"Always," he said, bending nearer to see her expression. Which having seen, he perhaps forgot to note in his little booklet, for he continued to look at her.
"I haven"t very much to say," she said. "Only--to learn any art or trade or profession it is necessary to work at it unremittingly. But to discuss it never helped anybody."
"My dear child," he said, "I know that what you say was the old idea.
But," he shrugged, "I do not agree with it."
"I am so sorry," she said.
"Sorry? Why are you sorry?"
"I don"t know.... Perhaps because I like you."
It was not very much to say--not a very significant declaration; but the simplicity and sweetness of it--her voice--the head bent a little in the starlight--all fixed Brown"s attention. He sat very still there in the luminous dusk of the white veranda; the dew dripped steadily like rain; the lagoon glittered.
Then, subtly, taking Brown unawares, his most treacherous enemy crept upon him with a stealth incredible, and, before Brown knew it, was in full possession of his brain. The enemy was Imagination.
Minute after minute slipped away in the scented dusk, and found Brown"s position unchanged, where he lay in his chair looking at her.
The girl also was very silent.
With what wonderful attributes his enemy, Imagination, was busily endowing the girl beside him in the starlight, there is no knowing. His muse was Thalomene, slim daughter of Zeus; and whether she was really still on Olympus or here beside him he scarcely knew, so perfectly did this young girl inspire him, so exquisitely did she fill the bill.
"It is odd," he said, after a long while, "that merely a few hours with you should inspire me more than I have ever been inspired in all my life."
"That," she said unsteadily, "is your imagination."
At the hateful word, imagination, Brown seemed to awake from the spell.
Then he sat up straight, rather abruptly.
"The thing to do," he said, still confused by his awakening, "is to consider you impersonally and make notes of everything." And he fumbled for pencil and note-book, and, rising, stepped across to the front door, where a light was burning.
Standing under it he resolutely composed his thoughts; but to save his life he could remember nothing of which to make a memorandum.
This worried him, and finally alarmed him. And so long did he stand there, note-book open, pencil poised, and a sickly expression of dismay imprinted upon his otherwise agreeable features, that the girl rose at last from her chair, glanced in through the door at him, and then came forward.
"What is the matter?" she asked.
"The matter is," said Brown, "that I don"t seem to have anything to write about."
"You are tired," she said. "I think we both are a little tired."
"_I_ am not. Anyway, I have something to write about now. Wait a moment till I make a note of how you walk--the easy, graceful, flowing motion, so exquisitely light and----"
"But _I_ don"t walk like that!" she said, laughing.
"--Graciously as a youthful G.o.ddess," muttered Brown, scribbling away busily in his note-book. "Tell me; what motive had you just now in rising and coming to ask me what was the matter--with such a sweetly apprehensive expression in your eyes?"
"My--my motive?" she repeated, astonished.
"Yes. You had one, hadn"t you?"
"Why--I don"t know. You looked worried; so I came."
"The motive," said Brown, "was feminine solicitude--an emotion natural to nice women. Thank you." And he made a note of it.
"But motives and emotions are different things," she said timidly. "I had no motive for coming to ask you why you seemed troubled."
"Wasn"t your motive to learn why?"
"Y-yes, I suppose so."
He laid his head on one side and inspected her critically.
"And if anything had been amiss with me you would have been sorry, wouldn"t you?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Why? Because--one is sorry when a friend--when anyone----"
"I _am_ your friend," he said. "So why not say it?"
"And I am yours--if you wish," she said.
"Yes, I do." He began to write: "It"s rather odd how friendship begins.
We both seem to want to be friends." And to her he said: "How does it make you feel--the idea of our being friends? What emotions does it arouse in you?"
She looked at him in sorrowful surprise. "I thought it was real friendship you meant," she murmured, "not the sort to make a note about."
"But I"ve got to make notes of everything. Don"t you see? Certainly our friendship is real enough--but I"ve got to study it minutely and make notes concerning it. It"s necessary to make records of everything--how you walk, stand, speak, look, how you go upstairs----"
"I am going now," she said.
He followed, scribbling furiously; and it is difficult to go upstairs, watch a lady go upstairs, and write about the way she does it all at the same time.
"Good-night," she said, opening her door.
"Good-night," he said, absently, and so intent on his scribbling that he followed her through the door into her room.
XVI
"She goes upstairs as though she were floating up," he wrote, with enthusiasm; "her lovely figure, poised on tip-toe, seems to soar upward, ascending as naturally and gracefully as the immortals ascended the golden stairs of Jacob----"