57. CHAPTER LVII.
DINING WITH LAWRENCE NEWT.
Gabriel Bennet was not confident that Edward Wynne
would be at the birthday dinner given in his honor by Lawrence
Newt, but he was very sure that May Newt would be
there, and so she was. It was at Delmonico's; and a carriage
arrived at the Bennets' just in time to convey them. Another
came to Mr. Boniface Newt's, to whom brother Lawrence explained
that he had invited his daughter to dinner, and that
he should send a young friend—in fact, his confidential clerk,
to accompany Miss Newt. Brother Boniface, who looked as
if he were the eternally relentless enemy of all young friends,
had nevertheless the profoundest confidence in brother Lawrence,
and made no objection. So the hero of the day conducted
Miss May Newt to the banquet.
The hero of the day was so engaged in conversation with
Miss May Newt that he said very little to his neighbor upon
the other side, who was no other than Hope Wayne. She
had been watching very curiously a young man with black
curls and eyes, who seemed to have words only for his neighbor,
Miss Ellen Bennet. She presently turned and asked Gabriel
if she had never seen him before. “I have, surely, some
glimmering remembrance of that face,” she said, studying it
closely.
Her question recalled a day which was strangely remote
and unreal in Gabriel's memory. He even half blushed, as
if Miss Wayne had reminded him of some early treason to a
homage which he felt in the very bottom of his heart for his
blue-eyed neighbor. But the calm, unsuspicious sweetness of
Hope Wayne's face consoled him. He looked at her for a
moment without speaking. It was really but a moment, yet,
as he looked, he lay in a heavily-testered bed—he heard the
beating of the sea upon the shore—he saw the sage Mentor,
the ghostly Calypso putting aside the curtain—for a moment
he was once more the little school-boy, bruised and ill at Pinewood;
but this face—no longer a girl's face—no longer anxious,
but sweet, serene, and tender—was this the half-haughty
face he had seen and worshipped in the old village church—
the face whose eyes of sympathy, but not of love, had filled his
heart with such exquisite pain?
“That young man, Miss Wayne, is Edward Wynne,” he
said, in reply to the question.
It did not seem to resolve her perplexity.
“I don't recall the name,” she answered. “I think he must
remind me of some one I have known.”
“He is as black as Abel Newt,” said Gabriel, looking with
his clear eyes at Hope Wayne.
“But much handsomer than Mr. Newt now is,” she answered,
with perfect unconcern. “His eyes are softer; and,
in fact,” she said, smiling pleasantly, “I am not surprised to
see what a willing listener his neighbor is. I wish I could recall
him. I don't think that he resembles Mr. Newt at all, except
in complexion.”
Arthur Merlin heard every word, and watched every movement,
and marked every expression of Hope Wayne's, at
whose other hand he sat, during this little remark. Gabriel
said, in reply to it,
“The truth is, Miss Wayne, you have seen him before. The
first time you ever saw me he was with me.”
The clear eyes of the young man were turned full upon her
again.
“Oh yes, I remember now!” she answered. “He was your
friend in that terrible battle with Abel Newt. It seems long
ago, does it not?”
However far away it may have seemed, it was apparently a
remembrance that roused no especial emotion in Miss Hope
Wayne's heart. Having satisfied herself, she released the attention
of Gabriel, who had other subjects of conversation
with May Newt than his quarrel with her brother for the favor
of Hope Wayne.
But Arthur Merlin observed that while Hope Wayne listened
with her ears to him, with her eyes she listened to Lawrence
Newt. His simple, unselfish, and therefore unconscious
urbanity—his genial, kindly humor—and the soft, manly earnestness
of his face, were not unheeded—how could they be?—
by her. Since the day the will was read he had been a faithful
friend and counselor. It was he who negotiated for her
house. It was he who daily called and gave her a thousand
counsels in the details of management, of which every woman
who comes into a large property has such constant need. And
in all the minor arrangements of business she found in him the
same skill and knowledge, combined with a womanly reserve
and softness, which had first so strongly attracted her.
Yet his visits as financial counsel, as he called himself, did
not destroy, they only heightened, the pleasure of the meetings
of the Round Table. For the group of friends still met.
They talked of poetry still. They talked of many things, and
perhaps thought of but a few. The pleasure to all of them
was evident enough; but it seemed more perplexed than formerly.
Hope Wayne felt it. Amy Waring felt it. Arthur
Merlin felt it. But not one of them could tell whether Lawrence
Newt felt it. There was a vague consciousness of something
which nearly concerned them all, but not one of them
could say precisely what it was—except, possibly, Amy Waring;
and except, certainly, Lawrence Newt.
For Aunt Martha's question had drawn from Amy's lips
what had lain literally an unformed suspicion in her mind, until
it leaped to life and rushed armed from her mouth. Amy
Waring saw how beautiful Hope Wayne was. She knew how
lovely in character she was. And she was herself beautiful
and lovely; so she said in her mind at once, “Why have I
never seen this? Why did I not know that he must of course
love her?”
Then, if she reminded herself of the conversation she had
held with Lawrence Newt about Arthur Merlin and Hope
Wayne, she was only perplexed for a moment. She knew
that he could not but be honest; and she said quietly in her
soul, “He did not know at that time how well worthy his
love she was.”
