An Echo of Passion

IV.

AFTER dinner, when they went into the small, unripe-looking parlor, where Anice by her mere presence placed the farmer’s plain belongings in an attitude of apology, Mr. Evans began telling how he happened to come to Tanford. “ You would suppose that, coming from so far inland, we would go to the sea-coast. But I don’t like the sea, — the perpetual smell of sea-weed and old fish, which people say is so exhilarating. We 've been to the Lake, and Wine Islands, and St. Lawrence, and the Delaware Water Gap, and other places ” —

“ And even tried staying at home,” smiled Mrs. Eulow.

“And we’re tired of ’em all,” he continued. “Now, my father was a farmer in this place for a while, when he was a young man, and it suddenly struck me I’d come here.”

“Is this the very same farm ? ” asked Ethel.

“ Oh, dear, I don’t know! ” exclaimed Mr. Evans, his old habit of appearing to be immersed in details reasserting itself. “ I Ve inquired around, but can’t find out anything. No one has even taken the trouble to remember his existence. I shall look the tiling up at the registry of deeds in Worcester, if I ever get time. But the fact is, my father did n’t stay here long ; and that’s where he showed his sense. It’s a fine place for the summer; beautiful scenery, of course ; but the farming ! ” Here he screwed up his sagacious eyes significantly, tumbled his restless hair about with his hands a little more, and abandoned the attempt to express the desperateness of the situation ; but he rehabilitated and paraded an old joke about raising crops of mortgages, which amused Ethel.

The gentlemen presently removed to the porch in order to smoke, the ladies staying within for a while. “ I 've persuaded our farmer to bring up my horse Star,” said Mrs. Eulow, “and then we ’ll go out and look at him. I hope you’ll ride him, sometimes.”

“ I shall not dare to. I never rode much,” said the young matron; and they settled themselves for a brief feminine chat. Ethel was on her guard against allowing it to be seen that her husband had not imparted to her all his memories of the widow ; but Mrs. Eulow soon drew from her the main facts of her own history, learned how arduous Fenn’s struggle for existence had been, and was even yet; then sounded her as to her tastes and talked with her about her favorite authors, who proved to be Tennyson, Dickens, and Whittier. “ You see, I have my piano here,” said she. “ The room is hardly large enough, hut — Oh, by the way, will you play for us ? ”

Again Mrs. Ethel’s answer was negative. She shook her head, almost like a mortified school-girl. “ I used to play a very little before I was married,” said she; “but only for myself — and for Mr. Fenn, of course. But I don't practice.” She would not confess that they had not a piano at home.

The bay came up at this juncture, and was duly admired. Ethel even became enthusiastic, and secretly thought she would try riding again. Going out to the porch for a better view of Star, they found Mr. Evans and Fenn in the midst of a debate so weighty and earnest that Ethel thought they must be discussing some great political movement.

“ You must make changes here, sir ; you must make them. I tell you, it’s a great reform ! ” Mr. Evans was saying with energy.

“ Our people are conservative in Massachusetts,” Fenn interposed.

“ Politics ? ” queried Ethel.

“ No,” said Mr. Evans, like a man who has interests on his hands too grave to allow of much interruption from women. “ It’s beet sugar.”

“ I knew it must be,” laughed his daughter.

“ Mr. Evans,” explained the chemist, with the air of a neutral placed on the defensive, “ maintains that the farmers in this State ought to take up the culture of sugar beets on a large scale.”

“ Giving twenty-five to forty tons to the acre,” said the old gentleman warmly, “ at six dollars a ton from the manufacturer ; after which ” —

“ But I have told you that the Department of Agriculture has found out, by chemical test, that both Indian corn and amber cane yield a larger percentage of sugar than beets do,” the other objected.

The lawyer continued to talk about “ refuse pulp,” and two crops in a season, but was gradually led away from his theme by a diversion to small fruits and gem tomatoes.

There was a moment of silence, and Ethel turned to Mrs. Eulow. “ Won't you sing me something ? ” she asked. “ I want so much to hear you, after what my husband has said.” She spoke in so low a tone that the two men could not hear.

Anice looked at her in an odd, semiindulgent way, apparently about to comply ; the young wife’s manner was so confiding, so gentle. Suddenly, however, her glance passed on to Fenn, who was still soothing the disputant with raspberries, and particularly the raising of Pride of the Hudson on warm, moist soils; and she changed her mind. “Not now, Mrs. Fenn,” she said; “wait till another time; I'm not in the right mood. Besides, we 're going to take you to drive, soon.”

Did she refuse because it was not Fenn who had asked her? Possibly. She was usually very complaisant and ready to exercise her voice ; and either his indifference at the moment affected her, or else a whim to please herself with reserving for the present, intact, the charm which had first won her the admiration of Ethel’s husband. It was significant, too, that Fenn, who in a moment or two more had exhausted temporarily the soil for small fruits, did not think of asking to hear her. He had always been eager to do so hitherto when he imagined himself to have no deeper interest. Mrs. Eulow observed it, and a quick intuition told her that his unconscious indifference to her voice now might mean that another kind of interest had sprung up, or revived, within him. It took only a moment for these little impulses and perceptions to pass through her mind ; instinct and passion, like light, travel with incalculable swiftness. The cigars were finished, and the group returned to the parlor, where Anice quietly sat down at the piano, and began stealing from the instrument minor chords of a Song Without Words, in which many black keys were involved. Ethel, who had followed with a disappointed air, thought that her wish was to be gratified, after all. But Anice noticed that Fenn was abstractedly glancing over some books on the table, and she continued to weave the voiceless harmony in a subdued volume, with light and remote touches.

“ Ah,” remarked the young man, all at once, “ I see you are looking into chemistry yourself, Mr. Evans.” He held up a scientific journal, which he had found.

“ Oh, no. Those are of my daughter’s collection.”

Anice stopped playing, and looked around. “ You see,” she said rather archly, “ I knew what you meant by an aniline dye. Twelve parts carbon, seven of hydrogen, and one of nitrogen ! ”

Fenn was evidently pleased, " So you really have been studying it ? ”

“Not studying; only reading,” the widow said, apologetically.

He turned over three or four other pamphlets and books, and came upon one thin report on a special subject, hearing his own name ; at which he uttered a cry of surprise and satisfaction. Ethel went hastily to see what it was. “ Where did you ever pick this up ? ” he inquired.

“ Oh,” said Anice, carelessly, “ I found out accidentally that you had written it, and sent for a copy.” She did not tell him that her whole interest in the science had sprung up from the knowledge that he pursued it; and perhaps, under the circumstances, silence on this point was the better honesty ; but the chemist, without egotism, instantly suspected the truth.

“I shall take a new interest in what I write now,” he said, in a tone of quiet enjoyment, but without raising his glance to her. “ You must have found it pretty dry, though,” he added, with a significant look at his wife.

“You mustn’t ask me too much,” said the widow, as if inclined to snub him a little.

Ethel laughed in great glee. “You did n’t get your compliment, Ben, did you ? Served him right,” she confided to Mr. Evans, who had somehow pleased her from the beginning, and given her an agreeable sense of sympathy.

“It’s compliment enough that she should have read it at all,” retorted Fenn, somewhat nettled.

Anice rose from the piano with a vague air of triumph about her, which no one especially noticed. “ I hear the carry-all coming,” she announced to them.

“ And I have an idea ! ” said Mr. Evans, starting up with unusual energy. “It is n’t very hot to-day, and a short walk would n’t do me any harm, after dinner. I propose that we go and try Mr. Fenn’s echo.”

“ Capital ! ” cried the widow, becoming almost the young girl again, in her vivacity. “ You mean we will walk over ? And how shall we try it ? Some one must start the echoing from here, you know.”

“ Oh, we ’ll have the farm horn tooted,” said her father. “ How will that do, Mrs. Fenn ? ”

“ I would rather hear Mrs. Eulow sing,” Ethel said, timidly.

“ You shall, then,” declared the old gentleman, firmly, as if he had taken her under special protection, and was going to make her a sort of pet.

Fenn did not altogether like the notion of Anice’s singing for the experiment. He was as much averse to it as if he had had a peculiar ownership in her melodious capability. It struck him that she herself did n’t like the idea; hut, after a brief hesitation, she assented, with convincing readiness.

Accordingly, the remaining three set out across the fields. The modest and unstylish carry-all, suited to the hilly roads, was to meet them at a point below the oak, near the foot of the hill, whither Fenn was confident they could go by the birch-path. The signal of their arrival at the echo ground was to be a blast on the horn, which they took with them for that purpose. Mr. Evans’s pace was slow; Fenn was aware of a curious blankness and suspense coming over him, as soon as they had got away from Anice; and Ethel was in haste to hear those magical notes: so that when they reached the tree by the wall they were an impatient trio.

The horn sounded.

After a few seconds, a faint thread of melody reached them, swelling, after a scarcely perceptible break, almost at once into a louder but still distant strain. The air, as Mr. Evans told them, when a few bars had been given, was one which Anice had heard in the mountains of Tyrol.

“ It does n’t sound right, though,” Fenn observed. “ Could I have been deceived about that echo ? It was a very subtle, elusive thing.”

“ I did n't half believe in it, eveu yesterday,” said Ethel, smiling. “But oh, Mr. Evans, how beautiful your daughter’s voice is ! I should think you would be very proud.”

“ So proud, madam,” he answered, with considerable elaborateness, “ that I have never been willing to have her appear in opera.”

“ What a pity! ” was Ethel’s first, impulsive utterance. “ But no; perhaps it is n’t. That voice is too lovely for most people to be fit to hear it. Does she want to ? ”

“ Go upon the stage ? No ; I ’m glad to say, not. But she has been urged to, continually, both here and abroad.”

Fenn had listened attentively, and was more pleased than there was any occasion for being, that his wife liked Anice’s singing. He said nothing about this, however. “ Let’s try it again,” he proposed, taking up the horn.

The second signal was answered as the first had been, except that the responsive strain was now a hunting-song, which came to them in this wild, halfsylvan spot with an inspiriting motion.

But the man of science was dissatisfied. “ I can’t make it out,” he said to the other two. “ Does n’t it seem to you more as if the sounds came from the birches, up above here ? It is n’t like yesterday, at any rate.”

“ It did sound nearer,” Mr. Evans agreed. “To tell the truth, Mr. Fenn, I ’m not entirely satisfied with your discovery.” It was plain that Mr. Evans had not forgotten the younger man’s opposition on the sugar-beet question.

Just then a rich peal of laughter, a melody in itself, sounded forth not far from the group ; and, turning in that direction, they saw Anice standing in the fluttering shadow of the white-stemmed birches, a few yards away. “ Was I a good echo? ” she called out, merrily. “ I’ve been here all the time, since you came.” At this there was a general hilarity. Anice had, in fact, taken the upper part of the hill, and made her way to a convenient shelter, while the rest were walking slowly over, below.

“ And you made all those changes of distance just by altering your voice?” asked Ethel.

“ Oh, that’s very easy,” said Mrs. Eulow. “ I really did n’t think I could deceive you all.”

“ But where are we to meet the carriage ? ” her father inquired, practically.

“ Just where we said. I’ve sent it down.”

As they took their way to the appointed place, Fenn wondered at the change that had gradually made itself visible in Anice since their unexpected encounter, scarcely twenty-four hours earlier. On leaving her then, he had thought of her as sad and statuesque, a form placed in some shadowy corner of life, and with all its loveliness veiled in sorrow, which he had been permitted to gaze upon once more, but which could perhaps never come again into the circle of intimate and usual realities. Today, on the contrary, —nay, within the two hours just past, — she bad become a joyous and hopeful presence ; she was even sportive; those fair hands, which had seemed to move with so mournful a languor in the departed twilight, now expressed buoyancy. It might have been a thoroughly happy woman who followed the narrow pathway with him, and he was within a little of doubting the justness of his first impression. This quick transition was exhilarating, alluring. He may have felt that his own appearance on the scene had something to do with it, and this, again, may have led him to walk faster, so that Anice and he drew away from Ethel, who came behind with Mr. Evans.

The track grew fainter ; the ground was roughened by roots that struggled to escape from their smothered underground existence. Finally, the pair were confronted by a loose stone wall. Fenn leaped over, and extended his hand. Mrs. Eulow mounted adroitly, and accepted his aid ; then, as she gave a slight spring to the ground and withdrew her hand from his, he received an unmistakable but fleeting pressure from her clasp. Coming at the instant after she had touched the grass and no longer needed support, it was hard to believe it had not been intentional, evanescent though it was.

Anice walked rapidly on over the open but uneven space they had entered ; then stopped, waiting, holding up her parasol, perfectly self-possessed, and apparently searching for Ethel and her father.

Fenn had paused instinctively by the wall, intending to assist his wife when she should come. The first definite result of the surprise which Anice’s touch had caused was indignation mixed with alarm. She was doing an injustice, he felt, both to herself and him. In another moment he dismissed as unworthy and unlawful the suspicion that she had meant to establish a mute communication with him in this way ; besides, it was childish. When, in boyish years, this pressing of the hand had been a received method of indicating preference among little girls of his acquaintance, he had always considered it especially senseless ; and it was quite unlikely that Mrs. Eulow would resort to it. “ Some nervous movement; that was all,” he said to himself. But curiosity ensued. If the gentle impact of that hand had been intentional, how much, after all, did it signify ? A fine pulsation, a momentary delight and unexpected defiance, struck through his veins, and his heart beat tumultuously.

The whole situation did not last a minute. Fenn experienced these graduated phases so swiftly that he could not consciously register them. Who knows what corresponding activity took place under the impassive exterior and behind the frank, luminous eyes of the woman standing a few paces away ? Yet time enough even for embarrassment had not passed, and nothing appeared to have happened. They looked precisely as they had done before; the bare and rocky ground, the clear hot sky, the trees, were not more natural and unchanged. But the blue of the sky seemed to rain a tingling fire into Fenn’s breast; the very odors of the ground and the woods, the searching perfume of the sweet-fern, were laden now with a secret and inspired sweetness he had not detected before. He was resolved to learn more; he felt himself challenged to conquer some admission or some denial from this strangely fascinating friend of his.

“ Let us wait a moment,” he said. Anice smiled pleasantly.

Ethel arrived, and was assisted by him: her hand was strong and trusting, but it certainly did not impart that peculiar pressure which had just now influenced him so potently.

It haunted him throughout the drive, which was long and beautiful, leading through a singular region of low land between the Tanford plateau and another wilder ridge: a region thickly wooded, with plunging descents down steep and bowery declivities, abrupt turns to this and that side of the valley ; and encounters with a streamlet, alternately flowing in bright shallows where the sunlight made amber of it, and lost in deep trout-pools, which Ethel said would be just the place for little Mr. Sharon Reeves, a wandering Episcopal clergyman at the Institute, who was trying to acquire a worldly air by practicing with the rod and line. At another point, some unforeseen ascent would bring them to a line of maples, a few fields, and a farm-house, which appeared to be utterly lost to the world, but boasted a stunted little croquet-ground, with hoops set all awry like skeleton grave-stones.

“ I should think the people here,” said Ethel, “would have some difficulty in finding even themselves, to say nothing of the world.”

But these little homes were happily unconscious of their obscurity, and presented a serene front to the flying critics in the carry-all.

Mr. Evans had explored the route before; but it was new to Fenn, and the absence of knowledge as to what lay ahead suited his mood. Besides, the beauty of the sun-dazzled curtain of leaves through which they peered on either side; the lance-like thrust of long beech boughs and infinite tracery of finer branches in the depth of the wood ; the pale reminiscence of autumn in the rain-flattened dead leaves on the earth, from which the trunks rose erect, or steadied themselves at strange angles, like bodies poised for swimming ; the dull or twinkling shadows; the tints of green and gray, dim blue, lilac and gold, that trembled in and out among the clean, strong forms of growth,—these things alone gave an active stimulus to the senses. A cool, spicy incense rose to meet them from the coverts of undergrowth and vine, or was distilled by the sunbeams from gaunt and noiseless ranks of pine on sandy banks above the road ; clumps of hardhack, with its panicles of hoary rose, and stretches of chiccory, with its hardy purple-blue, seemed to float past them as they rolled on. They branched from one narrow way into another, enjoying it all with that zest belonging to American scenery away from towns, which comes from the impossibility of taking anything for granted about it.

“ Is this a park, or a forest, or an English estate in an unkempt, second-growth condition, or what, may I ask ? ” said Fenn, at last.

“It’s nothing particular,” answered Anice, “ and it rejoices in the name of Tom’s Swamp.”

“ I don’t think we’ve seen Tom or the swamp, yet,” said he. “ “Where do you keep them, Mr. Evans ? ”

“ Tom himself is a myth,” began Mr. Evans ; “ or a historical person ” —

“ Which is the same thing nowadays,” Ethel cynically remarked, to her husband’s surprise.

“ Yes, that’s true. As for the swamp, you ’ll see a little corner of it before long.”

It was merely a gleam of low, watery ground, with the pale purple clusters and flat leaves that belonged there, seen among the trees; and from here the horse was guided to scale the Tanford ridge once more, the top of which was coursed along for miles by the broad turnpike that had once been a post-road, and was lined with towering elms suggesting endless relays of couriers. They passed an old house, deserted like many others in the township, where marigolds and satin-flowers, balsams and hollyhocks, were growing in the midst of rank weeds and wild creepers that were slowly tugging at the roof, to get it down.

“ Do you think that could have been your father’s?” asked Ethel, to whom the coincidence relating to the dead Evans appeared romantic.

“Very likely,” returned the lawyer, becoming harassed with imaginary business again, and touching up the mare.

In this way the drive continued, Anice and Fenn the same as ever in their bearing toward one another, in despite of those transient and silent passages which, several times since morning, had appeared to be preparing the way for some changed attitude. And, in truth, what was there to make them alter their bearing, as yet? Decidedly, neither had any definite assurance that the other had any thought which would have been better away, or concealed spark that might break into a dangerous blaze. As for Fenn, he would have asked, — had there been any reasoning upon such a theme, — What is a man to do, in his position? Must he say openly to the lady immediately concerned that he finds himself imprudently interested in her, and thinks it best that they should not encounter often ? At one time it would have been according to his code to speak in this fashion, attacking the matter directly ; but the time had rather gone by for those ideas. He had told Anice, once, that he did not mean to make love to her, and it was questionable whether any good had been accomplished by it ; possibly much harm was to come of that verdant confidence.

These reflections passed through his mind in detached order, at intervals of the drive; but, above all, Fenn was sound-hearted and healthy, and the rush of pure air against his cheeks, the sweet odors of the country, tempered the slow fever which had set in at that critical moment in the rocky field, where Anice and he had waited for Ethel. He enjoyed, too, his wife’s keen pleasure in this simple after-dinner diversion, and the sight of it did him good. Mr. Evans struck off from the old post-road again, through broad, cultivated acres, hedged with single lines of ash and maple bordering the rough walls, and so down into another wild trough, on the opposite and southern side of Tanford, quite unlike the swamp; more open, breezier, containing houses of a more prosperous aspect, and occasional orchards. Here, too, at the very bottom was a saw-mill, in a state of dead quiescence, like most small mills of its kind for a great part of the year. The only practical purpose it served was as an adventurous perch for the Rev. Mr. Reeves, who, fish-pole in hand, was humming a lively popular ditty, upon which he prided himself as marking his rapid advance in broad and manly culture; allowing his hook, meanwhile, to dangle cautiously in the rough water.

This was the last point of interest, for it was followed by a long and painfully slow climb on the part of the fagged mare up towards Tanford, her head being pointed for the top of the church spire, the only object in the village plainly discernible from this depth. The ascent was so steep as to resemble a flight upward in the air; but when they reached the hill-top they were at the base of the spire, instead of its summit, — a fact at which Mrs. Ethel professed to be much astonished. And, “ Oh, you dreary old Institute,” she said, addressing the blank and dusty front of the academic hotel, when they had alighted in front of it, “ I feel as if I’d been away for a week! ”

V.

There is said to have existed among the Jews an oracle of echoes, and although its responses and prophecies must have been somewhat vague, Fenn could at this time have believed that they were impressively minatory, in cases of predicted danger. An echo is in itself a mock, which seems to fling back upon you something of its own hollowness and transiency. What could more appropriately bring home to a human being his own fleeting, perishable, and fateful state than a helpless rebounding of sound thrown from surface to surface, and lost in space ? Then, as to prophetic tone, this ghostly repetition symbolizes well the truth that what has been will be again ; that the future has in store for us some exact return of good or evil for what we are now doing; or that a result impending at the current hour is often the direct consequence of an act or utterance preceding it by a long time, the echo of which is only just reaching us. Of some such oracle Fenn was beginning to take counsel. His own consciousness was full of mysterious reverberations, which were repeated or accompanied in the coincidences surrounding him. There was the striking accident of Anice’s voice breaking into his reverie at the instant when he had been recalling it; there was the unbidden return of excitement as he watched the stars and thought of her face ; and, again, the furtive, unconscious association with her of the odor of violets in the old garden. Going over the incidents of the day, and thinking of these things, he was forced to ask what they portended. Like muffled echoes they responded, and he understood the answer, although it was not given in words.

“ What did you think of Mrs. Eulow?” he asked his wife, when they were alone in their room.

“ Oh, I think she’s remarkably handsome.”

“ Yes, she is, rather,” he admitted, as if he had not previously quite made up his mind about this.

“It’s more than ‘rather,'” said Ethel. “ Can’t you be a little more enthusiastic ? ”

“ Why ? ”

“ Because if you ’re not impressed by her, I shall begin to think you’ve never really seen anything pretty about me.” She was fastening a jewel-pin at her throat, and gave him a half-coquettish look, yet there was a touch of seriousness in her sweet, simple face.

“What nonsense, Ethel ! I don’t like you even to hint that you ’re not the loveliest woman I know.” And it was true that she was so to Fenn. He went on : “ Mrs. Eulow is a beauty, there’s no doubt of that ; but it is only one kind of beauty. She is the sort of woman I would like to pay compliments to.”

“I should say that’s a pleasant kind of woman to be.”

“ No ; compliments are not the highest form of admiration. But Mrs. Eulow would have such a way of receiving them — not believing them exactly, you know, but understanding that they were the best a man could offer her — that it would be a pleasure to give them. Don’t you see how there are some people who compel just that form of tribute ? ”

“ I suppose I can understand,” said Ethel. “ But you speak as if you’d never tried it with her, or had n’t known her such a long time.”

Her husband perceived that his theory did not apply very well. “ The fact is,” he acknowledged, “ I never did do that sort of thing, the few times I met her.”

“ But I thought you had seen a good deal of her.”

“ No; not much.”

“ Mr. Evans said she saw you as long ago as ten years.”

“ That’s a mistake. It was n’t more than eight.”

“ Well, I think it’s very queer you never talked to me about her. I was dreadfully put out when he began speaking as if I knew all about the acquaintance. Of course I had to pretend I did, and then get him to tell me ; and I don’t like to do that. It’s deceptive.”

“ Never mind,” said Fenn, seeing that she was nettled, and at once becoming so himself. “ We can’t be forever telling people the exact truth. If we did, they would n’t care anything about us.”

“Then I suppose it was all a fib, when Mr. Evans said they thought of you so often, and had hoped they might meet me some time.”

“ Not necessarily. I can conceive,” said Fenn, sarcastically, “of their taking some mild interest in me and my affairs.”

“ Yes,” said Ethel, veering around at once, for the sake of the advantage; “ but I think it would have been better taste if she had kept those chemical books out of sight, — at any rate, for a while.”

Fenn got up, angrily, and took his hat. “ Do you mean to say you think she put them there on purpose to impress me ? ” he demanded.

“ Ben, I forbid you to speak to me that way. It’s just as improper as your not telling me about your friends beforehand. And what difference does it make to you whether she put them in sight purposely, or not ? ”

“Poh!” said he. “It’s ridiculous to even suggest that I care. But I detest seeing you allow yourself such petty ideas.” He took a few steps towards the door, but his wife hardly thought he would go; the dispute was at too interesting a stage to be dropped.

She made a slight concession, and started afresh. “ I did n’t say I thought so,” she reminded him. “ But I do think it would have been nicer not to thrust her interest in chemistry at you, the first thing.”

“She didn’t,” said Fenn, settling down to a methodical altercation. “It would have argued a horrible self-consciousness if she had packed them all away before inviting us to dinner.” The truth was, he bad been more pleased with the episode of the books than he at all knew, until its charm was so rudely lessened.

“The secret of all this,” his wife returned, “is that you want me to he just like her. You are never satisfied; you never will be.” He made a sound of vigorous impatience, but allowed her to proceed. “ You know, Ben, that I am very proud of your being a scientific man, and I listen to everything you say, and try to understand it. I like to have you explain ; but I did n’t fall in love with chemistry and marry it. I like it because it’s you that explain it to me. But if I went and made myself a woman of science, what need should I have of a man of science.”

“You couldn’t be a woman of science, unless you soaked your whole mind with things in my laboratory, just as I do,” he retorted, rather vindictively, though what she had said had pleased him.

“ Then Mrs. Eulow can’t, either,” declared Ethel, with an air of finality.

“ No, she can’t,” he assented, “and she does n’t pretend to. But it’s a very good thing for her to read about anything of the kind that she’s interested in; and so it would be for you.” Upon this, Ethel, tossing some small articles into a drawer, and shutting it with slight emphasis, effected a movement of the head which meant that she would do exactly as she pleased about that. Her husband, however, felt that it was time for him to respond to the kind things she had said about him, and he added more gently, “ You know, my dear, I appreciate you and delight in you as you are. If I had n’t— Well, I think I gave the most substantial proof of it that I could, some time ago.”

“Yes, you did,” she said, with a loving glance. Everything was in train for a reconciliation. “ I wish I could make myself more interesting,” she went on, humbly. “ Very likely I shall succeed, one of these days.” She was silent a moment, and he took her hand, smiling. By some unexplained connection of ideas, she returned to Anice. “Did you know Mrs. Eulow wouldn’t sing for me ? ” she asked. “ I wanted her to, at the house, and she would n’t. Then, when we were going to try the experiment, she sang close to us, just because we did n’t want her to. Don’t you think that was queer ? I was really hurt when she refused me.”

Fenn quietly relinquished the hand. “ You are very critical this evening,” he said, coldly. But he was annoyed at himself for having forgotten so important a thing as asking the widow to sing for his wife.

“ Good gracious ! ” exclaimed Ethel. “What harm have I done ? May n’t I say anything at all about Mrs. Eulow ? ”

“ Why, yes ; yes. It’s to be hoped we can tell each other what we think. But ” — Fenn would have found some difficulty in stating what he held his wife to blame for. He half lifted his hat again, in a preparatory way, and burst out, with more irritation than was common in him : “ I can’t stand this, Ethel, positively. Here are these two people, old friends : they’ve done as much as they could to make things pleasant for us to-day; and, besides that, Mrs. Eulow is a charming woman, well worth knowing. Yet the first thing to be done is to pick her to pieces.”

The criticism was not altogether ill founded, but Ethel merely laughed, and said, with exasperating acuteness, “You began with being almost apathetic, yourself, about her beauty, and you said she did n’t command the highest kind of admiration ; and now, when I have said one or two little things ” —

“ Oh, well,” interrupted her husband, in a desperate tone, “ if you want to spoil the whole pleasure of an acquaintance that might have made our vacation more agreeable, go ahead ! You will lose as much as I shall. But of course, if you choose to have it this way, you must. Only, you both appeared to like each other so much, and I thought you were having such a good time, that I’m naturally a little surprised and disgusted.”

And with this very moderate description of his feelings he left the room abruptly.

Ethel followed in a moment, passed through the large corridor below, and vainly scanned the increasing darkness without for some trace of him. She was very anxious for him to come back, now. In reality she liked her new acquaintance more than she did most women, and the tone she had taken was entirely due to her annoyance at not having known more about her. But as Fenn did not reappear promptly, to receive her apology, she went into the dining-room alone.

She had nearly finished supper, and he had not returned, when two ladies coming by, from another table, stopped to speak. One was stout, in a baggy skirt profusely trimmed, and carried on her head a variety of puffs and ribbon ; she had numerous downward wrinkles about the mouth, indicating an exuberant, contented, confidential bent. The other was small, dry even to gauntness, and wore a vast number of artificial seed-pearls sewn on to her scrimped black dress, which furnished Ethel with an amusing fancy that they represented fruit hanging to a prematurely withered bough.

“Oh, Mrs. Fenn!” exclaimed the comfortably confidential lady, with a cheap imitation of a wicked smile. “ So glad to get at you without your husband ! Is n’t that naughty of me ? ”

“ Why, Mrs. Dadmun ? ”

“ We had a little plan to propose,” said Mrs. Whidden, the thin companion, taking the answer upon herself, “ and we should hardly have dared to do it if he had been here.” Whereupon they both laughed, apparently from pride in their audacious anti-marital manœuvre.

“ I don’t see how that could have prevented, if it’s anything I can do at all,” said Ethel.

“ It’s nothing in the world but this,” Mrs. Dadmun responded, becoming matter of fact: “ there is a picnic party for to-morrow, and we have just one place left in the carriages. We got as far as that, and then everybody decided that we must have you and Mr. Fenn ; but as there’s only one place, we ’re obliged to ask you alone, and leave your husband to come on horseback, or something of that sort.”

“ Two of the gentlemen are going to walk ; they start earlier than the rest of us,” Mrs. Whidden volunteered. “ You won't disappoint us, Mrs. Fenn, will you ? There’s Miss Ibbit and Miss Hamill, — they’re going; and Sharon Reeves, and Kingsmill— You ought to know Mr. Kingsmill better, Mrs. Fenn. He’s quite an admirer of yours ! ” And Mrs. Whidden put a starved smile on duty, as she ended.

“ Let me think ” — began Ethel.

“ Have you been to Temple Lake, yet?” asked Mrs. Dadmun, disposing her wrinkles in amiable array.

“ No; and I should like very much to join your picnic — if Ben were only here.” The thought that he was not there, and that he ought to be, brought out a rebellious impulse to accept the invitation, and go without him.

“ He will come if you consent, of course,” said Mrs. Dadmun.

“ I don’t know,” Ethel answered, seizing more firmly the project of going alone; “ he has been saying there was some work that he must do in a day or two, to send off to the city. But you are all so kind to have thought of me that I think I ’ll decide to go, any way.”

“ You ’re a dear ! How very nice ! ” said the ladies. “ At nine o’clock, — so as to get there before it’s too hot, you know.”

As they passed out of the diningroom, Fenn came in, and they accorded him a very suave greeting. His boots were dusty, and the moisture on his face showed that he had been walking fast. He had gone out in a fit of intense vexation, and had been walking along the old post-road, without much idea what he wanted to do. With a conscience slightly disturbed, he had been quick to suppose that Ethel was a shade jealous of Anice (though that was in fact far from being the case), and he resented this in proportion to the secret knowledge he possessed of there being some justification for such jealousy. But perhaps his acutest displeasure arose from the added peril in which that sentiment on his wife’s part would place him. It was bad enough to be afflicted with the recrudescence of a passion which it was wrong for him to think twice of ; to have it aggravated by a hostility on Ethel’s part, which would inevitably drive him more irresistibly towards Anice, was unendurable. A taper held above the channeled heat of a lamp becomes the axis of a tiny aurora, which flashes volatile blue flame all around it in the air, yet does not ignite the scroll itself. By a slight change in its position, a little altering of the draught of air, the taper itself breaks into clear fire. Fenn’s mind was in the incipient stage : his suppressed ardor towards Anice did not yet seem wholly to possess him; the flame was visionary and hovering, — did not reach quite to his heart. But he feared that the unexpected ground Ethel had assumed in their conversation this evening made the trifling change that would cause that premonitory gleam of infatuation to puff out in an actual blaze.

Restless and suffering, he thought he would not rejoin his wife, but would go down to the other end of the village, where Pincott, an artist of mild and genial temperament, was boarding with his family in a private house, and try the soothing effect of the painter’s goodfellowship. He went as far as the gate, and caught sight of Pincott sitting in a rocking-chair outside of the house, where the lamplight from behind a sunflowerstudded window-curtain fell on his gray hair, and showed the smoke floating idly up from his meerschaum. The figure was so peaceful, it did him good to see it: a gush of tenderness poured back into his heart. " Dear old Pincott ! ” he murmured ; and as the painter fortunately did not discover him, he turned and went quickly back to the hotel.

So both husband and wife had relented, and both saw that their petty discord had been absurd; but Ethel had the affair of the picnic on her mind, of which she preferred to say nothing at present, and there was therefore a reserve between them. Ethel waited for him graciously, at the table; they did not talk much, but as they went out to the portico she said, “ I don't think you understood, Ben, how much I like Mrs. Eulow. I expect to enjoy her immensely. Really, for the little I know about her, I think more of her than I ever did of any woman on a first introduction, and I won't say anything mean about her again.”

“That’s right,” he said, gratefully. “You ’re always good in the end.”

They sat down in a corner under the colonnade, and amused themselves talking of Mr. Evans, and about the people in the hotel and Pincott’s pictures. But at last young Kingsmill came up to them. He was one of the handsome young men, it should be explained, who were given to taking picturesque positions on the railing. He had dark gray eyes and a very magnificent mustache, and when he talked the Adam’s apple in his throat moved with great activity and prominence.

“ I’m so delighted to hear that you ’re going with us to-morrow,” he said, addressing them both.

Fenn was completely surprised, and while his wife was saying, “ Yes, it ought to be very pleasant,” be began with, “ To-morrow ? what comes off then ? I had n’t heard ” —

“ Why, the picnic. Temple Lake, you know,” said Kingsmill.

“ I did n't know whether you could go, Ben,” said Ethel, turning to Fenn. “ Mrs. Dadmun and Mrs. Whidden were speaking about it before you came in.”

“ Oh ! Yes, I’ve heard that it’s a beautiful spot,” he returned, directing his words at Kingsmill, and stifling his dissatisfaction at not having been told about the excursion before.

“ Shall you go ? ” the young man inquired, with a concentrated glance.

Fenn perceived that Kingsmill was not so anxious for his company as he might have been. “ It’s pretty far,” he answered, “ and I’ve been meaning to get some papers ready for my firm, soon. I may not be able to give the time.”

When Ethel explained to him, afterward, that he would have to get a horse, he gave up the plan decisively.

In the morning, however, when he had watched the party drive off, a great depression fell upon him. He kept thinking of Kingsmill and his air of attention towards Ethel; then it occurred to him that he was missing a rather pleasant affair, and his work was not so very pressing. He made inquiries about a horse, but found the limited stable of the Institute exhausted; whereupon he became determined, and searched the village for a steed. He obtained one, after some effort, — bony and unaristocratic, but able to carry him, — and started in the direction of Temple. An eighth of a mile brought him to a fork of the road, Temple being on the line of one branch : the other led to Mr. Evans’s house. He stopped the horse’s trot as he approached, and a weak disinclination to go to the picnic beset him. “ Ethel almost arranged it so that I should n’t go,” he reflected ; and by the time he reached the fork he had pressed the rein which would turn his horse towards Evans’s. The next moment he was cantering briskly thither, and when he left the highway for the winding drive up to the farm-house his spirits had so risen that he hummed to himself blithely, “Should auld acquaintance be forgot?”

Anice had an enthusiasm for the very footfall of a horse, and came at once to the porch. She was clad in white, this morning, and bloomed against the woodbine-covered trellis like a morning-glory or petunia.

“ Are you alone ? ” she cried, as if disappointed. “ Where is Mrs. Fenn?”

“ She has gone to a picnic. They had n’t room for me.”

“ And you are going to ride after them ? ”

“ I had thought of it.”

The widow paused an instant. “ I should like to take Star out,” she said.

“ Just what I was going to propose,” Fenn assured her, with vivacity, dismounting. “ I will wait for you to get ready.”

“ But I can hardly go to the picnic,” said Anice. “ I have n’t been invited.”

“ I shall be happy to go in any direction you like,” he said, more seriously than he had spoken before.

She answered quickly that they would ride where he had intended, and that she would come back alone. In a few minutes she returned from her room, transformed, habited in a green-black riding-suit and a small cap suited for the country, which set off her beauty in a novel aspect. How they darted off over the white turnpike ; the umbrageous elms waiting to cool them with momentary darkness ! In other places spindling maples, newly set out, recorded their rapid flight in vertical lines which fell behind, one after another, and were gone, while the wide country sparkled on either hand in multitudinous greens, among interblended tints of fields with their wild flowers, or distant hill-sides left red from the cutting of a buckwheat harvest. The steady earth seemed to fly, and only the moving clouds appeared motionless. It was very exhilarating; and when they struck off where a huge butternut-tree and a paintless house marked the junction of two roads, and entered a silent pine wood, they were glad to go more slowly and enjoy the glow of their first gallop, at rest.

“ My rickety beast is stimulated by the example of Star, I think,” observed the cavalier.

Anice laughed freshly and heartily, as if she had been sending forth a roulade of notes in a song. “ Don’t be too hard on your nameless gray,” said she. “ He brings you along very well, and you ought to be grateful. I hn sure I am.”

“ He appreciates his good luck in having a companion, as I do mine.” Fenn got this off gracefully.

“ Oh, listen ! ” exclaimed Anice, abruptly, reining Star in. “ I hear a beautiful note in the woods.”

Fenn stopped, also. The note was that of a wood-thrush. Its lonely, exquisite refrain made the listeners think of a shattered ray of sunlight falling pensively into the recesses of greenery whence the notes issued ; and a blending of sorrow, or it may be of longing, streamed into the light mood of the previous moment. They went on through the piece of pines without further conversation ; an identical train of feeling possessed each mind.

The horseman was careful not to keep up too rapid a pace, and they followed the winding road up hill and down, with numerous intervals of slow walking and agreeable talk, arriving at Temple, six miles away, without having overtaken the larger party. The lake was at a short distance from this village, and Mrs. Eulow said she must turn Star’s head, without going farther.

“ I shall not allow you to ride home alone,” said Fenn.

“ That’s hardly fair,” she answered. “ I really can’t go on to the lake, and if I take you back with me Mrs. Fenn will be disappointed.”

“To tell you the truth,” he informed her, “ they don’t expect me at the picnic, for I gave it up this morning, and I believe I should enjoy riding a good deal better.”

“ Oh, well, then, if it’s not interfering with any plan” — she began.

“ No ; I thought it was just as well to come this way, and then we could decide.” Fenn had had an additional reason, which he did not disclose ; and this was that it would have been undesirable to be seen riding from Tanford in any other than the direction of the picnic. “ I have a notion,” he concluded, energetically, “ that we can get home by another way, — coming down to your house ever Sheep’s Back.”

“ Is n’t that too long? ” she asked.

“ It can’t be more than a mile or two farther.”

“ Then I should like it ever so much,” said Anice, with great vim.

He fancied he saw in her face a new expression of pleasure, softer than any he had noticed there before, as they moved away again. It made him tingle with a mad, forbidden delight.

They succeeded in finding the road which led over the mountain-side. It was rough and solitary, but at every rod it grew more delightful, rising to a climax of grandeur where it cut into the lofty crown of the hill, and was embowered like a leafy gallery in young beeches and chestnuts and other forest trees. But the Nameless Gray, as Anice had called him, gave signs of disastrous fatigue when they reached this point. Several times Fenn had dismounted and led him up severe inclines, and now, in going down to the valley, he was obliged to repeat the process.

“ This is tedious work,”he said, at length, “ and I 'm getting very hungry.”

“ You see you will be sorry, after all, that you did n’t go to the lake,” Anice observed, with possibly a trace of malice. “ It’s a little after twelve, and they ’ll soon be eating.”

“ Don’t make fun of my masculine appetite,” he implored. “I don’t regret the picnic a bit, but I am hungry; and it’s very hot, besides. Suppose we have a little picnic of our own.”

“ With all my heart; but where are the provisions ? ”

“ I see a small house down there. We ’ll stop and get something.”

It was true there was a house, crowded down among the wild trees as if it had been put there for squirrels; but when they came down to it, no tokens of inhabitancy were found ; it was deserted. A wilderness of blackberry bushes, however, surrounded the place, and they at once decided to tether their horses out of sight from the path, and make a lunch of fruit. Ferm held threatening branches aside, here and there, and found the largest clusters of berries for Anice. There was a good deal of excitement as to which should make the most striking discoveries in this line.

“ Oh, how pleasant this is ! ” cried the widow, merrily. “ I feel as if I were a girl again.”

“ Yes,” said her friend, “ this is a magic fruit, that takes away all care, and restores happiness to the sorrowful.”

While they were engaged in the primitive and refreshing pursuit of this innocent food, several thrushes began singing with indolent sweetness in a thick covert, not far away. Anice let a heavyladen branch slip from her fingers and spring back to its place.

“ Those birds again! How wonderful they are ! Why, this place seems to be full of them. Couldn’t we see one, Mr. Fenn ? ”

“It’s very hard to get near them. I never saw but one, though I’ve tried a good many times. But I should like nothing better than to try it again with you. Come.”

She hesitated briefly ; perhaps a sense that they were proceeding a little carelessly for persons in their position restrained her. But in a moment, with a slight air of defiance, she collected the long riding-skirt more firmly in her hand, and joined her companion. A few steps brought them to an abandoned track, the mossy ruts of which were soft and refreshing to the foot, and led downward towards the haunt of the thrushes. It was broken by large stones, in places, and there Fenn offered the help of his hand ; at first with a faint trembling in his voice, and afterwards in silence.

“ We must move very carefully,” he whispered, as they came to a small glade, more open than the surrounding forest, “ or the birds will be frightened and fly away.”

The mystery and caution of their advance pleased Mrs. Eulow. But, notwithstanding their care, the thrushes stopped singing before they had come very near.

“ It’s always so,” murmured her escort. “But they ’ll begin again; and we might as well stop and rest. Besides, the longer we wait, the better for my poor old gray.” He dropped easily upon the ground, while giving this advice, and Anice followed his example.

“ I wonder what has become of the people who lived up in that old house,” she said ; “ and I wonder whether they liked to hear the thrushes. I dare say they were very prosaic, and have gone off somewhere and become thriving hucksters ; but don’t you always speculate about such things, and imagine some very mournful fate connected with these empty houses ? ”

“ I think I do,” Fenn replied. “ And I suppose it’s better to do that than to be thinking mournful things about ourselves.”

They had continued, without noticing it, to speak in the low tones adopted out of consideration for the timid songsters ; and this insensibly gave what they said an intimate and almost tender quality.

“ Yes, indeed. But you don’t do that, at any rate.”

“ No, not much ; though a man with any go in him is generally dissatisfied about something.”

“ Women sometimes have go in them, too,” hinted the widow, smiling.

“ That’s true,” he admitted. He had begun to roll a cigarette. “ Well, are you ever dissatisfied ? ” he asked, looking up.

She gave a subdued laugh. “You are never afraid to say things plainly,” was what she said.

“I’m not sure about that. I think I am sometimes.” And Fenn felt that she must know what he referred to in his own mind.

“You used to be very direct, in old days,” she returned, teasingly. “ But, at any rate, there’s no reason why I should n’t speak frankly, too. Yes, I am dissatisfied, and very often. My life is not a success ; my memories are sad ones, and I have nothing to look forward to.”

“ I don’t know,” said he, “ why you have n’t anything to look forward to. You have money, and you have strong intellectual tastes. You can study, work, write; help mankind, and especially womankind, along.”

“ I would like to do that; sometimes I imagine I am preparing for it. But then at other times I think I would prefer to come away and live completely isolated, in some place like this deserted house.” At these words a dizzying, faithless vision came to the man at her feet of the life he might lead in some profound seclusion with such a woman. “ At those times everything seems to be over,” she added.

“ Did you love your husband so deeply, — is that it ? ” Fenn was impelled to ask, by a strange conglomerate desire. Among other things, he was troubled by an unreasonable jealousy, which he had no right to feel, of the hold which the dead Eulow might have had upon her.

Anice surprised him by her simple answer. “No. I was young when I married. I was mistaken.”

There was so much quiet sadness in the way she said this, so much of selfrespect and of respect for the husband she had lost, mingled with an unusual frankness accorded to the friend whom she considered worthy to hear this secret, that Fenn received no shock. Her manner was very far removed from that dank and earthy sentimentality in favor with certain women, who are forever disclosing their disappointments in order to win male sympathy.

He looked gravely into her face, and her eyes met his. He wished to take her hand, and soothe her and pity her; saying to himself that this at least could be done without danger. But something kept him from attempting it.

A fruitful silence succeeded, during which he looked up between the trees, and contemplated a huge white cloud that moved luxuriously through the ether, with sides made dazzling by the sunlight, yet easy for the eye to rest on. It brightened and darkened, according to the changing poise of the fleecy mass, and, from being speckless white, softened into the dim tints of the shaded feathers on a dove’s breast. The image of Ethel in Fenn’s mind was brightening and fading alternately, like this cloud, floating away, insubstantial and remote. His love for her, which he had held on to so firmly under the first stress of temptation, was slipping from his grasp. Could it be, he asked himself in drowsy wonder, that it was an illusion, which was being dispelled by the contact of a more vital fervor ? It might be well to test this by some hardy utterance to Anice, throwing off all concealment recklessly.

Suddenly he got up and stood before her, his eyes glowing with suppressed fire. “ You ought not to think everything is over. There is much in store for you,” he said to her. “Ah, I could help you, — I could show you how to live for something ! ”

The exclamation seemed to come without his will; but when it had escaped, he thought he had said everything, that he had disclosed his heart and stood on the verge of a crisis.

He was wrong.

“ Will you do it — give me some direction and put purpose into my days ? ” Anice asked, grateful and eager.

The fire faded from his glance, and he looked down. “ I wish I could. I will try. I hardly knew what I was promising,” he answered, in a tone so changed that she was bewildered.

At this moment, the thrushes once more began swaying their slow, ecstatic yet melancholy notes on the tree-tops. But this time they were much farther away.

“ Ah,” said she, “ they have commenced again. But we shall never find them, Mr. Fenn.”

The same thought struck them both : that there was something in their lives which they were trying to find, but which was always beyond them, unattainable, like this vanishing music of the woods.

Fenn resumed his place on the moss near her, with a pained and brooding look. “I can’t help anybody,” he said despondently. “ I can’t even manage myself. There is something the matter, and yet I am what is called a happy man.”

“ You have reason to be,” said the widow, gently.

“ I know I have.” He said no more, and the thrushes resounded faintly through the silence, expressing the longing within him.

In a few moments Anice reminded him that they must go.

“ Wait a minute,” he urged. “ There is something I want to speak of. You have never mentioned, since, the extraordinary thing I said to you when I made my visit at your father’s house.”

The color in her cheeks receded a little, but she responded with seeming ease : “ About not making love to me ? Oh, that—there could have been no reason or possibility for mentioning that. Don’t you think it was one of those things that is complete at one stroke ? ”

“ I want to know what you really thought about it,” said Fenn, with a sort of breathlessness, and gazing at her intently.

She did not laugh contemptuously, as he had feared she might. “ It was so long ago,” was her reply, “ you can’t expect my impression to be fresh; and it may not be best to say much about it, any way. I did n’t think it was the wisest thing that could be done.”

For a second time he had the premonition that a great crisis was at hand. “ It was a terrible mistake ! ” he declared vehemently, feeling that the statement implied all his latent passion about her.

“ Yes ; as a matter of prudence, you may call it a mistake,” said Anice, calmly. For a second time, the crisis had come to nothing.

“ And you thought me a great fool ? ” he inquired, after a short, dazed pause at her mode of taking it.

“ No. That would have been rather conceited. I did n’t consider every young man under obligation to be an adorer. And I think I liked your sincerity, all things considered.”

There was but one question more that Fenn could have put; and that was whether there had been any regret because of his announcement that he should not make love. The desire to know this tortured him ; but of course it was impossible to ask it. Thus the situation was presented, that her frank replies excited his importunate question ing tendency still more deeply.

He remained thinking; but, seeing that she waited for him to take the lead in returning to the horses, he unwillingly made a start. When they came to the rough places, he attempted to aid her, as before, but she thanked him, and went on by herself; it was not until she nearly stumbled to the ground, in the folds of her habit, that she took his hand. Fenn was filled with trepidation. Could it be that she was offended with him ? He knew that to ask her that would simply place him at a fresh disadvantage, and he was forced to keep the doubt to himself; but how unlike was this return to the one he had half imagined as possible ! When they had entered this secluded place, he had had a dim presentiment that the growing current of his feeling for her would carry away some barrier, and place them in a new relation ; that it might, in fact, lead to some mutual discovery, for the sake of which they would be willing to set aside everything else in the world, — so intoxicated was he. Their dialogue in the glade of the thrushes had seemed to him charged with intensive meaning, as if at any moment the great climax might come. Yet it had all passed away into the air, and nothing had happened ; except, perhaps, that he had forfeited something of her regard and confidence. He emerged from the solitude with the sensations of a man who has shouted aloud in his dreams, and waked to find his imaginary cry the exaggeration of a feeble moan.

George Parsons Lathrop.