The Gilded Man: A Romance of the Andes

  II

  IN UNA'S GARDEN

  Until David told her that evening in the garden at Stoneleigh, Una hadnot known that her uncle opposed her marriage. No reason was given forhis opposition--and David's attitude was quite as much of a puzzle.He talked of some shadow in his past, and was on the point of tellingUna what it was. But she stopped him. Their love, she said, had todo with the present, the future; it had nothing to do with the past.Nevertheless, she wished David had set himself right with Leighton.

  "Why didn't you answer Uncle Harold?" she asked.

  At first he avoided her glance, snapping his riding-whip nervously amongthe withered sunflower stalks. Then he turned to her.

  "I don't know," he said.

  "You knew he was wrong."

  "In a way--yes. And then, I wondered if, after all, he was right. As Isaid, I can't explain it to myself. You stopped my speaking to you aboutit. And yet, do you know, after talking with your uncle, I convincedmyself--I thought I convinced myself--that I was unworthy of you, thatour marriage would be wrong."

  "Don't say that!" she exclaimed angrily. "Unless your love for me haschanged, it is the one right thing in the world--as mine is for you."

  "Beloved! Let it be so," he said, his dark mood vanishing. "Let thefirst day of our new life be the first day of our past. Do you rememberthat first day? Coming down the river we spoke hardly a word. Youlaughed at me, called me lazy, the boat slipped along so slowly. Andyou were right! Watching you I forgot the stupid business of rowing.Never before were you so beautiful--but now you are a million timesmore beautiful! How I wanted to kiss you! If I had dared kiss just abit of your dress, anything blessed by touching you! But I didn't--notthen! How it all happened afterward, when we landed at our island, isthe mystery--or, rather, the most natural thing in the world. I wastongue-tied as ever. Not a word in the language was in reach of me--atleast, I couldn't think of one. Naturally, the dictionary men leftout our words; they didn't know you. And yet, we understood! Did thebirds tell us, I wonder, or was it written on the trees, or whisperedin the golden air? Love talks without words. But now--" he broke offabruptly--"now I must answer Uncle Harold."

  "Why?"

  "I wish I could talk it over with Raoul," he went on, not heeding thequestion.

  "Why with Raoul?"

  "You don't know Raoul."

  "Tell me about him."

  "He understands me, that's all. We have been together a lot. But what'sthe use of thinking of him! He's in India, probably--or, maybe,Bogota--yes, it must be Bogota--and will stay there for years."

  "You are fond of him?"

  "No! I can't imagine any one being fond of him. He fascinates you. He'squeer. He is my age, yet his hair is white--even his eyebrows and hiseyelashes are white. Fancy a young man with white eyelashes! There's nota hint of color in his face. And his eyes--you can't tell what they are;neither can you avoid them when they stop twitching and fix themselveson you. Did you ever see a human being jump out at you from a pair ofeyes? It sounds foolish; but then, you've never seen Raoul! Love leapsout of your eyes, and all the beauty of trees and rivers. God made youreyes and put you in them just to help people. It was the devil who madeRaoul's eyes."

  They lingered at the far corner of the terraced garden where a lowhedge of box overlooked a deep, silent grove of balsams. Beyond, at oneside, the gray walls of Stoneleigh, the square tower bearing aloft asingle ray of light, rose indistinctly against a background of firs.The familiar scene, softened by the twilight, dispelled their firstfeeling of uneasiness. Everything had changed. Once more the world wasbrightened by their love. The touch of Una's hand, the fragrance of herhair, the joy of her quivering lips, were, for David, the only thingsthat mattered.

  Since their first meeting, a year ago on the Derwentwater, in England,love had grown with these two. On the night before that meeting, Davidhad reached Keswick, where Una was staying. Skiddaw and Helvellyn,when first he saw those famous peaks, were dimly outlined behind theevening mists. Next morning the sky was cloudless, and although Davidwas familiar with the scenery of Alps, Andes and Himalaya, the charm ofthis English landscape touched him deeply. The peaceful lake, surroundedby steep hills of living green, and holding on its breast thickly woodedislands, stirred a new longing within him. These hills, it is true, werenot comparable in height or sweeping contour to the majestic altitudesof Southern Asia or Western South America. Neither was the Derwentwaterequal, in certain scenic effects, to similar bodies of water that hadwon his admiration in distant countries. Here, nevertheless, Nature wasrevealed in her loveliest mood, and David yielded himself delightedly toher gracious influence.

  As he floated dreamily in his skiff on the Derwentwater, the dip of hisoars made the only visible ripple on the glassy surface of the lake,while the rugged outlines of the hills, drenched in sunlight, seemed toweave a fairy circle into which the world of ordinary experience mightnot enter. The scene reacted inevitably on his own emotions. For thefirst time in many months a feeling of complete restfulness possessedhim, a mood ripe for dreams and all that hazy kind of speculation lyingon the borderland of dreams. In this mental state he sought one of theislands whose sylvan shadows lengthened over the water's sunny surface.The hollow echo from oar and rowlock, the grating of prow on pebbledbeach, broke the silence that had surrounded him ever since he left thelittle wharf at Keswick. The lightest of summer breezes stirred thetopmost branches above him. Invitation was in the air, rest beneaththe trees. This was surely the morning of the world, and he was thediscoverer of this nameless island. Strange that it should be here,unmarred, untouched, unknown, in populous England!

  There was welcome in the crackle of twigs beneath his feet; a responsivethrill from the green moss upon which he threw himself. As he tried tocatch the blue of the sky beyond the moving canopy of green, he idlywondered whether he was the first to pierce the island's solitude,whether its secret had been kept for him.

  Perhaps it was in answer to his unuttered query that the stillness wassuddenly broken by the faintest echo of silvery laughter. He listenedin surprise, for the island was far too small, he imagined, to screeneither house or camp from the view of any one approaching it, and beforehe left his boat he had satisfied himself that no other summer idlerwas here before him. Nevertheless, there was that tantalizing laughter,coming from a portion of the island opposite the beach on which he hadlanded--and there was the shattering of his daydreams.

  He parted the low-lying branches of some bushes growing between him andthe shore, but could see nothing save the clear expanse of lake uponwhich there was neither sail nor rowboat. He perceived, however, judgingby the distance of the water below him, that the shore of the islandmust here become a diminutive cliff, in the shelter of which, doubtless,was the being whose laughter he scarcely knew whether to welcome orshun. The fairy-like spot obviously had some prosaic owner who was thereto enjoy what was his--or hers. The laughter was unmistakably a woman's.

  David rose hastily from his retreat beneath the trees, uncertainwhether to apologize for his intrusion or to slip away unperceived.After all, the laughter chimed in pleasantly enough with his rovingfancies. There had been wood-nymphs before, if one can believe the oldromancers, who sang the carefree joys of the glens they inhabited--andperhaps this was a wood-nymph. His curiosity aroused, David peered againthrough the branches. This time he saw her.

  She was not a wood-nymph of old mythology, but an incarnation of thespirit of youth that all morning had pursued him. She was clad in thesimplest of sailor suits, the blouse of gray silk opening loosely abouther delicately moulded throat and neck, her hair straying in tawnyringlets over her shoulders and reaching down to the book which she heldin her lap. At her side sat an old man, of stalwart frame, white-haired,with the strongly lined face and sharpened features typical of thestudent. A wide-brimmed quaker hat lying at his feet emphasized hisfreedom from the conventionalities of dress and was in strict keepingwith his long black coat and voluminous trousers.

  They were reading a bo
ok together, a book that had evidently provokedthe disturbing laughter and brought a grim look of amusement to the oldman's face. The noise made by David, however, broke up their pleasantoccupation. The girl turned her head, gazing curiously at the spotwhence came the sound of rustling leaves. What she saw stirred her asnothing ever had before. Her glance met David's; and to both of them itseemed as if all their lives they had been waiting for the revelation ofthat moment. Her pulse quickened; her cheek paled, then grew rosy red;her gray eyes dilated with mingled alarm and pleasure.

  The sudden, deep impression was dashed by a singular interruption.The girl's companion, his back half turned to David, his face stillexpressive of amusement, and looking straight before him at the rippleof water kissing the pebbles at his feet, spoke in a loud, harsh voice:

  "Una," he said, "remember the schoolmaster! This man's world is notours. What does he know of Rysdale?"

  She looked down confusedly, aware that her uncle--for it was HaroldLeighton--without seeing this stranger who had so quickly aroused herinterest, spoke as if he knew who he was and all about him. When shelooked again, David was gone.

  Between that first meeting and this evening, a year after, when theystood together in Una's garden at Stoneleigh, they had lived throughmuch of Love's first golden record. Their experiences had not alwaysbeen cloudless. Harold Leighton, it is true, did not actively opposetheir marriage; but he had borne himself in a manner that showed, attimes, either a singular indifference, or a covert mistrust of theman who was so soon to take from him his brother's only daughter. Itmight be from jealousy, it might be from a perfectly natural feelingof caution; at any rate, he never discussed their plans with them, henever explained his attitude towards them. Never again did he allude tothe schoolmaster, nor account for the strange words he had used on thelittle island in Derwentwater.

  For the most part he watched their courtship with a sort of whimsicalcuriosity, but always withholding his assent from the marriage to whichthey looked forward. Una was indignant at his final attempt to separatethem. His suspicions and David's quixotic manner of meeting themincreased her faith in her lover. Never before had she been so perfectlyhappy as she was this evening with him in the garden's autumnal silence.

  "It will soon be forever," she whispered.

  "You are not afraid?"

  "If it were possible for our love to die, if it were as shortlived asthe sunflowers, if some one had the power to take it from us, I would beafraid. Tell me that no one has the power, David."

  He held her from him for a space, his eyes searching hers.

  "You alone have the power, Una," he said.

  From a slowly moving figure amid the bushes behind them came anuncompromising question:

  "David, you have told her?"

  The dusky outline, the large quaker hat, the wide-skirted coat catchingoccasionally among the dry twigs and branches, revealed Harold Leighton.He stood in the center of the pathway, his gray eyes fixed upon them,awaiting an answer.

  "David has told me," said Una firmly.

  "You have told her?" he repeated.

  "I have told her that I love her," he answered.

  "Is that all?"

  "I told her that I am unworthy of her."

  "Why are you unworthy of her?"

  "You speak as if you knew something against me," said David. Then addedfiercely, "Tell it!"

  With an odd smile on his face the old man looked at Una.

  "He says he is unworthy of you--you are free," he said. "Una, how do youchoose?"

  She bowed her head before her lover.

  "David, I love you," she said.

  The old man turned towards the house.

  "David, I see your horse is lame; you have ridden him to death," he saiddrily. "You had better spend the night at Stoneleigh."