"Well, then, come to our house and play a little tomorrow evening,"
she answered from the platform of a street car, and was borne away.
Dennis went to his lonely room, full of self-reproach.
"Does she find Christ"s service so sweet, and do I find it so dull and hard? Does human love alone constrain me, and not the love of Christ?
Truly I am growing weak. Every one says I look ill. I think I am, in body and soul, and am ceasing to be a man; but with G.o.d"s help I will be one--and what is more, a Christian. I thank you, Miss Winthrop; you have helped me more than I have helped you. I will accept your invitation to go out into the world. I will no longer mope, brood, and perish in the damp and shade of my own sick fancies. If I cannot win her, I can at least be a man without her;" and he felt better and stronger than he had done for a long time. The day was breaking again.
In accordance with a custom that was growing with him ever since the memorable evening when Bill Cronk befriended him, he laid the whole matter before his Heavenly Father, as a child tells an earthly parent all his heart. Then he added one simple prayer, "Guide me in all things."
The next day was brighter and better than its forerunners. "For some reason I feel more like myself," he thought. After the excitement and activity of a busy day, he said, "I can conquer this, if I must."
But when he had made his simple toilet, and was on his way to Miss Winthrop"s residence, his heart began to flutter strangely, and he knew the reason. Miss Winthrop welcomed him most cordially, and put him at his ease in a moment, as only a true lady can. Then she turned to receive other guests. He looked around. Christine was not there; and his heart sank like lead. "She will not be here," he sighed. But the guests had not ceased coming, and every new arrival caused a flutter of hopes and fears. He both longed and dreaded to meet her. At last, when he had almost given up seeing her, suddenly she appeared, advancing up the parlor on her father"s arm. Never had she seemed so dazzlingly beautiful. He was just then talking to Mr. Winthrop, and for a few moments that gentleman was perplexed at his incoherent answers and the changes in his face. Having paid their respects to the daughter, Mr.
and Miss Ludolph came toward Mr. Winthrop, and of course Dennis had to meet them. Having greeted them warmly, Mr. Winthrop said, "Of course you do not need an introduction to Mr. Fleet."
Dennis had shrunk a little into the background, and at first they had not noticed him. Mr. Ludolph said, good-naturedly, "Glad to see you, Mr. Fleet, and will be still more glad to hear your fine voice."
But Christine merely bowed as to one with whom her acquaintance was slight, and turned away. At first Dennis had blushed, and his heart had fluttered like a young girl"s; but, as she turned so coolly away, his native pride and obstinacy were aroused.
"She shall speak to me and do me justice," he muttered. "She must understand that I spoke unconsciously on that miserable morning, and am not to be blamed. As I am a man, I will speak boldly and secure recognition." But as the little company mingled and conversed before the music commenced, no opportunity offered. He determined to show her, however, that he was no country boor, and with skill and taste made himself agreeable.
Christine furtively watched him. She was surprised to see him, as the idea of meeting him in society as an equal had scarcely been suggested before. But when she saw that he greeted one after another with grace and ease, and that all seemed to enjoy his conversation, so that a little knot of Miss Winthrop"s most intelligent guests were about him at last, she felt that it would be no great condescension on her part to be a little more affable. In her heart, though, she had not forgiven the unconscious words that had smitten to the ground her ambitious hopes.
Then again, his appearance deeply interested her. A suppressed excitement and power, seen in the glow and fire of his dark eyes, and felt in his tones, stirred her languid pulses.
"He is no vapid society-man," she said to herself; and her artist eye was gratified by the changes in his n.o.ble face.
"Look at Fleet," whispered her father; "could you believe he was sweeping the store the other day? Well, if we don"t find out his worth and get what we can from him, the world will. We ought to have had him up to sing before this, but I have been so busy since your illness that it slipped my mind."
Miss Winthrop now led Christine to the piano, and she played a cla.s.sical piece of music in faultless taste. Then followed duets, solos, quartets, choruses, and instrumental pieces, for nearly all present were musical amateurs. Under the inspiration of this soul-stirring art, coldness and formality melted away, and with jest and brilliant repartee, alternating with song, there gathered around Miss Winthrop"s piano such a group as could never grace the parlors of Miss Brown. Sometimes they would carry a new and difficult piece triumphantly through; again they would break down, with much laughter and good-natured rallying.
Dennis, as a stranger, held back at first; but those who remembered his singing at the tableau party were clamorous to hear him again, and they tested and tried his voice during the evening in many and varied ways. But he held his own, and won greener laurels than ever. He did his very best, for he was before one whom he would rather please than all the world; moreover, her presence seemed to inspire him to do better than when alone. Christine, like the others, could not help listening with delight to his rich, clear tenor, and Mr. Ludolph was undisguised in his admiration.
"I declare, Mr. Fleet, I have been depriving myself of a good deal of pleasure. I meant to have you up to sing with us before, but we have been under such a press of business of late! But the first evening I am disengaged you must surely come."
Christine had noticed how quietly and almost indifferently Dennis had taken the many compliments showered on him before, but now, when her father spoke, his face flushed, and a sudden light came into his eyes.
Dennis had thought, "I can then see and speak to her." Every now and then she caught his eager, questioning, and almost appealing glance, but he made no advances. "He thinks I am angry because of his keen criticism of my picture. For the sake of my own pride, I must not let him think that I care so much about his opinion;" and Christine resolved to let some of the ice thaw that had formed between them. Moreover, in spite of herself, when she was thrown into his society, he greatly interested her. He seemed to have just what she had not. He could meet her on her own ground in matters of taste, and then, in contrast with her cold, negative life, he was so earnest and positive. "Perhaps papa spoke for us both," she thought, "and I have been depriving myself of a pleasure also, for he certainly interests while most men only weary me."
Between ten and eleven supper was announced; not the prodigal abundance under which the brewer"s table had groaned, but a dainty, elegant little affair, which inspired and promoted social feeling, though the "spirit of wine" was absent. The eye was feasted as truly as the palate.
Christine had stood near Dennis as the last piece was sung, and he turned and said in a low, eager tone, "May I have the pleasure of waiting on you at supper?"
She hesitated, but his look was so wistful that she could not well refuse, so with a slight smile she bowed a.s.sent, and placed the tips of her little gloved hand on his arm, which so trembled that she looked inquiringly and curiously into his face. It was very pale, as was ever the case when he felt deeply. He waited on her politely but silently at first. She sat in an angle, somewhat apart from the others. As he stood by her side, thinking how to refer to the morning in the show-room, she said: "Mr. Fleet, you are not eating anything, and you look as if you had been living on air of late--very unlike your appearance when you so efficiently aided me in the rearrangement of the store. I am delighted that you keep up the better order of things."
Dennis"s answer was quite irrelevant.
"Miss Ludolph," he said, abruptly, "I saw that I gave you pain that morning in the show-room. If you only knew how the thought has pained me!"
Christine flushed almost angrily, but said, coldly, "Mr. Fleet, that is a matter you can never understand, therefore we had better dismiss the subject."
But Dennis had determined to break the ice between them at any risk, so he said, firmly but respectfully: "Miss Ludolph, I did understand all, the moment I saw your face that day. I do understand how you have felt since, better than you imagine."
His manner and words were so a.s.sured that she raised a startled face to his, but asked coldly and in an indifferent manner, "What can you know of my feelings?"
"I know," said Dennis, in a low tone, looking searchingly into her face, from which cool composure was fast fading--"I know your dearest hope was to be among the first in art. You staked that hope on your success in a painting that required a power which you do not possess."
Christine became very pale, but from her eyes shone a light before which most men would have quailed. But Dennis"s love was so true and strong that he could wound her for the sake of the healing and life he hoped to bring, and he continued--"On that morning this cherished hope for the future failed you, not because of my words, but because your artist eye saw that my words were true. You have since been unhappy--"
"What right have _you_--you who were but a few days since--who are a stranger--what right have you to speak thus to me?"
"I know what you would say, Miss Ludolph," he answered, a slight flush coming into his pale face. "Friends may be humble and yet true. But am I not right?"
"I have no claim on your friendship," said Christine, coldly. "But, for the sake of argument, grant that you are right, what follows?" and she looked at him more eagerly than she knew. She felt that he had read her very soul and was deeply moved, and again the superst.i.tious feeling crept over her, "That young man is in some way connected with my destiny."
Dennis saw his power and proceeded rapidly, for he knew they might be interrupted at any moment; and so they would have been had anything less interesting than eating occupied the attention of others.
"I saw in the picture what in your eyes and mine would be a fatal defect--the lack of life and true feeling--the lack of power to live.
I did not know who painted it, but felt that any one who could paint as well as that, and yet leave out the soul, as it were, had not the power to put it in. No artist of such ability could willingly or ignorantly have permitted such a defect."
Christine"s eyes sank, their fire faded out, and her face had the pallor of one listening to her doom. This deeper feeling mastered the momentary resentment against the hand that was wounding her, and she forgot him, and all, in her pain and despair.
In a low, earnest tone Dennis continued: "But since I have come to know who the artist is, since I have studied the picture more fully, and have taken the liberty of some observation"--Christine hung on his lips breathlessly, and Dennis spoke slowly, marking the effect of every word--"I have come to the decided belief that the lady who painted that picture can reach the sphere of true and highest art."
The light that stole into Christine"s face under his slow, emphatic words was like a rosy dawn in June; and the thought flashed through Dennis"s mind, "If an earthly hope can so light up her face, what will be the effect of a heavenly one?"
For a moment she sat as one entranced, looking at a picture far off in the future. His words had been so earnest and a.s.sured that they seemed reality. Suddenly she turned on him a look as grateful and happy as the former one had been full of pain and anger, and said: "Ah, do not deceive me, do not flatter. You cannot know the sweetness and power of the hope you are inspiring. To be disappointed again would be death.
If you are trifling with me I will never forgive you," she added, in sudden harshness, her brow darkening.
"Nor should I deserve to be forgiven if I deceived you in a matter that to you is so sacred."
"But how--how am I to gain this magic power to make faces feel and live on canvas?"
"You must believe. You yourself must feel."
She looked at him with darkening face, and then in a sudden burst of pa.s.sion said: "I don"t believe; I can"t feel. All this is mockery, after all."
"No!" said Dennis, in the deep, a.s.sured tone that ever calms and secures attention. "This is not mockery. I speak the words of truth and soberness. You do not believe, but that is not the same as cannot. And permit me to contradict you when I say you _do_ feel. On this subject so near your heart you feel most deeply--feel as I never knew any one feel before. This proves you capable of feeling on other and higher subjects, and what you feel your trained and skilful hand can portray. You felt on the evening of that miserable day, and sang as I never heard you sing before. Your tones then would move any heart, and my tears fell with the rain in sympathy: I could not help it."
Her bosom rose and fell tumultuously, and her breath came hard and quick.
"Oh, if I could believe you were right!"
"I know I am right," he said, so decidedly that again hope grew rosy and beautiful in her face.
"Then again," he continued, eagerly, "see what an advantage you have over the most of us. Your power of imitation is wonderful. _You can copy anything you see._"
"Good-evening, Miss Ludolph. Where have you been hiding? I have twice made the tour of the supper-room in my search," broke in the voluble Mr. Mellen. Then he gave Dennis a cool stare, who acted as if unconscious of his presence. An expression of disgust flitted across Christine"s face at the interruption, or the person--perhaps both--and she was about to shake him off that Dennis might speak further, when Miss Winthrop and others came up, and there was a general movement back to the parlors.
"Why, Christine, what is the matter?" asked her friend. "You look as if you had a fever. What has Mr. Fleet been saying?"
"Oh, we have had an argument on my hobby, art, and of course don"t agree, and so got excited in debate."
Miss Winthrop glanced keenly at them and said, "I would like to have heard it, for it was Greek meeting Greek."