Louisiana Part 7

The next instant she had checked herself again, just as she had done before.

"Let us talk of something else," she said, coldly.

"It will not be easy for me to do so," he answered, "but I will try."

Before Olivia went to bed she had a visit from her.

She received her with some embarra.s.sment, it must be confessed. Day by day she felt less at ease with her and more deeply self-convicted of some blundering,--which, to a young woman of her temperament, was a sharp penalty.

Louisiana would not sit down. She revealed her purpose in coming at once.

"I want to ask you to make me a promise," she said, "and I want to ask your pardon."

"Don't do that," said Olivia.

"I want you to promise that you will not tell your brother the truth until you have left here and are at home. I shall go away very soon.

I am tired of what I have been doing. It is different from what you meant it to be. But you must promise that if you stay after I have gone--as of course you will--you will not tell him. My home is only a few miles away. You might be tempted, after thinking it over, to come and see me--and I should not like it. I want it all to stop here--I mean my part of it. I don't want to know the rest."

Olivia had never felt so helpless in her life. She had neither self-poise, nor tact, nor any other daring quality left.

"I wish," she faltered, gazing at the girl quite pathetically, "I wish we had never begun it."

"So do I," said Louisiana. "Do you promise?"

"Y-yes. I would promise anything. I--I have hurt your feelings," she confessed, in an outbreak.

She was destined to receive a fresh shock. All at once the girl was metamorphosed again. It was her old ignorant, sweet, simple self who stood there, with trembling lips and dilated eyes.

"Yes, you have!" she cried. "Yes, you have!"

And she burst into tears and turned about and ran out of the room.

CHAPTER VI.

THE ROAD TO THE RIGHT.

The morning after, Ferrol heard an announcement which came upon him like a clap of thunder.

After breakfast, as they walked about the grounds, Olivia, who had seemed to be in an abstracted mood, said, without any preface:

"Miss Rogers returns home to-morrow."

Laurence stopped short in the middle of the path.

"To-morrow!" he exclaimed. "Oh, no."

He glanced across at Louisiana with an anxious face.

"Yes," she said, "I am going home."

"To New York?"

"I do not live in New York."

She spoke quite simply, but the words were a shock to him. They embarra.s.sed him. There was no coldness in her manner, no displeasure in her tone, but, of course, he understood that it would be worse than tactless to inquire further. Was it possible that she did not care that he should know where she lived? There seemed no other construction to be placed upon her words. He flushed a little, and for a few minutes looked rather gloomy, though he quickly recovered himself afterward and changed the subject with creditable readiness.

"Did not you tell me she lived in New York?" he asked Olivia, the first time they were alone together.

"No," Olivia answered, a trifle sharply. "Why New York, more than another place?"

"For no reason whatever,--really," he returned, more bewildered than ever. "There was no reason why I should choose New York, only when I spoke to her of certain places there, she--she----"

He paused and thought the matter over carefully before finis.h.i.+ng his sentence. He ended it at last in a singular manner.

"She said nothing," he said. "It is actually true--now I think of it--she said nothing whatever!"

"And because she said nothing whatever----" began Olivia.

He drew his hand across his forehead with a puzzled gesture.

"I fancied she _looked_ as if she knew," he said, slowly. "I am sure she looked as if she knew what I was talking about--as if she knew the places, I mean. It is very queer! There seems no reason in it. Why shouldn't she wish us to know where she lives?"

"I--I must confess," cried Olivia, "that I am getting a little tired of her."

It was treacherous and vicious, and she knew it was; but her guilty conscience and her increasing sense of having bungled drove her to desperation. If she had not promised to keep the truth to herself, she would have been only too glad to unburden herself. It was so stupid, after all, and she had only herself to blame.

Laurence drew a long breath.

"You can not be tired of _her_!" he said. "That is impossible. She takes firmer hold upon one every hour."

This was certainly true, as far as he was concerned. He was often even surprised at his own enthusiasm. He had seen so many pretty women that it was almost inconsistent that he should be so much moved by the prettiness of one charming creature, and particularly one who spoke so little, who, after all, was--but there he always found himself at a full stop. He could not say what she was, he did not know yet; really, he seemed no nearer the solution of the mystery than he had been at first. There lay the fascination. He felt so sure there was an immense deal for him to discover, if he could only discover it. He had an ideal in his mind, and this ideal, he felt confident, was the real creature, if he could only see her. During the episode on the upper gallery he fancied he had caught a glimpse of what was to be revealed.

The sudden pa.s.sion on her pale young face, the fire in her eyes, were what he had dreamed of.

If he had not been possessed of courage and an honest faith in himself, born of a goodly amount of success, he would have been far more depressed than he was. She was going away, and had not encouraged him to look forward to their meeting again.

"I own it is rather bad to look at," he said to himself, "if one quite believed that Fate would serve one such an ill turn. She never played me such a trick, however, and I won't believe she will. I shall see her again--sometime. It will turn out fairly enough, surely."

So with this consolation he supported himself. There was one day left and he meant to make the best of it. It was to be spent in driving to a certain mountain, about ten miles distant. All tourists who were possessed of sufficient energy made this excursion as a matter of duty, if from no more enthusiastic motive. A strong, light carriage and a pair of horses were kept in the hotel stables for the express purpose of conveying guests to this special point.

This vehicle Ferrol had engaged the day before, and as matters had developed he had cause to congratulate himself upon the fact. He said to Louisiana what he had before said to himself:

"We have one day left, and we will make the best of it."

Olivia, who stood upon the gallery before which the carriage had been drawn up, glanced at Louisiana furtively. On her part she felt privately that it would be rather hard to make the best of it. She wished that it was well over. But Louisiana did not return her glance.

She was looking at Ferrol and the horses. She had done something new this morning. She had laid aside her borrowed splendor and attired herself in one of her own dresses, which she had had the boldness to remodel. She had seized a hint from some one of Olivia's possessions, and had given her costume a pretty air of primitive simplicity. It was a plain white lawn, with a little frilled cape or fichu which crossed upon her breast, and was knotted loosely behind. She had a black velvet ribbon around her lithe waist, a rose in her bosom where the fichu crossed, and a broad Gainsborough hat upon her head. One was reminded somewhat of the picturesque young woman of the good old colony times. Ferrol, at least, when he first caught sight of her, was reminded of pictures he had seen of them.