Electra stood taller and straighter.
"At least," she said, "the young woman is here, and we have got to do our best about it."
"The young woman! Don"t talk as if she were a kitchen wench. What"s the use, Electra! What"s the sense in being so irreproachable? Come off your stilts while we"re alone together."
"But, grandmother," said Electra, with an accession of firmness, and leaving irrelevant strictures to be considered in the silence of her room, "I shall neither acknowledge her nor shall I invite her here."
"You won"t acknowledge her?"
"Not until she brings me proof."
"You won"t ask for it?"
"I shan"t ask for it. It is for her to act, not for me."
"And you won"t have her here? Then, by George, Electra, I will!"
Electra raised her eyebrows by the slightest possible s.p.a.ce. It was involuntary, but the old lady saw it.
"You"re quite right," she said ironically, "the house isn"t mine."
"The house is yours to do exactly as you please with it," said Electra, with an instant justice instinct even with a dutiful warmth. "Any guest you invite is welcome. Only, grandmother, I must beg of you not to invite this particular person."
"Person! Electra, you make me mad. Be human; come, unbend a little. Take the poker out of your training. Do the decent thing, and ask her here, and then find out about her, and if she"s a baggage, turn her out, neck and crop."
"I must refuse, grandmother," said Electra. "Now aren"t you getting tired? I will bring your food."
Madam Fulton spoke with deliberate unction:--
"Perdition take my food!"
IX
Rose came down out of her chamber after supper on a warm still evening.
She had stayed in retirement nearly all day. Grandmother had been suffering discomfort from the heat and was better alone. Peter had gone to town, and he had not come back. The girl stopped in the doorway of the silent house and looked out into the night. It was all moonlight, all mysterious shadows and enchanting stillnesses. The glamour of the hour lay over it like a veil, and her heart responded to the calling from mysterious distances, voices that were those of life itself springing within her and echoing back from that delusive world. She stood there smiling a little, trying to keep the wholesome bitterness of her mood, because she thought she knew what a deceiving jade fortune is, and yet with her young heart pathetically craving life and the fullness of it. Rose thought she had quite fathomed the worth of things. She knew the bravest shows are made by the trickiest design, and she had sworn, in desperate defense of herself, to "take the world but as the world,"--a gaming-ground for base pa.s.sions and self-love. But to-night all the instincts of youth in her were innocently vocal. Here was the beautiful earth, again fecund and full of gifts. She could not help believing in it. She gathered her skirts about her, and stepped out into the dew, and with no avowed purpose, but, straight as inevitable intent could lead her, crossed the orchard and went down across the field to Osmond. She had selected that way, in her unconscious mind, when grandmother had that morning sent her into the attic to look at some precious heirlooms in disuse. Looking out of the attic window she had noted his little shack and fields of growing things, and some impatience then had said to her, That would be the way to get to him. Before the last wall, she came out on a low rise where there was a spreading tree.
It was an oak tree, and though there seemed to be no wind that night, the leaves rustled thinly.
"Where are you going?" It was Osmond"s voice out of the shadow near the wall.
Rose answered at once,--
"I was going down to see you."
"I thought you would come."
He was sitting there, his back against the wall, and at once she sank down opposite him on a stone that made her a prim little seat. The shadow lay upon her in flecks, but the outline of her white dress was visible to him.
"Did you call me?" she asked. There was no trace of her unrest of the moments before, either in her manner or in her own happy consciousness.
She felt instead a delicious ease and security that needed no explaining even to herself.
Osmond answered as if he were deliberating.
"I don"t know whether I called you. I hope I didn"t. I was thinking about you, of course."
"Why do you hope you didn"t?"
"Because I haven"t any right to."
"Doesn"t my coming prove you had a right to? You see you did call me, and I came."
After a moment he answered irrelevantly,--
"I"m a cowardly sort of chap. When I feel like calling you, I choke it down. I don"t want to get the habit of you."
"Why not?"
"One reason--it will be so difficult when you go away."
A sense of freedom and happiness possessed her. Words rose tumultuously to her lips, to be choked there. She wanted to say unreasonably, "I shall never go away. How could you think it?" But instead she asked, with a happy indirection, "Where am I going?"
He, too, answered lightly,--
"How should I know? Back into your cloud, I guess--dear G.o.ddess." The last words were very low, and to himself, but she heard them. Instantly and against all reason, she, who had never meant to be happy again, laughed ecstatically.
"Think," she said, "a month ago I didn"t know you were in the world."
"Oh, yes, you did. Peter told you he had a kind of a brother, that worked on the farm. But I didn"t know you were in the world."
"Of course," she deliberated softly, "I knew Peter had a brother. But I didn"t know it was you."
The moonlit air was as beguiling to him as it was to her. Everything was different and everything was possible. He put his hand to his head and tried to recall old prudences. In vain. The still, bright world told him, with a voice so quiet that it was like a hand upon his heart, that it was the only world. The daylight one of doubts and dull expediency had been arranged by man. This was the home of the spirit. For a moment he felt himself drowning in that sea of life. Then, perhaps lifted by his striving will, he seemed to come out again to the free air that had touched him at her coming. Again he was at peace and incredibly exalted.
He tried to bring lightness into their talk.
"I suppose," said he, "you are one of the charmers."
"What do you mean by charmers?"
"Don"t ask me what I mean, when you know. If you do that, we shall forget our language."
"What do you mean by our language?"
"Yours and mine. Don"t you hear it going on, question and answer, question and answer, all the time our tongues are talking? Those are the things we never can speak out loud."
"Yes, I hear them. But I couldn"t tell what I hear."