The High Heart

by Basil King

  CHAPTER XX

  Mr. Brokenshire arrived on the 26th of June, thus giving us a few days'grace. In the interval Mrs. Brokenshire remained in bed, neither tirednor ill, but white, silent, and withdrawn. Her soul's tragedy hadplainly not ended with her skimming retreat through Clover Lane. In thenew phase on which it had entered it was creating a woman, possibly awife, where there had been only a lovely child of arrested development.Slipping in and out of her room, attending quietly to her wants, I wasable to note, as never in my life before, the beneficent action ofsuffering.

  Because she was in bed, I folded my tent like the Arab and silentlyvacated my room in favor of Mr. Brokenshire. I looked for some objectionon telling her of this, but she merely bit her lip and said nothing. Ihad asked the manager to put me in the most distant part of the mostdistant wing of the hotel, and would have stolen away altogether had itnot been for fear that my poor, dear little lady might need me.

  As it was, I kept out of sight when Mr. Brokenshire drove up withsecretary, valet, and chauffeur, and I contrived to take my meals athours when there could be no encounter between me and the greatpersonage. If I was wanted I knew I could be sent for; but the 27thpassed and no command came.

  Once or twice I got a distant view of my enemy, as I began to callhim--majestic, noble, stouter, too, and walking with a slight waddle ofthe hips, which had always marked his carriage and became morenoticeable as he increased in bulk. Not having seen him for nearly threemonths, I observed that his hair and beard were grayer. During thosefirst few days I was never near enough to be able to tell whether or notthere was a change for the better or the worse in his facial affliction.

  From a chance word with the cadaverous Spellman on the 28th I learnedthat a sitting-room had been arranged in connection with the twobedrooms Mrs. Brokenshire and I had occupied, and that husband and wifewere now taking their repasts in private. Later that day I saw themdrive out together, Mrs. Brokenshire no more than a silhouette in theshadows of the limousine. I drew the inference that, however the soul'stragedy was working, it was with some reconciling grace that did whatlove had never been able to accomplish. Perhaps for her, as for me,there was an appeal in this vain, fatuous, suffering magnate of a coarseworld's making that, in spite of everything, touched the springs ofpity.

  In any case, I was content not to be sent for--and to rest. After atranquil day or two my own nerves had calmed down and I enjoyed thedelight of having nothing on my mind. It was extraordinary how remote Icould keep myself while under the same roof with my superiors,especially when they kept themselves remote on their side. I had decidedon the 1st of July as the date to which I should remain. If there was nodemand for my services by that time I meant to consider myself free togo.

  But events were preparing, had long been preparing, which changed mylife as, I suppose, they changed to a greater or less degree themajority of lives in the world. It was curious, too, how they arrangedthemselves, with a neatness of coincidence which weaves my own smalldrama as a visible thread--visible to me, that is--in the vast tapestryof human history begun so far back as to be time out of mind.

  It was the afternoon of Monday the 29th of June, 1914. Having secured aBoston morning paper, I had carried it off to the back veranda, whichwas my favorite retreat, because nobody else liked it. It was justoutside my room, and looked up into a hillside wood, where there werebirds and squirrels, and straight bronze pine-trunks wherever thesunlight fell aslant on them. At long intervals, too, a partridge hencame down with her little brood, clucking her low wooden cluck andpecking at tender shoots invisible to me, till she wandered off oncemore into the hidden depths of the stillness.

  But I wasn't watching for the partridge hen that afternoon. I wasthrilled by the tale of the assassination of the Archduke FranzFerdinand and the Duchess of Hohenberg, which had taken place atSarajevo on the previous day. Millions of other readers, who, no morethan I, felt their own destinies involved were being thrilled at thesame moment. The judgment trumpet was sounding--only not as we hadexpected it. There was no blast from the sky--no sudden troop of angels.There was only the soundless vibration of the wire and of the Hertzianwaves; there was only the casting of type and the rattling ofinnumerable reams of paper; and, as the Bible says, the dead could hearthe voice, and they that heard it stood still; and the nations weresummoned before the Throne "that was set in the midst." I was summoned,with my own people--though I didn't know it was a summons tillafterward.

  The paper had fallen to my knee when I was startled to see Mr.Brokenshire come round the corner of my retreat. Dressed entirely inwhite, with no color in his costume save the lavender stripe in hisshirt and collar, and the violet of his socks, handkerchief, and tie, hewould have been the perfect type of the middle-aged exquisite had it notbeen for the pitiless distortion of his eye the minute he caught sightof me. That he had not stumbled on me accidentally I judged by the wayin which he lifted a Panama of the kind that is said to be made underwater and is costlier than the costliest feminine confection by CarolineLedoux.

  I was struggling out of my wicker chair when the uplifted hand forbademe.

  "Be good enough to stay where you are," he commanded, but more gentlythan he had ever spoken to me. "I've some things to say to you."

  Too frightened to make a further attempt to move, I looked at him as hedrew up a chair similar to my own, which creaked under his weight whenhe sat down in it. The afternoon being hot, and my veranda lacking air,which was one of the reasons why it was left to me, he mopped his browwith the violet handkerchief, on which an enormous monogram wasembroidered in white. I divined his reluctance to begin not only fromhis long hesitation, but from the renewed contortion of his face. Hishand went up to the left cheek as if to hold it in place, though with nosuccess in the effort. When, at last, he spoke there was a stillness inhis utterance suggestive of an affection extending now to the lips orthe tongue.

  "I want you to know how much I appreciate the help you've given to Mrs.Brokenshire during her--her"--he had a difficulty in finding the rightword--"during her indisposition," he finished, rather weakly.

  "I did no more than I was glad to do," I responded, as weakly as he.

  "Exactly; and yet I can't allow such timely aid to go unrewarded."

  I was alarmed. Grasping the arms of the chair, I braced myself.

  "If you mean money, sir--"

  "No; I mean more than money." He, too, braced himself. "I--I withdraw myopposition to your marriage with my son."

  The immediate change in my consciousness was in the nature of adissolving view. The veranda faded away, and the hillside wood. Oncemore I saw the imaginary dining-room, and myself in a smart littledinner gown seating the guests; once more I saw the white-enamelednursery, and myself in a lace peignoir leaning over the bassinet. As inprevious visions of the kind, Hugh was a mere shadow in the background,secondary to the home and the baby.

  Secondary to the home and the baby was the fact that my object wasaccomplished and that my enemy had come to his knees. Indeed, I felt noparticular elation from that element in the case; no special sense ofvictory. Like so many realized ambitions, it seemed a matter of course,now that it had come. Nevertheless, it seemed to me that for my own sakeand for the sake of the future I must have a more definite expression ofsurrender than he had yet given me.

  I remembered that Mrs. Brokenshire had said she would help me, and couldimagine how. I summoned up everything within me that would rank asforce of character, speaking quietly.

  "I should be sorry, sir, to have you come to this decision against yourbetter judgment."

  "If you'll be kind enough to accept the fact," he said, sharply, "we canleave my manner of reaching it out of the discussion."

  In spite of the tone I rallied my resources.

  "I don't want to be presumptuous, sir; but if I'm to enter your family Ishould like to feel sure that you'll receive me whole-heartedly."

  "My dear young lady, isn't it assurance enough that I receive you atall? When I bring myself
to that--"

  "Oh, please don't think I can't appreciate the sacrifice."

  "Then what more is to be said?"

  "But the sacrifice is the point. No girl wants to become one of a familywhich has to make such an effort to take her."

  There was already a whisper of insecurity in his tone.

  "Even so, I can't see why you shouldn't let the effort be our affair.Since we make it on our own responsibility--"

  "I don't care anything about the responsibility, sir. All I'm thinkingof is that the effort must be made."

  "But what did you expect?"

  "I haven't said that I expected anything. If I've been of the slightesthelp to Mrs. Brokenshire I'm happy to let the service be its ownreward."

  "But I'm not. It isn't my habit to remain under an obligation to anyone."

  "Nor mine," I said, demurely.

  He stared.

  "What does that mean? I don't follow you."

  "Perhaps not, sir; but I quite follow you. You wish me to understandthat, in spite of my deficiencies, you accept me as your son's wife--forthe reason that you can't help yourself."

  Two sharp hectic spots came out on each cheek-bone.

  "Well, what if I do?"

  "I'm far too generous to put you in that position. I couldn't take youat a disadvantage, not even for the sake of marrying Hugh."

  I was not sure whether he was frightened or angry, but it was the one orthe other.

  "Do you mean to say that, now--now that I'm ready--"

  "That I'm not? Yes, sir. That's what I do mean to say. I told you oncethat if I loved a man I shouldn't stop to consider the wishes of hisrelatives; but I've repented of that. I see now that marriage has awider application than merely to individuals; and I'm not ready to enterany family that doesn't want me."

  I looked off into the golden dimnesses of the hillside wood in order notto be a witness of the struggle he was making.

  "And suppose"--it was almost a groan--"and suppose I said we--wantedyou?"

  It was like bending an iron bar; but I gave my strength to it.

  "You'd have to say it differently from that, sir."

  He spoke hoarsely.

  "Differently--in what sense?"

  I knew I had him, as Hugh would have expressed it, where I had beentrying to get him.

  "In the sense that if you want me you must ask me."

  He mopped his brow once more.

  "I--I have asked you."

  "You've said you withdrew your opposition. That's not enough."

  Beads or perspiration were again standing on his forehead.

  "Then what--what would be--enough?"

  "A woman can't marry any one unless she does it as something of afavor."

  He drew himself up.

  "Do you remember that you're talking to me?"

  "Yes, sir; and it's because I do remember it that I have to insist. Withanybody else I shouldn't have to be so crude."

  Again he put up a struggle, and this time I watched him. If his wife hadmade the conditions I guessed at, I had nothing to do but sit still.Grasping the arms of his chair, he half rose as if to continue theinterview no further, but immediately saw, as I inferred, what thatwould mean to him. He fell back again into the creaking depths of thechair.

  "What do you wish me to say?"

  But his stricken aspect touched me. Now that he was prepared to come tohis knees, I had no heart to force him down on them. Since I had gainedmy point, it was foolish to battle on, or try to make the Ethiopianchange his skin.

  "Oh, sir, you've said it!" I cried, with sudden emotion. I leaned towardhim, clasping my hands. "I see you do want me; and since you doI'll--I'll come."

  Having made this concession, I became humble and thankful and tactful. Iappeased him by saying I was sensible of the honor he did me, that I washappy in the thought that he was to be reconciled with Hugh; and Iinquired for Mrs. Brokenshire. Leading up to this question with an airof guilelessness, I got the answer I was watching for in the ashen shadethat settled on his face.

  I forget what he replied; I was really not listening. I was calling upthe scene in which she must have fulfilled her promise of helping Hughand me. From the something crushed in him, as in the case of a man whoknows the worst at last, I gathered that she had made a clean breast ofit. It was awesome to think that behind this immaculate white suit withits violet details, behind this pink of the old beau, behind thismoneyed authority and this power of dictation to which even the mightysometimes had to bow, there was a broken heart.

  He knew now that the bird he had captured was nothing but a capturedbird, and always longing for the forest. That his wife was willing tobear his name and live in his house and submit to his embraces waslargely because I had induced her. Whether or not, in spite of hispompousness, he was grateful to me I didn't know; but I guessed that hewas not. He could accept such benefits as I had secured him and yet beresentful toward the curious providence that had chosen me in particularas its instrument.

  I came out of my meditations in time to hear him say that, Mrs.Brokenshire being as well rested as she was, there would be no furtherhindrance to their proceeding soon to Newport.

  "And I suppose I might go back to my home," I observed, with no otherthan the best intentions.

  He made an attempt to regain the authority he had just forfeited.

  "What for?"

  "To be married," I explained--"since I am to be married."

  "But why should you be married there?"

  "Wouldn't it be the most natural thing?"

  "It wouldn't be the most natural thing for Hugh."

  "A man can be married anywhere; whereas a woman, at such a turning-pointin her life, needs a certain backing. I've an uncle and aunt and a greatmany friends--"

  The effort at a faint smile drew up the corner of his mouth and set hisface awry.

  "You'll excuse me, my dear"--the epithet made me jump--"if I correct youon a point of taste. In being willing that Hugh should marry you I thinkI must draw the line at anything like parade."

  I know my eyebrows went up.

  "Parade? Parade--how?"

  The painful little smile persisted.

  "The ancient Romans, when they went to war, had a custom of bringingback the most conspicuous of their captives and showing them in triumphin the streets--"

  I, too, smiled.

  "Oh! I understand. But you see, sir, the comparison doesn't hold in thiscase, because none of my friends would know anything more about Hughthan the fact that he was an American."

  The crooked features went back into repose.

  "They'd know he was my son."

  I continued to smile, but sweetly.

  "They'd take it for granted that he was somebody's son--but theywouldn't know anything about you, sir. You'd be quite safe so far asthat went. Though I don't live many hundreds of miles from New York, andwe're fairly civilized, I had never so much as heard the name ofBrokenshire till Mrs. Rossiter told me it was hers before she wasmarried. You see, then, that there'd be no danger of my leading acaptive in triumph. No one I know would give Hugh a second thoughtbeyond being nice to the man I was marrying."

  That he was pleased with this explanation I cannot affirm, but he passedit over.

  "I think," was his way of responding, "that it will be better if weconsider that you belong to us. Till your marriage to Hugh, which Isuppose will take place in the autumn, you'll come back with us toNewport. There will be a whole new--how shall I put it?--a whole newphase of life for you to get used to. Hugh will stay with us, and Ishall ask my daughter, Mrs. Rossiter, to be your hostess till--"

  As, without finishing his sentence, he rose I followed his example.Though knowing in advance how futile would be the attempt to presentmyself as an equal, I couldn't submit to this calm disposition of myliberty and person without putting up a fight.

  "I've a great preference, sir--if you'll allow me--for being married inmy own home, among my own people, and in the old parish church in whichI was ba
ptized. I really have people and a background; and it's possiblethat my sisters might come over--"

  The hand went up; his tone put an end to discussion.

  "I think, my dear Alexandra, that we shall do best in considering thatyou belong to us. You'll need time to grow accustomed to your newsituation. A step backward now might be perilous."

  My fight was ended. What could I do? I listened and submitted, while hewent on to tell me that Mrs. Brokenshire would wish to see me during theday, that Hugh would be sent for and would probably arrive the nextafternoon, and that by the end of the week we should all be settled inNewport. There, whenever I felt I needed instruction, I was not to beashamed to ask for it. Mrs. Rossiter would explain anything of a socialnature that I didn't understand, and he knew I could count on Mrs.Brokenshire's protection.

  With a comic inward grimace I swallowed all my pride and thanked him.

  As for Mrs. Brokenshire's protection, that was settled when, later inthe afternoon, we sat on her balcony and laughed and cried together, andheld each other's hands, as young women do when their emotions outruntheir power of expression. She called me Alix and begged me to invent aname for her that would combine the dignity of Hugh's stepmother withour standing as friends. I chose Miladi, out of _Les TroisMousquetaires_, with which she was delighted.

  I begged off from dining with them that evening, nominally because I wastoo upset by all I had lived through in the afternoon, but really forthe reason that I couldn't bear the thought of Mr. Brokenshire callingme his dear Alexandra twice in the same day. Once had made my blood runcold. His method of shriveling up a name by merely pronouncing it issomething that transcends my power to describe. He had ruined that ofAdare with me forever, and now he was completing my confusion at beingcalled after so lovely a creature as our queen. I have always admittedthat, with its stately, regal suggestions, Alexandra is no symbol for aplain little body like me; but when Mr. Brokenshire took it on his lipsand called me his dear I could have cried out for mercy. So I had mydinner by myself, munching slowly and meditating on what Mr. Brokenshiredescribed as "my new situation."

  I was meditating on it still when, in the course of the followingafternoon, I was sitting in a retired grove of the hillside woodwaiting for Hugh to come and find me. He was to arrive about three andMiladi was to tell him where I was. In our crowded little inn, with itscrowded grounds, nooks of privacy were rare.

  I had taken the Boston paper with me in order to get further details ofthe tragedy of Sarajevo. These I found absorbing. They wove themselvesin with my thoughts of Hugh and my dreams of our life together. Anarticle on Serbia, which I had found in an old magazine that morning,had given me, too, an understanding of the situation I hadn't hadbefore. Up to that day Serbia had been but a name to me; now I began tosee its significance. The story of this brave, patient little people,with its one idea--an _idee fixe_ of liberty--began to move me.

  Of all the races of Europe the Serbian impressed me as the one that hadbeen most constantly thwarted in its natural ambitions--struck downwhenever it attempted to rise. Its patriotic hopes had always beeninconvenient to some other nation's patriotic hopes, and so had to beblasted systematically. England, France, Austria, Turkey, Italy, andRussia had taken part at various times in this circumvention, denyingthe fruits of victory after they had been won. Serbia had been the poorlittle bastard brother of Europe, kept out of the inheritance of justiceand freedom and commerce when others were admitted to a share. For someof them there might have been no great share; but for little Serbiathere was none.

  It was terrible to me that such wrong could go on, generation aftergeneration, and that there should be no Nemesis. In a measure itcontradicted my theory of right. I didn't want any one to suffer, but Iasked why there had been no suffering. Of the nations that had knockedSerbia about, hedged her in by restrictions, dismembered her and kepther dismembered, most were prosperous. From Serbia's point of view Icouldn't help sympathizing with the hand that had struck down at leastone member of the House of Hapsburg; and yet in that tragic act therecould be no adequate revenge for centuries of repression. What I wantedI didn't know; I suppose I didn't want anything. I was onlywondering--wondering why, if individuals couldn't sin without paying forthe sin they had committed, nations should sin and be immune.

  Strangely enough, these reflections did not shut out the thought of thelover who was coming up the hill; they blended with it; they made itlarger and more vital. I could thank God I was marrying a man whose handwould always be lifted on behalf of right. I didn't know how it could belifted in the cause of Serbia against the influences represented byFranz Ferdinand; but when one is dreaming one doesn't pause to directthe logical course of one's dreams. Perhaps I was only clutching atwhatever I could say for Hugh; and at least I could say that. He was nota strong man in the sense of being fertile in ideas; but he was braveand generous, and where there was injustice his spirit would be amongthe first to be stirred by it. That conviction made me welcome him when,at last, I saw his stocky figure moving lower down among the pinetrunks.

  I caught sight of him long before he discovered me, and could make mynotes upon him. I could even make my notes upon myself, not wholly withmy own approval. I was too business-like, too cool. There was nothing Ipossessed in the world that I would not have given for a singlequickened heart-throb. I would have given it the more when I saw Hugh'spinched face and the furbished-up spring suit he had worn the yearbefore.

  It was not the fact that he had worn it the year before that gave me apang; it was that he must have worn it pretty steadily. I am notobservant of men's clothes. Except that I like to see them neat, theyare too much alike to be worth noticing. But anything not plainlyopulent in Hugh smote me with a sense of guilt. It could so easily beattributed to my fault. I could so easily take it so myself. I did takeit so myself. I said as he approached: "This man has suffered. He hassuffered on my account. All my life must be given to making it up tohim."

  I make no attempt to tell how we met. It was much as we had met afterother separations, except that when he slipped to the low boulder andtook me in his arms it was with a certainty of possession which hadnever hitherto belonged to him. There was nothing for me but to letmyself go, and lie back in his embrace.

  I came to myself, as it were, on hearing him whisper, with his faceclose to mine:

  "You witch! You witch! How did you ever manage it?"

  I made the necessity for giving him an explanation the excuse forworking myself free.

  "I didn't manage it. It was Mrs. Brokenshire."

  He cried out, incredulously:

  "Oh no! Not the madam!"

  "Yes, Hugh. It was she. She asked him. She must have begged him. That'sall I can tell you about it."

  He was even more incredulous.

  "Then it must have been on your account rather than on mine; you can betyour sweet life on that!"

  "Hugh, darling, she's fond of you. She's fond of you all. If you couldonly have--"

  "We couldn't." For the first time he showed signs of admitting me intothe family sense of disgrace. "Did you ever hear how dad came to marryher?"

  I said that something had reached me, but one couldn't put the blame forthat on her.

  "And she's had more pull with him than we've had," he declared,resentfully. "You can see that by the way he's given in to her onthis--"

  I soothed him on this point, however, and we talked of a generalreconciliation. From that we went on to the subject of our married life,of which his father, in the hasty interview of half an hour before, hadbriefly sketched the conditions. A place was to be found for Hugh in thehouse of Meek & Brokenshire; his allowance was to be raised to twelve orfifteen thousand a year; we were to have a modest house, or apartment inNew York. No date had been fixed for the wedding, so far as Hugh couldlearn; but it might be in October. We should be granted perhaps a threemonths' trip abroad, with a return to New York before Christmas.

  He gave me these details with an excitement bespeaking intensesatisfact
ion. It was easy to see that, after his ten months' rebellion,he was eager to put his head under the Brokenshire yoke again. Hisinstinct in this was similar to Ethel's and Jack's--only that they hadnever declared themselves free. I could best compare him to a horse whofor one glorious half-hour kicks up his heels and runs away, and yetreturns to the stable and the harness as the safest sphere ofblessedness. Under the Brokenshire yoke he could live, move, have hisbeing, and enjoy his twelve or fifteen thousand a year, without thatonerous responsibility which comes with the exercise of choice. Underthe Brokenshire yoke I, too, should be provided for. I should be raisedfrom my lowly estate, be given a position in the world, and, though fora while the fact of the _mesalliance_ might tell against me, it would beovercome in my case as in that of Libby Jaynes. His talk was a paean onour luck.

  "All we'll have to do for the rest of our lives, little Alix, will be toget away with our thousand dollars a month. I guess we can dothat--what? We sha'n't even have to save, because in the natural courseof events--" He left this reference to his father's demise to go on withhis hymn of self-congratulation. "But we've pulled it off, haven't we?We've done the trick. Lord! what a relief it is! What do you think I'vebeen living on for the last six weeks? Chocolate and crackers for themost part. Lost thirty pounds in two months. But it's all right now,little Alix. I've got you and I mean to keep you." He asked, suddenly:"How did you come to know the madam so well? I'd never had a hint of it.You do keep some things awful close!"

  I made my answer as truthful as I could.

  "This was nothing I could tell you, Hugh. Mrs. Brokenshire was sorry forme ever since last year in Newport. She never dared to say anythingabout it, because she was afraid of your father and the rest of you; butshe did pity me--"

  "Well, I'll be blowed! I didn't suppose she had it in her. She's alwaysseemed to me like a woman walking in her sleep--"

  "She's waking up now. She's beginning to understand that perhaps shehasn't taken the right attitude toward your father; and I think she'dlike to begin. It was to work that problem out that she decided to comeaway with me and live simply for a while. . . . She wanted to escapefrom every one, and I was the nearest to no one she could find to takewith her; and so-- If your sisters or your brother ask you any questionsI wish you would tell them that."

  We discussed this theme in its various aspects while the afternoon lightturned the pine trunks round us into columns of red-gold, and a softwind soothed us with balsamic smells. Birds flitted and fluted overhead,and now and then a squirrel darted up to challenge us with the peak ofits inquisitive sharp little nose. I chose what I thought a favorablemoment to bring before Hugh the matter that had been so summarilyshelved by his father. I wanted so much to be married among my ownpeople and from what I could call my own home.

  His child-like, wide-apart, small blue eyes regarded me with growingastonishment as I made my point clear.

  "For Heaven's sake, my sweet little Alix, what do you want that for?Why, we can be married in Newport!"

  His emphasis on the word Newport was as if he had said Heaven.

  "Yes; but you see, Hugh, darling, Newport means nothing to me--"

  "It will jolly well have to if--"

  "And my home means such a lot. If you were marrying Lady Cissie Boscobelyou'd certainly go to Goldborough for the occasion."

  "Ah, but that would be different!"

  "Different in what way?"

  He colored, and grew confused.

  "Well, don't you see?"

  "No; I'm afraid I don't."

  "Oh yes, you do, little Alix," he smiled, cajolingly. "Don't try to pullmy leg. We can't have one of these bang-up weddings, as it is. Of coursewe can't--and we don't want it. But they'll do the decent thing by us,now that dad has come round at all, and let people see that they standbehind us. If we were to go down there to where you came from--Halifax,or wherever it is--it would put us back ten years with the people wewant to keep up with."

  I submitted again, because I didn't know what else to do. I submitted,and yet with a rage which was the hotter for being impotent. Thesepeople took it so easily for granted that I had no pride, and wasentitled to none. They allowed me no more in the way of antecedents thanif I had been a new creation on the day when I first met Mrs. Rossiter.They believed in the principle of inequality of birth as firmly as ifthey had been minor German royalties. My marriage to Hugh might be validin the eyes of the law, but to them it would always be more or lessmorganatic. I could only be Duchess of Hohenberg to this young prince;and perhaps not even that. She was noble--_adel_, as they call it--atthe least; while I was merely a nursemaid.

  But I made another grimace--and swallowed it. I could have broken outwith some vicious remark, which would have bewildered poor Hugh beyondexpression and made no change in his point of view. Even if it relievedmy pent-up bitterness, it would have left me nothing but a nursemaid;and, since I was to marry him, why disturb the peace? And I owed him toomuch not to marry him; of that I was convinced. He had been kind to mefrom the first day he knew me; he had been true to me in ways in whichfew men would have been true. To go back on him now would not be simplya change of mind; it would be an act of cruel treachery. No, I argued; Icould do nothing but go on with it. My debt could not be paid in anyother way. Besides, I declared to myself, with a catch in the throat,I--I loved him. I had said it so many times that it must be true.

  When the minute came to go down the hill and prepare for the littledinner at which I was to be included in the family, my thoughts revertedto the event that had startled the world.

  "Isn't this terrible?" I said to Hugh, indicating the paper I carried inmy hand.

  He looked at me with the mild wondering which always made his expressionvacuous.

  "Isn't what terrible?"

  "Why, the assassinations in Bosnia."

  "Oh! I saw there had been something."

  "Something!" I cried. "It's one of the most momentous things that haveever happened in history."

  "What makes you say that?" he inquired, turning on me the innocent stareof his baby-blue eyes as we sauntered between the pine trunks.

  I had to admit that I didn't know, I only felt it in my bones.

  "Aren't they always doing something of the sort down there--killingkings and queens, or something?"

  "Oh, not like this!" I paused. "You know, Hugh, Serbia is a wonderfullittle country when you've heard a bit of its story."

  "Is it?" He took out a cigarette and lit it.

  In the ardor of my sympathy I poured out on him some of the informationI had just acquired.

  "And we're all responsible," I was finishing; "English, French,Russians, Austrians--"

  "We're not responsible--we Americans," he broke in, quietly.

  "Oh, I'm not so sure about that. If you inherit the civilization of theraces from which you spring you inherit some of their crimes; and you'vegot to pay for them."

  "Not on your life!" he laughed, easily; but in the laugh there wassomething that cut me more deeply than he knew.