Marie-Aimée's ghost-seeing eyes became fixed upon nothingness. She sat so a long time, her chin dropped in dolorous absorption; a figure which struck discomfort in the beholder. Another woman buying music bent over the counter and whispered to the clerk, who whispered back, and both stole glances at the unconscious, rigid, dumpy profile, stamped with tragedy, of the well-known pianiste, whose most intimate sorrow had become town-talk.
She went out at last into the hubbub of the streets, which seemed a cruelty of men, under the gorgeous sunset sky, which seemed a cruelty of Heaven's, and, as much as a great heaviness would allow, hurried home and to bed and the dark. It was no use! no use! Though Tony's conduct to her admitted of the face she had put on it to Miss Cheriton, and though the world's jury, upon full evidence, might have acquitted him, he not being the last shade of black, she herself knew, and something of incorruptible justice in the bottom of her heart would not let her blink it, that she had been badly, badly treated. But that was not the most woeful, that she should have been badly treated, or that she must live her days hereafter without him; but that he, Tony, should have been capable of doing this thing to her, to her, who would have shed her blood for him, and he knew it.
In the days following, as she went about her crowded occupations, she did not, as she had allowed herself to do before, seek relief in speaking of what weighed upon her heart. But human strength did not suffice to keep the matter out of her face; her cheek was leaden, her eyes were in a fog.
But it was useless now, her avoiding Anthony Bronson's name. She had spoken too much before. Besides, too many remembered the soft, radiant, enamored face with which she had been used to beam up at him in those earliest days after their return from touring, and down upon which he had benignantly beamed, like a big, gratified idol. Furthermore, this gossip concerning persons so well known had too many of the elements which ensure a thing being repeated till everyone knows. Reports of "scenes" made by Marie-Aimée were still spreading after she had placed the seal upon her lips; and those who got them last did not know that they were old news; and as it was the least interested in her personally who last became au fait of her affairs, some among them took the view that little Nevers was disgracing herself; which sentiment once in the air, certain of Marie-Aimée's closer friends saw the matter more nearly in that light, experienced a reaction from too complete sympathy with her. One heard it said with a touch of impatience, "Some one ought to talk to Marie-Aimée!" Even those who loved her most, this, as it seemed, insistent and protracted harping upon an unfortunate attachment at last came near disgusting. And she did receive scoldings and lectures, of which she abjectly owned the justice; and she tried to keep herself more out of sight. Only so far as the necessity to earn a living made it imperative did she go about. Wherefore some whose invitations she refused said, "Nevers is moping. It is a pity she can't behave like the rest who have to suffer from the fickleness of man!"
A critical, less friendly attitude of the world toward her was beginning at last, through her dismal preoccupation, to penetrate her heart with its novel chill, and make the city where she had always lived seem not like home any more. She looked about, bewildered, for escape. The day of the Bronson-Cheriton wedding, too, was close at hand; but before it had arrived, there descended upon her from a distance a stern older married sister, whom rumors at last had aroused.
No one saw Marie-Aimée after the coming of this sister. To everyone's astonishment, in the busiest time of the season, Marie-Aimée's rooms were empty of her. It was thought that the sister had carried her off to keep her under surveillance: till it became known from Marie-Aimée herself, writing to her old friends, that she was in a convent of the Sacred Heart, hundreds of miles removed, and there proposed to remain until she had become free from the faintest taint of the folly that had made her a scandal and a laughing-stock,—yes, if she remained there until she died. Her time was profitably spent in study, and the giving of piano-lessons to the young girls receiving their education in the holy house. And she enjoyed the inestimable privilege, accorded to her by the Mother Superior, of weeping as much as she pleased.
II
To that little portion of the busy world-in-general which concerned itself with her, one may be sure it seemed very soon after her disappearance that it began to be said Nevers might be looked for again. Already? Yet, when one had grumbled that love, after all, does not last very long, he made calculations, and these told him that three years and more had slipped past since the tragico-comic retreat of the poor crossed-in-love. Certainly, something may be expected of three years.
She was really coming back? There was excitement. She was coming, no longer any doubt of it; there was glee, there was expanding of the heart. She was come; there was a rush to see her. Affection accounted for much of this; for the rest, curiosity to see the result of her three years. But when she had been seen, delight knew no reserve; each felt as if he had won a bet.
A movement arose, as a breeze comes up, and gradually gained force, till it resulted in a concert given for Marie-Aimée, a testimony of the regard felt for her, and the joy at her return. The occasion was made a magnificent one; the house was crowded, and contained such a proportion of personal friends of Marie-Aimée that the affair took the character of a huge family festivity. But the applause resounding when Marie-Aimée herself appeared to perform her little task at the piano was in excess of all the rest. In the sound, in the faces, in the air, one felt "How she is beloved!"