"My father was an excellent teacher," he said, indifferently. "The whole object of his training was self-control. He was really a very wonderful man, my father. But he overlooked one highly important factor in my make-up, my Hynds blood."
I made no reply. I was wondering, perplexedly, how I, I of all people, should have been picked up and enmeshed in the web of these Hyndses and their fate.
"Thank you," said he, gratefully, "for your silence. Most women would have talked, for the good of my soul. Why don"t you talk?"
"Because I have nothing to say."
"You evidently inherited a G.o.d-sent reticence from your British forebears. The British have "illuminating flashes of silence." It is one of their saving graces."
I proved it.
Mr. Jelnik, with a whimsical, sidewise glance, drew nearer.
"Why, instead of sitting at the foot of a pine-tree, which is also a reticent creature, are you not sitting at the feet of our friend The Author, who is perfectly willing to illumine the universe? Very bright man, The Author. How do you like his secretary?"
"Mr. Johnson? Oh, very much indeed! He is charming!"
"I find him so myself. But he is melting wax before the fire of feminine eyes. A man in love is a sorry spectacle!"
"Is he?"
"_Ach_, yes! Consider my cousin Richard Geddes, for instance."
At that I winced, remembering the doctor"s eyes when he had spoken of Alicia and of this man. I looked at Mr. Jelnik now, wonderingly.
If he knew that much, hadn"t he any heart? He stopped short. A wrinkle came between his black brows.
"I am not to speak lightly of my Cousin Richard, I perceive."
"No. Please, please, no!"
"I hadn"t meant to. Richard," said Mr. Jelnik, gravely, "is a good man."
"Oh, yes! Indeed, yes! And--and he has a deep affection for _you_, Mr. Jelnik."
"We Hyndses are the deuce and all for affection. We take it in such deadly earnest that we store up a fine lot of trouble for ourselves." His face darkened.
I had been right, then, in supposing that there was somebody, perhaps half the world away, for whom he cared. _And he didn"t care for Alicia._ I was sure of that.
"Don"t go!" he begged, as I stirred. "Stay with me for a little while: I need you. I am tired, I am bored, I am disgusted with things as they are. There is nothing new under the sun, and all is vanity and vexation of spirit. Also, I am fronting the forks of a dilemma: Shall I shake the dust of Hyndsville from my foot, yield to the _Wanderl.u.s.t_ and go what our worthy friend Judge Gatch.e.l.l calls "tramping," or shall I stay here yet awhile? I can"t make up my mind!"
"Do you want to go?"
"Yes and no. Hold: let"s toss for it and let the fall of the coin decide." He took from his pocket a thin silver foreign coin, and showed it me.
"Heads, I go. Tails, I stay," he said, and tossed it into the air.
It fell beside me, out of his reach. With a swift hand I picked it up.
"Well?" he asked, indifferently.
My hand shut down upon it. There was the sound of wind in my ears, and my heart pounded, and my sight blurred. Then somebody--oh, surely not I!--in a low, clear, modulated voice spoke:
"_You will have to stay, Mr. Jelnik_," said the voice, pleasantly.
"_It is tails._"
And all the while the inside Me, the real Me, was crying accusingly: "Oh, _liar! liar! It is heads!_"
Did he smile? I do not know. He did not look at me for the minute, but stared instead at the gray-blue, shadowed woods, the brown boles of the pines, the bright trickle of water playing it was a real brook.
"Tails it is. I stay," he said presently. And with a swift movement he reached out and lightly patted my hand with the coin in it.
"Well, it"s decided. You have got me for a next-door neighbor for a while longer, Miss Smith. No, don"t go yet."
So I stayed, who would have stayed in the Pit to be near him, or walked out of heaven to follow him, had he called me.
"Do you know," he spoke in a plaintive voice--"that I haven"t had any lunch? I forgot to go home for lunch! Boris, go get me something to eat, old chap!"
Boris hung out a tongue like a flag, looked in his man"s eyes, and vanished, running as only the thoroughbred wolf-hound can run.
"I am so tired! Should you mind if I kept my dog"s place warm at your feet, Miss Smith?" And he stretched his long length on the pine-needles, his hands under his head, his face upturned.
"I wish I had a pillow!" he complained.
I scooped up an armful of the pine-needles, while he watched me lazily, and packed it over and between the roots of the pine-tree.
"You"re a Sister of Charity," said he, gratefully. "But I can"t afford to scratch my neck." And coolly he took a fold of my brown silk skirt, patted it over the straw, and with a sigh of satisfaction rested his head upon it.
"This is very pleasant!" he sighed. Presently: "Your hair looks just as a woman"s hair ought to look, under that brown hat," he said drowsily, "soft and fair. And after this, I shall order some brown-silk cushion-covers. I never knew anything could feel so comfortable and restful!" He closed his eyes.
I sat there, hands locked tightly together, and looked down at his beautiful head, his slim and boyish body; and I felt an aching sense of resentment. No man has any business to be like that, and then come into the life of a woman named Smith.
He did not move, nor did I. We might have been creatures motionless under a spell, in that Enchanted Wood; until from the outside world came Boris, carrying a wicker basket, in which sandwiches, fruit, a small bottle of wine, and a silver drinking-cup had been carefully packed.
"Boris is used to playing courier." His master patted him affectionately. "Come, Miss Smith. By the way, that isn"t your real name, though. Your name is Woman-in-the-Woods. Mine is--"
"Fortunatus."
He raised his brows. "I was about to say "Man-who-is-Hungry,""
he finished, pleasantly. "I once knew an Indian named Tail-feathers-going-over-the-Hill. It taught me the value of being explicit as to one"s name. Here, you shall have the cup, and I"ll drink out of the bottle. Some of these fine days, Woman-in-the-Woods, I shall take you on a jaunt with me and Boris."
"It sounds promising," I admitted, cautiously.
"It is more. You shall learn all the fine points of out-of-door housekeeping.--Drink your wine, Woman-in-the-Woods. You were pale, very pale, when I came upon you. I was afraid something had been troubling you."
"Something troubles everybody."
"Oh, bromidic Miss Smith!--Drink your wine, please. And do not look doubtfully upon that sandwich. My man knows how to build them."
His man did. The sandwich was manna. The wine evidently came from heaven.