Yet all this time Fannie might be dying, and her child perishing for want—every moment was precious beyond price!
Phædra sought her master's presence, and pleaded with him—pleaded by her long years of faithful service; by her devoted care of him in his feeble infancy; by the days of his childhood, when he and Valentine were playmates; by all the long years, as boys and as men, those two had passed together, inseparable companions, until the marriage of each; by her own devoted attachment to them; by his love for his own wife; by every sweet affection and holy thought, to have compassion on her son, his own foster-brother, and let him go and minister to his sick—probably his dying wife. Phædra pleaded with more eloquence, but with not more success, than the others.
Some substances melt under the action of water—others, in the same element, turn to stone. Instead of melting Mr. Waring's obduracy seemed to ossify under the effects of tears and entreaties. He told Phædra, firmly, that he did not mean to gratify one man at the hazard of exposing many to contagion. And at the dinner-table, speaking partly in justification of his own line of conduct, and partly in apology for the manner in which he had met Mrs. Waring's intercession of the morning, he said:
"You emphasize this matter too much, madam; this Fannie is, after all, but one sufferer among thousands; you also mistake in endowing these creatures with the same acuteness of feelings that we possess; there is a difference, madam! there is a difference! I wish I could make people understand that there is a difference; neither Valentine nor Phædra seem to have the slightest conception of this difference."
"I must confess that in that respect I share their obtusity," remarked madam, while Mr. Waring, in apparent self-satisfaction, went on with his dinner.
But was he really satisfied with himself? Who shall answer?
Meantime, Valentine wandered about, consumed with sorrow and anxiety. Doubtless, he would have run away and endeavored to reach the town, but he knew how carefully the avenues thither were guarded, and how desperate was the attempt that he had already thrice before made to elude the police. It would involve a loss of several hours to make the attempt, which, if it should fail, as it was altogether likely to do, would entirely preclude him from all possible chance of seeing Fannie; therefore he thought best to make another appeal to his master before taking the last desperate step. He knew by experience that the hour after dinner always found Oswald Waring in his best humor.
It was then that he sought him.
He found him—not, as before, walking in the front piazza, where the afternoon sun was now shining, but reclining on a settee on the back piazza that was now in the shade. He lay languidly fanning himself with one hand, while he held a pamphlet that he was reading in the other. Valentine had resolved not to provoke him by any hasty words, as he had used in the morning. He resolved to govern his own spirit, to approach his master respectfully, humbly. He did so.
"Master Oswald!"