Chapter VII: Book II: Victim of Fate (3)

The storm was over, and Helen remained as the weather-beaten evidence that it had taken place. Exhausted both in mind and body, she lay back in her chair, with her eyes wide open, her thoughts rushing madly to and fro seeking a new anchorage. She must keep her strength for the ordeal yet before her. She must play her part through to the end without wavering, or what she had already endured would be of no avail. So at last she bade good-night to the stars which had been her silent companions and entered the house. Mechanically she fastened the veranda shutters and went up-stairs to her room, closing the door to the world outside, with which she felt she must become acquainted anew as she pursued her chosen path--alone.

XIX

The contessa found herself eager to continue her inquiries along the new lines which had so clearly indicated themselves during the conversation with Mrs. Armstrong and Emory. This desire was by no means malicious, for those very attributes which attracted Helen to her would have contradicted anything so really reprehensible, even as a counter-irritant. In the contessa's life, filled as it was with _ennui_ in spite of her heroic efforts to enliven it with excitement, gossip and a bit of scandal acted as agreeable and much-needed stimulants. She may never have put this thought into words any more than the man does who depends upon his modest tipple to give zest to his daily routine; yet, like him, she found her dependence upon her stimulant growing slowly yet steadily as the days advanced and the "dear Morelli" became more and more "impossible." In the present instance the interval since the last spicy episode had been longer than usual, and the contessa felt a thrill of enthusiastic delight replace the dull apathy which she had lately experienced, even at the suggestion of the conditions as she thought she saw them. It was a problem which offered her the joy of solution rather than merely a curiosity to learn more of the various factors which entered into it.

She liked Helen from the first moment of their meeting. America often seemed far away to the contessa, and her new acquaintance brought it nearer to her; but beyond this Helen proved in herself to be more than ordinarily interesting. The contessa had known women as beautiful as Mrs. Armstrong, she had known women who carried themselves with equal self-confidence and independence; but never had she seen these combined with such lofty ideals actually maintained. Her early impression that Helen's idealism was the result of innocence was soon corrected. In the school of experience there are taught two branches in which every clever woman of the world must perfect herself--character-reading and the gentle art of self-defence; both are absolutely essential to her success. Men underestimate their importance, and thus develop them to a lesser degree; as a result, the woman's intuitive reading of character is as much more delicate and subtle as is her practise of self-defence, and to a similar extent more effective. Amelie was a medal pupil in both these branches, and her instinctive exercise of the first told her that she had discovered an unusual personality among conditions which under ordinary circumstances would work out along but one line. This solution was not in keeping with what she had read in Helen's character, and she wondered how the conditions themselves had come to exist. The contessa hummed cheerily to herself as she moved about the villa the next morning, and the servants took it for granted that their master's malady had taken a more decided turn for the worse.

In the afternoon the contessa's motor-car drew up before the entrance to the Laurentian Library. The custodian at the gate took her card, and presently returned announcing that the librarian was in his study. The name of Morelli was well known to Cerini, who had assisted the count upon several occasions before his marriage in disposing of some of the rare volumes which had once been a part of his grandfather's splendid collection. The librarian had even casually met the new contessa once or twice, but this was the first time she had honored him with a call, and he wondered what her errand might be. Possibly it was her desire to dispose of other volumes; perhaps it was to protest against further despoliation; at all events he would be guarded in his conversation until her object was disclosed.

"Welcome to the halls of the Medici!" exclaimed Cerini, cordially, rising to greet his visitor as she appeared in the doorway.

The contessa smiled so radiantly in acknowledging his salutation that the librarian was convinced that his first hypothesis must be correct. "You are surprised to see me," she remarked, seating herself with deliberation and looking across at her host with a friendly air. "You may as well admit it, for I can read it in your face."

"Both surprised and pleased, contessa," Cerini answered, maintaining his guarded attitude.

"Your surprise should be that I have not been here before," Amelie continued.

"Ah!" The old man held up his hand with a deprecatory gesture. "You society women have so much to divert you otherwise that I could scarcely expect, even with the wonderful books I have here, to prove a magnet sufficiently strong to draw you away from your customary pursuits. And your husband has so many splendid volumes in your own library that these here can hardly prove a novelty."

"It is about these volumes that I came to see you."

Cerini smiled sagely, feeling pleased at his intuition.

"Yes, we have some splendid old volumes, as you say," the contessa continued. "I have looked them all over and have tried to study them, but beyond my admiration for their beauty I must admit that I can't make much out of them."

"Then you are really interested in the books themselves!" exclaimed the librarian, his pleasure increasing with the prospect of securing a new convert. "This is delightful!"

"Of course." The contessa raised her eyebrows with well-feigned surprise. She was entirely satisfied with her progress thus far. "But I don't need to tell you that my interest is not a very intelligent one. I tried to get Morelli to tell me something about them once, but he doesn't know a book of hours from a missal, so I promised myself the pleasure of learning from you, if you were willing to teach me. Are you?"

The contessa was fond of punctuating her conversation with sharp interrogations, but in the present instance the expression upon Cerini's face made any question unnecessary.

"This is the happiest year I have known since I first made my home among these books, my daughter," he replied, with much feeling. "For a long time I felt as a miser must feel surrounded by his gold, far more in quantity than he can ever count, yet separated by its overwhelming value from the world outside. My loneliness came, of course, from another cause--I craved the opportunity to share my treasures, yet this opportunity came but rarely. Patiently have I waited, marvelling that so few should even know that these treasures exist, and a lesser number should care to partake of what is offered to them freely in as large quantities as they are able to carry away. Year by year I have watched the number increase, I have seen the signs of a veritable renaissance; and as one after another comes to me, as you have this afternoon, my heart fills with an unspeakable joy."

The sincerity of the old man penetrated through even the contessa's worldly armor, but the problem she had set herself to solve was too fascinating to be laid aside. The librarian need never know how much less interest she felt in books than in her present undertaking.

"So this year has crowned your labors," she replied, sympathetically. "I do not wonder that you feel gratified! You have had a greater number of converts, you say, most of whom, I presume, come from the libraries and universities near by."

"Not at all!" contradicted Cerini, eagerly. "They come from England, from France, from Germany--and even from your own far-off country, contessa."

"Indeed!" Amelie smiled at the air of triumph with which the librarian uttered the last words. "From America? Have my countrymen really discovered what rich mines of learning are here in Florence?"

Cerini nodded his head and drew his chair closer to hers. "At this very moment there are two Americans working here in the library who have so assimilated the learning of the past that they have become a part of it themselves. I have had many students here during all these years, but never any one who was able so completely to carry out my ideas of modern intellectual expression. What they have done and are doing has given me courage to believe that I am not so much of a visionary as my colleagues think. If by my influence I can produce two such modern humanists my labors will not have been in vain."

"Are these two wonderful men from some library or university in America?" the contessa asked, with apparent innocence.

"They are not," replied the librarian, with emphasis. "If they were they would have come here, as the others have, with preconceived ideas which centuries could not break down. One of them is a young advocate from Boston, and the other--you will scarcely believe me--is a young woman."

"Really?" The contessa manifested an interest not wholly assumed. "A young woman, you say--his wife, perhaps?"

"No, simply a friend."

"Oh!" Amelie smiled knowingly. "Then perhaps soon to be his wife?"

"You are wrong again, contessa," replied Cerini. "The man is already married, so that could hardly be the case."

"And his wife makes no objections? Come, come, monsignore, that would not be human."

"His wife is as remarkable in her way as he is in his," the old man answered, with confidence. "We have discussed the matter, and she understands the importance of allowing the work to go on."

"Then she has raised some objections? Do tell me that she has or I shall find it difficult to believe your story."

"She did suggest that she would have liked to be able to do this work with her husband, but that was quite out of the question, and she saw it just as I did."

"How very, very interesting!" the contessa remarked, more to herself than to him. "I wish I might see them at work." The librarian hesitated, and Amelie knew that hesitation is consent if promptly followed up. "I will promise not to disturb them," she urged.

"I should not wish them to know that I was exhibiting them to my friends," Cerini said, doubtfully. "Still, I can see no harm unless we disturb them."

"Then come!" Amelie exclaimed, rising quickly lest the old man change his mind. "I will be as still as a mouse."

Cerini led the way to the little alcove which Armstrong and Inez had come to regard as a part of themselves. Motioning to the contessa, he pointed out a place beside an ancient book-shelf where she could observe without herself being seen. Amelie studied the faces before her carefully. Armstrong was so seated that only his profile was visible, but Inez sat so squarely in front of her that had she not been so engrossed in her labors she could hardly have avoided seeing the contessa. It was the girl's face which first held Amelie's attention. In it she read all that Inez had fought so hard to conceal. She had found the second woman! It was not the usual type, she told herself. The passionate devotion to its given object was there, but it was evidently absolutely controlled by the intellectual. How much more interesting, the contessa thought, but how much more dangerous!

Then she turned her attention to Armstrong. He was younger than she had expected and his personality far more attractive. The height of his forehead, the depth of his eye, the strength of his mouth were all carefully noted. The contessa watched every movement, every change in the expression, with the keenest delight. They were an interesting pair, she admitted, but even her astuteness, she was forced to confess, was unequal to the task of understanding their relations without further study. The problem was as new as it was fascinating, and the contessa had no misgivings over her little plot, which had worked out so successfully.

She followed the librarian quietly back to his study, where she made an appointment for him to examine with her the Morelli collection and to point out to her the merits of the various volumes. She expressed her thanks for the charming afternoon he had given her, but through it all, and even after she returned to her villa, the faces of Armstrong and Inez were still before her. Beneath that abstraction which the man's face and manner so clearly portrayed, was there a response to the woman's passionate adoration? Was he capable of affection, or had the intellectual so far claimed the ascendency that the physical had, for the time being at least, become so subdued as practically to be eliminated? Where did the wife, who had so attracted her, come in? These were some of the questions over which the contessa pondered. The problem was more complex than she anticipated, and she found herself even more determined to carry it through to a solution.

XX

A week passed by with little outward change at the Villa Godilombra. For a day or two after their interview in the garden Armstrong watched his wife carefully, but as there was apparently no difference in her attitude toward him or toward Miss Thayer he decided that what she had said at that time was the result merely of a momentary mood which had since passed away. He also watched Miss Thayer, to satisfy himself in regard to the monstrous suggestion Helen had made that she was in love with him, and became convinced that his own explanation of her feelings toward him was correct. Having settled these two important matters to his entire satisfaction, he promptly discarded them from his mind and devoted himself to the single purpose of completing his work.

"Once let me get this finished," he said to himself, "and Helen will see that there is nothing between us."

As a matter of fact, Inez had not been pleased with Armstrong's suggestion to Helen that she should take up with him a similar kind of work in Boston. For the first time since she had known him he had done something which annoyed her. She realized better than any one else the absorption which held him subject to a different code of conventions, but this did not give him a right to assume that she would accept such an arrangement, without at least raising the question with her. Helen and Mr. Cartwright could but think that the matter had already been discussed between them, and it placed her in a false light at a time when she felt that her position was sufficiently untenable without this unfair and unnecessary addition. She also realized, as Armstrong apparently did not even after Uncle Peabody's pointed remarks, that this daily companionship would be entirely impossible.

During those few days, therefore, when Armstrong was observing her, she was in a mood quite at variance with what Helen had described; but what had wounded her in one respect proved to be a salve in another. Had Armstrong been conscious of her affection for him, or had he himself reciprocated it, the request would never have been made. She was quite safe, therefore, to continue on until the book was finished, and the danger lay, as she had told her conscience, only with herself. And even with this annoyance, which, after all, was but an incident, she felt it to be her only happiness to stay beside him as long as she could. She dreaded the time when the break must come, for she saw no light beyond that point.

Helen had herself well in hand. She was conscious of Jack's scrutiny, and was also conscious of the relaxing of his watchfulness. She saw his new interest in Inez, and was equally conscious of her friend's unusual frame of mind. Everything seemed to Helen to be intensified to such a degree that she could read all that was passing in the minds of those about her, and she wondered if some new power had been given her to make her test the harder. She had already felt the force of the blow; the others had it still before them. And it would be a blow, at least to Jack, she was sure--not so hard a one as in her own case, for after the pain of the break there was for him happiness and serenity; but he had cared for her, and when he once came to a realization of what must be he would suffer, too. This was her only consolation.

Naturally, Helen turned to Uncle Peabody. Now that all was settled, it was better that he should know from her how matters stood rather than surmise as he and Emory had done; and besides this, the burden had become too heavy to be borne alone. She waited a few days for the right opportunity, which came during a morning walk along the ancient road above the villa which led to the highest point of Settignano. They had left the frequented part of the path behind them, and were strolling among the rocks and trees of the little plateau commanding a view of the panorama on either side.

"I wish I could find out from Jack how much longer you are to remain in Florence," Uncle Peabody said. "I really need to get back to my work."

"Not yet," exclaimed Helen, quickly. "Don't go yet. I need you so much!"

Uncle Peabody regarded his niece critically. There was a new note in her voice, and it pained him.

"It won't be much longer, uncle," Helen continued. "I need you here, and I may want you to go back home with me."

"I could not do that, Helen; but of course I will stay here as long as you really need me."

"But you would go back with me if I needed that, too, would you not?" insisted Helen.

"If you needed me, yes; but I can't imagine any such necessity."

"It would be so hard to go home alone."

Helen's voice sank almost to a whisper.

"Alone?" echoed Uncle Peabody. "Is Jack going to stay over here and send you back?"

"I don't know what Jack is going to do, but I shall return home as soon as his book is completed; and unless you go with me I shall go alone."

Uncle Peabody understood. "My dear, dear child," he said, taking her hand in his and pressing it sympathetically.

"Don't, please." Helen gently withdrew her hand. "If you do that I shall become completely unnerved. Let us return to the villa; I really want to talk with you about it."

The short walk home was accomplished in silence. As they entered the hallway Uncle Peabody was the first to speak. "Where shall we go?" he asked.

"To my 'snuggery,'" Helen answered. "There we are sure not to be interrupted."

"Now tell me all about it," he urged, as they seated themselves.

"I imagine you know a good deal about the situation without my telling you," began Helen, bravely; "but I want you to know the whole story. Otherwise you can't help me, and without your aid I am absolutely alone."

"You know well that you can depend upon that," he interrupted.

Helen moved nearer and passed her hand through his arm. "We have made a horrible mistake, Jack and I," she said. "We are not at all suited to each other, and never should have married."

"That is a pretty serious statement," replied Uncle Peabody.

"It is," assented Helen; "but the fact itself is even more serious. Tell me, do you not see that Jack is a very different man from the one you first met here?"

"Yes," he replied. "There can be no question about that."

"If this change was but a passing mood it would not be so serious," continued Helen, "but the Jack I know now is the real Jack, and as such our interests are entirely apart."

"But all this may correct itself," suggested Uncle Peabody. "Why not get him away from the influences which have produced this change and see if that will not straighten matters out?"

Helen was thoughtful for a moment. "That would never do," she said, at length. "You see, there is another consideration which enters in. Inez and Jack are in love with each other."

"Has Jack admitted this?" demanded Uncle Peabody.

Helen smiled sadly. "No; he would never admit it, even if he knew it to be true. At present his affection is wholly centered upon his book, and he himself has no real conception of how matters stand."

"Then why do you feel so certain? I think you are right about Miss Thayer, but I have seen nothing to criticise in Jack's conduct except this complete subjugation to his work."

"I have been watching it for weeks, uncle, and I know that I am right. The old Jack--the Jack I married--found in me the response he craved; but to the new Jack--the real Jack--I can give nothing. Inez is his counterpart; Inez is the woman who can talk his language and live his life--not I."

"There is no reason why you could not do this if he gave you the chance," he asserted.

"At first it was my fault that I did not make the effort when he did give me the chance. Then I tried to enter into it--you remember the day I went to the library--but it was too late. Cerini showed me how hopeless it was. Then you remember Professor Tesso's story. He was right; they are absolutely suited to each other. It is useless to fight against it and thus increase the misery."

"If you are not going to fight against it, what are you going to do?"

"I am going to right the wrong in the only way which remains," replied Helen, firmly.

"I don't see it yet." Uncle Peabody showed his perplexity. "What are you going to do?"

"Jack and I must be separated just as soon as it can be arranged."

Uncle Peabody placed his hands upon her shoulders and looked into her eyes. With all the advance signals of the storm which he had noted he was unprepared for this climax. "Surely that point has not yet arrived, Helen," he said, slowly. "'Those whom God hath joined together--'"

"That is just the point," she interrupted. "Those whom God joins together are those who are suited to each other. When it becomes evident that two people have been married who are unsuited, it is also evident that God never joined them together, and that they ought not to stay together. That is the case with Jack and me."

"Have you told Jack your decision?"

"Not in so many words, but in substance. He does not appreciate the situation at all, and he won't until the book is finished."

"Why don't you go home for a while and see what happens?"

"If I went away now Inez would have to leave, and that would interrupt the work."

"I can't follow you, Helen. One moment you speak of the misery this work has brought to you, and the next moment you can't do something because it will interfere with the very work which you would like to stop."

"It seems to be my fate not to be able to make myself understood," Helen replied, wearily. "Let me try again. I have no desire to stop the work. It is a necessary part of Jack's development, and it will open up a great future for him."

"But to continue this means to continue the intimacy between him and Miss Thayer," insisted Uncle Peabody.

"I have no desire to stop that, either." Helen was calm and firm in her replies. "It would be no satisfaction to hold Jack to me when I know perfectly well that duty and marriage vows remain as the only ties. It breaks my heart that all this has happened, but neither the work itself nor even Inez is responsible. The other side of Jack was like an undeveloped negative--these are simply the mediums which have brought out the picture which was already there."

"You are not in a condition to consider this matter as you should, Helen," Uncle Peabody replied, hardly knowing what to say. "The whole affair has been preying on your mind for so long that you are arriving at conclusions which may or may not be justified. Your very calmness shows that you do not appreciate the seriousness of your suggestions."

Helen looked at Uncle Peabody reproachfully. "Don't make me think that men are wilfully obtuse," she said. "When I talked it over with Jack he called it jealousy; now you think I lack an appreciation of the seriousness of it all!" Helen paused for a moment and closed her eyes. When she spoke again all the intensity of her nature burst forth. "Can you not see beneath this calmness the effort I am making to do my duty?" she asked, in a low, tense voice. "Can you not see my heart burned to ashes by the fire it has passed through? Look at me, uncle. Jack says I seem ten years older--twenty would be nearer the truth. Do these changes come to those who fail to appreciate what they are doing? It is not that I don't realize; it is because I can't forget."

"Don't misunderstand me, child," Uncle Peabody hastened to say, appalled by the effect of his words. "My own heart has bled for you all these weeks, and I would be the last to add another burden to the load you bear. It is hard to suffer, but sometimes I think it is almost as hard to see those one loves passing through an ordeal which he is powerless to lighten. I don't want you to take a step which will plunge you into deeper sorrow, that is all. You may be right, but I pray God that you are wrong. Now let me help you, if I can."

Helen smiled through the mist before her eyes. "You can help me," she said, "just by being your own dear self during these hard weeks to come. Stay here until it is over, and then take me home, where you can show me how to use the years I see before me." Helen buried her face in her hands. "Oh, those years!" she cried; "how can I endure them?"

"Come, come, Helen," urged Uncle Peabody, kindly, "I can't believe that the world has all gone wrong, as you think it has. Let us take one step at a time, and see if together we can't find the sun shining through the cypress-trees. Tell me just what you propose to do."

"The programme is a simple one," Helen answered. "Outwardly there will be no change. I shall make Jack's home as attractive as possible to him while we share it together. Inez is my guest, and will be welcome as long as I am here. Other than this it will be as if we all were visitors. Jack will notice no difference while his work lasts. Then when it is completed you and I will go back home. Jack may stay here or return, as he chooses. Inez will decide her own course. Then Jack will at last understand that I meant what I said--that I saw that I stood in the way of his future and stepped aside."

"Do you imagine that he will permit this when once he understands?" asked Uncle Peabody.

"He will try to prevent it," assented Helen. "He will realize that he has neglected me and he will want to atone, but this will be from a sense of duty, even though he does not know it. The actual break will be a blow to him, but then he will turn to Inez and will find that I understood him better than he did himself."

"But he is counting on continuing this work in Boston next winter. He spoke of it again yesterday, and said how splendid it was of you to make it possible for Miss Thayer to work there with him."

Helen rose and stepped out into the garden, looking far away into the distance. Then she turned toward him.

"I am making it possible, am I not?" she said, simply.

And the lump in Uncle Peabody's throat told him that he understood at last.

XXI

The evening had arrived for the reception at Villa Godilombra by which Helen was to acknowledge the many social obligations laid upon her by her friends in Florence. In the details of preparation she had found temporary relief from her ever-present burden, with Uncle Peabody assuming the role of general adviser, comforter, and prop. Together they had worked out the list of guests; together they had planned the many little surprises which should make the event unique. Much to old Giuseppe's disgust, his own flowers were found to be inadequate, and to his camellias, lilies, oleanders, and roses was added a profusion of those rare orchids which bear witness that the City of Flowers is well named. Emory was also pressed into service as the day drew near, and his energy was untiring in carrying out the ideas of his superior officers and in suggesting original ones of his own.

Armstrong had expressed his willingness to co-operate, but was obviously relieved to find his services unnecessary. He had reached a crisis in his work, he explained, and if he really was not needed it would hasten the conclusion of his labors if they might be uninterrupted at this particular point. Inez had also offered her aid, but Armstrong insisted that she could not be spared unless her presence at the villa was absolutely demanded. So the work upon the masterpiece had proceeded without a break, while little by little the plans for the reception matured.

The novelty of the preparations consisted principally in the electrical and the floral displays. Uncle Peabody succeeded in having a number of wires run from the trolley-line into the villa and the garden, leaving Emory to plan an arrangement of lights which did credit to the limited number of electrical courses which his college curriculum had contained. The grotto was lighted by fascinating little incandescent lamps, which shed their rays dimly through the guarding cypresses but full upon the varicolored shells and stones. Along the top of the retaining wall, and scattered here and there at uneven distances and heights among the trees and the statues, the lights looked like a swarm of magnificent fire-flies resting, for the time, wherever they happened to alight. But Emory's _piece de resistance_ was the fountain, beneath the spray of which he had helped the electrician to fashion a brilliant fleur-de-lis in compliment to the city of their adoption.

This final triumph was brought to a successful conclusion almost simultaneously with the cessation of Helen's labors in transforming the dining-room, the hallway, and the verandas into veritable flower arbors. Old Giuseppe and the florist's men had accomplished wonders under Helen's guidance, and they approved the final result as enthusiastically as they had opposed the scheme at first, when Helen had insisted upon a departure from the conventional "set pieces" which they tried to urge upon her. Realizing that the time was approaching for the light repast, and glad of a respite, Helen wandered out to the garden where Emory and Uncle Peabody, hand in hand, were executing an hilarious dance around the fountain.

"What in the world--" began Helen, in amazement.

"It is great, is it not, Mr. Cartwright?" cried Emory, ceasing his evolutions and turning to Uncle Peabody. "This settles it; I am going home on the next steamer and set myself up as an electrical engineer--specialty, decoration of Italian gardens. Watch, Helen--I will turn on the lights."

In an instant the flitting insects were flickering throughout the garden, and the water of the fountain became a living flame. Helen's first exclamation of delight was interrupted by Giuseppe's groan of terror as the old gardener hastily retreated to the house, crossing himself and praying for divine protection against the magic of the evil one which had entered and taken possession of his very domain. The suspicion with which he had viewed the labors of the electricians during the past few days was now fully justified, and he saw his work of thirty years in danger of destruction by the conflagration which he believed must inevitably follow.

"Splendid, Phil!" cried Helen, when Giuseppe was at last quieted. "I had no idea you were carrying out so grand a scheme. What should I have done without you?"

"It was Mr. Cartwright's idea, you know, Helen," insisted Emory.

"To get the light up here--not the arrangement, which is all to your credit," Uncle Peabody hastened to add.

"I owe everything to both of you," said Helen, holding out a hand to each. "Now I want to see every light." Slowly they walked about the garden inspecting the illumination. "It is perfect," exclaimed Helen. "I can't tell you how pleased I am with it. I ought to be jealous that you have so outdone me in your part of the decoration, but I am really proud of you!"

As they were taking an admiring view of the floral arrangements Jack and Inez rode up. Emory started to suggest to them a view of the garden, but a glance from Helen prevented.

"Save it for a surprise, Phil," she whispered. "They have no idea of what you have done."

It was nearly ten o'clock when the first guests arrived, and for an hour Helen, Jack, and Uncle Peabody greeted the brilliant gathering as it assembled. To most of them Armstrong was a complete stranger, and it was quite evident that many of those who had known and admired Helen and Mr. Cartwright possessed no little curiosity concerning this man of whom so little had been seen.

"Then there really is a Mr. Armstrong, after all," exclaimed the Marchesa Castellani, smiling blandly as Helen presented him. "We had almost come to look upon you as one of those American--what shall we say?--conceits."

The color came to Helen's face, but before she could reply Cerini pressed forward from behind.

"Signor Armstrong has been my guest these weeks, marchesa, inhaling the wisdom of the past instead of the sweeter but more transitory grandeur of Florentine society. This has perhaps been his loss, and yours; but, with his great work nearly ready for the press, dare we say that the world will not be the richer for the sacrifice?"

"I shall not be the one to dare," replied the marchesa, again smiling and passing on to make room for others behind her.

Cerini watched his opportunity for another word with Helen. "I came to-night," he said, "expressly to tell you that your reward is near at hand. Another week and your husband's labors will be completed. I have thought often of our conversation, and of your patience; but the result of my advice has been more far-reaching even than I thought. The character-building has extended beyond him and his 'sister-worker'--it has reached you as well."

The arrival of new guests fortunately delayed the necessity of immediate reply, but it also gave Cerini an opportunity to watch the effect of his words. The old man's voice softened as he continued:

"You have suffered, my daughter; I did not know till now how much. Yet suffering is essential. George Eliot was a woman, and she knew a woman's heart when she wrote, 'Deep, unspeakable suffering is a baptism, a regeneration--the initiation into a new state.' Your initiation is passed, my daughter, and your enjoyment of the new state is near at hand. Do you not see now how far-reaching has been the influence?"

"Yes," Helen replied, with a tremor in her voice; "and this time I think I may say that it has been more far-reaching than even you realize."

Cerini's eyes sought hers searchingly. He had already seen more than she had intended.

"Then the book is really coming to its completion?" she continued, calmly. "And you feel well satisfied with my husband's work?"

"It is superb; it is magnificent," cried Cerini, enthusiastically. "He has produced a work which is without an equal in the veracity of its portrayal of the period and in the insight which he has shown in dealing with the characters themselves. It will make your husband famous."

"We shall be very proud of him, shall we not?" replied Helen, forcing a smile. "And he will owe so much to you for the help and the inspiration you have given him."

"And also to you, my daughter," added the librarian, meaningly.

Emory approached as Cerini left her side. "Every one is in the garden now, Helen. May I take you there?"

Helen glanced around for her husband, and saw him somewhat apart from the other guests engaged in a conversation with the Contessa Morelli. Unconsciously her mind went back to what the contessa had said to her about marriage in general and about her husband in particular, and she wondered what her new friend thought of him, now that they had actually met.

"Jack has his hands full for the present," Emory remarked, noting her glance. "You need not worry about him. By Jove, Helen, you are simply stunning to-night!" he continued, in a low voice, as they strolled across the veranda. "I have been anxious about you, but now you are yourself again. You should always wear white."

Helen made no answer. She was recalling to herself the fact that to-night, for the first time, Jack had made no comment upon her appearance, as he had always done before; yet she had tried to wear the very things which he preferred. After all, she thought, it was better so. But what a mockery to stand beside a man, as she stood with Jack this evening, jointly receiving their friends and their friends' congratulations! What deception! What ignominy!

In the mean time, as Emory had surmised, Armstrong had his hands sufficiently full with the contessa. Her mind had been too constantly applied to her interesting problem, during the days which had elapsed since her call upon Cerini, to allow this opportunity to escape her. She had exercised every art she possessed to learn something further from Helen; she even had Emory take tea with her with the same definite object in view; but either consciously or unconsciously both had parried her diplomatic questioning with an air so natural and simple as to convince her that they were not unskilled themselves in the game in which she considered herself an adept. The one thing which remained was the picture she had seen at the library; but this had been so positive in the impression which it had made that she found herself even more keen than ever to follow up the small advantage she had gained.

Watching her opportunity, Amelie found herself beside Armstrong, with the other guests far enough removed to enable her to converse with him without being overheard.

"All Florence owes you a debt of gratitude for bringing your beautiful wife here," she began. "And how generous you have been to let us have so much of her while you have been otherwise engaged!"

"It has been my misfortune not to be able to share her social pleasures," Armstrong replied. "Perhaps she has told you of the serious work upon which I am engaged."

"Yes, indeed," answered the contessa, cheerfully. "I am sure every man in Florence who has had an opportunity to meet your wife has blessed you for your devotion to this 'serious work,' as you call it. Italian husbands are not so generous, especially upon their honeymoon."

Armstrong bowed stiffly. The contessa's manner was far too affable to warrant him in taking offence, yet he felt distinctly annoyed by what she said. Amelie, however, gave him no opportunity to reply.

"Oh, you don't know these Italian husbands," she continued, shrugging her beautiful shoulders. "I have one, so I know all about it. They go into paroxysms of fury even at the thought of having their wives go about without them, receiving the admiration of other men. I have no doubt that at this very moment my dear Morelli is either abusing one of the servants or breaking some of the furniture, just because I happen to be here while he is nursing his gouty foot at home. I am always proud of my countrymen when I see them, as you are, willing to let their wives enjoy themselves without them."

"I do not think I have observed this trait among American husbands developed to the extent you mention," Armstrong observed, with little enthusiasm.

"You haven't?" queried the contessa, innocently. "Perhaps that is because you are such a learned man, with your eyes upon your books instead of upon the world. You must take my word that it is so. But you know enough of the world to recognize admiration when you yourself become the object of it?"

Amelie fastened upon her companion an arch smile so full of meaning that Armstrong was caught entirely off his guard.

"I the object of admiration?" he asked, incredulously. "I wish I might think that you were speaking of your own."

The contessa laughed merrily. "I certainly laid myself open for that, did I not?" she replied. "Now suppose I had said adoration instead of admiration, then you would not have replied as you did."

"I should hardly have so presumed," he said, mystified by the contessa's conversation.

"Yet I have seen you the object of adoration--nothing less. I have seen eyes resting upon your face filled with a devotion which a woman never gives but once. You ought to feel very proud to be able to inspire all that, Mr. Armstrong. I should if I were a man."

"You have evidently mistaken me for some one else, contessa. Otherwise I cannot understand what you are saying."

Amelie looked at him curiously. "I wonder if you are really ignorant of all this?" she asked.

"You say that you have witnessed it, so it cannot be my wife of whom you speak, as you have never seen us together. I certainly know of no other woman who cares two straws about me. It must be that you have taken some one else for me."

"No; I am not mistaken."

Armstrong's curiosity proved stronger than his resentment. "And you have actually seen this?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Where and when?"

The contessa's mood had become serious. She realized that she was playing with dangerous weapons. "If you are sincere in what you say, Mr. Armstrong, you would not thank me for telling you."

"But you have gone so far that now I must insist." Helen's words suddenly came back to him as he spoke. The contessa saw a change of expression come over his face, and she held back her answer.

"Was it at the Laurentian Library?" Armstrong asked, impulsively.

Amelie smiled triumphantly. "It is really better for me not to answer that question, my dear Mr. Armstrong. I only meant to pay you a compliment, and I fear that I have touched on something I should have avoided. You will forgive me, will you not?"

Armstrong was for the moment too occupied with his own thoughts to comprehend fully what she said to him. Mechanically he pressed the hand which was held out to him, and a moment later the contessa entered into a merry conversation with some of her friends in the garden. Too late he realized that he had tacitly accepted the compromising position into which she had led him.

Emory left Helen in the midst of an animated group discussing in enthusiastic tones their appreciation of the many innovations. The musicians were concealed in the "snuggery," playing airs from favorite operas, while waiters from Doney's served _gelati_ and _paste_ and champagne at little tables scattered throughout the garden. The cool air was grateful to Helen, and she threw herself into the enjoyment of the moment. No one among her guests realized how little the brilliant, happy scene fitted in with the sorrow in her heart. Yet the musicians played on, the guests chatted merrily, and the lights reflected only that side of life which Helen felt was hers no more. The hour-glass filled and emptied, with no change save the departure of the guests.

As the last good-night was spoken Helen sought mechanically the low retaining wall against which she had so often rested. Jack and Uncle Peabody were for the moment inside the house, and she was alone. Yes, alone! How strongly she felt it, now that the stillness replaced the hum of voices which had filled the garden! Her features did not change, but a tear, unchecked as it was unbidden, coursed its way down her cheeks. Emory saw it as he approached, unnoticed, to say good-night.

"Helen!" he whispered, softly.

She turned quickly and brushed the tear away with her hand. "How you startled me!" she said. "I thought every one had gone."

"Helen," Emory repeated, "you are unhappy."

"I am tired," she replied, lightly; "that is all."

"No, that is not all," he insisted. "You are miserably unhappy."

"Don't, Phil," she entreated.

"I must, Helen," Emory kept on. "I should have no respect for myself if I kept silent another moment. All this time I have stood by and seen you suffer without saying a word, when I have longed to take you in my arms in spite of all and comfort you as you needed to be comforted."

"Phil, I beg of you!" Helen cried, beseechingly. "You must not say such things. I am not strong enough to stop you, and every word adds to the pain."

"Then there is pain!" cried Emory, fiercely. "At last I know it from your own lips. And if there is pain it gives me the right to protect you from it."

"Oh, Phil!" Helen sank helplessly into a chair.

"I have the right," Emory repeated. "My love, which you cast aside when you accepted him, now gives it to me; my loyalty in surrendering you to him for what I thought was your happiness now gives it to me; his selfishness and his neglect now give it to me. And I claim my right."

She made no reply. Convulsed with weeping, she sat huddled in the chair, helpless in her sorrow.

"I am going to Jack Armstrong now," continued Emory, savagely. "I am going to tell him what a brute he is and demand you of him. I did not give you up to be tortured by neglect while he devotes himself to his 'affinity.'" Emory's voice grew bitter. "And he calls it his 'masterpiece'! Better men than he have called it by another name."

Helen rose, white and ghostlike in the pale, dim light. She was calm again, and her voice was compelling in its quiet force.

"You have been my friend, Phil--a friend on whom I have felt I could rely always; yet you take this one moment, when I need real, honest friendship more than ever before in all my life, to add another burden. Is it kind, Phil--is it noble? I have suffered--I admit it. Jack is the cause of it--I admit that, too. You have discovered all this by pulling aside the veil which by my friend should have been held sacred; but with my heart laid bare before you, can you not see that it contains no thought except of him?"

"I do not believe it," Emory replied, stubbornly.

"You must believe it," she continued, with finality. "You know that my words are true. Jack Armstrong is my husband and I am his wife. We must forget what you have said and never refer to it again. Come, let us join them in the house."

"I can't, Helen."

"Then we must say good-night here."

Emory took the outstretched hand in his. For a moment their eyes met firmly. Then he raised her fingers to his lips.

"It is not good-night, Helen," he said, his voice breaking as he spoke; "do you understand, it is not good-night--it is good-bye."

Her glance did not falter, though a new sensation of pain passed through her heart. "Good-bye," she replied, faintly, as she gently withdrew her hand.

Armstrong watched Emory's hasty departure and Helen's slow return to the house from his unintentional place of concealment behind the oleanders, where his footsteps had been arrested by the sound of voices. The contessa's remarks had recalled with vivid intensity his conversation with Helen about Inez. She regarded his relations with Miss Thayer to be at least questionable, and he impatiently awaited the departure of the guests to tell Helen what had happened and to set himself right in her eyes. Now he had just heard Emory express himself even more pointedly upon the same subject.

The consciousness that he had been an eavesdropper, even though unwittingly, prevented him from carrying out his purpose. As he saw Helen drag herself rather than walk along the paths, he longed to fold her to his heart and brush away her doubts for all time; but to do this he must disclose his uncomfortable position, and this he could not do. His resentment against Emory faded away in the face of Helen's splendid loyalty. "My heart contains no thought except of him," he had heard her say; and he thanked God that his awakening had not come too late.

After a few moments he returned to the house from the opposite side of the garden.

"Where is Helen?" he asked Uncle Peabody, whom he met at the door.

"She has gone to her room, Jack," Mr. Cartwright replied, without meeting his eyes. "She said she was very tired, and asked particularly not to be disturbed."

Armstrong hesitated. She was hardly strong enough to talk the matter over to-night, anyway. It would be a kindness to leave it until to-morrow.

"Thank God it is not too late!" Uncle Peabody heard him repeat to himself, and the old man wondered if, after all, the sun was going to shine through the cypress-trees.

XXII

Helen did not come down to breakfast the next morning, so Armstrong and Miss Thayer found themselves at the library at their usual hour in spite of the festivities of the night before. The events of the evening impressed upon Jack the necessity of bringing his work to a speedy conclusion. With feverish haste, and forgetful of his companion, he seized his pen and transferred to the blank paper before him the words which came faster than they could be transcribed. Left to her own resources, Inez picked up the bunch of manuscript and settled back in her chair to run it over, glancing from time to time at Armstrong, who seemed consumed by the task before him. Accustomed as she was to his moods while at work, Inez was almost frightened by the present intensity. She hesitated even to move about lest he be disturbed, yet until he gave her something to do she was wholly unemployed.

For over an hour Armstrong's pen ran on. The fever was upon him, the message was in his mind, the spirit must be translated to the more tangible medium of words. At length, utterly exhausted for the moment, he threw aside his pen and leaned back in his chair.

"It is finished!" he cried, looking for the first time into Inez' face; "all is now actually written, and the revision alone remains."

Inez started to speak a word of congratulation, but in a flood of realization she knew that the companionship of the past three months was at an end. For the revision Armstrong would need no assistance; so she faltered for a moment, but the omission was unnoticed.

"I have just written the summary in the last chapter," Armstrong continued. "I have taken Michelangelo's allegorical statues in the Laurentian Chapel as typifying the characteristics and the tendencies of the period. All that I have written seems naturally to lead up to them. Listen."

In a rich, tense voice Armstrong read from the sheets which he gathered together in proper sequence: