ANOTHER week slipped away. The weather changed. There was rain almost every day, and a persistent wind blew from the north-east. So the loggia of No. 43 Beekman Place was not much patronized. Nevertheless, Arthur heard Mrs. Lehmyl sing from time to time. When he would reach home at night, he generally ensconced himself near to a window at the front of the house; and now and then his vigilance was encouraged by the sound of her voice.

Hetzel, of course, ran him a good deal. He took the running very philosophically. “I admit,” he said, “that she piques my curiosity, and I don’t know any reason why she shouldn’t. Such a voice, joined to such beauty and intelligence, is it not enough to interest any body with the least spark of imagination? When are you going to call upon them?” But Hetzel was busy. “Examinations are now in full blast,” he pleaded. “I have no leisure for calling on any one.”

“‘It sometimes make a body sour to see how things are shared,’.rdquo; complained Arthur. “To him who appreciates it not, the privilege is given; whereas, from him who would appreciate it to its full, the privilege is withheld. I only wish I had your opportunity.”

Hetzel smiled complacently.

“And then,” Arthur went on, “not even an occasional encounter in the street. Every day, coming and going, I cherish the hope that we may meet each other, she and I. Living so close together, it would be but natural if we should. But I’m down in my luck. We might as well dwell at the antipodes, for all we gain by being near neighbors. Concede that Fate is deucedly unkind.”

“I don’t know about that,” said Hetzel, reflectively. “Perhaps Fate is acting for the best. My private opinion is that the less you see of that woman, the better for you. You’re a pretty susceptible young man; and those eyes of hers might play sad havoc with your affections.”

“That’s just the way with you worldly, practical, materialistic fellows. You can’t conceive that a man may be interested in a woman, without making a fool of himself, and getting spoony over her. You haven’t enough spiritualism in your composition to realize that a woman may appeal to a man purely on abstract principles.”

Hetzel laughed.

“You’re a cynic,” Arthur informed him.

“I don’t believe in playing with fire,” he retorted.

Thereafter their conversation drifted to other themes.

Well, the week glided by, and it was Sunday again; and with Sunday there occurred another change in the weather. The mercury shot up among the eighties, and the sky grew to an immense dome of blue. Sunday morning Hetzel said, “I suppose you haven’t forgotten that we are engaged to sup with Mrs. Berle this evening?” To which Arthur responded, yawning, “Oh, no; it has weighed upon my consciousness ever since you accepted her invitation.”

“I wouldn’t let it distress me so much, if I were you. And, by the way, don’t you think it would be well for us to take some flowers?”

“I suppose it would be a polite thing to do.”

“Then why don’t you make an excursion over to the florist’s on Third Avenue, and lay in an assortment?”

“You’re the horticulturist of this establishment. Go yourself.”

“No. Your taste is superior to mine. Go along. Get a goodly number of cut flowers, and then two or three nosegays for the ladies.”

“Ladies? What ladies?” demanded Arthur, brightening up. “Who is to be there, besides us and Mrs. Berle?”

“Oh, I don’t say that any body is. I thought perhaps one of her daughters, or a friend, or—”

“Well, maybe I’ll go over this afternoon. For the present—”

“This afternoon will be too late. The shops close early, you know, on Sunday.”

Arthur issued forth upon his quest for flowers.

What was it that prompted him, after the main purchase had been made, to ask the tradesman, “Now, have you something especially nice, something unique, that would do for a lady’s corsage?” The shopkeeper replied, “Yes, sir, I have something very rare in the line of jasmine. Only a handful in the market. This way, sir.”—Arthur was conducted to the conservatory behind the shop; and there he devoted a full quarter hour of his valuable time to the construction of a very pretty and fragrant bunch of jasmine. What was it that induced this action?

When he got back home and displayed his spoils to Hetzel, the latter said, “And this jasmine—I suppose you intend it for Mrs. Berle to wear, yes?” To which Arthur vouchsafed no response.

They went down stairs at six o’clock. Mrs. Berle was alone in her parlor. They had scarcely more than made their obeisance, however, when the door-bell rang; and presently the rustle of ladies’ gowns became audible in the hallway. Next moment the door opened—and Arthur’s heart began to beat at break-neck speed. Entered, Mrs. Hart and Mrs. Lehmyl.

“I surmised as much, and you knew it all the while,” Arthur gasped in a whisper to Hetzel.

His friend shrugged his shoulders.

The first clamor of greetings being over with, Arthur, his bunch of jasmine held fast in his hand, began, “Mrs. Lehmyl, may I beg of you to accept these little——”

“Oh, aren’t they delicious!” she cried, impulsively.

Her eyes brightened, and she bent over the flowers to breathe in their incense.

“But I mustn’t keep them all for myself,” she added.

“Oh, we are equally well treated,” said Mrs. Hart, flourishing a knot of Jacqueminot roses.

“Yes, indeed,” Mrs. Berle joined in, pointing to a table, the marble top of which was hidden beneath a wealth of variegated blossoms.

“Nevertheless,” said Mrs. Lehmyl. And she went on picking her bouquet to pieces. Mrs. Hart and Mrs. Berle received their shares; Hetzel his; and then, turning to Arthur, “Maintenant, monsieur” she said, with a touch of coquetry, “maintenant À votre tour.” She fastened a spray of jasmine to the lappel of his coat. In doing so, a delicate whiff of perfume was wafted upward from her hair. Whether it possessed some peculiar elixir-like quality, or not, I can not tell; but at that instant Arthur felt a thrill pierce to the very innermost of his heart.

“It is so warm,” said Mrs. Berle, “I thought it would be pleasant to take supper out of doors. If you are agreeable, we will go down to the backyard.”

In the back-yard the table was set beneath a blossoming peach-tree. The grass plot made an unexceptionable carpet. Honeysuckle vines clambered over the fence. The river glowed warmly in the light of the declining sun. The country beyond on Long Island lay smiling at the first persuasive touch of summer—of the summer that, ere long waxing fiercely ardent, was to scorch and consume it.

Mrs. Lehmyl looked around, with child-like happiness shining in her eyes. Arthur looked at her.

“Permit me to make you acquainted with my brother, Mr. Lipman,” said the hostess.

Mr. Lipman had a head that the Wandering Jew might have been proud of; snow-white hair and beard, olive skin, regular features of the finest Oriental type, and deep-set, coal-black eyes, with an expression in them—an anxious, eager, hopelessly hopeful expression—that told the whole story of the travail and sorrow of his race. He kissed the hands of the ladies and shook those of the gentlemen.

“Now, to the table!” cried Mrs. Berle.

The table was of appetizing aspect; an immaculate cloth, garnished by divers German dishes, and beautified by the flowers our friends had brought. Arthur’s chair was placed at the right of Mrs. Lehmyl’s. Conversation, however, was general from first to last. Hetzel contributed an anecdote in the Irish dialect, at which he was an adept. Arthur told of a comic incident that had happened in court the other day. Mrs. Lehmyl said she could not fancy any thing being comic in a courtroom—the atmosphere of a court-room sent such a chill to the heart, she should think it would operate as an anaesthetic upon the humorous side of a person. Mr. Lipman gave a few reminiscences of the Hungarian revolt of ’49, in which he had been a participant, wielding a brace of empty seltzer bottles, so he said, in default of nobler weapons. This led the talk up to the superiority of America over the effete monarchies of Europe. After a good deal of patriotism had asserted itself, a little criticism began to crop out. By and by the Goddess of Liberty had had her character thoroughly dissected. With the coffee, Mrs. Berle, who had heretofore shone chiefly as a listener, said, “Now, you young gentlemen may smoke, just as if you were three flights higher up.” So they lit their cigars—in which pastime Mr. Lipman joined them—and sat smoking and chatting over the table till it had grown quite dark. At last it was moved that the party should adjourn to the parlor and have some music. There being no Wagnerites present, Mrs. Lehmyl sang Jensen’s Lehn deine Wang, with so much fervor that two big tears gathered in Mr. Lipman’s eyes and rolled down his cheeks. Then, to restore gayety, she sang La Paloma, in the merriest way imaginable; and finally, to bring the pendulum of emotion back to its mean position, Voi chi Sapete from the “Marriage of Figaro.” After this there was an interim during which every body found occasion to say his say; and then Mrs. Berle announced, “My brother plays the ’cello. Now he must also play a little, yes?”

Mrs. Lehmyl was delighted by the prospect of hearing the ’cello played; and Mr. Lipman performed a courtly old bow, and said it would be a veritable inspiration to play to her accompaniment. Thereupon they consulted together until they had agreed upon a selection. It proved to be nothing less antiquated than Boccherini’s minuet. The quaint and graceful measures, wrung out from the deep-voiced ’cello, brought smiles of enjoyment to every face. “But,” says Arthur, “what pleased me quite as much as the music was to keep my eyes fixed on the picture that the two musicians presented; that old man’s wonderful countenance, peering out from behind the neck of his instrument, intent, almost fierce in its earnestness; and hers, pale, luminous, passionate, varying with every modulation of the tune. And all the while the scent of the jasmine bud haunted my nostrils, and recalled vividly the moment she had pinned it into my buttonhole.”—In deference to the demand for an encore, they played Handel’s Largo. Then Mrs. Berle’s maid appeared, bearing the inevitable wine and cakes. By and by Mrs. Hart began to make her adieux. At this, Arthur slipped quietly out of the room. When he returned, half a minute later, he had his hat in his hand. Mrs. Hart protested that it was quite unnecessary for him to trouble himself to see them home. “Why, it is only straight across the street,” she submitted. But Arthur was obstinate.

On her door-step, Mrs. Hart said, “We should be pleased to have you call upon us, Mr. Ripley.”

He and Hetzel sat up till past midnight, talking. The latter volunteered a good many favorable observations anent Mrs. Lehmyl. Arthur could have listened to him till daybreak.—In bed he had difficulty getting to sleep. Among other things, he kept thinking how fortunate it was that Peixada had disapproved of the trip to Europe. “Why, New York,” he soliloquized, “is by all means the most interesting city in the world.”

He took advantage of Mrs. Hart’s permission to call, as soon as he reasonably could. While he was waiting for somebody to appear, he admired the decorations of Mrs. Hart’s parlor. Neat gauze curtains at the windows, a rosy-hued paper on the wall, a soft carpet under foot, pretty pictures, pleasant chairs and tables, lamps and porcelains, and a book-case filled with interesting looking books, combined to lend the room an attractive, homelike aspect; for all of which, without cause, Arthur assumed that Mrs. Lehmyl was answerable. An upright piano occupied a corner; a sheet of music lay open on the rack. He was bending over it, to spell out the composer’s name, when he heard a rustling of silk, and, turning around, he made his bow to—Mrs. Hart.

Mrs. Hart was accompanied by her cats.

Arthur’s spirits sank.

“Ah, how do you do?” said Mrs. Hart. “I’m so glad to see you.”

She shook his hand cordially and bade him be seated. He sat down and looked at the ceiling.

“Why didn’t you bring your comrade, Mr. Hetzel?” she asked.

“Oh, Hetzel, he’s got an examination on his hands, you know, and has perforce become a recluse—obliged to spend his evenings wading through the students’ papers,” explained Arthur, in a tone of sepulchral melancholy.

Mrs. Hart tried to manufacture conversation. Arthur responded absent-mindedly. Neither alluded to Mrs. Lehmyl. Arthur, fearing to appear discourteous, endeavored to behave as though it was to profit by Mrs. Hart’s society alone that he had called. His voice, notwithstanding, kept acquiring a more and more lugubrious quality. But, by and by, when the flame of hope had dwindled to a spark, a second rustling of silk became audible. With a heart-leap that for a moment rendered him dumb, he heard a sweet voice say, “Good evening, Mr. Ripley.” He lifted his eyes, and saw Mrs. Lehmyl standing before him, smiling and proffering her hand. Silently cursing his embarrassment, he possessed himself of the hand, and stammered out some sort of a greeting. There was a magic about that hand of hers. As he touched it, an electric tingle shot up his arm.

All three found chairs. Mrs. Hart produced a bag of knitting. One of the cats established himself in Mrs. Lehmyl’s lap, and went to sleep. The other rubbed up against Arthur’s knee, purring confidentially. Arthur cudgeled his wits for an apt theme. At last he got bravely started.

“What a fine-looking old fellow that Mr. Lipman was,” he said. “It isn’t often that one sees a face like his in America.”

“No—not among the Americans of English blood; they haven’t enough temperamental richness,” acquiesced Mrs. Lehmyl.

“Yes, that’s so. The most interesting faces one encounters here belong to foreigners—especially to the Jews. Mr. Lipman, you know, is a Jew.”

“Naturally, being Mrs. Berle’s brother.”

“It’s rather odd, Mrs. Lehmyl, but the more I see of the Jews, the better I like them. Aside from the interest they possess as a phenomenon in history, they’re very agreeable to me as individuals. I can’t at all comprehend the prejudice that some people harbor against them.”

“How very liberal,” If there was a shade of irony in her tone, it failed of its effect upon Arthur, who, inspired by his subject, went gallantly on:

“Their past, you know, is so poetic. They have the warmth of old wine in their blood. I’ve seen a great deal of them. This neighborhood is a regular ghetto. Then down-town I rub elbows with them constantly. Indeed, my best client is a Jew. And my friend, Hetzel, he’s of Jewish extraction, though he doesn’t keep up with the religion. On the average, I think the Jews are the kindest-hearted and clearest-minded people one meets hereabouts. That Mr. Lipman was a specimen of the highest type. It was delightful to watch his face, when you and he were playing—so fervent, so unselfconscious.”

“And he played capitally, too—caught the true spirit of the music.”

“So it seemed to me, though of course, I’m not competent to criticise. Speaking of faces, Mrs. Lehmyl, I hope you won’t mind me saying that your face does not look to me like and American—I mean English-American.”

“There is no reason why it should. I’m not’ English-American.”

“Ah, I felt sure of it. I felt sure you had Italian blood in your veins.”

“No—nor Italian either.”

“Well, Spanish, then?”

“Why, I supposed you knew. I—I am a Jewess.”

“Mercy!” gasped Arthur, blushing to the roots of his hair. “I hope—I hope you—” He broke off, and squirmed uncomfortably in his chair.

“Why, is it possible you didn’t know it?” asked Mrs. Lehmyl.

“Indeed, I did not. If I had, I assure you, I shouldn’t have put my foot in it as I did—shouldn’t have made bold to patronize your race as I was doing. I meant every word I spoke, though. The Jews are a noble and beautiful people, with a record that we Gentiles might well envy.”

“You said nothing that was not perfectly proper. Don’t imagine for an instant that you touched a sensitive spot. I am a Jewess by birth, though, like your friend, Mr. Hetzel, I don’t go to the temple. Modern ceremonial Judaism is not to me especially satisfying as a religion.”

“You are not orthodox?”

“I am quite otherwise.”

“I am glad to hear it. I am glad that there is this tendency amoung the better educated Jews to cast loose from their Judaism. I want to see them intermarry with the Christians—amalgamate, and help to form the American people of the future. That of course is their destiny.”

“I suppose it is.”

“You speak as though you regretted it.”

“No; I don’t regret it. I am too good an American to regret it. But it is a little melancholy, to say the least, to see one of the most cherished of Jewish ideals being abandoned before the first step is made toward realizing it.”

“What ideal is that?”

“Why, the hope that cheered the Jews through the many centuries of their persecution—the hope that a time would come when they could compel recognition from their persecutors, when, as a united people, they could stand forth before the world, pure and strong and upright, and exact credit for their due. The Jew has been for so long a time the despised and rejected of men, that now, when he has the opportunity, it seems as though he ought to improve it—show the stuff he is made of, prove that Shylock is a libel upon him, justify his past, achieve great results, demonstrate that he only needed light and liberty to develop into a leader of progress. The Jew has eternally been complaining—crying, ’You think I am such an inferior style of personage; give me a chance, and I will convince you of your error.’ Now that the chance is given him, it seems a pity for him quietly to efface himself, become indistinguishable in the mass of mankind. I should like him to retain the name of Jew until it has grown to be a term of honor, instead of one of reproach. However, his destiny is otherwise; and he must make the best of it. It is the destiny of the dew-drop to slip into the shining sea.’ Probably it is better that it should be so.”

“But how many Jews are there who would subscribe to your view of the case—who would admit that amalgamation is inevitable?”

“Doubtless, very few. Most of them have no views at all on the subject. The majority of the wealthier Jews here in America are epicureans. Eat, drink, be merry, and lay up a competence for the rainy day, is about their philosophy. But among the older people the prejudice against intermarriage is wonderfully strong. We shall have to wait for a generation or two, before it can become common. But it is a prejudice pure and simple, the offspring of superstition, and not the result of allegiance to that ideal I was speaking of. The average Jew of a certain age may not care a fig for his religion, but if he hears of an instance of intermarriage, he will hold up his hands in horror, and wag his head, and predict some dire calamity for the bride and bridegroom. The same man will not enter a synagogue from year’s end to year’s end, and should you happen to discuss theology with him, you’d put him down for an out-and-out rationalist at once. But then, plenty of people who pride themselves on being freethinkers, are profoundly superstitious—Gentiles as well as Jews.”

“No doubt about that. In fact, I think that every body has a trace of superstition in his makeup, no matter how emancipated he may fancy himself. Now I, for example, can’t help attributing some uncanny potency to the number seven. There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of by modern science; and perhaps superstition is a crude way of acknowledging this truth. It is the reaction of the imagination, when confronted with the unknowable.”

“It seems to me that much which passes for superstition in the world, ought not to be so called. It is, rather, a super-sense. There is a subtle something that broods over human life—as the aroma broods over a goblet of old wine—a something of such fine, impalpable texture, that many men and women are never able to perceive it, but which others of more sensitive organization, feel all the time—are forever conscious of. This is the material which the imagination seizes hold of, and out of which it spins those fantastic, cobweb shapes that practical persons scoff at as superstitions. I can’t understand, however, how any body can specialize it to the extent of linking it to arithmetic, as you do, and as those do who are afraid of thirteen.”

“What you have reference to falls, rather, under the head of mysticism, does it not? And mysticism is one form of poetry. You come rightfully by your ideas on this subject. A strain of mysticism is your birthright, a portion of your inheritance as a Jewess. It’s one of the benefits you derive from being something more than an American.”

“Oh, but I am an American, besides. It is a privilege to be one.”

“I meant American of English ancestry. We are all Americans—or more precisely, we are all immigrants or the descendants of immigrants. But those of us that have an infusion of warmer blood than the English in our veins, are to be congratulated.”

“It seems to me that Ripley is an English name.”

“So it is. But my father’s mother was a Frenchwoman.”

“A ruddy drop of Gallic blood outweighs a world of gold,” parodied Mrs. Lehmyl.

“Oh, you may make fun of me, if you like,” cried Arthur; “but my comfort in thinking of that French grandmother of mine will remain undiminished. I wonder,” he added, more gravely, “I wonder whether you have ever suffered from any of the indignities that your people are sometimes put to, Mrs. Lehmyl. I declare I have been tempted to wring the necks of my fellow Gentiles, now and then.”

“Suffered? I have occasionally been amused. I should not have much self-respect, if any thing like that could cause me suffering. Last summer, for instance, Mrs. Hart and I were in the mountains, at a hotel. Every body, to begin with, was disposed to be very sociable. Then, innocently enough, one day I said we were Jewesses. After that we were left severely alone. I remember, we got into an omnibus one afternoon to drive to the village. A young man and a couple of young ladies—guests at the same house—were already in it. They glared at us quite savagely, and whispered, ’Jews!’ and signaled the driver to stop and let them out. So we had the conveyance to ourselves, for which we were not sorry.”

“I wish I had been there!” cried Arthur, with astonishing energy.

“Why?” asked Mrs. Lehmyl.

“Oh, that young man and I would have had an interview alone,” he answered, in a blood-curdling key.

“He means that he would have given that young man a piece of his mind,” put in Mrs. Hart.

The sound of her voice occasioned Arthur a veritable start. He had forgotten that she was present.

“I hope not,” said Mrs. Lehmyl. “To resent such conduct would lend undue importance to it.”

“All the same it makes my blood boil—the thought that those young animals dared to be rude to you.”

The pronoun “you” was spoken with a significant emphasis. A student of human nature could have inferred volumes from it. Mrs. Hart straightway proceeded to demolish her own claims to be called a student of human nature, if she had any, by construing the syllable in the plural number.

“I’m sure we appreciate your sympathy,” she said. “Ruth, play a little for Mr. Ripley.”

Was this intended as a reward of merit? Contrariwise to the gentleman in Punch, Arthur would so much rather have heard her talk than play.

“Shall I?” she asked.

“Oh, I should be delighted,” he assented.

She played the Pathetic Sonata. Before she had got beyond the first dozen bars, Arthur had been caught up and borne away on the strong current of the music. She played with wonderful execution and perfect feeling. I suppose Arthur had heard the Pathetic Sonata a score of times before. He had never begun to appreciate it till now. It seemed to him that in a language of superhuman clearness and directness, the subtlest and most sacred mysteries of the soul were being explained to him. Every emotion, every passion, that the heart can feel, he seemed to hear expressed by the miraculous voice that Mrs. Lehmyl was calling into being; and his own heart vibrated in unison. Deep melancholy, breathless terror, keen, quivering anguish, blank despair; flashes of short-lived joy, instants of hope speedily ingulfed in an eternity of despond; tremulous desire, the delirium of enjoyment, the bitter awakening to a sense of satiety and self-deception; intervals of quiet reflection, broken in upon by the turbulent cries of a hundred malicious spirits; weird glimpses into a world of phantom shapes, exaltation into the seventh heaven of delight, descent into the bottom pit of darkness; these were a few of the strange and vague, but none the less intense, emotional experiences through which Mrs. Lehmyl led him. When she returned to her chair, opposite his own, he could only look upon her face and wonder; he could not speak. A delicate flush had overspread her cheeks, and her eyes shone even more brightly than their wont. She evidently misunderstood his silence.

“Ah,” she said, with frank disappointment, “it did not please you.”

“Please me?” he cried. “No, indeed, it did not please me. It was like Dante’s journey through the three realms of the dead. It was like seeing a miracle performed. It overpowered me. I suppose I am too susceptible—weak, if you will, and womanish. But such music as that—I could no more have withstood its spell, than I could withstand the influence of strong wine.”

“Speaking of strong wine,” said Mrs. Hart, “what if you should try a little mild wine?” And she pointed to a servant who had crossed the threshold in the midst of Arthur’s rhapsody, and who bore a tray with glasses and a decanter.

“In spite of this anti-climax,” he said, sipping his wine, “what I said was the truth.”

“It is the fault, no doubt, of your French blood, Monsieur,” said Mrs. Lehmyl. “But I confess that, perhaps in a moderated degree, music has much the same effect upon me. When I first heard La Damnation de Faust, I had to hold on to the arms of my chair, to keep from being carried bodily away. You remember that dreadful ride into perdition—toward the end? I really felt that if I let go my anchorage, I should be swept off along with Faust and Mephistopheles.”

“I remember. But that did not affect me so. I never was so affected till I heard you play just now.”

“I don’t know whether I ought to feel complimented, or the reverse.”

“What is the feeling we naturally have at perceiving our power over another human being?” Mrs. Lehmyl changed the subject.

“That was an exceedingly clever guess you made the other day,” she said, “that I was a lover of Browning. I can’t understand what suggested it.”

“I told you then that I dared not enlighten you, lest I might be deemed presumptuous. If you will promise me absolution, beforehand—”

“But you, too, I take for granted, share my sentiments.”

“What I have read is unsurpassed. ’The Inn Album,’ for example.”

“And ’The Ring and the Book.’.rdquo;

“I haven’t read ’The Ring and the Book.’.rdquo;

“Oh, then you must read it at once. Then you don’t half know Browning. Will you read it, if I lend it to you?”

“You are very kind. I should like nothing better.”

Mrs. Lehmyl begged to be excused and left the room. Arthur followed the sound of her light, quick footsteps up the stairs.

“Browning is her patron saint,” volunteered Mrs. Hart. “She spends her time about equally between him and her piano.”

Mrs. Lehmyl came back.

“There,” she said, giving him the volume, and smiling, “there is my vade mecum. I love it almost as dearly as I could if it were a human being. You must be sure to like it.”

“I am sure you honor me very highly by entrusting it to me,” he replied.

At home he opened it, thinking to read for an hour or two before going to bed. What interested him, however, even more than the strong, virile, sympathetic poetry, and, indeed, ere long, quite absorbed his attention, were the traces of Mrs. Lehmyl’s ownership that he came across every here and there—a corner dog-eared, a passage inclosed by pencil lines, a fragment of rose-petal stuck between the pages. It gave him a delicious sense of intimacy with her to hold this book in his hands. Had not her hand warmed it? her hair shadowed it? her very breath touched it? Had it not been her companion in solitary moments? a witness to the life she led when no human eye was upon her? What precious secrets it might have whispered, if it had had a tongue! There was a slight discoloration of the paper, where Pompilia tells of her miseries as Guido’s bride. Who could say but that it had been caused by Mrs. Lehmyl’s tears? That she had loaned him the book seemed somehow like a mark of confidence. On the flyleaf something had been written in ink, and subsequently scratched out—probably her name. He wondered why she had erased it. Toward the close of Caponsacchi’s version, one of the pages had been torn clear across, and then neatly pasted together with tissue paper braces. He wondered what the circumstances were under which the mischief had been done, and whether the repair was her handiwork. A faint, sweet perfume clung to the pages. It had the power of calling her up vividly before him, and sending an exquisite tremor into his heart. And, withal, had any body suggested that he was at the verge of falling in love with her, he would have denied it stoutly—so little was he disposed to self-analysis.

But ere a great while, the scales fell from his eyes.

By dint of much self-discipline, he managed to let a week and a day elapse before paying his second call. While he stood in the vestibule, waiting for the opening of the door, sundry bursts of sound escaping from within, informed him that a duet was being played upon the piano. Intuitively he concluded that the treble part was Mrs. Lehmyl’s; instinctively he asked, “But who is carrying the bass?” On entering the parlor, it was with a sharp and significant pang that he beheld, seated at Mrs. Lehmyl’s left, no less redoubtable a creature than a Man. He took a chair, and sat down, and suffered untold wretchedness until that duet was finished. He could not see the man’s face, but the back of his head indicated youth. The vicissitudes of the composition they were playing brought the two performers painfully close together. This was bad enough; but to poor Arthur’s jealous mind it seemed as if from time to time, even when the music furnished no excuse, they voluntarily approached each other. Every now and then they hurriedly exchanged a whispered sentence. He felt that he would eagerly have bartered his ten fingers for the right to know what it was they said. How much satisfaction would he have obtained if he had been stationed near enough to overhear? All they said was, “One, two, three, four, five, six.” Perhaps in his suspicious mood he would have magnified this innocent remark into a confidence conveyed by means of a secret code.

When the musicians rose Arthur experienced a slight relief. Mrs. Lehmyl greeted him with marked kindness, and shook hands warmly. She introduced her co-executant as Mr. Spencer. And Mr. Spencer was tall, lean, gawky and bilious-looking.

But Arthur’s relief was of short duration. Mr. Spencer forthwith proceeded to exhibit great familiarity with both of the ladies—a familiarity which they did not appear to resent. Mrs. Hart, indeed, reciprocated to the extent of addressing him as Dick. His conversation made it manifest that he had traveled with them in Europe. He was constantly referring to people and places and events about which Arthur was altogether ignorant. His every other sentence began: “Do you remember?” Arthur was excessively uneasy; but he had determined to sit Mr. Spencer out, though he should, peradventure, remain until sunrise.

Mr. Spencer did indeed remain till the night had got on its last legs. It lacked but a quarter of midnight when, finally, he accomplished his exit.

Said Mrs. Hart, after he had gone: “A Boston man.”

“We met him,” said Mrs. Lehmyl, “at Aix-les-Bains. He’s a remarkably well-informed musician—writes criticisms for one of the Boston papers.”

“He came this evening,” went on Mrs. Hart, “to tell us of the happy termination of a love affair in which he was involved when we last saw him. He’s going to be married.”

At these words Arthur’s spirits shot up far above their customary level. So! There was no occasion for jealousy in the quarter of Mr. Spencer, at any rate. The reaction was so great that had Mr. Spencer still been present, I think our hero would have felt like hugging him.

“A very fine fellow, I should judge,” he said. “I have outstaid him because I wanted to tell you that Hetzel and I have devised a jolly little plan for Sunday, in which we are anxious to have you join us. Our idea is to spend the afternoon in the Metropolitan Art Museum. You know, the pictures are well worth an inspection; and on Sunday there is no crowd. Hetz has procured a Sunday ticket through the courtesy of the director. Then, afterward, you are to come back with us and take dinner—if the weather permits, out on our roof. Mrs. Berle will be at the dinner, though she doesn’t care to go with us to see the pictures. We may count upon you, may we not?”

“Oh, certainly; that will be delightful,” said Mrs. Hart.

“Then we will call for you at about three o’clock?”

“Yes.”

“Good-night.”

His hand was hot and trembling as it clasped Mrs. Lehmyl’s; a state of things which she, however, did not appear to notice. She gazed calmly into his eyes, and returned a quiet good-night. He stood a long while in the doorway of his house, looking across at No. 46. He saw the light quenched in the parlor, and other lights break out in the floors above. Then these in their turn were extinguished; and he knew that the occupants were on their way to the land of Nod. “Good angels guard her slumbers,” he said, half aloud, and climbed the stairs that led to his own bedchamber. There he lay awake hour after hour. He could hear the waters of the river lapping the shore, and discern the street lamps gleaming like stars along the opposite embankment. Now and again a tug-boat puffed importantly up stream—a steam whistle shrieked—a schooner glided mysteriously past. I don’t know how many times he confessed to his pillow, “I love her—I love her—I love her!”

The next day—Saturday—he passed in a fever of impatience. It seemed as though to-morrow never would arrive. At night he scarcely slept two hours. And on Sunday morning he was up by six o’clock. Then, how the hours and minutes did prolong themselves, until the hands of his watch marked three!

“What’s the matter with you?” Hetzel asked more than once. “Why are you so restless? You roam around like a cat who has lost her kittens. Any thing worrying you? Feeling unwell? Or what?”

“Oh, I’m a little nervous—guess I drank more coffee for breakfast than was good for me,” he replied.

He tried to read. The print blurred before his eyes. He tried to write a letter. He proceeded famously thus far: “New York, May 24, 1884.—My dearest mother.—” But at this point his pen stuck. Strive as he might, he could get no further.

He tore the paper up, in a pet. He smoked thrice his usual allowance of tobacco. Every other minute he had out his watch. He half believed that Time had slackened its pace for the especial purpose of adding fuel to the fires that were burning in his breast. Such is the preposterous egotism of a man in love.

When at length the clock struck half after two, his pulse quickened. This last half hour was as long as the entire forepart of the day had been. With each moment, his agitation increased. Finally he and Hetzel crossed the street. He had to bite his lips and press his finger-nails deep into the flesh of his hands, in order to command a tolerably self-possessed exterior.

Arthur says that he remembers the rest of that Sunday as one remembers a bewildering dream. He remembers, to begin with, how Mrs. Lehmyl met him in Mrs. Hart’s drawing-room, and gave him a warm, soft hand, and spoke a few pleasant words of welcome. He remembers how his heart fluttered, and how he had to catch for breath, as he gazed into her unfathomable eyes, and inhaled that daintiest of perfumes which clung to her apparel. He remembers how he marched at her side through Fiftieth Street to Madison Avenue, in a state of delirious intoxication, and how they mounted a celestial chariot—Hetzel says it was a Madison Avenue horse car—in which he sat next to her, and heard her voice mingle with the tinkling of silver bells, like a strain of heavenly music. He remembers how they sauntered through the galleries, chatting together about—oddly enough, he can not remember what. Oddly enough, also, he can not remember the pictures that they looked at. He can remember only “the angelic radiance of her face and the wonderful witchery of her presence.” Then he remembers how they walked home together through the Park, green and fragrant in the gentle May weather, and took places side by side at the table on the roof. “What is strangest,” he says, “is this, that I do not remember any thing at all about the other people who were present—Hetzel and Mrs. Berle and Mrs. Hart. As I look back, it seems as though she and I had been alone with each other the whole time.” “But we were there, nevertheless,” Hetzel assures me; “and one of us enjoyed hugely witnessing his young friend’s infatuation. It was delightful to see the big, stalwart, imperious Arthur Ripley, helpless as a baby in the power of that little woman. One not well acquainted with him might not have perceived his condition; but to me it was as plain as the nose on his face.”—“There was a full moon that evening,” Arthur continues, “and I wish you could have seen her eyes in the moonlight. I kept thinking of the old song,

’In thy dark eyes splendor,

Where the warm light loves to dwell.’.rdquo;

“I dare say you’ll think me sentimental, but I can’t help it. The fact is that those eyes of hers glowed with all the tenderness and pathos and mystery of a martyr’s. Pale, ethereal fires burned deep down in them, and showed where her soul dwelt. They haunted me for days afterward. Days? No—months. They haunt me now. My heart thrills at this moment, thinking of them, just as it did then, when I was looking into them. I tell you it hurt here”—thumping his chest—“when I had to part with her. It was like—yes, sir; you needn’t smile—it was like having my heart wrenched out. My senses were in confusion. I walked up and down my floor pretty much all night. You never saw such a wretched fellow. At least I fancied I was wretched. The thought of how hopeless my case was—of how unlikely it was that she would ever care a farthing for me—drove me about frantic. All the same, I wouldn’t have exchanged that wretchedness for all the other treasures of the world.” In this exaggerated vein, he would gladly babble on for the next twenty pages; but to what profit, since it is already clear that he was head-over-ears in love?

Of course Arthur had no idea of making a declaration. That she should cherish for him a feeling at all of the nature of his for her, seemed the most improbable of contingencies. So long as he could retain the privilege of seeing her frequently, he would be contented; he would not run the risk of having it withdrawn by revealing to her a condition of affairs which, very likely, she would not sanction. His supremest aspiration, he derived a certain dismal satisfaction from fancying, would be realized if he could in some way become useful and helpful to her, no matter after how lowly a fashion. Henceforward he spent at least one evening a week in her company. ’She never received him alone; but Mrs. Hart’s presence was not objectionable, because she had the sensible custom of knitting in silence, and leaving the two younger folks to do the talking. Their talk was generally about music and literature and other edifying themes; rarely about matters personal. Arthur got pretty well acquainted with Mrs. Lehmyl’s views and tastes and habits of thought; but when he stopped to reckon up how much he had gathered concerning herself, her family connections, her life in the past, he acknowledged that it could all be represented by a solitary nought. Not that she was conspicuously reserved with him. She made it unmistakably evident that she liked him cordially. Only, the pronouns, I and thou, played a decidedly minor part in her ordinary conversation.

He experienced all the pains and pleasures of first love, and all the strange hallucinations that it produces. The man who looks at the world through a lover’s eyes, is as badly off as he who looks at it through a distorting lens—objects are thrown out of their proper relations; proportion and perspective go mad; big things become little, and vice versa. Especially is it remarkable how completely his notions of time will get perverted. For instance, the hours flew by with a rapidity positively astounding when Arthur was in Mrs. Lehmyl’s presence. He would sit down opposite her at eight o clock; they would converse for a few moments; she would sing a song or two; and then, to his unutterable stupefaction, the clock would strike eleven! On the other hand, when he was away from her, time lagged in an equally perplexing manner. He and Hetzel, to illustrate, would finish their dinner at half past seven—only a half hour before he would be at liberty to cross the street. But that half hour! It stretched out like an eternity, beyond the reach of Arthur’s imagination. Life had changed to a dream or to a delirium—it would be hard to say which. The laws of cause and effect had ceased to operate. The universe had lost its equilibrium. Arthur’s heart would swing from hot to cold, from cold to hot, without a pretense of physiological rhyme or reason. He became moody and capricious. A fiber in his composition, the existence of which he had never hitherto suspected, acquired an alarming prominence. That was an almost womanish sensitiveness. It was as if he had been stripped of his armor. Small things, trifling events, that had in the past left him entirely unimpressed, now smote his consciousness like sharpened arrows. Sights of distress in the streets, stories of suffering in the newspapers, moved him keenly and profoundly. He had been reading Wilhelm Meisler. He could not finish it. The emotions it occasioned him were poignant enough to border upon physical pain. The long and short of it is that Love had turned his rose-tinted calcium light upon the world in which Arthur moved, and so made visible a myriad beauties and blemishes that had lain hidden in the darkness heretofore. Among other things that Arthur remarked as curious, was the frequency with which he saw her name, Lehmyl, or other names resembling it, Lemyhl, Lehmil, etc., on sign-boards, as he was being whirled through the streets on the elevated railway. He was sure that he had never seen it or heard it till she had come to dwell in Beekman Place. Now he was seeing it all the time. He was disposed to be somewhat superstitious anent this circumstance, to regard it as an omen of some sort—but whether for good or evil, he could not tell. Of course its explanation was simple enough. With the name uppermost in his mind, it was natural that his attention should be caught by it wherever it occurred; whereas formerly, before he had known her, it was one of a hundred names that he had passed unnoticed every day. And yet, emerging from a brown study of which she had been the subject, it was a little startling to look out of the window, and find Lehmyl staring him in the face.

Now and then, if the weather was fine, he would go up-town early and accompany her for a walk in Central Park. Occasionally he would tuck a book into his pocket, so that when they sat down to rest he could read aloud to her. One day the book of his selection chanced to be a volume of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s shorter tales. They had appropriated unto themselves a bench in a secluded alley; and now Arthur opened to “The Snow Image.”

But before he had proceeded beyond the second sentence, Mrs. Lehmyl stopped him. “Oh, please—please don’t read that,” she cried, in a sharp, startled tone.

Arthur looked up. He saw that her face had turned deathly pale, that her lips were quivering, and that her eyes had moistened. Thrusting the book into his pocket, he stammered out a few hasty words of anxiety. She was not ill?

“Oh, no,” she said, “not ill. Only, when you began to read that story—when I realized what it was that you were reading—I—it—it recalled disagreeable memories. But—shall we walk on?” She was silent or monosyllabic, and her face wore a grave expression, all the rest of their time together. At the door of her house she gave him her hand, and looked straight into his eyes, and said, “You must forgive me if I have spoiled your afternoon. I could not help it. You know how it is’ when one is happy—very happy—to be reminded suddenly of things one would like to forget.”

Arthur’s heart went out to her in a mighty bound. “When one is happy—very happy!” The phrase echoed like a peal of gala bells in his ears. He had a hard struggle to keep from flinging himself at her feet there in the open street. But all his love burned in the glance he gave her—an intense, radiant glance, which she met with one that threw his soul into a transport. She knew now that he loved her! There could be no doubt about that. And, since her eyes did not quail before his—since she had sustained unflinchingly the gaze which, more eloquently than any words, told her of the passion that was consuming him—might he not conclude—? Ah, no; he would trust himself to conclude nothing till he had spoken with her by word of mouth.

“Good-by,” she said.

“May—may I call upon you to-morrow?”

“Yes.”

He relinquished her hand, which he had been clinging to all this time, and went his way.

“When one is happy—very happy,” he repeated again and again. “So she was happy—very happy!—until I opened that ill-fated book. What can the associations be that darkened her mood so abruptly? But to-morrow!”