The delight and relief this telegram induced, the subtle sensation of hope and flattery, not only routed torpidity, but lashed her into such a state of fury that she ran up to her bedroom and indulged in an attack of nerves. When it was over she faced the truth with the unshrinking clarity of vision she could summon at will. But if she was not as astonished as she thought she ought to be, she was no less angry, not only with herself, but with life for playing her such a trick. Less than ever did she want to marry, and cease to be wholly herself, to run the risk of disillusionment and weariness, and that ultimate philosophy which was no compensation for the atrophy and death of imagination. But no less did she turn appalled from the thought of a future without Gwynne. All her old vague plans were suddenly formless, and she felt that if she even faced the prospect of regarding the shifting beauties of the Rosewater marsh for the rest of her life, she would hate nature as much as she now hated her treacherous self. And none could divine better than she, that, present or dismissed, when a man has conquered a woman's invisible and indefensible part she might as well give him the rest. He is in control. She has lost her freedom for ever. So strong was the feeling of mental possession that Isabel glanced uneasily about the room, half-expecting to see the soul of Gwynne; wondering inconsequently if it would descend to notice that her eyes were red. But she vowed passionately that she would not marry him. If she had to be unhappy, far better unhappy alone and free, with some of her illusions undispelled. She had seen no married happiness that she envied, even where there was a fine measure of love and philosophy. Even Anabel had come to her one day in town, looking rather strained and worn, and, in the seclusion of Isabel's bedroom, had confessed that the constant exactions of a husband, three children, and migratory servants "got on her nerves," and made her long for a change of any sort. "And there are so many little odd jobs, in a house full of children," she had added, with a sigh. "And they recur every day. You can no more get away from them than from your three meals; I never really have a moment I can call my own. Of course I am perfectly happy, but I do wish Tom were not in politics and would take me to Europe for a few years."

And if Anabel was not happy—wholly happy—with her supreme capacity for the domestic life, how could she hope to endure the yoke? She with her impossible ideals and theories? Not that they were impossible; but to anticipate, in this world, the plane upon which the more highly endowed natures dared to hope they were to dwell in the next, absolute freedom was necessary. Isabel's theory of life—for women of her make—had not altered a whit, but the beckoning finger had lost its vigor. That left her with no material out of which to model a future for this plane—which, of course, was another triumph to the credit of the race.

She knew that Gwynne had conquered, that she had really loved him, as soon as he had ceased to play upon her maternal instincts. She had casually assumed at the time that her interest in him was decreasing, but in this day of retrospect, she realized keenly that it had marked the opening of a new chapter. This was, perhaps, the most signal of Gwynne's victories, for the maternal tenderness for man means maternal dominance, a cool sense of superiority. Isabel was so conscious of Gwynne's mastery that she longed to kick him as she blushed to recall she had done once before. She rubbed her arms instinctively, as if she still felt the furious pressure of his fingers, and when the memory of another sort of pressure abruptly presented itself she hurreedly bathed her eyes and went out on her horse.

VII

For a week she was so moody and irascible that Abraham twice gave warning, Old Mac artfully took to his bed with rheumatism, and only the inexcitable Chuma was unconcerned. She rode her horse nearly to death, snubbed Anabel—whose children were down with the measles—over the telephone, and even boxed the ears of a dilatory hen. At the end of the week a sudden appreciation of her likeness to a cross old maid frightened her, and time and the weather completed the cure. Her ill-humor, which had scourged through every avenue of her being, took itself off so completely that it seemed to announce it had had enough of her and would return no more.

And the spring came with a rush. The hills burst into buttercups, "blue eyes," yellow and purple lupins, the heavy pungent gold-red poppy. The young green of weeping willows and pepper-trees looked indescribably delicate against the hard blue sky. Rosewater was a great park, all her little squares and gardens, and long rambling streets, set thick with camellias, roses, orange-trees heavy with fruit, immense acacia-trees loaded with fragrant yellow powdery blossoms. Main Street was clean again, and so were the farmers and their teams at the hitching-rails; the girls were beginning to wear white at church on Sunday, and to walk about without their hats. The great valley was as green as the hills, save where the earth had been turned, and one or two almond orchards were so pink they could be seen a mile away. It was spring in all its glory, without a taint of summer's heat, or a lingering chill of winter.

In Isabel's garden were many old Castilian rose bushes, that for fifty years had covered themselves pink with the uninterrupted lustiness of youth; and their penetrating, yet chaste and elusive fragrance, combined with the rich heavy perfume of the acacia-tree beside the house, would have inspired a distiller and blender of scents. The birds sang as if possessed of a new message; and several of Isabel's prize roosters, tired of their old harems, flew over the wire-fences and strutted off in search of adventure, proclaiming their route by loud and boastful clamor. When they were captured by the unsympathetic Abe and restored to their excited ladies, they flew at and smacked them soundly, then tossed back their red combs and crowed with all their might: a pæan to the ever conquering male.

There were other flowers besides Castilian roses in Isabel's garden, haphazardly set out and cared for, but the more riotous and luxuriant for that. And all around her, save on the Leghorns' hills, was the gay delicate tapestry of the wild flowers. The marsh glittered like bronze in the sunlight. In the late afternoon it was as violet as the hills. In the evening afterglows it swam in as many colors as the Roman Campagna. At this hour the sky was often as pink as the almond orchards, melting above into a blue light but intense; while everything in its glow, the tall trees on the distant mountains, and the picturesque irregularities of the marsh-lands, seemed to lift up their heads and drink in the beauty until Isabel expected to see them reel.

And the pagan intoxication of spring took as complete a possession of her. She sat under the long drooping yellow sprays of her acacia-tree, her lap full of the pink Castilian roses, and dreamed. No one could help being in love in the spring, she concluded, given a concrete inspiration; and far be it from any creature so close to nature as herself to attempt to stem that insidious musical scented tide. It was possible that Gwynne would not return, or returning, would flout her; she hardly cared. In fact so steeped was she in the pleasures of merely loving, in a sweet if somewhat halcyon passion, that she had no wish that the mood should be dispelled; and felt that she could ask nothing more than to spend the rest of her mortal life with a beautiful memory—like the aunt whose dust lay over the mountain in the convent yard. She knew that if Gwynne returned and demanded her, she should be tempted to marry him—she never went so far as to promise either him or herself the rounded chapter; but one of the strongest instincts of her nature was to squeeze the passing moment dry, jealously drink every drop of its juice. She had no intention of tormenting herself with problematical futures. Futures took care of themselves, anyhow.