第60章

And he had them in fact. He called the next day at the same hour, and he found the mother and the daughter together in their pretty salon.

Angela was very gentle and gracious; he suspected Mrs. Vivian had given her a tender little lecture upon the manner in which she had received him the day before. After he had been there five minutes, Mrs. Vivian took a decanter of water that was standing upon a table and went out on the balcony to irrigate her flowers. Bernard watched her a while from his place in the room; then she moved along the balcony and out of sight.

Some ten minutes elapsed without her re-appearing, and then Bernard stepped to the threshold of the window and looked for her. She was not there, and as he came and took his seat near Angela again, he announced, rather formally, that Mrs. Vivian had passed back into one of the other windows.

Angela was silent a moment--then she said--"Should you like me to call her?"

She was very peculiar--that was very true; yet Bernard held to his declaration of the day before that he now understood her a little.

"No, I don't desire it," he said. "I wish to see you alone;

I have something particular to say to you."

She turned her face toward him, and there was something in its expression that showed him that he looked to her more serious than he had ever looked.

He sat down again; for some moments he hesitated to go on.

"You frighten me," she said laughing; and in spite of her laugh this was obviously true.

"I assure you my state of mind is anything but formidable.

I am afraid of you, on the contrary; I am humble and apologetic."

"I am sorry for that," said Angela. "I particularly dislike receiving apologies, even when I know what they are for.

What yours are for, I can't imagine."

"You don't dislike me--you don't hate me?" Bernard suddenly broke out.

"You don't ask me that humbly. Excuse me therefore if I say I have other, and more practical, things to do."

"You despise me," said Bernard.

"That is not humble either, for you seem to insist upon it."

"It would be after all a way of thinking of me, and I have a reason for wishing you to do that."

"I remember very well that you used to have a reason for everything.

It was not always a good one."

"This one is excellent," said Bernard, gravely. "I have been in love with you for three years."

She got up slowly, turning away.

"Is that what you wished to say to me?"

She went toward the open window, and he followed her.

"I hope it does n't offend you. I don't say it lightly--it 's not a piece of gallantry. It 's the very truth of my being.

I did n't know it till lately--strange as that may seem.

I loved you long before I knew it--before I ventured or presumed to know it. I was thinking of you when I seemed to myself to be thinking of other things. It is very strange--there are things in it I don't understand. I travelled over the world, I tried to interest, to divert myself; but at bottom it was a perfect failure. To see you again--that was what I wanted.

When I saw you last month at Blanquais I knew it; then everything became clear. It was the answer to the riddle.

I wished to read it very clearly--I wished to be sure; therefore I did n't follow you immediately. I questioned my heart--I cross-questioned it. It has borne the examination, and now I am sure. I am very sure. I love you as my life--I beg you to listen to me!"

She had listened--she had listened intently, looking straight out of the window and without moving.

"You have seen very little of me," she said, presently, turning her illuminated eye on him.

"I have seen enough," Bernard added, smiling. "You must remember that at Baden I saw a good deal of you."

"Yes, but that did n't make you like me. I don't understand."

Bernard stood there a moment, frowning, with his eyes lowered.

"I can imagine that. But I think I can explain."

"Don't explain now," said Angela. "You have said enough; explain some other time." And she went out on the balcony.

Bernard, of course, in a moment was beside her, and, disregarding her injunction, he began to explain.

"I thought I disliked you--but I have come to the conclusion it was just the contrary. In reality I was in love with you.

I had been so from the first time I saw you--when I made that sketch of you at Siena."

"That in itself needs an explanation. I was not at all nice then--I was very rude, very perverse. I was horrid!"

"Ah, you admit it!" cried Bernard, with a sort of quick elation.

She had been pale, but she suddenly blushed.

"Your own conduct was singular, as I remember it. It was not exactly agreeable."

"Perhaps not; but at least it was meant to be. I did n't know how to please you then, and I am far from supposing that I have learned now.

But I entreat you to give me a chance."

She was silent a while; her eyes wandered over the great prospect of Paris.

"Do you know how you can please me now?" she said, at last.

"By leaving me alone."

Bernard looked at her a moment, then came straight back into the drawing-room and took his hat.

"You see I avail myself of the first chance. But I shall come back to-morrow."

"I am greatly obliged to you for what you have said.

Such a speech as that deserves to be listened to with consideration.

You may come back to-morrow," Angela added.

On the morrow, when he came back, she received him alone.

"How did you know, at Baden, that I did n't like you?" he asked, as soon as she would allow him.

She smiled, very gently.

"You assured me yesterday that you did like me."

"I mean that I supposed I did n't. How did you know that?"

"I can only say that I observed."

"You must have observed very closely, for, superficially, I rather had the air of admiring you," said Bernard.

"It was very superficial."

"You don't mean that; for, after all, that is just what my admiration, my interest in you, were not. They were deep, they were latent.

They were not superficial--they were subterranean."

"You are contradicting yourself, and I am perfectly consistent," said Angela. "Your sentiments were so well hidden that I supposed I displeased you."

"I remember that at Baden, you used to contradict yourself,"

Bernard answered.