The old lady appeared not to hear him; her hands were holding the white shawl close round her neck, her eyes were following the long row of street lamps on the right. The horses, waiting with the carriage before the house, moved restlessly, and made their harness clink in the stillness. Far off, a cornet was playing, as cornets love to do, “Then you’ll remember me.” Beside her stood the young man watching. Behind, in the drawing-room, dimly lighted by the shaded lamp and candles, the others were talking, forgetful of everything but the subject that interested them. Cheap sentimental surrounding enough, but they all told on the old lady standing out on the balcony. The stars looking down on her lighted up the soft white about her throat, and the outline of the shawl-wrapped shoulders, almost youthful in their slenderness. Mr. Wimple went a little closer, the tears came into her eyes, they trickled down her withered cheeks, but he did not know it.
“It is like years ago,” she whispered, “those dear children and all—all—it carries me back to forty—more—eight-and-forty years ago, when I was a girl, and now I am old, I am old, it is the end of the world for me.”
He stooped and picked up the handkerchief with the lace border.
“No,” he said, “don’t say that. It is not the end; age is not counted by years, it is counted by other things;” and he coughed uneasily and waited as if to watch the effect of his speech before continuing. “In reality,” he went on, in the hard voice that would have jarred horribly on more sensitive nerves—“in reality I am older than you, for I have found the world so much colder than you can have done.” He said it with deliberation, as if each word were weighed, or had been learnt beforehand. “I wish you would teach me to live out of the abundance of youth that will always be yours.”
She listened attentively; she turned and looked towards her left, far ahead, away into the distance, as if puzzled and fascinated by it, almost as if she were afraid of the darkness to which the distance reached. Then she gave a little nod, as if she had remembered that it was only the trees of the Regent’s Park that made the blackness.
“If you would teach me to live out of the abundance of youth that will always be yours,” he said again, as if on consideration he were well satisfied with the sentence, and thought it merited a reply.
She listened attentively for the second time, and looked up half puzzled—
“I should esteem myself most fortunate, if I could be of use to any friend of Walter’s,” she answered, with an almost sad formality.
“You have so many who love you——” The voice was still hard and grating.
“No,” she said, “oh no——”