‘For all was as I say, and now the man
Lies as he once lay, breast to breast with God,’
the light shone in her eyes, and she said, ‘Oh, that is good and great; I shall get much out of him; I had always feared he was impossible.’ And ‘Paracelsus,’ too, stirred her; but when I recited the thrilling fragment, ‘Prospice,’ on to that closing rapturous cry—
‘Then a light, then thy breast,
O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again,
And with God be the rest!’—
the red colour faded from her cheek, her breath came in a sob, and she rose quickly and passed out without a word. Ever after, Browning was among her gods. But when we talked of music, she, adoring Wagner, soared upon the wings of the mighty Tannhauser, far above, into regions unknown, leaving me to walk soberly with Beethoven and Mendelssohn. Yet with all our free, frank talk, there was all the while that in her gentle courtesy which kept me from venturing into any chamber of her life whose door she did not set freely open to me. So I vexed myself about her, and when Mr. Craig returned the next week from the Landing where he had been for some days, my first question was—
‘Who is Mrs. Mavor? And how in the name of all that is wonderful and unlikely does she come to be here? And why does she stay?’
He would not answer then; whether it was that his mind was full of the coming struggle, or whether he shrank from the tale, I know not; but that night, when we sat together beside his fire, he told me the story, while I smoked. He was worn with his long, hard drive, and with the burden of his work, but as he went on with his tale, looking into the fire as he told it, he forgot all his present weariness and lived again the scenes he painted for me. This was his story:—
‘I remember well my first sight of her, as she sprang from the front seat of the stage to the ground, hardly touching her husband’s hand. She looked a mere girl. Let’s see—five years ago—she couldn’t have been a day over twenty three. She looked barely twenty. Her swift glance swept over the group of miners at the hotel door, and then rested on the mountains standing in all their autumn glory.
‘I was proud of our mountains that evening. Turning to her husband, she exclaimed: “O Lewis, are they not grand? and lovely, too?” Every miner lost his heart then and there, but all waited for Abe the driver to give his verdict before venturing an opinion. Abe said nothing until he had taken a preliminary drink, and then, calling all hands to fill up, he lifted his glass high, and said solemnly—
‘“Boys, here’s to her.”
‘Like a flash every glass was emptied, and Abe called out, “Fill her up again, boys! My treat!”