"Your mother."
The Colonel pushed back his plate and went to the window. Beyond the mountains, somewhere in "G.o.d"s acre," was the little sunken grave still enfolding a handful of sacred dust. With a sudden throb of pain, Allison realised, for the first time in his life, that his father was an old man. The fine, strong face, outlined clearly by the pitiless afternoon sun, was deeply lined: the broad shoulders were stooped a little, and the serene eyes dimmed as though by mist. In the moment he seemed to have crossed the dividing line between maturity and age.
Allison was about to suggest that they take a walk after luncheon, having Madame Bernard"s household in mind as the ultimate object, but, before he could speak, the Colonel had turned away from the window.
"Some day you"ll marry, lad," he said, in a strange tone.
Allison smiled and shrugged his shoulders doubtfully.
"And then," the Colonel continued, with a little catch in his voice, "the house will be none too large for two--for you two."
Very rarely, and for a moment only, Allison looked like his mother. For an instant she lived again in her son"s eyes, then vanished.
"Dad," he said, gently, "I"m sure you wouldn"t desert me even if I did marry. You"ve stood by me too long."
The stooped shoulders straightened and the Colonel smiled. "Do you mean that--if you married, you"d still--want me?"
"Most a.s.suredly."
"She wouldn"t."
"If she didn"t," returned Allison, lightly, "she wouldn"t get me. Not that I"m any prize to be wrangled over by the fair s.e.x, individually or collectively, but you and I stand together, Dad, and don"t you forget it."
The Colonel cleared his throat, tried to speak, then stopped abruptly.
"I have been thinking," he continued, with a swift change of mood and subject, "that we might manage a dinner party. We"re much indebted to Madame Bernard."
"Good idea! I don"t know what sort of party it would prove to be, but, if we did our best, it would be all right with them. Anyhow, Aunt Francesca would give an air to it."
"So would the others, Miss Rose especially."
"I wonder why Aunt Francesca didn"t marry again," mused Allison.
"Because her heart is deep enough to hold a grave."
"You knew her husband, didn"t you?"
"He was my best friend," answered the Colonel, a little sadly. "How the years separate and destroy, and blot out the things that count for the most!"
"I wonder how she happened to be named "Francesca." It isn"t an American name."
"She wasn"t. Her name was "Mary Frances," and he changed it to "Marie Francesca." So she has been "Marie Francesca" ever since, though she never uses the "Marie." That was his name for her."
"The change suits her someway. Queer idea she has about names fitting people, and yet it isn"t so queer, either, when you come to think of it.
Rose might have been named Abigail or Jerusha, yet I believe people would have found out she was like a rose and called her by her proper name."
Colonel Kent flashed a quick glance at him, but the expression of his face had not changed. "And Isabel?" he queried, lightly.
"Isabel"s only a kid and it doesn"t matter so much whether things fit her or not. I"ve promised to take her to the theatre," he continued, irrelevantly, "because Aunt Francesca wants her guest to be amused. I"m also commissioned to find some youths about twenty and trot "em round for Isabel"s inspection. Do you know of anybody?"
"I"ve seen only one who might do. There"s a lanky boy with unruly hair and an expansive smile whom I"ve seen at the post-office a time or two.
He usually has a girl with him, but she may be his sister. They look astonishingly alike."
"Bet it"s the Crosby twins. I"d like to see the little devils, if they"ve grown up."
"They"re grown up, whoever they are. The boy is almost as tall as I am and his sister doesn"t lack much of it."
"I must hunt "em up. They"ve already called on Isabel, and perhaps, when she returns the call, she"ll take me along."
"Who brought them up?" asked the Colonel idly.
"They"ve brought themselves up, for the last five or six years, and I"m of the opinion that they"ve always done it."
"Let"s invite them to the dinner party."
Allison"s eyes danced at the suggestion. "All right, but we"ll have to see "em first. They may not want to come."
"I"ve often wondered," mused the Colonel, "why it is so much more pleasant to entertain than it is to be entertained. I"d rather have a guest any day than to be one."
"And yet," returned Allison, "if you are a guest, you can get away any time you want to, within reasonable limits. If you"re entertaining, you"ve got to keep it going until they all want to go."
"In that case, it might be better for us if we went to Crosbys"."
"We can do that, too. I think it would be fun, though, to have "em here.
We need another man in one sense, though not in another."
"I have frequently had occasion to observe," remarked the Colonel, "that many promising dinners are wholly spoiled by the idea that there must be an equal number of men and women. One uncongenial guest can ruin a dinner more easily than a poor salad--and that is saying a great deal."
"Your salad days aren"t over yet, evidently."
"I hope not."
The hour of talk had done the Colonel a great deal of good, and he was quite himself again. Some new magazines had come in the afternoon mail and lay on the library table. He fingered the paper knife absently as he tore off the outer wrappings and threw them into the fire.
"I believe I"ll go up and work for a couple of hours," said Allison, "and then we"ll go out for a walk."
"All right, lad. I"ll be ready."
Even after the strains of the violin sounded faintly from upstairs, accompanied by a rhythmic tread as Allison walked to and fro, Colonel Kent did not begin to cut the leaves.
Instead, he sat gazing into the fire, thinking. Quite unconsciously, for years, he had been carrying a heavy burden--the fear that Allison would marry and that his marriage would bring separation. Now he was greatly rea.s.sured. "And yet," he thought, "there"s no telling what a woman may do."
The sense that his work was done still haunted him, and, resolutely, he tried to push it aside. "While there"s life, there"s work," he said to himself. He knew, however, as he had not known before, that Allison was past the need of his father, except for companionship.
The old house seemed familiar, yet as though it belonged to another life. He remembered the building of it, when, with a girl"s golden head upon his shoulder, they had studied plans together far into the night.
As though it were yesterday, their delight at the real beginning came back. There was another radiant hour, when the rough flooring for the first story was laid, and, with bare scantlings reared, skeleton-like, all around them, they actually went into their own house.
One by one, through the vanished years, he sought out the links that bound him to the past. The day the bride came home from the honeymoon, and knelt, with him, upon the hearth-stone, to light their first fire together; the day she came to him, smiling, to whisper to him the secret that lay beneath her heart; the long waiting, half fearful and half sweet, then the hours of terror that made an eternity of a night, then the dawn, that brought the ultimate, unbroken peace which only G.o.d can change.
Over there, in front of the fireplace in the library, the little mother had lain in her last sleep. The heavy scent of tuberoses, the rumble of wheels, the slow sound of many feet, and the tiny, wailing cry that followed them when he and she went out of their house together for the last time--it all came back, but, mercifully, without pain.