Paul Patoff Part 20

"I should think you would find it vastly more interesting."

"I do; especially when you are one of the people I am permitted to study."

"If you think I will permit it long, you are mistaken," said Hermione, who was beginning to lose her temper, without precisely knowing why. She took up her book and a piece of embroidery she had brought with her, as though she would go.

"You cannot help my making a study of you," returned the professor, calmly. "If you leave me now, I regard it as an interesting feature in your case."

"I will afford you that much interest, at all events," answered Hermione, rising to her feet. She was annoyed, and the blood rose to her delicate cheeks, while her downcast lashes hid the anger in her eyes.

But she did not know the man, if she thought he would let himself be treated so lightly. She knew neither him nor his weapons.

"Miss Carvel, permit me to ask your forgiveness," he said. "I am so fond of hearing myself talk that my tongue runs away with me."

"Why do you tease me so?" asked Hermione, suddenly raising her eyes and facing Cutter. But before he could answer her she laid down her work and her book, and walked slowly away from him. She reached the opposite side of the broad conservatory, and turned back.

Cutter's whole manner had changed the moment he saw that she was seriously annoyed. He knew well enough that he had said nothing for which the girl could be legitimately angry, but he understood her antipathy to him too well not to know that it could easily be excited at any moment to an open expression of dislike. On the present occasion, however, he had resolved to fathom, if possible, the secret cause of the feeling the beautiful Hermione entertained against him.

"Miss Carvel," he said, very gently, as she advanced again towards him, "I like to talk to you, of all people, but you do not like me,--forgive my saying it, for I am in earnest,--and I lose my temper because I cannot find out why."

Hermione stood still for a moment, and looked straight into the professor's eyes; she saw that they met hers with such an honest expression of regret that her heart was touched. She stooped and picked a flower, and held it in her hand some seconds before she answered.

"It was I who was wrong," she said, presently. "Let us be friends. It is not that I do not like you,--really I believe it is not that. It is that, somehow, you do manage to--to tease me, I suppose." She blushed.

"I am sure you do not mean it. It is very foolish of me, I know."

"If you could only tell me exactly where my fault lies," said Cutter, earnestly, "I am sure I would never commit it again. You do not seriously believe that I ever intend to annoy you?"

"N--no," hesitated Hermione. "No, you do not intend to annoy me, and yet I think it amuses you sometimes to see that I am angry about nothing."

"It does not amuse me," said Cutter. "My tongue gets the better of me, and then I am very sorry afterwards. Let us be friends, as you say. We have more serious things to think of than quarreling in our conversation. Say you forgive me, as freely as I say that it has been my fault."

There was something so natural and humble in the way the man spoke that Hermione had no choice but to put out her hand and agree to the truce.

Professor Cutter was as old as her father, though he looked ten years younger, or more; he had a world-wide reputation in more than one branch of science; he was altogether what is called a celebrated man; and he stood before her asking to "make friends," as simply as a schoolboy.

Hermione had no choice.

"Of course," she answered, and then added with a smile, "only you must really not tease me any more."

"I won't," said Cutter, emphatically.

They sat down again, side by side, and were silent for some moments. It seemed to Hermione as though she had made an important compact, and she did not feel altogether certain of the result. She could have laughed at the idea that her making up her differences with the professor was of any real importance in her life, but nevertheless she felt that it was so, and she was inclined to think over what she had done. Her hands lay folded upon her lap, and she idly gazed at them, and thought how small and white they looked upon the dark blue serge. Cutter spoke first.

"I suppose," he began, "that when we are not concerned with our own immediate affairs, we are all of us thinking of the same thing. Indeed, though we live very much as though nothing were the matter, we are constantly aware that one subject occupies us all alike."

To tell the truth, Hermione was not at that moment thinking of poor Madame Patoff. She raised her eyes with an inquiring glance.

"I am very much preoccupied," continued the professor. "I have not the least idea whether we have done wisely in allowing Paul to see his mother."

"If she knew him, I imagine it was a good thing," answered Hermione.

"How long is it since they met?"

"Eighteen months, or more. They met last in very painful circ.u.mstances, I believe. You see the impression was strong enough to outlive her insanity. She was not glad to see him."

"Why will they not tell me what drove her mad?" asked Hermione.

"It is not a very nice story," answered the professor. "It is probably on account of Paul." There was a short pause.

"Do you mean that she went mad on account of something Paul did?" asked Hermione presently.

"I am not sure I can tell you that. I wish you could know the whole story, but your father would never consent to it, I am sure."

"If it is not nice, I do not wish to hear it," said Hermione, quietly.

"I only wanted to know about Paul. You gave me the impression that it was in some way his fault."

"In some way it was," replied Cutter. "Poor lady,--I am not sure we should have let her see him."

"Does she suffer much, do you think?"

"No. If she suffered much, she would fall ill and probably die. I do not think she has any consciousness of her situation. I have known people like that who were mad only three or four days in the week. She never has a lucid moment. I am beginning to think it is hopeless, and we might as well advise your father to have her taken to a private asylum. The experiment would be interesting."

"Why?" asked Hermione. "She gives n.o.body any trouble here. It would be unkind. She is not violent, nor anything of that sort. We should all feel dreadfully if anything happened to her in the asylum. Besides, I thought it was a great thing that she should have known Paul yesterday."

"Not so great as one might fancy. I think that if there were much chance of her recovery, the recognition of her son ought to have brought back a long train of memories, amounting almost to a lucid interval."

"I understood that you had spoken more hopefully last night," said Hermione, doubtfully. "You seem discouraged to-day."

"With most people it is necessary to appear hopeful at any price,"

answered Cutter. "I feel that with you I am perfectly safe in saying precisely what I think. You will not misinterpret what I say, nor repeat it to every other member of the household."

"No, indeed. I am glad you tell me the truth, but I had hoped it was not as bad as you say."

"Your aunt is very mad indeed, Miss Carvel," said the professor.

I may observe, in pa.s.sing, that what the professor said to me differed very materially from what he said to Hermione, a circ.u.mstance we did not discover until a later date. For Hermione, having given her promise not to repeat what Cutter told her about her aunt, kept it faithfully, and did not even a.s.sume an air of superiority when speaking about the case to others. She believed exactly what the professor said, namely, that he trusted her, and no one else, with his true views of the matter; and that, to all others, he a.s.sumed an air of hopefulness very far removed from his actual state of mind.

Singularly,--or naturally, as you look at it,--the result of the conversation between Hermione and the professor was the complete disappearance, for some time, of all their differences. Cutter ceased to annoy her with his sharp answers to all she said, and she showed a growing interest in him and in his conversation. They were frequently seen talking together, apparently taking pleasure in each other's society, a fact which I alone noticed as interesting, for Patoff had not been long enough at Carvel Place to discover that there had ever been any antipathy between the two. On looking back, I ascribe the change to the influence Cutter obtained over Hermione by suddenly affecting a great earnestness and a sincere regret for the annoyance he had given in the past, and by admitting her, as he gave her to understand that he did, to his confidence in the matter of Madame Patoff's insanity. Be that as it may, the result was obtained very easily by the professor; and when Hermione left him, before lunch, it is probable that in the solitude of the conservatory the man of science rubbed his gigantic hands together, and beamed upon the orchids with unusual benignity.

But while this new alliance was being formed in the conservatory, another conversation was taking place in a distant part of the house, not less interesting, perhaps, but not destined to reach so peaceable a conclusion. The scene of this other meeting was Miss Chrysophrasia Dabstreak's especial boudoir, an apartment so singular in its furniture and adornment that I will leave out all description of it, and ask you merely to imagine, at will, the most aesthetic retreat of the most aesthetic old maid in existence.

After breakfast, that morning, Chrysophrasia had sent word to Mrs.

Carvel that she should be glad to see her, if she could come up to her boudoir. Chrysophrasia never came down to breakfast. She regarded that meal as a barbarism, forgetting that the mediaeval persons she admired began their days by taking to themselves a goodly supply of food. She never appeared before lunch, but spent her mornings in the solitude of her own apartment, probably in the composition of verses which have remained hitherto unpublished. Mrs. Carvel at once acceded to the request conveyed in her sister's message, and went to answer the summons. She was not greatly pleased at the idea of spending the morning with her sister, for she devoted the early hours to religious reading whenever she was able; but she was the most obliging woman in the world, and so she quietly put aside her own wishes, and mounted the stairs to Miss Dabstreak's boudoir. She found the latter clad in loose garments of strange cut and hue, and a green silk handkerchief was tied about her forehead, presumably out of respect for certain concealed curl papers rather than for any direct purpose of adornment. Chrysophrasia looked very faded in the morning. As Mrs. Carvel entered the room, her sister pointed languidly to a chair, and then paused a moment, as though to recover from the exertion.

"Mary," said she at last, and even from the first tone of her voice Mrs.

Carvel felt that a severe lecture was imminent,--"Mary, this thing is a hollow sham. It cannot be allowed to go on any longer."

Mrs. Carvel's face a.s.sumed a sweet and sad expression, and folding her hands upon her knees, she leaned slightly forward from the chair upon which she sat, and prepared to soothe her sister's views upon hollow shams in general.

"My dear," said she, "you must endeavor to be charitable."

"I do not see the use of being charitable," returned Chrysophrasia, with more energy than she was wont to display. "Dear me, Mary, what in the world has charity to do with the matter? Can you look at me and say that it has anything to do with it?"