," he resumed. "Is there anyone at the station to meet Isabel?"
"Nobody but the coachman and the carriage," returned Madame, dryly. "I'm not in the habit of being asked whether or not I have made proper provision for my guests."
"I beg your pardon, Aunt Francesca. I would have known, of course, if I had stopped to think."
"How is your father?" she put in, abruptly.
"All right, I guess. He's making a garden and the whole front yard is torn up as though sewer pipes were about to be put in."
Madame's heart softened with pity, for she knew that only loneliness would have set the Colonel to gardening. "I must go over and see it," she said, in a different tone. "My valuable advice hasn't been asked, but I think I could help a little."
"Undoubtedly. Your own garden is one of the loveliest I have ever seen.
Isn't that the train?"
"I think so. If Isabel comes, I believe I'll leave you to entertain her while I drive over to inspect the new garden."
She was oppressed, as never before, by the necessity of speech, and, of all those around her, Colonel Kent was the only one to whom it would be possible for her to say a word. She did not stop to consider what she could accomplish by it, for in her heart, she knew that she was helpless—also that a great deal of the trouble in the world has not been caused by silence.
Allison drummed on the arm of his chair until he heard the rumble of wheels, then went to the window. "It's Isabel," he announced, joyously. "I'll go down and help her out—she may have parcels."
Presently they came in together, laughing. Isabel's face was flushed and Allison was heavily laden with packages, both small and large. "I feel like Santa Claus," he cried, gaily, to Madame, as she passed them on the way out.
She smiled, but did not take the trouble to speak. "Colonel Kent's," she called to the driver, as she closed the carriage door with a resounding bang, "and please hurry."
The Colonel was on the veranda when she arrived, superintending the gardening operations from there. He greeted her with surprise, for it was not her way to drive over there alone. "I am deeply honoured," he said, as he assisted her up the steps. "May I order tea?"
"No, thank you," she answered, somewhat primly. It was evident that she was ill at ease. "I understood from Allison that you were doing all this yourself. Instead, I find you sitting on the veranda like a landed proprietor, in command of an army of slaves."
"Two Irishmen don't make an army," he laughed, "though I'll admit that, if angry, they would make a formidable force. I helped to dig for a while this morning, but it didn't seem to agree with me, so I quit. My work seems to be done," he continued, with a sigh.
"No, it isn't," she returned, sharply. "There's work to be done, but whether you or I or both together can do it, is extremely doubtful."
"What do you mean, Francesca?"
Madame leaned toward him confidentially. "Richard," she said, in a low tone, "has it ever occurred to you that Allison might marry?"
A shadow crossed his face, then vanished in a smile. "Yes. Why?"
"Have you ever seen a woman you would be willing for him to marry?"
"Rose," said the Colonel, softly. "Your Rose."
"I've felt that way, too," whispered Madame. There was silence for the space of a heart-beat, then she cried out sharply: "But it isn't Rose— it's Isabel!"
"What?" he cried, startled for once out of his usual calm. "That child?"
"'That child' is past twenty, and he is only ten years older. There was fifteen years' difference between you and—" Madame forebore to speak the name of the dead and beloved wife.
Colonel Kent turned his dim blue eyes toward the hills. Behind them the sun was setting, and he could guess that the gold of the Spring afternoon was scattered like star dust over the little sunken grave. He left Madame and went to the end of the veranda, where he stood for a few moments, facing the West. Then he came back.
"Francesca," he said, slowly, "you and I are on the Western slope and have been for a long time. The Valley of the Shadow lies at the foot of the hill and the descent is almost made. But the boy is young, and most of the journey lies before him. You chose for yourself, and so did I. Shall we not grant him the same right?"
"Rose," interrupted the Colonel, "is too good for any man—even my own son, though, as I said before, she is the only woman I would willingly see him marry. You stand almost in his mother's place to him, but neither you nor I can shield him now. We must try to remember that his life is his—to make or mar."
"I know," she sighed, "I've thought it all out."
"Besides," he went on, "what could we do? Separation wouldn't last long, if he wants her, and talking would only alienate him from us. Perhaps you could bear it, but I—I couldn't."
"Nor I," she returned, quickly. "When we come to the sundown road, we need all the love we have managed to take with us from the summit of the hill. I hadn't meant to say anything to anyone," she went on, in a changed tone, "but my heart was full, and you are—"
"Your best friend, Francesca, as you are mine. It seems to take a lifetime for us to learn that wisdom consists largely in a graceful acceptance of things that do not immediately concern us."
"How like you," she responded, with a touch of her old manner. "I ask for comfort and you give me an epigram."
"Many people find satisfaction in epigrams," he reminded her. "Sometimes a snap-shot is better than an oil painting."
"Or a geometrical design, or even a map," she continued, catching his mood. The talk drifted to happier themes and Madame was quite herself again at dusk, when she rose to go.
On the way back, she passed Allison, returning home to dinner by a well- worn path, but he was thinking of something else and did not see her at all.
The lilac-scented midnight was starred here and there with white blooms when May went out and June came in. Drifts of "bridal wreath" were banked against the side of the house and a sweet syringa breathed out a faint perfume toward the hedge of lilacs beyond. Blown petals of pink and white died on the young grass beneath Madame's wild crab-apple tree, transplanted from a distant woodland long ago to glorify her garden.
The hour was one of enchantment, yet to Rose, leaning out into the moonless night, the beauty of it brought only pain. She wondered, dully, if she should ever find surcease; if somewhere, on the thorny path ahead, there might not be some place where she could lay the burden of her heartache down. Her pride, that had so long sustained her, was beginning to fail her now. It no longer seemed more vital than life itself that Allison should not know.
She had the hurt woman's longing for escape, but could think of no excuse for flight. She knew Aunt Francesca would manage it, in some way, should she ask, and that she would be annoyed by no troublesome questions, yet loyalty held her fast, for she knew how lonely the little old lady would be without her.
Day by day, the tension increased almost to the breaking point. June filled the garden with rosebuds, but their pale namesake in the big white house took no heed of them. She no longer concerned herself about her gowns, but wore white almost constantly, that her pallor might not show.
The roses broke from their green sheaths, then bloomed, opening their golden hearts to every wandering bee. The house was full of roses. Aunt Francesca wore them even on her morning gowns and Isabel made wreaths of red roses to twine in her dark hair. Every breeze brought fragrance to the open windows and scattered it through the house.
Madame's heart ached for Rose, but still she said no word, though it seemed to her that the blindness of the others could not last much longer. She could not take Rose away unless she took Isabel also, and, should she do that, things would soon be just as they were now.
As Rose faded, Isabel blossomed into the full flower of her youth. Her high, bird-like laugh echoed constantly through the house and garden, whether anyone was with her or not. With sinking heart, Rose envied her even a tithe of her abundant joy.
As the moon approached its full, the roses had begun to drop their petals. Under every bush was a scattered bit of fragrance that meant both death and resurrection. Far down in the garden, where the sunken lily-pool mirrored the stars, the petals of golden roses drifted idly across the shining surface.
Rose had worn white at dinner, as she always did, now, the night the June moon came to its full. Isabel, too, was in white, but with a difference, for as surely as the older woman's white was mourning, her silver spangles were donned for joy. At the table, Madame had done most of the talking, for Isabel's conversational gifts were limited, at best, and Rose was weary beyond all words.
After dinner she went to the piano and struck a few aimless chords. Isabel, with a murmured excuse, went up to her own room. "Nothing that is not true," said Rose to herself, steadily; "nothing that is not true."
Presently a definite thought took shape in her mind. To-morrow she would tell Aunt Francesca, and see if it could not be arranged for her to go away somewhere, anywhere, alone. Or, if not to-morrow, at least the day after, as soon as she had seen him again. She wanted one last look to take with her into the prison-house, where she must wrestle with her soul alone.
[Illustration: musical notation.]
Her stiff fingers shaped the melody that Aunt Francesca loved, and into it went all her own longing, her love, and her pain. The notes thrilled with an ecstasy of renunciation, and the vibrant chords trembled far out into the night.
[Illustration: musical notation.]
A man entered the gate very quietly, paused, then turned into the garden, to soothe his wildly beating heart for a few moments with the balm of scent and sound. Upstairs, behind the shelter of the swaying curtain, a shining figure drew back into the shadow. Smiling, and with an agreeable sense of adventure, Isabel tiptoed down the back stairs, and entered the garden, unheard, by a side door.
With assumed carelessness, yet furtively watching, she made the circuit of the lily-pool, humming to herself. A quick leap and a light foot on the grass startled her for an instant, then she laughed, for it was only Mr. Boffin, playing with his own dancing shadow.
[Illustration: musical notation.]
The sound of the piano had become very faint, though the windows were open and the wind was in the right direction. Isabel stopped at another bush, picked a few full-blown white roses, and sat down on a garden bench to remove the thorns.
"I wonder where he can be," she said to herself. "Surely he can't have gone home again." She listened, but there was no sound save the distant piano, and the abrupt, playful purr of Mr. Boffin, as he pounced upon a fallen white rose.
Isabel put the flowers in her hair, consciously missing the mirror in which she was wont to observe the effect. "He must have gone in while I was coming down," she thought, "but I don't see why he shouldn't have gone straight in when he first came."
She decided to wait until he came to look for her, then as swiftly changed her mind. Rose was still playing.
[Illustration: musical notation.]
Isabel hummed the melody to herself, not noting that she was off the key, and started slowly toward the house, by another path.
Allison was standing in the shadow of a maple, listening to the music and drawing in deep breaths of the rose-scented air. The moon flooded the garden with enchantment, and a shaft of silver light, striking the sundial, made a shadow that was hours wrong. He smiled as he saw it, amiably crediting the moon with an accidental error, rather than a purposeful lie.
[Illustration: musical notation.]
Deeper and more vibrant, the woman within sent the cry of her heart into the night, where the only one who could answer it stood watching the shadow of the moon on the sun-dial and the spangled cobwebs on the grass. He picked a rose, put it into his button-hole, and turned toward the house.
A hushed sound, as of rustling silk, made him pause, then, at the head of the path, where another joined it, Isabel appeared, with white roses in her hair and the moon shining full upon her face. The spangles on her gown caught the light and broke it into a thousand tiny rainbows, surrounding her with faint iridescence.
The old, immortal hunger surged into his veins, the world-old joy made his senses reel. He steadied himself for a moment, then went to her, with his arms outstretched in pleading.
"Oh, Silver Girl," he whispered, huskily. "My Silver Girl! Tell me you'll shine for me always!"
[Illustration: musical notation.]
The last chord ceased, full of yearning that was almost prayer. Then Isabel, cold as marble and passionless as snow, lifted her face for his betrothal kiss.