"But not for good, I hope," said Miss Brooke; and Paul's universe changed at once into a wonderful enchanted garden. "Of course, it will be very nice to be at home with poppa and mamma again, but I should not be leaving Paris from choice. I was making such progress at school that my professor was quite angry I couldn't stay. But perhaps I shall be back in a year's time. I certainly shall if everything goes well."
"I do hope it's nothing serious that calls you away, and that keeps you from your studies so long a time," exclaimed Paul fervently.
"From my point of view it's certainly serious," smiled Miss Brooke, good-humouredly. "As I've already tried to make you believe, I am a very greedy person, with a fondness for dollars, and the whole trouble is that they keep out of reach. Poor hardworked poppa can't send me any more money just now, but he'll be getting a bigger salary next year, and I shall be able to go back and paint a masterpiece for the Salon. In the meanwhile I shall have to amuse myself as best I can sketching about the place, and watching poppa getting through big batches of couples. He's a minister—you know the cloth's hereditary in our family—and marries off people wholesale."
Till that moment Miss Brooke had been the railway king's daughter. For Paul to find now that she was a comparatively poor girl, whose anxiety to earn money by making her mark in art was no mere jesting pretence, involved a complete readjustment of his mental focus. But its instantaneity made the operation a violent one, especially as he strove hard not to exhibit any external signs of discomposure. At the same time a good deal that had bewildered him was explained, though there were points yet on which he needed enlightenment. And with all his astonishment went an unbounded admiration for the cheerful way in which she accepted her position, the lover's keen lookout for every scrap of virtue in the beloved seizing on this greedily for commendation. What a splendid, plucky girl she was! The glamour of his romance was heightened. Mere millionaires and all that appertained to them seemed suddenly prosaic.
Into what a bizarre misconception had he fallen! She herself was not to blame. If his mind had not been clogged up by what Thorn had told him beforehand he would not so persistently have misunderstood her references to money; but how should he have thought of challenging what he knew only now to have been a mere speculative rumour? There had been nothing in her appearance and personality to belie that rumour, and, as obviously she was not called upon to contradict statements about herself she had never heard, such manifestations of the truth as had since become visible to him had only served to mystify him.
The way, too, she had taken certain things for granted as perfectly natural and proper, somewhat astonished him, to wit, her inviting him to call here, her reception of him in a bedroom, and his presence alone with her now. These facts contravened the ideas in which he had been brought up, and he could only suppose that American ideas probably differed from English. This surmise seemed, on the whole, corroborated by the glimpse he had had that day into the spirit of the American independent woman—a type entirely new to him—as exemplified both by Mrs. Potter and Miss Brooke.
He asked how soon she was leaving, and learnt she was sailing on the Saturday, so that barely two days of London remained to her. He did not like the idea at all, as he had formed the hope he might somehow see her again before her departure.
"My berth is taken," explained Miss Brooke, perhaps amused by his evident discontent. "Some boxes have gone on. Besides, I could not stay here any longer. Dollars are getting scarce. I'm going to have some more tea—won't you join me?"
"Willingly." He wanted to stay longer, and tea, by filling the time plausibly, would help to lessen his constraint at the original position in which he found himself.
"I am so pleased you were able to call!" went on Miss Brooke, as she poured out the beverage. "You haven't forgotten your promise to tell me all about your work—and your Utopia as well," she added, smiling, and handing him his cup.