The novelist gazed at the speaker with a strange look.
"I have treated you like a brute," he said, slowly. "And I have treated Mr. Fern just as badly. My punishment is well deserved. But how can this puzzle of her absence be accounted for! Of course she would have had to satisfy me on that point before I could have married her."
The listener turned giddily toward a window.
"And yet you talk of love!" he said, recovering. "If that girl had done me the honor she did you I would not have _asked_ her such a question--I would have refused to _listen_ if it gave her the slightest pain to tell."
"I wonder she did not love you instead of me--for she did love me once,"
was the sober reply. "You would be a thousand times better, more suitable, than I."
There was no reply to this, but the two men walked slowly out of the house and to the station, where they took the next train for the city.
On the way they talked little, and at the Grand Central Depot they separated.
Lawrence Gouger, who had in some strange way learned the news of Miss Fern"s return, was awaiting Roseleaf in his rooms.
"Well, I hear the missing one is found," he said, as the novelist came in.
"Yes. She is with her father. But the peculiar thing is that she closes her lips absolutely about her absence. She not only refuses to speak now, but announces that her refusal is final."
Mr. Gouger hesitated what card to play.
"When does the marriage take place?" he asked, finally.
"With me? Never. I have been thrown over. Unless she had explained I could not have married her, any way; could I?"
The critic said he did not know. It would certainly have been awkward.
"And what is your theory?" he added. "Do you still lay anything to Weil?"
"No. I am completely nonplussed. But, never mind. It is over."
Roseleaf stretched himself, and yawned.
"Do you know, Gouger, I almost doubt if I have really been in love at all. I feel a queer sense of relief at being out of it, though there is a dull pain, too, that isn"t exactly comfortable. I told Archie coming in that she should have married _him_. Upon my soul I wish she would.
She"s an awful nice little thing, and he has a heart that is genuine enough for her. Well, it"s odd, anyway."
Astonishment was written on the face of the other gentleman as he heard these statements.
"You have at least gained one point," he said, impressively. "You have done the best part of the greatest novel that ever was written. Sit down as soon as you can and finish it, and we shall see your name so high up on the temple of fame that no contemporary of this generation can reach it."
"So high the letters will be indistinguishable, I fear," responded Roseleaf, with a laugh. "Where do you think I can get the heartiest supper in New York? I am positively starved. I don"t believe I"ve eaten a thing since yesterday. If you can help me any to clear the board, let us go together."
This invitation was accepted, and Roseleaf began making a more particular toilet, taking great pains with the set of his cravat and spending at least ten minutes extra on his hair when he had finished shaving himself. He never had allowed a barber to touch his face.
"You won"t lose any time on the novel, will you?" asked Gouger, anxiously, while these preparations were in progress. "You must take hold of it while the events are fresh in your mind."
"All right. I"ll begin again to-morrow morning, and stick to the work till it"s done. Where shall we go to supper? I"ll tell you--Isaac Leveson"s."
The critic could not conceal his surprise at the overturn that had taken place so suddenly in the young man"s conduct. He stared at him with a look that approached consternation.
"You want to go there!" he exclaimed, unable to control himself. "You wish to dine with some pretty girl, eh?"
Roseleaf started violently.
"No, no! Not--yet!" he answered. "We can get a supper room without that appendix. I wish to be among men as mean as myself. I want to dine in a house full of people who would cut a woman"s throat--or break her heart--and sleep soundly when they had done it!"
CHAPTER XXV.
AN UNDISCOVERABLE SECRET.
The Ferns did not stay much longer at Midlands. Crushed by their misfortunes neither cared to remain near the scenes that had made them so unhappy, nor where they would be likely to meet faces which kept alive their grief. The father knew no more than at first concerning the strange conduct of his daughter. She had told him nothing, and he had not asked her a single question. It was enough for him that she was bowed with a great trouble. His only thought was to mitigate her distress in every possible way. He was old--how old he had not realized until that week when she changed from a happy, laughing girl, standing at the threshold of a marriage she longed for, to a sombre shadow that walked silently by his side. He was the one who under ordinary circ.u.mstances should have received the care and the thoughtfulness--but everything was altered now. He guided and directed the younger feet, even though his own were faltering and slow.
Where they had gone no one seemed to know. Archie Weil received one brief note from Mr. Fern thanking him again in touching phrase for his many kindnesses, and saying that Daisy wished to add her most earnest wish for his happiness. The letter said they were going away for some time; but no more. He went one day to Midlands, hoping to learn something from the servants, and found the home entirely deserted. A neighbor told him a real estate agent near by had the keys, but that the place was neither for sale nor to rent. The agent, when found, could add nothing to his stock of information. Mr. Fern had merely mentioned that he was going on a journey and asked to have a man sleep at the house during his absence, as a precaution against robbery.
Mr. Weil saw Roseleaf two or three times, but the interviews were so unsatisfactory that he felt them not worth repeating. The novelist told him, as he had told Gouger, that he did not believe he had ever really loved Daisy, and was actually relieved now that the strain was ended. No persuasion could turn him from this statement, which he made rather in explanation of his present course than as a defense of it. Gouger had persuaded him that a love affair was necessary to develop his talents as a writer. Before he knew what he was about, such an affair had been precipitated upon him. He had felt its pleasures and pains to the uttermost, and now it was ended. All that was left as a result was a pile of MSS. which the critic p.r.o.nounced wonderful. It was as if he had been in a trance, or mesmerized. Henceforth he would confine his writings to actualities or to poetic imaginings.
Talking with a man who held these views was not inspiring, to put it mildly, and Archie reluctantly gave up all hopes of making Daisy Fern a happy woman through this source. He had dreamed of unraveling the mystery that surrounded her and placing the young couple again in the position which, by some horrible mischance, had been so vitally changed in the short s.p.a.ce of one day. Though he still loved Daisy with all the warmth of his nature, Archie had no thought of trying to win her for himself. She had given the fullness of her innocent heart to Roseleaf and he did not believe she was one to change her affections to another so soon as this.
What had happened! What had happened! He thought it over day by day, and night by night.
Among the things he did before leaving New York--for he felt that a journey was necessary for him--was to seek out Millicent. He found the elder sister adamant to every suggestion of love for her family. She believed herself injured by them, and would have nothing more to do with either. As to the strange affair regarding Daisy she declared she had no theory. She did not think it sufficiently interesting even to try to formulate one. Her time was given to writing, and she had found another a.s.sistant that quite filled Roseleaf"s place. The firm of Scratch & Bytum had accepted her latest novel, as she did not care to have anything more to do with Mr. Gouger.
When she mentioned the name of Roseleaf, Mr. Weil looked at her intently, and saw that she uttered it with the utmost calmness. She had hardened. Her fancied grievances had made her a different woman. She was cynical before, but now she was bitter. He would not have believed that such an alteration could have taken place in so short a time.
"What is your new book about?" he asked, trying to be polite.
"Crime!" she answered briefly. "It deals with the lowest of the low. It suits the mood I am in. I am writing of things so terrible that they will hardly be credited. To get at my facts I have to go into the most depraved quarters, and a.s.sociate with the _canaille_. But I am going to make a hit that has not been equaled in recent years!"
He smiled sadly.
"Roseleaf had the same expectation," he said. "And yet he tells me that he is doing nothing on that wonderful tale over which I have heard Gouger rave so often. He has reached a point where he can go no farther, and unless he rouses himself, all he has done is merely wasted time."
Millicent closed her eyes till they resembled those of a cat at noonday.
"Keep watch for mine," she said. "It will be all I claim for it."
During the winter Mr. Weil was in California. As spring approached he returned to the East and visited a well known resort in North Carolina, where by one of those curious coincidences that happen to travelers, he found himself placed at table exactly opposite to Mr. Walker Boggs. The ordinary salutations and explanations followed, and then Mr. Boggs alluded to a more interesting subject.
"I think I can surprise you," he remarked, "by something that I learned the other day. Mr. Fern and Miss Daisy are living within five miles of here."
It was certainly news, and entirely unexpected at that. Those people might be in Greenland, for all Archie had known, and indeed he had supposed they were on the other side of the ocean. He listened with interest while Boggs went on to say that they had hired an old plantation house and grounds and were living a strictly secluded life.
The narrator had seen them in one of his drives through the country, and had talked a few minutes with Mr. Fern; but--and he said it with a touch of pique--he had not been invited to visit them, nor had any apology been made for the neglect.
"By George, I thought it rather tough!" he added, "considering the way you and I got him out of that n.i.g.g.e.r"s clutches."