第76章

There came moments when I grew slightly alarmed,as,for instance,one Sunday in the early spring when I was dining at the Ezra Hutchins's house and surprised Mrs.Hutchins's glance on me,suspecting her of seeking to divine what manner of man I was.I became self-conscious;I dared not look at Maude,who sat across the table;thereafter I began to feel that the Hutchins connection regarded me as a suitor.I had grown intimate with George and his wife,who did not refrain from sly allusions;and George himself once remarked,with characteristic tact,that I was most conscientious in my attention to the traction affair;I have reason to believe they were even less delicate with Maude.This was the logical time to withdraw--but I dallied.The experience was becoming more engrossing,--if I may so describe it,--and spring was approaching.The stars in their courses were conspiring.I was by no means as yet a self-acknowledged wooer,and we discussed love in its lighter phases through the medium of literature.Heaven forgive me for calling it so!About that period,it will be remembered,a mushroom growth of volumes of a certain kind sprang into existence;little books with "artistic"bindings and wide margins,sweetened essays,some of them written in beautiful English by dilettante authors for drawing-room consumption;and collections of short stories,no doubt chiefly bought by philanderers like myself,who were thus enabled to skate on thin ice over deep water.

It was a most delightful relationship that these helped to support,and Ifondly believed I could reach shore again whenever I chose.

There came a Sunday in early May,one of those days when the feminine assumes a large importance.I had been to the Hutchinses'church;and Maude,as she sat and prayed decorously in the pew beside me,suddenly increased in attractiveness and desirability.Her voice was very sweet,and I felt a delicious and languorous thrill which I identified not only with love,but also with a reviving spirituality.How often the two seem to go hand in hand!

She wore a dress of a filmy material,mauve,with a design in gold thread running through it.Of late,it seemed,she had had more new dresses:

and their modes seemed more cosmopolitan;at least to the masculine eye.

How delicately her hair grew,in little,shining wisps,around her white neck!I could have reached out my hand and touched her.And it was this desire,--although by no means overwhelming,--that startled me.Did Ireally want her?The consideration of this vital question occupied the whole time of the sermon;made me distrait at dinner,--a large family gathering.Later I found myself alone with heron a bench in the Hutchinses'garden where we had walked the day of my arrival,during the campaign.

The gardens were very different,now.The trees had burst forth again into leaf,the spiraea bushes seemed weighted down with snow,and with a note like that of the quivering bass string of a 'cello the bees hummed among the fruit blossoms.And there beside me in her filmy dress was Maude,a part of it all--the meaning of all that set my being clamouring.

She was like some ripened,delicious flower ready to be picked....One of those pernicious,make-believe volumes had fallen on the bench between us,for I could not read any more;I could not think;I touched her hand,and when she drew it gently away I glanced at her.Reason made a valiant but hopeless effort to assert itself.Was I sure that I wanted her--for life?No use!I wanted her now,no matter what price that future might demand.An awkward silence fell between us--awkward to me,at least--and I,her guide and mentor,became banal,apologetic,confused.I made some idiotic remark about being together in the Garden of Eden.

"I remember Mr.Doddridge saying in Bible class that it was supposed to be on the Euphrates,"she replied."But it's been destroyed by the flood.""Let's make another--one of our own,"I suggested.

"Why,how silly you are this afternoon."

"What's to prevent us--Maude?"I demanded,with a dry throat.

"Nonsense!"she laughed.In proportion as I lost poise she seemed to gain it.

"It's not nonsense,"I faltered."If we were married."At last the fateful words were pronounced--irrevocably.And,instead of qualms,I felt nothing but relief,joy that I had been swept along by the flood of feeling.She did not look at me,but gazed straight ahead of her.

"If I love you,Maude?"I stammered,after a moment.

"But I don't love you,"she replied,steadily.

Never in my life had I been so utterly taken aback.

"Do you mean,"I managed to say,"that after all these months you don't like me a little?""`Liking'isn't loving."She looked me full in the face."I like you very much.""But--"there I stopped,paralyzed by what appeared to me the quintessence of feminine inconsistency and caprice.Yet,as I stared at her,she certainly did not appear capricious.It is not too much to say that I was fairly astounded at this evidence of self-command and decision,of the strength of mind to refuse me.Was it possible that she had felt nothing and I all?I got to my feet.

"I hate to hurt your feelings,"I heard her say."I'm very sorry."...

She looked up at me.Afterwards,when reflecting on the scene,I seemed to remember that there were tears in her eyes.I was not in a condition to appreciate her splendid sincerity.I was overwhelmed and inarticulate.I left her there,on the bench,and went back to George's,announcing my intention of taking the five o'clock train....