"Then you do know now that Inez loves you?"

Armstrong bowed his head.

"What is it that has at last convinced you?"

He hesitated for a moment. "It seems uncanny, Helen, but I have been 'seeing things.'"

She looked at him questioningly. "Seeing things?" she repeated.

"Yes; you will think I have lost my mind again, just as I did; but the doctor says it is not unusual. Inez was alone with me, after the accident, you know, in the cottage."

"Well?" encouraged Helen, breathlessly.

"She thought me dead, and--this is brutal to repeat to you, Helen."

"No, no--go on!"

"Why, she said she loved me--that is all."

"But you were unconscious, Jack--you did not know what was happening."

"Not then, but later. It came to me yesterday, while lying on the couch,--almost as in a vision. I spoke to the doctor about it, and he said that sometimes such things do happen. If you had not told me what you did I probably should have thought it nothing but an uncomfortable dream, but as it was, of course I understood."

"Are you sure now that it was no dream?"

"Yes; I questioned Miss Thayer about some of the details--not the most vital ones, of course--and she corroborated them. But telling you all this will only make matters worse."

"No, Jack; I know about it already. Inez has told me everything, and the poor girl is distracted. I am glad that at last you are convinced."

"You knew all this?" He looked at her in amazement. "You knew it, and have let her stay here?"

"It is right that she should remain," Helen answered, firmly.

Armstrong's voice broke for a moment. "And I said you were jealous!" he reproached himself. Then he continued his appeal. "But granting all this, it cannot settle the matter, deeply as I deplore it. My own blindness and stupidity are to blame for it, and I must accept the full responsibility; but my love for you has never and could never be transferred to her or to any one else. I have been criminally neglectful, I have been culpably dense, but through it all you, and you alone, have been in my heart. I have longed to say this to you even while the spell was on me. I have longed to fold you in my arms and ease the pain I have seen you suffer, but I found myself powerless in this as in all else. Can you not--will you not--believe what I say?"

Helen looked up into her husband's face before she replied.

"Sometimes I wish you were not so conscientious, Jack--but of course I don't mean that; only it would make it easier for me to adhere to my determination to do what I know is right. I was sure that this moment would arrive; I know your ideas of duty and loyalty, and I know that you would sacrifice yourself and your future rather than be false to either.

I believe that you are sincere in thinking that your sentiments toward Inez are purely platonic--I am sure they would be so long as you were not free to have them otherwise."

"Then why do you insist that they are otherwise?"

"I don't insist--I am simply accepting things as they really are, even though I must suffer by doing so. You are the only one who does not realize it, unless it be Inez herself. Cerini told me, 'I have never seen two individualities cast in so identical a mould.' Professor Tesso, who saw you at work together at the library, said, 'There is a perfect union of well-mated souls'; you yourself, when we returned from that moonlight ride, said to her, 'You are the only one who understands me.'

It has simply been your absorption in your work and your loyalty to me which has kept you from seeing it yourself."

"Cerini said that--Tesso saw us at the library?" Armstrong looked at Helen in bewilderment. "You thought my remark to Miss Thayer possessed anything more than momentary significance?" His face a.s.sumed an expression of still greater concern. "I have, indeed, been more culpable than I realized. Is it not enough if I tell you that you are all wrong--that I do not love any one except the one person I have a right to love?"

Helen smiled sadly. "No, Jack," she replied, kindly but firmly, "it is all too clear. When you return to your real life, as you must do, you will return to your real self as well. Then you will know that I have saved you from the greatest mistake of all. You and Inez are meant for each other, and always have been." She looked up with a brave but unsuccessful attempt to smile. "Perhaps our little experience together has been necessary in the development of us both, dear. If so, it will make it easier to believe that our mutual suffering will not have been in vain."

"I will never accept it, Helen!" cried Armstrong, desperately in earnest. "Your devotion to this false idea will do more than all I have done to wreck our lives. You must listen to reason."

"Don't make it any harder for me than it is," Helen begged, her voice choking. "I am trying to talk calmly, and to do what I know I must do; but I have been through so much already. Please don't make it any harder."

Armstrong longed to comfort her, but he knew that she would repulse him if he tried. He watched the conflict through which the girl was pa.s.sing and was overwhelmed by the sense of his own responsibility. He realized how near the tension was to the breaking-point, and dared not pursue the subject further. Taking both her hands in his, he gazed long into her eyes now filled with tears.

"If to give you up is the necessary penalty for the sorrow I have brought to you," he said, quietly, his voice breaking as he spoke, "it shall be done--for your sake, no matter what it means to me; but my love for you is beyond anything I have ever known before."

XXIX

There had been many visitors at the villa during Armstrong's illness and convalescence. Cerini had called several times, being most solicitous for the speedy recovery of his _protege_; and the Contessa Morelli, temporarily thwarted in the solution of her problem, took advantage of the proximity of her villa to be frequently on the spot, where she could observe the progress of affairs under the suddenly changed conditions.

Armstrong had long desired to question the contessa further in regard to the disquieting conversation he had held with her upon the occasion of their first meeting; but the rapidity with which his latent impressions had become definite realities made him unwilling to allow any new developments to add to the complexity of the situation as he had now come to know it. After his interview with Helen, however, he was convinced that matters had reached their climax, and he grasped any additional information as possible material to be used in the solving of his double dilemma. His opportunity came on the following day, when he found himself alone with the contessa upon the veranda, Helen having been called to another part of the villa by some household demand.

After Helen had made her excuses, Armstrong felt himself to be the subject of a careful scrutiny on the part of the contessa. He looked up quickly and met her glance squarely. Amelie had a way of making those she chose feel well acquainted with her, and Armstrong, during his convalescence, had proved interesting.

"Well," he asked, smiling, "what do you think of him?"

It was the contessa's turn to smile, and the question caught her so unexpectedly that the smile developed into a hearty laugh.

"I have been trying to make up my mind," she replied, frankly. "At first I thought him a human thinking-machine, all head and no heart, but I am beginning to believe that my early impressions were at fault."

"It gratifies me to hear you say that," Armstrong answered, calmly. "I presume those early impressions of yours were formed at the library, when Miss Thayer and I came under your observation."

"Yes," replied the contessa, unruffled by the quiet sarcasm which she could but feel. "You see, I have lived here in Italy for several years and have become accustomed to the sight of saint worship; but it is a novel experience to see the saint come down off his pedestal and prove himself to have perfectly good warm blood coursing through his veins."

"Don't you find it a bit difficult to picture me with all my worldly attributes even as a temporary saint?"

"Not at all," the contessa answered. "Most of the saints possessed worldly attributes before they attained the dignity of statues. But think of the confusion among their worshippers should they follow your example and again a.s.sume the flesh! I imagine their embarra.s.sment would almost equal yours."

Amelie spoke indifferently, but Armstrong felt the thrust. It was evident that she had no idea of dropping the subject, and Jack saw nothing else but to accept it as cheerfully as possible.

"Why not say 'quite'?" he asked.

"Because the saints were wifeless. Perhaps that is what made it possible for them to be saints."

Armstrong laughed in spite of himself. "If modern women were to be canonized, you undoubtedly think they should be selected from the married cla.s.s?"

"Canonizing hardly covers it," the contessa replied; "they belong among the martyrs."

"But you have not told me why you now feel that your early impressions were in error," Armstrong resumed, sensing danger along the path which they had almost taken, and really eager to learn how far his att.i.tude had impressed others. The contessa regarded him critically.

"There are many kinds of men," she began, "and to a woman of the world it is a necessity to cla.s.sify those whom she meets."

"Indeed?" queried Armstrong. "You are throwing some most interesting side-lights upon a subject which my education has entirely overlooked."