“Not just yet. I prefer this twilight. Do you, Mr. Darley?”
“Very much—for itself. It is very satisfying and soothing, and always seems to me like a benediction. But it is very bad for your eyes, and very soon I shall be only able to half see your face.”
“Which will be very good for your eyes. Well, I have done work for today.” Miss Charteris laid the hood away, which Darley had been regarding curiously, and folded her hands in her lap. The action and the moment made Darley think of the “Angelus;” the “Angelus” made him think that it was getting late, and that made him think that it was time to go. The lamps, he said, had come round, and——
“No, sit down, unless you really want to go,” said Miss Charteris. She was remarkably frank, this young lady. “The lamps have not come round; and, on the contrary, I think that my disinclination for them should be taken as proof that I do not think it is time for you to go. Besides, the days are cruelly short now.”
“I find them so,” answered Darley, softly. “Leonard is making everything so comfortable for me that I do not know what I shall feel like when the curtain has rung down. It will seem like awaking suddenly from dreamland to cold earth again. I am sure I shall feel like one of those mountains falling into the sea of dullness that Poe describes: 'Mountains toppling evermore into seas without a shore.'”
“You seem a great admirer of Mr. Leonard,” ventured Miss Charteris. There was just the slightest suspicion of jealousy in her tone, which Darley did not notice. Was it because he had inadvertently attributed his loneliness at leaving to his friend's kindness, and not paid her that little tribute of homage which women love? But who knoweth the heart of woman? Darley longed to tell her why he should feel lonely when he came to say good-by; but he did not wish to garnish such a declaration with quotations from poets. Let a man speak from the inspiration of the moment when he tells his love, or hints at it.
“Admirer!” he echoed, in reply to Miss Charteris' remark. “It is more than that. Just think! We were inseparable for years. I wish we had remained so. No one who knows Jack Leonard as I have known him could help thinking him a perfect man, noble and generous, as he is!”
“We are one in that opinion,” answered Miss Charteris, quietly. “And, next to esteeming a noble man, I can esteem his friend who can speak so unselfishly and sincerely of him, as you have done.”
Darley felt touched—not so much at the words, but at the way in which they were spoken, gently, deeply, as if breathing of sincereness. But he did not distinguish anything beyond that in the grave eulogy to Leonard and himself.
At length the lights had to be brought in, and Darley rose to go.