"How could you!" he repeated with intense emphasis. All that part of his life seemed vague and far away as though he had dreamed it in some prehistoric period of his existence. It refused to take the hues and proportion of reality. Yes, that was nothing but a wild fantastic dream—the sort of dream from which one wakes with a wretchedly bad taste in the mouth. This rare girl, with the flower-like curves and colours, was the only reality. And yet, was she reality? Her dress, wreathed flame-like from warm white shoulders to satin shod feet, lay in rich glowing lengths upon the waxed and polished floor. Her beautiful head, too heavily weighted with braids and coils of raven blackness, swayed slumberously upon the dainty white neck, and he could not tell whether he better liked to see the dark lashes lying upon her cheeks or uplifted to reveal the magical eyes beneath. He was very much in love. The soft intoxicating strains of music went to his head like wine. He was powerless to struggle against the thrilling illusion of the hour. When the others returned to their seats or promenaded the brilliant rooms they escaped alone and unobserved into the conservatory. Here they beheld the greatest possible contrast to the desolate wintry waste without. The air was heavy and languorous with the odour of tropic flowers. The music, almost oppressive in the crowded parlours, melted deliciously upon the ear as they wandered away. Helene, when she noticed that they were quite alone, suffered a vague alarm. She told herself in one moment that it was not possible that Edward would choose this opportunity for a formal declaration of his love, and the next moment she reminded herself that impossible things are the ones that frequently come to pass. The idea, like an ill-shaped burden, pressed uncomfortably upon her.
A maiden's heart, like a summer night, knows and loves its own secret. All through the mysterious deep hours of sleep it holds the secret closely wrapped in darkness, pure as the dew on the grass, innocent as the little leaves in the forest, glorious as the countless stars of heaven. Some time, and soon enough, the dawn will come. Then the stars will pale before a glory more intense, the countless little leaves, like delicate human emotions, will wake and stir, and the white mists of maidenliness will be warmed with heavenly radiance. But after sunrise comes the day—the long prosaic day of duty and denial, of work and its rewards, of sober, plain realities. Why should the night of mystery and beauty hasten towards the common light? Her being thrilled under the first faint approaches of the dawn, and yet—yet a little longer, oh, ardent, impetuous, all-conquering Sun! It seemed as though the girl's very soul were pleading. The rich-hued, fragrance-laden flowers in the sweet dim place bent their heads to listen, but her impassioned lover paid no heed to the unspoken prayer. The sense of her beauty—of her unsurpassable charm, mingled with the voluptuous music—pierced his heart with insupportable pain. Could she not feel his unuttered love? Her lily-like face was cool and pale, but in that warm-coloured robe it seemed as though her very body blushed. In leaning over to reach a peculiar flower that attracted her attention, a little wave of her gown rested upon his knee, and it seemed to his infatuated vision that the insensate fabric throbbed as well as glowed from the momentary contact. Helene kept up a continual flow of small talk, of which he heard not a syllable. Rising hurriedly, her long train caught in a low branch that stretched across the walk, and he bent to extricate it.
"How is it that you dare to touch the hem of my garment?" she demanded laughingly.
"Oh, I can dare more than that," he cried. The conviction that she loved him, as indeed she did, gave him a sort of desperate courage. He took her in his arms and held her close, kissing her passionately on lips and eyes and soft white shoulders. She neither moved nor spoke, but stood, when he released her, confronting him with a sort of frigid, fascinated stare. "Oh, what have I done? Helene," he exclaimed tremblingly. "I thought you loved me."
"I?" she questioned with haughty disdain, "love?" she demanded with incredulous contempt, "you?"
The concentrated fires of her wrath and scorn were heaped upon this final monosyllable. Every word was a fierce insulting interrogation. Surely the traditional "three sweet words" had never before been uttered with such tragic effect. She stood before him a living statue of outraged pride, clothed in a fiery robe of righteous indignation; then she turned and passed out of his sight, leaving the young man to his reflections.
They were bitter enough in all truth. He still cared for Helene, he loved her as he loved himself. But it is only fair to add that he held himself in the very smallest estimation. He had acted like a drunken fool. How would he like any man alive to treat his little Rose in that style? But then she might have behaved reasonably about it. She had trampled on his heart, and left it sore and bruised and bleeding. Very well, he was not a child to cry out when he was hurt. He went back to the gay throng, and saw, as in a cruel dream, the girl who despised him scattering profuse smiles upon others. No matter! Nothing could possibly be of any importance now. Rose was making her way with some difficulty towards him. How wan and tired she looked. Was it possible that any one besides himself was suffering? The idea was absurd.
"Isn't it time for us to go, Edward?" she said. "Madame DeBerczy has invited our party to remain over to-morrow, but I promised papa not to desert him any longer than was strictly necessary." Edward found the proposition a most welcome one. They could not leave Oak Ridges too soon, nor remain away from it too long.
His sister's drooping little figure attracted the attention of Helene. "Do you talk of going?" Helene asked. "Well, so you shall go—to bed; and the very first bed we come to." She bent caressingly over the little golden head of her friend. Their beautiful arms were interlinked. Rose glanced irresolutely at her brother.
"You will need to put on the extra wraps you brought," he said, "as it is particularly cold at this hour of the morning." Helene was ignored utterly. He did not seem to know that she was present. The proud girl was wounded to the quick. She was not visible at their leave-takings. When every one was gone she went away upstairs, telling herself at every step that she hated, hated, Edward Macleod; that he was in all things and in every way detestable. She did not weep nor bewail. The tears showed as seldom in her eyes as the blood in her cheeks, and her pride was of the inflexible sort that scorns to relax when its possessor is alone. She dropped into a heavy troubled sleep, and dreamed that she was solitary in a frozen land, whose only sunshine was the golden head of her lover. In the strange fantastic manner of dreams he seemed to be a very little child, whose light warm weight lay along her arms, close to the heart above which he had pressed those burning kisses. It was bitter cold; but the whole scene was like a picture of winter. She could not feel it—she could feel nothing but the aching of her own heart, the warm breath growing ever warmer, and the clinging hands, clinging ever closer, of the child she loved. The sense of delicious languor changed to a feeling of heaviness—almost suffocation. Every golden hair of the head upon her breast pierced her like a ray of brightest sunshine. Hastily putting him from her she fled away with the wintry winds, herself as wild and swift and soulless as they. But presently coming to look for the child, and unable to find him, she realized that he was lost, and then she woke, trembling with deep, tearless sobs.