To think too exclusively of ourselves or our own concerns, even under our best aspects, is, as a rule, to become sad, weary, and discouraged. But to be immured in such thoughts, when the thrill and joy of life are gone, when its best promises are mildewed with disillusion and disappointment, is to poison the very source of sane existence and healthy endeavour. It had been so with Stella, and in the lowest deep of her unhappiness there yet opened the lower deep, that the misery which had overtaken her like a flood was so largely her own doing.
Yes; gradually she crept back from the gulf that had threatened to close over her. The little ones that gathered round her, their faces lighting up with pleasure, drew her to them from day to day, and then they would shyly ask for stories of Australia—that strange, far-away land with strange birds and beasts, and unknown trees that never lost their leaves. Sometimes she would write out beforehand one of the little twilight stories she had told at Lullaboolagana, so that she might not hesitate and be at a loss for words when her little audience clustered breathlessly around her. 'The dear lady'—that was the name by which they learned to call her.
And then it began to be spring once more—the spring of a northern climate, when Nature gradually wakens from her rigid sleep, when the first early blossoms and the first returning birds—those timid evangels of quickening life—thrill the air with messages, which the heart understands but does not put into words.
It was one day early in April. The air had lost its barbarous keenness. The sun shone as if it was getting warm. There were dun-coloured clouds over part of the sky, but between them a wistful azure showed itself, and on the tall, slender birch in the Thiergarten that was opposite Stella's sitting-room a swallow and some linnets were carolling as if they were bent on being marked as the first choristers of the season. Stella had returned from a visit to one of the museums with Professor Kellwitz, and sat by the window as she had entered, in her sealskin coat and toque. As they returned they met Langdale, and he accompanied them as far as the Pension Eisengau. The incident had brought back the first day they met in Berlin with startling distinctness. They had exchanged few words beyond the ordinary salutations. Mrs. Kellwitz and Stella were often together, but she and Langdale met seldomer, and but for a few minutes. Yet these accidental brief meetings surrounded the day on which they took place with an aureole. Stella now sat with lips slightly parted, her hands folded in her lap, looking fixedly before her with a half-startled, dawning sort of expression. Ritchie entered at that moment, and was struck with the air of vividness in her face.
'Why, Stella, you will soon be quite yourself again,' he said, leaning against the mantelpiece near where she sat.
The colour slowly deepened in her cheeks, and she took off her toque.
He suddenly stooped over her, and touched her forehead with his lips. She started as if she were stung. 'You must not do that,' she said, in a peremptory tone.
He was deeply wounded, and drew back, looking at her with a startled expression. 'Perhaps I had better not come into the same sitting-room you are in,' he said, in a rougher voice than he had ever used to her before. A look of cold displeasure settled on her face, but she said nothing.
'While you were so ill,' he went on in a gentler tone, 'and seemed more miserable if I were about, I kept out of the way. Then, as you got better you were kinder to me; you sometimes drove out with me, and let me do things for you. But now again you hardly speak to me once in two days; and as for laughing or joking——' He noticed a look almost akin to terror creeping into her face, and stopped abruptly. 'Forgive me, Stella, if I have been rough,' he said after a little.
Stella had rung the bell, and when Maisie came in she gave her her toque and coat to put away, and asked for her writing-desk. Before she returned an answer to Ted's apology there was a tap at the door, and Mrs. Farningham came in.