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Page 86
Gwen's face was a study. In it surprise, fear, pain, and dismay,
each struggled for predominance. She tried to retain her
self-control while I was present, but it was all in vain. A moment
later she threw herself upon the sofa, and, burying her face in the
cushions, wept long and bitterly. I stole quietly away and sent
Alice to her, and after a time she regained her self-control, if
not her usual interest in affairs.
As day after day passed, however, and Maitland neglected to call,
transacting such business as he had through me, the shadow on
Gwen's face deepened, and the elasticity of manner, whereof she
had given such promise at Maitland's last visit, totally deserted
her, giving place to a dreamy, far-away stolidity of disposition
which I knew full well boded no good. I stood this sort of thing
as long as I could, and then I determined to call on Maitland and
give him a "piece of my mind."
I did call, but when I saw him all my belligerent resolutions
vanished. He was sitting at his table trying to work out some
complicated problem, and he was utterly unfitted for a single
minute's consecutive thought. I had not seen him for more than two
weeks, and during that time he had grown to look ten years older.
His face was drawn, haggard, and deathly pale.
"For Heaven's sake, George," I exclaimed, "what is the matter with
you?"
"I've an idea I'm spleeny," he replied with a ghastly attempt at a
smile. This was too much for me. He should have the lecture after
all. The man who thinks he is dying may be spleeny, but the man
who says he is spleeny is, of the two, the one more likely to be
dying.
"See here, old man," I began, "don't you get to thinking that when
you hide your own head in the sand no one can see the colour of
your feathers. You might as well try to cover up Bunker Hill
Monument with a wisp of straw. Don't you suppose I know you love
Gwen Darrow? That's what's the matter with you."
"Well," he replied, "and if it is, what then?"
"What then?" I ejaculated. "What then? Why go to her like a man;
tell her you love her and ask her to be your wife. That's what I'd
do if I loved--" But he interrupted me before I had finished the
lie, and I was not sorry, for, if I had thought before I became
involved in that last sentence, how I feared to speak to Jeannette
--well, I should have left it unsaid. I have made my living
giving advice till it has become a fixed habit.
"See here, Doc," he broke in upon me, "I do love Gwen Darrow as few
men ever love a woman, and the knowledge that she can never be my
wife is killing me. Don't interrupt me! I know what I am saying.
She can never be my wife! Do you think I would sue for her hand?
Do you think I would be guilty of making traffic of her gratitude?
Has she not her father's command to wed me if I but ask her, even
as she would have wed that scoundrel, Godin, had things gone as he
planned them? Did she not tell us both that she should keep her
covenant with her father though it meant for her a fate worse than
death? And you would have me profit by her sacrifice? For shame!
Love may wither my heart till it rustles in my breast like a dried
leaf, but I will never, never let her know how I love her. And see
here, Doc, promise me that you will not tell her I love her--nay,
I insist on it."
Thus importuned I said, though it went much against the grain, for
that was the very thing I had intended, "She shall not learn it
first through me." This seemed to satisfy him, for he said no more
upon the subject. When I went back to Gwen I was in no better frame
of mind than when I left her. Here were two people so determined
to be miserable in spite of everything and everybody that I sought
Jeannette by way of counter-irritant for my wounded sympathy.
Ah, Jeannette! Jeannette! to this day the sound of your sweet name
is like a flash of colour to the eye. You were a bachelor's first
and last love, and he will never forget you.
CHAPTER V
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