Yes, of course, she had always had a train of men after her, and the fact that she remained unmarried showed either that she had no heart—or—sometimes a wild thought had crossed Thorndyke’s mind—suppose Constance Maitland still remembered him? This thought, coming into his head, set his heart to pounding like a steam-engine while Crane talked on.
“That woman epitomises the charm of Washington life to me. First, she is unlike any woman I ever saw before; that is in itself a charm. Then, she has an environment; that, too, is new to me. I went to see her four times last winter.” Then he mentioned where she lived. “Her parlour—I mean drawing-room—was nothing compared with the others I’d been in here, but it was distinctive. It wasn’t furnished from bric-à-brac shops and art-sale catalogues. All the antiques came from her own family—all the miniatures and portraits were her own kinsfolk. And, after having lived in Europe for twenty years, as she told me—because she doesn’t mind mentioning dates—and having seen more of European society than one American woman in ten thousand, she loves and admires her own country, and came back here to live the first minute she was free. That struck me all of a heap, because, though you wouldn’t judge so from my Fourth of July speeches at Circleville, I should think that Europe would be something between Washington and Paradise.”
“You haven’t been there yet,” was Thorndyke’s response to this. And then Crane proceeded to tell a story which Thorndyke knew by heart.
“It seems, so I heard from other people, she was brought up by an old crank of an aunt, who had married a Baron Somebody-or-other in Germany. This old feminine party tried to make Constance marry some foreign guy, and when she wouldn’t, the old lady, in a rage, made a will, giving all she had to Constance on condition that she did not marry an American. It was thought the old lady wasn’t exactly in earnest, but unluckily she died the week after, and so the will stands—and that’s why Con—Miss Maitland never married, I guess.”
Just then a band came blaring down the street, followed by the usual crowd of negroes, dancing, shouting, and grimacing along the sidewalk, and looking weird in the high lights and black shadows of the night. Crane, to whom the negroes had never ceased to be a raree show, got up and went to the window, whistling the air the band played; meanwhile Thorndyke lay back in his chair trying to get used to the knowledge that Constance Maitland had been in Washington months and he had not known it. There was a prologue to the story just told by Crane—and Crane had no suspicion of this prologue. A young American of good birth but slender fortune—himself, in fact—was the primary cause of the old Baroness von Hesselt’s remarkable will. It was he whom the old lady held responsible for Constance Maitland’s flat refusal to marry the son of an imperial privy councillor with seven points to his coronet. Oh, those days at the Villa Flora on Lake Como—those days that come only in youth, when the whole world seems young! When, from the terrace, Constance and himself watched the sunset trembling in the blue lake and making another heaven there! And those starlit nights when Constance and himself were in a boat alone together, and she sang to her guitar for him, and he repeated verses from Childe Harold to her! They were both young and singularly innocent, and were deeply in love—of that Thorndyke could never doubt; and because they were young and innocent and in love with each other the old Baroness thought them the wickedest and most designing creatures on earth. She had spent all her life in Europe, had frankly married for a title, and wished Constance to do the same. The old Baron, a helpless invalid, was not reckoned in the equation.
The Baroness von Hesselt had acquired what many Americans who live abroad acquire—a spite against her own country. This was accentuated by the fact that she was a Southerner of the old régime, who hated liberty, equality, and fraternity from the bottom of her heart, and who instinctively realised her unfitness for America. She had also forgotten a good deal about it, and thought a very effective way to keep Constance from marrying Thorndyke or any other American was to cut her off from a fortune in that event. The will was made, and the old Baroness proclaimed it loudly for a week. At the end of that time the gentleman on the pale horse unexpectedly summoned her. There was but one thing for any man to do in Geoffrey Thorndyke’s circumstances, and that was, to go far away from Constance Maitland. No definite words or promises had passed between them, but unless eyes and tones of the voice, and all sweet, unutterable things are liars, they were pledged to one another.
Thorndyke, being in those days a very human youngster, hoped that Constance would send him a line—a word—and doubted not for a moment that his love would make up to her for a fortune. But no line or word ever came. As years went on Thorndyke reached the sad knowledge that modern life requires something more than bread and cheese and kisses, and felt a sense of relief that it had not been in his power to take Constance Maitland’s fortune from her with only love to give in return. But this knowledge did not make him content. On the contrary, year by year had her memory become more poignant to him. It was that which had made him throw himself with all his being and equipment into public life. It was that which made him tender to all innocent, sweet women like Annette Crane—innocent, sweet women brought back to him something of his lost love. He knew she had never married, but all else concerning her was a blank to him. He was consumed with a desire to ask Crane something about her—all about her—but he had noted instantly that in Crane’s eye and voice was a manner which revealed a dangerous interest in Constance Maitland; and Thorndyke was held back and urged forward to speak of her.
The band passed on, the street once more grew quiet, and Crane returned to his seat. Thorndyke smoked savagely to keep from mentioning Constance Maitland’s name. Crane did likewise with the same motive, but having less self-control than Thorndyke he could not but hark back to the ticklish subject.
“So you say you knew Miss Maitland?”
“Yes. A long time ago.”