A Woman's Will Part 35

"Yes, I think so; I lost all my love for my husband that night, and killed all my faith in mankind forever."

"Why did you be possessed to go?"

"I went because I did not want to be deceived in the way that many women are deceived."

Von Ibn laughed.

"You know now all of everything, you think?"

"I know more than most other women do."

"You would have known much more yet if you had worn a mask," he told her very dryly.

She did not reply, and after a few minutes he continued:

"And now, when you know everything, and can no more be deceived, are you so most happy?"

"I do not know," she said slowly.

"How have you lost your faith?" he inquired; "what in especial can no more deceive you?"

"I don't believe in men," she declared; "I don't believe in anything that they say, nor in anything that they promise. And I don't believe one bit in love!"

The man stopped by an empty bench.

"We have walked so long," he remarked parenthetically; and she sat down, parenthetically also, so to speak.

"That is sad," he said, digging in the gravel with his cane, "not to believe in love, or in the truth of a man! and you are a woman, too!

Then there is no more truth and love for you."

Rosina felt disheartened. A ready acquiescence in her views is always discouraging to a woman. What is the use of having views, if they are just tamely agreed to at once?

"I think perhaps men really mean what they say when they say it," she began; "but, oh dear, they can't stick to it afterwards. Why, my husband told me that my lightest wish should be his law, and then what do you think he did?"

"He did perhaps kiss you."

"No, he went and bought a monkey!"

"What is a monkey?"

"Don't you know what a monkey is?"

"If I know I will not trouble you to ask."

"_C'est un singe,--affe_; now you know."

"Oh, yes; I was thinking of a monk, and of how one told me that you had them not with you."

Then he sc.r.a.ped gravel for a long time, while her mind wandered through a vista of monks and monkeys, and finally, entering the realm of the present day, paused over the dream of a hat which she had seen that morning in the Theatinerstra.s.se, a hat with a remarkably clever arrangement of one buckle between two wings; it was in the store that faced--

"I am an atheist," said her companion, rising abruptly from his seat.

"Apropos of what?" she asked, decidedly startled, but rising too,--"apropos of the monkey?"

"_Comment?_" he said blankly.

"Nothing, nothing!" quickly.

They walked on slowly among the shadows which were beginning to gather beneath the trees; after a while he spoke again.

"I tell you just now that I am an atheist, and that is very true. Now I will make you a proposal and you shall see how serious I mean. I will change myself and believe in G.o.d, if you will change yourself and believe once more in men."

"Can you believe in G.o.d or not just as you please?" she asked wonderingly.

"I am the master of myself," he replied straitly; "if I say that I will pray to-night, I will pray. And you must say that you will believe," he insisted; "you must again have a faith in men, and in their truth, and in honor." Then he paused lengthily. "And in love?" he continued; "say that you will again believe in love?--you will, will you not? yes?"

"I don't know that I can do it, even if I want to," she said musingly; "looking on at life is so terribly disheartening, especially with us in America, you know."

"Oh," he said quickly, "but I do not want you to believe in love in America; I talk of here in Munich."

"I suppose you mean yourself?"

"Yes," he said most emphatically,--"me."

She could not help laughing a little.

"You do really amuse me so much," she apologized.

A workman in a dirty blouse and a forlorn, green Tyrolese hat, the c.o.c.k's plume of which had been all too often rained upon, pa.s.sed close beside them. Von Ibn, nothing daunted, seized her gloved hand and pressed it to his lips; she freed it quickly and swept all their environage with one swift and comprehensive glance.

"If any one that knew us should see you!" she exclaimed.

He calmly gazed after the now distant workman.

"I did not know him," he said; "did you?"

Then she was obliged to laugh again.

"You are always so afraid of the world," he continued, remonstrating; "what does it make if one do see me kiss your hand? kissing your hand is so little kissing."

He paused a moment and smiled whimsically.

"I did really laugh alone in my room the other night. I sit there smoking and thinking what a bad fright you have always when I will to take your hand and kiss it--you fear ever that some one shall not be there to see. Then I think, if I would give you a true kiss, that would be to your mind so awful,--the fear of a seeing, you know,--that we must then go in a cellar and bolt nine doors first, probably."

He laughed, but she did not.

"When I go into a cellar with you," she said coldly, "and allow nine doors bolted, you may kiss me, and I pledge you my word not to scream."