Colonel Kent had gone away on a short business trip and Allison was spending his evenings, which otherwise would have been lonely, at Madame Bernard's. After talking for a time with Aunt Francesca and Isabel, it seemed natural for him to take up his violin and suggest, if only by a half-humorous glance, that Rose should go to the piano.
Sometimes they played for their own pleasure and sometimes worked for their own benefit. Neither Madame nor Isabel minded hearing the same thing a dozen times or more in the course of an evening, for, as Madame said, with a twinkle in her blue eyes, it made "a pleasant noise," and Isabel did not trouble herself to listen.
Both Rose and Allison were among the fortunate ones who find joy in work. Rose was so keenly interested in her music that she took no count of the hours spent at the piano, and Allison fully appreciated her. It had been a most pleasant surprise for him to find a good accompanist so near home.
The discouraging emptiness of life had mysteriously vanished for Rose. Her restlessness disappeared as though by magic and her indefinite hunger had been, in some way, appeased. She had unconsciously emerged from one state into another, as the tiny dwellers of the sea cast off their shells. She had a sense of freedom and a large vision, as of dissonances resolved into harmony.
Clothes, also, which, as Madame had said, are "supposed to please and satisfy women," had taken to themselves a new significance. Rose had made herself take heed of her clothes, but she had never had much real interest. Now she was glad of the time she had spent in planning her gowns, merely with a view to pleasing Aunt Francesca.
To-night, she wore a clinging gown of deep green velvet, with a spray of green leaves in her hair. Her only ornament was a pin of jade, in an Oriental setting. Allison looked at her admiringly.
"There's something about you," he said, "that I don't know just how to express. I have no words for it, but, in some way, you seem to live up to your name."
"How so?" Rose asked, demurely.
"Well, I've never seen you wear anything that a rose might not wear.
I've seen you in red and green and yellow and pink and white, but never
in blue or purple, or any of those soft-coloured things that Aunt
Francesca wears."
"That only means," answered Rose, flushing, "that blue and grey and tan and lavender aren't becoming to me."
"That isn't it," Allison insisted, "for you'd be lovely in anything.
You're living up to your name."
"Go on," Rose suggested mischievously. "This is getting interesting." "You needn't laugh. I assure you that men know more about those things than they're usually given credit for. Your jewels fit in with the whole idea, too. That jade pin, for instance, and your tourmaline necklace, and your ruby ring, and the topazes you wear with yellow, and the faint scent of roses that always hangs about you."
"Well, I had a note from you the other day. It was fragrant with rose petals and the conventionalised rose, in gold and white, that was stamped in place of a monogram, didn't escape me. Besides, here's this."
He took from his pocket a handkerchief of sheerest linen, delicately hemstitched. In one corner was embroidered a rose, in palest shades of pink and green. The delicate, elusive scent filled the room as he shook it out.
"There," he continued, with a laugh. "I found it in my violin case the other day. I don't know how it came there, but it was much the same as finding a rose twined about the strings."
Aunt Francesca was on the other side of the room, by the fire. Her face, in the firelight, was as delicate as a bit of carved ivory. Her thoughts were far away—one could see that. Isabel sat near her, apparently absorbed in a book, but, in reality, listening to every word.
"I wish," Allison was saying, "that people knew how to live up to themselves. That's an awkward phrase, but I don't know of anything better. Even their names don't fit 'em, and they get nicknames."
"'Father calls me William,'" murmured Rose.
"'And Mother calls me Will,'" Allison went on. "That's it, exactly. See how the 'Margarets' are adjusted to themselves by their friends. Some are 'Margie' and more of 'em are 'Peggy.' 'Margaret' who is allowed to wear her full name is very rare."
"I'm glad my name can't be changed, easily," she said, thoughtfully.
"It could be 'Rosie,' with an 'ie,' and if you were that sort, it would be. Take Aunt Francesca, for instance. She might be 'Frances' or 'Fanny' or even 'Fran,' but her name suits her, so she gets the full benefit of it, every time."
Madame turned away from the fire, with the air of one who has been away upon a long journey. "Did I hear my name? Did someone speak to me?"
"Only of you," Allison explained. "We were talking of names and nicknames and saying that yours suited you."
"If it didn't," observed Madame Bernard, "I'd change it. When we get civilised, I believe children will go by number until they get old enough to choose their own names. Fancy a squirming little imp with a terrible temper being saddled with the name of 'William,' by authority of Church and State. Except to his doting parents, he'll never be anything but 'Bill.'"
"Does my name fit me?" queried Isabel, much interested.
"It would," said Allison, "if you weren't quite so tall. Does my name fit me?"
He spoke to Madame Bernard but he looked at Rose. It was the older woman who answered him. "Yes, of course it does. How dare you ask me that when I named you myself?"
"I'd forgotten," Allison laughed. "I can't remember quite that far back."
They began to play once more and Isabel, pleading a headache, said good- night. She made her farewells very prettily and there was a moment's silence after the door closed.
"I'm afraid," said Madame, "that our little girl is lonely. Allison, can't you bestir yourself and find some young men to call upon her? I can't think of anybody but the Crosby twins."
"What's the matter with me?" inquired Allison, lightly. "Am I not calling? And behold, I give her a headache and she goes to bed."
"You're not exactly in her phase of youth," Madame objected. "She's my guest and she has to be entertained."
"I'm willing to do my share. I'll take her into town to the theatre some night, and to supper afterward, in the most brilliantly lighted place I can find."
"That's very nice of you," responded Rose, with a look of friendly appreciation. "I know she would enjoy the bright lights."
"We all do, in certain moods," he said. "Are you ready now?"
The voice of the violin rose to heights of ecstasy, sustained by full chords in the accompaniment. Mingled with the joy of it, like a breath of sadness and longing, was a theme in minor, full of question and heartbreak; of appeal that was almost prayer. And over it all, as always, hovering like some far light, was the call to which Rose answered. Dumbly, she knew that she must always answer it, though she were dead and the violin itself mingled with her dust.
Madame Bernard, still seated by the fire, stirred uneasily. Something had come into her house that vaguely troubled her, because she had no part in it. The air throbbed with something vital, keen, alive; the room trembled as from invisible wings imprisoned.
Old dreams and memories came back with a rush, and the little old lady sitting in the half light looked strangely broken and frail. The sound of marching and the steady beat of a drum vibrated through her consciousness and the singing violin was faint and far. She saw again the dusty street, where the blue column went forward with her Captain at the head, his face stern and cold, grimly set to some high Purpose that meant only anguish for her. The picture above the mantel, seen dimly through a mist, typified, to her, the ways of men and women since the world began—the young knight riding forward in his quest for the Grail, already forgetting what lay behind, while the woman knelt, waiting, waiting, waiting, as women always have and always must.
At last the music reached its end in a low chord that was at once a question and a call. Madame rose, about to say good-night, and go up- stairs where she might be alone. On the instant she paused. Her heart waited almost imperceptibly, then resumed its beat.
Still holding the violin, Allison was looking at Rose. Subconsciously, Madame noted his tall straight figure, his broad well-set shoulders, his boyish face, and his big brown eyes. But Rose had illumined as from some inward light; her lovely face was transfigured into a beauty beyond all words.
Francesca slipped out without speaking and went, unheard, to her own room. She felt guilty because she had discerned something of which Rose herself was as yet entirely unconscious. With the instinctive sex- loyalty that distinguishes fine women from the other sort, Madame hoped that Allison did not know.
"And so," she said to herself, "Love has come back to my house, after many years of absence. I wonder if he cares? He must, oh, he must!" Francesca had no selfish thought of her own loneliness, if her Rose should go away. Though her own heart was forever in the keeping of a distant grave, she could still be glad of another's joy.
Rose turned away from the piano and Allison put his violin into the case. "It's late," he said, regretfully, "and you must be tired."
"Perhaps I am, but I don't know it."
"You respond so fully to the music that it is a great pleasure to play with you. I wish I could always have you as my accompanist."
"I do, too," murmured Rose, turning her face away. The deep colour mounted to the roots of her hair and he studied her impersonally, as he would have studied any other lovely thing.
"Why?" he began, then laughed.
"Why what?" asked Rose, quickly.
"I was about to ask you a very foolish question."
"Don't hesitate," she said. "Most questions are foolish."
"This is worse—it's idiotic. I was going to ask you why you hadn't married."
With a sharp stab at the heart, Rose noted the past tense. "Why haven't you?" she queried, forcing a smile.
"There is only one answer to that question, and yet people keep on asking it. They might as well ask why you don't buy an automobile."
"Well?" continued Rose, inquiringly.
"Because 'the not impossible she,' or 'he,' hasn't come, that's all."
"Perhaps only one knows," she suggested.
"No," replied Allison, "in any true mating, they both know—they must."
There was a long pause. A smouldering log, in the fireplace, broke and fell into the embers. The dying flame took new life and the warm glow filled the room.
"Is that why people don't buy automobiles?" queried Rose, chiefly because she did not know what else to say.
"The answer to that is that they do."
"Sounds as if you might have taken it from Alice in Wonderland," she commented. "Maybe they've had to give each other up," she concluded, enigmatically.
"People who will give each other up should be obliged to do it," he returned. "May I leave my violin here? I'll be coming again so soon."
"Good-night." He took her hand for a moment, in his warm, steady clasp, and subtly, Rose answered to the man—not the violin. She was deathly white when the door closed, and she trembled all the way up-stairs.
When she saw herself in the mirror, she was startled, for, in her ghostly pallor, her deep eyes burned like stars. She knew, now. The woman who had so hungered for Life had suddenly come face to face with its utmost wonder; its highest gift of joy—or pain.
The heart of a man is divided into many compartments, mostly isolated. Sometimes there is a door between two of them, or even three may be joined, but usually, each one is complete in itself. Within the different chambers his soul sojourns as it will, since immeasurably beyond woman, he possesses the power of detachment, of intermittence.
Once in a lifetime, possibly, under the influence of some sweeping passion, all the doors are flung wide and the one beloved woman may enter in. Yet she is wise, with the wisdom of the Sphinx, if she refuses to go. Let her say to him: "Close all these doors, except that which bears my name. In that chamber and in that alone, we shall dwell together." For, with these words, the memories housed in the other chambers crumble to dust and ashes, blown only by vagrant winds of Fate.
In the heart of a woman there are few chambers and still fewer doors. Instead of business-like compartments, neatly labelled, there are long, labyrinthine passages, all opening into one another and inextricably bound together. To shut out one, or even part of one, requires the building of a wall, but it takes a long time and the barrier is never firm.
At a single strain of music, the scent of a flower, or even one glimpse of a path of moonlight lying fair upon a Summer sea, the barriers crumble and fall. Through the long corridors the ghosts of the past walk unforbidden, hindered only by broken promises, dead hopes, and dream- dust.
Even while the petals of long-dead roses rustle through the winding passages, where the windows are hung with cobwebs, greyed at last from iridescence to despairing shadows, a barrier may fall at the sound of a talismanic name, for the hands of women are small and slow to build and the hearts of women are tender beyond all words.
Hidden in the centre of the labyrinth is one small secret chamber, and the door may open only at the touch of one other hand. The woman herself may go into it for peace and sanctuary, when the world goes wrong, but always alone, until the great day comes when two may enter it together.
As Theseus carried the thread of Ariadne through the labyrinth of Crete, there are many who attempt to find the secret chamber, but vainly, for the thread will always break in the wrong heart.
When the door is opened, at last, by the one who has made his way through the devious passages, there is so little to be seen that sometimes even the man himself laughs the woman to scorn and despoils her of her few treasures.
The secret chamber is only a bare, white room, where is erected the high altar of her soul, served through life, by her own faith. Upon the altar burns steadfastly the one light, waiting for him who at last has come and consecrated in his name. The door of the sanctuary is rock-ribbed and heavy, and he who has not the key may beat and call in vain, while within, unheeding, the woman guards her light.
Pitifully often the man does not care. Sometimes he does not even suspect that he has been admitted into the inmost sanctuary of her heart, for there are men who may never know what sanctuary means, nor what the opening of the door has cost. But the man who is worthy will kneel at the altar for a moment, with the woman beside him, and thereafter, when the outside world has been cruel to him, he may go in sometimes, with her, to warm his hands at those divine fires and kindle his failing courage anew.
When the sanctuary is not profaned by him who has come hither, its blessedness is increased ten-fold; it takes on a certain divinity by being shared, and thereafter, they serve the light together.
And yet, through woman's eager trustfulness, the man who opens the door is not always the one divinely appointed to open it. Sometimes the light fails and the woman, weeping in the darkness, is left alone in her profaned temple, never to open its door again, or, after many years, to set another light high upon the altar, and, in the deepening shadows, pray.
So, because the door had never been opened, and because she knew the man had come at last who might enter the sanctuary with her, Rose lifted her ever-burning light that night to the high altar of her soul, and set herself to wait until he should find his way there.