Harvey could not forbear to indulge a glance through the flaming windows as he drew near the house. He noted, a little ruefully it must be said, that almost every gentleman guest was attired after the conventional fashion he had predicted; but a moment's reasoning repelled any threatening embarrassment with scorn. Pressing bravely on, he had soon deposited his hat and coat, and after a minute or two of waiting in the dressing-room began his descent of the stairs to mingle with the animated scene.
Looking down, one of the first to be descried was David Borland himself, as blithe and cheerful as though he were beginning, rather than concluding, his sojourn in the spacious house. He was chatting earnestly with Dr. Fletcher, interrupting the conversation now and then to greet some new-arriving guest. Near him was his wife, absorbed in the pleasant duty of receiving the steadily increasing throng who were to taste for the last time the hospitality for which that home had long been famous.
But all others, and there were many whom Harvey recognized at a glance, were soon forgotten as his eyes rested on one whose face, suddenly appearing, filled all the room with light. For Madeline was making her way into the ample hall, flushed and radiant; her brow, never so serene before, was slightly moistened from the evening's warmth, while the wonderful hair, still bright and sunny, glistened in the softly shaded light. Aglow with excitement, her cheeks seemed to boast a colour he had never seen before, the delicate pink and white blending as on the face of childhood; and the splendid eyes, crowning all, were suffused with feeling. The significance of the hour and the animation of the scene united to create a sort of chastened mirthfulness, brimming with dignity and hope, yet still revealing how seriously she recognized the vicissitude time had brought, how well she knew the import of the change already at the door.
Harvey stood still on the landing, gazing down unobserved, his eyes never turning from the face whose beauty seemed to unfold before him as he stood. Yet not mere beauty, either—he did not think of beauty, nor would he have so described what charmed him with a strange thrill he had never owned before—but the rich expression, rather, of an inward life that had deepened and mellowed with the years. Great sense was there, for one thing—and in the last appeal this feature of womanhood is irresistible to a truly manly heart; and her face spoke of love, large and generous, as if the weary and the troubled would ever find in her a friend; cheerfulness, courage, hope, the dignity of purity, the sweetness that marks those who have been cherished but not pampered and indulged but not petted, all combined to provide a loveliness of countenance that fairly ravished his heart as he peered through spreading palms upon the unconscious face beneath.
Yet the joy he felt was not unmingled. For he could see, as a moment later he did see, that other eyes were turned with equal ardour in the same direction as his own. Madeline's appearance was a kind of triumphal entry; and there followed her, willing courtiers, two or three of the gallants of the place, whose function it evidently was to bear the glorious groups of flowers that various admirers had sent. Harvey's face darkened a little as he noted that Cecil was among them; though, to tell the truth, his seemed the most careless gaze of all—if admiration marked it, it was hungry admiration and nothing more. But the flowers he was carrying were pure; he had asked leave to carry them—and they themselves could not protest, shrink as they might from the unfitting hand. Others, nobler spirits, had burdens of equal fragrance, all fresh and beautiful as became the object of their homage.
Slowly Harvey moved down the stairs. The proprieties were forgotten—all else as well—as he passed Mr. and Mrs. Borland by, the one glancing at him with obvious admiration, the other with impatient questioning. He was standing close in front of Madeline before she knew that he was there at all; suddenly raising her head as she turned from speaking with a friend, the soulful eyes fell full on his. She did her best—but the tides of life are strong and willful, and this one overswept the swift barrier she strove to interpose, as straws are swept before a storm. And the flood outpoured about him, surging as it smote the passion that leaped to meet it, the silent tumult beating like sudden pain on heart and ears and eyes, its mingled agony and rapture engulfing him till everything seemed to swim before him as before a drunken man.
What voices silent things possess! And how God speaks through dull inanimate creatures as by the living lips of love! And what tell-tale tongues have the most trivial things to peal out life's holiest messages! For he saw—dimly at first and with a kind of shock, then clearly and with exultant certainty—he saw what was in her hand. It was only a bunch of simple flowers; but they were sorry looking things compared to their rivals whose fragrance filled the air, and the languor of death was upon them—yes, thank God, their bloom was faded, their freshness gone. For he recognized them, he knew them; and in the swift foment of his mind he even saw again the hard commercial face of the man from whom he had bought them, again the hard spared coins he had extracted from the poor total his poverty had left him, his heart the while leaping within him as though it could stand imprisonment no more. Dimly, vaguely, he saw behind her the noble clusters that other hands had sent—but other hands than hers were bearing them—and his were in her own, in the one that was bared in careless beauty as her glove hung indifferent from the wrist, unconscious of all that had displaced it. Careless observers had doubtless noted the dying flowers, marvelled mayhap; they knew not how instinct they were with life, how fadeless against the years their memory was to sweeten and enrich.
He stood silent a moment with his hand half-outstretched, his eyes divided between the flowers beneath and the face above. His soul outpoured itself through them in a riot of joy he had neither desire nor power to restrain. Madeline stood like some lovely thing at bay, her eyes aglow, their message half of high reproach and half of passionate welcome.
"You told me you weren't coming," she said in protesting tones, the words audible to no one but himself; "and I didn't expect you," her lips parted, her breath coming fast and fitfully, as though she were exhausted in the chase. Her radiant face was glorified—she knew it not—by the rich tides of life that leaped and bounded there, disporting themselves in the hour they had awaited long. Yet her whole attitude was marked by a strange aloofness, the wild air of liberty that is assumed by captive things; and her voice was almost controlled again as she repeated her remark.
"You said you weren't coming;" the words voiced an interrogative.