University of Virginia Library

28. CHAPTER XXVIII.

On arriving at Casa G—, Paul found Colonel
Paleford sitting solitary and thoughtful under the roofed
gateway at the entrance of the vineyard, and it was
evidently a relief and pleasure to him to see his friend.
In the course of a few minutes' conversation, on their
way to the house, it chanced to be mentioned that the
secret of the nameless artist had been kept. They had
not felt at liberty to speak of it without Paul's permission
—Miss Ashly, of course, at present, expecting a visit from
a stranger.

The light of the little drawing-room was soon arranged,
and the easel and its belongings made ready for “the
sitting.” They still waited for the appearance of the
ladies; but, in taking up his pencil, as they conversed,
Paul found, both how ill he was, and how much his
depressed spirits had been already tried, that day. By
the nicely understood feel of his wand of genius, he

was reminded of his trembling hand, and of the doubtfulness
of the calm of inner strength that was to be
particularly needed for the critical ordeal before him.
With the long-cherished dream of his youth just crushed
in his heart—a fresh touchstone to be applied to the
point of his secret pride and weakness—the cause of his
now most dreaded rival to be magnanimously forwarded
by a plot of his own contriving—and the skill of the
artist, notwithstanding all these deranging and disturbing
causes, expected to confirm, by his present work, its
previous triumphs of art and discrimination—he literally
felt the strength insufficient. He was about to confess
as much, at an expression of sympathy from Colonel
Paleford, who had remarked his paleness and debility,
when Miss Ashly's step was heard upon the stair.

The greeting was frank and cordial, as she entered, with
the pressure given by her hand to Paul's.

“A very artistic arrangement,” she said, looking round
upon the half-darkened room, “but where is the artist?”

Paul took the pencil from the little shelf of the easel
standing near him, and, with a bow of mock ceremony,
made the sign of the cross upon his own forehead.

“Our friend Fane,” said Colonel Paleford, smiling at the
blank incredulity with which the silent announcement was
received, “is the nameless artist we have been admiring all
this while!

“And the picture of Miss Sybil?” asked the astonished
guest, beginning already to be formal.

“Was his work, I believe!” said the colonel.

“And my aunt!” she almost breathlessly added.

“Miss Winifred Ashly did me the honor to sit to me,
also,” said Paul, with the deferential air of an employed
artist.

There were too many things to remember, and to rearrange
in accordance with this startling surprise, for
Miss Mildred Ashly to recover very readily. She looked
at the easel and at Paul alternately, and seemed to be
trying to identify them with something in her mind.
Feeling somewhat embarrassed with her scrutiny, he
went to his portfolio-case which leaned against the
wall.

“And here,” he said, producing his crayon copy of
her brother, and setting it upon the drawing-board, “is
a present from the same nameless artist, which I presume
will be very welcome to Miss Paleford. I have endeavored
to show, in my crayon portrait, the enthusiasm
and nobleness of Mr. Ashly's face—wanting which, I
thought that the miniature you lent me had done injustice
to his hidden qualities and character.”

There was an involuntary utterance of admiring pleasure
by Miss Ashly, as she first looked at the drawing; but a
recovery of her attitude of reserve, a moment after, and

a just perceptible return of her long-remembered and
indescribable impenetrability of countenance, once more
staggered Paul. He was not reassured or comforted,
even by the expressive movement of Colonel Paleford,
who, after looking a moment at the portrait of Mr.
Ashly, passed near where stood the young friend whom
he thus considered generously disinterested, silently pressing
the hand that Paul was resting on his hip.

The pause became embarrassing.

“I have your own portrait already in my mind, Miss
Ashly!” said Paul, wishing to change the subject, and feeling
that he must begin soon upon his morning's work, or
lose the strength for it altogether; “I have chanced to
see you, also” (he added, with forced playfulness), “when
the inner face of the Ashlys shone through.”

But this significant and rather desperate betrayal of
his secret thought, as to the present and outer look of
the Ashly features, seemed but to confirm her hesitating
reserve.

“Pardon me, Mr. Fane!” she said, “I was not aware
upon whose attention I was—making such demands!
It had not occurred to me that your valuable time was
that of—an artist. I, really—you must excuse me,
Mr. Fane!—I could only sit to you—professionally!”

“There was in this broken explanation (and particularly
in the concluding word, and in the accent and look with

which it was uttered), a whole volume for Paul's well-prepared
comprehension to read. He saw at once the full
length and breadth of the feelings now struggling in Miss
Ashly's mind, and he felt that the line between himself
and her—the long hated line of difference of rank and
position—was re-drawn as with a pen of fire. There was
but this softening of it, that, as an attaché and with the
opportune power of rendering very important service, he
had been unquestionably taken into her confidence; but
even this might be attributed to overruling reasons of
interest, and it was an admission of equality and willing
obligation, now very suddenly withdrawn, on discovering
him to be an artist. With the rapid crowding of this
unwelcome conviction on his mind, Paul's natural promptitude
at grappling with uncertain shadows came to his
aid.

“If Miss Ashly chooses to be my first customer,” he
said, quietly, “she is very welcome to so honor me!
Though I have not painted portraits for money, thus far,
it was because I was an apprentice in Art. It is to be my
profession!”

Paul caught sight of Colonel Paleford's face, as he
turned to his easel to arrange for a beginning, in apparently
undisturbed accordance with Miss Ashly's wish;
and there was an approval in the old soldier's calm eye,
which repaid him for much that he was suffering unseen.

But the entrance of Miss Paleford turned the attention
for a moment. She glided in with her usual stately grace,
as freshly and simply cordial as she was renewedly and
wonderfully beautiful; and her father, exercising his polished
tact as a man of the world, stated the embarrassment
to her, mock seriously, as an amusing scruple of over-delicacy
on the part of Miss Ashly.

“Suppose we compromise the matter, my dear Mildred,”
said the unsuspecting Sybil, “by your accepting the portrait
from me? I am quite at liberty, I am very sure, to accept
it, myself, from Mr. Fane, and we shall thus bridge over
the chasm, without calling that hateful `money' to our
aid.”

“But you are not aware, my child,” said the Colonel,
“how deeply you are in Mr. Fane's debt, already. He has
done a masterpiece of work for you, which you have not
yet seen. There” (the father continued, as Paul set the
portrait of Mr. Ashly on his easel) “is what, he thinks,
represents truly the brother of our friend.”

It was a long and silent gaze now bent upon that crayon
portrait by Sybil Paleford. In every one of the three
hearts, beating almost within hearing of hers, there was a
throb of suspense, of which each dreaded the betrayal as a
secret of his own—and the voice of the beautiful mourner
first broke the silence:

“How strangely admirable!”

Paul heard—and saw the look given to his work by the
large soft eyes that were now the world to him—and, by
those expressive words, he knew that the dreaded success
of his artistic effort was complete, his own genius throwing
a new and more favorable light upon the character and
features of his rival. He forgot, in the anguish of the
moment, Miss Ashly and her torture of his pride! It
would be necessary, in another instant, to meet and answer
Sybil's look, or the expression of her thanks in words.
He nerved resolution and summoned up the calmness for
lip and eye.

But Nature was overtasked! The giddiness of the
enfeebled invalid had already reminded him, once or twice,
that he had both fasted longer than usual, and passed his
accustomed noon hour of repose from mental labor. His
sight was not clear without an effort, and his brain grew
faint. Suddenly his feet felt uncertain under him. Miss
Paleford turned to speak, and he made one struggle to
seem as he had been gathering strength to seem at that
crisis—but it was too late. Around swam all the objects
in the room—furniture, people, windows—and Paul fell
senseless to the floor.

It appeared to be twilight when consciousness once more
lifted the eyelids of the sleeper. He found himself alone,

and lying upon the broad cushions of a lounge, in a room
that seemed not at first familiar to him; but which the
sight of his easel in the corner, and the portrait of Mrs.
Paleford on the wall, soon recalled to him as the drawing-room
of Casa G—. He gradually remembered the
errand with which he had come thither, and the trials and
combining circumstances of that morning, to him so eventful;
and he then recalled his debility by illness, and the
sudden failure of his strength, while preparing to take a
first sitting from Miss Ashly; and the truth became evident.
He had fainted, for the first time in his life, and,
falling asleep while yet scarce conscious of his restoration,
had been left by the family to his repose.

Languid and spiritless, Paul lay, struggling with his fast
up-crowding thoughts. Not a sound was to be heard; and,
as he became more used to the shadows of the dim-lighted
room, he once more rallied his remembrance of each well-known
article of furniture and ornament; and, by aid of
these associations, recovered, link by link, the chain of
resolve and duty which had there been bound about his
heart. It was difficult. He could not but confess to himself—more
than ever before, as he lay undisturbed, with
the atmosphere of that beauty-haunted and dream-hallowed
house silent around him—that he loved her who was the
angel of the place. The mother, whose tender look now
fell upon him from the portrait on the wall, seemed again

to offer her dying gift—the priceless daughter's love, which
it had been his bitter task to assist his rival more certainly
to win. The release given to him in the knowledge of the
indifference of Mary Evenden—no longer a surprise—
seemed a welcome ordaining of Fate, in his destiny of
love. His whole soul, as he now lay, re-waking and fancy-wild,
upon that invalid couch, sprang to Sybil Paleford.

But there was a sudden revulsion to the incomplete and
wayward tide of his returning thoughts. He remembered
her countenance and her expressive words as she had
looked at his portrait of Mr. Ashly! His heart sickened
and grew dark. The possibility—nay, the certainty almost
—that his own unclasping of that locked book, and his
own laying open of the hidden leaves of character, had
induced her to read with new eyes, and with approval
unfelt before! It seemed to him more and more fatally
true, as he recalled the scene, that, to the gaze of the
admiring mourner, it was a revelation of Mr. Ashly's countenance
and inner nature which was welcomed with delight.
Her looks, her words, said it. They had betrayed unmistakably
the dawn of a new feeling. She already loved the
absent brother of her friend!

With these conflicting and darkening feelings brooding
over the feeble beatings of his heart, Paul was startled by
the scarce perceptible moving of the latch. The door
opened timidly, and, with the streaming of the dying glow

of the west into the darkened room, he saw the outlined
form of Sybil in her mourning weeds. She stood listening
for a moment, and then noiselessly and softly entered.
Paul did not stir. It occurred to him that the desk of
Colonel Paleford was near the head of the couch on which
he lay, and there might be something wanted from this, to
bring those gliding feet thus noiselessly into the room.
She probably thought to achieve her errand, and pass out
without disturbing the sleeper.

With closed lids, and the thought that, by the delicacy
which propriety required, he should make no stir, nor
speak, except in answer, Paul lay breathlessly still. The
spirit-ear of love, even without the whisper of her moving
dress, would have told him of her approach! His heart
beat faster and warm, as the folds of her rustling weeds
touched the arm that hung languidly over the couch. The
desk was near, but she stood turned to his pillow. He
thought his pulse would become audible! Her gaze was
on his face. He thrilled with the flood of light from her
soft eyes—his lips and brow bathed as by a magnetism of
indescribable thrill. Suddenly she stooped. He felt her
warm breath upon his cheek. Two swift kisses were
impressed upon his eyes—and, like a shadow of a cloud,
she vanished from the room!

To thank God for the night that was before him—to
long for the morning to stay away, and for life to be but

the prolonging of that sweet dream and the wild joy he
had now to be alone with—to wrap himself in bliss beyond
words, with the certainty that Sybil Paleford loved
him—was Paul's tumult of thought, with those kisses on
his eyes!