Then she turned her attention to Armstrong. He was younger than she had expected and his personality far more attractive. The height of his forehead, the depth of his eye, the strength of his mouth were all carefully noted. The contessa watched every movement, every change in the expression, with the keenest delight. They were an interesting pair, she admitted, but even her astuteness, she was forced to confess, was unequal to the task of understanding their relations without further study. The problem was as new as it was fascinating, and the contessa had no misgivings over her little plot, which had worked out so successfully.

She followed the librarian quietly back to his study, where she made an appointment for him to examine with her the Morelli collection and to point out to her the merits of the various volumes. She expressed her thanks for the charming afternoon he had given her, but through it all, and even after she returned to her villa, the faces of Armstrong and Inez were still before her. Beneath that abstraction which the man's face and manner so clearly portrayed, was there a response to the woman's pa.s.sionate adoration? Was he capable of affection, or had the intellectual so far claimed the ascendency that the physical had, for the time being at least, become so subdued as practically to be eliminated? Where did the wife, who had so attracted her, come in? These were some of the questions over which the contessa pondered. The problem was more complex than she antic.i.p.ated, and she found herself even more determined to carry it through to a solution.

XX

A week pa.s.sed by with little outward change at the Villa G.o.dilombra. For a day or two after their interview in the garden Armstrong watched his wife carefully, but as there was apparently no difference in her att.i.tude toward him or toward Miss Thayer he decided that what she had said at that time was the result merely of a momentary mood which had since pa.s.sed away. He also watched Miss Thayer, to satisfy himself in regard to the monstrous suggestion Helen had made that she was in love with him, and became convinced that his own explanation of her feelings toward him was correct. Having settled these two important matters to his entire satisfaction, he promptly discarded them from his mind and devoted himself to the single purpose of completing his work.

"Once let me get this finished," he said to himself, "and Helen will see that there is nothing between us."

As a matter of fact, Inez had not been pleased with Armstrong's suggestion to Helen that she should take up with him a similar kind of work in Boston. For the first time since she had known him he had done something which annoyed her. She realized better than any one else the absorption which held him subject to a different code of conventions, but this did not give him a right to a.s.sume that she would accept such an arrangement, without at least raising the question with her. Helen and Mr. Cartwright could but think that the matter had already been discussed between them, and it placed her in a false light at a time when she felt that her position was sufficiently untenable without this unfair and unnecessary addition. She also realized, as Armstrong apparently did not even after Uncle Peabody's pointed remarks, that this daily companionship would be entirely impossible.

During those few days, therefore, when Armstrong was observing her, she was in a mood quite at variance with what Helen had described; but what had wounded her in one respect proved to be a salve in another. Had Armstrong been conscious of her affection for him, or had he himself reciprocated it, the request would never have been made. She was quite safe, therefore, to continue on until the book was finished, and the danger lay, as she had told her conscience, only with herself. And even with this annoyance, which, after all, was but an incident, she felt it to be her only happiness to stay beside him as long as she could. She dreaded the time when the break must come, for she saw no light beyond that point.

Helen had herself well in hand. She was conscious of Jack's scrutiny, and was also conscious of the relaxing of his watchfulness. She saw his new interest in Inez, and was equally conscious of her friend's unusual frame of mind. Everything seemed to Helen to be intensified to such a degree that she could read all that was pa.s.sing in the minds of those about her, and she wondered if some new power had been given her to make her test the harder. She had already felt the force of the blow; the others had it still before them. And it would be a blow, at least to Jack, she was sure--not so hard a one as in her own case, for after the pain of the break there was for him happiness and serenity; but he had cared for her, and when he once came to a realization of what must be he would suffer, too. This was her only consolation.

Naturally, Helen turned to Uncle Peabody. Now that all was settled, it was better that he should know from her how matters stood rather than surmise as he and Emory had done; and besides this, the burden had become too heavy to be borne alone. She waited a few days for the right opportunity, which came during a morning walk along the ancient road above the villa which led to the highest point of Settignano. They had left the frequented part of the path behind them, and were strolling among the rocks and trees of the little plateau commanding a view of the panorama on either side.

"I wish I could find out from Jack how much longer you are to remain in Florence," Uncle Peabody said. "I really need to get back to my work."

"Not yet," exclaimed Helen, quickly. "Don't go yet. I need you so much!"

Uncle Peabody regarded his niece critically. There was a new note in her voice, and it pained him.

"It won't be much longer, uncle," Helen continued. "I need you here, and I may want you to go back home with me."

"I could not do that, Helen; but of course I will stay here as long as you really need me."

"But you would go back with me if I needed that, too, would you not?"

insisted Helen.

"If you needed me, yes; but I can't imagine any such necessity."

"It would be so hard to go home alone."

Helen's voice sank almost to a whisper.

"Alone?" echoed Uncle Peabody. "Is Jack going to stay over here and send you back?"

"I don't know what Jack is going to do, but I shall return home as soon as his book is completed; and unless you go with me I shall go alone."

Uncle Peabody understood. "My dear, dear child," he said, taking her hand in his and pressing it sympathetically.

"Don't, please." Helen gently withdrew her hand. "If you do that I shall become completely unnerved. Let us return to the villa; I really want to talk with you about it."

The short walk home was accomplished in silence. As they entered the hallway Uncle Peabody was the first to speak. "Where shall we go?" he asked.

"To my 'snuggery,'" Helen answered. "There we are sure not to be interrupted."

"Now tell me all about it," he urged, as they seated themselves.

"I imagine you know a good deal about the situation without my telling you," began Helen, bravely; "but I want you to know the whole story.

Otherwise you can't help me, and without your aid I am absolutely alone."

"You know well that you can depend upon that," he interrupted.

Helen moved nearer and pa.s.sed her hand through his arm. "We have made a horrible mistake, Jack and I," she said. "We are not at all suited to each other, and never should have married."

"That is a pretty serious statement," replied Uncle Peabody.

"It is," a.s.sented Helen; "but the fact itself is even more serious. Tell me, do you not see that Jack is a very different man from the one you first met here?"

"Yes," he replied. "There can be no question about that."

"If this change was but a pa.s.sing mood it would not be so serious,"

continued Helen, "but the Jack I know now is the real Jack, and as such our interests are entirely apart."

"But all this may correct itself," suggested Uncle Peabody. "Why not get him away from the influences which have produced this change and see if that will not straighten matters out?"

Helen was thoughtful for a moment. "That would never do," she said, at length. "You see, there is another consideration which enters in. Inez and Jack are in love with each other."

"Has Jack admitted this?" demanded Uncle Peabody.

Helen smiled sadly. "No; he would never admit it, even if he knew it to be true. At present his affection is wholly centered upon his book, and he himself has no real conception of how matters stand."

"Then why do you feel so certain? I think you are right about Miss Thayer, but I have seen nothing to criticise in Jack's conduct except this complete subjugation to his work."

"I have been watching it for weeks, uncle, and I know that I am right.

The old Jack--the Jack I married--found in me the response he craved; but to the new Jack--the real Jack--I can give nothing. Inez is his counterpart; Inez is the woman who can talk his language and live his life--not I."

"There is no reason why you could not do this if he gave you the chance," he a.s.serted.

"At first it was my fault that I did not make the effort when he did give me the chance. Then I tried to enter into it--you remember the day I went to the library--but it was too late. Cerini showed me how hopeless it was. Then you remember Professor Tesso's story. He was right; they are absolutely suited to each other. It is useless to fight against it and thus increase the misery."

"If you are not going to fight against it, what are you going to do?"

"I am going to right the wrong in the only way which remains," replied Helen, firmly.

"I don't see it yet." Uncle Peabody showed his perplexity. "What are you going to do?"

"Jack and I must be separated just as soon as it can be arranged."

Uncle Peabody placed his hands upon her shoulders and looked into her eyes. With all the advance signals of the storm which he had noted he was unprepared for this climax. "Surely that point has not yet arrived, Helen," he said, slowly. "'Those whom G.o.d hath joined together--'"

"That is just the point," she interrupted. "Those whom G.o.d joins together are those who are suited to each other. When it becomes evident that two people have been married who are unsuited, it is also evident that G.o.d never joined them together, and that they ought not to stay together. That is the case with Jack and me."