Antony heard the words throughout the day, and they haunted him—c'est dommage. Barye's voice had been light, but the sculptor knew the underlying ring in it. There is, indeed, no greater pity than for a man of talent not to work. That day he lunched with her on the terrace of her hotel overlooking the rose garden. Fairfax ate scarcely anything. Below his eyes spread a parterre of perfect purple heliotropes. The roses were beginning to bloom on their high trees, and the moist earth odours from the garden he had thought so exquisite came to him delicately on the warm breeze. But this day the place seemed oppressive, shut in by its high iron walls. In the corner of the garden, the gardener, an old man in blue overalls, bent industriously over his potting, and to Antony he seemed the single worthy figure. At the table he was surrounded by idlers and millionaires. He judged them bitterly to-day, brutally and unreasonably, and hastily looked toward Mrs. Faversham, his future life's companion, hoping that something in her expression or in her would disenchant him from the growing horror that was threatening to destroy his peace of mind. Mary Faversham was all in white; from her ears hung the pearls given her by her husband, whom she had never loved; around her neck hung a creamy rope of pearls; she was discussing with her neighbour the rising value of different jewels. It seemed to them both a vital and interesting subject.
It was the end of luncheon; the fragrance of the strawberries, the fragrance of the roses came heavily to Antony's nostrils.
His aunt, the Comtesse Potowski, sat at his right. She was saying—
"My dear boy, when are you going to be married? There is nothing like a happy marriage, Tony. A woman may have children, you know, and be miserable; she has not found the right man. I hope you will be very happy, Tony."
Some one asked her to sing, and Madame Potowski, languid, slim, with unmistakable distinction, rose to play. She suggested his mother to Antony. She sang selections from the opera then in vogue. Tony stood near the piano and listened. Her voice always affected him deeply, and as he had responded to it in the old days in New York he responded now, and there was a sense of misery at his heart as he listened to her singing the music of old times when he had been unable to carry out his ideals because of his suffering and poverty.
There was now a sense of soul discontent, of pitiless remorse. As if again to disenchant himself, he glanced at Mary as she, too, listened. Back of her in the vases were high branches of lilac, white and delicate, with the first beauty of spring; she sat gracefully indolent, smoking a cigarette, evidently dreaming of pleasant things. To Antony there was a blank wall now between him and his visions. How unreal everything but money seemed, and his soul stifled and his senses numbed. In this atmosphere of riches and luxury what place had he? Penniless, unknown, his stature stunted—for it had been dwarfed by his idleness. Again he heard Barye say, "C'est dommage."
His aunt's voice, bright as silver, filled the room. He believed she was singing for him expressly, for she had chosen an English ballad—"Roll on, silvery moon." Again, with a sadness which all imaginative and poetic natures understand, his present slipped away. He was back in Albany in the cab of his engine; the air bellied in his sleeve, the air of home whipped in his veins—he saw the fields as the engine flashed by them, whitening under the moonlight as the silvery moon rolled on! How
he had sweated to keep himself a man, how he had toiled to keep his hope up and to live his life well, what a fight he had made in order that his visions might declare themselves to him!
When his aunt ceased to sing and people gathered around her, Tony rose and limped over to Mrs. Faversham. He put out his hand.