CHAPTER XXIII
When Rosalind Hollis found herself on her feet again a slight sensationof fright checked her for a moment. Then, resolutely suppressing suchunworthy weakness, the lofty inspiration of her mission in lifedominated her, and she stepped forward undaunted. And Carden, seeing heradvance toward him, arose in astonishment to meet her.
For a second they stood facing each other, he astounded, she a triflepale but firm. Then in a low voice she asked his pardon for disturbinghim.
"I am Rosalind Hollis, a physician," she said quietly, "and physiciansare sometimes obliged to do difficult things in the interest of theirprofession. It is dreadfully difficult for me to speak to you in thisway. But"--she looked fearlessly at him--"I am confident you will notmisinterpret what I have done."
He managed to assure her that he did not misinterpret it.
She regarded him steadily; she examined the dark circles under his eyes;she coolly observed his rising color under her calm inspection; she sawhim fidgeting with his walking stick. She _must_ try his pulse!
"Would you mind if I asked you a few questions in the interest ofscience?" she said earnestly.
"As a m-m-matter of fact," he stammered, "I don't know much aboutscience. Awfully glad to do anything I can, you know."
"Oh, I don't mean it that way," she reassured him. A hint of a smiletinted her eyes with brilliant amethyst. "Would you mind if I sat herefor a few moments? _Could_ you overlook this horrid unconventionalitylong enough for me to explain why I have spoken to you?"
"I could indeed!" he said, so anxiously cordial that her lovely facegrew serious and she hesitated. But he was standing aside, hat off,placing the bench at her disposal, and she seated herself, placing herbook on the bench beside her.
"Would you mind sitting here for a few moments?" she asked him gravely.
Dazed, scarcely crediting the evidence of his senses, he took possessionof the end of the bench with the silent obedience of a schoolboy. Hisattitude was irreproachable. She was grateful for this, and hersatisfaction with herself for not having misjudged him renewed herconfidence in him, in herself, and in the difficult situation.
She began, quietly, by again telling him her name and profession; whereshe lived, and that she was studying to be a specialist, though she didnot intimate what that specialty was to be.
Outwardly composed and attentively deferential, his astonishment attimes dominated a stronger sentiment that seemed to grow and expand withher every word, seizing him in a fierce possession absolutely andhopelessly complete.
The bewildering fascination of her mastered him. No cool analysis ofwhat his senses were confirming could be necessary to convince him ofhis condition. Every word of hers, every gesture, every inflection ofher sweet, clear voice, every lifting of her head, her eyes, herperfectly gloved hands, only repeated to him what he knew was acertainty. Never had he looked upon such physical loveliness; never hadhe dreamed of such a voice.
She had asked him a question, and, absorbed in the pure delight oflooking at her, he had not comprehended or answered. She flushedsensitively, accepting his silence as refusal, and he came out of histrance hastily.
"I beg your pardon; I did not quite understand your question, MissHollis--I mean, Dr. Hollis."
"I asked you if you minded my noting your pulse," she said.
He stretched out his right hand; she stripped off her glove, laid thetip of her middle finger on his wrist, and glanced down at the goldwatch which she held.
"I am wondering," he said, laughing uncertainly, "whether you believe meto be ill. Of course it is easy to see that you have found somethingunusual about me--something of particular interest to a physician. Isthere anything very dreadful going to happen to me, Dr. Hollis? I feelperfectly well."
"Are you sure you feel well?" she asked, so earnestly that the smile onhis lips faded out.
"Absolutely. Is my pulse queer?"
"It is not normal."
He could easily account for that, but he said nothing.
She questioned him for a few minutes, noted his pulse again, lookedclosely at the bluish circles under his eyes. Naturally he flushed upand grew restless under the calm, grave, beautiful eyes.
"I--I have an absolutely new and carefully sterilized thermometer--" Shedrew it from a tiny gold-initialed pocket case, and looked wistfully athim.
"You want to put that into my mouth?" he asked, astonished.
"If you don't mind."
She held it up, shook it once or twice, and deliberately inserted itbetween his lips. And there he sat, round-eyed, silent, the end of thethermometer protruding at a rakish angle from the corner of his mouth.And he grew redder and redder.
"I _don't_ wish to alarm you," she was saying, "but all this is sodeeply significant, so full of vital interest to me--to the world, toscience--"
"_What_ have I got, in Heaven's name?" he said thickly, the thermometerwiggling in his mouth.
"Ah!" she exclaimed with soft enthusiasm, clasping her pretty unglovedhands, "I cannot be sure yet--I dare not be too sanguine--"
"Do you mean that you _want_ me to have something queer?" he blurtedout, while the thermometer wiggled with every word he uttered.
"N-no, of course, I don't _want_ you to be ill," she said hastily."Only, if you _are_ ill it will be a wonderful thing for me. Imean--a--that I am intensely interested in certain symptoms which--"
She gently withdrew the glass tube from his lips and examined itcarefully.
"_Is_ there anything the matter?" he insisted, looking at the instrumentover her shoulder.
She did not reply; pure excitement rendered her speechless.
"I seem to _feel_ all right," he added uneasily. "If you really believethat there's anything wrong with me, I'll stop in to see my doctor."
"Your doctor!" she repeated, appalled.
"Yes, certainly. Why not?"
"Don't do that! Please don't do that! I--why _I_ discovered this case. Ibeg you most earnestly to let me observe it. You don't understand theimportance of it! You don't begin to dream of the rarity of this case!How much it means to me!"
He flushed up. "Do you intend to intimate that I am afflicted with somesort of rare and s-s-trange d-d-disease?" he stammered.
"I dare not pronounce upon it too confidently," she said withenthusiasm; "I have not yet absolutely determined the nature of thedisease. But, oh, I am beginning to hope--"
"Then I _am_ diseased!" he faltered. "I've got _something_ anyhow; isthat it? Only you are not yet perfectly sure what it is called! Is thatthe truth, Miss Hollis?"
"How can I answer positively until I have had time to observe thesesymptoms? It requires time to be certain. I do not wish to alarm you,but it is my duty to say to you that you should immediately placeyourself under medical observation."
"You think that?"
"I do; I am convinced of it. Please understand me; I do not pronounceupon these visible symptoms; I do not express an unqualified opinion;but I could be in a position to do so if you consent to place yourselfunder my observations and care. For these suspicious symptoms are notonly very plainly apparent to me, but were even noted by that oldgentleman whom you may perhaps have observed conversing with me."
"Yes, I saw him. Who is he?"
"Dr. Austin Atwood," said the girl solemnly.
"Oh! And you say he also observed something queer about me? What did hesee? Are there spots on me? Am I turning any remarkable color? Am I--"And in the very midst of his genuine alarm he suddenly remembered themake-up box and what the Tracer of Lost Persons had done to his eyes.Was _that_ it? Where was the Tracer, anyway? He had promised to appear.And then Carden recollected the gray wig and whiskers that the Tracerhad waved at him from the cupboard, bidding him note them well. _Could_that beaming, benignant, tottering old gentleman have been the Tracer ofLost Persons himself? And the same instant Carden was sure of it, spiteof the miraculous change in the man.
Then logic came to his aid; and, deducing with care and patience, anearnest convict
ion grew within him that the dark circles under his eyesand the tottering old gentleman resembling Dr. Austin Atwood had a greatdeal to do with this dreadful disease which Dr. Hollis desired to study.
He looked at the charming girl beside him, and she looked back at himvery sweetly, very earnestly, awaiting his decision.
For a moment he realized that she had really scared him, and in thereaction of relief an overwhelming desire to laugh seized him. Hemanaged to suppress it, to compose himself. Then he remembered theTracer's admonition to acquiesce in everything, do what he was told todo, not to run away, and to pay his court at the first decentopportunity.
He had no longer any desire to escape; he was quite willing to doanything she desired.
"Do you really want to study me, Dr. Hollis?" he asked, feeling like ahypocrite.
"Indeed I do," she replied fervently.
"You believe me worth studying?"
"Oh, truly, truly, you are! You don't suspect--you cannot conceive howimportant you have suddenly become to me."
"Then I think you had better take my case, Dr. Hollis," he saidseriously. "I begin now to realize that you believe me to be a sort offreak--an afflicted curiosity, and that, in the interest of medicine, Iought to go to an asylum or submit myself to the ceaseless observationof a competent private physician."
"I--I think it best for you to place yourself in my care," she said."Will you?"
"Yes," he said, "I will. I'll do anything in the world you ask."
"That is very--very generous, very noble of you!" she exclaimed,flushing with excitement and delight. "It means a great deal to me--itmeans, perhaps, a fame that I scarcely dared dream of even in my mostenthusiastic years. I am too grateful to express my gratitudecoherently; I am trying to say to you that I thank you; that I recognizein you those broad, liberal, generous qualities which, from yourappearance and bearing, I--I thought perhaps you must possess."
She colored again very prettily; he bowed, and ventured to remind herthat she had not yet given him the privilege of naming himself.
"That is true!" she said, surprised. "I had quite forgotten it." Butwhen he named himself she raised her head, startled.
"Victor Carden!" she repeated. "You are the _artist_, Victor Carden!"
"Yes," he said, watching her dilated eyes like two violet-tinted jewels.
For a minute she sat looking at him; and imperceptibly a change cameinto her face, and its bewildering beauty softened as the vivid tintsdied out, leaving her cheeks almost pale.
"It is--a pity," she said under her breath. All the excitement, all thelatent triumph, all the scarcely veiled eager enthusiasm had gone fromher now.
"A pity?" he repeated, smiling.
"Yes. I wish it had been only an ordinary man. I--why should this happento you? You have done so much for us all--made us forget ourselves inthe beauty of what you offer us. Why should this happen to _you_!"
"But you have not told me yet what has happened to me, Miss Hollis."
She looked up, almost frightened.
"_Are_ you our Victor Carden? I do not wish to believe it! You have doneso much for the world--you have taught us to understand and desire allthat is noble and upright and clean and beautiful!--to desire it, toaspire toward it, to venture to live the good, true, wholesome livesthat your penciled creations must lead--_must_ lead to wear suchbeautiful bodies and such divine eyes!"
"Do _you_ care for my work?" he asked, astonished and moved.
"I? Yes, of course I do. Who does not?"
"Many," he replied simply.
"I am sorry for them," she said.
They sat silent for a long while.
At first his overwhelming desire was to tell her of the deceptionpracticed upon her; but he could not do that, because in exposinghimself he must fail in loyalty to the Tracer of Lost Persons. Besides,she would not believe him. She would think him mad if he told her thatthe old gentleman she had taken for Dr. Atwood was probably Mr. Keen,the Tracer of Lost Persons. Also, he himself was not absolutely certainabout it. He had merely deduced as much.
"Tell me," he said very gently, "what is the malady from which youbelieve I am suffering?"
For a moment she remained silent, then, face averted, laid her finger onthe book beside her.
"That," she said unsteadily.
He read aloud: "Lamour's Disease. A Treatise in sixteen volumes by EroS. Lamour, M.D., M.S., F.B.A., M.F.H."
"All that?" he asked guiltily.
"I don't know, Mr. Carden. Are you laughing at me? Do you not believeme?" She had turned suddenly to confront him, surprising a humorousglimmer in his eyes.
"I really do not believe I am seriously ill," he said, laughing in spiteof her grave eyes.
"Then perhaps you had better read a little about what Lamour describesas the symptoms of this malady," she said sadly.
"Is it fatal?" he inquired.
"Ultimately. That is why I desire to spend my life in studying means tocombat it. That is why I desire you so earnestly to place yourself undermy observation and let me try."
"Tell me one thing," he said; "is it contagious? Is it infectious? No?Then I don't mind your studying me all you wish, Dr. Hollis. You maytake my temperature every ten minutes if you care to. You may observe mypulse every five minutes if you desire. Only please tell me how this isto be accomplished; because, you see, I live in the Sherwood StudioBuilding, and you live on Madison Avenue."
"I--I have a ward--a room--fitted up with every modern surgicaldevice--every improvement," she said. "It adjoins my office. _Would_ youmind living there for a while--say for a week at first--until I can beperfectly certain in my diagnosis?"
"Do you intend to put me to bed?" he asked, appalled.
"Oh, no! Only I wish to watch you carefully and note your symptoms frommoment to moment. I also desire to try the effects of certain medicineson you--"
"What kind of medicines?" he asked uneasily.
"I cannot tell yet. Perhaps antitoxin; I don't know; perhaps formalinlater. Truly, Mr. Carden, this case has taken on a graver, a moreintimate significance since I have learned who you are. I would haveworked hard to save any life; I shall put my very heart and soul into mywork to save you, who have done so much for us all."
The trace of innocent emotion in her voice moved him.
"I am really not ill," he said unsteadily. "I cannot let you think Iam--"
"Don't speak that way, Mr. Carden. I--I am perfectly miserable over it;I don't feel any happiness in my discovery now--not the least bit. I hadrather live my entire life without seeing one case of Lamour's Diseasethan to believe you are afflicted with it."
"But I'm not, Miss Hollis!--really, I am not--"
She looked at him compassionately for a moment, then rose.
"It is best that you should be informed as to your probable condition,"she said. "In Lamour's works, volume nine, you had better read exactlywhat Lamour says. Do you mind coming to the office with me, Mr. Carden?"
"Now?"
"Yes. The book is there. Do you mind coming?"
"No--no, of course not." And, as they turned away together under thetrees: "You don't intend to begin observing me this afternoon, do you?"he ventured.
"I think it best if you can arrange your affairs. Can you, Mr. Carden?"
"Why, yes, I suppose I can. Did you mean for me to begin to occupy thatsurgical bedroom at once?"
"Do you mind?"
"N-no. I'll telephone my servants to pack a steamer trunk and send itaround to your apartment this evening. And--where am I to board?"
"I have a dining room," she said simply. "My apartment consists of theusual number of servants and rooms, including my office, and myobservation ward which you will occupy."
He walked on, troubled.
"I only w-want to ask one or two things, Dr. Hollis. Am I to be placedon a diet? I hate diets!"
"Not at once."
"May I smoke?"
"Certainly," she said, smiling.
"And you won't p-put me--send m
e to bed too early?"
"Oh, no! The later you sit up the better, because I shall wish to takeyour temperature every ten minutes and I shall feel very sorry to arouseyou."
"You mean you are coming in to wake me up every ten minutes and put thattube in my mouth?" he asked, aghast.
"Only every half-hour, Mr. Carden. Can't you stand it for a week?"
"Well," he said, "I--I suppose I can if _you_ can. Only, upon my honor,there is really nothing the matter with me, and I'll prove it to you outof your own book."
"I wish you could, Mr. Carden. I should be only too happy to give youback to the world with a clear bill of health if you can convince me Iam wrong. Do you not believe me? Indeed, indeed I am not selfish andwicked enough to wish you this illness, no matter how rare it is!"
"The rarer a disease is the madder it makes people who contract it," hesaid. "I should be the maddest man in Manhattan if I really did haveLamour's malady. But I haven't. There is only one malady afflicting me,and I am waiting for a suitable opportunity to tell you all about it,but--"
"Tell me now," she said, raising her eyes to his.
"Not now."
"To-night?"
"I hope so. I will if I can, Miss Hollis."
"But you must not fear to tell a physician about anything which troublesyou, Mr. Carden."
"I'll remember that," he said thoughtfully, as they emerged from thePark and crossed to Madison Avenue.
A moment later he hailed a car and they both entered.
CHAPTER XXIV
No, there could be no longer any doubt in her mind as she went into herbedroom, closed the door, and, unhooking the telephone receiver, calledup the great specialist in rare diseases, Dr. Austin Atwood, M.S.,F.B.A., M.F.H.
"Dr. Atwood," she said with scarcely concealed emotion, "this is Dr.Rosalind Hollis."
"How-de-do?" squeaked the aged specialist amiably.
"Oh, I am well enough, thank you, doctor--except in spirits. Dr. Atwood,you were right! He _has_ got it, and I am perfectly wretched!"
"_Who_ has got _what_?" retorted the voice of Atwood.
"The unfortunate young gentleman we saw to-day in the Park."
"What park?"
"Why, Central Park, doctor."
"Central Park! _I_ haven't been in Central Park for ten years, mychild."
"Why, Dr. Atwood!--A--_is_ this Dr. Austin Atwood with whom I amtalking?"
"Not the least doubt! And you are that pretty Dr. Hollis--RosalindHollis, who consulted me in those charity cases, are you not?"
"I certainly am. And I wanted to say to you that I have the unfortunatepatient now under closest observation here in my own apartment. I havegiven him the room next to the office. And, doctor, you were perfectlyright. He shows every symptom of the disease--he is even inclined tosentimentalism; he begins to blush and fidget and look at me--a--in thatunmistakable manner--not that he isn't well-bred and charming--indeed heis most attractive, and it grieves me dreadfully to see that he alreadyis beginning to believe himself in love with the first person of theopposite sex he encounters--I mean that he--that I cannot mistake hisattitude toward me--which is perfectly correct, only one cannot avoidseeing the curious infatuation--"
"_What_ the dickens is all this?" roared the great specialist, and Dr.Hollis jumped.
"I was only confirming your diagnosis, doctor," she explained meekly.
"What diagnosis?"
"Yours, doctor. I have confirmed it, I fear. And the certainty has mademe perfectly miserable, because his is such a valuable life to theworld, and he himself is such a splendid, wholesome, noble specimen ofyouth and courage, that I cannot bear to believe him incurablyafflicted."
"Good Heavens!" shouted the doctor, "_what_ has he got and _who_ is he?"
"He is Victor Carden, the celebrated artist, and he has Lamour'sDisease!" she gasped.
There was a dead silence; then: "Keep him there until I come! Chloroformhim if he attempts to escape!"
And the great specialist rang off excitedly.
So Rosalind Hollis went back to the lamp-lit office where, in aluxurious armchair, Carden was sitting, contentedly poring over theninth volume of Lamour's great treatise and smoking his second cigar.
"Dr. Atwood is coming here," she said in a discouraged voice, as he rosewith alacrity to place her chair.
"Oh! What for?"
"T-to see you, Mr. Carden."
"Who? Me? Great Scott! I don't want to be slapped and pinched and polledby a man! I didn't expect that, you know. I'm willing enough to have youobserve me in the interest of humanity--"
"But, Mr. Carden, he is only called in for consultation. I--I have adreadful sort of desperate hope that perhaps I may have made a mistake;that possibly I am in error."
"No doubt you are," he said cheerfully. "Let me read a few more pages,Dr. Hollis, and then I think I shall be all ready to dispute mysymptoms, one by one, and convince you what really is the trouble withme. And, by the way, did Dr. Atwood seem a trifle astonished when youtold him about me?"
"A trifle--yes," she said uncertainly. "He is a very, very old man; heforgets. But he is coming."
"Oh! And didn't he appear to recollect seeing me in the Park?"
"N-not clearly. He is very old, you know. But he is coming here."
"_Ex_actly--as a friend of mine puts it," smiled Carden. "May I bepermitted to use your telephone a moment?"
"By all means, Mr. Carden. You will find it there in my bedroom."
So he entered her pretty bedroom and, closing the door tightly, calledup the Tracer of Lost Persons.
"Is that you, Mr. Keen? This is Mr. Carden. I'm head over heels in love.I simply must win her, and I'm going to try. If I don't--if she willnot listen to me--I'll certainly go to smash. And what I want you to dois to prevent Atwood from butting in. Do you understand? . . . Yes, Dr.Austin Atwood. Keep him away somehow. . . . Yes, I'm here, at Dr.Hollis's apartments, under anxious observation. . . . She is the _only_woman in the world! I'm mad about her--and getting madder every moment!She is the most perfectly splendid specimen of womanhood--_what_? Oh,yes; I rang you up to ask you whether it was _you_ in the Parkto-day?--that old gentleman--_What!_ Yes, in Central Park. Yes, thisafternoon! No, he didn't resemble you; and Dr. Hollis took him for Dr.Atwood. . . . What are you laughing about? . . . I can _hear_ youlaughing. . . . _Was_ it you? . . . What do I think? Why, I don't knowexactly what to think, but I suppose it must have been you. Was it?. . . Oh, I see. You don't wish me to know. Certainly, you are quiteright. Your clients have no business behind the scenes. I only asked outof curiosity. . . . All right. Good-by."
He came back to the lamp-lit office, which was more of a big, handsome,comfortable living room than a physician's quarters, and for a moment ortwo he stood on the threshold, looking around.
In the pleasant, subdued light of the lamp Rosalind Hollis looked upand around, smiling involuntarily to see him standing there; then,serious, silent, she dropped her eyes to the pages of the volume he haddiscarded--volume nine of Lamour's great works.
Even with the evidence before her, corroborated in these inexorablyscientific pages which she sat so sadly turning, she found it almostimpossible to believe that this big, broad-shouldered, attractive youngman could be fatally stricken.
Twice her violet eyes stole toward him; twice the thick lashes veiledthem, and the printed pages on her knee sprang into view, and the coldprecision of the type confirmed her fears remorselessly:
"The trained scrutiny of the observer will detect in the victim of thisdisease a peculiar and indefinable charm--a strange symmetry which, oncloser examination, reveals traces of physical beauty almostsuperhuman--"
Again her eyes were lifted to Carden; again she dropped her white lids.Her worst fears were confirmed.
Meanwhile he stood on the threshold looking at her, his pulses racing,his very soul staring through his eyes; and, within him, every senseclamoring out revolt at the deception, demanding confession and itspenalty.
"I can't stand this!
" he blurted out; and she looked up quickly, herface blanched with foreboding.
"Are you in pain?" she asked.
"No--not that sort of pain! I--_won't_ you please believe that I am notill? I'm imposing on you. I'm an impostor! There's nothing whatever thetrouble with me except--something that I want to tell you--if you'll letme--"
"Why should you hesitate to confide in a physician, Mr. Carden?"
He came forward slowly. She laid her small hand on the empty chair whichfaced hers and he sank into it, clasping his restless hands under hischin.
"You are feeling depressed," she said gently. Depression was asignificant symptom. Three chapters were devoted to it.
"I'm depressed, of course. I'm horribly depressed and ashamed of myself,because there is nothing on earth the matter with me, and I've let youthink there is."
She smiled mournfully; this was another symptom of a morbid state. Sheturned, unconsciously, to page 379 to verify her observation.
"See here, Miss Hollis," he broke out, "haven't I any chance toconvince you that I am not ill? I want to be honest without involvinga--a friend of mine. I can't endure this deception. Won't you let meprove to you that these symptoms are--are only significant of somethingelse?"
She looked straight at him, considering him in silence.
"Let us begin with those dark circles under my eyes," he saiddesperately. "I found some cold-cream in my room and--look! They arepractically gone! At any rate, if there is a sort of shadow left it'sbecause I use my eyes in my profession."
"Dr. Lamour says that the dark circles disappear, anyway," said thegirl, unconvinced. "Cold-cream had nothing to do with it."
"But it _did_! Really it did. And as for the other symptoms, I--well, Ican't help my pulses when y-you t-t-touch me."
"Please, Mr. Carden."
"I don't mean to be impertinent. I am trying my hardest to tell thetruth. And my pulses _do_ gallop when you test them; they're gallopingnow! This very moment!"
"Let me try them," she said coolly, laying her hand on his wrist.
"Didn't I say so!" he insisted grimly. "And I'm turning red, too. Butthose symptoms mean something else; they mean _you_!"
"Mr. Carden!"
"I can't help saying so--"
"I know it," she said soothingly; "these sentimental outbursts are partof the disease--"
"Good Heavens! _Won't_ you try to believe me! There's nothing in theworld the matter with me except that I am--am--p-p-perfectlyf-f-fascinated--"
"You must struggle against it, Mr. Carden. That is only part of the--"
"It isn't! It isn't! It's you! It's your mere presence, yourpersonality, your charm, your beauty, your loveliness, your--"
"Mr. Carden, I beg of you! I--it is part of my duty to observe symptoms,but--but you are making it very hard for me--very difficult--"
"I am only proving to you that it isn't Lamour's Disease which doesstunts with my pulses, my temperature, my color. I'm not morbid exceptwhen I realize my deception. I'm not depressed except when I think howfar you are from me--how far above me--how far out of reach of such aman as I am--how desperately I--I--"
"D-don't you think I had better administer a s-s-sedative, Mr. Carden?"she said, distressed.
"I don't care. I'll take anything you give me--as long as _you_ give itto me. I'll swallow pint after pint of pills! I'll fletcherize 'em! I'llluxuriate in poison--anything--"
She was hastily running through the pages of the ninth volume to seewhether the symptoms of sentimental excitement ever turned into frenzy.
"What can you learn from that book?" he insisted, leaning forward to seewhat she was reading. "Anyway, Dr. Lamour married his patient so earlyin the game that all the symptoms disappeared. And I believe the troublewith his patient was my trouble. She had every symptom of it until hemarried her! She was in love with him, that is absolutely all!"
Rosalind Hollis raised her beautiful, incredulous eyes.
"What do you mean, Mr. Carden?"
"I mean that, in my opinion, there's no such disease as Lamour'sDisease. That young girl was in love with him. Then he married her atlast, and--presto!--all the symptoms vanished--the pulse, thetemperature, the fidgets, the blushes, the moods, the whole business!"
"W-what about the strangely curious manifestations of physicalbeauty--superhuman symmetry, Mr. Carden?"
"Do you notice them in _me_?" he gasped.
"A--yes--in a m-modified measure--"
"In _me_?"
"Certainly!" she said firmly; but the slow glow suffusing her cheeks wasdisconcerting her. Then his own face began to reflect the splendid colorin hers; their eyes met, dismayed.
"There are sixteen volumes about this disease," she said. "There _must_be such a disease!"
"There is," he said. "I have it badly. But I never had it before I firstsaw you in the Park!"
"Mr. Carden--this is the wildest absurdity--"
"I know it. Wildness is a symptom. I'm mad as a hatter. I've got everyseparate symptom, and I wish it was infectious and contagious andcatching and fatal!"
She made an effort to turn the pages to the chapter entitled "Manias andIllusions," but he laid his hand across the book and his clear eyesdefied her.
"Mr. Carden--"
Her smooth hand trembled under his, then, suddenly nerveless, relaxed.With an effort she lifted her head; their eyes met, spellbound.
"_You_ have _every_ symptom," he said unsteadily--"every one! What haveyou to say?"
Her fascinated eyes held his.
"What have you to say?" he repeated under his breath--"you, with everysymptom, and your heavenly radiant beauty to confirm them--that splendidyouthful loveliness which blinds and stuns me as I look--as I speak--asI tell you that I love you. That is my malady; that is the beginning andthe end of it; love!"
She sat speechless, immovable, as one under enchantment.
"All my life," he said, "I have spent in painting shadows. But theshadows were those dim celestial shapes cast by your presence in theworld. You tell me that the world is better for my work; that I haveoffered my people beauty and a sort of truth, which they had neverdreamed of until I revealed it? Yet what inspired me was the shadowonly, for I had never seen the substance; I had never believed I shouldever see the living source of the shadows which inspired me. And now Isee; now I have seen with my own eyes. Now the confession of faith is nolonger a blind creed, born of instinct. You live! You are you! What Ibelieved from necessity I find proved in fact. The occult no longer cansway one who has seen. And you, who, without your knowledge or mine,have always been the one and only source of any good in me or in mywork--why is it strange that I loved you at first sight?--that Iworshiped you at first breath?--I, who, like him who raises his altar to'the unknown god,' raised my altar to truth and beauty? And a miraclehas answered me."
She rose, the beautiful dazed eyes meeting his, both hands clasping theninth volume of Lamour's great monograph to her breast as though toprotect it from him--from him who was threatening her, enthralling her,thrilling her with his magic voice, his enchanted youth, the masterfulmystery of his eyes. What was he saying to her? What was this mountingintoxication sweeping her senses--this delicious menace threatening hervery will? What did he want with her? What was he asking? What was hedoing now--with both her hands in his, and her gaze deeply lost inhis--and the ninth volume of Lamour on the floor between them, sprawlingthere, abandoned, waving its helpless, discredited leaves inair--discredited, abandoned, obsolete as her own specialty--her life'swork! He had taken that, too--taken her life's work from her. And inreturn she was holding nothing!--nothing except a young man'shands--strong, muscular hands which, after all, were holding her ownimprisoned. So she had nothing in exchange for the ninth volume ofLamour; and her life's work had been annihilated by a smile; and she wasvery much alone in the world--very isolated and very youthful.
After a while she emerged from the chaos of attempted reflection andlistened to what he was saying. He spoke very quietly, very distinctly,not spar
ing himself, laying bare every deception without involvinganybody except himself.
He told her the entire history of his case, excluding Mr. Keen inperson; he told her about his aunt, about his birthday, about hisdetermination to let the legacy go. Then in a very manly way he told herthat he had never before loved a woman; and fell silent, her hands adead weight in his.
She was surprised that she could experience no resentment. A curiousinertia crept over her. She was tired of expectancy, tired of effort,weary of the burden of decision. Life and its problems overweighted her.Her eyes wandered to his broad young shoulders, then were raised to hisface.
"What shall we do?" she asked innocently.
Unresisting, she suffered him to explain. His explanation was notelaborate; he only touched his lips to her hands and straightened up, atrifle pale.
After a moment they walked together to the door and he took his hat andgloves from the rack.
"Will you come to-morrow morning?" she asked.
"Yes."
"Come early. I am quite certain of how matters are with me. Everythinghas gone out of my life--everything I once cared for--all the familiarthings. So come early, for I am quite alone without you."
"And I without you, Rosalind."
"That is only right," she said simply. "I shall cast no more shadows foryou. . . . Are you going? . . . Oh, I know it is best that you shouldgo, but--"
He halted. She laid both hands in his.
"We both have it," she faltered--"every symptom. And--you will comeearly, won't you?"
THE END
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