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Copyrighted 1902 by 
 The Pelham Press 
 
 
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 CONTENTS 
 
 
 
 Page 
 
 I 
 
 An Epilogue 
 
 I 
 
 II 
 
 The Princess and her Comedy 
 
 33 
 
 III 
 
 The White Garden 
 
 57 
 
 IV 
 
 Juan de Castro's Golden Week 
 
 73 
 
 V 
 
 "And in the Fire of Spring" 
 
 iog 
 
 VI 
 
 An Experiment in Souls 
 
 127 
 
 VII 
 
 A Question of Motive 
 
 141 
 
 VIII 
 
 The Day of Judgment 
 
 157 
 
 IX 
 
 Shadows 
 
 177 
 
 X 
 
 Pierre of the Woods 
 
 191 
 
AN EPILOGUE 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 an epilogue 
 
 €* 
 
 CONFESS/' said the 
 Distinguished Diplo- 
 mat, smiling down the 
 well-set table at his 
 well-dressed guests, " I 
 confess to a foolish and 
 ill-balanced love of the 
 romantic and the pic- 
 turesque! It has car- 
 ried me into all sorts of weaknesses and many 
 real troubles, but I can't seem to outgrow 
 it! Give me a romance, and I can forgive 
 anything.' ' 
 
 His genial laugh, the laugh of a man whose 
 autumn of life was as cheerful as most peo- 
 ple's midsummer, was infectious. Even Lady 
 Harvey smiled a response to his good humour. 
 She, — be it interpolated, — was a fair, beauti- 
 ful woman, hardly more than a girl in 
 years, and only recently married to good- 
 looking, conservative Archie Harvey of the 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Dragoons. Colonel Sir Archibald Harvey 
 they put it in Burke, but no one ever dreamed 
 of calling him anything but Archie. His 
 bride was very blonde and very quiet and 
 very cold, and it was no secret that she did 
 not love Archie ; indeed, most people agreed 
 that she was too essentially a "good 
 woman" to ever really love any man. 
 
 "That's an unsafe taste of yours," ban- 
 tered Regie Craig, a young journalist of the 
 dilettante order. " Romance is the most un- 
 stable of all guides for a man's principles ! " 
 
 "Romance!" retorted the Distinguished 
 Diplomat, scornfully. " My boy, you do not 
 even know what it is ! You are all too 
 busy, or too refined, or too scientific, or too 
 something, nowadays, to experience a grand 
 passion or know a violent emotion except 
 by proxy ! And when one does give you a 
 case of love-at-first-sight, or good, old-time 
 vengeance, or ' all for love and the world 
 well lost/ — or any other example of the 
 adventurous impulses, — you mutter ■ Shock- 
 ing ! ■ or ' Savage ! ' and think you have dis- 
 posed of the subject ! M 
 
 " You are really shocking Lady Harvey 
 already! " laughed the Brunette at the Dis- 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 tinguished Diplomat's right. Lady Harvey 
 had courteously assumed the responsibilities 
 of hostess for the evening, and sat opposite 
 the host. She smiled gently and appealingly 
 down at him, with eyes as gravely innocent 
 as those of a child, while Archie beamed his 
 pride in her. 
 
 "Aren't things at cross-purposes in life?" 
 murmured the Actress of Character Parts who 
 sat next to the young Journalist. " The Har- 
 vey woman would forget Archie's existence 
 if people didn't keep asking them together. 
 Yet he adores her as much as though she 
 were not his wife ! And there's Lily Cole, — 
 the dark girl, you know, — who would have 
 gone out and currycombed his horses with 
 pleasure! " 
 
 "Fact?" 
 
 "Fact it is." 
 
 And they went on with their dinner. 
 
 "Yes," the Distinguished Diplomat con- 
 tinued, " I don't doubt that if I cited one or 
 two of the instances which have particularly 
 interested me in my career, you would all 
 look upon me as a horrid old man, with no 
 conscience, and a simply scandalous taste 
 for meddling! " 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Lady Harvey looked soft and intoxicating 
 deprecation. 
 
 " Oh ! " breathed the Actress of Character 
 Parts, very gently, " she can do it after all, 
 eh?" 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "Flirt. Look at that glance! Dear me, 
 she could teach a great deal to us cruder 
 artists!" 
 
 "Why not try us?" suggested Archie, 
 with an inspiration of purely transitory 
 intelligence. " Tell us one of your instances, 
 or whatever you call 'em, and see what we 
 all think of it." 
 
 "That would be weakness and bad man- 
 ners," declared the Distinguished Diplomat, 
 modestly, "to monopolize my own table in 
 that fashion." 
 
 But — perhaps because the guests were at 
 cross-purposes, if not actually badly chosen 
 and assorted — they insisted. General con- 
 versation, not dialogues, seemed desired, so 
 the host obediently took the lead and they 
 listened with as much attention as they 
 cared to spare from the really excellent 
 dinner. 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Since you are kind enough to make a 
 point of it," he said, "I will promptly im- 
 agine myself a sort of narrator, such as we 
 come across in the old tales, and taking one 
 remembered romance at random, I will unfold 
 to you as much of it as I am lucky enough to 
 know. It is a brief glimpse or indication, 
 nothing more, — but the situation interested 
 me, and you may be able to fill in the blanks 
 from your imaginations. 
 
 " Some years ago, in the course of the 
 pursuance of my profession in St. Peters- 
 burg, I met a curious and interesting man. I 
 will not mention his name, I will call him 
 merely the Prince, — both in courtesy to his 
 title, and to lose none of the permissible 
 romantic accessories to the situation ! We 
 did not readily become intimate, for he in 
 some ways repelled even while he attracted 
 me. However, in spite of many definite 
 causes for disliking him, he did fascinate me 
 and absorb my attention when I was in his 
 company. He possessed to an extreme de- 
 gree the magnetic power, and when I tell 
 you that he flattered my vanity by appearing 
 to care for my company, in spite of the great 
 difference in our ages, (a difference vastly in 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 his favour) and further that he was the most 
 daring adventurer whom I have ever met, 
 you will possibly understand my interest in 
 him. 
 
 " He was one of the handsomest men, I 
 firmly believe, ever born. I will not describe 
 him, but will merely tell you that he alone, 
 among the many persons pointed out to me 
 at various times as deserving that compari- 
 son, was really like a Scandinavian god. 
 He had an extreme love of luxury, an animal 
 enjoyment of all sensuous things, together 
 with a savage power of endurance, and he 
 was quite unscrupulous. His chief passion 
 was jewels, and he owned some of the rarest 
 and most unusual gems, I believe, that have 
 ever been in any private collection. Among 
 his possessions was a jewel which he used 
 to call his Amourette, an absurdly frivolous 
 name for so wonderful a stone, but, as I 
 must tell you, he was a mass of perversities 
 and whimsicalities. The Amourette was an 
 immense emerald of extraordinary colour 
 and lustre. He pointed out to me an infini- 
 tesimal flaw which slightly lessened its 
 market value, but did not in the smallest 
 degree impair its beauty to a connoisseur. 
 
 6 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 He often told me that he was keeping the 
 Amourette for a woman, — the woman whom 
 he considered worthy to wear it. ■ I 've 
 never found her yet/ he declared, 'but when 
 you miss the emerald, mon ami, that, you 
 may know, is where it has gone/ In the 
 course of time, I drifted away from St. 
 Petersburg, and I did not see the Prince or 
 his collection of jewels or the Amourette for 
 a year. Then I met him in a curious way, 
 one late afternoon in Paris. 
 
 " I was walking near the Arc de Triomphe, 
 it being an hour when I often went out to 
 watch faces, and invent appropriate romances 
 to fit groups or incidents which came in my 
 way. I soon became interested in a woman 
 who was walking just in front of me. She 
 did not look like the type of woman who 
 would be apt to be wandering about Paris 
 alone, only a short time before dusk. At 
 least, let me qualify that: her dress and 
 bearing led me to believe that her family 
 would not approve of promiscuous wander- 
 ing of this sort, and I shrewdly guessed that 
 she had left her maid somewhere behind her. 
 I am afraid that I stared very hard at the 
 lady's back, for it was a very graceful one ; 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 and I like pretty women whose figures and 
 clothes suit each other. I approved of the 
 way she walked, and I also liked her splen- 
 did, sunny, golden hair, and the angle on 
 which her small head was set on her very 
 round and well-proportioned body. I am 
 sorry that I cannot describe her gown; I 
 have a dim impression that it was of some 
 nondescript colour, — gray or violet or some- 
 thing of that sort, and I distinctly remember 
 that her hat was black and absurd as to 
 shape, though I don't doubt it was becoming 
 to her face. I should much like to have 
 seen the latter ! 
 
 "My narrative is growing longer than I 
 had intended it to be. You must really for- 
 give me, but my tongue runs away with me 
 in matters of reminiscence ! While I was 
 strolling quietly along and making quite 
 casual and idle conjectures as to the station 
 and identity of the fair-haired lady in the 
 pretty clothes who walked in front of me, I 
 saw a rather smart-looking turn-out coming 
 down the street rapidly. The horse was 
 very good, the cart all that could be desired, 
 the livery of the groom behind was perfect, 
 and the man who drove was an excellent 
 
 8 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 match for the rest ; and that is by no means 
 a matter of course, you know ! He was big, 
 good-looking, and properly dressed, — and 
 imagine my surprise in recognizing him to 
 be my St. Petersburg friend, the Prince ! 
 
 " He did not notice me, indeed I must 
 frankly say that he only seemed to notice one 
 person or thing in his surroundings. That 
 was the blonde lady in front of me. She had 
 stopped, by the bye, and stood looking at 
 the approaching turn-out, — which was com- 
 ing at a much slower rate of speed now ; the 
 Prince was pulling up, all the time with his 
 eyes fixed upon her. Let me confess to my 
 usual curiosity in a possibly romantic climax ; 
 I seated myself unostentatiously on a bench, 
 and I watched the performance with as cas- 
 ual an air as I could command. 
 
 " My friend pulled up at the curb, still 
 staring in a way which surprised me and 
 quite upset my ideas concerning his tradi- 
 tionally unimpeachable good manners. Then 
 he gave the lines to the man and alighted. 
 The girl started away from him as he ap- 
 proached, but he stopped her with an appeal- 
 ing sort of gesture. Then they talked. 
 Naturally I did not try to listen; even my 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 sins in the cause of romance have their 
 limit. I gazed down the street and watched 
 some gamins fighting in a gutter, and I kept 
 my face turned away from the Prince and, I 
 feared, his ultimate recognition of me. Sud- 
 denly I heard him say : ' Call me Fate, — 
 Chance, — the Unknown, — what you will! 
 What does it matter ? 'What do names mat- 
 ter ? What does anything matter ? You are 
 brave enough to defy convention, — another 
 woman would not be, but I know from your 
 face that you are. Will you come ? ' 
 
 " I did not hear her answer, and I carefully 
 avoided looking in their direction. So in the 
 one moment when I think her face was turned 
 toward me, I did not see her. I wished after- 
 ward that I had looked at her well, and tried 
 to analyze the charm which was the Prince's 
 bane and rapture and ultimate undoing. After 
 another short conversation, he raised his hat 
 and fell back ; she walked on quickly, and 
 then, just as he turned to enter his trap once 
 more, he saw me. I instantly rose and came 
 forward, not trying to ignore what I had been 
 looking at. 
 
 "'I have been out seeking romance, as 
 usual/ I remarked, by way of greeting. ■ But 
 
 10 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 I got more than I bargained for ! Where did 
 you drop from ? ' 
 
 "The flush which had risen to his fore- 
 head when he first saw me died away some- 
 what. He held out his hand with a heartiness 
 which, knowing his variable and contradic- 
 tory nature, I cannot approximately estimate 
 as being sincere or feigned. 
 
 " ' My dear fellow/ he said, « one is sure of 
 a certain number of surprises in this world ! 
 One begins to get bored, and to think that 
 nothing ever happens ; and behold ! whole 
 chains of happenings follow promptly on the 
 conviction ! I have been telling myself that 
 a trip to the East and an investigation of 
 hashish was the only fresh variety of sensa- 
 tion which I could command ; and now I am 
 taken with a grand passion on the spur of 
 the moment, and I am surprised, — positively 
 surprised, in my blase attitude of mind, — by 
 your appearance ! ' 
 
 "Any other man would have irritated me 
 by his affectations in speech, but there was 
 the fellow's old influence over me, back again 
 as strong as ever. 
 
 " ' I have been watching a chapter of your 
 grand passion / " I said, rather shamefacedly. 
 
 ii 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " He sighed and smiled response. 
 
 "'The first chapter, dear man!' he said. 
 ' But why waste time here ? You will drive 
 back with me to my rooms and dine, and we 
 will try to bridge over the time of our separa- 
 tion by a little retrospective explanation and 
 narrative ! ' 
 
 " Of course I went with him ; I had noth- 
 ing on for the evening, except an Embassy re- 
 ception, which might be postponed into an 
 indefinite lateness of hour. On the way I 
 enquired for the Amourette. 
 
 "'In excellent spirits,' he told me. 'As 
 fine in colour and copious of brilliancy as 
 ever! I am inclined to think that the 
 Amourette and I will soon part company ! ' 
 
 " ' Not debts/ I hazarded, ' or a woman ? ' 
 
 " ' Debts ! ' He laughed long at that. ' A 
 woman, — yes! I have at last seen some- 
 one to whom I think the emerald would be 
 becoming ! ' 
 
 "Our dinner was one of those very brief, 
 very perfect affairs which are to ordinary 
 meals what orchids are to plebeian daisies. 
 Over it we talked of everything on earth 
 except the blonde lady of the Arc de 
 Triomphe. 
 
 12 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "He told me of various curious events 
 which had occurred in his curious life since 
 our last meeting. He described a trip which 
 he had taken in the interests of detective 
 work, and which had ended in the recovery 
 of an important official paper ; he told me of 
 a gambling establishment run under cover 
 of a fashionable private house, and of the 
 woman who was used as a decoy there ; he 
 edified me by accounts of several of his 
 later escapades, all of them interesting, most 
 of them not fit for repetition here, even 
 if I chose to lengthen out this long, and I 
 doubt not tedious, narrative. Your faces 
 disclaim ennui, yet I am nevertheless doubt- 
 ful of my wisdom in pursuing my subject to 
 the end. However, I have begun and I will 
 finish. 
 
 " In the course of time, I reminded my 
 friend of his allusion to the Amourette, and 
 expressed a desire to see it again. It was 
 instantly forthcoming, and held out to me, — 
 gleaming up, like the lustre that shows 
 between the big green waves when the sun 
 is shining, from the white velvet of its box. 
 The Prince kept it always in a tiny silver 
 case, velvet-lined and shaped like a bonbon- 
 
 13 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 nidre, and he was very apt to have it in an 
 inner pocket where, in fact, he had it now. 
 
 '" It is as wonderful as ever,' I declared, — 
 an idiotic remark, but the gem always fasci- 
 nated me. ' It would look well on some 
 woman's neck, would it not?' 
 
 " • Provided the neck were of the requisite 
 whiteness and form,' he laughed, 'and par- 
 ticularly if the face topping it were as fair as 
 a pale tea-rose, and the hair red-gold. 1 
 
 " ( Come ! ' I could not help saying, 'tell 
 me something of your little affairs, an incident 
 in which I was so indiscreet as to witness a 
 few hours ago. I am morally, or unmorally, 
 certain that you are at this instant picturing 
 the Amourette glowing in the bosom of that 
 very lady with whom you were talking so 
 ardently.' 
 
 "'Why deny it?' he said recklessly, slip- 
 ping the silver box back into his pocket. 
 ' She is a young goddess, an Aphrodite, a 
 Here, a ' 
 
 '"I am sure of it ! ' I interrupted hastily. 
 ' But when did you meet her, and who is she ? ' 
 
 " ' I met her/ he said, with a queer smile, 
 ' near the Arc de Triomphe, this afternoon ; 
 and you know as much about her as I do.' 
 
 M 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " I gasped at this. I was prepared for 
 almost any confession of insanity on the 
 part of my friend, the Prince, but this was 
 beyond the limit of ordinary belief. Still, he 
 was capable of it; this I acknowledged to 
 myself, even while I gasped. 
 
 "'Do you seriously mean to tell me,' I 
 said, 'that the woman with whom I heard 
 you talking, and with whom I believe that I 
 heard you making some sort of an appoint- 
 ment or arrangement, is a complete stranger 
 to you ? ■ 
 
 " He smiled, rather sardonically. 
 
 "'Dear friend/ he said sweetly, 'I mean 
 to tell you nothing seriously. Nevertheless 
 the lady is a stranger to me — unless you will 
 permit me to except in my dreams ! ' 
 
 " He proceeded to further astonish me by 
 analyzing for my benefit, and with an elo- 
 quence and an introspective dexterity which 
 was remarkable in its way, the nature of his 
 passion for the beautiful unknown. He said 
 calmly that he believed her to be similarly 
 attracted, so to speak, emotionally. He had 
 induced her, he explained, to consent to go 
 with him for a week or two to a little box 
 he had hired in Normandy, and she was to 
 
 *5 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 meet him at the station the next morning at 
 seven minutes after eleven. Allow me to 
 state here, even if it is lacking in discretion, 
 that my amazement was not in the least 
 caused by my friend's proposed visit to Nor- 
 mandy with an unknown lady, that being, I 
 must confess, the most ordinary and custom- 
 ary performance for him, possible to imagine. 
 But, feeling confident that the woman was 
 a lady in point of fact as well as of courtesy, 
 and that her bearing was distinctly that 
 produced by rank and breeding, I was aston- 
 ished. The Prince's affairs had comprised 
 a variety of stations in life, and had been 
 carried on in diverse ways, but this calm 
 proposal to carry away a young and well- 
 born girl to his Normandy box, without the 
 formality of discovering her name or dis- 
 closing his, capped the climax in the list of 
 all his escapades. His next remark showed 
 that he perceived the peculiar points of the 
 matter himself. 
 
 11 ■ She is evidently a lady/ he said. ■ Could 
 you see that from the back of her head ? 
 Also, allow me to inform you, she cannot be 
 more than eighteen. Am I a blackguard, 
 mon ami?' 
 
 16 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "'Rather, I suppose/ I said, but I could 
 not help laughing. ' However, if she wants 
 to go with you, I should think you were 
 quite exonerated. What a young devil she 
 must be ! ' 
 
 " ' Every woman who amounts to anything 
 has a spice of the devil,' he observed, tran- 
 quilly, but I think he hardly liked my char- 
 acterization. This, too, was a novelty in him. 
 
 I knew his opinion of le beau sexe in general. 
 
 I I imagine from what she said that she is 
 visiting friends here, and that her family ex- 
 pect her to join them in England in a few 
 days.' 
 
 "« Oh,— English?' 
 
 " ' Very English. That is, in all save her 
 impulses.' 
 
 " 'And her power of yielding to them,' I 
 remarked, drily; for I knew that British 
 maidens yield to temptation about as readily 
 as British youths refrain from pheasant- 
 shooting. 'She must be a curious specimen.' 
 
 " * I have already told you she was a god- 
 dess,' he said with a laugh. After which he 
 resolutely changed the subject, and I was 
 obliged to content myself with generalities 
 until the time for my reception came, and 
 
 17 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 I betook myself in the direction of the 
 Embassy. 
 
 " < I shall not see you then for two weeks/ 
 I said, in parting. 
 
 "'No, not for two weeks!' He laughed 
 a little, and waved me a good-bye. I went 
 my way, more interested in the matter and 
 less shocked than a respectable member of 
 society and the diplomatic corps should 
 confess ! I had a curious notion that I 
 should hear from my erratic Prince in a day 
 or two. I was not disappointed. In thirty- 
 six hours a brief note postmarked at a small 
 town in Normandy reached me. In effect, 
 the epistle ran as follows : 
 
 " « In the hurry of starting, my dear friend, 
 we omitted to send three very important 
 telegrams : One to Mademoiselle's family, 
 one to Mademoiselle's maid, who is visiting 
 her mother in a Paris Faubourg some- 
 where, and one to Mademoiselle's friend in 
 Cherbourg. Be good enough to send all 
 three, which I enclose. It is necessary, as 
 you will perceive, that they should come 
 from Paris ! Also, please be good enough to 
 send a second message to Mademoiselle's 
 family in a week's time, containing the brief 
 
 18 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 statement : ' Am well — leaving for home 
 next week.' A thousand thanks, mon ami! 
 You are our good angel, and Mademoiselle, 
 did I confide to her your assistance, would 
 thank you as affectionately as does your 
 
 most devoted " 
 
 "There his name was signed. The en- 
 closures were three duly written telegrams. 
 The names and addresses inscribed on each 
 are immaterial, and with one exception I 
 have forgotten them. Suffice it to say that 
 one explained to Mademoiselle's family that 
 she was going to visit ' Lucille ' for two 
 weeks ; one told « Lucille ' that she regretted 
 she could not visit her; the third directed 
 Mademoiselle's maid to extend her visit to 
 her mother until further notice, as Made- 
 moiselle had no immediate need of her. They 
 were all signed by initials, — M. L. D., I think. 
 Dear friends, what should I have done ? In 
 the cause of propriety, which is the antith- 
 esis of romance, I should indignantly have 
 refused to smooth M. L. D.'s path of wrong- 
 doing, or to embroil myself in a net of trifling 
 deceptions. In the cause of romance, — 
 which laughs at propriety, (having a higher 
 and at the same time a more practical code 
 
 19 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 of morality) , — I obediently went out and sent 
 the telegrams myself, paying for them, 
 willingly enough, out of my own pocket ! 
 When the week had passed, I proceeded to 
 send the second message to Mademoiselle's 
 family in England, and I can assert upon 
 my honour that my conscience never gave 
 me a twinge. 
 
 "Well, in time, the Prince came back to 
 his rooms in Paris, and I was summoned to 
 lunch with him promptly. I confess that 
 my heart went out to him when I found him, 
 that gray day, sitting smoking by the fire. 
 He looked older, it struck me, yet I had 
 never so strongly felt the protective emo- 
 tion justified by the disparity in our ages, as 
 I did at that moment. He greeted me affec- 
 tionately enough, — how sincerely I know not. 
 
 " ■ Well, my dear boy, you are back/ was 
 my superfluous observation, as I took my 
 seat, and accepted a cigarette. 
 
 "'Yes/ he answered, listlessly, 'and I 
 was a damned fool ever to have gone. I 
 must tell you about it, or I shall lose my 
 temper, simply thinking over it/ 
 
 "So he launched forth upon a long ac- 
 count of the two weeks in Normandy, — the 
 
 20 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 madness which had possessed him, and her, 
 too, — the conviction which had grown upon 
 him day by day, that this passion of his was 
 really the one serious emotion of his life. 
 
 11 ' Heaven knows/ he fumed, ' I know the 
 value and the limit of light love. Well ! — 
 this was nothing of the kind. In a day I 
 knew that that girl was the one thing neces- 
 sary to my happiness. I felt as though I 
 wanted to carry her off to Africa, or Siberia, 
 or ' 
 
 " ' Hard on her ! ' I murmured. He flashed 
 out more fiercely at that. 
 
 " ' It isn't in the least a matter for a joke. 
 I tell you I love her. Oh, call it absurd, — 
 damnable nonsense, anything you like, — but 
 you've got to take it seriously or ' 
 
 II 'Tranquilize yourself, as the French 
 say,' I told him, soothingly. ' I am taking 
 it seriously. So she was as wonderful as 
 that, eh ? ' 
 
 "'Yes,' he said, his fire fading a little, 
 4 she was as wonderful as that.' 
 
 " « And has she the Amourette ?' I asked. 
 "'Yes.' 
 
 II I shook my head. Clearly it was the 
 genuine article, this passion of his, if he had 
 
 21 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 given her the emerald which had failed to 
 be assailed by any of his preceding love- 
 affairs, however long of duration they had 
 been, or however apparently serious of 
 intent at the time. 
 
 " His further explanation followed. "Ac- 
 cording to his tale, the two weeks in the 
 little Normandy box had not been all hal- 
 cyon. He had felt a certain element of cold 
 savagery in her which had chilled him at 
 the very moment when it most strongly 
 touched an appreciative chord in his own 
 odd make-up. She was absolutely indiffer- 
 ent to suffering, whether mental or physical, 
 whether in herself or others. She had a 
 note of recklessness in her spirit, a touch of 
 hardness, and a wealth of passion, which 
 was amazing in an English girl of eighteen 
 and of established antecedents. She pro- 
 fessed to love him, but when, impelled by 
 the novelty as well as the fervour of his 
 emotions, he had suggested to her that they 
 make the purely temporary arrangement per- 
 manent and go away together to the ends of 
 the earth and be happy, she had stared at 
 him as though she suspected his reason of 
 being unbalanced. 
 
 22 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " ' You must have forgotten that the agree- 
 ment was distinctly limited as to time/ she 
 said. He pleaded that, on his part, it had 
 come to be more than a mere agreement, 
 subject to limitations or curtailment, — that 
 it was now a living necessity to his happi- 
 ness. He told her that she was his mate, 
 — his love, — he offered her everything he 
 owned. She looked at him unmoved. 
 
 "'I am engaged to be married,' she said, 
 icily, 'to an Englishman and a gentleman. 
 I shall leave you to-night and forget you 
 to-morrow.' 
 
 "The thing was so unspeakable, her im- 
 pertinence so colossal, and her strange per- 
 verted point of view so unanswerable, that 
 he had no more words. She did leave him 
 that night, without a word of good-bye, and 
 he did not doubt, he declared bitterly, that 
 she had kept her word, in regard to the 
 second point as well as the first, and had 
 forgotten his existence the next day. 
 
 " Never since has the mysterious woman, 
 who is the owner of one of the largest em- 
 eralds in existence, crossed my path. Once 
 only she crossed my friend's. It was at some 
 big race in England, and she was sitting on a 
 
 23 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 coach with a well-known sporting man and 
 watching the race. The Prince raised his hat 
 to her ; she looked at him, growing a shade 
 whiter, he thought, and cut him dead. He 
 never forgave her for that. My story ends 
 nowhere, as you see. One day this extra- 
 ordinary man informed me that he was 
 too unendurably bored to support life another 
 moment, and he accordingly took a dose of 
 opium disguised with a strong liqueur, and 
 departed in search of other and newer sen- 
 sations in other and newer worlds.' ' 
 
 The Distinguished Diplomat came to a full 
 stop at last. Several of the guests looked 
 politely bored by this time ; one or two 
 seemed really sorry to hear the close ; three 
 alone showed an interest as intense as it was 
 curious. The Journalist was staring hard at 
 the Actress of Character Parts. 
 
 " What is the matter with you ? " he whis- 
 pered. " What are you looking at ? " 
 
 "I am studying a face," said the Actress 
 of Character Parts, immovably. Her eyes 
 were fixed upon Lady Harvey. " I am study- 
 ing with all the power of perception I pos- 
 sess. Don't bother me; I wouldn't have 
 missed this for a diamond bracelet." 
 24 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Lady Harvey was leaning back in her 
 chair fanning herself slowly. She was very, 
 very pale, and her fair hair stood out more 
 vividly than ever around the absolute waxen 
 white of her face. 
 
 "It is close in here, is it not? ,, said the 
 Distinguished Diplomat, noticing her pallour. 
 "Drink some wine, Lady Harvey. You look 
 ill." 
 
 " I am not ill," she answered, quietly, still 
 fanning. " Do go on with your story. Is 
 there nothing more?" She spoke almost 
 eagerly. 
 
 " Nothing," he answered. " I would give 
 something to know what became of the 
 woman and the Amourette ; but that is the 
 worst of Fate. As a dramatist she is unap- 
 proachable up to a certain point, but she 
 never can manage a denouement satisfac- 
 torily." 
 
 "So there is no epilogue! " said the Bru- 
 nette, disappointedly. 
 
 "None that we know of," answered the 
 Distinguished Diplomat, " and perhaps it is 
 as well. It probably would be an anti- 
 climax." 
 
 25 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Later, when they were all in the drawing- 
 room, the Distinguished Diplomat showed 
 Lady Harvey a photograph of his dead 
 friend, the eccentric Prince of the narrative. 
 The face was a strikingly handsome one, of 
 singularly attractive expression, and very 
 sombre eyes. She looked at it in silence, 
 and gave it back. The Distinguished Diplo- 
 mat put it on the table, and, there in the 
 heavy silver frame, the nameless Prince 
 looked out on the lazily chattering guests 
 imperturbably. 
 
 "What are you looking at now?" asked 
 the Journalist once more of the Actress of 
 Character Parts. 
 
 " Still studying that face," she answered, 
 slowly. " Some day I may want to imper- 
 sonate a woman who is hiding some inner 
 emotion magnificently, but who is almost 
 overcome by some sudden blow. And there 
 is my model. " 
 
 "Nonsense!" said the Journalist. But, 
 meanwhile, the Distinguished Diplomat and 
 Lady Harvey still sat together, and near 
 them was the Prince looking out from his 
 silver frame. Suddenly Lady Harvey raised 
 
 26 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 her eyes to her Inquisitor's face with a quiet 
 abandonment of subterfuge. 
 
 " He is really dead?" she said. 
 
 "Really." 
 
 " I did not know that ; I had not heard. 
 Did he speak — of me — at all, toward the 
 end?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Thank you." She choked a little. Then 
 she went on : 
 
 " Why did you tell this to-night ? Think 
 of what it must have been to me." 
 
 " I was not sure it was you until I was 
 half through the story." 
 
 " You suspected ? " 
 
 "Yes; from the address on one of those 
 telegrams, and one or two other things, in- 
 cluding intuitive evidence." 
 
 " And you told it because " 
 
 " Shall we say partly from curiosity, and 
 partly because I thought you needed a little 
 punishment ? He loved you, you see, in his 
 own queer way; and he is dead." 
 
 With as little ostentation as possible, she 
 drew out something which was suspended 
 on a fabulously slender chain and hidden in 
 
 27 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 her bosom. It was an emerald of great size 
 and deep colour. 
 
 " I wear it always," she said simply. 
 
 A slight look of pity came into his eyes 
 and he took her fan and began to fan her 
 himself. 
 
 " Here are the liqueurs," he said. " Take 
 one, Lady Harvey, and forget this absurd 
 story." He had raised his voice intention- 
 ally with the last words. "I am so glad," 
 he added, speaking to the others generally, 
 " that I was able to make you take my little 
 narrative seriously. It was pretty, I flatter 
 myself, but a total fabrication, from begin- 
 ning to end, — except for the identity of my 
 friend." 
 
 "Not true?" they chorused, righteously 
 disgusted with his deception. 
 
 " Not true — in the smallest particular. As 
 I told you, I am not to be trusted on the 
 subject of romance ! " 
 
 He was still fanning Lady Harvey. He 
 alone could see the passionate gratitude in 
 her eyes. She said no word, but he under- 
 stood, and marvelled a little at the minds 
 and hearts of women. She raised her glass 
 of Benedictine to her lips, and her gaze 
 
 28 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 drifted absently, wistfully, to the likeness of 
 the dead Prince in the silver frame. And 
 the Amourette glowed unconcernedly on the 
 slender chain, drinking in the unwonted light 
 before she hid it once more in her bosom. 
 
 29 
 
THE PRINCESS AND 
 HER COMEDY 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Co meb p 
 
 xxxx 
 
 XIII 
 
 EVER to have lived ! " 
 ** Imt ^^P^Hssl sighed the Princess. 
 
 " Never to have known 
 the least bit of a ro- 
 mance or a comedy to 
 look back upon and to 
 smile over when I am 
 old! I should like 
 to have had a little 
 masque, a little play-time, before I am a 
 middle-aged married princess, and settled 
 for life." 
 
 The Princess sat at her window. I know 
 not the name of her home, but it was some- 
 where under Italian skies, and it was spring 
 there. And the Princess was on fire with 
 the growing electric current which seemed 
 to run through the whole waking earth. She 
 was not yet twenty, and the next day her 
 betrothal to a strange distinguished Duke 
 was to be formally celebrated. She did not 
 love the Duke, and a betrothal without love 
 
 33 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 is at all times an ill thing, but particularly so 
 in spring ; then, if ever, the boy Love runs 
 vagrant-like through the land, and all men 
 acknowledge his sway and attend his bid- 
 ding. 
 
 The Princess had dark hair and eyes and 
 a skin which looked as though pure molten 
 gold ran in her veins mixed with the rich red 
 blood. She was not sentimental, but there 
 was a sharp, tugging pain in her heart, as 
 she looked out of her window and breathed 
 the subtle, vague aroma of opening buds and 
 springing grass. Her duenna called her and 
 bade her come to her embroidery, but the 
 Princess rebelled. 
 
 " I detest it — the embroidery,'* she said, 
 feelingly, " all foolish crosses and flowers 
 and gold and purple thread, set together with 
 a meaning that only the designers can com- 
 prehend. I do not think that Monsignore 
 the Cardinal wants such foolish trimming 
 for his vestments.' ' 
 
 " Hush, — you are not respectful to the holy 
 ecclesiastical pattern, cara mia. You are an 
 irreverent child.' ' 
 
 "Signora," pursued the girl, unheeding, 
 " do you not think it rather sad that I have 
 
 34 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 never had the smallest shadow of a romance 
 or a comedy?" 
 
 "They are indeed shadows," said the 
 duenna, seriously. " You are better without 
 either. Though indeed I think you will find 
 one or the other in time. Life is very much 
 of a comedy, carrissima, — and that you will 
 discover for yourself.' ' 
 
 Yet she sighed, and could say no more to 
 discourage her charge's discontent. She sat 
 silent, and thought of her own spring and 
 its undying brightness. She knew that her 
 present dull lot was only rendered endurable 
 by the echoes of her own young laughter 
 which still rang in her brain, though it was 
 many years since she had left all comedies 
 behind. Sometimes her heart sang yet 
 with the joy of love, though the man she 
 loved had been dead for thirty years. She 
 slipped out of the room soon, and left the 
 Princess at the window, with the spring 
 music outside, and the breath of spring 
 blowing — blowing past, with a challenge and 
 a bidding in its sweetness. 
 
 Now, it was an hour later that the good lady 
 returned to bid the Princess go to be dressed 
 for her drive. But the room was empty. 
 
 35 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Margherita," she called, softly, but Mar- 
 gherita was gone. 
 
 " Pardon, Signora," said Margherita's 
 maid from the door of an inner room, " Her 
 Excellency said she was going to mass, and 
 would not let me accompany her." 
 
 " Luisa, you know the Princess should not 
 have gone alone. Was she veiled ? " 
 
 " Yes, Signora, — and left word that you 
 must not be disturbed. She required the 
 fresh air, she said, Signora. " 
 
 The duenna was worried and disturbed, 
 but — after all, what harm could come to the 
 child ? It was early afternoon, and she was 
 veiled. She settled herself in a comfortable 
 chair with a book, and the warm spring day 
 drifted on. 
 
 The Princess knelt meekly in the shadowy 
 church, and crossed herself at prescribed 
 intervals, and tried not to think of the sun 
 and sweetness outside. She wore her veil 
 drawn closely over her face, and no one 
 noticed the slender figure kneeling among 
 the rest. But, as she came out into the 
 sunshine, the temptation was very strong, 
 and she raised her veil to breathe the air at 
 
 36 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 will. The people were pressing out about 
 her. It was good to be one of them, to feel 
 their arms touch hers, to see their brown 
 faces and strong, bent shoulders so close to 
 her. She was conscious for the first time in 
 her life of being truly alive, — one of these 
 vast numbers of human beings, a woman 
 born upon the earth to be as other women. 
 The momentary sensation thrilled her. She 
 saw a contadina with a baby held over her 
 shoulder. She caught the woman's eyes 
 and smiled at her. The cheerful little mother 
 smiled in return, and the child clutched at 
 the dark veil which blew about Margherita's 
 hat. 
 
 "What a pretty baby!" she murmured, 
 foolishly. 
 
 "Thank you, Excellency,' ' said the woman, 
 " he is well, praise God." 
 
 The term " Excellency " chilled her. She 
 went on. No, they would not have her 
 except as an " Excellency," — one not of 
 themselves. 
 
 Suddenly she saw a man watching her. 
 He had not been to mass, evidently, and 
 seemed to stand quite idle, leaning against 
 the wall of a house. He was a tall man, not 
 
 37 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 in his first youth, with a superb head and 
 piercing eyes. These eyes were fixed upon 
 the Princess with a strange, impersonal, but 
 deeply interested gaze. They did not seem 
 to recognize her as a woman, but as a being ; 
 there was in them not admiration so much 
 as absorbed attention. Margherita felt the 
 colour warm her face, yet with no definite 
 sensation of embarrassment. She might 
 have been a Shakespearean folio, or a bit of 
 Byzantine brass-work from the way he 
 looked at her. As she passed him, he started 
 forward and hastened on at her side. Reali- 
 zing that he had removed his hat and was 
 about to speak, she mechanically lowered 
 her veil, keeping her steady, leisurely pace. 
 
 "Pardon, Signorina," he said, quite with- 
 out formality, but with an accent of cultiva- 
 tion, " I mean no disrespect, but I have a 
 reason for wishing to speak to you." 
 
 She felt a slight thrill of excitement. Some- 
 thing told her that she need fear no approach 
 to discourtesy from this man. And the inci- 
 dent was full of a nameless interest. 
 
 " Will you allow me to speak ? I repeat 
 that you need have no anxiety. They call 
 me mad, here, but once many years ago I 
 
 38 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 was a gentleman. Now I am a third-rate 
 artist and paint little pictures for my daily 
 bread. They are very bad little pictures, 
 Signorina, but I love them. Also I know, 
 you see, how much better I can do. But 
 you have not yet given me permission to 
 speak.' ■ 
 
 One more moment she hesitated, then im- 
 pelled by something — she knew not what — 
 she turned toward him and answered, very 
 low, " Speak, Signor." 
 
 He bowed gravely. 
 
 4 'They call me mad, Signorina, as I have 
 said. Surely I am mad to address you — I, a 
 stranger to you, — in the street! Yet, you 
 seem to understand. Perhaps you see in 
 me what may not be quite dead — the gen- 
 tleman that I was born. To be brief, 
 Signorina, I am painting a picture for a 
 friend, a benefactor. He has given me the 
 subject, he has given me the name; but I 
 have in my brain a greater picture than he 
 could imagine. It is to be called ■ Comedy/ 
 Signorina, and I have been hunting far and 
 wide for a model. I wanted a face which 
 should have in it all the vitality and strength, 
 all the humour and gladness, of life and of 
 
 39 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 youth, — but, underneath, that pathos which 
 lies like an undercurrent to all gaiety. No 
 smile is of any value, Signorina, unless the 
 possibility of tears be behind it. In your 
 face I have found my ideal." 
 
 Margherita started with amazement, and 
 stared at him through her veil. 
 
 " You want me to pose for your picture, — 
 me?" she began with marked displeasure. 
 Then she realized, quickly, that she had 
 brought the proposal on herself, and also 
 that after all he knew neither her name nor 
 rank, and could not intend an insult. In fact, 
 he was looking at her with a certain pained 
 expression in his eager and flashing eyes. 
 The belief came to her suddenly that he was 
 a very great artist, and softened her voice 
 when she spoke. 
 
 "I am sorry, Signor," she said, coldly but 
 gently, "it is quite out of the question." 
 
 But the man, still with that troubled look, 
 walked on at her side. 
 
 "But, Signorina," he persisted, eagerly, 
 " I am quite certain that you cannot know 
 what it is to me. I am selfish, I know ; all 
 artists are selfish. But — I have dreamed of 
 this opportunity all my life, and starved and 
 
 40 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 struggled for it. And now it has come so 
 close to me ; the vision of it is in my brain. 
 It will be a far greater picture than the man 
 who ordered it even dreams. See, Signorina, 
 I will tell you ! It is the woman Comedy : 
 she stands in a careless pose, her head is 
 thrown back, her gay dress is old and tattered, 
 but its lines are full of grace. The figure is 
 complete, — it was easy to find models for 
 that ! The dress is like the costume of the 
 female jesters of the French Court, but for 
 the great rents in the green and yellow 
 raiment. She is finished save for the 
 face. But the face must be that of a 
 young angel strayed to earth and laughing 
 splendidly to make the sport of the mortals 
 for whom in her heart she could really 
 weep. Ah, Signorina, I will immortalize 
 you in my painting! See, — you cannot go 
 away and leave me, now that I have found 
 my ideal! " 
 
 The Princess was surprised to find how 
 much she was moved. The theme of the 
 picture, the words of the artist, interested 
 her strangely. Of course it would be mon- 
 strous if she, Margherita, Princess of D — , 
 should allow an unknown, common painter 
 
 4i 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 to put her into his picture ! Yet — the man's 
 eyes stirred her soul. She had often longed 
 for an opportunity to help some one, to in- 
 spire some great dream, to assist in some 
 great work. Suppose her father should find 
 out ? Well, he could not kill her ! And she 
 was in a position to laugh at any scandal 
 which might accrue to her if her likeness 
 should be recognized. What was rank if 
 not a protection from the vulgar ? People 
 would assume it was from a photograph. 
 'With a curious impulse, which seemed to 
 come elsewhere than from herself, she turned 
 to the artist. 
 
 " Listen," she said, " there is a reason why 
 I should not let you paint me, — wait ! a very 
 real reason. Yet, because you interest me, 
 because you make me believe that you really 
 are a genius and that I may help you, — I will 
 let you make a sketch of me; just that, no 
 more. I can never come again, but I will 
 give you this one afternoon to catch the like- 
 ness for your woman Comedy." 
 
 He listened with deep and passionate 
 attention. 
 
 " Thank you, Signorina," he cried, " a 
 thousand, thousand times ! Come, — come 
 
 42 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 quickly ! I will show you what can be done 
 in one afternoon. Ah, God is good! " 
 
 He led her down a side street, and like a 
 creature in a dream she followed him up a 
 long flight of stairs and into his studio. It 
 was a large, bare room, a work-room, no 
 more ; canvases were piled against the walls, 
 and pushed into a corner, stood a broad, 
 coarse table upon which were a number of 
 undusted books, some sketching-blocks of 
 various sizes, a half unrolled charcoal study, 
 a graceful little figurine, and a heap of some 
 terra-cotta material which had probably been 
 used either as background or drapery. The 
 room would have been untidy if there had 
 been more in it; as it was, it was like a 
 garret or a barn. In the course of time 
 Margherita's surprised glances encountered 
 isolated points of beauty in the dingy desola- 
 tion of the place : a rough but striking out- 
 line from the nude, done in charcoal on a very 
 large square of paper and tacked upon the 
 wall; a black-framed group of Bartolozzi 
 cupids smiling in a corner; a complacent 
 brown Buddha on a plain deal shelf, and a 
 quaint, poster-like study in blue, white and 
 green, which fascinated the Princess, though 
 
 43 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 she could not know its value as one of 
 Japan's rarest of kakemonos. 
 
 The artist went to work in wild haste. 
 He flung the cloth off his picture, — a bold 
 and well-executed woman's figure in the 
 costume he had described. Then he caught 
 up brushes and palette, and began to squeeze 
 out colour after colour with hands that 
 trembled. 
 
 " Be good enough to remove your hat, 
 Signorina," he said, in an imperative tone. 
 She obeyed with a slight flush. He seemed 
 the master now, and she felt very meek and 
 obedient. Then he bade her sit where the 
 light cast a peculiarly deep shadow beneath 
 chin and cheek, and to tilt her head back. 
 
 So the work began. 
 
 When the Princess was very old she used 
 to look back with curious interest to that 
 afternoon. It was very easy to conjure up 
 that bare studio, with the light slanting in, 
 and the artist, his tall and slender frame 
 instinct with power and with absorption 
 in his work, — painting — painting — painting. 
 There was no clock, and she had no way of 
 knowing the hour, but she was quite certain 
 that by that time the casa would be in a tur- 
 
 44 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 moil of anxiety concerning her. She dreaded 
 the home-going later. But all the while the 
 memory of that part of her life was like a 
 dream of things which had been years ago. 
 This was the reality. This was, or should 
 be, her true life, — here in the studio with the 
 dust and the tools of art about her, and the 
 artist painting — painting — painting. 
 
 "Do you paint here every day, Signor?" 
 she asked, rather timidly. 
 
 " Every day, except when " 
 
 He coloured darkly, then finished with 
 angry bluntness, — " Except when I am 
 drunk." 
 
 She started and shrank, then tried to hold 
 herself as still as before. 
 
 "That shocks you, Signorina. I did not 
 drink years ago, when I was a gentleman. 
 But I have had suffering and some trouble. 
 It is no excuse, but it explains, perhaps, 
 partly. They say that I am mad, Signorina. 
 Is not drunkenness a kind of madness? I 
 think indeed at times I am mad." 
 
 He painted on. Suddenly he flung his 
 palette from him and buried his face in his 
 hands. * 
 
 " God ! " he muttered, desperately, " I can- 
 
 45 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 not paint ! I cannot ! I am no longer fit ! " 
 
 She rose, much bewildered and a little 
 frightened. 
 
 "What is it, Signor?" she asked, softly. 
 "Why can you not paint?" 
 
 He made an eloquent gesture, pointing 
 toward the canvas. She came quietly to 
 his side and looked. The likeness was 
 sufficiently good, the technique striking 
 evidence of the man's ability and training ; 
 yet all vitality, all spirituality, all conviction 
 of conception seemed lacking. His dream 
 was nobler than his execution. 
 
 "It is like me, I think," she said, gently. 
 She felt a vague but profound pity for this 
 man, and it was in her voice as she spoke. 
 
 He looked up at her without stirring. 
 
 " Can you not see ? " he said, in a low but 
 tragic tone, " I have made it commonplace 
 — prosaic ! I, who desired it to be the cul- 
 mination of poetry! No, it is too fine for 
 me, — too fine, — too high. Ah, Signorina, 
 I ask your pardon. You must go. I can do 
 nothing more. I shall return to the little 
 paintings that sell for little sums at the pic- 
 ture-frame shops." 
 
 His voice rang with bitterness ; his eyes 
 
 46 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 were fastened upon hers. For the first time 
 something was in his gaze besides mere 
 artistic appreciation. He was a man, and the 
 Princess was very lovely and very young. 
 
 She stood silent. There were a great 
 many thoughts within her brain at that 
 moment, and her heart was pulsing strangely. 
 
 " Please try once more," she said at last, 
 looking at him. " She will come, — your 
 Comedy; but you must go on working, — 
 please." 
 
 The artist caught her hand, — very young 
 and slender, and cream-white like ivory, — 
 and pressed it against his face for one short 
 instant. His heart thanked her in the action 
 for her belief in him. And, curiously, she 
 was not angered, but went slowly and tran- 
 quilly back to her place, though her hand 
 still tingled with the strength of his clasp 
 and the fire of his cheek. 
 
 And once more he began to paint, — with a 
 new look in his face now, and occasional 
 deep glances which she could feel though 
 her eyes were not on his. Then the light 
 from bright pale gold grew rich and orange in 
 tone, and both realized that the afternoon was 
 waning. Outside someone was singing an 
 
 47 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 old song, — one of the songs which the people 
 echo generation after generation, until it be- 
 comes the expression of personal joys and 
 longings. 
 
 And at last the artist laid down his brushes 
 and rose. His eyes called her, and she came 
 to look. She felt stiff and weary from her 
 long pose, but she was happy, — deeply if 
 unaccountably happy,. And the picture was 
 a success. Her own face looked out at her 
 from the canvas, her own warm gold-tinted 
 colouring bloomed there, her own deep eyes 
 brooded softly. There was her sensitive 
 mouth, there her delicate chin and fine ear, 
 there her broad forehead and that soft curve 
 of cheek which made people love her. 
 
 "You are a very great artist !" she said, 
 wonderingly. " It is a marvellous picture." 
 
 " Do you think it is art which has done 
 this?" he said suddenly, his eyes growing 
 very dark with passion. " It is you, Signor- 
 ina, — it is " 
 
 He bowed his head, and fell a step back. 
 
 " Signorina, — you know — what it — is," he 
 said. 
 
 The colour flooded the girl's face, up to the 
 warm brown of her hair. 
 
 4 8 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Signor !" she exclaimed. And after a 
 pause she repeated, in a changed and soft- 
 ened voice, " Signor! " 
 
 He looked at her steadily. 
 
 " 'Will you tell me your name, Signorina ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " It is — Margherita," she answered. " I — 
 I cannot — I must not tell you the rest." 
 
 11 Yes, yes ; I can understand. Margher- 
 ita! — Margherita! — You are very wonder- 
 ful, Signorina Margherita. I think you 
 are more wonderful than any woman who 
 ever lived before. It is because you are 
 so wonderful, and so far beyond all other 
 women and men, that I dare say some- 
 thing to you which brands me forever as 
 mad. Come with me to the window for 
 one moment. " 
 
 They stood together at the high window — 
 the sky-fronting, northern window peculiar 
 to studios. Below and above were roofs — 
 red roofs, gray roofs, broken roofs, new roofs. 
 Smoke curled faintly away here and there in 
 graduated chains of haze. Trees and ivy 
 were rustling faintly, singing a song that 
 was very, very old. Down in a square a 
 flock of doves circled a stone fountain, and 
 
 49 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 some brightly dressed children sold spring 
 flowers. 
 
 " For many years," said the man, as they 
 gazed, " I have looked out over the town and 
 dreamed, but always with pain in remem- 
 bering the past, and usually with a faint 
 smothered hope for the future. Hereafter 
 it will be different. My one joy will be in 
 remembrance, — my one terror, the eternal 
 loneliness of the days and years to come. I 
 know that I am mad, Signorina, very mad : 
 mad enough to have become new-born in a 
 single day ; mad enough, at this moment, 
 to bar the door against the future which 
 must come creeping in like cold mist. Mad 
 enough even to — love you." 
 
 The Princess made no answer. Was it 
 only to-day that she had mourned the lack 
 of incident in her life ? Was it only two 
 hours ago that she had come to the studio 
 more in a spirit of careless, interested ad- 
 venture than anything else ? Was it indeed 
 herself, — Margherita, — who now looked out 
 of the high window and so quietly listened 
 to this man tell her that he loved her? 
 
 " I love you," repeated the man. " People 
 do not usually love in two hours, do they ? 
 
 50 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 You are the most beautiful woman in the 
 world, and the noblest, the truest. It has 
 come to me suddenly, this strange thing 
 they call love, and it is too late for me to 
 seize it. I am too old, and too worn, and 
 too utterly unworthy." He bent his head. 
 
 "Why are you these things?" asked the 
 Princess. " You do not speak truth; you are 
 wrong. If you are old, it is not in years. If 
 you are worn, it is not in heart. And if 
 you are unworthy, it is not in the eyes of 
 love—" 
 
 She stopped, growing white rather than 
 red. The man looked at her. 
 
 "Tell me," he said, "you are wise, as 
 women are wise, sometimes. Am I a coward 
 to tell you that I love you ? — to tell you that 
 I have waited for you all my life, and that if 
 I might I would never let you go away again ? 
 If the gods let me, I would keep you near 
 me, with me, in my arms forever and for- 
 ever ; and we would go forth together, you 
 and I, and seek adventures, and love men 
 and each other, and return thanks for the 
 good green earth in our love. Am I a coward 
 to say all this?" 
 
 "No," she whispered, "you are not a 
 
 5i 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 coward. You make me happy. I, too, 
 should like that to be so." 
 
 He caught her into his arms, and bending 
 laid his lips on hers. She never knew how 
 long they stood so. Only, in that space, she 
 lived her entire life of love and joy and free- 
 dom, resting so in his arms, her brain stilled 
 by his kiss and everything else shut out. 
 
 At last he lifted his head and let her slip 
 from his arms. In a voice broken with sud- 
 den tears she said that she must go. The 
 tears were gone as soon as they had come ; 
 the time for weeping was not yet, — not while 
 she could still see him. And she put on her 
 hat and arranged her veil, and came to him 
 for good-bye. 'When he held her in his arms 
 in that last moment, he cried out, as though 
 in spite of himself, " Must it be ? — Margher- 
 ita, it shall not ! You belong to me ; I will 
 not let you go." 
 
 " Hush! " she said, " I must. And I am 
 content; I have lived." 
 
 Before she left the studio, she saw him 
 draw a knife across the painting so that the 
 head and figure were severed forever. 
 
 " I will paint a new Comedy," he said; "a 
 smiling, mocking thing, knowing the values 
 
 52 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 of life. This pictured face shall be my love 
 and my wife for the rest of my days. Have 
 no fear for me. I shall be a great man now, 
 I believe." 
 
 So she went away and left him, with the 
 complacent brown Buddha grinning on his 
 dusty shelf among the shadows, and the last 
 glimmering light lying faintly on the green 
 and yellow tatters that clothed the Comedy 
 on the easel. 
 
 Dusk was falling ; the world had come to 
 an end. 
 
 "Well!" snapped the duenna, between 
 tears and rage, when the Princess was at 
 home again, and the angry anxiety of the 
 household had been assuaged, and the truant 
 had been properly lectured, "and possibly 
 you may be good enough to give an account 
 of yourself! You went to mass, — good! 
 Where have you been ever since ? " 
 
 "I wandered about the streets," said the 
 Princess, "in search of Romance and of 
 Comedy." She stopped and laughed curi- 
 ously. " I found them. Comedy! — My God ! " 
 
 "Do not be blasphemous, Margherita," 
 said the duenna. " I am sure I do not know 
 
 53 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 what you mean. Do you mean you saw 
 curious sights in the streets ? A town like 
 this is always full of odd happenings." 
 
 "Yes," said the Princess, "full of odd 
 happenings." 
 
 Then she put her head down upon her 
 arms and broke into sobs. 
 
 "Hush, — hush, carrissima!" cried the 
 duenna, leaning over her in perturbation. 
 "You are overtired, and no wonder. You 
 see where your wildness leads you ! How- 
 ever, we will say no more about that. I 
 will bring you a cup of tea, poverina, and 
 then you must rest. The Duke, your affi- 
 anced, dines here to-night, and you must 
 not be pale and red-eyed." 
 
 But the Princess sobbed on, unheeding. 
 
 " I said I was content," she was whisper- 
 ing, between her sobs, "but I am not, — I 
 am not!" 
 
 54 
 
THE WHITE 
 GARDEN 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Cfce Wtytt Garten 
 
 T was like a garden of 
 snow, — such a garden 
 as a disembodied spirit 
 might have loved and 
 tended, for only white 
 flowers grew there. 
 They bloomed, and fell 
 asleep and came again 
 with each bright spring, 
 — but they were all white. No colour ever 
 stole in to jar the delicate monotone which 
 made the garden ; its purity was absolute, its 
 beauty frail and unquestionable. To one who 
 felt gardens to be among the warmest and 
 sweetest of man's pleasures, and knew no 
 shame in the happy riot of the senses in their 
 riches, the wan loveliness of this garden 
 would have seemed far too remote and col- 
 ourless. But a nun, or a monk, grown accus- 
 tomed to austerity in the emotions, would 
 have been content there. 
 
 White snow-drops in early spring heralded 
 the multiplied sweet profusion of the later 
 
 57 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 flowers which soon filled the garden and 
 gave joy to the bees and butterflies. There 
 were all the many blossoms that make the 
 flower-beds of old houses fragrant, — but only 
 the white varieties. 'White sweet-peas, like 
 little ghostly butterflies, fluttered there, and 
 white carnations breathing an aromatic per- 
 fume too suggestive for their pallour ; white 
 lilacs, — blossoms expressive of all the poetry 
 and the music in nature's soul ; pale hydran- 
 gias, and snowy hollyhocks that blew in the 
 wind like spirits, and the rest of the sweet 
 and innocent blooms that made up the 'White 
 Garden. Then in June the air was delicious 
 with the scent of the white roses, full and 
 delicate and beautiful. 
 
 So the summer passed. Autumn is not 
 a white season, so the garden went to sleep 
 early, and rested, and perhaps drew new 
 freshness and purity of tint from the snow 
 which lay upon it all winter. 
 
 One morning in midsummer, the woman 
 who owned and tended the garden stood in 
 the midst of its waning sweetness and looked 
 wistfully about her. The roses still lingered, 
 and the hollyhocks and sweet-peas were at 
 their fairest ; but, for the most part, the gar- 
 
 58 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 den's best time was passed. Spring was 
 gone, and the white flowers would soon go 
 too. 
 
 The woman was very beautiful in a pale 
 and fragile fashion. She was slender, and 
 stooped slightly as though under burdens 
 too heavy for her. Her eyes were sad, but 
 her mouth had the sweetness which only 
 comes after much smiling through tears. 
 
 "It is like a bridal, my garden," she said 
 to herself, and then with a sigh, " — or like a 
 funeral; I hardly know which.' ' 
 
 She plucked a cluster of small climbing 
 roses from a hedge, and passed with them 
 back to the house, — the quiet, white colonial 
 house brooding with its Revolutionary mem- 
 ories over the garden. For ten years the 
 house had been her home, yet she never 
 quite understood it. Her poetic soul had 
 grasped its beauty, however, and it had 
 strangely fitted in to the new phase of her 
 life and thoughts, — the phase which had just 
 caused her to remodel the old, flaunting, 
 overgrown, riotous garden, to weed out the 
 colours, and to plant only white blossoms 
 there. 
 
 "I have brought you flowers," she said, 
 
 59 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 gently, as she came up between the pillars 
 onto the verandah. The man who sat in 
 the rocking-chair took the roses she brought 
 and held them to his face with a peculiar 
 intentness. He was blind. 
 
 "They have the breath of summer," he 
 commented. " Tell me, — is the garden beau- 
 tiful this year, Anne ? " 
 
 "It is — perfect, " she answered him, with 
 a wistful, backward glance. "Try to see 
 them through my eyes, Wilfred, — the deli- 
 cacy, and the luxuriance " 
 
 "And the colours, " he said, responsively. 
 
 "Yes," she answered, steadily, "the 
 lovely, warm, bright colours." 
 
 " Your voice had a curious note, then," he 
 said, frowning a little. " Your tone is never 
 quite true when you speak of your garden. 
 You never seem to love it as most women 
 love theirs. You always speak of it per- 
 functorily, with an effort. Is it that you do 
 not really care for flowers? " 
 
 " So much! " she told him, speaking with 
 seeming difficulty, " so much ! " 
 
 He was silent for a moment, then spoke 
 gently. 
 
 "Anne, you have been the most faithful 
 
 60 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 and devoted wife that ever married a blind 
 man and became his eyes and hands and 
 brain. Yet there has always been a lack 
 which I have felt." 
 
 "A lack, Wilfred ?" Her voice rang with 
 pain. 
 
 " Yes, dear. The lack of yourself. Since 
 you came to me, — first the friend of my 
 sister who died so soon afterward, then my 
 consoler, finally my wife, — you have seemed 
 to grow dearer and more necessary to me 
 each day. Yet I have felt from the first 
 that something, some part of yourself was 
 held back. Your voice is sweet, but tone- 
 less, Anne, as though you spoke from a 
 distance. Your touch is gentle, but restrained 
 — controlled. Your presence affects me as 
 the presence of a spirit — a shadow. Yet 
 you love me, Anne, — I know it. What is it 
 which makes you fear to be yourself with 
 me?" 
 
 She pressed her hand upon her heart 
 before she answered, and there was a look 
 of fear in her eyes. 
 
 " Wilfred," she said, " I do love you. You 
 know that ; what else matters ? " 
 
 " A great deal," he returned, with gentle 
 
 61 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 promptness, "I was a faded, blind, worn 
 man, Anne, when you came to me and loved 
 me and became my wife. I was as cold and 
 as stern as the rocks of a sea-shore. Yet I 
 had lived, had moved in the world, had 
 mixed with men and women, and I under- 
 stand voices somewhat. I know how to 
 read self-repression in a voice, for one thing. 
 Yours rings with it, sobs with it, vibrates 
 with it, Anne. What is it which your voice 
 hides ? I want to know the real Anne who 
 has been far away, while my wife Anne has 
 lived with me and ministered to me, these 
 ten long years." 
 
 11 No one can read another's heart truly," 
 she said, steadily. " There is self-restraint 
 even in the most perfect love and compre- 
 hension. You, Wilfred, — your heart is as 
 much a mystery to me as mine to you." 
 
 He was silent for a minute, fingering the 
 small white roses, while from each yellow 
 calyx the pale petals fluttered now and then 
 to the floor. 
 
 "That is true," he said, slowly. "There 
 is something in my heart which you do not 
 know, Anne. I will tell it to you, now, 
 to-day, that I may do my part to remove 
 
 62 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 this strange, cold barrier which is between 
 us in spite of our love for each other." 
 
 " Wilfred," she interrupted, " tell me noth- 
 ing; I need nothing. I know all about you 
 that it is necessary for me to know. I love 
 you. I am satisfied." 
 
 " You do not know this that I am about to 
 tell you. You know that I am a good man, as 
 the world considers it. You know that I was 
 educated for the Church, and only gave it up 
 because of « scruples/ — much to my credit, 
 the Bishop said. You know that I am a 
 theologian of some rank, and that before my 
 blindness I was a student who had won 
 respect. You do not know " 
 
 He drew a long breath. " You do not know 
 that I was once for more than a year, the 
 lover of a woman lost to all sense of good 
 and of decency, that I followed her from 
 place to place, her slave and adorer, that I 
 gave her my soul and heart and all my senti- 
 ments and ambitions upon which to trample, 
 and squandered upon her that which should 
 by right have been my sister's, — and now 
 yours. Men think little of these things in 
 the world, but I have never been of the 
 world and I know the depth of my shame." 
 
 63 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Strangely enough, the woman who heard 
 him showed neither surprise nor agitation. 
 Only upon her face grew an expression of 
 overwhelming and helpless sadness. 
 
 "She cared nothing for me," pursued the 
 blind man, quietly. " But I loved her with 
 all my soul, and would have died for her." 
 
 "Who was she?" asked the woman, and 
 when he answered she shivered. 
 
 " Her name was Anita Leicester, or so 
 she called herself, and she was a singer. I 
 heard her first in ' Carmen ' and I adored her, 
 passionately, irrevocably. I overturned all 
 convention in order to see her. She encour- 
 aged me, poisoned my life with her cruel, 
 tender sweetness, — let me believe that she 
 loved me. I was young and a fool. I did 
 not know that women could play at love like 
 that, and venture into the deep, strong waters 
 of passion — all for a game. I wrote to my 
 Bishop, giving up all idea of entering the 
 Church, because she had once laughed at 
 my appointed calling. 
 
 "Then I found a note from her. She had 
 gone, they said. I learned every word by 
 heart in that one moment of misery. * Poor, 
 good, religious boy ! ' the note ran ; * have I 
 
 64 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 hurt you ? I am sorry, for you were very 
 charming, and I could almost have loved 
 you. But we are as unlike as an eagle and 
 a poor little foolish night-moth, fond of 
 sweet flowers and bright lights. Go your ways 
 and let me go mine. Good-bye ! Anita.' " 
 
 The woman raised her hands and covered 
 her face, but she made no sound. 
 
 "I returned to my sister/' continued the 
 blind man, tonelessly, "and entered once 
 more upon my theological studies, though 
 more as an intellectual occupation than be- 
 cause of any religious interest. That was 
 dead. I have always considered my blind- 
 ness the punishment for my sin." 
 
 His voice had grown hoarse and broken. 
 As he clenched his hands the remains of 
 the small white roses fell from them. 
 
 "I have been very frank, Anne," he said, 
 slowly. " It has been the hardest task of 
 my life. Perhaps I have done wrong in 
 even mentioning before you the name of a 
 woman like Anita Leicester. But I felt 
 impelled " 
 
 He said no more. His strength had failed 
 him, and he now sat silent, waiting for her 
 to speak. 
 
 65 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "I thank you," she said, very low, "for 
 telling me — all — this. Though I am sorry, 
 both for your pain, and also because — Oh, 
 Wilfred, I, too, have had a burden to carry, 
 deep down in my heart where it could only 
 hurt me — and now it seems I must let it 
 hurt you, too. Wilfred, did Phoebe — did 
 your sister ever tell you how she met me ? 
 It was while we were both abroad, and we 
 met — and her name interested me. Ah, how 
 shall I tell it all ? She showed me your pic- 
 ture, — the picture of the brother who was 
 blind, she said. It was after that that she 
 asked me to visit her, and I came back, and 
 you know — the rest — " Her voice trailed off 
 into silence. 
 
 " Yes, I know the rest, Anne. I remem- 
 ber Phoebe's letter from Nice about the 
 beautiful, strange woman she had met, — so 
 good and so charming. I remember your 
 arrival. I remember you as Phoebe's loving 
 friend — almost sister, even then. Why do 
 you go into this, Anne? ,, 
 
 "Because — I have not the courage to go 
 into the rest. Yet I must. My life was a 
 strange one before I met Phoebe, Wilfred, — 
 I have had much to expiate. When I came 
 
 66 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 here and realized the peace and chastity and 
 quiet of this old place I felt afraid, ashamed. 
 I vowed to myself that I would purify my 
 own soul until I became as nearly as pos- 
 sible like the Puritan-minded women who 
 have lived here generation after generation. 
 I strove with that in view ; I shut out every 
 temptation from my life and heart. Wilfred, 
 there are no colours in my garden. The 
 flowers are all white — white — white, — as I 
 would have made my thoughts. This was 
 one of my penances. Sometimes — ah, you 
 do not know how I have struggled with my 
 craving for sensuous things, — for light, and 
 colour, and beauty, and music — " 
 
 "Anne!" he cried, "what has come to 
 you ? Your voice is new. It is like the 
 voices I knew out there in the world, years 
 ago. It says " 
 
 She had risen to her feet, and suddenly 
 she raised her hands with the swift, graceful 
 gesture of an accomplished actress holding 
 the centre of the stage. In every curve of 
 her body spoke the woman accustomed to 
 sway multitudes. Her chest expanded, her 
 eyes glowed, and then softly, exquisitely, 
 she began to sing. 
 
 67 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " L' Amour est enfant de Boheme," she 
 
 sang, — the inimitable, insolent confession of 
 the faith of Carmen, — and as she sang her 
 voice gained in strength and smoothness. It 
 changed and softened and warmed and rose in 
 power, until it seemed to have run through 
 the entire gamut possible to the human voice. 
 The blind man had risen slowly, and stood, 
 grasping the back of his chair. 
 
 " Prend garde a toi!" challenged the 
 beautiful, passionate voice, and then it broke 
 and fell, ending in a sob. 
 
 " Anne ! " he gasped, and then, in a burst 
 of comprehension, " Anita ! That was Anita's 
 voice! M 
 
 Tears sprang to her eyes and rolled down 
 her cheeks. She stretched out her hands 
 toward him, then drew them quickly back 
 and pressed them against her face. When 
 she spoke her voice was muffled, and marred 
 by tears. 
 
 "I am Anita," she said. "I loved you, 
 and when I knew of your blindness I came 
 to you. I have tried to make myself anew 
 for your sake, for I knew how you despised 
 and scorned me as I was. Now — you know ; 
 and I will go away." 
 
 68 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Anita ! " he said, again, and she trembled 
 and dropped her hands, for his voice was 
 melodious with passionate joy, and his face 
 was aflame, — transfigured. 
 
 " You — are — glad ? " she managed to 
 whisper. 
 
 "Glad!" he repeated, and now his voice 
 was as hushed as her own. He took one 
 step toward her and held out his arms. 
 
 " Come," he said. 
 
 69 
 
JUAN DE CASTRO'S 
 GOLDEN WEEK 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 3uan *e Castro's Allien 
 
 xxxxx 
 
 xxxxx 
 
 HIS is a story of Ha- 
 vana, as it was some 
 years since, when I 
 was a boy there, Senor; 
 — in the days when it 
 was more isolated, 
 more oppressed, more 
 unhealthy and more 
 picturesque than it is 
 to-day, — the days when the mail-steamers 
 came only once in two weeks, and we could 
 only cable Madrid via Key West. Eh, Senor, 
 those, if you like, were good days, — good at 
 least in the view of us young scoundrels, 
 who were too wise to work if we could, too 
 foolish if we would. We spent long days 
 and nights in wine, women and song, — and 
 tobacco ! — we must not forget nicotine, 
 Sefior, the little cigarito, which is so good, 
 so comforting, so inspiring to the imagina- 
 tion and the digestion. We were harmless 
 for the most part ; few of us had the wit to 
 
 73 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 think of actual evil for ourselves. De Castro, 
 though, — he, if you like, had brains — but 
 brains ! Truly I wonder at the brains of de 
 Castro ! He might have been very great had 
 he been placed elsewhere than in our Habafia, 
 — the place of blue skies and hot, steaming 
 nights, and pretty, painted Cuban belles, and 
 the cigarito. As it was, he was the greatest 
 man in Havana. But you shall hear ; — then, 
 judge for yourself! 
 
 Juan de Castro, you must know, Senor, 
 was very poor, — as poor as — well, as the rest 
 of us! More could not be said. It was 
 stated that he owed every tradesman in 
 Havana, and there seemed no reasonable 
 probability that he would ever pay them. 
 He had affairs with every Seftorita of note, 
 and, half the time, did not seem to be 
 expected to pay toll even in such light coin 
 as jewels or flowers. Women loved him 
 readily, — for his handsome eyes and his 
 spendthrift ways, for his lithe figure and 
 his white teeth, for his laugh, and his 
 gay, imperious manner. 
 
 Those whom he loved were usually those 
 of merry hearts and small minds, — those who 
 ask not intentions, and can love for a month, a 
 
 74 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 week, a day, or an hour as suits their pleas- 
 ure. But there was one lady, — very high 
 and grand and marvellously fair, a white- 
 skinned Spanish maid and the daughter of a 
 general, — and Juan loved her. She was 
 called Isabella, — the rest of her name matters 
 little, — and I myself will confess that she 
 had a marvellous air, and eyes for which 
 one could imagine a man's cherishing an 
 abiding yearning and passion. She seldom 
 glanced in Juan's direction, yet he gave her 
 such whole-hearted adoration as the old 
 Castillian poets used to sing of in immortal 
 verse. 
 
 Often I have seen him look after her, as 
 she passed, with a deep heart-hunger in his 
 gaze which made me pity him ; and then he 
 would say: "Is she not beautiful, — but 
 beautiful, Pedro? Beautiful, and pure and 
 sweet ! I love her, Pedro ! Ah, I love her 
 — lovelier!" 
 
 One day he followed her to mass, and 
 again, and yet again. And at last — ah, I do 
 not know how he had brought it about, but 
 so it was! — he had succeeded in winning 
 speech with her, and stood a fair chance, 
 as I could see, for her favour. Then her 
 
 75 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 father discovered something, — a perfectly 
 innocent something it must have been, — 
 a rose, or a verse written in the hasty hand 
 of impatient love, and folded trianglewise. 
 At all events, he quite properly took the 
 Seftorita to task, and put a stop to her going 
 to mass alone. 
 
 So there was an end of it, and my heart 
 ached for Juan, for he was badly hurt in this 
 stupid and ungenerous tourney of love, and 
 seemed now unable to support life save 
 with such fortitude born of bitterness as cut 
 me to see and countenance. 
 
 He went once to the General, determining 
 to be so honest at least as to deserve honest 
 treatment, and he must have plead his cause 
 with some courage and wit, for the old gentle- 
 man heard him through. And, having heard, 
 he did him the courtesy of saying respect- 
 fully, " I am sorry, Sefior, that what you ask 
 is out of the question. I would sacrifice 
 anything to my daughter's wishes except my 
 daughter herself. You have nothing; the 
 question is closed at the outset. I must ask 
 you to excuse me from further discussion.' ' 
 
 Juan dwelt much on his trouble, and noth- 
 ing seemed to console him. We took him to 
 
 76 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 the bull-fight ; — an excellent fight it was too, 
 really a battle, Sefior, with much blood and 
 many bulls and a celebrated Matador from 
 Seville, — Jose Diaz was his name. But my 
 poor friend looked on with a frown and left 
 before the second bull met his death. He 
 afterwards declared that he liked not the 
 brute's bleeding shoulders. Now, I knew 
 from this that his trouble was very heavy, 
 for a man with Spanish or Cuban blood in 
 him must indeed be in a dark way when he 
 finds no pleasure in a bull-fight. 
 
 We next took him to see the last favourite 
 dance. She was a full-throated, lithe-limbed 
 creature, and the surprising absence of rouge 
 on her cheeks was soon discounted by the 
 deep red blood that flushed her delicate skin 
 when she danced. Her steps were most 
 seductive and her dress as alluringly insig- 
 nificant as possible. Yet Juan looked gloomy 
 and abstracted, and forgot to applaud. 
 
 One day he said to me : 
 
 " Pedro, I have put my ill-luck to one 
 more test. I have bought a share in the big 
 Madrid Lottery." 
 
 "That is a foolish use to which to put 
 good money," I told him, tranquilly. 
 
 77 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Many men buy shares in the Madrid lot- 
 teries, each hoping to win the Capital Prize, 
 which comes to forty thousand of your dol- 
 lars, Senor. Yet in my long life-time I have 
 met but three men who ever made money 
 out of them. One had something to do with 
 the running of one of them ; the other two — 
 But you shall judge for yourself how far the 
 Madrid Lottery was concerned in the for- 
 tunes of de Castro and his friend Riccardo 
 Bari. 
 
 " Eh, Pedro/' Juan laughed, rather bit- 
 terly, in answer to my comment, "but my 
 money is not good money; there's too little 
 of it." 
 
 44 All money is good," I declared, — which 
 you know is a fact, Sefior, however one may 
 argue. "Two dollars are better than one, 
 but one is very good." 
 
 "And forty thousand is superlatively 
 good," drawled Juan, provokingly. "Pedro, 
 my luck must turn ! " 
 
 I glanced away from him to watch the 
 new beauty, — the dancer we had seen re- 
 cently, — drive by. She was assuredly very 
 lovely, and very kind if report were accurate. 
 She looked, I think, with more than a pass- 
 
 78 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 ing interest at Juan, who hardly noticed her. 
 That is the way with women, Sefior. They 
 will always turn away from the man who 
 looks at them, to the man who keeps his 
 eyes to himself. People will tell you it is 
 pure feminine perversity; but I think it 
 goes deeper than that, though I am no phil- 
 osopher. I but argue from the old tale of 
 Eve and the First Garden. 
 
 Something of the Beauty's present expres- 
 sion in passing us, I had once seen in Isa- 
 bella's eyes, when they rested on him, — a 
 look which included curiosity, interest, de- 
 sire to comprehend, and a strange, half- 
 wayward, half-tender yearning. People felt 
 that way about Juan. 
 
 One night, it was soon after this, Juan and 
 I sat at dinner in what we called the " Caf6 
 Amo." It was alive with light and colour, 
 for there were many pretty women there 
 and much cigarette-smoke. The Beauty 
 who had noticed Juan sat near us with Felipo 
 de Lodia. She flaunted her gorgeous loveli- 
 ness in our eyes as only a Cuban woman 
 can, with a boldness which was quite 
 inoffensive. Your women, — the Northern 
 women, — cannot do that like ours, Sefior. 
 
 79 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 There is that in their slower and cooler blood 
 which makes their coquetry less natural, 
 less entrancing, and, I think, less delicate. 
 This girl was like a child, or a graceful 
 young wild thing, withal most curiously and 
 prettily conscious of her beautiful self and 
 her witchery. 
 
 She rolled her white arms, showing their 
 curves, and widened her great eyes till they 
 were big and deep and bright as moonlit 
 water. Also she threw Juan a bright red 
 flower from a cluster which pressed her 
 bosom and lay vividly against her white skin. 
 
 Juan drank her health, of course, and Felipo 
 de Lodia frowned. He was weak in body 
 and mind and therefore jealous ; he was not 
 a man of our sort and we had little enough 
 to do with him or his sly ways. I have no 
 patience with a man whose instinctive 
 cowardice wards him away from danger, but 
 who has neither the wit nor the grace to own 
 himself wrong in time to save trouble. 
 
 Then came the event. A cablegram was 
 handed Juan. He tore it open quickly, and I 
 fancied at the moment that I saw his hand 
 tremble. Upon reading it he sprang to 
 his feet and flung it up in the air, catch- 
 
 80 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 ing it again with a lunge as it fluttered past 
 him. 
 
 " Drink to me, all of you ! " he cried, at the 
 top of his voice, " come, drink, I tell you ! I 
 have drawn the Capital Prize in Madrid — 
 drink !" 
 
 Well, the place was pandemonium in a 
 moment. Everyone loved Juan and every- 
 one rejoiced in his change of luck. He was 
 instantly surrounded by a wildly excited 
 crowd, while congratulations rained thick 
 and fast through the air, and drinks were 
 passed around and his health was pledged 
 again and again with a hearty good will. 
 I alone was disturbed; I did not like the 
 feverish gaiety of my friend's manner, and 
 I was incredulous, too, of the authenticity of 
 the telegram. I had never heard, you see, 
 of anyone's winning anything through the 
 Madrid lotteries, and I could hardly believe 
 in this sudden surprising news. Still I could 
 only accept the matter hopefully, and trust 
 that poor Juan was not the victim of a 
 mistake. 
 
 That night, on the strength of the word 
 received, we proceeded to celebrate the oc- 
 casion. We ordered more and more wine 
 
 81 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 and liquor, and danced and sang and drank ; 
 and we flatly refused to separate in spite of 
 the protesting voice of the man who kept 
 the "Cafe Amo" and was held responsible 
 for its respectibility. The Beauty had long 
 since deserted de Lodia, who, in spite of 
 his cowardice, had challenged Juan, and my 
 friend in the most debonair manner pos- 
 sible had promised him satisfaction at de 
 Lodia's own time and place. 
 
 Ah, Senor, sometimes, when one is very 
 old, one feels again the long-silent, dare- 
 devil clash of the pulses, and again every- 
 thing grows pink and golden, as though seen 
 through Burgundy and champagne. One's 
 feet itch to dance, and one's voice longs 
 to lift itself in some old drinking-round ! 
 I can sometimes dream that I am again in 
 the "Cafe Amo," with those other gay fol- 
 lowers of folly and of youth, with wine in 
 plenty, and music, fitful but infectious. 
 Again I can see Juan, as handsome as a 
 god, his dark hair ruffled and his face flushed, 
 grasping his wine-glass as he looked amour- 
 ously at the Beauty, who sat near him, 
 every line in her figure breathing fascina- 
 tion. Eh, well ! We will not dwell on that. 
 
 82 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 The picture is one which is perhaps better 
 forgotten. 
 
 When dawn broke, gray and still, I was 
 walking down the street toward my lodg- 
 ings, wondering what was to come of this 
 sudden change in de Castro's fortunes. Ha- 
 vana was barely stirring awake, and the 
 languid dreariness which follows a night 
 spent not wisely, however well, was heavy 
 upon me, causing me to take a dark view of the 
 future. Let it be stated here, however, Senor, 
 that I had been, as ever, most abstemious ! 
 
 My coffee and rolls were hardly finished that 
 day, before Juan was with me, looking very 
 white and rather grim. It was his way when 
 he had been more than usually outrageous. 
 
 11 Come around with me to the Bank," he 
 said, slowly. 
 
 " Bank I" I gasped. The thought of Juan 
 in close connection with the Havana Bank 
 was too new not to be startling. 
 
 " Yes,— the Bank. Must I repeat it ? " 
 
 "My nerves have come out better than 
 yours/ ' I informed him sweetly, as we left 
 the room together, a few moments later. 
 
 m Nerves !"he repeated, — " nerves ! Mine 
 must stay by me now, such as they are ! 
 
 83 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Listen, Pedro ! for only one thing have I — 
 I mean, has this money come to me: to 
 enable me to win Isabella. Her father will 
 at least listen to me now. Do you not think 
 so, Pedro ?" 
 
 His voice was pitifully eager, like a child's. 
 
 " Yes," I assured him, "if he is disposed 
 to like you, I think he will listen to you now." 
 
 " This — M went on Juan, "this will make 
 it possible, — even easy perhaps " 
 
 " M — yes," I observed. Then I could not 
 help adding, " It was very considerate in 
 Providence to think of that, wasn't it ? " 
 
 He looked at me sharply, even suspi- 
 ciously, but he said nothing. We were 
 already at the Bank. 
 
 Let me tell you briefly, Seiior, that Juan 
 interviewed the Bank President and tried to 
 induce him to look upon the cable message 
 in the light of a draft, and to cash it. The 
 Bank President smiled kindly, — Juan looked 
 very handsome that day, and was young 
 enough to be the Bank President's son, — 
 and said quietly : 
 
 " I think, Seftor, that we will wait until the 
 mail-steamer comes in to corroborate your 
 news. There may be a mistake, you know." 
 
 84 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " But that is a week off ! " 
 
 " True ; but is a week long to wait for forty 
 thousand dollars ?" asked the Bank Presi- 
 dent. 
 
 " But, Sefior President, I am hard put to 
 it, — I need the money ! Ah, I have it ! Will 
 you not cable, yourself, to Madrid, and find 
 out the number of the ticket which drew the 
 Capital Prize ? Find it out from headquarters, 
 Sefior President, — would not that do ? " 
 
 "That would be conclusive, certainly," 
 admitted the Bank President, thoughtfully. 
 He ruminated for a few minutes, then glanced 
 at Juan's handsome eager face, and smiled 
 once more. 
 
 "I will cable Madrid," he said, "and I 
 will also have the advice of some of my 
 Directors. Leave the number of your ticket 
 with me, and your address." 
 
 Juan became voluble with gratitude, the 
 Bank President became frigid in proportion 
 to his volubility, and we departed. 
 
 I was surprised at the turn matters were 
 taking, — I admit I had doubted the authen- 
 ticity of that message. I was still more 
 surprised when the Bank President notified 
 us next day that they had cabled Madrid and 
 
 85 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 that the answer was satisfactory. Seftor 
 de Castro's number had drawn the Capital 
 Prize ; Sefior de Castro would be permitted 
 by courtesy to receive the sum he had won, 
 from the Bank, in advance. There was a 
 little legal bother in the matter, — Juan being 
 obliged to pledge himself to make over his 
 checque when he received it, to the Bank, 
 etc. I probably have that all wrong, Senor, 
 I never had a head for business. I never 
 thought Juan had, either ; but it seems that 
 in that, as in many other matters in the 
 course of my life, I was mistaken. 
 
 Juan was rather grave when we came out 
 of the Bank together, the money securely 
 packed in a small bag in his hand. He had 
 chosen to have it in cash, — " having debts 
 to settle," he explained cheerfully. I noticed 
 his quiet manner, and respected him for it. 
 Evidently he was accepting the responsibili- 
 ties of his recently acquired possession in 
 a serious spirit. 
 
 That day he wrote a letter to the General, 
 Isabella's father, and we both waited in 
 great anxiety for the reply. Juan was so 
 nervous that he hardly hoped for a favour- 
 able one, but, for me, I felt that his chance 
 
 86 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 was good. His letter was a particularly 
 manly one, and the old General could appre- 
 ciate good courage and straight speaking, as 
 he had proved. Juan had not overestimated 
 in his letter the possibilities of forty thou- 
 sand dollars, but he had stated that sum as 
 being available immediately, and had ex- 
 pressed his intention of getting into some 
 serious work at once. With that for capital, 
 something ought to be done; this was his 
 plea. Meanwhile, he asked to be permitted 
 to see the General and the Seftorita Isabella 
 from time to time, and to once more plead 
 his case in person, — which he hoped he 
 would be better able to do than on paper. 
 Something to this effect he said, but it was 
 put in a frank, eager way which I should 
 find it difficult to copy. Juan was very 
 much a boy at times, and some of that odd 
 boyishness of his, together with a fair allow- 
 ance of clear-minded, strong-hearted manli- 
 ness, went into that letter. 
 
 The General evidently liked the letter 
 and did not feel inclined to entirely ignore 
 the alteration in conditions. He did not, in 
 his reply, actually mention the Capital Prize, 
 but he expressed himself as being willing to 
 
 87 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 reconsider the unqualified nature of his 
 answer to Sefior de Castro a short time 
 before. His daughter's happiness was very 
 dear to him, and she had been able to con- 
 vince him in what direction it lay. If Senor 
 de Castro would call on the General that 
 evening they might approach a better under- 
 standing of the situation and of one another. 
 It was a very diplomatic, guarded letter, but 
 I thought I could read in it a certain rather 
 touching note of affection for his daughter. 
 It seemed as though the old man had become 
 convinced of the importance of Juan to his 
 daughter's contentment of life, and seized, — 
 albeit with a semblance of decent hesitation, 
 — the first chance offered him to make mat- 
 ters straight, and to promote the girl's hap- 
 piness. He was an old man and not a hard 
 one, save at times, and Isabella was an only 
 daughter, with a pale cold way of clinging to 
 her own secret grief, more potent to one who 
 loved her than the storming of a virago. 
 
 Juan held the note for some minutes in his 
 hand and stared at it with a strange look 
 which had in it, it seemed to me, quite as 
 much of sorrow as of joy. Then he asked 
 me to go for a walk with him, and we went 
 
 88 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 accordingly. How warm the sun was that 
 day ! I often think of it. And the streets 
 were fuller of people than was usual at the 
 hour. There was an element of festivity, of 
 good cheer which permeated one as one 
 walked, — and the air, — ah! the air was a 
 caress. 
 
 "How is the Beauty ?" I asked, after a 
 time, to bring a gayer element into his too 
 serious thoughts. He started a little and 
 flushed, — I thought with a touch of shame 
 or of regret. 
 
 "I have not seen her since that night," 
 he told me, simply enough. In my own 
 mind, I meditated quietly upon the right- 
 eous, or unrighteous, rage of the Beauty if 
 this were true, but I did not attempt further 
 levity. 
 
 " Now," said Juan, very softly, after a 
 silence with which I was well enough 
 pleased having many things to look at and 
 think upon, "now begins the Golden 'Week, 
 Pedro, — the week with every moment shod 
 as brightly with gold as I can make it. If 
 the Fates give me no more than this one 
 week,— faith! I'll see to it that it is full 
 measure." 
 
 89 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Something in his voice disturbed me, for I 
 could not understand it. But if I allowed 
 myself to be anxious over the many things 
 in life that I do not understand, I should have 
 a weary lot, Sefior, so I put that matter out 
 of my head and worried no more concern- 
 ing it, — at the time ! 
 
 The week, — the Golden Week as I shall 
 always call it, — slipped by all too quickly 
 for the lovers. The General, having per- 
 mitted Juan a footing of sufferance, soon 
 found that matters were beyond his control, 
 had he wished to stop them. The two 
 young people were foolishly, madly happy. 
 I cannot help a certain resentment which 
 enters my heart whenever I see such joy, — 
 a resentment not against them, God knows, 
 — but against Fate, Senor, who never seems 
 able to let well alone, and must always have 
 a finger in the most toothsome pies. It 
 seems a pity, — does it not, Senor? — that 
 Grief and Separation and such odious night- 
 hags seem irresistibly attracted to the happy 
 and smiling young Love God. They can't 
 leave the pretty sprite alone, it seems. Ah, 
 well! this is not a place in which to let 
 one's private regrets and grudges creep in, 
 
 90 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 though we know what they are, — eh, Sefior ? 
 
 Juan's face became filled with joy, yet a 
 joy as strangely new as it was strangely 
 serious. I realized now that he heartily 
 and even bitterly regretted his past follies 
 and dissipations, — most of all his excesses 
 on that night when he had first received 
 word from Madrid. This novel attitude on 
 his part seemed to put my friend far away 
 on a pinnacle by himself, and I sometimes 
 felt strangely and sadly shut out from his 
 present exalted gladness and gravity. Yet 
 now and then a curious hard grim look 
 leaped momentarily to his eyes, a look cal- 
 culating yet reckless. Had I seen that look at 
 a gaming-table I should have said: " There 
 is one who has wagered everything. If he 
 wins he will be rich for life. If he loses, he 
 will kill himself. 1 ' 
 
 The hot golden days and the hot silver 
 nights came and passed. Those two dreamed 
 away their time of good fortune with pathet- 
 ic concentration of love and rapture. Each 
 morning Juan went to his lady with a flush 
 of expectation on his face, each night he re- 
 turned with a sort of hush about him won- 
 derful to note. And suddenly the week had 
 
 9i 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 gone, and it was the day before the arrival 
 of the mail-steamer. And on that day Juan 
 came to me very white indeed, and told me 
 that something had happened which brought 
 matters to a crisis. 
 
 " What do you mean?" I said, rather 
 testily, for he spoke significantly and I dis- 
 trust riddles. 
 
 " I cannot tell you exactly what I mean — 
 now," said Juan, whiter than ever. "You 
 will know soon enough. But this I can tell 
 you. I must hurry matters, — I must bind 
 Isabella to me forever, and I must do it 
 quickly." 
 
 " Are you quite mad ? " I asked. 
 
 U I do not think so, — at least not at pres- 
 ent. Perhaps I shall be before I reach the 
 end of this. Only one thing remains clear 
 in my mind ; Isabella must be my wife to- 
 night." 
 
 He spoke passionately, feverishly and with 
 a note of panic in his voice. I stared at him, 
 doing my best to understand. 
 
 " You are going to marry the Sefiorita to- 
 day ? " I asked him, at last, calmly. When 
 one is quite dazed one is of necessity calm, 
 all emotion being out of the question. 
 
 92 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " I am." He spoke definitely, and straight- 
 ened up as he said it. 
 " Does she know it ? " 
 " No. But she will marry me." 
 I looked at him and shook my head be- 
 wildered. Yet I was bound to acknowledge 
 to myself that, as he looked then, he might 
 carry that or any other point. 
 
 And, as a matter of fact, by some reason- 
 ing or lover-like lack of reasoning, he did 
 win Senorita Isabella's consent to this mad 
 and ill-timed marriage. At sun-down she 
 was going to mass. He would join her and 
 they would be married. The old General 
 was not to know until the next day, or such 
 time as Isabella chose to divulge it, — but 
 Juan argued, I do not doubt, that he would 
 not be too angry with them, having already 
 shown much indulgence and leniency. In 
 any case, Isabella was to be Isabella de 
 Castro by nightfall. When Juan told me 
 this his face flushed deeply, and a look came 
 into his eyes which was a new surprise to 
 me. "And — to-morrow," he added, almost 
 inarticulately, "I shall not care what hap- 
 pens. Pedro ! — she will be my wife — 
 to-night!" 
 
 93 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Quite like Romeo and Juliet, poor things ! 
 — quite like Romeo and Juliet. At this late 
 date I cannot seem to remember whether or 
 not the traditional rope-ladder was added to 
 the preparations. I am inclined to think 
 that it must have been. 
 
 "She will be my wife — to-night !" had 
 murmured Juan, in the mock-omnipotence 
 of love. But the good God adjusts our 
 plans, Senor, to suit His sublime judgment. 
 Undoubtedly it is for the best, but it is apt 
 to be exasperating. 
 
 Felipo de Lodia, who had apparently 
 been fabricating a fictitious courage during 
 the past week, chose this day to arrange his 
 long-deferred duel with Juan, — the duel in 
 connection with the Beauty. I will still 
 call her so, Senor, — 'tis a title widely applic- 
 able in Cuba, and therefore does her no 
 injury. I am told that she has since 
 become so respectable that it would look 
 like shocking impertinence on my part 
 to mention her name together with a duel 
 in Havana, and when a woman has the 
 good sense to keep her own eccentric 
 affairs to herself, she deserves encourage- 
 ment. 
 
 94 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Juan received Felipo de Lodia's challenge 
 with a stony face, and told the second who 
 brought it that he had an engagement for the 
 hour, just before sun-down, appointed by de 
 Lodia. The man dared, to my disgust, say 
 something about the convenience of some 
 engagements, which, also to my disgust, 
 settled the matter. Juan said, of course, 
 that it would give him the greatest possible 
 pleasure to run through Seftor de Lodia at 
 the time suggested, and to run through his 
 second afterward. Indeed, he declared, 
 suavely, the temptation was so great that 
 he would postpone his engagement rather 
 than run the risk of losing the opportunity 
 altogether. He realized, he ended with a 
 malicious inflection, that it might not be 
 offered him again ! 
 
 The man went out, angry enough with his 
 reception, I do not doubt, and I cannot in the 
 least blame him. As soon as we were alone 
 Juan turned to me with a curious smile. He 
 said nothing but I burst out, — " It is an 
 abominable shame!" hotly sympathetic. 
 Where was the proposed marriage with 
 Isabella, where the Romeo and Juliet 
 romance, where the rope-ladder ? Juan 
 
 95 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 'would have to keep in retirement for a few 
 days even if he were so discreet as to merely 
 wound de Lodia slightly. Blindly I realized, 
 while seeing no cause, that Juan had had 
 some great and definite reason for wishing 
 the marriage to take place that night ; so 
 blindly I pitied him, and condoled with him 
 in the witless way of friends. 
 
 " No," he said, " it is only fate. It has " 
 
 He stopped suddenly, and, after a short 
 moment of hesitation, ended, "it has saved 
 me, Pedro, from the greatest wrong of all the 
 many great wrongs the reckoning for which 
 I must soon meet." 
 
 He wrote a few letters after that, and then 
 went out alone, though it was in the hot 
 hours of the siesta. I went back to my own 
 quarters and did not see him until late in 
 the afternoon, when he came in looking 
 rather worn as to face, but with a hard, cool 
 look about his mouth which I knew yet did 
 not know. We went together to the place 
 de Lodia had appointed. It was a wonderful 
 afternoon with a special and rare brilliancy 
 upon everything and a heavy sweetness in 
 the air. 
 
 The duel was a swift one, and as pretty as 
 
 96 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 anything of the kind which I have ever seen. 
 Juan wounded de Lodia very soon, though 
 in truth he really let his adversary play 
 about untouched for several minutes out of 
 pure courtesy. The wound was a slight one, 
 but enough, we all decided, and he and I 
 strolled homeward just as the sun dropped 
 down out of sight. 
 
 When I suggested that a trip into the coun- 
 try for a day or two might be expedient he 
 shook his head. When I further mentioned 
 the hour and remarked that he might still 
 join Isabella at mass, he almost turned on me. 
 
 " God, man ! " he cried, " don't you see ? I 
 came to my senses in time. I sent her word 
 concerning the duel, and put the temptation 
 behind me. Are you Satan yourself that 
 you revive it again ? " 
 
 Satan himself! I put it to you, Seftor, 
 was that friendly or grateful ? However, he 
 quickly apologized, and I could not bear 
 malice where Juan was concerned. Still, I 
 felt dejected and utterly at sea, I frankly 
 confess. 
 
 " Pedro/' he said, at last, "you may have 
 known that I was a scoundrel, but perhaps 
 you never suspected that I was an out-and- 
 
 97 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 out blackguard and an out-and-out thief. 
 Come with me to the Bank and see me prove 
 myself both.' ' 
 
 Now, I knew by his voice just how serious 
 this matter was to be, so I went trembling. 
 I had no doubt of his villainy, Sefior, for I 
 believed in his estimate of himself; but I 
 loved him. 
 
 We were shown into the Bank President's 
 private office. I was shaking, but Juan was 
 quite cool. 
 
 " Sefior President," he said, as the older 
 man, smiling kindly, looked up at him, "I 
 have come to break to you bad news, — very 
 bad news." 
 
 "What news, Senor?" asked the Presi- 
 dent, smiling still. 
 
 "It is this," said Juan; "that I have not 
 the smallest idea that my number drew the 
 Capital Prize in Madrid n 
 
 The President leaped to his feet. 
 
 " What are you talking about ? " he cried. 
 
 "Of course, it is possible that it has," 
 continued Juan, "but I think it is one of the 
 most unlikely possibilities in the world. I 
 have not the faintest knowledge as to what 
 number did come out ahead, but it would 
 
 98 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 be hardly short of miraculous if it were 
 mine." 
 
 The Bank President looked at him with a 
 frozen gaze. 
 
 "I think you must have gone mad," he 
 said. " Do you not know that every pre- 
 caution was taken to verify the fact ? We 
 cabled- — " 
 
 " Yes, Seftor President. And my accom- 
 plice is Riccardo Bari, the operator at Key 
 West. You see the matter lay easily in his 
 hands. His work consisted in the manage- 
 ment of one small detail. Your cable went 
 through all right, asking for the number 
 which had drawn the Prize. When he re- 
 ceived the answer from Madrid, he merely 
 changed the number cited to the number of 
 my ticket, and repeated the message duly with 
 that one small, undiscoverable alteration." 
 
 The Bank President and I were almost 
 equally paralyzed ; but I think he felt worst. 
 We both waited, seeing that further state- 
 ments were to follow from this surprising 
 man who stood there, rather white but quite 
 immovable, and confessed his fraud with 
 complete coolness and lack of embarrass- 
 ment. 
 
 99 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " I have looked up Spanish law in Cuba, 
 Sefior President," pursued Juan, "and I 
 find that the penalty for obtaining money 
 under false pretenses is fifteen years im- 
 prisonment. My friend Bari and I are quite 
 prepared to go. I have been settling my 
 affairs with that end in view, and I can 
 answer for him that he will make no effort 
 to leave Key 'West before the officers reach 
 there.' ' 
 
 "Where is the money ?" burst from the 
 Bank President, with extreme violence. 
 
 " Quite safe, Sefior President, in the hands 
 of Bari's friends, where we can easily obtain 
 it at the end of our terms of imprisonment. M 
 
 The President leaned forward and moist- 
 ened his dry lips. Twice he tried to speak 
 in vain, then with an air of proposing a busi- 
 ness transaction he said : 
 
 " If you will give up that money this mat- 
 ter shall never reach the ears of the police." 
 
 " You do not understand, Sefior President. 
 If we were afraid of arrest why did we not 
 escape with the money instead of confessing 
 it? We planned this long ago, Bari and I. 
 We agreed that the life of criminals in hiding 
 would be unpleasing to us, — to me particu- 
 
 ioo 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 larly. Bari would have been willing to have 
 taken his chances, I think. This is entirely 
 my own plan, but he fully agrees to it, and 
 it would be unfair for me to back out now, 
 after having induced him to enter the game 
 ■with me." 
 
 The President, rather pale and exceedingly 
 blank as to expression, stared at him. 
 
 "Good God, man!" he said, "you are a 
 gentleman ; what made you invent such a 
 damnable fraud as this ? " 
 
 A sudden, very hot colour stained my 
 friend's face, but he said not one word. I 
 caught his arm. 
 
 "Juan, give it up," I besought, almost be- 
 side myself, " you are no thief! " 
 
 " You neither of you seem to understand," 
 he said, dully. " Bari has risked everything 
 to have this money, fifteen years hence at the 
 latest. He wants to come out then and find 
 his money waiting for him to use, not as a 
 thief, but as a man who has honestly paid 
 the penalty and worked for his fortune." 
 
 The Bank President fell back in his chair 
 and raised a futile hand toward Heaven. 
 
 11 Merciful powers," he muttered, weakly, 
 — quite beyond connected, much less elabo- 
 
 IOI 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 rate speech, — " The reasoning ! — Great God ! 
 — His reasoning ! — His preposterous, infernal 
 reasoning ! M Words failed him. 
 
 " I have risked everything," went on Juan, 
 quietly, " for one week's chance. I would do 
 it again for this short, golden week. It was 
 worth it all and I do not regret my part in 
 it." He was looking at me. He knew that 
 I would understand his unspoken reference 
 to Isabella. " I wanted a chance, — I had it, 
 and I took it. Had it not been for de Lodia, 
 Pedro, I should have taken more than was 
 mine by right — to-night. I should have 
 married her.. .married to a felon ! M He had 
 quite forgotten the Bank President. " One 
 thing, Pedro, I will swear to you. When I 
 come out — of prison, I shall never, — so help 
 me Heaven! — touch one penny of that 
 damnable money." 
 
 The Bank President in all his trouble 
 stared at him with an amazement which 
 wavered between curiosity and a perverse 
 admiration. 
 
 "You are the most extraordinary fellow 
 that the Lord ever made," he remarked. 
 "You seem to have committed a felony for 
 the sake of possessing a large sum of money 
 
 102 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 for one week. You are now going to prison 
 for it, on your own voluntary confession, 
 and you are swearing never to touch a penny 
 of it when you are free, after all ! " 
 
 Juan's expression, as he looked at him, I 
 can only term acknowledgment. 
 
 " I think you are beginning to understand," 
 he said. " I had intended to use that money 
 when I was free, Sefior President. It was 
 my plan, — a villain's plan, villainously exe- 
 cuted. But — Seiior, since last week I have 
 become betrothed to a lady. But for a 
 strange chance I should be her bridegroom 
 to-night. Can you understand better now? " 
 
 The President's face was astonishingly 
 comprehending. 
 
 " Yes," he said, " I think I can. You have 
 paid a great price, Sefior, for your golden 
 week, as you call it, — fifteen years of free- 
 dom, and your share of forty thousand dol- 
 lars! So you cannot be induced or bribed 
 to give the money up ? " 
 
 " It was my plan, — I keep to it," said Juan, 
 briefly. " Anything else would be unfair to 
 Riccardo Bari, as well as cowardly on my 
 part. I am not a coward, Sefior, if I am a 
 criminal. I am quite ready to pay." 
 
 103 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Juan wrote one very short note to the 
 Senorita Isabella, and in it he stated the 
 case. He was certain, and even I believed, 
 that she would send him some message of 
 love and absolution before he went to prison. 
 But you cannot trust those snow-white, 
 high-born, cold-featured women, Seiior, 
 when it comes to emergencies. She re- 
 turned his note with a vehement "Fare- 
 well" dashed across it, — and nothing more. 
 
 The Beauty behaved differently. When 
 Juan was taken to jail there was a violent 
 feeling of resentment among his friends. 
 His departure was made a triumphal proces- 
 sion, and among those who pressed to see 
 him was the Beauty. She kissed her hands 
 to him, not coquettishly but passionately, 
 and her face was disfigured by tears. But 
 Juan hardly seemed to see her. His eyes, 
 hungry and tragic, lifted themselves to the 
 Seiiorita's window as he passed under it. 
 She might, I thought, have waved to him, 
 but no, — there was not a sign of her. 
 
 So he went on ; and it was to have been 
 the first morning after his marriage, too ! 
 Ah, well, Senor, life is a queer thing, and it 
 is better not to think about it too much. 
 
 104 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 The Beauty married, ten years later, and is 
 a great lady now, but I have heard that she 
 has never forgotten de Castro. To my mind, 
 her's was the better love, — warmer, more 
 comforting, and less fatally clear of sight. 
 Indeed, perhaps the true clarity of vision is 
 a tender blindness, Sefior, — who can say ? 
 
 In due time Juan came out of prison, and 
 made a fair living, but he never would touch 
 a penny of those ill-gotten gains. Bari is out 
 too, — a rich man, of course. And Isabella ? 
 Oh, she married de Castro ; declares that she 
 went into conventual retirement until he 
 was freed. Well, Juan has what he wishes, 
 — though I always preferred the Beauty, 
 poor soul ! — and I suppose, under the cir- 
 cumstances, he does not even now grudge 
 the price he paid for his Golden "Week and 
 what it brought him. As for his wife, no 
 woman who has Juan would change places 
 with our Regent ! — a rare fellow with women 
 is Juan. 
 
 I have told a long tale, Sefior! But when 
 one lets oneself drift back into those old 
 days, one forgets how to be brief and to the 
 point ! They were good days, — good days, 
 Sefior! But they are all gone. 
 
 105 
 
"AND IN THE FIRE 
 OF SPRING" 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 «&n& in tfje JFtre of 
 
 €* 
 
 O you will not return 
 to Paris for the pres- 
 ent ? Not even though 
 it is May, the height of 
 the season ? " 
 
 "No; I am growing so 
 young again, I have no 
 wish to leave — Olym- 
 pus, may I call it ? The 
 
 atmosphere is so very Greek, it suggests 
 
 Olympus ! " 
 
 Mme. Lefevre smiled her wistful, fleeting 
 
 smile, as her long fingers shaped the red 
 
 wax which littered her modelling-table. 
 
 She was tall and very slender, and her hair 
 
 was softly-blended flaxen and gray. She 
 
 owned to thirty-seven, but she did not look 
 
 more than thirty. 
 
 " Ah, well, " she said, "Olympus is glad 
 
 that you will stay. Sometimes we grow 
 
 lonely among the gods." 
 
 Her metaphor was not too far-fetched nor 
 
 109 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 inapplicable, for casts in marble and plaster 
 glimmered all about the room, and seemed 
 to dream of the Golden Age and ancient 
 Greece. The room was large and dim and 
 cool, and through it blew breezes fresh from 
 the sea. The two broad, open windows 
 were framed in the hanging clusters of a wis- 
 taria vine that climbed and twined outside. 
 Though salt air and measured surf-notes 
 bespoke the near presence of the ocean, there 
 was no glimpse of it through the window. 
 Mme. Lefevre lived high on the cliffs, and 
 from where the two sat the horizon-line was 
 invisible. The only outlook was the pale blue 
 sky, — two great squares of infinite faint-hued 
 space, framed in the hanging wistaria blooms. 
 
 Mme. Lefevre's companion's eyes included 
 windows, room and graceful occupant in a 
 long panoramic glance full of conscious satis- 
 faction, and luxurious content. He was an 
 angular man, a trifle worn, a trifle gray, with 
 just a touch of cynicism in his mouth, dis- 
 pelled at intervals by his slow but not un- 
 kindly smile, a man with clean-cut features, 
 and uncommunicative gray eyes. 
 
 Paul Carthier, the successful banker, was 
 rusticating near the sea. His luck, as usual 
 
 no 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 beneficent, had given him letters to Mme. 
 Lef6vre, a rich, beautiful and eccentric 
 widow, who lived, modelled and read in a 
 lonely house on lonely cliffs, and who, before 
 she abandoned the world and its ways, had 
 been one of the most charming of Parisian 
 belles. They understood each other, the 
 graceful woman, — with the piquant silver 
 touches in her fair hair, which looked as 
 though they had been put there by a powder- 
 puff to enhance her fairness, — and the world- 
 weary man. How or why they should be 
 in sympathy, they never knew, but from the 
 beginning Paul Carthier had rejoiced in a 
 sense of rest and comfortable absence of 
 discord or effort, which always seemed to 
 greet him at the door of Mme. Lefevre's 
 work-room. And, on her part, she liked to 
 listen to his keen, careless views of men and 
 things, she liked to see the world again in 
 his crisp and vivid utterance ; and his appre- 
 ciation of herself and her surroundings was 
 pleasant to her. 
 
 She was not a " professional sculptress," 
 as she often explained, and merely toyed 
 with the classic art with her slender, grace- 
 ful fingers. Carthier was glad that she was 
 
 in 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 ■mirwnnrni — |— —————— —--—-■— - ■■!■■■■■ him in — iii—i— i ■■■ ■■■■——»■ 
 
 not too great, and did not take her ambitions 
 too seriously. The room in which they sat 
 was undeniably the room of one to whom 
 beauty was a passion, in any case, and with 
 a distinct sensation of delight he noted the 
 splendid bare spaces where the big white 
 gods were fitly honoured, and were not forced 
 to suffer the indignity of ignoble companion- 
 ship. No "bric-a-brac," no modern art, no 
 "ornaments" desecrated the room. Mme. 
 Lefevre was Asiatic in her belief that one 
 beautiful thing at a time was as much as man's 
 limited appreciation could adequately grasp. 
 
 " It would be wicked not to be young and 
 happy to-day," said Carthier. "It is May, 
 Madame! — May, and the sun is shining 
 outside ! " 
 
 "Ah, to be sure," she said lightly, "it is 
 May. Even the old grow young again in 
 
 May. It is only the dead " She checked 
 
 herself. " It is hard that the access of 
 strength should not mean the access of 
 peace," she mused aloud. 
 
 Carthier looked at her enquiringly. 
 
 " I mean," she pursued, "that this infusion 
 of light and life which enters the veins in 
 spring should bring with it the repose of 
 
 112 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 power, instead of warring impulses, and 
 beating blood." 
 
 Carthier laughed. 
 
 " Had you ever * warring impulses ' in your 
 life ? " he asked, audaciously. 
 
 "I? I am full of them, — far too full of 
 them for a quiet, lonely lady approaching 
 middle life ! " She laughed softly, and lightly 
 pressed the wax she held into the delicate 
 semblance of a face. In her odd, touching 
 voice she quoted as though to her own inner 
 ears : 
 
 " ' Come, — fill the Cup and in the Fire of Spring, 
 Your Winter Garment of Repentance fling. 
 The Bird of Time has but a little way 
 To fly, and lo ! the Bird is on the Wing ! ' " 
 
 " * Your winter garment of repentance ! ' " 
 repeated Carthier. " Repentance — penance ! 
 Do you believe in hidden penance ? " 
 
 " Surely.' ' 
 
 " I mean penance in the mind, the soul. Not 
 fasting nor yet prayer, but that inner scourg- 
 ing which is caused not from a sense of 
 religion but of justice. At intervals, I repair 
 to some inner Inquisition and ask myself 
 whether or not I am fit to mix with my 
 fellow men ! " 
 
 113 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " How dark a record you must have ! " 
 She laughed, but she looked more attentive 
 than before. 
 
 " Once upon a time," said Carthier, speak- 
 ing in a very casual manner, " a man asked 
 me for help and I refused it. He was a 
 blackguard, but, as I found out afterward, he 
 happened to be in extreme need, and I was 
 — or had been — his friend, you see. He came 
 to me to borrow the money that was to save 
 him from ruin. I did not believe his story; 
 I had heard it very often from his lips and, 
 after yielding, had very often found that what 
 I had let him have had gone — well, I would 
 rather not mention how. I refused, and, I 
 think, put it rather brutally. He besought 
 me again, more pressingly; I ordered him 
 out. Next day he shot himself." 
 
 Mme. Lefevre very softly pushed away the 
 lumps of red wax, and stared at him. 
 
 "The broken sword; and the piece fits — 
 the piece fits," she whispered, enigmatically. 
 Aloud she said : 
 
 "Your < winter garment of repentance' is 
 a heavy and burdensome one, Monsieur. It is, 
 I admit, a very serious sin to withhold one's 
 hand from the friend who appeals to one." 
 
 114 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Carthier flushed, painfully; his eyes 
 seemed pleading for more gentle censure. 
 But he said no word. Mme. Lefevre sat 
 motionless, her elbows upon the modelling- 
 table, her chin upon her white hands, her 
 eyes cast down. 
 
 " So this soft spring season does not bring 
 a uniform peace," she said, as though she 
 pondered deeply. "You have remorse, and 
 I — perhaps, Monsieur, your special act of 
 cruelty affects me the more deeply because 
 it calls to mind an episode in my own life 
 the memory of which will always be a hard 
 one. I was betrothed, Monsieur, when I 
 was very young, to the man I loved — rare, 
 indeed, among French girls, but my parents 
 desired my happiness above all things. The 
 engagement was not known outside the 
 family, but would be soon. One day my 
 father came to me and told me that my lover 
 was ruined, disgraced, and that I could 
 never see him again. I demanded speech 
 with him; it was finally allowed me. He 
 came — he talked to me for the last time. He 
 was in debt, he had no way of getting out of 
 it — he was hopeless. He had appealed to a 
 man, a friend, who was in a position to help 
 
 "5 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 him. The friend had refused. My poor boy- 
 clasped me in his arms for good-bye, after 
 telling me this, and rushed from the house. 
 Next day he killed himself/ ' 
 
 She spoke very calmly and quietly, and 
 still patted the red wax. Only in a curious 
 hard look about her lips was it possible to 
 read her intimate suffering in the brief 
 tragedy she had related. 
 
 " A sad little story, Monsieur, is it not ? " 
 she continued. " It is all my romance. 
 Shortly after I made the usual marriage of 
 convenience. M. Lefevre was a good man; 
 when he died I came here to live. Only one 
 definite desire remains in my heart, Mon- 
 sieur. I want to see the man who refused 
 my lover the help so entirely in his power to 
 give. I hated him — I hated him. To-day I 
 hate him still. 9 ' 
 
 She spoke tranquilly, but her eyes were 
 quite implacable. 
 
 " What a good hater ! " said Carthier, half 
 jestingly. " And is it all to no purpose ? 
 Have you no clue to his identity ? " 
 
 1 ' I never heard his name — but I have vowed 
 to find him, and God respects and aids a vow 
 like that. My God is the God of the Scrip- 
 
 116 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 tures. Some day my enemy will be placed 
 in my power, — I do not know how, but God 
 knows. I shall be able to hurt him, through 
 his love or his ambition or his remorse or 
 his pride — the way will be pointed out to 
 me, and I shall have power to punish him. 
 I have prayed, and God will not remain deaf 
 forever." 
 
 Something in her voice and quiet bearing 
 chilled her listener strangely. How calm 
 she was ! — how exquisite ! — and how won- 
 derfully stern in her half Pagan, half fanatical 
 determination. 
 
 <( Do you know," he said, "that there is 
 something primitive and savage about you 
 at this moment ? You, who in some ways 
 are the last breath of civilized and delicate 
 womanhood! " 
 
 " Many of us are in reality primitive/' she 
 responded, tranquilly. " We wear well-built 
 clothes if we are men, and Paquin gowns 
 if we are women, but in our hearts we are 
 as naked as Aphrodite there, or Apollo, or 
 
 Bacchus " she indicated the glimmering 
 
 white shapes about them. 
 
 " You are hard," he said, quietly. " I would 
 have sworn you were as gentle and as fine 
 
 117 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 as your wistaria blowing about in the wind 
 outside the window. But you are hard. 
 Surely one may forget one's old grudges in 
 May." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 Then she slowly loosened from a long 
 chain about her neck upon which dangled 
 various metal and jewelled objects, a tiny 
 silver cross. 
 
 "I gave this to — him — when we were 
 betrothed," she said. "When he died some 
 one, kinder than the others, sent it back to 
 me. I think, at the very last, when — they 
 found him,— he asked them to. There was 
 a little drop of blood dried onto it, — it had 
 been in his pocket, you see, and the pistol... 
 I have kept it close to my heart these twelve 
 years, and I have told it in the name of our 
 love, his and mine, that I would never rest 
 or know happiness until that man was in my 
 power." 
 
 She sat silent, holding the little cross in 
 her fingers. 
 
 " And you love him still ? " asked Carthier, 
 very gently. His heart gave a throb of pain, as 
 he spoke. What love — what love ! he 
 thought, within his soul. Had the dead 
 
 118 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 boy been worth it ? he wondered. Prob- 
 ably better worth it than — He bowed his 
 head. 
 
 " You have no right to ask," she said, very 
 white. "He was my lover — I vowed — " 
 Her voice was broken. " That is enough ! " 
 she ended, almost fiercely. 
 
 "How will you find the man you have 
 vowed to punish ?" asked Carthier, with a 
 weary realization that he must carry the 
 talk beyond dangerous personalities. To 
 his surprise she leaned forward and looked 
 with an odd, searching stare straight into 
 his eyes. 
 
 " Monsieur," she said, deliberately, "have 
 you ever heard the story of Iseult of Ireland ? 
 Her betrothed, Morold, was slain by a knight 
 whom she had never seen, and who mock- 
 ingly sent home to her the severed head of 
 her lover. She preserved the splinter of 
 steel which she found imbedded in the skull 
 and sought near and far for the sword with 
 a nick in the blade into which that sliver 
 would exactly fit. At last, in a blade which 
 lay at the bedside of a wounded minstrel 
 whom she was tending, she found a broken 
 place, and the piece of steel fitted into it." 
 
 119 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "Yes, I have heard the story," said Car- 
 thier. " Well, and do you expect to find 
 your enemy by the same means?" He 
 smiled. 
 
 " No, Monsieur, because I have already 
 found him." 
 
 Carthier looked at her, but half compre- 
 hending. 
 
 "The name of the man to whom I was 
 betrothed was Gaston de Gris," cried Mme. 
 Lefevre, in a clear voice. 
 
 Carthier started upright. 
 
 "Is it possible?" he gasped. "Good 
 heavens ! De Gris ! " 
 
 "The piece fits, Monsieur, the piece fits ! " 
 she said, facing him. Then she hid her face 
 in her hands. " You ! " she murmured, 
 brokenly, — " it was you who failed him. My 
 enemy! — you! " 
 
 In the silence that followed Carthier came 
 one step nearer to her, and then stopped 
 short, clenching his hands in the impotence 
 of his position. Outside the waves could be 
 heard faintly, lapping — lapping, at the foot of 
 the cliff. A fisherman, just pushing off, sang 
 a love-song in a minor key; it was a queer, 
 sobbing, uneven thing, with a sea-lilt in it. 
 
 120 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "Madame," at last said Carthier, very 
 low, "you have been praying God for re- 
 venge these past twelve years— it is in your 
 hands. You have asked that the man whom 
 you hated should be placed in your power ; 
 he is here, Madame. And I will tell you 
 how to wound and punish him: in his — " 
 His voice broke, and he paused. 
 
 " In his love for you, Madame," he ended, 
 simply. 
 
 Mme. Lefevre started as though in horror. 
 She caught up the little silver cross, and 
 pressed it convulsively to her heart ; on her 
 lips was an unspoken prayer. 
 
 "Do not stop me," continued Carthier, 
 softly and gravely, " I am trying to show 
 you that my punishment is even greater than 
 any which you could devise. To know that 
 you have in your heart a grave to love and 
 weep over, to know that you are predis- 
 posed, in any case, to hate me, — to know — 
 Ah, Madame ! You have not prayed to the 
 good God in vain. Truly your God is the 
 God of the Scriptures, and is not deaf for- 
 ever." His voice was very bitter as he 
 spoke the last words. 
 
 The refrain of the fisherman's love-song 
 
 121 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 floated inland like a ghost of sound. And 
 the waves were still lapping — lapping against 
 the foot of the cliff. In through the open 
 windows, — the broad windows framed in 
 clustering wistaria-blooms that moved in 
 shadowy silhouettes against the pale blue 
 sky, — blew the salt wind. And all about, 
 stood the kindly white deities, smiling for 
 the most part, as though they watched a 
 comedy. Who should know better than 
 they the things that count and that do not ? 
 
 Suddenly Mme. Lefdvre flung the little 
 silver cross from her, and burst into a passion 
 of tears. 
 
 " It is too late to change — my whole life," 
 she cried, brokenly, her face hidden in her 
 hands, "you are asking me to forget — every- 
 thing." 
 
 Carthier started violently, and the blood 
 poured into his face. Yet he steadied his 
 voice and did not advance one step closer to 
 her. 
 
 " I am asking you — nothing, Madame," he 
 said. " I am — asking — you — nothing. I am 
 only telling you that — I love you." 
 
 Then he stood, breathless, and awaited 
 his sentence. 
 
 122 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Ah ! " murmured Mme. Letevre, drawing 
 her hands away from her tear-stained face. 
 "You said, Monsieur, that spring could 
 make even the old young. But if one has 
 been — dead — these many years ?" 
 
 Carthier was at her side. 
 
 "It is the season of resurrection," he 
 whispered. 
 
 123 
 
AN EXPERIMENT 
 IN SOULS 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 &n tf spmmtnt in Bonis 
 
 N,DOUBTEDLY the 
 
 ($ fJT^^KSr^iS boy can sing, but he 
 
 has no soul. Truly he 
 is but a Necker such as 
 the poets sing of. He 
 was born without a 
 soul! ,, 
 
 So spoke the Master, 
 with a petulance most 
 unprecedented. The Master was not wont 
 to take so much heed to his pupils, nor to 
 their souls, and his sister raised her eyes 
 toward him in slight amazement. Madame 
 Perrinat, the Master* sister and assistant, 
 was beautiful. Further, she was intensely 
 artistic, and quite unscrupulous. Yet she 
 was not a bad woman, which is a paradox, 
 yet truthful. 
 
 " Tiens, Philippe," she remarked, sensibly, 
 answering her brother's testiness. " Get him 
 a soul." 
 
 "And where, I ask you? 7 demanded the 
 Maitre Philippe, with a rising inflection. 
 
 127 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Where does one find a factory where they 
 manufacture souls ? " 
 
 Madame stretched herself, and half closed 
 her sleepy dark eyes. 
 
 " You have spoken of the Necker, mon 
 frere, — you remember how the Necker 
 always found a soul ? — Through love ! — Ah, 
 yes, truly! Alors, let the boy fall in love." 
 
 The Master laughed, his rare deep laugh. 
 " Bien, — that is a good idea, Fran<;oise! 
 With whom, then ? Not Liselle ? " 
 
 Madame laughed shrilly. Liselle was their 
 convent-bred niece, a little pale wisp of a 
 thing, with reddish hair and not the dimmest 
 comprehension of art nor of life. Love and 
 Liselle ! — Madame laughed for some mo- 
 ments. 
 
 Suddenly her laughter broke on her lips 
 into a silence which made the Master look 
 at her. She seemed to be considering some- 
 thing quite new, and her face was grave. 
 
 "Of what are you thinking, Franqoise ? " 
 asked the Master, anxiously. 
 
 "I am thinking," said Madame, slowly, 
 "that I like experiments. And an experi- 
 ment in souls — Dieu! There would be some 
 excitement there I " A light leaped into her 
 
 128 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 eyes. " What if I undertake it, this experi- 
 ment ? " she cried, quickly. " What if I give 
 the boy his soul?" 
 
 The Master stared at her. 
 
 "You — Francjoise! You are fifteen years 
 older than he ! Also, it is dangerous, experi- 
 menting with souls. Suppose in giving one 
 to him, you should play havoc with your 
 own?" 
 
 Madame laughed recklessly. 
 
 "I will take the risk, I," she exclaimed. 
 " Bien, Philippe, — I undertake it, this experi- 
 ment in souls !" 
 
 The Master raised his hand hastily. 
 
 "It is Jeannot himself who comes," he 
 said. 
 
 A slender, yellow-haired boy, older in 
 reality than he looked, came in laughing. 
 He was Jean de Bonfoi, known to his 
 intimates as Jeannot, and he was the son of 
 one of the Master's old friends. Jeannot's 
 marvellous tenor voice was only less re- 
 markable than his extraordinary absence of 
 responsibility, of gravity, of sentiment. The 
 Master had said well, — the boy had no soul. 
 Or if a soul lurked somewhere behind those 
 boyish yet mocking eyes, it had not yet 
 
 129 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 raised its wings, — not yet made itself known. 
 
 It was time for the morning singing lesson, 
 and Maitre Philippe lost no time in begin- 
 ning. To-day, Madame remained in the 
 room, flung in a cat-like, comfort-seeking 
 pose among the cushions on the divan. 
 Jeannot sang, and as he sang he must 
 perforce catch her eyes now and then. 
 Madame's eyes were worth remembering, — 
 the quick, strange way in which they dilated 
 and narrowed had a peculiar fascination 
 which was difficult to analyze. When the 
 lesson was over, she stirred for the first 
 time, and sat upright. 
 
 "Now, brother Philippe/' she said, "you 
 have filled his head full of scales and trills 
 and shakes. Come here beside me, Jeannot, 
 and I will try to make you forget them all ! " 
 She laughed softly as she spoke, and, as 
 Jeannot came toward her, the Master left the 
 room, his confidence in his sister's intelli- 
 gence warring with a certain distrust of her 
 present methods. 
 
 Madame had never talked with Jeannot 
 before for any length of time. She found him 
 quick,— almost witty, indeed, — and most ap- 
 preciative. But he laughed at everything, 
 
 130 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 at life, at love, at death, and at the hereafter. 
 There was something uncanny in the sound 
 of that careless, short laugh of his, coming 
 from so young a mouth. A handsome, 
 lovable mouth it was, — this Madame noticed. 
 She also perceived the tone of curious blue- 
 purple which made his eyes so attractive 
 and unusual. 
 
 " Tiens," she said at last, looking full at 
 him, — her voice was as vibrant and as sweet 
 as a note of music. " You are a very dear 
 boy. So away, now. I have some letters 
 to write before degeuner." 
 
 She did not offer him her hand, but laid it 
 lightly on his arm for a moment. Then, after 
 he had gone, she sat, wrapped in dreams, 
 for quite twenty minutes, and was only 
 awakened from this most seductive revery 
 by the rather shrill sound of Liselle's voice. 
 
 " Truly, tna tante" she was asserting in a 
 high key, "this is a most evil and dreadful 
 land. I desire greatly to return to the dear 
 sisters and learn more crochet-stitches." 
 
 "Do not talk so loud," said Madame, 
 sharply. " Your voice deafens me. No, 
 child, forgive me. I spoke without thought. 
 Are you indeed so wretched away from your 
 
 131 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 convent? But come upstairs with me, and 
 we will talk together.' ' 
 
 Summer, — hot, sweet, full of suggestive 
 sounds and scents, — drifted by. Hardly a 
 month had passed before Madame woke to 
 the knowledge that her experiment in souls 
 had carried her into deeper 'water than she 
 had dreamed probable. She discovered, by 
 slow processes rather than through any 
 flash of revelation, that she loved Jeannot, 
 intensely — as she could love. And she 
 dreamed, imagined, even believed, that a 
 certain maturity had come to the boy's mind 
 of late. He spoke more gently, more seri- 
 ously now, and laughed less mockingly. He 
 sang little, save at his lessons, and these did 
 not go well. He would not practice his 
 exercises, the Master complained. 
 
 The sultry weather had irritated the nerves 
 of all of them before August had gone by. 
 Even Liselle was aroused from her stilted 
 phrases and methodical ways, and was more 
 than once found by her aunt in a passion of 
 tears. It was a strange summer. 
 
 Still Madame clung passionately to her 
 " experiment " — so much more than an ex- 
 periment now. A soul of much strength, 
 
 132 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 fire and scope had been given to Fran$oise 
 Perrinat when she was born — a life of 
 struggle and toil had developed it, — a pas- 
 sionate love affair and early widowhood had 
 given it knowledge and poise. And it was 
 this soul which she was tearing into atoms to 
 serve Jeannot de Bonfoi, and to win his love. 
 
 Not for one moment did she doubt the cer- 
 tainty of her success. It was quite impossible, 
 clearly, that such whole-hearted love as hers 
 should be without return, without completion 
 or crown. Sometimes it angered her to realize 
 that she had given her heart to a foolish, 
 careless boy, but, after all, she argued to her 
 wise self, there is no fitness nor unfitness in 
 love's eyes. These things are regulated by 
 strange and unseen laws,— and Madame 
 knew that no accumulated proof that Jeannot 
 was the last person on earth whom she 
 should love would affect her. As for the 
 matter of age, she could afford to laugh at 
 that when she looked in the glass and saw 
 her dark, brilliant face, — always beautiful — 
 now young again through love. 
 
 One hot night full of electric-seeming 
 silences, Madame stood with Jeannot on the 
 verandah. The honey-suckle, climbing all 
 
 133 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 about them, shook in a short-lived wind. 
 The scent blew in their faces and quickened 
 their breath. Honey-suckle perfume seemed 
 to pervade the universe. 
 
 "Ah, it is beautiful, — the night," sighed 
 Madame, speaking tremulously because she 
 feared the stillness. " And to-morrow I go 
 far from here — to visit a friend. You will 
 miss me, Jeannot ? " 
 
 " You are going away ? " he said, as though 
 startled. " I did not know." 
 
 " No, I would not tell you. It is Made- 
 leine Calmont — la pauvre; — she needs me, 
 having lost her child. You will miss me, 
 Jeannot?" 
 
 The repetition of the words disturbed him. 
 He frowned in the darkness, yet, hesitatingly, 
 he put out his hand and touched her arm. 
 It was bare and warm, and it seemed to thrill 
 under his fingers. 
 
 Suddenly, Madame turned and, half dis- 
 traught with the sweetness of the night and 
 the sadness of the parting, put her hands 
 upon his shoulders and leaned against him. 
 Instinctively his arms closed about her and 
 they stood so for a heart-beat. Then Madame 
 drew his face to hers and swiftly kissed him. 
 
 134 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 After which she vanished within and did not 
 see him again before she left. 
 
 She was gone a month, but she was not 
 unhappy, for she had many things upon 
 which to dream, and she now felt certain 
 that Jeannot was growing to love her, and 
 that he was finding his soul. It would have 
 amazed Maitre Philippe had he been able to 
 know precisely the working of his sister's 
 mind at just that period. 
 
 It was the end of September when Madame 
 came home. All the way her heart was 
 singing. All the way she was saying to 
 herself, — " He will have learned, through my 
 absence, his own heart.' ' So often had she 
 dreamed of the moment when she would 
 enter the hall and pause at the door of the 
 music-room that the actual occurrence of 
 these things seemed like the repetition of 
 familiar events. It also seemed eminently 
 in keeping that she should hear Jeannot's 
 beautiful voice, singing, as she crossed the 
 threshold of the house. It was all quite 
 natural and proper, only ... As she stood 
 there listening to the music, she suddenly 
 raised her hands to her heart and lifted her 
 face with a jerk, transfixed by a dawning 
 
 135 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 knowledge. Never before had Jeannot sung 
 like that. Madame did not feel her gloves 
 and handkerchief drop from her hands, did 
 not know that the tears were running down 
 her cheeks. Jeannot was singing, "Ah, 
 Lfeve-toi, Soliel," by Gounod, and he was 
 singing it with a passion and a power at 
 which to marvel. 
 
 "Ah, Dieu!" whispered Madame, with 
 shut eyes and quivering lips, "he has found 
 the soul, — I hear it! — Ah, Dieu de bonie, 
 Dieu de sagesse ! I hear it." 
 
 Very slowly she walked toward the door 
 of the music-room, the joy in her heart too 
 solemn to admit of haste. She would wait 
 for the last " Levetoi! " And then she 
 would push aside the curtain and enter, 
 and crown him with her love and adoration 
 forever. Ah, she had never dreamed, — 
 never, never, that even love could teach him 
 to sing like that ! 
 
 The final high, sweet note died away and 
 was lost in the accompaniment which swiftly 
 ceased in a sustained chord. Madame flung 
 the curtain aside, and entered with a noise- 
 less step. So noiseless was it that it was 
 not heard, and, as an animal retreats from a 
 
 136 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 hunter, Madame stepped back, and back, 
 until she stood once more outside the room. 
 Her hand still held the curtain so that she 
 might see. This new thing was so terrible 
 that there would have to be much seeing 
 before she could believe. 
 
 For Jeannot sat on the piano-stool looking 
 up with eyes of love at the face of the girl 
 who bent over him, — a girl about whom his 
 arm was clasped, a girl whose small, pale 
 face was alight with tenderness — Liselle. 
 There is an old tradition that youth calls to 
 youth. This flashed into Madame's dizzy 
 brain as for one burning, horrible moment 
 she looked. Liselle bent lower and they 
 kissed each other, but neither spoke. The 
 sunshine lay like a golden carpet upon the 
 floor. The room was glorified, magnificent. 
 
 Madame dropped the curtain. 
 
 137 
 
A QUESTION OF 
 MOTIVE 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 & Question of jftlotfoe 
 
 HE violinist, spas- 
 modically exploited by 
 fashionable " leaders " 
 in London, and now 
 the ostensible draw- 
 ing-card at Lady 
 Griggs's evening re- 
 ception, had just come 
 back to earth in a tri- 
 umphant staccato finale. The last notes of 
 the accompaniment were becoming merged 
 in the ascending tumult of polite conversa- 
 tion; — one of the trying but necessary 
 interludes being past, people were hastily 
 enjoying themselves, chattering volubly and, 
 in a measure, against time, always with the 
 imminent danger of another solo from the 
 celebrity. At an evening musical, one may 
 watch human nature with extraordinary 
 ease. Whether a certain safety is felt under 
 cover of what should be a general concen- 
 tration of attention, or whether some uncon- 
 scious effect of the music brings inherent 
 
 141 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 emotions to the surface, I know not. But if 
 you look about you during a musical num- 
 ber, you may constantly behold a very strange 
 disarray of masks, and may be startled by 
 the sight of utterly unprecedented passions 
 painted upon familiar faces. 
 
 A tall man with a curiously attractive 
 smile and satirical eyes, stood in a door- 
 way ; and, being something of a philosopher, 
 with a taste for analysis, he cast his eyes 
 occasionally over the mixed roomful of 
 people and drew some interesting conclusions 
 from very commonplace external evidence. 
 And as he looked, — with an ironic inward 
 laugh, — his vagrant glance encountered the 
 carelessly poised blonde head of a girl on 
 the other side of the room. He knew her, — 
 had met her often during his two years of 
 diplomatic life. They were sworn enemies, 
 yet she attracted him to-night for the first 
 time. Perhaps he recognized a certain sym- 
 pathetic irony in the curl of her lips, and the 
 quiet, meditative look in her gray eyes. At 
 all events, he crossed the room with the 
 deliberation of a man who always claims 
 what he chooses, and leaned against the wall 
 at her side. 
 
 142 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " How do you do ? " he said, looking down. 
 "I do not think I have seen you about 
 lately." 
 
 Alison Campbell looked up at him with a 
 slightly mocking expression. 
 
 " Some people * have eyes and see not,' " 
 she quoted, lightly. "I should doubt your 
 attentive search, Count Ralne. I have gone 
 out as much as usual — certainly more than I 
 like." 
 
 " Ah, you find it — wearing — too ! I knew, 
 somehow, that we agreed on that. 'Why 
 have we not agreed on other things, I 
 wonder." 
 
 " I suppose the point of view of a dis- 
 tinguished diplomat and an eccentric Ameri- 
 can girl could hardly be expected to be 
 identical." 
 
 " They tell me you dislike diplomats. Is 
 that true ? — All diplomats ? You must not 
 take me as a type of my companions in 
 crime. Some of them are quite nice." 
 
 " I like the men of my own country best. 
 Does that offend you ? " 
 
 " No, it is delightful. You do not flatter. 
 Pardon me if I say that many of your 
 country-women, as well as many ladies of 
 
 143 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 this delightful but foggy land, are prone to 
 flattery. They put a man a little too much 
 at his ease with their — flattery. " 
 
 "I suppose," said the girl, indifferently, 
 "that they instinctively take the tone which 
 they think will be most satisfactory. We 
 are very adaptable, you know, with all — " 
 She stopped herself before she said " classes 
 of people.'' 
 
 Her companion's eyes sparkled. 
 
 "Mais contme vous etes delicieuse!" he 
 murmured, but she pretended not to hear. 
 
 " For example," he said, slightly changing 
 his tactics, "the little lady opposite." 
 
 His eyes indicated a slight, brown-eyed 
 girl with a laughing glance and an appealing 
 mouth. 
 
 "Bessie Lucas," said Miss Campbell, 
 quickly, "my best friend, — yes, and what of 
 her?" 
 
 " Your best friend ? Ah, well, I must say 
 no more then. You are a loyal friend, are 
 you not?" 
 
 "What about Bessie?" she asked, insist- 
 ently. 
 
 "Only it is such as she of whom I spoke 
 just now ; — who give us so much kind — flat- 
 
 144 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 tery. I like that word, by the way; it is 
 courteous and non-committal, and it is so 
 like charity, which covers, etc.!" 
 
 She looked at him a moment, then she 
 said very low, " Count Ranl6, that is what I 
 meant when I said that I liked my own 
 countrymen best. An American would not 
 have said that." 
 
 "If you have a fault," he remarked, 
 suavely, "it is that of jumping to quick 
 conclusions. I said nothing in any way 
 uncomplimentary to your friend, — far from 
 it. Indeed, I adore her — as you may possibly 
 have heard. One always does hear things, 
 I find, in time." 
 
 " No," said Alison, quietly, " I have never 
 heard that. I have heard that you have 
 devoted yourself to her, that you have fol- 
 lowed her about, have even boasted of your 
 easy conquest, — but no more." 
 
 "She is charming," he declared, diplo- 
 matically. " Come, — I can say no more than 
 that." 
 
 "No," Alison said, rather bitterly. "Of 
 course you can say no more than that, — you 
 who have tried to spoil her pretty, child-like 
 illusions of people and things, and, with 
 
 145 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 other men, have talked about her naivete, — of 
 course, you can say no more." 
 
 He opened his eyes a little wider. 
 
 " You are not in earnest, surely ? " he ex- 
 claimed, more seriously. "You are only 
 jesting, of course ! " She said nothing, and 
 he understood that she had been thoroughly 
 in earnest. 
 
 ,f Really," he said, after a short pause, "it 
 had never occurred to me that I was a 
 modern Faust." 
 
 Still she said nothing and he laughed a little. 
 
 "Ah," he besought, in a peculiarly pleas- 
 ant voice, and with a frank gaze, " do not be 
 so hard on a little affaire; why, everyone 
 has flirtations nowadays. They do no one 
 a grain of harm, — there is thorough good 
 feeling all through and afterward. What 
 hurt can a few pretty speeches and half a 
 dozen boxes of roses do Miss Lucas? Or 
 even — " he hesitated—" say the little affaire 
 went a bit farther, — she will only be the 
 more lessoned in the art which is more 
 important than anything else in life, — the 
 art of love!" 
 
 "I suppose," returned Alison, slowly, 
 "that you will think me gauche, — stupid, — 
 
 146 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 bourgeois, in speaking to you like this. I 
 am not sure I am not all three. But I love 
 Bessie dearly, and I mean to save her from 
 you yet. I'm telling you of my intention, 
 you see, for I always fight fair." 
 
 " I believe that," he said, with an inflection 
 which was a compliment. 
 
 11 Remember," she said, looking straight at 
 him, " if I did not think more of her welfare 
 than of dignity and good taste and even good 
 breeding, I should order you out of my sight. 
 And, Count Ranl6, you should always remain 
 out of it, even though we met face to face." 
 
 He felt distinctly uncomfortable, for he 
 could not understand the look in her eyes. 
 
 " I suppose," she went on, with apparently 
 a vituperative pleasure in each fresh sting 
 which she invented, " this interview would 
 make a good chapter in your story of the 
 little affaire at the club." 
 
 " Miss Campbell ! " he said, flushing. And 
 she had a curious desire to apologize ; only 
 she would not. She tapped her left hand 
 with her fan and kept her eyes in her lap. 
 
 44 Count Ranl6, you are a man whose 
 reputation is not of the kind to permit you to 
 be attentive to any young girl." 
 
 M7 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "Truly you are frank." 
 
 " I am trying to be dispassionate and just. 
 Your name was coupled with those of several 
 women in Washington a few years ago — not 
 to their advantage." 
 
 11 Pardon me," he interrupted, dryly, " but 
 a woman's name is never coupled with a 
 man's, — in that sense, — to her advantage, 
 Miss Campbell." 
 
 "That is true, but against a certain girl 
 whose name came up for discussion as to 
 her eligibility for a girl's theatre club for 
 Lent, and who was not admitted, there was 
 no better charge brought than that last year 
 Count Ranle used to be devoted to her. A 
 certain hostess whom I know was called to 
 account by a debutante's mother, because 
 she had allowed the girl to sit next to Count 
 Ranl6 at dinner. Shall I give you other 
 instances to support my ideas ? " 
 
 " Thank you," he answered, stiffly, " you 
 have been peculiarly happy in your choice of 
 the first two. I will not ask for any others." 
 
 4 ■ It is all a matter of public opinion," the 
 girl went on, steadily. "You see, however 
 innocent and worthy you may know your- 
 self to be, you are not considered, in the 
 
 148 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 world's eyes, a proper person to send Miss 
 Lucas ' half a dozen boxes of roses,' nor to 
 carry on a little affaire with her. Yet you 
 have, I suppose, succeeded up to a point, — 
 you have certainly taught her to lie in order 
 to meet you, to . . . But it is all too revolting, 
 too hateful. I cannot talk about it any more. 
 Only I could not contain myself. I — I wish 
 that music would stop. It is deafening, 
 confusing.' ' She leaned back and fanned 
 herself rapidly. Her face was very white. 
 
 Ranl6 looked down at her with growing 
 admiration. It was with a certain quiet 
 determination that he bent over her and 
 said: "You are a loyal friend, but you can- 
 not keep people from following their bent. 
 Has Miss Lucas told you her plans for to- 
 morrow ? " 
 
 "Yes— she lunches with Alice Miller, a 
 mutual friend of ours." 
 
 " Ah, yes — she told you that ? Truly, the 
 diplomatic corps lost a man in her! That 
 was not a case of the truth, the whole truth, 
 and nothing but the truth, Miss Campbell. 
 I myself had hoped to see your friend at 
 luncheon by some fortunate chance. Yet I 
 do not know Miss Miller." 
 
 149 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 She turned slowly, read his eyes, and saw 
 that he spoke truth. 
 
 " I will stop it," she said, hotly. " I will 
 make her see, — I will tell her what you are." 
 
 " And would she believe you ? She thinks 
 I am a lover such as rode in tourneys for his 
 lady in the Middle Ages. She would not 
 take even your word against mine. ,, 
 
 " No, — it is true," she said, very low. M I 
 know it. She is weak, blinded, — and you 
 have done it all. What a thing to be proud 
 of, Count Ranle!" 
 
 He saw how beautiful was the line of her 
 cheek and throat. A bunch of violets pinned 
 in her gown made the fair curves of her neck 
 like marble. Her hair, as he bent over her, 
 was a soft, dense mass of gold. 
 
 " She is weak and blinded," he answered 
 her, speaking under his breath, " a child, a 
 flower, a butterfly. She cannot think, feel, 
 love, understand, suffer. She has been, — 
 she only could be, — a plaything at best, — a 
 thing to delight in for a moment and then 
 brush aside as one would brush a roseleaf. 
 Can you imagine that such a woman could 
 ever hold more than a passing charm for a 
 man of my nature ? I could only love some 
 
 150 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 one as strong and as indomitable as myself, 
 — some one as passionate, — as fervent in 
 hate and in love, — the complement yet the 
 fulfillment of myself. Ah, I could make 
 such a woman understand the inner mean- 
 ings of herself as she had never even dreamed 
 she should understand. I could " 
 
 He broke off, but the intensity of his look 
 forced her to turn her head upward and 
 meet his eyes. She shivered a little as she 
 did so, but she did not glance away. 
 
 " We have been enemies for so long! " he 
 went on. " But enemies are better than mere 
 casual acquaintances, indifferent to each 
 other. To-night I came across to you 
 because I felt that we belonged together, 
 you and I, in this crowd of alien people/ ' 
 
 "And Bessie?" she said, slowly, still 
 looking up at him. "And the luncheon to- 
 morrow ? " 
 
 His eyes blazed suddenly, and she read in 
 them a warm if short-lived passion. 
 
 " Let me come to see you," he said, "let 
 me come, — and tell you — oh, the numbers of 
 things that I should like to tell you — and I 
 will forget the luncheon — and everything 
 else." 
 
 151 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 She rose and closed her fan slowly. There 
 was a strange light in her eyes at the 
 moment, he noticed. 
 
 " I am going now," she said, formally. 
 " Is not that Lady Griggs standing with her 
 back to us ? I must say good-night.' ' 
 
 " May I put you into your carriage ? " he 
 asked, and accepting a certain faint motion 
 of her head as consent, he bowed conven- 
 tionally and moved away. 
 
 When she went down the steps a few 
 minutes later, she found him at her side. 
 'When she entered her carriage his hand on 
 hers gave her caressing rather than perfunc- 
 tory assistance. And as she drew the door 
 toward her, he caught it and seemed about 
 to speak. 
 
 "No," she said, faintly. "No, really, I 
 must go. And about to-morrow, — if you 
 will come at " 
 
 «« Yes ? " he said, softly, " at " 
 
 There was a brief silence, then suddenly 
 she dragged the door toward her till it 
 clicked, and cried out, almost with a sob in 
 the words : " No — no — no ! You must not 
 come ! I have changed my mind. I have 
 no right to interfere in your affairs nor in 
 
 152 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Bessie's. Forget what I have said, or at 
 least forgive it, if you can. As you have said 
 — everyone — everyone — must follow their 
 own bent — they — Oh, tell him to drive on, 
 please, — quickly, quickly, — good-night. " 
 
 The carriage was moving, for the man had 
 heard the order, but the look in her eyes 
 made Ranle stretch out his hands toward 
 her and cry in amazement, " Alison ! " Then 
 she was gone, and there was only the click- 
 clack of the horses' hoofs going off toward 
 Prince's Gate. 
 
 " Good God ! " he muttered, " I believe if 
 that damned coachman hadn't driven off so 
 quickly ' ' 
 
 " Beg pardon, sir ? " said the man in livery 
 on the steps. 
 
 11 I did not speak." And he walked down 
 the street in the direction of his Embassy. 
 
 And, meanwhile, Alison Campbell was 
 sobbing her heart out in the darkness of the 
 carriage. 
 
 "I should never have known," she whis- 
 pered, " I could never have told whether or 
 not my motive was true. If I had gone on 
 and perhaps separated them, — it might have 
 been for Bessie's sake, but it might — it 
 
 153 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 might — it would have been for my own. 
 Dear Lord in Heaven, why have you let me 
 love him as I do ? Love him, — love him, — 
 love him, — so that nothing, — not the things 
 I hear of him, not the things I know of him, 
 not the things I say of him, — can take away 
 the love/' 
 
 But in the morning arrived some heavy- 
 scented violets and a card : " I am coming 
 at twelve o'clock — to help you save your 
 friend. Remember, you are being purely 
 philanthropic ; but — I am coming. Will you 
 wear these, or return them, I wonder ? — 
 Ranl6." 
 
 She grew very white, but with a hesita- 
 ting hand she thrust the violets into the 
 bosom of her gown. 
 
 It was just noon. 
 
 154 
 
THE DAY OF 
 JUDGMENT 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 C&e Bap of 3trt>sment 
 
 ENFOLD is a very 
 small, sober village in 
 the northern part of 
 New England. It is 
 the most respectable 
 village in America, ac- 
 cording to statistics, 
 and they have a Free 
 Public Library. 
 Upon a certain day in a certain year, Pen- 
 fold was interested in learning that the Bas- 
 tick Farm had been sold to a strange lady 
 from New York. She was a Miss Mary Rush, 
 a spinster of seemingly definite age, and she 
 had a full sufficiency of worldly goods. She 
 was, however, absolutely unpretentious, as 
 it turned out, in spite of her comfortable bank 
 account, and seemed almost shy when her 
 neighbours made kindly advances. With her 
 was her small niece, her dead brother's child, 
 she explained, — a pale little girl, twelve 
 years old, named Phyllis. They were a cur- 
 ious pair, — the quiet woman who, by virtue 
 
 157 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 of her staid bearing, seemed much older than 
 her actual thirty-nine, and the fragile, pretty 
 child who already partook slightly of her 
 aunt's shy gravity and reticence. 
 
 Penfold never grew to know Miss Rush 
 very well. She was courteous to every one, 
 and seemed grateful for kindness and friend- 
 liness ; but she permitted no intimacy, and 
 after a while Penfold settled itself to a 
 simple acceptance of Miss Rush as she 
 was, — stand-offishness and all. 
 
 Ten years slipped softly and gravely by 
 in the Bastick Farm. The crimson rambler 
 had climbed higher up the old walls ; the 
 garden was fuller and sweeter; the wood- 
 shed had needed repairing more than once. 
 Mary Rush's hair had begun to turn gray, 
 and she had grown a little colder and more 
 reserved. And Phyllis had become a tall, 
 slight girl with yellow hair and colourless 
 complexion — a beauty, people said, marking 
 her delicacy and her strange air of distinc- 
 tion. More than one Penfold youth adored 
 her from afar, but in vain. Miss Rush 
 disliked all men, and Phyllis herself seemed, 
 for a young and beautiful girl, strangely 
 indifferent to the opposite sex. 
 
 158 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 The two women lived in a world of books 
 and flowers and unexciting household affairs. 
 They were quite content with long morn- 
 ings spent in consorting with Goldsmith and 
 Bacon, and afternoons in caring for poppies 
 and larkspur. Their sympathy seemed pro- 
 found if undemonstrative, and neither would 
 have admitted that she was not perfectly 
 happy. 
 
 And the Day of Judgment began to creep 
 up below the horizon, gathering itself for 
 that ' 'Awful Rose of Dawn " at the last. 
 
 It was in autumn, warm-hued and tragic, 
 that the shadows seemed to deepen as they 
 sometimes do preparatory to the coming 
 morning. Aunt and niece sat in the library 
 having tea. That pretty feast seems fated, in 
 paradox of its innocent festivity of intention, 
 to accompany very many unnamed tragedies. 
 
 "Aunt Mary," said Phyllis, quietly, " when 
 I was walking to-day I met Dr. Caine." 
 
 u Did you ? " was her aunt's sole response. 
 
 u He — he walked with me to the village 
 and back. He was rather disagreeable.' • 
 
 "Matthew Caine is a good man," said 
 Miss Rush, pouring hot water slowly into 
 her cup. " What did he say ?'• 
 
 159 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "He asked me to marry him. He even 
 had the impertinence to persist after I had 
 refused him. I thought it exceedingly vulgar 
 ofhim. ,, 
 
 " Why did you refuse him ? " 
 
 1 'Why?" Phyllis opened her clear, gray 
 eyes very wide. "Aunt Mary! How can 
 you ask ? I detest him." 
 
 " I should like you to marry him." 
 
 " He said you 'favoured his suit.' Those 
 were his detestable words. I did not be- 
 lieve him at the time. I didn't know you 
 even liked him. I didn't know you wanted 
 me to marry any one. Aunt Mary, will you 
 really tell me why you wish me to marry 
 that man ? ' ' 
 
 11 1 think, as I said, that he is a good man, 
 who will make you a safe husband." 
 
 " Please tell me what you mean by ■ safe.' 
 I never did understand that expression. 
 Does it mean that he would be safe or I ? " 
 
 " Both, — principally you. It is a very good 
 thing for a woman to be quite secure, quite 
 well cared for and protected." 
 
 " 'Why should I need protection ? " 
 
 " All women need it ; you more than most. 
 You inherit many weak and wayward ten- 
 
 160 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 dencies. Your father was a dissipated man. 
 The less said of your mother the better.' ' 
 
 Phyllis flushed. 
 
 " I don't like to hear you speak so of my 
 mother," she said gently. " I know you 
 never approved of my father's marriage, 
 but — she was my mother, and she is dead." 
 
 Mary Rush laughed with peculiar and 
 unwonted harshness. 
 
 "That is true," she said, "she is dead. 
 I repeat,— I wish you to marry Dr. Caine, 
 Phyllis. I told him I would use my in- 
 fluence." 
 
 "I cannot marry him, Aunt Mary," said 
 Phyllis, definitely. 
 
 "It is very evident that I overestimated 
 my influence when I offered to use it," re- 
 marked Miss Rush, drily and rather cruelly. 
 But neither said any more, though Phyllis 
 was deeply hurt and puzzled. 
 
 It was her aunt who broached the subject 
 a week later. 
 
 "I have told Dr. Caine that you will marry 
 him," she said. They were in the garden, at 
 the time, covering sensitive bulbs with straw 
 and preparing for the approaching winter. 
 Phyllis stopped her work to look at her. 
 
 161 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " I am sorry you did that," she said, 
 quietly and steadily, " because I shall not." 
 
 Mary Rush controlled the sudden passion 
 which leaped to her eyes and flushed her 
 face. 
 
 " You will forfeit my affection for the rest of 
 your life," she said, her voice shaking a trifle. 
 11 1 will never forget your lack of obedience, 
 your lack of gratitude, your lack of docility, 
 of womanliness — " she stopped, breathless, 
 then went on grimly, " and I shall never 
 forgive you." 
 
 Phyllis grew very pale. 
 
 "Aunt Mary!" she said; "is it that you 
 don't love me any longer? You can't, of 
 course, — to speak to me like that ! " 
 
 Mary Rush's lips quivered, but she made 
 no response. 
 
 "The worst of it is," pursued the girl, 
 brokenly, " I have no one else to talk to, — 
 no one else at all. And so it has come to 
 this, that I must tell you the truth, in spite 
 of your hardness and unkindness toward me. 
 Not only do I not love him, Aunt Mary, but 
 I love someone else — very much." 
 
 Miss Rush looked petrified. 
 
 " Who ? " she asked, briefly. 
 
 162 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "You will be angry if I tell you," whis- 
 pered Phyllis, with drooping head. " It is 
 someone whom I can love, but — never can 
 marry. There is a — barrier — between us. 
 But we can look across the barrier and love 
 each other. Only that." 
 
 Miss Rush still stared at her. 
 
 " Who is it ? " she asked again. 
 
 " He — has duties in his life," Phyllis con- 
 tinued, growing very pale. " We can never 
 be anything to each other. But I — I can 
 keep myself free and faithful and true for his 
 sake. That at least I can do." 
 
 " Duties ! " broke in Miss Rush. " And I 
 suppose you have no duties ! Tell me the 
 name of this man who has let you love him, 
 though he cannot marry you." 
 
 "Hush!" said Phyllis, quickly. "You 
 vulgarize it by speaking like that. We are 
 not that kind of people, Aunt Mary. His 
 love asks to come no nearer to me than mine 
 to come to him. We ask — nothing. It is 
 — Wilson Stone, Aunt Mary." 
 
 "Wilson Stone!" repeated Miss Rush. 
 " Let me be sure I know who you mean. He 
 is the man who lives at the other end of 
 Penfold — the man with the invalid wife ? " 
 
 163 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Phyllis bowed her head. 
 
 "He is a trusted lawyer, is he not?" 
 went on Miss Rush, relentlessly. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "A gentleman ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "And an honourable man, evidently. A 
 person with scruples and high ideals ! " She 
 went to Phyllis and caught hold of her arms, 
 her eyes full of fire. The girl should have 
 seen the passion of love behind their anger, 
 but she only shrank a little, fearing her aunt 
 for the first time. 
 
 "Now," said Mary Rush, panting, "you 
 must marry Matthew Caine. This settles 
 it ; nothing else can save you. I know these 
 pure passions ; good God ! do I not ? I have 
 seen many such in my life. And I tell you 
 to marry Dr. Caine, and to thank God that 
 such a way of safety and escape lies open to 
 you." 
 
 She pushed the girl from her and went 
 into the house. 
 
 The next day she announced to every one 
 in the village that Phyllis was engaged to 
 Dr. Caine, and that they were to be married 
 before Christmas. 
 
 164 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 During the following month Bastick Farm 
 was like a tomb where two unfriendly ghosts 
 lived, moved, ate and slept, but never spoke. 
 Phyllis had once for all said that she would 
 never marry Dr. Caine. Mary Rush had 
 said that she should if she had to drag 
 her to the church herself. So matters 
 rested. 
 
 Then, one night, Phyllis spoke to her aunt 
 for the first time in four weeks. 
 
 "Aunt Mary," she said, "I am going 
 away." 
 
 Mary Rush looked suddenly twice her 
 real age. She clasped either arm of her 
 chair with rigid fingers and sat staring. 
 
 " 1 am going away," repeated Phyllis. " I 
 cannot bear it any longer. I have nothing 
 to hold fast to. You are trying to drive me 
 into this marriage. You know I would 
 rather die and go to hell. You don't love 
 me any more. I am going away." 
 
 " Where do you intend to go ? " asked Miss 
 Rush, speaking with difficulty, but in an 
 icy voice. 
 
 "I — don't know." Phyllis's voice was 
 vague and miserable. " I believe I shall go 
 to New York and try to get some sort of a 
 
 165 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 position. I think I could teach. I don't 
 know, — oh, I don't know ! It kills me to go 
 away, — alone, — I am afraid. But there is 
 nothing else to do. I cannot bear this, — I 
 cannot, — truly I cannot. And while Wil- 
 son Stone is alive I will marry no other 
 man." 
 
 Mary Rush bent her head on her hands 
 and began to rock herself to and fro, moan- 
 ing. The dawn of the Day of Judgment was 
 beginning to stain her sky with red. 
 
 " Oh, my God ! Oh, my God ! " she mut- 
 tured ; Phyllis heard the low words, — " it 
 would have been so much better if Thou 
 hadst never let her be born V 
 
 Phyllis, shocked and frightened, slipped 
 from the room. 
 
 Mary Rush sat for an hour, a swaying, 
 shivering figure in her armchair. And the 
 fire went out, and the night-wind which 
 in late autumn heralds and imitates mid- 
 winter, howled around the house. Finally, 
 she rose and with unsteady steps went to 
 her desk ; then she began to write. Her 
 face was very white, but it was strangely 
 determined. The time had come for the 
 truth, at last. She wrote as though her 
 
 166 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 hand were impelled by fate, and as she 
 wrote her pen grew fluent and her thoughts 
 eloquent. Her restraint of years was being 
 washed away in this great flood of con- 
 fession and explanation : 
 
 " My Phyllis :— 
 
 " If I have hurt you and broken your heart, 
 as I believe I may have with my cruelty and 
 hardness, it is only your right that you 
 should know why I have seemed to turn 
 from you in this hour of your pain and 
 struggle. Ah, my dear, it has not been 
 because I have not understood, but because 
 I have understood too well. And, seeing 
 the rocks ahead, I have tried with all my 
 might to drive you away from them into a 
 safe channel. In doing this I have hurt you, 
 and I have done no good. So now I will 
 speak, and you shall judge for yourself in 
 these questions with which I have wrestled 
 alone and in my own heart for twenty-three 
 years. 
 
 11 You have a very credulous nature, Phyl- 
 lis : one which is satisfied with very few 
 explanations. Your curiosity is almost null. 
 This must be the reason why you have 
 never insisted upon knowing more than the 
 
 167 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 barest facts concerning your parentage. I 
 told you long ago that your father was my 
 brother, that he married some one whom I 
 disliked, and that they both died when you 
 were two years old. It was a very pretty 
 tale, and I had learned it carefully. I had 
 also prepared various links in the chain, and 
 some confirmatory evidence, in case the 
 man you married should prove more curious 
 than you. 
 
 "The whole story was false, — from first 
 to last, and in every smallest particular, 
 absolutely and utterly untrue. My one ex- 
 cuse for framing it is that it was for your 
 sake. A cloud hangs very blackly over your 
 birth, my dear, and I would not let it shadow 
 your life if I could prevent it merely by 
 taking a few lies upon my conscience. It 
 can bear much, that conscience of mine, — it 
 has never been very dainty. 
 
 "My child, your mother was a woman 
 much as you are, with just such power 
 for passion and for suffering, and just such 
 determination and indomitable loyalty. She 
 was allowed to run as she would, and no 
 one guided or guarded her. She fell in love 
 with a man much older than herself, an 
 
 168 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 honourable man in his daily habit of life, but 
 one who in this case loved neither wisely 
 nor well. He induced her to leave her 
 home and go away with him. He had a 
 wife, and later he read in the papers that 
 she had become unbalanced mentally and 
 was in an institution for insanity. He never 
 got over it. They, your father and your 
 mother, were not happy together ; love is 
 very rarely worth the price we are willing 
 and eager to pay for it. Can you see now 
 why I have feared for you, seeing how piti- 
 lessly history was repeating itself in the 
 conditions preparatory to the cataclysm ? 
 
 " Phyllis, — you are not my niece, you are 
 my daughter. Your father left me in New 
 York the year you were born. He is dead, 
 now. I would rather not tell you his name. 
 You have never heard it, and it would mean 
 nothing to you, but it would kill me to see it 
 written here, in my own hand. There are 
 the facts of your birth, at last, — naked, 
 shameful and brutally unvarnished. You 
 now have the truth, and when you have 
 read it, I think you will perhaps begin to 
 understand me a little. Every hour of my 
 life, minute by minute, I have tried to ex- 
 
 169 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 piate my sin against you. I do not care 
 in the least for my crime against social con- 
 ditions or against the church, against man or 
 against God. May He forgive me for saying 
 it ! But my suffering lies in this : that, 
 through my wrong, you were born onto the 
 earth nameless, — a creature with no place in 
 the world, with a stigma attached to you. 
 I have done my best to eradicate the stigma 
 and the shame for you. I have lied and 
 schemed and lost my own soul that yours 
 might be safely sheltered. I have guarded 
 you, I have brought you up in honour and 
 comfort and peace, respected by every one, 
 suspected by no one. This is true, is it not, 
 Phyllis ? And I have said to myself, ■ She 
 will marry a good man, and little children 
 will grow up about her, and she will be safe 
 from the world and its sin.' 
 
 " I am your mother, Phyllis, and with that 
 right I speak to you. Learn through me, 
 my dear. Put this love out of your life. 
 You can do it, though it will hurt. Marry 
 the man who honours you and will make you 
 his wife in all men's eyes. It is your one 
 hope for a respected, tranquil life. I wish 
 it ; I command it. 
 
 170 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Though I love you more than my hope 
 of salvation, Phyllis, I do not ask you to 
 love me in return. I only ask you to pause 
 and to consider and to — obey. I know — I 
 know — I know, 
 
 " Your mother. 
 
 " Mary Rush." 
 
 She placed the letter in an envelope and 
 -went slowly upstairs. A lamp still burned 
 in Phyllis's room. She paused outside the 
 door and said in a shaking voice : 
 
 " Phyllis, — I have left something — here, — 
 on the hall table — for you to read. I will 
 see you in the morning." 
 
 Then she went away to her own room and 
 sank upon the bed, dressed as she was, too 
 weary to move a finger, too weary to cry, 
 and far, far too weary to sleep. 
 
 The night wore away, and morning came, 
 and with it the sounds that proclaim the 
 commencement of the every-day household 
 machinery. Voices in the kitchen region 
 exchanged salutations. Milk poured from 
 can to can. Wire doors slammed, and the 
 sound of the coffee-grinder mingled with a 
 cheerful Irish voice humming below. Mary 
 Rush lay stiff and wide-eyed on the bed, 
 
 171 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 wondering how it was that things could go on, 
 — and on, — and on, — while mental tragedies 
 were violently enacted, and life after life 
 reached its crisis and was settled for good 
 or ill. 
 
 She rose with grim determination at her 
 regular hour, and went down to breakfast. 
 Phyllis was not yet in the room. She seated 
 herself at the table and began to pour out a 
 cup of coffee with a steady hand. Then, sud- 
 denly, she saw an envelope lying on her plate. 
 It was addressed in Phyllis's hand, it was 
 duly stamped, and it was postmarked Pen- 
 fold. 
 
 " That was the only letter, ma'am, that 
 the man brought, " said the maid. 
 
 Miss Rush read the superscription several 
 times before she had the courage to open it. 
 She had spilled some hot coffee on her 
 hand, but felt no burn. The maid went to 
 one of the windows and fastened back a 
 blind which was banging in the wind. How 
 fresh and crisp the air was — how golden- 
 yellow the sun ! A dry vine rattled in 
 the sudden gusts, and out on the road the 
 clouds of dust were brightened to silver. 
 
 At last she opened the letter. 
 
 172 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Penfold Station. 
 " 11.30 p. m. 
 "Dear Aunt Mary : — 
 
 " When I left you an hour ago I went out 
 into the dark. I did not know where I was 
 going, — I only knew that I must go. I was 
 very unhappy and absolutely at sea. There 
 was nowhere to go, and no one to turn to — 
 except Wilson. He found me. I think I 
 should have killed myself if he had not, 
 but he did, — and then everything was made 
 right. And we have given up everything, he 
 and I, and are going away together to some 
 city where we will be quite lost in the rush 
 of people. I know we are very wicked, but 
 what can we do ? What can we do ? If you 
 had only seemed to love me a little, but I 
 have felt lately that I was only a burden 
 which you hated, and I could not do as you 
 wished ; I could not marry Dr. Caine. Please 
 try to forget me and the disgrace I have brought 
 to you. I suppose even shame may be for- 
 gotten in time. Forgive me — forgive me ! 
 But I was so unhappy, — and I love him so ! 
 
 " Phyllis Rush." 
 
 Mary Rush went upstairs with a steady 
 step and entered the deserted room. The 
 
 173 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 lamp had burned out and the air was close 
 and murky. She looked about her without a 
 change of expression; then came out and 
 shut the door. Then she picked up her un- 
 read confession from the table, and tore 
 it into tiny pieces, and let each white scrap 
 blow away out of the hall window, 
 
 " ' I suppose even shame may be forgotten 
 in time/ n she quoted, with that calm which 
 is born after the final blow has been dealt, 
 and the last test given emotional strength. 
 11 Forgotten ! Forgotten ! If I were a weak 
 woman I should take refuge in the great 
 Forgetfulness ! " She closed her eyes for 
 a second, luxuriating in the thought. " But 
 I have never been a weak woman, — never a 
 coward, whatever else I may have been. My 
 reckoning has come, and I will cheat neither 
 God nor the Devil. It is hell-fire hence- 
 forth, — which is quite as it should be. After 
 the Day of Judgment there comes no oblivion 
 through the rest of time and eternity." 
 
 174 
 
SHADOWS 
 
DISCO RDS 
 
 g>l)abotos 
 
 ORDON was watching 
 the clock with strange 
 impatience. The mo- 
 tion of those hesitating 
 hands lessened mo- 
 mentarily the distance 
 between him and one 
 of the great tragedies 
 of his life. Yet he hun- 
 gered for the silver chime of eight which 
 should tell him that his hour was at hand. 
 
 For years he had chosen the better part — 
 or so he called it — of inaction in the world's 
 busy doings. He had read and studied ; he 
 valued most things justly, appreciated his 
 own powers and limitations accurately, and 
 made use of them wisely. Had the analyti- 
 cal observer been asked to cite for demon- 
 stration a mind perfectly balanced and 
 excellently adjusted, he could hardly have 
 failed to at least remember that of Francis 
 Gordon. 
 This judicial poise and clarity of thought 
 
 177 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 were somewhat remarkable when one 
 considered that he had suffered from a 
 great and embittering injustice twenty years 
 before, — an injustice which had seriously 
 affected his reputation, and might well have 
 poisoned his entire mind and nature. A 
 man had defrauded him of his good name 
 for honour and gentlemanliness, and that is 
 a theft for which there are few legal or public 
 means of satisfaction. The man who had 
 so wronged him was named Louis Ellis, and 
 he had married the girl Gordon loved. They 
 had been friends as boys and young men, 
 and Gordon had remained loyal to his chum, 
 steadfastly putting his own disappointment 
 aside. But Ellis had always been jealous 
 of his more brilliant friend, and had treated 
 him with a certain disguised hostility which 
 was characteristic of the man. One night in 
 Ellis's own house, the host had accused his 
 guest of cheating at cards. 
 
 Others at the table supported the assertion, 
 and Gordon found himself in a moment the 
 chief figure in a rather unpleasant scandal. 
 The matter was ostensibly "hushed up," 
 but, like all such affairs, was soon known to 
 every man and woman in New York, and, in 
 
 178 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 spite of the large majority of people who still 
 believed in him, Frank Gordon was hence- 
 forward a marked man. He chose not to put 
 his friends' confidence to the test, and saying 
 carelessly that "he could afford to ignore 
 such matters/ ' he had dropped more and 
 more out of the world, and devoted himself 
 exclusively to his books and a dilletante 
 form of journalism which amused him. 
 
 It was long since he had asked anyone to 
 dinner in his rooms ; it was twenty years 
 since he had spoken to Louis Ellis. Now, 
 in the words of his man, he was " entertain- 
 ing again," and his guest was Ellis, — his 
 worst enemy, — the man whose hand he had 
 sworn never to touch again. He had written 
 him a brief note asking him to put bygones 
 by and dine with him, and Ellis had accepted 
 with the nervous effusiveness of one who 
 feels himself in the wrong. 
 
 The clock struck eight. 
 
 Gordon heard a hansom stop at the door 
 downstairs. He rose and walked slowly up 
 and down the room once. As he passed the 
 long mirror he noticed his spare well-dressed 
 figure as though it were another man's. He 
 did not see the tense whiteness of his lips, 
 
 179 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 nor the curious look in his eyes which would 
 have interested an alienist. 
 
 " Mr. Ellis, sir." 
 
 Gordon held out his hand, with a sense 
 that another man was responsible for the 
 action. Ellis was a heavy man, with a sallow 
 skin and pale eyes. A short, stiff mustache 
 covered his upper lip, and his lower was 
 weak and full. Gordon was no taller but, 
 by virtue of his slightness and his nice pro- 
 portion, gave the impression of several inches 
 advantage. 
 
 "Awfully good in you," Ellis stammered, 
 plunging fatally into the one impossible tone 
 and manner. 
 
 Gordon's face did not harden, only because 
 it was already adamantine. He merely 
 bowed and answered, "It's a good while 
 since we've met, isn't it ? That's the best 
 chair, I think. Will you have anything to 
 drink before dinner ? " 
 
 Dinner was immediately announced. The 
 two men sat alone at a large and elaborately 
 appointed table, and talked commonplaces 
 over the expanse of candle-lit white and 
 silver. Gordon was courtesy itself, and the 
 wine was insidious, yet Ellis was ill at ease. 
 
 1 80 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Truth to tell he could not imagine why Gor- 
 don had asked him to dinner. He had come 
 from a certain curious sense of cowardice. 
 He feared his enemy and weakly wished to 
 propitiate him by acquiescence. Now, as 
 he sat opposite him, he felt profoundly sorry 
 that he had come. A hideous constraint was 
 upon him, and the past like a skull and cross- 
 bones seemed to grin and rattle between 
 them. 
 
 The room was full of shadows, and the 
 wavering candle flames made them dance 
 upon the walls and take strange shapes. 
 They sat on and on, and in spite of the rare 
 cigar and the marvellous liqueurs Ellis still 
 cringed and paled with a sense of unrest 
 and fear. Finally he rose, with an unsteady 
 remark as to the lateness of the hour. 
 
 " It would be a pity to go, though, before 
 the storm lifts," protested Gordon. " Such 
 a downpour cannot last long." 
 
 Ellis became conscious for the first time 
 of the roar of wind and rain outside. Strange 
 to say, he had not noticed it — until Gordon 
 spoke ; but, now that he heard, it seemed to 
 shut out past and future. 
 
 " Still, I must go," he said, nervously. 
 
 181 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Gordon's eyes had narrowed slightly, the 
 smoke curling over his head took fantastic 
 shapes. The butler had left the room some 
 time since. Was it the wine, or the thunder 
 of the storm that gave to Ellis's brain 
 that elusion of expectancy, of dread, of 
 horror ? 
 
 " If you go now," said his host, slowly, " I 
 shall think that you still cherish the past, — 
 the past which makes you ill at ease with 
 me, — the past with its unseemly elements of 
 hate and bitterness and — injustice. " 
 
 Ellis shrank from the last word. Either 
 the wine had loosened his conventional 
 reserve, or the words were torn from him 
 by a culmination of remorse ; at all events 
 he broke out rather hoarsely, — 
 
 " Before God, Gordon, — I have regretted 
 that — injustice.' ' 
 
 Gordon did not look at him, but the hand 
 holding his cigar moved suddenly, so that 
 the ash was shivered into the air. 
 
 " I would have set it straight — later on — 
 if I could — " pursued Ellis, brokenly, roughly, 
 his eyes very blood-shot, his mouth tremu- 
 lous. " But there seemed no way. I should 
 have had to put myself in the wrong. And 
 
 182 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 there seemed — no way. And there was my 
 wife " 
 
 Then Gordon looked at him. 
 
 " Ah, yes," he said, " there was your wife. 
 Your wife is dead, is she not ? " 
 
 " She died ten years ago," answered Ellis, 
 indistinctly. He sank into a chair. 
 
 "Yes, — I heard that. At the time, I 
 thought of writing you. Then, on second 
 thought, I decided I would not. The peculiar 
 circumstances, you know — " He laughed 
 and threw his cigar away. 
 
 " It is strange," he remarked, " how 
 clearly things come back. I seem to see 
 those old episodes so vividly. That night, 
 for instance, in your house ; your wife's 
 face, at dinner. It was rather pale, Ellis. I 
 wonder how it happened that she was so 
 often pale." 
 
 " I was a brute to her," muttered Ellis. 
 " I was a fool and jealous." 
 
 "You — dared to be jealous of her? But 
 so are we made, I suppose, — we men ! 
 Then I remember the latter part of the same 
 evening — so distinctly. That little slip of 
 yours that only I saw, and did not speak 
 of, — for her sake. You knew that I saw, 
 
 183 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 though, Ellis, — you perhaps knew the cause 
 of my silence. I remember the green, pale 
 look that came over your face, and then, — 
 it was just afterward, — you accused me. 
 A pretty trick ! You were rather masterly, 
 too, in the way you got those drunken boys 
 to back you up. They owed you money, I 
 believe. Sometimes I have remembered it 
 all with positive admiration during these 
 twenty years." 
 
 Ellis turned his face toward him. He 
 was very white and shaking; his heavy lips 
 hung weakly open ; his eyes were full of fear. 
 
 " For God's sake, Gordon," he said, " don't 
 go over it — I've expiated, — great God, have 
 I not ! My wife knew. I don't know how, 
 but she did know, instinctively, and I read 
 hate in her eyes whenever I looked there, 
 I have been haunted by the terror of you 
 and of myself for twenty years." He moaned 
 the words — " For twenty years ! " 
 
 " * If blood be the price of Admiralty, 
 Lord God, we ha* paid in full,' " 
 
 murmured Gordon, musingly. "I am glad 
 you have enough conscience left, Ellis, to 
 appreciate a simple punishment. I feared, 
 that like the Inquisitors, I should have to 
 
 184 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 prepare particular methods for a particular 
 case." 
 
 Ellis struggled up from his chair, and 
 stood frozen, with wide and terrified gaze. 
 Their eyes met. " Gordon !" he gasped, 
 "you cannot kill me?" The words were a 
 question. "You cannot — for mere revenge — 
 a bit of a trick — at cards — twenty years 
 ago!" 
 
 "Twenty years ago!" repeated Gordon, 
 quietly. He rose and walked forward so 
 that he stood between Ellis and the door. 
 
 " For twenty years," he said, " I have 
 thought this thing over. I have had to con- 
 sider it, not as to magnitude but as to char- 
 acter. It was a fraud — and a fraud is a fact, 
 whether big or little. It was also an outrage. 
 I have divided life into facts and shadows. 
 The shadows are sentiment, — forgetfulness, 
 — joy, — forgiveness. The facts are love and 
 hate, honour and shame, birth, marriage and 
 death. We are not dealing with shadows, 
 but with facts to-night, Ellis. You married 
 the girl I loved; you treated her like a brute, 
 though she was the truest and sweetest soul 
 that ever made a great mistake, and paid for 
 it with self-sacrifice till she died. For that 
 
 185 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 you deserve to die. You cheated your friends 
 and guests in a game of cards — a small thing, 
 but an indication. And because you hated 
 me, and wished to save yourself, and be- 
 cause you knew that my worship of your 
 wife would ensure my silence, you accused 
 me of your own fraud, — and for that you 
 deserve to die." 
 
 Gordon's voice had grown a little hoarse 
 and choked ; his eyes were terrible ; — his 
 whole figure a menace. 
 
 "You have poisoned my life, my brain, 
 and my heart/ ' he burst out, stridently. 
 "You have made me a cynic — a scoffer — an 
 outcast. And for that " 
 
 He drew out a small revolver and pointed 
 it between Ellis's strained eyes. 
 
 " It is not a question of the importance of 
 things,' ' he continued, suddenly quieting his 
 voice. " It is with facts. Values and propor- 
 tions and all those phrases are but shadows 
 at best. It is the facts of dishonour and 
 hate and revenge — " He cocked the revol- 
 ver and with his finger upon the trigger 
 he paused and smiled. 
 
 " Your wife loved me," he said, slowly. 
 And after waiting a moment to catch the look 
 
 186 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 of supreme pain in the man's half-stupefied 
 eyes, he fired. 
 
 When the officers found him, he was 
 turning the pages of a beautiful edition of 
 Omar Khayyam. He looked at his visitors 
 with surprise and some amusement. 
 
 "Arrested — I?" he said; "because of — 
 that?" His eyes followed the police- 
 captain's to Ellis's body which lay on the 
 rug beside the dining room table. In falling, 
 the man had caught the white cloth in his 
 convulsive grasp, and it was pulled half off 
 the table ; the glasses were overturned, and 
 a long, narrow stain of claret showed in the 
 candle-light like blood. 
 
 u But you do not understand," said Gor- 
 don, quietly. " We were friends as boys, 
 but something came between us, — one of 
 the inevitable shadows of life." He smiled. 
 " We shall be friends again now that this 
 is all over. It has only been a dream — a 
 shadow. He does not bear malice, I am 
 sure. You will see, it will all come right 
 some day." He laughed, childishly, and 
 turned the pages of the book which he still 
 held in his hand. 
 
 i8 7 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 "This is an ambulance case, boys," said 
 the officer, bluntly. But Gordon paid no 
 heed. He was reading aloud, in the low, 
 clear voice of the student : 
 
 11 ' We are no other than a moving row 
 
 Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go 
 Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held 
 At Midnight by the Master of the Show.' " 
 
 1 88 
 
PIERRE OF THE 
 WOODS 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 $tero of t|>e Wtrit>% 
 
 ' NE day Pierre du Bois 
 gave up " guiding 1 ' and 
 married. He was a loss 
 : to the noble galaxy of 
 guides who went out 
 from Kineo every year, 
 for he was a rarely 
 expert woodsman and 
 waterman, and had an 
 instinct in regard to the habits and haunts of 
 wild things, which he himself ascribed to a 
 remote strain of Indian blood mingling with 
 his French-Canadian and American heri- 
 tages. But he was one who would prefer 
 independence and privacy for the first years 
 of his married life, so he took a position 
 as assistant in the one shop that the small 
 sporting colony boasted, commonly known 
 as " The Store." 
 
 " The Store " was the outfitting establish- 
 ment for all campers who had, through 
 neglect or ignorance, brought an insufficient 
 supply of blankets, cartridges, flies, reels, 
 
 191 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 woolen socks or canned corned-beef. Its 
 resources covered a variegated ground and 
 ran from six-by-six canvas tents to those 
 out-of-date, paper-backed novels, whose 
 soiled covers were ornamented by large- 
 eyed ladies in their death-throes, or super- 
 lative sunrises on preposterous peaks. It 
 was a dingy, unsavoury spot — The Store — 
 but it formed a sort of meeting-ground for 
 the men between trips, in the season, and 
 for them took the place of a club. Seldom 
 was The Store deserted, and rarely was it 
 possible to enter it without hearing the chat 
 of the lumber-camps or the trappers, the 
 desultory yet always vitally real talk of out- 
 of-door men. 
 
 The life in The Store was a confining 
 one to Pierre du Bois. He did not grow 
 rich, and he hated the shelves and boxes, 
 the inner room with its groceries and its 
 weighing-machine, the many flies, and the 
 smell of rubber blankets hanging up on 
 exhibition. Odd, he sometimes thought, 
 that that very smell of rubber was the 
 pleasantest thing in life on a wet night in 
 the woods when the fire was almost out, 
 and a man was rolled in his blanket and 
 
 192 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 poncho seeking sleep under an insufficient 
 tent-fly! Often he longed for the wood- 
 trail, for the " quick- water," where a 
 steady hand was needed, — even for the 
 lumber-camp, full of hardship though it 
 was. 
 
 His old pals nodded to him when they 
 came in to gossip round The Store's reeking 
 stove on autumn evenings. 
 
 " Great trapping up to Allegash, ,, Ned 
 Shell would say, in his drawling voice. Ned 
 was a wiry, silent man, with a pleasant and 
 ruddy face, and the sort of blue eyes that 
 people trust. " Goin' to be a good winter. 
 'You goin' to strike the trail, Peer ? " 
 
 " No ! " Pierre would grunt, angrily. 
 " Wife,— baby. How I strike the trail?" 
 
 Pierre only dimly remembered his French- 
 Canadian parents, but in moments of emo- 
 tion his accent leaped into his speech and 
 blurred the English words. 
 
 " Oh, well," long, good-humoured Hal 
 Ferris would say, easily, "Joe, — he's mar- 
 ried, but he goes all right." 
 
 11 Say, Peer," would finally urge Nick, the 
 Indian, " come out with Hawkins* gang this 
 winter. It's a great lumber year." 
 
 193 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 Nick and Pierre had always been good 
 friends. 
 
 " No ! 'tell you no ! M Pierre's shout would 
 be involuntarily savage, and he would turn 
 as though to leave them. But, invariably, a 
 word, telling of the sport he loved, of the 
 wild lore dearer to him than life, would hold 
 his ears, and he would listen eagerly to 
 some unimpassioned recital of the luck 
 Ned Shell had had " up to Allegash," or of a 
 brief unpleasantness between Nick and two 
 "lucifies," the skin of which ungracious 
 combatants Nick had just sent down to the 
 taxidermist in Greenville. 
 
 Pierre would sometimes stay in The Store 
 until very late, listening to this sort of talk, 
 and finally, on his return to his cottage, his 
 wife would detect a dullness in his eyes and 
 a tonelessness in his voice. 
 
 She was a pretty, petulant woman, — was 
 Lucy du Bois. She had been a belle, and 
 still sported a pink rose in her hat on Sun- 
 days, and her walk had not lost its jaunti- 
 ness. She adored Pierre and was proud of 
 him, but sometimes, after the manner of her 
 kind, she reproached him with their poverty. 
 " She had had more home to her father's," 
 
 194 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 she told him, fretfully. " There was little 
 enough for them, — and then, the child and 
 all — Oh, why had she ever been the great, 
 gawky fool as to marry a man as couldn't 
 support her! " 
 
 Pierre listened apathetically to her com- 
 plaints, but the day came when it seemed to 
 him that he could bear neither them nor 
 their cause any longer. That was the day, 
 too, when the man who kept The Store told 
 him that he was wanted there no longer. 
 He had a new and better assistant coming 
 from Greenville, — " a man as could figure 
 an' earn his wages.' ' 
 
 Pierre and he had words, and in a fury the 
 younger man struck the older, so that he lay 
 prone like one dead. And then Pierre fled 
 frantically away as though he were trying 
 to escape from himself. He told his wife 
 what had happened ; his voice was choked, 
 but he told his story with brutal simplicity. 
 She stared at him shocked, white and terri- 
 fied, and then burst out into such a wild 
 tirade of vituperation and horror that he 
 shivered under its fury. Then she took the 
 child and rushed out of the house, saying 
 that she would never return. And the door 
 
 195 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 banged after her, did not quite latch, and 
 went on banging in the wind. 
 
 Then Pierre sat down and thought. Prob- 
 ably the man was dead ; he was an old man, 
 Pierre had struck hard, and the fall had been 
 heavy. At the moment he did not in the 
 least care, and as a matter of fact his last 
 chance of penitence had been snuffed out 
 when the door had slammed behind his 
 wife and child. Henceforth, he realized, he 
 was alone, and could only depend on him- 
 self. He was a criminal whose arrest would 
 probably mean hanging, though in Maine 
 those things are sometimes adjusted with 
 certain concessions on the part of the law. 
 
 Suddenly, in the midst of the dreary reflec- 
 tions with which his brain was spinning and 
 wheeling in his hot head, he thought of the 
 woods, — his old beloved woods. They would 
 shield him and hide him, and with his gun 
 and rod he could keep life in him when he 
 could not smuggle provisions into his wilder- 
 ness. 
 
 The curious, stinging, dancing sensation 
 inside his head cleared and lightened. The 
 silent little kitchen with its big range, half- 
 cold now, and its aggressively ticking clock, 
 
 196 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 became the scene of his preparations, brief 
 though complete. He escaped that night be- 
 fore the alarm was given, and disappeared 
 into the friendly forest, going whither no 
 man knew. No message, no sign of him 
 remained ; he had faded into the underbrush 
 and the interlacing trees. He swamped no 
 trail by which to be traced. He vanished 
 utterly, and was lost. 
 
 Pierre du Bois, — Pierre of the Woods, 
 indeed. 
 
 It was five years later that Lucy du Bois 
 sat in her father's kitchen one August even- 
 ing and talked to Dick McLinn, the game- 
 warden. He was a handsome, dashing 
 fellow, big and blond, and his gray-blue 
 eyes were cool and fearless. He eyed her 
 pretty figure with distinct admiration in his 
 gaze, for Lucy was looking her best, and 
 had dared to tie a sky-blue ribbon in her 
 dark curly hair. Her face had perceptibly 
 hardened during the years since her hus- 
 band's disappearance, but it was still very 
 young, and very freshly coloured, and she 
 had her old jaunty, coquettish manner in 
 speaking. 
 
 197 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " Don't you think you like me — just a 
 little ?" ventured Dick, at once bashful and 
 bold. " Don't you suppose as I've a chance, 
 Lucy?" 
 
 " Chance, Dick McLinn ? With Peer off 
 there alive and well ? " 
 
 " Damn him ! " said Dick McLinn, between 
 his teeth. " I keep forgettin' you've a hus- 
 band, Lucy. Couldn't you forget it, too?" 
 
 " No," said Lucy. " Not but what I'd like 
 well enough to forget it! Think of the 
 shame he's brought on me! Him a mur- 
 derer ! " Her eyes filled with angry tears, and 
 her face grew scarlet. " I'd like well enough 
 to forget him altogether," she said again. 
 
 "Would you, now, Lucy?" asked Dick, 
 leaning nearer, and taking her hand. "And 
 if he was dead, Lucy, would you take up 
 with me, do you think ? " 
 
 "Oh, p'raps so, — I guess so," said Lucy, 
 with wary indifference and uncertainty. But 
 she was weak and Dick was insistent, and 
 before he left that night she had let him kiss 
 her several times, and she had repeated with 
 energy her wish that she might forget Pierre 
 du Bois and his shameful deeds. Thereupon 
 Dick had again muttered, "Damn him \ " 
 
 1 98 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 It was that night that Dick had a talk with 
 old Warrington, the warden whose word was 
 law with all lesser men. The talk was con- 
 cerning Pierre du Bois. He was at present 
 believed to be in that region known as Des- 
 olation, and had been seen at a distance by 
 two trappers. Not long before he had killed 
 a man who came too near his camp, and it 
 was clear that he was a dangerous charac- 
 ter. For public safety and legal satisfaction 
 his freedom must come to an end. Others 
 had tried to capture him alive, — well and 
 good. Stronger measures must now be made 
 use of. He must be captured ; that was the 
 wish of the authorities, with no qualifying 
 statements. Dick expressed an interest in 
 the wishes of the authorities, which made 
 the older man smile sardonically. 
 
 " Think you want a try at some big game 
 trapping, eh, young 'un ? " he remarked. 
 
 "Yes; think I do. You say he must be 
 captured. Does that mean alive or dead?" 
 
 "Alive or dead/' answered the old war- 
 den, and after that opened his lips to add 
 something ; but he thought better of it, and 
 shut them with another smile rather more 
 grim than the first. 
 
 199 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 " I understand, sir," said Dick McLinn. 
 
 For he had read in that smile the after- 
 thought which Warrington had suppressed : 
 " Alive or dead — preferably dead." 
 
 Dick McLinn had made up his mind to 
 bring Pierre of the Woods to justice. He 
 rarely attempted what he could not accom- 
 plish, and now his entire will, energy and 
 desire were all brought to bear upon this 
 one ultimate result. He left next morning 
 at daybreak, alone. No one knew where he 
 was going, except Warrington. He simply 
 disappeared, as Pierre himself had dis- 
 appeared five years before. 
 
 Desolation is one of the wildernesses of 
 the world. It is not a haunt of campers-out; 
 even the most violent fishermen are rarely 
 familiar with it. The woodsmen know it, 
 but it is a bit off the trail, and not in any 
 sense a frequented region. It is a place 
 where a man must swamp his way to avoid 
 subsequent bewilderment, — a place where a 
 man would rather go with a companion than 
 alone. Game is easily seen and easily taken 
 in Desolation, for man is not known and 
 therefore not feared. The big crane stands 
 motionless in the water; the "musk-rat" 
 
 200 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 paddles about with soft stroke and loud 
 intermittent splash; the deer comes down 
 daintily, big-eared and big-eyed, waving the 
 white plume of his tail, and placing each 
 fine, small hoof with a precision which is 
 grace, and drinks his fill ; all are unmolested. 
 The big caribou passes through with leis- 
 urely step; the moose, lord of all, reigns 
 there in undisputed sway. The wild things 
 know it is their vantage-ground, and it is 
 filled with them. 
 
 Smoke seldom rises from Desolation. The 
 high-swinging birds are rarely lured down 
 to camp-fires by the smell of the toothsome 
 food affected by humans. But one thread of 
 purple smoke was rising one night from a 
 small clearing in the very heart of the Deso- 
 lation woods. A man was cooking a piece 
 of venison above the blaze ; a man dingily 
 and raggedly dressed but healthily browned, 
 and with the clear gaze and alert frame of 
 the woodsman, — Pierre of the Woods, at 
 home in his forest hiding-place, — alone. 
 
 At a rather long stone's throw away from 
 him another man was also making his evening 
 meal. The two, as was noticed by an ob- 
 servant hawk far above, finished eating at 
 
 201 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 about the same time, and then the second 
 man began to move slowly and carefully 
 toward Pierre's camp. He walked very 
 softly, very lightly, with a trained step, and 
 he had gotten quite close to his desired goal 
 when he started a deer in a runway. The 
 shrill whistle penetrated the thickets, and 
 Pierre, preparing for the night, stopped short, 
 wondering what sudden scent had startled 
 the animal. It was some distance off, but 
 suddenly the sound came again, close at 
 hand; — the deer was running toward him, 
 therefore away from something else. The 
 bounding step and reiterated whistle passed 
 in the shrubbery, and Pierre knew that some 
 human being was near him. He extinguished 
 the remains of his camp-fire, and taking up 
 his rifle, he sat down at the door of his cabin 
 to wait. 
 
 Well he knew that no man approached 
 him in a friendly spirit. He was an outlaw, 
 with a price upon his body. He sat motion- 
 less, hardly breathing, looking into the dark- 
 ness. 
 
 It was intensely, awfully still. Who has 
 experienced the tense and muffled silence of 
 the woods without a shudder of almost 
 
 202 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 terror ? Pierre, since his return to his wild 
 life, had been strangely sensitive to the 
 moods of the forest. To-night his heart 
 was filled with a splendid excitement and 
 exaltation, an ecstasy of presentiment. Some 
 climax was coming to the strange chapters 
 of events which had made up his life. He 
 looked back upon the past with interest, but 
 no remorse. He regretted nothing, repented 
 him of nothing. He could almost have 
 thanked that old store-keeper, five years 
 back in his life, since it was through him 
 that he had come back to his woods. When 
 he thought of eternity it was with no fear, — 
 only an abounding curiosity. To-night, for 
 some reason, he felt intimately, oddly near 
 to eternity. He laughed silently in the dark 
 as he gripped his rifle and waited. 
 
 For a long time the dreary call of a far 
 away watchful owl was the only point of 
 sound upon the great blank of stillness. At 
 last it came, that for which Pierre waited, — 
 the faint click of a broken twig. Only an 
 animal can avoid those dry twigs that lie 
 along the wood-trails, — blessed protection to 
 the fugitive, whether man or beast. A faint 
 glimmer of starlight showed between the 
 
 203 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 dense branches, enough to disclose the cabin, 
 Pierre knew. He waited. 
 
 Then, a shadow on yet deeper shadows, 
 a man came out into the clearing. The 
 camp-fire was quite out and its place invisi- 
 ble, and very faintly came the jar of his foot 
 upon a log. Then there was a long silence. 
 Then, right before the cabin, stood the man's 
 figure. 
 
 Pierre moved his arm with the rifle 
 stealthily upward, but some elusive gleam 
 of starlight glinted on the barrel. With 
 an exclamation, the man sprang back ; both 
 fired at the same instant. 
 
 Dick's shot told; Pierre's sank harmlessly 
 into a tree-trunk beyond the clearing. Tar- 
 get practice in the dark is unsatisfactory, 
 even at short range. 
 
 "Who are you, — damn you?" asked Pierre, 
 leaning choking on his arm. He had fallen 
 over sideways when Dick fired. 
 
 11 McLinn, — warden," was the brief reply. 
 Dick was a bit frightened. He found the 
 experience unpleasant, and his nerves had 
 been strained for several days. " Give me 
 that gun." 
 
 He bent down to disarm the other ; Pierre 
 
 204 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 fired straight up, as near his heart as he 
 could. As it happened, his hand was un- 
 steady and the bullet barely grazed the 
 warden's arm, but he sprang back and 
 clapped his hand to the wound. 
 
 " Damn you l" choked Pierre, " and I only 
 one bullet lef ! Never mind ! — I give you 
 one hard job ; — you got carry me dead back 
 to Kineo. ,, 
 
 The last bullet went into his side, and 
 why death was not instantaneous no doctor 
 could subsequently understand. But, as a 
 matter of fact, he lived for several awful days 
 with those two murderous bullets in his 
 body, and Dick McLinn brought him back, 
 dragging and carrying him, paddling the 
 overloaded canoe alone, giving him water 
 occasionally, — food he would not touch, — 
 and listening to his oaths. Finally he died, 
 with two separate and definite curses : one 
 upon Dick, and the other upon that last bul- 
 let of his which had failed him, unmercifully 
 leaving him to prolonged agony. 
 
 Dick's flesh crept sometimes on looking 
 back upon that ghastly trip ; the last two 
 days and nights with the dead man always 
 near were particularly terrifying. Though 
 
 205 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 he was not a nervous man, he shook as 
 though with an ague when the trip was at 
 an end, and his face was hardly recognizable. 
 
 Dick McLinn did carry his captive dead 
 back to Kineo, even as the wounded man 
 had vowed he should. He made the hard 
 trip in marvellously quick time, and brought 
 in the body of the famous outlaw to the 
 authorities. 
 
 Pierre lay on the landing when his wife 
 and child came out of The Store. Dick, 
 trying to be jaunty, but with a very white 
 face, went up to the woman. 
 
 " It's all right," he said, with a nervous 
 and ghastly sort of brutality, " Peer's ac- 
 count's all closed. I — I've brought him 
 back." 
 
 " Brought him back ? " she cried, her eyes 
 wide and strange. She had a little bright- 
 hued shawl around her shoulders, and sud- 
 denly she flung it off as though the weight 
 of it were too much. "Brought him. . . . 
 Oh, my God! . . . Where?" 
 
 "I — he — I've brought him back," he 
 blurted, " but he ain't— he's dead." 
 
 Lucy du Bois looked at him as though she 
 were suddenly crazed. She seemed uncon- 
 
 206 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 scious of the growing crowd of people ; she 
 only stared at him. A woman, — Ned Shell's 
 kindly little wife, — touched her arm, but she 
 pushed her from her. 
 
 "Dead — dead — dead," she repeated, in a 
 level and hideous staccato. "Then you 
 killed him, — you killed him. You ! — Dead- 
 dead — dead." She spoke very rapidly; they 
 all shivered a little at her tone, and Dick 
 shrank from her as though she had struck 
 him in the face. 
 
 She approached to within a few feet of 
 Pierre, and at looking at him burst out into 
 gasping words: 
 
 "Eh, but you should have known! — You 
 should have guessed ! — You should have 
 come back ! — It was you, only you, all along. 
 I was a poor fool, but I 'd have followed you 
 if I *d had a notion where you *d gone, Peer. 
 I 'd have made amends." 
 
 She turned to Dick. 
 
 "Oh, you fool! You fool!" she said, 
 mouthing the words, " not to see as how it 
 was him I loved all along. And I was that 
 proud of him, too, — murder or not. Do you 
 think a woman minds murder if it's her 
 man ? It was that he didn't come back, — 
 
 207 
 
DISCORDS 
 
 he didn't come back — and it broke my heart 
 — and I talked against him — I talked against 
 him— Oh, my God!' ' 
 
 She pushed the child toward the body. 
 
 " Go on to him, you," she said. " Look at 
 him if you like. I ain't good enough.' ' 
 
 " He had grit," said one of the men, stand- 
 ing near, to another. " Peer had grit, an' he 
 knew his woods." 
 
 "A great man with a settin' pole," said 
 the second, " an* a good shot. Don't know 
 any man I'd rather have trusted to on a 
 trail." 
 
 And such was the passing of Pierre of the 
 Woods. 
 
 208 
 
^Pelham [press 
 
 The Goose Creek Church 
 
 Limited edition of 150 numbered copies 
 printed on Whatman paper. Illuminated 
 head-pieces. 
 
 Price, $2.00 
 
 The Lays of a Lawyer 
 
 A collection of Poems. Limited edition 
 of 250 numbered copies. Printed on hand- 
 made paper. Illustrated rubricated. 
 
 Price, $4.00 
 
 9 West 39th Street 
 New York City 
 
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