This man has hated him because he interfered with his plans and unearthed his selfish purposes, but _he_, Grandon, has no desire for revenge. Let him wrap himself in the garment of dead honor, his shall not be the hand to tear it asunder.

He takes the tidings back to the factory with him. They look over Wilmarth's desk. There are no private papers, but they find two notices that the insurance policy has expired. For almost a week the place has been uninsured.

"Well," he comments, with a grim smile, "we shall at least escape an inquisitorial examination. Jasper Wilmarth planned better for us than he knew. But this must be renewed to-day, and the damage repaired as speedily as possible. The transfer will have to wait until after the funeral. As for the rest, we may as well keep our own counsel."

They all agree with him. The factory will be closed for repairs. That it was an incendiary fire they must perforce admit, but beyond that they will make no unnecessary talk. Eugene drives down home and does a few errands, but the others are busy all day arranging matters for the future. Before Floyd goes home he visits Marcia, who is still wild with her grief. The house is full of friends. The library is closed and watchers are there. Mrs. Grandon will remain.

So it is almost night when Floyd reaches home. Violet and Pauline know there was a fire that would have worked complete devastation if Floyd had not fortunately gone to the factory. Eugene has given him the setting off of a hero, and would like to picture to their wondering eyes that deadly struggle, but is bound by a sacred promise. They are horrified, too, by Mr. Wilmarth's sudden death. Violet's heart swells with pity as she sees the pale, tired face and heavy eyes. She would like to fly to his arms with infinite sympathy, but he is never very demonstrative, and now it seems ill-timed. She starts to follow him up-stairs, but Briggs intercepts her,--cook wants to know something, and she has to give a few orders. There seems some difficulty about dessert, and she attends to its arrangement, then the bell rings.

Dinner topics are quite exciting. The Brades come in afterward, and several of the near friends.

"I must beg to be excused," Floyd says, after smoking a cigar with the gentlemen. "I am dead tired and half asleep. Good night," softly, with a little pressure on Violet's arm. Cecil runs for a kiss, and he pa.s.ses through the group on the porch. Violet's heart swells and for an instant she forgets what she is saying. When, three hours afterward, she steals noiselessly to his room, he is locked in slumber. If she dared bend and kiss him! If only he _loved_ her!

The excitement does not in any wise die out, but the one incident seems to offset the other. Mr. Haviland returns to his family, as some time must elapse before the completion of the matter, but they are to take full possession on the first of October. Mr. Murray is planning some kind of a home for Polly that will presently include her husband.

Eugene really blossoms out in a most attractive light. Prosperity and freedom from care are the elements on which he thrives serenely. He could never make any fight with circ.u.mstances,--not so much from inability as sheer indolence. For such people some one always cares.

"Life's pure blessings manifold" seem showered upon them, while worthier souls are left to buffet with adversity.

Marcia is inconsolable, Mrs. Grandon advises a little composure and common sense, but it is of no avail. Madame comes, with her sweet philosophy and sweeter voice, and Violet with tears, but nothing rouses her except the depth of c.r.a.pe on her dress and the quality of her veil.

Grandon Park and Westbrook are shocked by the awful suddenness. There is always a peculiar awe about an accidental death, and it pa.s.ses for an overdose of powerful medicine Mr. Wilmarth was in the habit of using.

The dead face holds its secret well. A rugged, unhandsome one at the best, it is softened by the last change; the sneer has gone out of it, and an almost grand composure settles in its place. Floyd Grandon studies it intently. A few trifling circ.u.mstances roused his distrust, and--was it destined beforehand that he should cross Wilmarth at every turn? He has saved his enemy's honor as well as his own, and a great pity moves him.

Floyd attends Marcia; no one else can control her. Eugene takes Violet and his mother, Mr. Murray has his own pretty daughter and Madame Lepelletier. Besides this there is a long procession to the church, and carriages without number to the beautiful cemetery two miles distant.

The world may not have much admired Mr. Wilmarth, but it knows nothing against him, and his romantic marriage was in his favor. So he is buried with all due respect in that depository of so many secrets, marred and gnarled and ruined lives.

Marcia is brought home to her brother's and takes to her bed. The day following is Sunday, a glorious, sun-ripe September day. The air is rich with ripening fruit, the pungent odor of drying balsams, chrysanthemums coming into bloom, and asters starring the hillsides.

The sky is a faultless blue overhead, the river takes its tint and flows on, a broad blue ribbon between rocky sh.o.r.es. A strange, calm day that moves every one to silence and tender solemnity.

But to Sunday succeeds the steady tramp of business. Fortunately for Marcia, and Floyd as well, Mr. Wilmarth has made a will in the first flush of marital satisfaction, bequeathing nearly everything to her, except a few legacies. It increased her adoration at the time, and did no harm to him since he knew he could change it if he saw pa.s.sionately, decorously, and she can also enjoy her new found liberty.

Laura's return is next in order, and she is not a little surprised at the changes. The Murrays are still at Grandon Park; Floyd insists upon this, as he really does not want Marcia to return, brotherly kind as he proves to her. The Latimers go to the city, and the professor is again domiciled a brief while at the cottage that seems so like home. Laura and Mr. Delancy set up a house of their own, and Marcia has a craze about the furnishing, making herself quite useful. Laura considers her rather picturesque, with the brief romance for background. But Eugene's engagement delights her.

"Upon my word, mamma," she exclaims, "you are a singularly fortunate dowager! Just think; less than a year and a half ago we were a doleful lot, sitting around our ancestral hearth, which was Floyd's, spinsters in abundance, and a woful lack of the fine gold of life, without which one is n.o.body. And here you have two distinguished married daughters, an interesting widow, a son who will serenely shadow himself under the wings of a millionnaire, and--well, I can almost forgive Floyd for marrying that red-haired little nonent.i.ty. Who ever supposed she was going to have such a fortune? And if she should have no children, Eugene may one day be master of Grandon Park! Who can tell?"

For, after all, Floyd's interests seem hardly identical with their own.

CHAPTER XXIX.

Pa.s.sion is both raised and softened by confession. In nothing perhaps were the middle way more desirable than in knowing what to say and what not to say to those we love.--GOETHE.

All this time Floyd Grandon has scarcely had an hour's leisure. When the last paper is signed, he draws a long breath of satisfaction. He has done his whole duty and succeeded better than any sanguine hopes he has ever dared to entertain. He has settled, so to speak, the lives that pressed heavily upon him, and they can sustain themselves. He has come out of it with the honor he prizes so highly. And what else? What has he saved for himself?

That the distance should widen between himself and Violet was not strange. He has a horror of a jealous, suspicious husband, and believes thoroughly in the old adage, that if a woman is good she needs no watching, and if bad she can outwit Satan himself. But this is no question of morals. He could trust Violet in any stress of temptation.

She would wrench out her heart and bleed slowly to death before she would harbor one wrong thought or desire. In that he does her full justice. She has seen the possibility and turned from it, but nothing can ever take away the vivid sense, the sweet knowledge that there might have been a glow in her life instead of a colorless gray sky.

He makes himself accept the bald, hard fact. He will not even trust himself to long for what is denied, lest he be stirred by some overmastering impulse as on that one night. She shall not suffer for what is clearly not her fault. She has no love to give him, nothing but a calm, grateful liking that almost angers him. That is his portion, and he will not torment her for any other regard.

They drop into an almost indifferent manner toward each other, except that it is so kindly solicitous. There are no little bits of confidence or tenderness in private, as there used to be, indeed, they are so seldom alone. He seems to leave her with Eugene and Polly, as they have all come to call her by way of endearment, and there is something wonderfully fascinating about these young people; they make love unblushingly; they can pick a quarrel out of the eye of a needle just for the purpose of reconciliation, it would seem, and they make up with such a prodigal intensity of sweetness; Polly strays down the walk to meet him or fidgets if he stays a moment longer than usual; Eugene hunts the house and grounds over to find her just to say a last good-by for an hour or two. Violet suspects at times that Polly runs away for the pleasure of being found. He puts flowers in her hair, and she pins a nosegay at his lapel, she scents his handkerchief with her own choice extract, and argues on its superiority and Frenchiness. They take rides; her father has bought her a beautiful saddle horse, and they generously insist that Violet shall accompany them because Floyd is always busy. It may be foolish, but it is very sweet, and Violet's heart aches with a pain thrust out of sight, for the heart of eighteen has not yet learned to despise sweetness. The level, empty years stretch out so interminably.

She has tried to comfort herself with the sorrows of others as a medicine. Lucia Brade, who has carried her preference for Eugene so openly, must be secretly brokenhearted, she thinks, and she looks for heavy eyes and a smileless face. But no, while there was hope Lucia waited; now that he is gone irrevocably, she bestirs herself instead of donning sackcloth. She is twenty, and of the eligibles about she must select a husband; so she no longer snubs the young men, but makes herself amiable and seductive, is always going or having company. There is no grave buried in her heart, only a rather mortifying sense of failure that she will eradicate as soon as possible.

Even Eugene seems to recover from the pa.s.sion she feared would blight his life. She is sincerely glad, and yet--is _she_ incapable of inspiring a lasting regard? Is there some fatal lack in her? Gertrude is delightfully pleasant, but she misses some old grace in her. It is her husband who has taken possession of the empty soul and filled it to the exclusion of others. What the professor says and does and thinks is paramount and right. There is no appeal from his judgment, so far as others are concerned, though she reserves little rights for herself.

Gertrude is very much married already; the stronger will has captured the weaker. She can admire the professor with out stint, so there is nothing to militate against her regard.

Violet always comes back to Polly. The naive, wondering eyes, the soft, sweet lips abloom with kisses, the limpid, purling voice that goes through pleasant meadows, shaded woods, little interruptions of stones and snags and dead gra.s.ses of yesterday that must be swept away, over cascades laughingly, dripping sweetness, and never seeming to settle.

She calls upon Violet to see faults in Eugene--"for I know he is not perfect," she says, with her pretty worldly wise air; and when Violet has timidly ventured to agree, she proceeds to demolish and explain away such a monstrous fancy!

Mr. Murray declares every day that he must send Polly to Baltimore, but instead Polly goes to the city and buys ravishing fall costumes, and Violet pleads to have her stay. Mr. Haviland purchases a house in the park and brings his family, a wife and two sisters and six children, and the two ladies have to be amiable to them. Polly, Violet, and Eugene visit every house that is even suggested as for sale, and make wonderful plans.

Not that Eugene is in the house from "early morn till dewy eve." He develops quite a business capacity, and can follow a strong lead excellently. He is no longer tossed to and fro by Wilmarth's sneers and innuendoes, or bracing himself to fight against what he considers Floyd's inexperience. Mr. Murray belongs to the wise children of this world, and possesses the secret of suavity, good-humor, and judicious commendation. Already he is an immense favorite in the factory, and the men are willing to run at his slightest beck. Eugene makes himself useful in many ways with the books and correspondence.

By the time Floyd is at liberty, Violet seems to have settled into a placid routine, and it is youth with kindred youth. Floyd is nearly twice her age, he remembers with dismay, but he does not feel old; on the contrary, it seems as if he could begin life with fresh zest.

Neither would he have her emerge too rapidly from youth's enchanting realm. Only--and the word shadows so wide a s.p.a.ce--can he do anything to make good the birthright he has unwittingly taken? She is rich, accomplished, and pretty, worth a dozen like Polly, it seems to him.

Must her life be drear and wintry, except as she rambles into the pleasaunce of others? He could give up the seductive delights that have never been his, yet he has come to a time when home and love, wife and child, have a sacred meaning, and are the joys of a man's life.

The garden parties begin to wane, but there is no lack of diversion for the young. Mr. Murray is not insensible to the charms of society, such as he finds at Madame Lepelletier's. He has travelled considerably, has much general information as to art and literature, men and events. With madame, the professor and his wife, and Floyd Grandon, the evenings pa.s.s delightfully.

Violet is left out of them more by accident than design. The elders simply light their cigars and stroll down the avenue. Gertrude accepts madame's hospitality with an air of perfect equality that sits admirably upon her. She has attended dinners at San Francisco and various other centres, given in honor of the professor, and more await them in Europe. She is not so dazzling and has not the air of courts, but she has the prestige of a famous husband and has recovered some of her youthful beauty. Irene Stanwood has not distanced her so immensely, after all.

If madame has been surprised at some turns of fate, there is one that has no flavor of disappointment thus far, and the crisis has nearly pa.s.sed. She has attained all that is possible; she is Floyd Grandon's friend; she can gently crowd out other influences. He defers to her, relies upon her judgment, discusses plans with her, and she secretly exults in the fact that she is nearer to the strong, daring, intellectual side of his nature than his girl-wife can ever be. The danger of a love entanglement has pa.s.sed by, he will settle to fame and the society of his compeers, and she will remain a pretty mother to his child, and the kind of wife who creates a wonder as to why the man has married her.

Eugene finds her in the corner of the library one evening, alone, and with a pat on her soft hair, says tenderly,--

"You poor little solitary girl, what are you doing?"

She glances up with bright, brave eyes, and with a bit of audacity that would do credit to Polly, says,--

"How dare you call me poor when you know I am an heiress! As for being little, you can tell me the more easily from Polly," and she laughs over the chasm of solitude that she will not remark upon.

"Yes," he answers, mirthfully, "it would be sad to make a mistake now, for I can't help loving Polly."

"Why should you? I am so glad you love her with your whole soul, for you _do_. She will always be my dearest friend, and if you neglect her or make her unhappy----"

"Oh, you _are_ an angel, Violet!" he cries, with actual humility. "You are never jealous or hurt, you praise so generously, you are always thinking how other people must be made happy. You give away everything!

I am not worth so much consideration," the crust of self-love is pierced for a moment and shows in the tremulous voice, "but I mean to make myself more of a man. And I can never love you any less because----"

"Because you love Rome more," and she compels herself to give a rippling laugh. "That is the right, true love of your life, the others have been illusions."

"Not my love for you," he declares, stoutly. "It will always hold, though it has changed a little. Only I wish you were----" Can he, dare he say, "happier"?

"Don't wish anything more for me!" and she throws up her hand with a kind of wild entreaty. "There is so much now that I can never get around to all. You must think only of Polly's happiness."

"Which will no doubt keep me employed"; and he laughs lightly. "By Jove! there won't be much meandering in forbidden pastures with Polly at hand! You wouldn't believe now that she was jealous last night, because I fastened a rose in poor Lucia's hair that had come loose.

Wouldn't there have been a row if I had given it to her? But she is never angry jealous like some girls, nor sulky; there is a charm--I cannot describe it," confesses the lover in despair. "But we three shall always be the best of friends."