"I have answered you!"
She seemed to grow tall and regal as she stood there by the gate, the long, arrowy ray of lamp-light from within illumining her proud, cold face, that could flush with such bewildering warmth. He discerned in some dim way that she had access to a life far above his; an atmosphere like hoar-frost surrounded her, raying off fine points, that thrust him farther away into darkness and coldness. Had something been taken out of his life?
The man's well-nigh imperturbable complacency had received a shock.
"Good-night," in a softer tone. One cannot break a pleasant friendship without a pang.
As one in a dream he heard the gate close, the soft footfall on the brick walk, and a waft of voices from within. Then it occurred to him that he, Frederic De Woolfe Lawrence, had been rejected by this little girl upon whose head he had meant to shower the blessing of marital protection, the regard of a soul that was not quite indifferent, after all. What was this dull pang somewhere in his symmetrical, well-kept body? Was it the night that made his pulses heavy and turgid?
Then he turned. "By Jove!" he muttered, "there's not another girl in the country that could have kept her fingers out of the governor's money-bags! Poor mother! What a disappointment for her! Of course Sylvie will marry Jack Darcy,—Pluto and Persephone again."
Then he softly whistled a stave of opera-music, and sauntered about leisurely. He had no fancy for facing his mother that night.
As for Sylvie, she knew her face was very white when she entered the door; but she bustled about with womanly evasion, and began to ask if her aunt had been lonesome, if any one had called, and declared she was tired from walking home, and her head ached a little, which was true; and presently the two women barred their doors, and went to bed.
Was she glad to have it over? Was she sorry she had left no loop-hole for future hope? Strange to say, she could not tell.
"But I could never live, like a pauper, on some other person's money!" she thought decisively. "And he did not care. It was for his mother's sake chiefly."