Part 9 (1/2)

The younger man was touched. 'She shall be as dear to me as she has been to you,' he said; 'do not fear. My love is proved by the very struggle I have made against it. I venture to say no man ever fought harder against himself than I have in this old castle of yours. I kept that t.i.tian picture as a countercharm. It resembles a woman who, at a word, will give me herself and her fortune,--a woman high in the cultivated circles of cities both here and abroad, beautiful, accomplished, a queen in her little sphere. But all was useless. That long night in the snow, when I crawled backwards and forwards to keep myself from freezing, it came to me with power that the whole of earth and all its gifts compared not with this love. Old man, she will be happy with me.'

'I know it.'

'Did you foresee this end?' asked Waring after a while, watching, as he spoke, the expression of the face before him. He could not rid himself of the belief that the old man had laid his plans deftly.

'I could only hope for it: I saw that she loved you.'

'Well, well,' said the younger man magnanimously, 'it was natural, after all. Your expiation has ended better than you hoped; for the little orphan child you have reared has found a home and friends, and you yourself need work no more. Choose your abode here or anywhere else in the West, and I will see that you are comfortable.'

'I will stay on here.'

'As you please. Silver will not forget you; she will write often. I think I will go first up the Rhine and then into Switzerland,'

continued Waring, going back to himself and his plans with the matter-of-course egotism of youth and love. And old Fog listened.

What need to picture the love-scene that followed? The next morning a strong hand knocked at the door of the flower-room, and the shy little maiden within had her first lesson in love, or rather in its expression, while all the blossoms listened and the birds looked on approvingly. To do him justice, Waring was an humble suitor when alone with her; she was so fair, so pure, so utterly ignorant of the world and of life, that he felt himself unworthy, and bowed his head. But the mood pa.s.sed, and Silver liked him better when the old self-a.s.sertion and quick tone of command came uppermost again. She knew not good from evil, she could not a.n.a.lyze the feeling in her heart; but she loved this stranger, this master, with the whole of her being. Jarvis Waring knew good from evil (more of the latter knew he than of the former), he comprehended and a.n.a.lyzed fully the feeling that possessed him; but, man of the world as he was, he loved this little water-maiden, this fair pagan, this strange isolated girl, with the whole force of his nature. 'Silver,' he said to her, seriously enough, 'do you know how much I love you? I am afraid to think what life would seem without you.'

'Why think of it, then, since I am here?' replied Silver.

'Do you know, Jarvis, I think if I had not loved you so much, you would not have loved me, and then--it would have been--that is, I mean--it would have been different--' She paused; unused to reasoning or to anything like argument, her own words seemed to bewilder her.

Waring laughed, but soon grew serious again. 'Silver,' he said, taking her into his arms, 'are you sure that you can love me as I crave?'

(For he seemed at times tormented by the doubt as to whether she was anything more than a beautiful child.) He held her closely and would not let her go, compelling her to meet his ardent eyes. A change came over the girl, a sudden red flashed up into her temples and down into her white throat. She drew herself impetuously away from her lover's arms and fled from the room. 'I am not sure but that she is a water-sprite, after all,' grumbled Waring, as he followed her. But it was a pleasure now to grumble and pretend to doubt, since from that moment he was sure.

The next morning Fog seemed unusually cheerful.

'No wonder,' thought Waring. But the character of benefactor pleased him, and he appeared in it constantly.

'We must have the old castle more comfortable; I will try to send up some furniture from below,' he remarked, while pacing to and fro in the evening.

'Isn't it comfortable now?' said Silver. 'I am sure I always thought this room beautiful.'

'What, this clumsy imitation of a second-cla.s.s Western steamer?

Child, it is hideous!'

'Is it?' said Silver, looking around in innocent surprise, while Fog listened in silence. Hours of patient labor and risks not a few over the stormy lake were a.s.sociated with each one of the articles Waring so cavalierly condemned.

Then it was, 'How you do look, old gentleman! I must really send you up some new clothes.--Silver, how have you been able to endure such shabby rags so long?'

'I do not know,--I never noticed; it was always just papa, you know,'

replied Silver, her blue eyes resting on the old man's clothes with a new and perplexed attention.

But Fog bore himself cheerily. 'He is right, Silver,' he said, 'I am shabby indeed. But when you go out into the world, you will soon forget it.'

'Yes,' said Silver, tranquilly.

The days flew by and the ice moved out. This is the phrase that is always used along the lakes. The ice 'moves out' of every harbor from Ogdensburg to Duluth. You can see the great white floes drift away into the horizon, and the question comes, Where do they go? Do they meet out there the counter floes from the Canada side, and then do they all join hands and sink at a given signal to the bottom?

Certainly, there is nothing melting in the mood of the raw spring winds and clouded skies.