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 THE LIFE MASK
 
 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR OF 
 "To M. L. G." 
 
 SECOND EDITION 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 Copyright, 1913, by 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 
 All rights rf served including that of translation into foreign 
 languages, including the Scandinavian, 
 
 February, 1913
 
 URU 514176J 
 
 DEDICATED 
 TO 
 
 THE CRITICS 
 
 IN THE OLD COUNTRY AND THE NEW 
 
 whose kind and generous words about 
 the book I wrote to "M. L. G." helped 
 me through dark days till bright ones 
 came. Now, when I am asked to try 
 my hand at fiction, I dedicate my work 
 to those men and women who, though 
 they may not be as lenient to the made 
 up story as they were to my real story, 
 will be just. And I want them all to 
 know it was through one of them that 
 happiness came to me from "M. L. G,"
 
 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 I WAS afraid to fall asleep the night after Sarah 
 Nicholls brought me home to the little house by 
 the sea. I thought, "If I dream the gray 
 dream here, there is no hope for me anywhere." 
 
 Nearly every night of the years I wished to forget, 
 the dream had come in the moment of dropping asleep, 
 and I had started up struggling to shake it off as 
 though it were some remorseless live thing. 
 
 I hoped to escape from it while I was ill at the san- 
 atorium, but it found its way there sometimes. If it 
 had come often, I should have died, as every one ex- 
 cept Sarah expected me to do. 
 
 " I knew you'd get well, dearie," she said. " I 
 prayed every minute. I never stopped prayin'. 
 Whatever I did, there was that prayer behind it, like a 
 kind of undertone. I was sure the Lord wasn't goin' 
 to let you slip away just when He'd give you the chance 
 to be happy." 
 
 " The chance to be happy ! " 
 
 I did not answer when she said that. I couldn't 
 bear to depress her. She had been such an angel to 
 me. 
 
 On this night when she tucked me into bed, as she 
 
 3
 
 4 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 used to when I was a little girl little Anita Duprez 
 I said, " Sarah, do you know I always see you with 
 a halo round your head, like a saint." 
 
 " Oh, my dearie, don't say such things to me ! " 
 she cried out, as if I had hurt her. "Me a saint! 
 Why, I'm nothin' but a worm, a crawlin' worm! 
 What I done, I done not from goodness, but from 
 love. You've bin my life, honey. I reckon there 
 ain't much credit to a body tryin' to save her own 
 life! And now I shan't let my lamb talk any 
 more of that kind o' talk this night. All she's got 
 to think about is that she's well again, an' she's young 
 an' beautiful an' her Sarah worships her; an' she's 
 safe, an' nothing bad can come to her in this little 
 home." 
 
 " You mean the dream," I said ; for Sarah knew 
 about the gray dream. " No, I'm sure it won't come 
 to me here." 
 
 It was true. I felt really sure, until she had kissed 
 my hand and had gone tip-toeing out of my room to her 
 own. She would have sat with me, but I didn't wish 
 her to do that. I thought it would be a bad beginning 
 for our new life, so I asked her to go, saying I should 
 sleep more rest fully if I knew she were in bed. She 
 left the door ajar, and I could hear her stirring in the 
 room which was pathetically different from the nest 
 she had prepared for me. A creak of the floor told 
 me that she was kneeling down to pray ; another, that 
 she was getting up from her knees ; then, a faint metal- 
 lic squeak like the "cheep" of a caught mouse an-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 5 
 
 nounced that Sarah's form pressed the thin mattress on 
 its poor springs. She had kept her promise, and crept 
 into bed, though it would be long before she could sleep, 
 and in spirit she was with me. 
 
 It was comforting to know she was there, loving me 
 with her whole heart ; and all my surroundings, brought 
 together by her devotion, were comforting; still, I was 
 afraid the dream might steal in. 
 
 " It will be a heavenly sign," I said to myself, " if 
 it doesn't come to me here." 
 
 The peace and coziness of the room, each detail of 
 which had been studied by Sarah, made me long to let 
 myself go, to fall deliciously asleep, yet the terror kept 
 plucking at my sleeve whenever my eyes half closed, 
 and wrenched me awake. By and by the wish to sleep 
 passed. It was as if an electric light had been turned 
 on in my brain, and I was willing to lie awake, defying 
 the dream. " You see, you can't come now," I said to 
 it, where it waited. 
 
 I began to feel an exquisite pleasure in the night 
 lamp, with its thick blue glass dome. It was a luxury, 
 as it had been at the sanatorium, after endless dark 
 nights. I knew why Sarah had thought of it for me. 
 She thought of everything. 
 
 The linen of the pillow-case and sheets was fine as 
 silk and cool as silver, and smelt of lavender. The 
 pillow was made of down ; the blankets were light and 
 fleecy; the bed was wide and soft to lie on. There 
 were no shrill complainings of springs when I moved. 
 The furniture was painted white with blue medallions
 
 6 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 in imitation of Wedgwood designs, an odd idea for 
 furniture, but it was the sort of thing which Sarah 
 would expect me to admire. Its frail, meretricious 
 daintiness was pathetic ; and the blue carpet with white 
 roses, and the white muslin curtains tied back with 
 bows of blue ribbon were pathetic too. 
 
 I could see all the features of the room in the moony 
 blue dusk. The night lamp on the mantelpiece was 
 reflected and had its dim double in the mirror over the 
 dressing-table. There was not enough ventilation 
 under the glass dome to keep the flame steady. A 
 small bright disc wavered on the ceiling, and the light 
 in the room was tremulous, flickering in the glass and 
 on the silver brushes and tray Sarah had bought for 
 me. What she must have spent for these things which 
 she had been collecting who could say how long, or 
 with what yearning love? 
 
 In the chest of drawers were little muslin bags of 
 lavender, one for each drawer, and in the wardrobes 
 more lavender bags of a different shape, hanging by 
 ribbons from the hooks, under the clothes I had not 
 had time to try on yet. Wonderful Sarah! And in 
 her strenuous life before I came, she had found time to 
 embroider fine underlinen and handkerchiefs for me. 
 Nobody I ever knew could embroider more beautifully 
 than Sarah Nicholls. 
 
 As I lay there in the bed, it was as if some inner 
 self slipped out of the shell that was my body, and 
 walked about, looking at everything: the china angels 
 on the mantelpiece, the lithographs on the satin-striped
 
 THE LIFE MASK 7 
 
 white wall-paper, all the pictures chosen for the cheer- 
 fulness of their subjects: children playing with kit- 
 tens; big dogs smiling at kennel doors; maidens with 
 short-waisted dresses making up lovers' quarrels in 
 gardens. 
 
 When this other me had catalogued the contents of 
 my room, it went and peeped into the bath, which I 
 had delighted Sarah by admiring : all white, and smell- 
 ing very good of a rather strongly rose-scented soap. 
 The bath-towels were thick and soft. There was a 
 white rug on the imitation oak linoleum, a rug with a 
 blue border and the word " Bath " in large blue letters, 
 I reveled childishly in the thought of this little cube 
 of a room with its white enameled tub, and the wall- 
 paper patterned like Dutch tiles. 
 
 Next, this self which could wander as it would while 
 I lay in bed, flitted to Sarah's room. There she made 
 up for her generous extravagance by severe economy : 
 no carpet; a stained floor, and a strip of matting in 
 front of the narrow iron bedstead; not an ornament 
 anywhere, nothing that was not strictly necessary, ex- 
 cept a small book-shelf on the wall. The real me 
 had glanced at those books when I first arrived in 
 the afternoon, and remembered every one from child- 
 hood days. Sarah owned them all when I was a 
 little girl, and had not lost one, nor bought a new one 
 since. There was " The Changed Cross," two 
 volumes of religious verse bound in blue, the gilded 
 edges of the leaves worn and faded now; " Step- 
 ping Heavenward," in brown; "The Gates Ajar,"
 
 8 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 green; a book of Methodist hymns; a blaclc-covered 
 Bible; a novel by E. P. Roe: and I knew the faint, 
 musty smell of the old pages. Nothing else in that 
 room, nor in the house, except those books, to remind 
 me of the past. 
 
 Those old friends Sarah could not part with, but 
 probably she had not expected me to notice them. They 
 had always seemed to me a part of herself. She 
 traveled with them everywhere. I wondered if the 
 books would ever do any more traveling, or if this 
 little seaside villa would be their permanent resting- 
 place and mine. 
 
 Laburnum Lodge! Sweet and new and, above all, 
 pathetic as it was, something began suddenly to shriek 
 into my ears that I could not bear it for very long. 
 I could like it now, and be thankful for its daintiness, 
 passionately grateful to Sarah for her goodness, but 
 by and by I should pine to get away. I should want 
 to go out of England. 
 
 The spirit self that walked about the room slipped 
 back into my body, and was hypnotized into peaceful- 
 ness by the disk of light on the ceiling. Hours after- 
 ward, my eyes opened to a different light, the living 1 
 fire of dawn. I realized with joy that I had been 
 asleep, and the gray dream had not come. 
 
 "Thank God!" I said involuntarily, almost in a 
 whisper, yet Sarah heard, and appeared at the open 
 door. 
 
 How good it was to see her there, though I ought 
 to have wished her to be asleep !
 
 THE LIFE MASK 9 
 
 By day, when Sarah was dressed, though she wore 
 a plain black gown like a maid's or a housekeeper's, 
 she had a mild air of distinction. She looked like a 
 lady ; a prim, delicate-minded, old-fashioned lady ; not 
 like a servant. Indeed, it seemed ridiculous, even hor- 
 rifying, to speak of her as a servant. 
 
 She did not look distinguished in her brown wrap- 
 per (she knew how I disliked gray things, and the rea- 
 son) with her mouse-colored, white-streaked hair in 
 a meek walnut at the back of her head; but she was 
 beautiful in my eyes. I think, through it all, I had 
 never loved her so much as at that moment. 
 
 I lay still with my eyes half closed, gazing at Sarah, 
 feeling the comfort of her presence and the joy of 
 knowing that she would be there to-morrow and all the 
 to-morrows. The light which came through the white 
 blind and curtains was clear, but not strong yet, 
 and as I lay in shadow Sarah could not be sure if I 
 were awake. She was afraid to come nearer, thinking 
 I might have spoken in my sleep. 
 
 There is something about the dawn which has a dif- 
 ferent quality from any other light. People who have 
 secrets to hide can't like to be seen in the dawn. It 
 is revealing. It seems to shine through the flesh to 
 the soul. It was a new Sarah that I saw, though older 
 than by day, older and frailer. She gazed at me with 
 an intensity which gave a wildness to her light-blue 
 eyes. They seemed to be telling me something which 
 I tried to understand but could not, and for an instant 
 her expression turned her into a stranger. I won-
 
 [10 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 dered what that mysterious something could be, for 
 nothing about her was really changed. Between my 
 lashes I studied the long, thin face, with its high 
 forehead, its hardly perceptible eyebrows, its deep-set, 
 pale eyes sloping downward at the outer corners; its 
 slightly prominent cheek-bones with the hollows be- 
 neath; the sweet, small, firmly-set lips, obstinately 
 folded together, contradicting the weak, pointed chin. 
 It was a lovable face, I thought, and very char- 
 acteristic of Sarah, a mixture of strength and weak- 
 ness. For my sake she had surmounted difficulties 
 that would have discouraged many of the bravest 
 men. Yet she was afraid of a mouse or a spider, 
 turned sick at the sight of blood, even a drop on a cut 
 finger; and she could neither read nor hear a descrip- 
 tion of torture. 
 
 " Sarah dear," I whispered lazily. It was delicious 
 to be lazy. 
 
 She started, with the quick shiver and involuntary, 
 sidewise glance that had been a nervous affliction with 
 her ever since the days of the great terror which shat- 
 tered both our lives. 
 
 " My lamb ! I thought you were asleep. You 
 called out, so I jumped up and ran to the door, but 
 your eyes were shut." 
 
 "I didn't call," I explained. "I only said 
 * Thank God ! ' because I'd slept all night, without the 
 dream." 
 
 " Ah, that's good, mighty good ! I told you it 
 wouldn't come here. I reckon I'd better put a light
 
 11 
 
 to your fire. There's a chill in the air. You know 
 this place is away up North. They say it's the best 
 in England to make sick folks well, and that's why 
 I took the house. But it's real cold sometimes." 
 
 "It doesn't seem cold to me," I said. " Aften 
 what I " 
 
 " Never mind, dearie, now don't you go talkin' about 
 anything. It's only April, and it ain't like our old 
 Aprils down in Alabama, is it?" 
 
 " They were so long ago, I've forgotten. Why, 
 Sarah, I wasn't more than ten when mother and you 
 and I came away. Think how many years " 
 
 " No," she insisted, with a break in her thread of a 
 voice, which had never lost its Southern drawl. " We 
 just won't think of any years. We'll think about 
 when you was a little girl, or we'll think of now. Or 
 else we'll think of by and by." 
 
 She bustled about, found matches, and lit the gas 
 fire. After all, I was glad of it. Not that I needed 
 the warmth, for the air which came through the half- 
 open window seemed to me mild as it was sweet ; but 
 I liked the purring of the gas, and the pretty light it 
 made between the imitation logs. 
 
 " Another luxury ! " I exclaimed. " Oh, Sarah, you 
 can't imagine what all these things mean to me! I'm 
 like some starved beggar-child, brought into a bright 
 room where there's a Christmas tree, and told that 
 I can have whatever I like for my own." 
 
 " I hope you ain't goin' to make me break down 
 an' cry," Sarah mumbled, her back turned to me as
 
 12 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 she stooped over the fireplace. " I don't want to be 
 as plumb silly as that." 
 
 " No, and I don't want you to be," I answered. 
 " I've given you sorrow enough." 
 
 And as I spoke I was ashamed because I had told 
 myself last night that I couldn't go on living always in 
 Laburnum Lodge, at Margate. As if it mattered 
 where I lived!
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 SARAH brought me my breakfast in bed : a silver 
 cream-jug and dwarf coffee-pot, and china thin 
 as an egg-shell. 
 
 " Oh, Sarah, what you must have spent on me ! " I 
 sighed. " But I know so well why you've done it 
 why you've made everything so dainty." 
 
 " Because I love you, that's why, Miss Nita," she 
 caught me up with quick sharpness, almost funny for 
 her monotonous voice, so meekly soft that it seldom 
 rose much louder than a whisper. And I smiled to 
 hear her call me " Miss Nita." " You needn't worry 
 about what I've spent." 
 
 " I don't worry except that I hope and pray 
 you've spent some of my money and not all yours." 
 
 " I've spent my money, because I've got plenty of 
 it," said Sarah, " and it's just as much yours as mine, 
 as well you know, or ought to. But what was yours 
 to begin with, I ain't touched a cent of. It's just bin 
 pilin' up interest ; and you ain't poor, Miss Nita. Don't 
 you go imaginin' you are. You've got enough to buy 
 yourself all the lovely things you ought to have: pretty 
 dresses and hats why, what makes you laugh ? " 
 
 " The idea of pretty dresses and hats for me ! 
 What would be the good of them? Sarah dear, I 
 shan't have the courage to go out of Laburnum Lodge, 
 
 13
 
 H THE LIFE MASK 
 
 except into the little garden at the back, and perhaps 
 not even there, for people can see me from the win- 
 dows of the two next door houses." 
 
 " Now, if you're goin' to feel like that, I shall just 
 die ! " Sarah quavered. 
 
 She came and stood at the foot of my bed, grasping 
 the brass rail. Her thin hands always thin, but 
 much thinner than in old days were like loose 
 gloves drawn on over skeleton fingers. It was as if 
 for my sake she had kept her face serene, and sweetly 
 prim, through the battle of the years, but the strain 
 had had to show somewhere, and so had made havoc 
 of her delicate hands. The window curtains were 
 drawn back, and the sunshine was merciless to her 
 pale skin, that had little fine creases or cracks all over 
 it, like very old china. Yet she did not look like a 
 stranger, as she had for a moment in the clairvoyance 
 of the dawn. She was sweet, and homely in the best 
 sense of the word, in her inevitable black dress, her 
 lace-trimmed cap over the neatly parted, sparse hair. 
 
 " I won't ' feel like that,' then ! " I promised. " I 
 will go into the garden. There's a nice tree there. I 
 shall sit under it and read. I shall love that." 
 
 " You won't go out in the streets ? " she asked, wist- 
 fully. 
 
 " Oh, I don't think I can ! There are such crowds 
 of people." 
 
 " Not people you know, dearie. They don't come 
 to Margate, I reckon; and this is outside the town, 
 anyway."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 15 
 
 " I know, but well, maybe I shall feel differently 
 some day. You won't try to make me go, will you ? " 
 
 " I shan't make you do one single thing you don't 
 want to do, though I wish But I was lyin' awake 
 some oh, not much in the night, thinkin' maybe 
 after all I'd made a real silly mistake bringin' you to 
 a place like this. I didn't realize it till I saw you in 
 the house. Then I says to myself, ' It ain't her kind. 
 I don't know as she can be happy here.' ' 
 
 " Oh, yes, I can," I hurried to reassure her. " Life, 
 as most people think of it, is finished for me, but " 
 
 " At your age, and with your looks ? That's not 
 right to say. God wouldn't like it." 
 
 " You good, old-fashioned Methodists know more 
 about what He likes and dislikes than others do, of 
 course," I laughed, " but He can't expect me " 
 
 " He does expect ! Why, you're goin' to begin all 
 over again. There ain't any reason why you shouldn't. 
 If you keep on say in' there is, it will kill me, that's 
 all." 
 
 " I won't again." 
 
 " If you think it and brood over it, that'll be worse." 
 
 " I'll try not to." 
 
 She went, as if on a sudden thought, quickly to the 
 dressing-table, and picked up the round silver-backed 
 handglass which was one of her extravagances for me. 
 
 " I want you should look at yourself," she said. 
 " You just do it, Miss Nita ! " And gently yet ob- 
 stinately she forced me to take the mirror. 
 
 I met my own eyes, and could not look away. A
 
 16 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 mirror is to my mind a wonderful and beautiful thing, 
 even in itself, and I could not help thinking that my 
 face was a wonderful and beautiful thing too. My 
 hair curled round it, and made me look very young, 
 as if nothing had ever happened in my life, ex- 
 cept pleasant, ordinary things, such things as happen 
 to protected girls. This struck me as terribly strange, 
 even unnatural. 
 
 It seemed to me, as the eyes in the glass held my 
 eyes, that I looked scarcely over nineteen. Yet I re- 
 membered that, when I had been really nineteen, I 
 was different. It was before my nineteenth birth- 
 day that the earth opened and swallowed me up. 
 Staring at myself now, I recalled my face as it was 
 then. 
 
 My eyes used to be so wide open that they had a 
 surprised expression, and seemed immensely large. 
 My face was round as a child's, and I used to hate my 
 bright color. I thought it uninteresting and admired 
 white- faced women. Mine was white enough now! 
 My hair, which used to be a yellow brown, had grown 
 many shades darker, almost black. 
 
 Now the eyes staring sadly at me were long, rather 
 than round, and did not look as if they could be sur- 
 prised. Nor was my face round. It had thinned to 
 an oval shape and my skin had paled to ivory. It 
 struck me that if I should meet myself as a stranger, 
 I should say, " She must be Spanish, or Italian." 
 And perhaps that was not odd, for there is Spanish
 
 THE LIFE MASK 17 
 
 blood in my veins. My mother's mother was a 
 Spanish woman, from Monterey. 
 
 " Sarah, I shall open those trunks to-day ! " I said 
 suddenly, giving her back the handglass. 
 
 " Mercy, Miss Nita, what brought them to your 
 mind?" 
 
 " Remembering myself as I was at nineteen. I 
 want to look through the things. I must have forgot- 
 ten ever so many." 
 
 "Better keep forgettin'. I'd ha' left the trunks 
 in the warehouse forever, and not brought 'em here 
 if you hadn't told me that after a while the folks would 
 open them to try and find out who they belonged to, 
 and see whether I used a false name." 
 
 " And they could have found out." 
 
 " Oh, yes, they could. But don't you touch the 
 things, Miss Nita anyhow till you're stronger." 
 
 " I feel as if I must," I said. " I want to get it 
 over. I can rest better afterward, perhaps." 
 
 She made no objections; and when I was dressed 
 we went together to the box-room in a gabled attic 
 above the two bedrooms of the little villa. It could 
 be reached only by a steep, ladderlike staircase, but 
 Sarah had had the trunks hidden away there in the 
 hope that I should forget they were in the house. 
 This she confessed, when she realized that I must be 
 allowed to have my way. 
 
 There were two trunks, both French. My mother 
 had bought them for me at a trunk-maker's in Paris
 
 i8 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 on my eighteenth birthday, though they were not re- 
 garded as birthday presents. So little had they been 
 used since then that they looked almost new, standing 
 in their corner of the bare new attic of Laburnum 
 Lodge. 
 
 Keys in hand, Sarah tried to make me change my 
 mind at the last moment. 
 
 "Are you plumb sure you can't wait just a few 
 weeks ? " 
 
 " ' Plumb ' sure," I echoed, smiling* at the word 
 which in a breath wafted me back to the South, and 
 my childhood. " Do you remember, Sarah, how when 
 I first went to school to Miss Peach, I came home and 
 told you that you mustn't say ' plumb ' any more, be- 
 cause it was a common expression unless you meant 
 fruit ? Oh, how well / remember ! You blushed, you 
 poor dear, and I was so sorry I'd hurt your feelings, 
 that I said the word myself whenever I could after- 
 ward, to make up to you." 
 
 Sarah, delighted to put off the evil moment of open- 
 ing the trunks, straightened up on her knees, as she 
 knelt on a piece of matting and smiled back at me. 
 
 "Dear me, no, Miss Nita, I reckon my feelings 
 couldn't ha' bin hurt very bad, for I ain't thought of 
 it from that day to this. But it's just like you to re- 
 member, with your tender heart that would grieve if 
 you harmed a fly ! " 
 
 As she spoke, our eyes met for an instant. There 
 was fright in hers, and a dark color streamed over her
 
 THE LIFE MASK 19 
 
 face. Then she looked hastily away, and began fit- 
 ting a key into the lock of the larger trunk. 
 
 " Well," she said confusedly, " I suppose if it's got 
 to be done, we might as well get at it." 
 
 " Hateful trunks ! " I mumbled. " Doesn't it seem 
 strange to see them look as new as they did when you 
 unpacked them for me in England? I liked the color 
 of them, then, but now " 
 
 It was not worth while to finish the sentence. Sarah 
 knew what I meant. Both trunks, exactly alike ex- 
 cept in size, were gray with a small stamped pattern 
 of fleur-de-lys. 
 
 Sarah's hands were trembling. She had some dif- 
 ficulty in lifting the lid, but when I would have helped, 
 she shook her head, with an excited, " No ; you 
 shan't touch it ! " Forcing the lid up with a wild 
 energy that was almost fury, some tiny, unseen tack 
 or splinter grazed her hand, bringing blood. She 
 turned yellow-pale, and a dew sprang out on her fore- 
 head, which glistened faintly in the light from a win- 
 dow high in the gable. 
 
 " Poor Sarah ! " I exclaimed. " I'm so sorry. 
 Does it hurt much ? " 
 
 " No, dearie, no," she said in a quivering voice. " It 
 ain't a bit bad. Only you know what a silly thing 
 I always was about a drop o' blood. I must ha' bin 
 marked that way, I reckon, by my mother before me. 
 I just can't help it." She wrapped a clean handker- 
 chief round the wounded hand, deftly making a kind 
 of thumbless mitten. " Now I can go on all right."
 
 20 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I pushed her gently back (for she was on her feet 
 now) and opened the top tray myself. Photographs 
 were there, framed and un framed, piled together any- 
 how, as Sarah had packed them in a hurry. On top 
 was a picture of me as a slim little thing of five, large- 
 eyed, with immense masses of curly hair, standing by 
 a chair in which sat my mother, her hands full of 
 roses. 
 
 " O Sarah! " I cried. " That's the dress with the 
 pocket you sewed up because I put snails in it ! " 
 
 She drew near, and I showed her the photograph. 
 My heart felt suddenly lighter, as if a heavy load had 
 been lifted from my breast; and I knew that Sarah 
 was cheered. 
 
 " Why, yes, so it is. Poor lamb." 
 
 " Poor, indeed! If she had known " 
 
 " Now, don't, Miss Nita ! What a pretty picture 
 it is of your mamma." 
 
 " Lovely," I agreed. " She couldn't have been more 
 than twenty-five, could she ? and she looks eighteen. 
 But she hadn't begun yet to realize what a great beauty 
 she was." 
 
 " I reckon she knew she was mighty handsome. 
 She couldn't ha' helped it, admired as she was by all 
 the gentlemen after your papa died. You can see by 
 her black dress, she wasn't out o' mourning for him 
 when the photograph was took. But 'twasn't till the 
 winter she went up to New York that she got to know 
 how much better-lookin' she was than all the noted 
 ladies."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 21 
 
 " When I was eight. We had a nice winter down at 
 home, you and I, Sarah. She didn't care enough, for 
 me to miss her much. But she brought me back that 
 lovely doll you remember? How I adored it! 
 Two years later when we were going to live abroad, 
 she said I would love Paris because there were lots 
 of dolls there, and I could have as many as I wanted. 
 But I never did have another." 
 
 " You took Antoinette to the convent when your 
 mama sent you to school. If I'm not mistaken, she's 
 in that very trunk you're lookin' in now, Miss Nita, 
 'way down at the bottom, wrapped in something blue, 
 I ain't sure what, because I was in no state of mind 
 to" 
 
 She broke off short. Already we had both left 
 many sentences unfinished. I foresaw that it would 
 often happen. Only the childhood days were safe 
 ground. Talking of them was like being on a flowery 
 island in the midst of a stormy sea, so small an island 
 that unless we were careful we missed our footing. 
 We were on the island of safety up to the time of 
 my coming out of the convent school. After that, 
 the rocks were slippery. 
 
 I glanced through the photographs, dreading some- 
 thing that I was spared. Then Sarah took out the 
 tray, and at the top of the one underneath lay the 
 thing which first made me hate all that is gray in 
 color. Together we saw it, and I heard Sarah draw 
 in her breath sharply. 
 
 "Oh, Miss Nita!" she said in her frightened
 
 22 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 whisper, " if only you'd ha' let me do this alone ! " 
 
 " I know. You would have hidden the gray dress- 
 ing-gown. But I didn't wish you to hide anything. 
 It seemed to me that if I could bear this, there's noth- 
 ing left that I can't bear. I wanted to test my strength. 
 Don't you think I'm doing well ? " 
 
 With an effort, I put out my hand and took the 
 dressing-gown from the trunk, but I could not help 
 shuddering when the satin folds and soft edging of 
 chinchilla brushed my bare arm. 
 
 " You know," I said, " it's always in this I see my- 
 self in the dream." 
 
 With a cry, Sarah snatched the dressing-gown from 
 me she, who was always so gentle, almost sub- 
 servient. 
 
 " For God's sake, let me burn it ! " she panted. 
 
 " Yes. That is one reason I wanted to open the 
 trunk. I wanted first to make sure where this was, 
 and then to know it had ceased to exist. Oh, I shall 
 be glad to have it burnt 1 But not yet. Don't leave 
 me alone here. There may be other things " 
 
 As I spoke, I saw the volume of Browning I had 
 been reading that night ... in the gray dress- 
 ing-gown ... to keep myself awake. " The 
 Ring and the Book " and " Pippa Passes." 
 
 Sarah's eyes fell on it, following mine. She re- 
 membered. 
 
 " Shall I burn this too ? " she asked, and would have 
 wrapped the book in the folds of satin. But I cov- 
 ered it with a. protecting hand.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 23 
 
 " It would be sacrilege to burn those glorious 
 thoughts," I said. " It's dreadful to burn any book. 
 But Browning No!" 
 
 * 
 
 With the dress and the book of the dream, the 
 worst was over. There was nothing else in either of 
 the trunks which stabbed my heart unless perhaps the 
 diary which used to be my intimate companion. But 
 this faded, blue-covered volume (I wonder if all girls 
 choose blue for their diaries?) brought me only from 
 the age of ten to fourteen. It began when we were 
 starting for Europe, mother, Sarah and I; and ended 
 with my unrequited love for Willy Mackinnon in the 
 summer holidays which I spent with Sarah at Ver- 
 sailles. 
 
 Once I had begun, I could not put the book down. 
 To read what I had thought and felt in those half- 
 forgotten days was like being pricked by the thorns 
 of a sweet-scented rose. 
 
 I stood turning over the pages, and Sarah did not 
 speak or interrupt me by a movement. Almost I for- 
 got her and the attic, as I read; yet I was conscious 
 that there was in both our minds an undertone of 
 the same thought: a remembrance of the missing 
 volume which followed this : the book of myself from 
 fourteen to nineteen, that had been taken away and 
 never given back. 
 
 If any one had offered, before I opened the diary, 
 to blot out from my life all that was terrible, provided 
 I would tell what was written on the first or any other
 
 24 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 page of the book, I could not have told. But opening 
 it was like opening the door of a shut-up house, and 
 walking from one long ago familiar room to another, 
 where not one piece of furniture, not one ornament was 
 really forgotten. The Christmas party at the hotel 
 in Paris, soon after we arrived and began to know peo- 
 ple. Charlie Sachett, who taught me to waltz and 
 tried to kiss my ear. 
 
 There was my first day at the convent, described 
 from beginning to end, and the Mother-Superior and 
 the sisters and what they had said; names of girls 
 buried till now under the dust of later memories ; my 
 first meeting with Diane Tenier and the idea about 
 mother which she put into my head. " On dit que 
 votre maman est tellement belle et jeune, qu'elle n'aime 
 pas d'avoir un enfant grand comme vous, pres d'elle. 
 C'est pour c,a que vous etes chez nous a present. Peut 
 etre vous restera toujours? " All this painfully writ- 
 ten down in my best newly learned French, followed 
 with, " I don't believe a word she says. Diane is a 
 mean thing. I don't like French girls nearly so well 
 as American or English ones." 
 
 I didn't believe Diane. But I never got her words 
 out of my head. Sometimes I used to try to push 
 them out, when they would suggest themselves as ex- 
 planations of things that happened. 
 
 On the last page of the diary, there they were, still 
 lurking in my memory: 
 
 " Mamma says she thinks I had better spend the rest 
 of my holidays at the convent because it's safer, till I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 25 
 
 come out for good. But I don't care. I shall never 
 forget Willy Mackinnon. If he isn't married when 
 I grow up I shall make him fall in love with me. 
 And I've vowed never to love any one but Willy 
 even if I have to be an old maid, though Diane thinks 
 mama will marry me off quickly, as French mothers 
 do their girls. At the end of ten years I'll look back 
 to this page and write down, in the space I'll leave 
 at the bottom, what has happened. But I know I 
 shall have kept my vow." 
 
 Poor little girl! I would not spoil her book by 
 writing another word in it. It does not seem as if 
 she and I were one. I think of her as a dead friend 
 for whom I have a pitying tenderness. But if she 
 had lived and grown up to be happy, she would not 
 have wanted to keep her vow. Willy Mackinnon was 
 a silly, effeminate boy, and worth none of the trouble 
 he helped to make later. I should like that little girl 
 to have loved a man if she had lived to grow up.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 I KEPT my promise to Sarah and went out, wear- 
 ing a thick blue veil which she bought for me; 
 but it was at the time of the Easter bank holi- 
 day, and the sea front and the streets depressed me 
 with a black depression. The air, I knew, was sup- 
 posed to be a tonic, and Sarah had chosen Margate 
 for my sake. Perhaps, too, she had secretly thought 
 that its " liveliness " would do me good. But the 
 people I saw, who stared at my veil as if in the 
 hope it might cover some curious deformity, irritated 
 and made me sad, they were so ugly or so coarse ; and 
 the knife-like wind cut through my body. If I had 
 been strong and happy, it might have affected me like 
 boisterous shouts of joy, but the gray sky and rough 
 gray sea, coldly silvered sometimes with bursts of un- 
 sympathetic sunshine, had no messages from Nature 
 for me. I longed for southern blues and greens, and 
 rich orange-gold, but I said nothing of this to Sarah. 
 I felt that it would be better to die in the little home 
 her love had made, rather than let her know that her 
 devotion was in vain. And there were reasons why 
 it would be well to die; few why it would be good 
 to live. 
 
 I sat wrapped in shawls and rugs in the back yard 
 which we both called " the garden," but I had no 
 
 26
 
 THE LIFE MASK 27 
 
 heart to work in it. I knew that I could not care for 
 any flowers which might consent to grow in such a 
 place, so why plant them if they were not to be loved? 
 
 I had thought, when I was ill, how splendid it would 
 be to walk, or even to be out of doors, but now I 
 liked better to stay in the house where I felt safe from 
 eyes, and where I was warmed by Sarah's watchful 
 affection. 
 
 Soot from the chimneys of the two neighboring 
 villas fell on me in the garden, and gave me an excuse 
 to run back to the sitting-room. I read a great many 
 romances which Sarah brought me from the circula- 
 ting library, and at first I enjoyed them, even those 
 which were not well written ; by and by, however, they 
 lost their novelty, even the best could not take my mind 
 off myself. 
 
 We had no servant; but Sarah, who had a natural, 
 Southern gift for cooking, thought of a new dish for 
 me every day, but it was an effort to express enough 
 delight to reward her. And I did so want to reward 
 her as she deserved ! 
 
 One morning when she had been out marketing, she 
 came in with a bunch of red roses on top of the bundles 
 in her string bag. 
 
 " For you, Miss Nita," she said, breathlessly, as she 
 always spoke after walking fast. " Don't they smell 
 like the South?" 
 
 I buried my face in the cup of the roses. 
 
 " They are the South," I answered. " They don't 
 belong here."
 
 28 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " Neither do we, I reckon," said Sarah. " You 
 don't, an' no more do I; an' I tell you what, lovey, 
 we ain't goin' to waste our lives stayin' in a place like 
 this when there's others about ten thousand times nicer 
 callin' an' callin' us to come." 
 
 I stared at her, over the roses. 
 
 A faint color was coming and going on her thin 
 face. I had never seen her like that except when she 
 was highly excited. She looked as she did the day 
 when mother offered to get a French maid and give 
 her Sarah back to me. 
 
 For a minute she stood nervously swinging the 
 string bag, full of bundles. Then, suddenly, she be- 
 gan taking them out, in a hurry : parcels of tomatoes, 
 of hot-house grapes, and Benger's food for me. Un- 
 derneath all, there was something shaped like a book, 
 in brown paper. 
 
 " There ! " she exclaimed. " Open that. Maybe 
 it's 'most as good as the roses. I reckon it'll show 
 you the way to 'em anyhow." 
 
 " Murray's * Spain/ " I said, when I had freed the 
 red book from its wrapping. " What made you think 
 of getting that ? " 
 
 " Because you used to say you'd rather see Spain 
 than any other place, on account o' your grandma. 
 Not that she was ever there herself, but her folks all 
 come from Spain. I reckon you haven't got over 
 wantin' to go, have you ? " 
 
 " I've not thought about it for a long time " 
 
 " Ah, that was only because it didn't seem as if you
 
 THE LIFE MASK 29 
 
 could get there," she caught the words out of my 
 mouth. " But now there ain't a single reason why you 
 can't. At the bookstore this morning I asked for a 
 book about Spain, and the man give me that. He was 
 a real nice man, and took an interest when I said I 
 thought o' goin'. He said he guessed spring was the 
 best time." 
 
 " But we can't go," I said. 
 
 " Yes, we can. Why not, I'd like to know? And 
 we've got to go somewheres mighty soon, because 
 Miss Nita, I've rented this house." 
 
 "Sarah!" 
 
 "Yes, I have. It's the same as done. I've bin 
 try in' to get it off our hands since a week after you 
 come. I see it wouldn't do. I didn't say a word, for 
 fear of buildin' up your hopes and lettin' 'em down, 
 for I sort o' knew you'd make a fuss about leavin', 
 if the villa was empty. You'd ha' thought 'twould 
 be a burden on me. Not that it would. But I wanted 
 you to have the pleasure without any worry. And 
 now it's all right, Miss Nita. I had a letter from the 
 house agent this morning. Don't you remember, you 
 thought it sounded like a postman's knock, and you 
 looked 'most frightened? I had to fib and say 'twas 
 a circular. So 'twas, in a way. It was to tell me 
 a gentleman will take the villa for himself and his 
 invalid wife for a year and maybe more if he 
 finds it as nice inside as out, and as good as the de- 
 scription the agent give him. Well, that's the 
 same as if it was rented, because it's a lot nicer
 
 30 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 inside than anybody'd think, to pass by, ain't it?" 
 
 " Indeed it is," I said. " But, O Sarah, the little 
 house you've spent so much on ! I can't " 
 
 " Yes, you can, honey. I always had it in my mind 
 that if it wouldn't do, I'd rent it to some one, and 
 we'd clear out. That's one reason I was partic'lar to 
 have things real well done, so as it would be a good 
 investment. Now I'm mighty glad I did. If you'll 
 take a walk this afternoon between three and four, 
 it will be best, because the gentleman's comm' to go 
 over the house. His wife has to live in Margate for 
 the air, and they're anxious to get out of their hotel 
 and settled. I shan't be surprised if you and me can 
 start next week." 
 
 It almost frightened me to find that I was still 
 capable of joy and excitement. I had told myself that 
 if I lived I should be like a shadow: wherever I might 
 go, the sunshine would fly before me. Yet here I was 
 with the blood racing through my veins because we 
 were turning our backs on Margate, looking toward 
 Spain. 
 
 I stayed out until five, and before I had time to 
 touch the electric bell, Sarah appeared, beaming. 
 
 " I thought you'd never come !" she exclaimed. 
 " Seemed like I couldn't wait to tell you. He's a re- 
 tired army officer, with money, I reckon, for he didn't 
 do any bargaining. His name's Major Turner, and 
 he's willin' to pay eighty pounds a year. That's four 
 hundred dollars, ain't it? Come and drink your Ben- 
 ger, and we'll make plans about startin'."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 31 
 
 " Sarah, you are an angel ! " I said, putting my arms 
 around her as we stood in the tiny passage. " A 
 glorious, unselfish angel ! " 
 
 I felt her quiver sensitively, and the joy died out 
 of her face. Suddenly it looked tired and old. 
 
 " You don't know, Miss Nita, how it hurts to hear 
 you' keep on callin' me such names as that. You 
 won't do it any more, will you, child ? " she pleaded, 
 almost pushing me away. 
 
 And for once she forgot her humility, to pass be- 
 fore me into the chintzy sitting-room which had 
 caught Major Turner's fancy. I felt ungrateful be- 
 cause I was glad that he, and not I, was to see it every 
 day for the next year. 
 
 By the time I had taken off my veil and gloves, and 
 Sarah had the cup of Benger on a tray, she was her 
 mild, cheerful self again, and we began to talk of 
 Spain. 
 
 " But supposing you're not happy there ? " I said. 
 " You don't know a word of Spanish. It will be dif- 
 ferent from any place where you have ever lived, and 
 so far away " 
 
 " Wasn't I happy in France, while I had you ? " she 
 broke in. " Why, any place is my home if you're 
 there. You ought to know that by this time. I ain't 
 had any other sort of home for so many years now, 
 I forget what it feels like; and even if I went way 
 back down to Alabama, it wouldn't be like home now, 
 because my folks are all dead and gone long ago, and 
 the friends I had have forgotten me at least "
 
 32 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 and the startled look came into her eyes "I hope 
 they have, for I don't want any one on this earth 
 but you. We're both of us alone in the world, me 
 ever since I was young, and you since your mamma 
 died. It's a pity if we can't make ourselves feel at 
 home anywheres. As for knowin* no Spanish, I never 
 knew more'n about twelve words o' French all the 
 time I was livin' in France. I reckon I can pick up 
 as much as that of another language, even at my age." 
 
 "Of course you can," I hurried to assure her. " I 
 spoke only because I can't bear to have you sacrificing 
 yourself " 
 
 " There you go again, Miss Nita ! " 
 
 I laughed at her reproachful face. " You won't 
 let yourself be appreciated if you can help it. Oh, 
 don't look like that! I shan't say any more. Let's 
 study Murray's ' Spain.' ' 
 
 Not that there was need of study. There was but 
 one place in Spain where I wanted, and had always 
 wanted, to live. That was Granada, which I had 
 yearned to see ever since a Monterey cousin sent me 
 Washington Irving's " Alhambra," on my ninth birth- 
 day. It was the first " grown-up " book I ever read, 
 and I had difficulty with the Spanish and Moorish 
 names. Perhaps those difficulties made the book more 
 precious, like a hidden jewel I had to search for in a 
 cave, as mysterious as the Alhambra itself. There 
 was also another reason, less romantic, but more im- 
 portant, why I fixed upon Granada the instant the pros- 
 pect of Spain was opened for me. Granada in June
 
 THE LIFE MASK 33 
 
 and July would be almost empty of tourists. The 
 Spanish people I should not mind. It seemed that I 
 might even feel at home with them; and it would be 
 a great interest, learning their language. I could not 
 imagine myself staying at a hotel in a town where 
 I might stumble against old acquaintances. The idea 
 was unbearable ; but Granada in the summer would be 
 empty, and already it was past the middle of May. I 
 had been at Laburnum Lodge for six weeks, which 
 seemed six months. I began to make plans. 
 
 " Sarah, were you a good sailor when we came from 
 America ? " I asked. 
 
 " Yes, indeed, I was mighty good," she said, 
 " though there was a storm that lasted three days." 
 
 " Then we'll travel by sea ! " I exclaimed. " We 
 can go to Gibraltar in a ship on its way to India or 
 Australia; and Murray says it's only half an hour 
 or so to cross to Algeciras. Don't you think that 
 will be best?" 
 
 " I'm right sure it will," Sarah agreed. 
 
 Neither of us spoke out what was in our thoughts, 
 or swimming just underneath their surface: that we 
 did not wish to go to Paris. It was a place of mem- 
 ories. 
 
 The next day we began to get ready, though we had 
 a whole week before the Turners would move in. I 
 made Sarah give away the two gray trunks that were 
 in the attic, and everything in them which could not be 
 identified, except the gray dressing-gown and a few 
 photographs which she had burned. The Browning
 
 34 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 and my diary, and my dead mother's picture I kept, 
 though she had never cared for me really, and hated 
 me at the last. 
 
 Now that I was to leave Laburnum Lodge I began 
 to love it, though I knew that I should fall back into 
 the old bored dislike, if anything happened to change 
 our plans and force us to stay. 
 
 In feeling this, I looked at my character as if it were 
 that of another person whom I was studying. Was it 
 a sign that I was changeable, that nothing could please 
 me for long? That no sooner had one thing been 
 given me than I tired of it, and longed for something 
 else. If so, there was no chance of contentment in 
 the future stretching ahead like a long, straight road, 
 dimly seen in twilight. Would it be the same thing 
 over again, when we got to Granada? I kept asking 
 myself, in fear of what the answer might have to be. 
 If I should find that the fault was in myself, not in 
 Laburnum Lodge, then there was no hope left, noth- 
 ing in me worth Sarah Nicholls' devotion, nothing 
 worth self-respect. 
 
 There was not much packing to do, for neither of us 
 had many clothes. Sarah had provided me with a 
 few things, hoping that as I grew stronger I might 
 take an interest in choosing for myself; but the inter- 
 est had not come yet. 
 
 In London we stayed for several days in quiet lodg- 
 ings, which we selected from a list of advertisements 
 in a newspaper; and, wearing the thick veil I wore in 
 Margate, I bought our tickets for the ship, and did a
 
 THE LIFE MASK 35 
 
 little shopping. I felt like a ghost, sent back to visit 
 old haunts, yet the thought of Granada in the distance 
 kept me from being depressed. 
 
 I had no idea of buying pretty things for myself, 
 but the day before the Mooltan was to sail, Sarah went 
 out alone, and was gone all the morning. When she 
 came in, white and weary about three o'clock, I asked 
 anxiously what had delayed her so long. 
 
 " I kep* thinkin' of one thing an' another to do," 
 she answered, mysteriously, with the little dry cough 
 she always had when she was tired, and her heart 
 was fluttering. " I didn't realize you was goin' to be 
 worried, I was that interested! " 
 
 " Oh, well, then I'm glad you stayed out," I said. 
 " But you might tell me what it was that interested 
 you so much." 
 
 " You'll see by an' by," she replied, nodding her 
 head. " I've been buyin' two or three little odds an' 
 ends. They'll be stringin' along all the afternoon, I 
 reckon. But don't you ask me any questions, for I've 
 plumb made up my mind not to answer." 
 
 " Just one ; did you have any lunch ? " 
 
 " Mercy, no, child, I didn't get a single minute to 
 spare. I'll have a cup o' tea and some toast now. 
 I've kind o' bin lookin' forward to it." 
 
 " I should think so, when you had no breakfast but 
 toast and tea. And now you'll lunch on tea and toast. 
 Bad Sarah!" 
 
 " I know I'm bad," she answered meekly, where- 
 upon I was disarmed. Marvelous Sarah!
 
 36 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 As she said, the things did " keep stringing along " 
 all the afternoon, and into the evening. 
 
 Sarah had bought me silk stockings, and suede 
 gloves of pale tints, which she considered suitable to 
 Spain. She had bought delicate blouses, silk petti- 
 coats, and a white serge coat and skirt. There were 
 dainty shoes and slippers, matched in size from a boot 
 of mine taken by stealth, and even a pair of rose-and- 
 white, brocaded satin corsets. 
 
 " Why, Sarah," I reproached her, " you must have 
 spent more than twenty pounds ! " And that was be- 
 fore the hats and veils and perfumes and manicure 
 things began to arrive. 
 
 " Never you mind how much I spent ! " she chuckled 
 with unwonted, gaiety. " I was bound you should 
 have the things, and I knew you wouldn't get 'em for 
 yourself, because I begged you to, a hundred times in 
 Margate, and you never would. This is next best to 
 your choosin', and if anything ain't right it can be 
 changed. But I reckon there won't be much wrong. 
 I've taken a lot o' pains; and I ain't enjoyed a day 
 so much since I fetched you out o' the convent when 
 you was seventeen. Now I want you should try 
 every single thing on, and see how you look in 
 'em all. That's what I've bin countin' on the live- 
 long day." 
 
 " But, Sarah me in those satin corsets ! Me in a 
 Leghorn hat wreathed with roses! It's it's like 
 dressing up a corpse ! " 
 
 The minute the words were off my tongue I re-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 37 
 
 gretted them, fearing to see her flinch; but she pro- 
 tested in undiminished excitement: 
 
 " You put the things on, Miss Nita, and see whether 
 you feel a dead corpse or not. You're no woman 
 if you do." 
 
 I would not have believed that the pretty frivolities 
 could make a complete change in my feelings. But 
 instinct must have told Sarah what the effect was 
 likely to be. I can describe it only by saying that a 
 rush of youth came over me. It was the Leghorn 
 hat with roses, and the collarless chiffon blouse, and 
 the white cloth skirt, showing bronze shoes and brown 
 silk stockings, which worked the magic. 
 
 I threw my arms around Sarah and hugged her. 
 
 " I owe everything to you ! " I cried out. " I've 
 owed you everything for a thousand black years, and 
 now you're giving me back my youth ! I've no right 
 to it but " 
 
 ' You've got a right to everything that's good and 
 beautiful," she said. " You've got the right to live! "
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 FOR one thing I thanked Margate. It was the 
 sight of the incoming waves, and the thought 
 of the unseen, outgoing ships, bound for far- 
 off ports, in the east and west and south, that put into 
 my head the wish to go by sea to Spain. 
 
 All day Sarah and I sat on deck, in steamer chairs. 
 I wore my thick veil, and sat with eyes half shut, 
 seldom speaking to Sarah or glancing at the book 
 in my lap. New voices, such as I had never heard 
 before, spoke to me in the wind, and in the clear 
 whisper of waters against the beating side of the ship. 
 The brown-skinned Lascars, with their little caps and 
 bright sashes, and bare feet padding on the deck, gave 
 an air of strangeness to the ship, romantic as the smell 
 of sandalwood. 
 
 To be going out of England to a country dreamt of, 
 yet never seen a country to which my blood gave me 
 claim was beautiful as an answered prayer. This 
 was not because I had learned to hate England 
 rather the contrary; but because I told myself that I 
 had no longer any right in that land. It was, to my 
 mind, as if I were an adopted child in a country- 
 house full of happy children who belonged there. I, 
 an alien, because of things that had happened, was not 
 loved by the children of the house. They did not wish 
 
 38
 
 THE LIFE MASK 39 
 
 me to play with them, but murmured and raised their 
 eyebrows when I came near. 
 
 At first, I had not the courage to go to the dining- 
 saloon for meals. Sarah brought me something to 
 eat on deck; but when she reported that at her table 
 there were only a deaf man with a near-sighted wife, 
 and their two daughters, I decided to run the risk. It 
 would make things easier afterward, if I began to go 
 among people, Sarah argued; and it was conspicuous 
 to sit always on deck, taking my meals there. 
 
 On the third day I went to luncheon, unpinning my 
 veil as I sat down. For a minute I could not look 
 up, though I tried. It seemed as if there were a hand 
 on my eyelids. My fingers trembled so that I could 
 hardly unfold my napkin, and I felt as if all the eyes 
 in the dining-saloon had become one great, terrible 
 eye staring at me. But when I did compel myself 
 to look up (more for Sarah's sake than my own, be- 
 cause I heard that little nervous, fluttering cough of 
 hers) nobody was taking the slightest notice of me. 
 We had chosen the moment after the sounding of 
 the bugle, to come below, so that we might be among 
 the first. No one had arrived at our table. People 
 in other parts of the saloon were slipping into their 
 revolving chairs, talking and laughing, for everybody 
 knew everybody else by this time. 
 
 As the dark- faced Indian steward gave me a menu, 
 and Sarah had not yet dared to speak, our table com- 
 panions came, sliding into their chairs on the side op- 
 posite us. For a second or two my heart was in my
 
 40 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 throat, it was so new and terrible to be thus close and 
 at the mercy of strangers. But the deaf husband, a 
 stout, comfortable man of fifty-five was helping to seat 
 his wife. They bowed to Sarah, including me in the 
 gesture. The man's look rested on me benevolently 
 for an instant. Then he absorbed himself in advis- 
 ing his wife what to have for luncheon, and announc- 
 ing to the whole family his own selection. The two 
 bouncing girls looked at me with vague interest in a 
 new arrival whom, perhaps, they flattered by thinking 
 rather pretty. Maybe they were sorry for me because 
 I was large-eyed and pale, not rosy and sunburned like 
 themselves. 
 
 By and by the gentle little mother spoke. She 
 hoped that I had not suffered from the sea? No? 
 That was good. The voyage so far had been delight- 
 ful. Her husband had brought her by sea for the 
 benefit of her health. We talked across the table: 
 the girls asked if I played or sang: they were getting 
 up a concert. Never mind if I couldn't do anything. 
 I could listen. . . . And so the ordeal was over. 
 After that I took all my meals at the table; and though 
 Sarah and I did not refer to it, because we had a way 
 of ignoring things, I knew that she was thankful. 
 This was what she had prayed for, no doubt; and 
 her prayer was answered. I was sure that she did 
 pray for me, even for the smallest trifles concerning 
 my welfare; for Sarah, though meekly unobtrusive 
 about her inner life, was fervently religious. 
 
 Only one thing I said, on the voyage, that bore on
 
 THE LIFE MASK 41 
 
 the subject of my new courage. " I wonder if there 
 can be a chance for me," I asked, " to break the co- 
 coon and come out alive from the chrysalis? Or isn't 
 there a chrysalis? Am I just a mummy tightly folded 
 up in my musty wrappings ? " 
 
 " No, you ain't any mummy," Sarah soothed me, 
 though I suspect that if asked to describe a mummy, 
 or even a chrysalis she would have been at a loss. 
 " You're something like the princess in a fairy tale I 
 used to read you out of your blue book do you re- 
 member ? The wicked fairy had made her go to sleep 
 in a dark, deep wood, and she was like one dead till 
 the black magic was taken off by the prince " 
 
 " The prince ! " I laughed so harshly that poor Sarah 
 was startled. " If I depend on a prince to take away 
 the curse I shall lie forever in my enchanted sleep. 
 No prince would come near me. And I should send 
 him away if he did." 
 
 " I reckon you couldn't do that, if you was fast 
 asleep," said Sarah, slyly, in her soft Southern drawl. 
 " And there ain't any reason why you should send a 
 prince away, even if you was wide awake. You've 
 got as good a right " 
 
 " Don't! " I cut her short. " Don't let's even talk 
 about such a thing. I hate it ! " 
 
 Sarah was silenced, and looked so crushed that I 
 was repentant. 
 
 " Forgive me, dear, kind friend," I said, taking her 
 hand and pressing it against my cheek, as I lay in my 
 berth and she bent over me, " tucking me in." " I
 
 42 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 know how you mean to cheer me, as if I were like 
 other women. But I don't need a prince to wake me 
 up, if only I can prove myself to be a butterfly in a 
 chrysalis. I shall find out how to feel my wings when 
 the time comes. The thing I ask is, am I one of those 
 who have the faculty of beginning life over again, 
 after such a knock-down blow? Some people have 
 that faculty. Others haven't. It's a kind of gift, I 
 suppose. Is it too good to be true that I should 
 have it? I've only just begun to wonder. A little 
 while ago I should have thought it would be impossible 
 for me to live again. But now sometimes, for a 
 minute or two at a time I hope O Sarah, if I 
 develop the faculty, it will be all through you ! " 
 
 " My precious one ! " she crooned. " You make me 
 want to fall right down on my knees and give up the 
 ghost!" 
 
 Half laughing at her, half crying for us both, I 
 would have kissed her hand if she hadn't snatched it 
 away, and kissed mine instead. 
 
 After five days, a crouching lion-form of rock rose 
 dark against a sky of pale violet. And as we landed 
 from the tender, among a crowd of swarthy Spaniards, 
 white-turbaned Moors, and khaki-clad British soldiers, 
 a voice seemed to whisper an answer to my question. 
 It said, "Yes, you can learn, if you will, to begin 
 again." 
 
 "This is what we wanted, ain't it?" asked Sarah,
 
 THE LIFE MASK 43 
 
 as we rattled in a queer little brown vehicle up the 
 hilly street to a hotel. " Something 'most as dif- 
 ferent from what we ever knew, as if we'd flown to 
 some other world ? " 
 
 She meant it was what / had wanted, but it was not 
 worth while to argue. 
 
 By this time we had come to the first of June and 
 there were very few people in our hotel. It was a noisy 
 hotel, and its cheap modern copies of old Moorish tiles 
 were crude and harsh in color; but it was so novel 
 to us and everything was so strange, that we were in- 
 clined to admire. We had meant to stop only one 
 night, but the great rock fortress in the sea fasci- 
 nated us both, and we stayed on. " We can do just 
 as we like," said Sarah. " There ain't one thing to 
 hurry us." 
 
 That was true. No one cared what Mrs. A. Lippin- 
 cott and Miss S. Nelson did, where they went, how 
 soon they arrived anywhere, or even whether they died, 
 provided they did not fall dead in a hotel or any 
 other public place inconvenient to their (more or less) 
 fellow human beings. 
 
 It was Sarah who gave me the name of Mrs. Lippin- 
 cott. When I surprised every one concerned by get- 
 ting well instead of dying, it seemed necessary to have 
 a new label, since the old one was worse than useless. 
 I proposed to be Mrs. Smith, because any one can be 
 Mrs. Smith, and about half the inhabitants of many 
 places are. But Sarah's favorite name, for some 
 reason, was Lippincott. She thought it sounded
 
 44 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 distinguished, without being conspicuous. And when 
 I realized that she would take more pride in Mrs. 
 Lippincott than in Mrs. Smith, I was glad to please her. 
 " Nelson " she chose for herself because it conve- 
 niently had the same initial as Nicholls, and the name 
 of Sarah Nicholls might have associations for ob- 
 serving persons with good memories. It was better 
 to make a clean sweep of both our names, as we were 
 trying to do with all that was old. 
 
 Mrs. Lippincott and Miss Nelson, her middle-aged 
 companion, spent most of their time at Gibraltar in 
 the public gardens, or in the long, hilly street of Ori- 
 ental looking shops. ' I had a different veil now, one 
 of creamy Spanish lace with a thick border, and a pat- 
 tern which hid my face as if behind a vine-covered 
 trellis. I wore it on a wide-brimmed, white straw hat, 
 which went very well with one of the muslin dresses 
 Sarah had bought on her famous field-day in London. 
 It was summer weather here, like July in England, ac- 
 cording to some old memories I had ; and the brilliant 
 sunshine was what I had longed for. 
 
 I entered the shops almost boldly shops where 
 they sold Indian silver and carved ivory; spicy-smell- 
 ing shops, where Turkish rugs were displayed, and 
 embroidered draperies; Spanish shops for lace and 
 fans and tiny models of black righting bulls speared 
 by miniature toreros; shops where spangled scarfs 
 glittered, and whiffs of attar of rose came through the 
 open doors; shops of Moorish pottery and antique 
 Spanish furniture and brocades. We bought odds
 
 THE LIFE MASK 45 
 
 and ends we did not want or know what to do with, 
 but they were all so unlike anything I had seen that 
 they seemed to be part of the new life. Here in Gi- 
 braltar it was as if I could peep through the crevice of 
 a door ajar, into that new life. I looked beyond into 
 a strange brightness which was glory after the dim 
 gray light of the dream. 
 
 Already the horror of being stared at was passing 
 like mist before the rising sun. I began to be less self- 
 conscious, and to enjoy gazing at people from behind 
 my veil: at the officers and soldiers, at the brown- 
 faced Gibraltarians whom they called " rock scor- 
 pions," and at the Moorish poultry merchants from 
 wild parts of Morocco, who were like Sultans out of 
 the " Arabian Nights." 
 
 At last, when we had been at Gibraltar five days, we 
 took an early boat across the bay of Algeciras. It 
 would be the first time we had set foot in Spain, 
 though we might have gone over any day and come 
 back in a few hours. I wanted not to go until we left 
 Gibraltar for good and all. 
 
 Suddenly, as the wind dashed sea-fragrance into 
 my face I felt as if the deepest-down layer of ice 
 that bound my heart was melting. The sound of the 
 breeze rushing past my ears as the boat moved, was 
 like a harp accompanying a song of many voices so 
 far off that I could not catch tune or words; but 
 the music was meant for me. The lively air and the 
 sparkling sea danced to it together, and the small blue 
 and silver waves were streaked with pink and golden
 
 46 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 lights of morning. Out of the rainbow-water the 
 tawny African mountains rose in strange, romantic 
 shapes. Only the shadows looked green. The hills 
 themselves were of that orange gold I had pined to see, 
 as some one who is starved with cold longs to see fire. 
 Everything was bright and full of color and motion, 
 except the warships in Gibraltar harbor, powerful 
 monsters which made the puffing tugs and skittish 
 launches, the glittering motor vessels and the sail- 
 boats with spread wings, look like ducks and gulls and 
 Mother Carey's chickens compared to sleeping whales. 
 To me it was all so beautiful that I wondered how the 
 people on our boat could laugh and chat about com- 
 monplace things in their own small lives. 
 
 We did not stay at Algeciras, for the hotel in 
 the beautiful garden was too full and too fashionable 
 for us, even in June. Straight to the Ronda and 
 Granada train we went from the boat-landing close 
 by; and then came hours of traveling through a 
 strange, lost Paradise, gorge after gorge where only 
 the train and men on foot or on horseback can go. 
 
 There were groves of cork-trees, with bare, fleshlike 
 trunks, and the dark covering of cork left here and 
 there like rags on a half stripped beggar. From the 
 train we could look far down to a river, with white 
 stones like pearls dropped into water green as jade. 
 Immense bunches of rose-colored, wild oleanders 
 crowded close to the edge, or leaned over from gray- 
 brown cliffs. A man in our carriage, English, but 
 evidently living in Spain, told a friend that the wild
 
 THE LIFE MASK 47 
 
 oleander was superstitiously supposed to breed fever, 
 or bring ill luck, and no Spaniards would go near it, 
 or have it in their houses. Then it occurred to me 
 that I was like the oleander, struggling to live my life 
 in sad, lonely places ; that people looked at me with a 
 kind of fearful admiration, and went away quickly, 
 as if I could do them harm, or bring misfortune to 
 their homes. I felt sorry for the oleander, and 
 thought that if ever I had a chance, I would risk gath- 
 ering some of the flowering branches. 
 
 My heart warmed to the country, wild as it was and 
 desolate among the mountains. And I should have 
 liked to live, with Sarah to love and be kind to me, 
 in one of the little houses of the road-menders, white- 
 washed cottages with posts or trunks of cut trees set 
 up in front, with beams across, curtained with vines. 
 
 From the small stations where we stopped, Spanish 
 eyes gazed up at the train windows, and boys offered 
 strawberries and cherries, or girls uncovered trays of 
 iced cakes. Old women poured water from dewy, 
 white clay jugs into tumblers, for the passengers, and 
 men with grave faces under broad sombreros loaded 
 jingling, tasselled mules with bags of meal or oil jars. 
 
 The Englishman who lived in Spain spoke to his 
 friend of the gorge of Ronda, and how in June 
 there would probably be no one but Spaniards in the 
 hotel. This, and the stories he told in a loud voice 
 (perhaps for our benefit) of the old Moorish palaces 
 and mills, made me want to stop at Ronda ; so we took 
 our hand luggage and got out at the station. The
 
 48 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 larger things we let go on to Granada ; and that night 
 we stayed at the Reina Victoria with its gardens 
 on the verge of an incredible gulf. It was like seeing 
 into another world to stand and stare over the edge. I 
 felt as if I were looking down into the depths of my 
 own past, after I had climbed up into air and daylight, 
 and had not yet found a firm footing. Perhaps I 
 never would find one, I said to myself ; but I had begun 
 to hope a little. Though I knew well that the flowery 
 hilltops belonged to the other people, the happy people, 
 I thought that if I didn't push myself forward, if I 
 asked and expected nothing of them, perhaps they 
 might not mind my having just a small place in the 
 sun. The wind pouring up from the depths of the 
 gulf was a kind voice promising peace. There at the 
 bottom, nearly a thousand feet down, everything con- 
 cerning man and his works appeared curiously insignifi- 
 cant. Could it be that the things I had suffered would 
 ever seem so far away, if I could mount to greater 
 heights? I wondered as I leaned on the wall of the 
 terrace looking over the precipice. 
 
 The season crowds had gone from the hotel, and it 
 was restful in the summer heat. Dark blue linen was 
 fastened over the panes of the huge windows, and the 
 awnings were down, between the brick pillars of the 
 veranda, from morning till sunset; but Sarah and I 
 braved the flaming gold of afternoon, and walked into 
 the town over the marvelous bridge, and to the Ala- 
 meda. A boy fair as an Anglo-Saxon thrust upon us 
 his services as guide, and got permission to go through
 
 THE LIFE MASK 49 
 
 the old palace of the Moorish king, down the steps 
 made by Christian slaves in secret passages, to the 
 bottom of the gorge. There, where we came out, the 
 wild oleander was growing above the green torrent 
 which rushed by and filled the ravine with its hoarse 
 voice. I gathered some of the branches, as I had 
 vowed in the train I would do, though Sarah begged 
 me not to touch them. 
 
 " Maybe it's true what that man said," she pleaded. 
 " You've had enough bad luck. I'd sooner do all I 
 could to keep it off, than run the risk of attractin' 
 more." 
 
 But I only laughed. 
 
 " You, a pious Methodist, as superstitious as the 
 Spanish peasants ! " I teased her. " The oleander is 
 sad, like me, because it is a pariah. I want to show 
 it that somebody isn't afraid of it." 
 
 The blue-eyed boy who had guided us could under- 
 stand English and speak it a little. He had learned 
 the language, he told us, for two reasons. One, be- 
 cause many tourists came to see the gorge, and he 
 could do good business with them; the other, be- 
 cause like many in Ronda he had an ancestor who was 
 an Englishman, one of Wellington's soldiers, married 
 to a Moorish woman. He listened to all we said, 
 and protested against my gathering the oleander. 
 
 " It bring a curse to any peoples who pulls it out of 
 where it grow," he said, " if they not have curse on 
 them before." 
 
 " And if they have? " I asked.
 
 50 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 "If they have curse already, oleanders can take it 
 off," he answered. " I hear gypsy by the Alhambra 
 tell that to some ones once. I was to Granada with 
 English family, like guide, and I hear that in the gypsy 
 cave. The gypsy peoples know all the secret things 
 of the plants and the stars. That one says, if some- 
 body been cursed, oleanders found by a happy one, can 
 bring a great, strange joy, but if not cursed, then take 
 care!" 
 
 I bent down from the rocky platform where we 
 stood, and gathered another flowering branch. 
 
 After olive-clad slopes and floods .of poppies, the 
 first sight of Granada was a blow. My heart ached 
 with disappointment as we drove in the hotel omnibus 
 from the railway station toward the hill of the Al- 
 hambra. The street was new and ugly and straggling ; 
 the young trees just at the awkward age were 
 gray with dust from the uneven white road. The one 
 pleasant sound among many was a jingling of mule 
 bells. Faces that passed looked Saracenic and sullen. 
 The people were of a very different type from the 
 deer-eyed Andalusians who had smiled up to the train 
 windows, offering fruit and compliments. I could see 
 the green beetle-wing glint of tiles on the distant Cathe- 
 dral of Ferdinand and Isabella. It looked heavy and 
 uninteresting. Had we come all the way from Eng- 
 land for this? I asked myself gloomily. Still, I did 
 not say to Sarah that I was disappointed, though I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 51 
 
 saw by her face as the omnibus jolted us past dull 
 shops and hideously decorated modern apartment 
 houses, that she was wondering why we had traveled 
 so far to see Granada. 
 
 Just then, we turned into a shadowy street, narrow 
 as a lane, and began to go steeply uphill. 
 
 On either side were curiosity shops, whose windows 
 were filled with bright fans and big tortoise-shell 
 combs ; and through open doors we could see very old 
 women and very young girls making lace on frames. 
 
 At the top was a great stone archway which I knew, 
 from the book I had read, must be the one built by 
 Charles the Fifth ; and beyond that was a deep green- 
 ness, as if a bright emerald curtain had been let down 
 behind the gateless barrier. 
 
 On the omnibus rattled, climbing higher, until the 
 mules had trotted under the stone arch, plunging into 
 the sudden coolness and green gloom of a forest. I 
 was gazing up an avenue of giant elms, like a vast 
 arbor, and even over the sound of wheels and the 
 hoofs of mules I could catch the music of running 
 water. It poured a stream of silver down a shallow 
 channel on each side of the shady brown road. Sing- 
 ing as it came, it bathed the feet of the tall trees 
 which rose out of it; and I remembered an old Spanish 
 saying, repeated by the cousin who sent me Irving's 
 " Alhambra " when I was a child : " The three sweetest 
 sounds on earth are the tinkle of gold pieces ; the music 
 of running water; and the melody of the loved one's 
 voice." It must have been some Moorish king of
 
 52 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Granada, I thought, who invented that proverb; and 
 as it echoed through my memory in tune with the 
 voice of springs and fountains in the Alhambra wood, 
 my heart gave a leap, but not of joy. A longing such 
 as I had never known swept over me, with the breeze 
 from the Sierra Nevada. It was the desire to love 
 and be loved, with a love all different from Sarah's 
 devotion.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 WE went to a big, vaguely Oriental hotel close 
 to the Alhambra, to which we had been rec- 
 ommended by the landlord at Gibraltar. In 
 the open-air entrance court I had a shock of surprise. 
 A group of people were laughing together, and chat- 
 ting in English, in front of a curiosity shop. Evi- 
 dently the tourist season was not over at Granada, and 
 this hotel had a number of guests still. But it was 
 too late to go away and try somewhere else for a 
 quieter place. Already our luggage was being taken 
 in by dark- faced servants; and I whispered to Sarah 
 as we passed into a big white hall, " We'll have to be 
 extravagant here, and take a private sitting-room, for 
 I can't go down to meals with all those English peo- 
 ple and Americans about. We can begin inquiring 
 and looking round for a little furnished flat or house." 
 
 It was Sarah who engaged rooms and wrote our 
 names in the visitors' book, while I hovered in the 
 background, glad of my veil. But when I had heard 
 that we could have a suite of three rooms and a bath 
 for out-of -season prices, I summoned up courage to 
 step forward. 
 
 " Till what time in the evening can we go into the 
 Alhambra?" I asked of the manager, who spoke 
 English. 
 
 53
 
 54 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " It closes at half-past six," he answered. 
 
 I looked at my watch a present from Sarah. 
 
 " Five o'clock ! " I said to her. " I don't think I 
 can wait until to-morrow." 
 
 " Very well, dearie, how'd you like to go now, and 
 when you come back I'll have the rooms nice and 
 homey ? " Sarah suggested. 
 
 " But you mustn't do the unpacking alone. You 
 aren't strong enough. It will spoil my pleasure if 
 you do." 
 
 " All right," she mildly consented. " I can just put 
 the little things about, and leave the big ones for you 
 to help with when you come back. But don't you 
 want to see the rooms first ? " 
 
 " No," I said. " They're sure to be nice. Only I 
 don't like going to the Alhambra for the first time 
 without you." 
 
 " You needn't mind," she assured me. " One 
 place is mighty near the same as another to me, as 
 long as you're happy. I'd as lief not see it till to- 
 morrow, and I reckon I wouldn't shed tears if 'twasn't 
 to be till day after." 
 
 A minute more, and Sarah had disappeared in the 
 elevator, followed by a small liveried boy with our bags 
 and umbrellas. It only remained to ask the way to the 
 Alhambra, which was easy to describe, and but a short 
 distance. 
 
 I passed through a burning pool of sunshine and 
 then was fanned by the freshness of the forest. 
 There in the green dusk, a nightingale had begun its
 
 THE LIFE MASK 55; 
 
 evening song, and the running waters sang with it. 
 There was a bitter-sweet fragrance of ferns and 
 moss, and moist earth drinking in its evening draught 
 I could see that it must always be cool and golden- 
 green in these long avenues under the elms, for the 
 sunshine could but leak through the arching roof 
 in a few gold drops. Never had I been in a place so 
 peace-giving, and I walked slowly, stopping at a great 
 fountain whose mossy stone base was a sheet of mov- 
 ing crystal. 
 
 On a heavy stone seat lolled an elderly brown man 
 with sombrero tilted back and to one side above the 
 level line of his eyebrows. He had a tray of flat, 
 sugared cakes to sell, though there was no one to 
 buy; and instinct told him so surely I was no client 
 that he did not offer his wares. Next to him, how- 
 ever, sat a withered old woman, with a bright-colored 
 handkerchief tied over her gray hair. She had a 
 basket of magnolia buds folded in packets of their 
 own glossy, brown-lined green leaves, and tied with 
 grass. 
 
 As I came near, she held up the basket, and the 
 luscious perfume came out from the packets, filling 
 the air. With a stab of remorse, I remembered that 
 I had left at Ronda the oleanders I had likened to 
 myself. No doubt they would have been thrown out 
 to fade. I might better have left them growing, since 
 my pity had done them only harm; but I could not 
 resist the magnolias. I bought two, all I could carry in 
 comfort, though they had been gathered with just
 
 56 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 enough woody stem to make a convenient handle for 
 each. Then I went on to the Alhambra, turning, as I 
 had been directed, past the immense bulk of Charles 
 the Fifth's unfinished palace; and in two or three 
 minutes I was buying my ticket of entrance for the 
 Alhambra. 
 
 I wanted one, I said, which would be good for many 
 weeks. Already I was making up my mind that I 
 must live here for a very long time, and my heart 
 was beating at the thought of the jewel I was about 
 to see. Nothing could rob me of my love of beauty 
 and the joy it gave. It was, I told myself, the one 
 link which united me with happier women. 
 
 As I talked to a Spanish official who could speak 
 French, a number of people passed on their way out 
 of the Alhambra. 
 
 " Mademoiselle is late," he said. " Everybody else 
 is going. Or if a few are left, they will be leaving 
 soon." 
 
 " But surely I have more than an hour before clos- 
 ing time? " I asked, frightened lest I had lingered too 
 long by the fountain. Still, I did not miss hearing the 
 " Mademoiselle." It made me feel younger, and as 
 if I had thrown off some burden, or else as if the 
 burden were invisible to others. 
 
 " Yes," he answered, " there is a little more than 
 an hour, but for some reason most people leave a good 
 while before the Alhambra shuts, even in the summer, 
 when it is as light at half-past six as at noon. We 
 often notice that. Will mademoiselle have a guide? "
 
 THE LIFE MASK 57 
 
 "No, thank you," I said, "not to-day. I don't 
 want to learn things at first. I want only to see them." 
 
 The man smiled indulgently, indicating the door by 
 which I could go from the office-room into some bright 
 space beyond, which I could see through the glass. I 
 went through ; and had left the world I knew, to enter 
 a world of centuries ago. 
 
 It was a haunted world, of " Arabian Nights Tales," 
 and I was dazed by the beauty of its fairy-palace. 
 Yet I felt at home, as if I knew the place and had a 
 right in it. 
 
 I was in the Patio de la Alberca, the marble-paved 
 court of the great pond bordered with myrtle. The 
 huge crenelated Tower of Comares reared its square 
 bulk against the blue of an unclouded sky. The tiles 
 of the gallery-roof glittered in the sun, like eyes in 
 a peacock's tail. Through the arched doorway under- 
 neath I could see the ivory-like walls and jeweled dado 
 of the Hall of Ambassadors, and I could look through 
 the windows of the immense room, far off to a vague 
 opal glimmer of sky and tree-branches. I stood in the 
 shadow which lay in a clearly defined line along the 
 pavement, like a strip of black marble joining the 
 white; and from my feet to the other end of the long, 
 open patio stretched the bright water of the bathing- 
 pool. Its color was the green of emeralds, but more 
 opaque. Still, it was transparent enough to show the 
 forms of fish brilliant as water-flowers, under the sur- 
 face. 
 No one was near. I seemed to have the silent
 
 58 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 palace to myself, and I threw my veil over my hat, 
 so that my eyes should lose nothing of detail and 
 color. The Tower of Comares, yellow-pink, the bright 
 roof of the gallery and its delicate supporting pillars, 
 the arched door and the dusk of the room beyond 
 were all repeated in the marble- framed green mir- 
 ror. I could see myself, too. The eyes looking down 
 met eyes looking up from the water-world. I could 
 not bear to raise my eyes, for it seemed that never 
 should I see such beauty again. A ruffling breath of 
 wind, and it would be blotted out, never to be so 
 radiant. Besides, I had the conviction of a child, that 
 into this fairy-land would steal something still more 
 wonderful, if I looked long enough without raising 
 my eyes; something like the visions which appear in 
 crystals to the gaze of seers. 
 
 By and by the green mirror began to hypnotize me. 
 What I could see in it was all that was real. I was 
 not sure that there was anything outside it. Maybe 
 I should see myself as I had been in another form 
 centuries ago when I lived here, and the Alhambra was 
 my home. Yes, if I were patient, I should know 
 whether I had been a princess or a slave, and whether 
 there had been some man who loved me. 
 
 I was almost afraid to wink, lest I should miss the 
 expected vision, and as I stared into the mirror some- 
 thing new did come into the picture. A figure, dark 
 in the shadow as a living silhouette, walked into the 
 doorway, and stood there for a moment. It was the 
 figure of a man, tall and straight and slim. He was
 
 THE LIFE MASK 59 
 
 bare-headed. He carried his hat in his hand. Under 
 his arm was something red. It might be a book. 
 Now he had begun to move again. He was walking 
 slowly put from under the shadow of the gallery, 
 coming along the patio toward me ; but it did not occur 
 to me to move, or even to pull down my veil. Half 
 hypnotized as I was by the great green crystal with 
 its picture, and the one moving form in it, the man 
 had for me no existence in the outer world. 
 
 The spell would have broken if I raised my head 
 to see an ordinary person idling in the sunlight, pass- 
 ing me and going out of the Alhambra, home to some 
 hotel or pension. For a minute he, whoever he was, 
 should have the privilege of living in my fairy-land. 
 He would never know what had happened to him, 
 and when, unknowing, he faded out of the mirror he 
 would cease to be, as a bubble dies in bursting, or a 
 rainbow changes into mist. 
 
 This I felt; and enjoyed the feeling in peace, be- 
 cause I knew that my face was hidden. In stooping 
 down to peer at the fish, I had knelt on one knee. 
 Round the other I had clasped my hands, and was 
 bending so far over that any one passing could see 
 no more than the crown of my hat and a long veil 
 falling over my hair behind. So I remained, in the 
 same position, without lifting my head, as the man 
 in the mirror came closer. I was no longer looking 
 at myself or at the goldfish. I was watching him, 
 seeing his features take a kind of ethereal clearness 
 as he drew near. At last, I could not have taken my
 
 60 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 eyes from his figure if I had tried. Although the real 
 man could catch no glimpse of my real face, I began 
 to guess that he must be able to see it in the water 
 as I saw his, for the eyes in the mirror met mine in 
 the mirror, and gave them some quick message. It 
 was like two astral bodies meeting in the mystery of 
 space, while the bodies of flesh were far away, asleep. 
 
 He was moving so slowly now, that he appeared 
 hardly to move at all. This would make the vision 
 in the crystal last longer. I was glad. I did not 
 want it to end. It was not like romance. It was 
 romance. 
 
 Yes, the red thing under his arm was a book. I 
 wondered what book, and was sorry that I should 
 never know. He was dressed in gray flannels. In 
 his buttonhole was stuck a scarlet pomegranate blos- 
 som, the sacred flower of Granada. He had a rather 
 low, soft collar, out of which his firm brown throat 
 rose. His face was deeply burned by the sun, all but 
 the highest part of the broad forehead, which looked 
 white by contrast. I could almost have smiled to see 
 how the line of white was aslant. Evidently he pushed 
 his hat always to one side. This slanting line of 
 brown gave a quaint effect. I glanced at the hat 
 swinging in his hand. It was a Panama, sunburned 
 like his face. He must have had it a long time. Per- 
 haps he loved it and hated to get a new one. Once 
 I had felt like that about some of my things. He 
 walked well. In the sheet of green water he seemed 
 to glide noiselessly as if to music he could hear and 
 I could not. The upper part of his face was beauti-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 61 
 
 ful. I thought that the arch of his eyebrows would 
 have made him look like a saint in some old picture, 
 if his lips had not been too full and his chin too square 
 for the face of a conventional saint. I fancied that 
 his eyes must be blue. They had an effect of being 
 light in contrast with his dark skin, and black eye- 
 brows and hair; but the sun in them dazzled mine as 
 if I were looking at something too bright. I did not 
 ask myself whether he were a handsome man or not. 
 Maybe the real man would not be beyond the ordinary, 
 but I did not want to know what he was like. The 
 face and the eyes looking out of the mirror might 
 be worth all the world to a woman, and they were mine 
 to keep forever, if I chose. He would not dream of 
 my dream. 
 
 We looked long at each other in the water, as he 
 slowly passed. Then he was gone out of the picture. 
 
 
 
 I waked up from the dream. I knew that a man 
 had come out from the Hall of the Ambassadors, 
 had walked past me, and was still in the Patio de la 
 Alberca. If I turned, I could see what he was like. 
 Possibly he would be looking back. But not for any- 
 thing would I have turned. Even the Tower of 
 Comares and the exquisite pillars and the orange-trees 
 and myrtle borders were more beautiful in the mirror 
 of water than they were in themselves. There was 
 just the difference between the real and the ideal. 
 
 I stopped without moving, until I was certain the 
 man had gone. Then I got up and walked through an 
 inconspicuous door into the Court of Lions.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 I FOUND other courts of the Alhambra as beauti- 
 ful as the Patio de la Alberca ; but none seemed 
 so wonderful that evening. Still, I stayed till 
 the last minute. I was the latest visitor, and it was 
 after half-past six when the door of the dull little 
 office shut behind me. Nothing could be seen of the 
 fairy palace but the plain red-brown walls, and brown- 
 tiled roofs with which Moorish men loved to conceal 
 the secret splendor of their dwellings. 
 
 I thought that I knew the way back very well, and 
 I should have known it, if I had not been thinking 
 of other things. Somehow, I got on the wrong road, 
 and there was nobody to direct me; but instead of 
 worrying, I was pleased. To lose myself seemed part 
 of the spell. And I was still wandering in the pre- 
 cincts of the Alhambra. 
 
 Presently I came to a tall iron gate. It was wide 
 open, but as I drew near a man on the other side be- 
 gan to shut it. Thinking that I wanted to enter, he 
 shook his head, saying something in Spanish which 
 I took to mean, " It is too late." 
 
 Until he said this, I had had no wish to go farther, 
 but when it was forbidden, I felt a desire to see what 
 was on the other side of the gate. Also, in the exalted 
 mood not yet thrown off, I could not bear to go back 
 
 62
 
 THE LIFE MASK 63 
 
 to the hotel and help Sarah unpack our trunks. I 
 wanted to stay out of doors and to be alone. 
 
 I took two pesetas out of my purse and held them 
 up. The man stopped shutting the gate. He began 
 to talk again in Spanish. I thought that he said, " It 
 is closing time, but if the Sefiorita wishes to walk 
 through, let her do so. I will wait here until she 
 comes out." I understood this more from gestures 
 than words; and, nodding my thanks, I marched 
 briskly through the gateway. I hoped to show him 
 by walking quickly that I knew what he meant, and 
 would return in a few minutes. 
 
 I was in a large, straggling wood, surrounded with 
 red walls. There were many trees, and a few rough 
 paths cut through the long grass. As I turned away, 
 the man called out to attract my attention, and pointed 
 toward two distant towers. Evidently they were the 
 attractions here, and this walled, wooded space being 
 part of the Alhambra, the gate was supposed to close 
 for the night. I hurried on along a brown path under 
 young trees, to the first tower, which must always have 
 been outside the palace precincts, though perhaps at 
 one time not out of the gardens. I remembered that 
 Washington Irving told of a tower where a princess 
 had been imprisoned. Perhaps this was the place. 
 Murray spoke of it, too, and of another tower near 
 by, but I had forgotten the names. Beautiful win- 
 dows supported by marble pillars suggested that there 
 was something worth seeing inside; but the door of 
 the tower was fastened. I knocked and called. No
 
 64 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 one came, and I realized that permission to walk 
 through the wood did not include a late visit to the 
 towers. I must wait till another day for the sight- 
 seeing, but I was not sorry I had come in. There was 
 a beauty in the desolation of the place, and the sky 
 was golden behind the trees. 
 
 I began to take bearings, and to realize that one of 
 the ruined red walls was a wall of the Alhambra it- 
 self. I could see a church, and the backs of some 
 curiosity-shops which had fronts higher up near the 
 palace of Charles the Fifth. In the ill-kept wood 
 there were two or three small houses, and a half 
 ruined patched-up tower where perhaps a guardian 
 lived. There was even a pension, behind a wall with 
 flowers falling over it; and there was another wall, 
 in front of which I stopped as if a voice had called 
 me. It was a very high wall, and very old, its white 
 plaster yellow in patches, and splashed with pink and 
 purple under the mass of convolulus cascading over 
 the top, as if generations of flowers had dyed it with 
 their petals. 
 
 In the wall was a gate of cedarwood carved in 
 squares like the oldest doors in the Moorish palace; 
 and it was because this gate stood ajar that I stopped. 
 Evidently it opened into a private garden, and I had 
 no right to peep, but I could not resist. A path led 
 straight on, and in the middle of it, not more than six 
 yards from the gate, was an old stone fountain, spray- 
 ing plumes of spun glass into a shallow basin and be-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 65 
 
 yond, over moss and weeds that choked the gravel; 
 ill-kept but beautiful borders of myrtle encroached 
 upon the path, and walled with green the tangled 
 masses of flowers which had once been carefully 
 planned beds. The scent of orange flowers and mag- 
 nolias fanned out to me, and I caught the tinkle of 
 water, which seemed to come from many directions. 
 I thought it was like a garduen of dreams, gentle 
 and mysterious like the perfume of flowers in moon- 
 light. I wondered if there were a villa out of sight 
 beyond the thicket of orange and magnolia trees and 
 cypresses which made a screen behind the fountain. 
 
 As I stood, longing to push the cedar gate wider 
 open, an elderly man ambled down the path. He had 
 been gathering oranges, and was coming out with them 
 in a basket. I retreated, ashamed of my curiosity 
 and afraid he might scowl at me, but instead he smiled 
 blandly. He was fat and brown, with oily skin, and 
 so little hair on his large round head that he looked 
 like a monk, in spite of his sombrero. His sloping 
 eyes, set far apart on either side of a wide nose, with 
 a flat bridge and a wrinkle straight across it, blinked 
 mildly like the eyes of a sheep. 
 
 " Carmen de Santa Catalina," he said, and more 
 which I could not understand. But I knew that Car- 
 men was Spanish for garden. I wanted so much to 
 ask questions about the garden that I felt desperate 
 in my forced dumbness. 
 
 Seeing that I did not understand him, the man whom
 
 66 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I took to be a gardener came out and locked the gate 
 with an immense key, which looked as if it might be 
 a hundred years old. Then, touching his sombrero 
 he walked away with an odd gait, which I thought like 
 a big armchair moving from side to side on legs set 
 at the corners. I walked away too, remembering that 
 I was trying the patience of the guardian at the en- 
 trance of the wood. But seeing the big key turned 
 in one of the cedarwood squares had made an exciting 
 idea jump into my head. I wondered if there were a 
 house in the garden not lived in, and if so, whether it 
 would be possible for us to take it. I could hardly 
 wait to get back to the hotel, hoping the manager 
 might know about the Carmen de Santa Catalina. 
 
 It turned out that he did know. The place had be- 
 longed in old days to a Spaniard who was a student of 
 Moorish history and dialects. He had died many 
 years ago, and the Carmen had been bought by a 
 Frenchman believed to have Arab blood. He had 
 been rich, but had somehow lost his money. Then 
 he killed himself, but not at Granada. He had been 
 far away, at Monte Carlo, it was rumored. Mean- 
 while he had married a Spanish wife, the daughter 
 of a curiosity-shop keeper down in the town. There 
 was a house in the garden, but the widow did not like 
 it, and had gone back to live with her father. Now 
 she was middle-aged, and kept the shop herself. 
 Sometimes she let the Carmen de Santa Catalina, but 
 not often, for the house was dilapidated. There was 
 little furniture, and the owner refused to buy anything
 
 THE LIFE MASK 67 
 
 new for tenants. This the manager knew because he 
 had once or twice had people in the hotel who were 
 looking for furnished villas on the Alhambra hill; 
 but they had said the Carmen de Santa Catalina was 
 impossible. Besides, it was inconvenient, having the 
 gate of entrance to the woods shut up at night, for 
 there was no other way of getting to the Carmen; 
 and some people would be afraid to live so near the 
 Tower of The Infantas, and the Cattiva, which were 
 believed by the superstitious to be haunted. 
 
 " I should like to live there," I said. 
 
 The manager smiled. 
 
 " Perhaps you would think differently if you saw 
 the house; and even the garden is in bad condition. 
 The old fellow who looks after it does nothing ex- 
 cept take care of the orange-trees and the grapes for 
 his mistress. Still, I can give you her name and ad- 
 dress." 
 
 I saw by his manner that he was sure I would never 
 live in the Carmen de Santa Catalina; but I was just 
 as sure that if I could, I would. I made up my mind 
 to go the first thing in the morning to the curiosity- 
 shop kept by the widow of the Arab-Frenchman. 
 
 By this time it was past seven o'clock, and I let the 
 elevator take me up to the floor of the suite which I 
 had not seen. 
 
 There were long cool corridors running from end to 
 end on each story of the hotel; and our rooms were 
 in the middle of one. I knew the numbers, but lin- 
 gered for an instant looking at a trunk standing out-
 
 68 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 side a door next one of ours. It was a leather port- 
 manteau, which had seen much service. 
 
 There were all sorts of labels on it, like decora- 
 tions on an old soldier's breast, and the name painted 
 in white letters on the end toward me was a soldier's 
 name: Captain H. St. J. Shannon. There were 
 labels of hotels in Cairo and Alexandria and other 
 eastern places which made me thrill with longing, al- 
 most with envy; and among the newest looking was 
 a white slip with " P. and O." printed on it, and the 
 name Mooltan. 
 
 "Our ship!" I said to myself. "Perhaps this 
 portmanteau was put on board her at Port Said or 
 somewhere for Gibraltar before she went to England 
 last time." I thought about the Mooltan, steaming 
 on at this moment through the blue Mediterranean 
 on her way to the far east, whence this trunk had 
 come; and I thought of all the places the label-cov- 
 ered thing had seen, if only it could tell. I felt drawn 
 to it, somehow, because of its unknown adventures, 
 and because it had traveled so far in our ship, maybe 
 in one of our staterooms. I was listening to a temp- 
 tation which said, " Look and see the number of the 
 cabin on the white label," when the door of the room 
 was thrown open. Instantly I grasped the handle of 
 my own door, and would have darted in, if I had not 
 seen a large bunch of wild oleanders dripping water 
 in the hands of a hotel chambermaid. She had 
 a disgusted look on her pretty dark face, and was 
 holding the long stems of the flowers in a torn bit
 
 THE LIFE MASK 69 
 
 of paper, so as not to touch them with her hand. 
 
 " Oh," I exclaimed in French, " are you going to 
 throw those away ? " 
 
 " But, yes, mademoiselle," she answered in the same 
 language luckily for me. " The monsieur in this 
 room has brought them, not knowing that they carry 
 fever and misfortune. I am going to have them 
 burned before he comes in to dress for dinner. They 
 are very bad things, and I would be sorry to have them 
 harm him." 
 
 " Perhaps he will be angry," I said. 
 
 " I think he will not notice, mademoiselle. But I 
 will get for his vase some better flowers." 
 
 " Here, take this magnolia," I said, offering her one 
 of the two buds I had bought in the packets of their 
 own leaves. " It will open out and be lovely if you 
 cut the knot of grass; and you can give me the olean- 
 ders instead. I like them." 
 
 "Mademoiselle is not afraid of the evil spirit?" 
 
 " No," I said. " I don't believe in it. Poor ole- 
 anders, how sad they must feel because people say 
 cruel things." 
 
 The girl laughed. 
 
 " It is said, too, that if they can give a curse, they 
 can take it off. But that does not concern mademoi- 
 selle." 
 
 " Still, I should like to have them," I insisted; and 
 she put the branches into my hands, taking one of my 
 magnolias instead. I was pleased with this episode, 
 because in the hurry of leaving Ronda in the morning
 
 70 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I had forgotten the oleanders gathered for pity's sake. 
 Now it seemed that I might atone. 
 
 Sarah had unpacked everything, after all. I might 
 have known she would. Of course she made meek ex- 
 cuses for not keeping her promise. 
 
 " 'Deed, Miss Nita, I was that tired sittin' in the 
 cars so long, I felt right glad to stir around and get 
 the cramp out of my bones. There wasn't another 
 livin' thing to do but unpack, or I'd a done it, to please 
 you. Anyways, I got through a long time ago, and 
 I've been en joy in' myself real well lookin' at the nice 
 view." 
 
 Her " nice view " was down from the great height 
 of the hotel windows over the brown roofs and open 
 patios of Granada, and the blue-green plain of the 
 Vega away to far mountains, the Last Sigh of the 
 Moor. Our rooms looked south, and would have been 
 hot but for a cool wind from the Sierra Nevada. They 
 were very Spanish rooms, I thought, with their white 
 walls, tiled floors and crimson curtains. Though they 
 were not pretty, I liked them for their novelty, and 
 Sarah had made them almost homelike with the few 
 sofa-cushions and bits of drapery and books we had 
 brought. Neither of us had any framed photographs 
 to carry on our travels. The only one I had kept, 
 the picture of my mother with me a little child 
 by her side, was not one I could let be seen. It was 
 wrapped in paper at the bottom of my trunk. 
 
 Sarah did not like my oleanders, so instead of
 
 THE LIFE MASK 71 
 
 using them to adorn the little salon between our 
 rooms, I put them into a jug of water in my own bed- 
 room. While I was arranging them, a man next door 
 the door of the leather portmanteau began to 
 whistle softly, but not so softly that I could not hear 
 him distinctly through the wall. He had come in, as 
 the maid said he would, to dress for dinner. He was 
 not angry about the loss of his oleanders, or he would 
 not be whistling, I thought. No man could whistle 
 so melodiously if his temper were upset. Perhaps he 
 liked my magnolia better than the oleanders. The 
 bud would be wide open now, and sending out a cloud 
 of perfume. 
 
 Never had I heard such musical whistling. He 
 might almost have been a professional, so flutelike 
 were his trills. I thought that he must be young, and 
 rather pleasant or good-looking, or the chambermaid 
 would not have troubled to protect him by taking away 
 the oleanders. 
 
 At first he whistled some Irish air which I had 
 heard, but had forgotten. Then he went straight 
 through the " Toreador " song from " Carmen," and 
 at last, to my surprise, he began to whistle a very 
 old darky ballad, " Weep no more, my lady." It 
 was a plantation song of the slave days, many years 
 before I was Born; but Sarah often crooned it in her 
 high, thin voice, to put me to sleep at night when I was 
 a tiny child. I used to love, and ask for it. " Weep 
 no more," I called it, though perhaps it had some other 
 name which I didn't know, for I never heard any one
 
 72 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 sing it except Sarah. Now this man, who must be 
 an Englishman, if he were Captain H. St. J. Shannon, 
 owner of the leather portmanteau, was whistling a 
 song of the Southern slaves. I wondered where he 
 could have learned it, and hearing the old tune made 
 my heart begin to beat fast. But, after all, he did not 
 know the air very well. The flutelike notes stopped 
 suddenly. He went back to the beginning again, and 
 broke down at the same place. Then he began to sing 
 the tune, in a tenor voice almost deep enough for bari- 
 tone, and with a thrilling quality in it. From the 
 whistling I had thought it would be lighter. It was 
 so sweet, so sad that tears came to my eyes, though 
 the voice on the other side of the wall was singing 
 " Weep no more, my lady." 
 
 Once more he broke down on the same note. He 
 had forgotten the rest of the tune, and like the singing 
 bullfinches trained in darkness, he had always to go 
 back to the beginning. 
 
 I was tempted to take up the song where he had to 
 leave off, and sing it through for him. How surprised 
 he would be! And he would never know who 
 prompted him. Whenever he sang the song after- 
 ward he would have to think of me, making up some 
 sort of image in his mind, where I would live as a 
 mystery. It was all I could do to resist, but I did 
 resist. Somehow the old Southern tune seemed to go 
 well with the soft, sleepy fragrance of magnolias. I 
 wondered if he thought so too, and if perhaps the 
 perfume had not suggested that song to his remen>
 
 THE LIFE MASK 73 
 
 brance. I should have liked to know; but now the 
 idea was connecting itself in my mind with magnolias, 
 I believed that I should always think of the song and 
 the beautiful white flowers together. 
 
 " Weep no more, my lady ! " . . . He kept on 
 trying, again and again, until the inspiration came, 
 and with triumph he whistled the whole air from be- 
 ginning to end. Evidently Captain H. St. J. Shannon 
 was not a man easily discouraged when he made up 
 his mind to do a thing. Almost, I clapped my hands 
 in applause; but not quite. And it was really a re- 
 lief when I heard his door open and shut, which it 
 did immediately after he had accomplished his aim. 
 He was going down to dinner. I believed that he 
 must have waited to remember the end of the tune, 
 and that he had determined not to leave the room until 
 he did so. 
 
 I liked him for his obstinacy, and I envied him be- 
 cause he had no reason to hide himself from people's 
 eyes. He could go happily to dinner in a big, gay 
 restaurant, meeting all the eyes, and giving back their 
 looks. Yes, I did envy him ! He did not know how 
 fortunate he was. No oleanders could give him bad 
 luck. I pictured him tall, and rather swaggering, with 
 light wavy hair, cut very short, and laughing blue eyes 
 with curled-up lashes. 
 
 Sarah and I dined together in our sitting-room, 
 looking out on a flaming sunset which died to royal 
 purple. She was tired afterward, and thought that I 
 must be also; but the Alhambra, and the face in the
 
 74 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 pool, and the thought of the Carmen de Santa Catalina 
 had excited me. I begged her to get ready for bed, 
 and let me sit by the window looking out at the sky 
 and the firefly lights of the Vega, when the waiter 
 had cleared our table. At last she consented, and 
 went to her room, which was on the left of the salon. 
 Mine was on the right. Her door was partly open, 
 and I could hear her stirring about. It made the place 
 seem homelike that she should be there. 
 
 With my arms on the window-sill, and the cool 
 breeze from the mountains on my face, I began in- 
 voluntarily to hum the air of " Weep no more, my 
 lady." Sarah heard, and appeared in her doorway, 
 slipping on her dressing-gown. 
 
 " Mercy me, Miss Nita ! " she exclaimed. " You're 
 singin' my old song, ' Weep no more.' I ain't heard 
 it for I don't know how many years." 
 
 " Why do you never sing it any more ? " I asked, 
 bringing my head back into the room from outside 
 the window. 
 
 " Because well, I never do sing anything, any 
 more. Not for years. My! But I ain't forgotten 
 that tune." 
 
 "Where did you learn it?" I asked. "You 
 never told me. It must have been old, even in your 
 day." 
 
 " I reckon it was. But it was mighty sweet, an' 
 folks sort o' clung to it. 'Twas a young man learned 
 it to me. His name was William. I don't know as 
 I ever spoke to you about him. There was no call
 
 THE LIFE MASK 75 
 
 to speak, for you was no more'n a baby when we was 
 goin' together, Will an' me." 
 
 " Were you in love with each other ? " I asked 
 eagerly. 
 
 " I liked him mighty well. An' he asked me to 
 marry him. I said I would. We was engaged. 
 But we couldn't be married just then ; an' I got a place 
 to take care of you. Folks thought I was a real good 
 nurse, an' that was why your mama was set on havin' 
 me. Afterward, when I'd had the care of you for a 
 while, you just wound yourself round an' round my 
 heart. You wasn't very strong, either. An' so when 
 Will wanted me to come away an' be married, why 
 I just couldn't! I said I reckoned to stay till you got 
 bigger, an' he took it into his head that I liked 
 you better'n I did him. Maybe I did, too but it 
 kind o' hurt when he went away an' took up with a 
 cousin o' mine. Well, I reckon 'twas for the best." 
 
 " So that was your love story ! " I said. " And I 
 spoiled it for you. It was like me ! " 
 
 " You can't hardly call it a love story. An* you 
 didn't spoil it, darling. I wouldn't put it past Will to 
 have gone back on me for Nance anyways. I reckon 
 'twas only an excuse." 
 
 She disappeared from the door, embarrassed, and 
 regretting, maybe, that some impulse had led her to tell 
 me the story. I half felt that I ought to follow 
 and caress her, as if to make up for the wrong 
 I had done in the past, beginning even as a baby to 
 cheat her of her love. But something held me back;
 
 76 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 selfishness, I am afraid, though I tried to make myself 
 believe that she would rather be alone just then. 
 
 Downstairs, the guests of the hotel were finishing 
 their dinner. Three stories under my window, I could 
 see them walking out through the long windows of 
 the restaurant, on to a wide, roofless balcony, bril- 
 liantly lighted. There were many seats, and round 
 tables dotted about on the tiled floor, and people 
 took chairs by these small tables, to smoke cigarettes, 
 and drink their after-dinner coffee. 
 
 I counted a dozen men, and twice as many women 
 in evening dress. Their voices floated up to me. A 
 few were talking French and Spanish, but most of 
 them were English and Americans, by their voices. I 
 had done right not to go down. Still, I felt lonely 
 looking down from my unlighted window on their 
 gayety, and I tried to pick out my whistling neighbor, 
 Captain H. St. J. Shannon. 
 
 There was no fair-haired young man, no young man 
 at all. The men were elderly or middle-aged. Most 
 of their heads were growing bald, as I could very well 
 see. 
 
 "Is he old, then?" I asked myself, vaguely disap- 
 pointed, because the voice had sounded gallant and 
 young. But at that moment another man came out 
 on to the balcony, and seated himself at a little table 
 away from all the others. He gave some order to a 
 waiter, and laid a red book open on the table, as he 
 struck a match to light a cigarette. The first match 
 went out, and he struck another. Then he lifted his
 
 THE LIFE MASK 77 
 
 head, slightly puffing at the cigarette between his lips. 
 His hair was black and thick, and I caught one glimpse 
 of the face I had seen in the pool. 
 
 I felt the blood rush to my cheeks. 
 
 " Why ! " I exclaimed, and said no more. I drew 
 in my head, and pushed my chair back from the win- 
 dow. 
 
 In the night, before dawn, I Heard faint, suppressed 
 sounds in the room next mine. Some one was dress- 
 ing 1 . By and by some one was softly opening and 
 closing the door. Captain H. St. J. Shannon was 
 going away from Granada.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 IT was a long time before I could fall asleep again, 
 after my neighbor's stealthy night-flitting. I 
 switched on the electric light by the bed, and 
 glanced at my watch. It was two o'clock, but already 
 the inhabitants of Granada were astir, or had not yet 
 gone to rest. I got up and looked out of my window, 
 and far below could see lights in the patios, which in 
 the blue night were like square plates of gold on dark 
 enamel. Voices came up to me, scolding or laughing 
 or singing in those illuminated wells. Watch-dogs 
 bayed, and cocks crowed. Nearer, a nightingale sang. 
 Seen and heard in the night, Granada might still have 
 been a city of the Moors. I felt sure their ghosts 
 must often come back, trying to fit keys into vanished 
 locks, or wishing to walk in gardens long ago built 
 over with shops or blocks of flats. 
 
 I went back to bed, but as I was falling down the 
 hill of sleep, to my horror I saw the gray dream on 
 its way to my bedside. Already I was under its in- 
 fluence, but I struggled to get away before it took hold 
 of me. " I can't, I can't dream it here ! " I heard my- 
 self saying. I tried to wake, for I realized that I was 
 asleep. Then again I heard my own voice crying out, 
 " Come and save me ! " I hardly knew to whom I was 
 calling, but it was not to Sarah. And the answer I 
 
 78
 
 THE LIFE MASK 79 
 
 seemed to hear was a man's voice singing, " Weep no 
 more, my lady." That gave me the power to throw 
 the horror off, and I woke, panting and sitting up in 
 bed. But the dream was conquered before it had 
 come near. 
 
 Instantly I thought of the oleanders. What was 
 that the boy at Ronda said about a great joy or gift 
 which could come with the oleander to a " person ac- 
 cursed," from another person more fortunate ? I felt 
 superstitious about the flower, though I had laughed 
 at Sarah. 
 
 She was as much excited as I over the Carmen de 
 Santa Catalina the next morning, and we got up early 
 in spite of my disturbed night. I said nothing to her 
 about the dream. If she heard that it had tried to 
 come on my first night on the Alhambra hill, she would 
 worry, and I could not explain what had driven it 
 away. 
 
 When I opened my door into the corridor, I was 
 surprised to see that the portmanteau was still there, 
 for certainly my neighbor had dressed himself and 
 gone out at two o'clock in the night. Also his door 
 was wide open, and two maids were working in the 
 room, with the feverish energy hotel servants seem 
 to have only when they are cleaning the deserted quar- 
 ters of one guest for the coming of another. I gave 
 a glance in passing and saw on a table near the door 
 an empty vase. Where was my magnolia? It could 
 not have faded yet, for it was a bud yesterday after- 
 noon, and the one I had kept was in full bloom of
 
 8o THE LIFE MASK 
 
 beauty. I wondered if the man had taken it with 
 him. The thought that he must have done so pleased 
 me, though I was glad he could not find out that his 
 neighbor was the woman who had looked at him in 
 the water mirror. I was glad, too, that he had gone. 
 I did not want ever to see the flesh and blood face 
 more distinctly than I had seen it looking down at 
 the balcony, for if I passed close by, in the street or 
 in a hotel corridor, it would cease to be ideal. I could 
 not bear to have the memory dimmed by a common- 
 place reality which would lie over it in my brain, like 
 a photograph taken on the same film with another. 
 
 I supposed that the portmanteau, now locked and 
 strapped, was to be sent after its owner. I could have 
 found out, if I had chosen to be curious and ask ques- 
 tions of the maids at work in the deserted room. But 
 I did not choose. 
 
 I guided Sarah to the iron gate in the wall which 
 enclosed the wood, hoping to get into the Carmen, but 
 the cedar door was fastened. Though I tapped and 
 called, no one came, and there was nothing to do but 
 go down into Granada, to the address the hotel mana- 
 ger had given. 
 
 It was in a side street close to the Cathedral, a curi- 
 osity-shop not as picturesque as those on the Alhambra 
 hill. This was sparsely furnished with wares, and 
 the few bits of old china, fans, tortoise-shell boxes 
 and ivory crucifixes in the window were dusty and un- 
 attractive. Madame de Ferrand, the widow of the 
 once rich Arab-Frenchman, was letting her business
 
 THE LIFE MASK 81 
 
 fall to pieces. Only a sleepy boy who could speak 
 neither French nor English was in the shop, but he 
 called the " Sefiora," and she rolled in like a wave, 
 a very fat; woman, clothed somehow in billows of 
 coarse muslin, such as cooks put over meat-safes to 
 keep the flies off. She must once have been gor- 
 geously handsome. Fanning herself with an illus- 
 trated paper, devoted to the interests of the bull- 
 ring, she listened to my proposition. She did not 
 interrupt, but as I talked her great eyes traveled 
 slowly, almost without winking over both our per- 
 sons, from hats to shoes, finally resting on my veil. 
 At last she shrugged her shoulders, looking as Ori- 
 ental as a statue of Buddha. She would be pleased, 
 she answered in bad French, to give us the key of 
 the Carmen, and those of the house. Also she would 
 be charmed to let the place, for as long a time as we 
 wanted it, provided we would pay each month in ad- 
 vance. But she was certain that we were not people 
 to be content with the discomforts of the house. She 
 was unlucky and always had been, since her husband 
 died. It was not likely that her luck would change. 
 
 Looking at her and her untidy surroundings, it was 
 easy to see why she was " unlucky." Still, it was 
 honest of her not to raise our expectations by prais- 
 ing her property. She went to a Spanish desk, the 
 only fine thing in the place (and the only thing not 
 for sale), peering near-sightedly into drawer after 
 drawer to find the keys. The desk was at the back 
 of the shop, where there was no window, and in the
 
 82 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 brownish dusk the immense figure in its yellow-white 
 dressing-gown loomed vague in outline as a swollen 
 ghost. 
 
 She rummaged through two rows of drawers, 
 muttering in Spanish as each one failed her, then be- 
 gan again at the beginning, and with a " Maria del 
 Pilar ! " clawed out a bundle wrapped in a dirty hand- 
 kerchief of Spanish colors. 
 
 The entire contents of the red and yellow rag con- 
 sisted of keys, mixed promiscuously together, large, 
 middle-sized, and very small, innocent of labels. 
 
 " It is a long time since I have needed any of these," 
 she apologized, with a sidelong glance at Sarah's 
 disapproving face. " But I know many of them by 
 sight. The worst of keys is, they seem to breed, like 
 mice or rabbits, and there are always ten times as many 
 as when you saw them last." 
 
 Of the biggest key there was no doubt. She un- 
 hesitatingly pronounced it the key of the garden, of 
 which Pepe the gardener had the duplicate. As for 
 the others, it was a more difficult question. There 
 were dozens, each of which wished to disguise itself 
 as another. But yes, that was almost certainly the 
 key of the back door, and if not, it did not matter, 
 for Pepe kept one in his pocket, if he had not lost it. 
 He was supposed to go in and air the house once 
 at least in every three or four months. Poor house, 
 she herself had not been to see it for years, it made 
 her too sad, with its memories of happiness! How- 
 ever, she used the oranges and lemons and the few
 
 THE LIFE MASK 83 
 
 grapes. If we took the place, which she did not be- 
 lieve possible, we must pay extra if we wanted the 
 fruit. Ah, here was the front door key. She knew 
 it because the handle was broken. And as for the 
 keys of cupboards and chests of drawers, if we de- 
 cided on living in the house, we might take this lot 
 with us, and try them in their places. That would 
 be the simplest way, as, after all, she had forgotten 
 which was which, and her brain was not equal to the 
 task of separating them. As for the rent, it was two 
 hundred pesetas a month, or two hundred and fifty 
 with house-linen and fruit. To the flowers, such as 
 they were, we were welcome. But really, it was hardly 
 worth while to talk business. Nothing would come 
 of it! 
 
 " What a shiftless piece o* poor white trash! " said 
 Sarah, with unusual sharpness; for with lazy, untidy 
 women she had no sympathy. But I was sorry for 
 Madame de Ferrand in her dusty shop, left high and 
 dry by the tide of fortune. Growing comfortably 
 fat and reading about bull-fights were her consola- 
 tions for the loss of her husband and the loss of her 
 looks. 
 
 It was too much for Sarah to walk up the hill, so 
 we found a cab. Strenuous exercise always drained 
 her face of color, and set her heart fluttering so pite- 
 ously that mine ached with a guilty ache. Well I 
 knew what was the strain which had weakened the 
 faithful heart, and that but for me it might be strong 
 and normal still.
 
 84 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Even the pleasant excitement of seeing the old villa 
 in its garden, and deciding whether we could attempt 
 housekeeping there, gave her that curious pallor round 
 the eyes which I was beginning to know and under- 
 stand. 
 
 " You mustn't say you would like to live in the villa 
 just to please me, unless you really would," I said, 
 when the moment came of fitting the big key into the 
 lock of the garden gate. 
 
 " I reckon 'twill do me good and keep me goin' to 
 have a house to look after, if 'tain't fallin' in over our 
 heads," she answered cheerfully. 
 
 We looked for Pepe, but he was not in the garden. 
 We had it to ourselves, and I was glad. I was glad, 
 too, when Sarah sat down on a stone seat, hot with 
 the sun, at the side of the path leading from the gate to 
 the fountain. She said that she was more concerned 
 with the house than the garden, and as she was a little 
 tired she would wait there for me till I was ready to 
 unlock the villa. She could walk! round the paths 
 another time. I did not try to persuade her to change 
 her mind, but I knew in my heart that she thought I 
 would find it more congenial to be alone than to have 
 her with me for the first time in this place of sad, 
 poetic beauty. It was true. I did want to be alone, 
 but I was sorry she had found me out. 
 
 " I must live here. I must have this for my own," 
 I said to myself, for the garden was speaking to me in 
 many voices, voices of trees, voices of flowers, voices 
 of fountains. I felt it was meant to be mine, and I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 85 
 
 couldn't give it up, no matter what the house might 
 prove to be like. 
 
 What a haven! I thought. Behind the high" wall 
 and the locked cedar gate I should be as safe from the 
 world as in a fortress. Even in the crowded season 
 at Granada, it would be the same. I need never be 
 seen. No one could get at me. The place seemed 
 made for me to live in for months or years. I knew 
 that here I could never grow restless, and long to go 
 somewhere else, as I had longed at Laburnum Lodge. 
 It was true, as Sarah had known by instinct. That 
 little house " wouldn't do" This would. In the gar- 
 den, all the beauty of the world would seem to be 
 mine. 
 
 I followed the path from the gate, past the middle 
 fountain, where another narrow path cut it across, 
 straight on to a low white wall covered with ivy and 
 honeysuckle and heliotrope. This was built on the 
 edge of a sheer height, looking down over the Vega, 
 and away, at the right, to the Sierra Nevada like 
 banked white clouds along the horizon. The other 
 three walls were so high as to be almost unclimbable, 
 and no one could see over them, except by mounting 
 a ladder. Along the low wall above the precipice 
 ran a seat whose brick and stone showed through the 
 ragged coat of stained white stucco, and at each of the 
 two junctions of this low wall with the high, side 
 walls, there was a simple summer-house of the kind 
 called by the Spaniards a mirador: a mere lookout 
 place of four pillars and a roof overgrown with flow-
 
 86 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 ers, built to command the view. One of these mira- 
 dors was at the far end of the garden; the other was 
 beyond but not far from the house, which I could 
 just see through a thicket of orange and magnolia 
 trees, with here and there the silver arbor of an 
 olive or a dark spire of cypress. From tree to tree 
 great branches of wistaria and rose vines had looped 
 themselves lovingly for companionship, as the years 
 slept in the garden; and all that was visible of the 
 house through the maze was a brown-tiled roof and 
 a few small windows framed in blazing flowers. 
 The intersecting paths were overgrown with grass 
 and at their junctions were fountains or stone- 
 rimmed sunken basins edged with myrtle. All the 
 neglected flower-beds, which were square in shape, 
 and the plantations of orange-trees had myrtle hedges, 
 once neatly trimmed, no doubt, but now putting out 
 irregular sprouts like little green hands beckoning, or 
 asking alms. Round each fountain ran a narrow 
 cushion of velvet moss where the water had sprayed 
 year after year. They reminded me of the long, 
 green-covered sandbags which old-fashioned people 
 lay against window-frames to keep out the draught. 
 Some of the myrtle-trimmed beds were given up 
 to roses, which passed from birth to death un- 
 tended, but lovely in all phases. Others were filled 
 with Madonna lilies glistening like marble where the 
 sun found them, between the branches of a magnolia 
 set in the center like a green-and-white brocaded um- 
 brella. Two immense box-trees had been hollowed
 
 THE LIFE MASK 87 
 
 out in the middle to make summer-houses, and smaller 
 ones, done in the same way, were dark niches for old 
 garden statues. Along the edge of each path and 
 each flower-bed deep gutters had been cut, for running 
 water. They were half choked with fallen leaves 
 and a potpourri of flower petals, wet from last night's 
 irrigation, though now the fountains were still. 
 
 There was no wind this morning, and the garden 
 was a great bowl of perfume, almost stifling in its 
 sweetness. A million insects were tuning tiny fiddles 
 and beating microscopic drums. Now and then a bird 
 let fall a liquid note, in secrecy of shadow ; and where 
 the sun was hottest white butterflies danced up and 
 down like spray from a hidden fountain. 
 
 It was a long time before I could leave the green 
 gloom of the intersecting paths, and the hot flowery 
 wall looking over the Vega. Even then I explored 
 one of the miradors before going to call Sarah. 
 Rickety wooden steps led up into it, and the open 
 facade toward the garden was thickly covered with a 
 mass of convolvulus. Inside was a three-legged table, 
 fallen down, and a chair which would certainly have 
 collapsed if I had trusted myself to it. A lizard ran in 
 front of my feet, and a family of baby bats clung up- 
 side-down to the broken roof. As I looked over 
 the sea-like expanse of the Vega, I heard Sarah's voice 
 calling : 
 
 " Where are you, Miss Nita ? I'm gettin' 'most 
 worried." 
 
 She had been on a small exploring expedition of her
 
 88 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 own, and had feared that I might have fallen over tfie 
 low parapet, built on the edge of the height. 
 
 " My, but it's a pretty garden ! " she said. " Real 
 wild and over-run ; but I reckon with a man who knew 
 his business and wasn't afraid o' work, we could make 
 it right sweet. You'd like to have it, wouldn't you? 
 And the price is mighty cheap, if there's any house at 
 all" 
 
 " We'll go and see," I said, almost trembling lest the 
 villa should turn out to be impossible. But, to my in- 
 tense joy, it was far better than either of us had dared 
 expect. The outside was as unpretentious as houses 
 built by Moors, a mere yellow-white box with small 
 windows protected by brown wooden shutters. But 
 its shabby stucco was almost hidden by flowering 
 plants, golden-hearted roses, and huge bunches of 
 wistaria. 
 
 The front door was of Moorish fashion Spanish 
 fashion, too ; a rusty iron grille; then a tiled vestibule ; 
 and a carved door of faded cedarwood. In an old 
 lamp hanging desolately from the painted ceiling a 
 bird had built a nest and tired of it, maybe years 
 ago. 
 
 Inside, all was in darkness, because of the barred 
 wooden shutters. We had to grope our way across 
 the first room, guided by knife-blades of light at 
 the cracks. The place smelled musty, and was 
 cold. Sarah was afraid lest a rat should run across 
 our feet. I laughed at her, and was surprised 
 at my own strength as I forced open the tightly
 
 THE LIFE MASK 89 
 
 jammed French windows and prized up the bars. 
 Sarah could not have done it. 
 
 It was a strange room which we saw when I had 
 let in air and sunshine. The walls were done in 
 arabesques and beehive work, copied from the Alham- 
 bra, perhaps by Monsieur de Ferrand, who was sup- 
 posed to have Arab blood. The floor of the hall was 
 tiled, but this room, with a dado of brilliant tiles, was 
 paved with many different woods, in an intricate 
 pattern. There was brown oak and lighter olive, 
 flesh-pink eucalyptus, and pale yellow and white 
 and greenish woods which I did not know. The floor 
 was done in stars, with rays of different colors. Win- 
 dows were bare of curtains, and for furniture there 
 were but a few dilapidated chairs and tables, once 
 handsome, but with their red velvet upholstery ragged 
 and faded now, past hope. 
 
 Other rooms were not so pretentious, but all were 
 large, with high ceilings. Most of the furniture and 
 some of the windows were broken. The kitchen 
 regions were depressing, and there was scarcely a 
 whole plate or cup in the house. The cooking arrange- 
 ments puzzled Sarah; and the table linen and bedding 
 were unfit for use; but if we were willing to spend a 
 little money we could make ourselves comfortable in a 
 primitive way. The prospect of buying things en- 
 chanted Sarah, for she had a reckless enjoyment of 
 spending money, if it were to give me pleasure. In a 
 small black bag she always wore hanging from her 
 belt she kept little blunt ends of pencil, and half-sheets
 
 9 o THE LIFE MASK 
 
 of paper economically saved. Walking from room to 
 room, she made two separate lists: one of things we 
 must get ; the second of things it would be nice to have. 
 
 " There's plenty of money, Miss Nita," she repeated 
 several times, when I opened my eyes at the growing 
 length of the first list, added to moment by moment 
 from the second. " There's all the legacy from my 
 poor Uncle John. My ! I shan't spend it while I live, 
 not if I try. And there's yours, that's been pilin' up 
 an' up year after year. I'm sure your mamma would 
 like you to spend it makin' yourself happy." 
 
 We were both remembering at that moment other 
 money I might have had, money which would have 
 made me rich ; but neither of us spoke of it. That be- 
 longed to the subject which we never mentioned. I 
 hated even to think of it in this house where I hoped to 
 begin my new life. And I saw myself drawing a 
 sharp line between the past and the present, as one 
 might cut an apple in two parts. 
 
 " When do you think we can come in, Sarah ? " I 
 asked. " Oh, do let's make it soon, even if we have 
 to engage an army of people to get things straight for 
 us at first." 
 
 She thought for a minute before answering, lost in 
 calculation. As I watched her, I could not help notic- 
 ing how old she looked, when her features relaxed, 
 without any attempt at brightness. Bent slightly down 
 as her face was, the delicate covering of flesh hung 
 loose, in long, straight lines like those in a white cloth 
 that has been wet and hung up to dry.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 91 
 
 " We'll come to-morrow ! " she exclaimed so sud- 
 denly that I started. I had just been telling myself 
 that it was time I began to take care of her. She was 
 wearing herself out in trying to make me forget. 
 
 " To-morrow ! " I echoed. " Do you really think 
 so? How splendid ! Our real life together will begin 
 to-morrow in this garden a new world, just for 
 us." 
 
 She looked at me with her tremulous, loving smile 
 that made one side of the prettily prim mouth go up 
 higher than the other. 
 
 " I'm mighty glad you think you'll be happy, dearie. 
 Gladder'n I can tell. But if you're goin' to stay 
 happy, there ought to be somebody else in the garden 
 for you besides me." 
 
 Just then a brown face with sloped, sheeplike eyes 
 looked smiling in at the open window. 
 
 " There'll be Pepe," I said.
 
 BOOK II 
 THE REALITY
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 AFTER we began our life in the Carmen de 
 Santa Catalina, I did not stir outside the gar- 
 den gate for more than a week, not even to go 
 into the palace of the Alhambra. 
 
 This was because, when Sarah and I were shopping 
 in the town, buying things for the villa, I saw go by 
 in an omnibus of a hotel on the hill, a man and 
 woman husband and wife whom I used to know 
 when I first lived in London. They had not been 
 friends of mine nor had they ever been enemies, 
 merely acquaintances; but I could not bear to run the 
 risk of meeting them. They were people who traveled 
 a good deal, and it was not a very strange coincidence 
 to run across them here, in a place of world-famous 
 interest, even out of season. When we decided upon 
 coming to Granada, I knew that among many tourists, 
 there might be a few old acquaintances, and I took the 
 chance of that. But, from the first, I planned to find 
 a villa where I could hide myself; and I had been for- 
 tunate, for the Carmen de Santa Catalina with its high 
 walls, its Moorish garden, and its glorious view was 
 ideal for my purpose. 
 
 We settled in hurriedly, with Pepe, Pepe's wife, 
 and a few more or less useful relatives of theirs to 
 help us. For several days life was a wild picnic, but 
 
 95
 
 96 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I enjoyed it, and Sarah was in her element. A cab 
 from Granada was engaged to take her down the hill 
 and back every day, until all that we needed was 
 bought; and her highly original French (picked up in 
 the years at Paris) served her well in the shops. No- 
 body knew English, but most of the tradespeople had 
 a few words of French. When we settled down, 
 we had as servants only Pepe, and a sister of his 
 whom we engaged to come and help Sarah every day 
 between the hours of eight in the morning and eight 
 in the evening. Pepe asked for an assistant in the 
 garden, if we wished to have things well kept; but 
 I had set my heart upon gardening, myself. I 
 wanted work in the garden, and learning Spanish, to 
 be my occupations. Already I had a kind of fond- 
 ness for old Pepe of the flat-bridged nose and blink- 
 ing eyes. I had discovered that his ears, under scal- 
 lops of silvered black hair, were pointed, and he 
 seemed like a soft-mannered, elderly faun, reluctantly 
 dressed in modern clothes. I felt that when I could 
 speak with him in his own language, he would be a 
 congenial presence in the garden; but I did not like 
 the long-lipped, beetle-browed young nephew who 
 was vetoed. Pepe shook his head at this, but soon 
 he found that because I loved it, I could really help him. 
 One task at which he set me was the cutting away 
 of dead roses from among the living ones. It kept 
 me busy for hours each day, for nothing had been 
 done since the roses began to bud. I did not care, 
 when on our sixth day in the Carmen Sarah reported
 
 THE LIFE MASK 97 
 
 seeing Sir Henry and Lady Moffat still at the Wash- 
 ington Irving, sitting in front of the hotel when she 
 passed. I had grown so infatuated with the walled 
 garden, that I had no wish to leave it for an hour. 
 I had been to the Alhambra only once, but already I 
 could go back to it in memory, walking from court to 
 court, seeing more distinctly than any other the Patio 
 de la Alberca with the picture reflected in its water- 
 mirror. The Alhambra would wait, I said to myself, 
 as it had waited hundreds of years for me to come 
 home to it. By and by the Moffats and the other 
 tourists would be gone. In July, and afterward for 
 many months, it would be almost as if the Alhambra 
 groves and the palace belonged to me alone. Mean- 
 while, I had the garden, and the view over the low 
 wall of the miradors; the old town beneath, with its 
 roofless patios, secret to the world on their own level, 
 but open to me and the birds. There, if I liked, I 
 could observe family quarrels, and love-makings. I 
 could hear girls singing over their work; I could see 
 mothers teaching half-naked brown babies to walk, 
 and children playing with dogs, and lambs, and old 
 women milking goats. I could look out over the Vega 
 of changing colors, never twice the same, its sunrise 
 and sunsets, its twilights, and the yellow flowers of 
 light that blossomed in the blueness of night. In the 
 evening, after the heat of the day was gone from 
 the garden, and the water had begun to swirl round the 
 myrtle-edged flower-beds, and ripple like silver snakes 
 down each side of the transverse paths, I could stroll
 
 98 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 along the grass-grown walks, and see the seven foun- 
 tains sparkling under the trees like flowers of glass. 
 All the air would then be full of music: the notes of 
 nightingales our own nightingales singing the 
 garden to sleep; the bubble and murmur of waters; 
 the chiming of church bells down in Granada; the 
 laughter of children softened by distance; and some- 
 times the strumming of guitars. Then I could pic- 
 ture young Spanish men in cool, narrow streets I 
 could not see, serenading girls they loved, who peeped 
 out from behind iron bars and threw roses from their 
 sleek black hair when the music stopped. It was bet- 
 ter to imagine this than to see it, because I was able 
 to paint the men as handsome and the girls as beauti- 
 ful as I chose. 
 
 Early in the morning, too, I could go to the garden 
 gate, and see Pepe's sister, Marta of the glorious eyes 
 and shadowy mustache, taking in the milk, and the 
 bread. A witch-like old woman brought the milk, 
 not in cans, but in goats jingling with bells, who were 
 stopped outside the gate, and milked before our eyes, 
 into big jugs which Marta carried from our kitchen. 
 The bread arrived in panniers on a small donkey with 
 tasseled and embroidered harness. While its driver 
 stopped to gossip, the little animal would lean in an 
 attitude of abandon against a tree, and appear to sleep, 
 if but for a moment. 
 
 Never before, though I had seen beautiful gardens, 
 had I made friends with a garden; but soon our Car- 
 men was my friend. I got to know each tree inti-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 99 
 
 mately, and all the flowers' faces, though they were so 
 many. I began to see that each face was different 
 from the others, as with human beings and animals. 
 I thought there was a difference even in the perfume, 
 the roses expressed themselves for me and each bud 
 was a note in the song of color. I laid my ear against 
 the trunks of trees, and it seemed as if I could hear 
 the whisper of the sap in their veins. If I happened 
 to wake early, I would steal downstairs and out of 
 the house in my nightgown, sure that there was no 
 one to spy upon me, and wade through the ghost-blue 
 sea of the dawn till the sun came up. Then, when the 
 veil of dewdrops spread over the heads of the flowers 
 began to glitter, I would bend down and bathe my face. 
 The pure sweetness of this " wine of the sky " gave 
 me a pleasure different from any I ever knew, even 
 when I was a child. And I was glad that I could help 
 give back its youth to the deserted garden, just as life 
 and work in it were giving back mine. 
 
 On the tenth day, in the afternoon, Sarah told me 
 that the Moffats had gone. She had seen them in the 
 hotel omnibus which was piled with their luggage. 
 
 " Now you needn't stay penned up any longer be- 
 hind this gate," she said. " You can go out as much 
 as you please. And there don't seem to be anybody 
 left, hardly. I don't meet a soul when I'm drivin' 
 down, except the Spanish." 
 
 " But I don't call this being penned up," said I. 
 " Once I used to pity the Lady of Shalott, but not 
 now."
 
 loo THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Sarah looked blank. 
 
 " I don't know as I ever heard you speak of her 
 before, but I know you used to have plenty o' friends 
 with titles. I'm mighty glad you're happy here, 
 honey, an' so am I, happier than I ever thought I 
 could be, even a little while ago when things began to 
 come right. Still, it ain't natural for a young lady 
 like you, livin' like this forever, without any interests 
 but a garden. I want something to happen to you, 
 Miss Nita." 
 
 " Oh, no, enough has happened to me ! " I cried 
 out. " For heaven's sake, don't let's have any more ! " 
 
 " I mean good things," she explained. " The kind of 
 things that ought to happen to a beautiful " 
 
 " Dearest old friend," I cut her short, " it's no use 
 pretending that I'm like others. We both know that 
 I'm one apart like the bat in the fable I used to be 
 so sorry for when I was little, because it wasn't bird 
 or beast, and could have no friends among either." 
 
 " There's no reason why you shouldn't have friends 
 make new ones, of course ! " Sarah exclaimed, ex- 
 citedly. " The garden, and just livin' ain't enough 
 anyhow they won't be enough long." 
 
 " But I'm going to have a new interest. Now the 
 Moffats are out of the way, I shall walk over to our 
 hotel one day soon, and ask about some one to teach 
 me Spanish. You can learn too if you like." 
 
 " No, I thank you, dearie. My French will do for 
 me. I can pick up what Spanish I need from hearin' 
 you speak it. I ain't equal to learnin' new things.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 101 
 
 What I want is to see you happy the way a woman 
 ought to be happy, an' then I can just lay comfortably 
 down an' die, if I feel like it." 
 
 "O Sarah, don't talk so!" I implored. "You're 
 not ill?" 
 
 " No, not a mite ill, only kind of tired sometimes, 
 as if 'twould be a rest to let the machinery stop. I 
 ain't goin' to do that, though, not if I can help it, 
 an' I reckon I can, till you've got a strong arm to 
 lean on, a whole sight stronger than mine ever was, 
 at the best. I want you to meet some good, splen- 
 did man, Miss Nita, who'll love you most to death, 
 an' make you marry him." 
 
 I stared at her, horrified. 
 
 "If it were any one else who spoke to me about 
 such things, I should say it was cruel," I reproached 
 her. " You wouldn't be cruel to me on purpose, 
 but" 
 
 " Only to be kind, as the sayin' is, honey. It ain't 
 cruel to wish for you what, if wise folks and books 
 are right, is the best gift on this earth. Well, I 
 reckon, next to the love of the Lord, the love of the 
 right man is the best thing there is for a woman." 
 
 I could not let her go on. It was like madness. 
 
 "Do you think," I broke in, "if I met a man 
 which I won't do and adored him, and he me, that 
 I'd marry him and not tell? Even if I were so self- 
 ish, so wicked, he'd find out soon." 
 
 "Well, and if he did?" Sarah gave me look for 
 look, with a new defiance which was strange on the
 
 102 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 prim face with its faded prettiness. " You're as much 
 of a martyr as if you was in Fox's Book, with bags 
 of gunpowder under your arms. Wouldn't a man 
 the right man thank God for the chance to com- 
 fort you ? " 
 
 I laughed then; I could not help it, though I hurt 
 her, making her shrink visibly in her sensitiveness to 
 ridicule. 
 
 " I don't know much about many men," I said, " but 
 I'm sure that isn't what they like best to do for a 
 woman. Besides, how can I tell that I didn't ' " 
 
 " For the Lord's sake for the Lord's sake! " she 
 cried sharply, waving her thin hands up and down. 
 " Don't you be keepin' that thought in your heart. 
 You don't want me to talk o' dyin', or layin' down to 
 rest, but that's the one quickest way there is to kill 
 me!" 
 
 " It's you who makes me say it. I can't tell " 
 
 " You can you can ! Just you believe Sarah. 
 I'm plumb certain ! " 
 
 " But the dream " 
 
 " Never mind the dream. It ain't comin' any more. 
 I reckon we've climbed up to where there's realities 
 now. Dreams go by contraries. An' there's no more 
 reason why you shouldn't be happy than any other 
 young lady that's beautiful an' full of life. See here, 
 honey, let you an' me go to those gypsies that blond 
 young fellow at Ronda was talkin' about. It would 
 be real interesting an' I reckon there's something 
 strange about 'em, different from other folks a sort 
 of gift. I know where they live, an' how to get there.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 103 
 
 I was talkin' this morning to the guide from the hotel 
 where we stayed. It was comin' home from the town, 
 an' there was that gypsy king as he calls himself, 
 struttin' and posturin' like a peacock in his velvet jacket 
 and red sash, and his silly white stockin's. He was 
 pesterin' me to buy his photograph, when that guide 
 come along and told him to let me alone. So I just 
 asked the young man if there was any good in the 
 gypsies, if they was nice to see, and if they could tell 
 fortunes. He give 'em a real good name for that; 
 an' everybody goes to visit the cave houses they live 
 in, an' watch 'em dance." 
 
 " Where everybody goes, is the place for us to keep 
 away from," I answered; but she looked so grieved, 
 that I repented. " Maybe everybody has gone away 
 now, though, and it would be safe." 
 
 " That's what I thought," she agreed. " I'd like to 
 see the caves an' the dancin' myself, for a kind of 
 change. It's what a body comes abroad for, to get 
 acquainted with the foreigneerin' ways." 
 
 "Well, then, we'll go," I promised her. "Will 
 you engage the guide to take us, some night soon?' 
 for I suppose we can't go alone ? " 
 
 She looked relieved, but self-conscious. 
 
 " I have pretty near engaged him," she admitted, 
 " for to-night, because he says night is the interesting 
 time. I've just set my heart on your havin' your 
 fortune told by a real fortune-teller." 
 
 I thought though I did not put my thought into 
 words that a " real fortune-teller " might have 
 things to say which would make me sad to hear.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 WE had dinner early, took off our few rings 
 and simple jewelry, and met the guide who 
 had engaged a carriage for us, at a little 
 after eight. The red of sunset still glowed in the 
 west, and In the midst shone the half full-moon, like a 
 silver vase in a furnace, as I saw it through my veil. 
 The guide, a wiry dark youth with bead-black eyes, 
 who could speak a hotchpotch of English and French, 
 sat perched on the high seat beside the driver. When 
 we had passed beyond the groves of the Alhambra 
 and its singing waters, and were going down the hill, 
 he began throwing us guide-book information. I 
 hardly listened, for to my surprise I found it exciting 
 to come out of the garden and go for a drive, after 
 having been shut up among the flowers and fountains 
 of the Carmen de Santa Catalina for ten days. Down 
 in the dusty white plain, we saw the Alhambra stand- 
 ing up grandly on its green height above the town ; and 
 for a while the carriage took us slowly through the 
 narrow old streets into which I had looked from the 
 miradors and terrace wall. They were picturesque be- 
 cause of their iron-grilled doors and windows, their 
 queer glassed-in balconies, and flapping green blinds 
 behind which powdered faces peeped out; but soon 
 we left them as our horses began to climb a steep 
 
 104
 
 THE LIFE MASK 105 
 
 and peculiarly ugly hill toward the gypsy quarter. 
 
 By this time the southern night, falling early and 
 with suddenness even in summer, had painted the red 
 west blue, with streaks of purple, and the moonlight 
 was gaining power. The low cottages and white- 
 washed cave-dwellings of the gypsies which I had read 
 about glimmered in the dusk like the inside of pearl- 
 oyster shells, and the lamps behind their deep-set door- 
 ways sent out a dull glow of orange yellow. Big 
 bunches of dusty cactus growing here and there, leered 
 at us like crowding hares with pricked-up ears. At 
 this hour the gypsy quarter looked a mysterious place, 
 and the effect was heightened, as our carriage stopped 
 before a cave-house, by a sudden rush of girls and 
 children in fantastic dresses. 
 
 " I sent the capitano de gitanos notice we come," 
 the guide announced, as he helped us out of the car- 
 riage. " All his peoples ready for dance, to make 
 you a pleasure. You find it very naice. And you go 
 in see this cave. It is clean, and not to be afraid of. 
 These days the gitanos very good peoples, not like 
 other times. No danger to hurt or rob." 
 
 It had not occurred to me that there could be dan- 
 ger, but now that he spoke, I was almost sorry to hear 
 that there was no spice of it. The girls in their short 
 pink and yellow dresses, their fringed shawls and 
 tuftlike head-dresses, surged round Sarah and me, 
 laughing, showing their white teeth and chattering in 
 Spanish. There were few who were pretty, but they 
 were young and bright-eyed.
 
 106 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " They ask if you see dance first, or have the for- 
 tune telling," the guide interpreted the chatter. 
 
 " Oh, I think we must save the fortune telling for 
 the last, don't you, Sarah?" I said. 
 
 She agreed, mildly. She was smiling, and looking 
 about with interest. I was delighted that I had 
 pleased her by consenting to her plan. Evidently she 
 was enjoying the adventure, she who never gave her- 
 self amusements of any kind! 
 
 " Yes, it is better, we do that," said the guide. 
 
 We went into the cave-house, through a doorway 
 which was an aperture in the whitewashed rock, 
 with a rough wooden door fitted into it. The cave 
 itself formed two rock-rooms. From the outer one, 
 which we entered from the road, I could see that there 
 was another beyond, but it was in darkness, while 
 the front room, used for a kitchen as well as for a 
 dancing-saloon, was lighted by unshaded lamps with 
 tin reflectors. The irregular roof and walls were 
 whitewashed and there were many utensils of polished 
 copper hanging from nails. Also there were a few 
 baskets, made of woven grasses, and colored, appar- 
 ently gypsy work intended for sale. Everything was 
 clean and meant for show. A fat old woman with a 
 brown, greasy complexion, was flattered by our admi- 
 ration of the copper pots and pans and ladles. She 
 pointed out the queer oven where she did her cooking, 
 and was so enchanted with Sarah's interest that she 
 patted the London-made, black silk mantle caressingly, 
 and fell to examining the bead fringe. At sight of
 
 THE LIFE MASK 107 
 
 this liberty and Sarah's amused smile, the young girls 
 took courage, and the prettiest one, spurred on by her 
 friends, with shrieks of impish laughter, tried to undo 
 my veil. 
 
 " They wish no harm," the guide explained, as I 
 shrank away. " They say, they sure the young lady 
 very beautiful. They want to look, and they dance 
 better if they see her face and eyes." 
 
 I had the impulse to refuse, but decided that it would 
 be foolish. I knew there was no real reason why I 
 need object to these gypsy girls staring as much as they 
 liked at my unveiled face. I put up my hands and 
 took out the pins myself. The folds of lace dropped, 
 and I laughed in spite of myself at the girls' affected 
 cries of admiration. 
 
 " They say, my lady, you have the eyes more splen- 
 did than the Spanish womens," the guide translated 
 their exaggerated compliments, " and the skin like 
 some magnolia flowers. They think my young lady 
 must be princess, she has such an high air, yet is much 
 sympathique." 
 
 " They are very kind," I said, " but now we have 
 talked enough about myself, and we should like to see 
 the dance." 
 
 " In one, two minute," promised the guide. " We 
 wait for the capitano. He come when he dressed." 
 Rush-bottomed chairs were given us, and by the 
 time we were settled, the captain of the gypsies ap- 
 peared: a strapping fellow with a low forehead and 
 two chins. His costume in honor of the dance was a
 
 io8 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 velveteen coat, and a red sash dividing his fancy white 
 shirt from common gray trousers. He bowed to us, 
 sat down in a businesslike way, and began to play on 
 a guitar while the girls, two at a time, danced and 
 postured, cracked their castanets and struck little tam- 
 bourines. Their dancing was rather wild and grace- 
 ful, and interesting because of the background: the 
 whitened cave-walls on which their moving figures 
 flung shadows like giant tarantulas, the smoky, yellow 
 lamplight that lit sparks in their glancing eyes and 
 made their teeth sparkle; but as a performance it was 
 nothing to Spanish dances I had watched in London 
 music halls, a thousand years ago, it seemed. Still, 
 there was a thrill in it, a hint of savagery, as in a band 
 of young tigresses at play. One dance changed into 
 another with guttural cries of pretended joy, snapping 
 of castanets, beating and jingling of tambourines and 
 a strumming undertone of the guitar. 
 
 At last music and dancing stopped abruptly, the 
 girls laughing and breathing hard, all eyes on us. 
 We clapped our hands, and the guide announced 
 that we had now been given twenty-five pesetas' worth 
 of amusement. If we cared to pay more, they would 
 dance more. But Sarah and I, after consulting, asked 
 him to intimate politely that though we had enjoyed 
 the performance we had had enough. 
 
 " Then the fortune telling can be done," said the 
 guide. "Which of the ladies be first?" 
 
 " Oh, I am not going to have mine told," cried 
 Sarah. " I'm past fortunes. It's this young lady "
 
 THE LIFE MASK 109 
 
 But the idea of Sarah having her fortune told 
 amused me. She had insisted that mine should be 
 done. Now it was my turn to insist. 
 
 " No. You must go, too," I laughed. " I won't, 
 till after you've been. You must come back and let 
 me hear what it's like." 
 
 Sarah gazed at me wistfully, but seeing that I was 
 in the mood for mischief a mood she must almost 
 have forgotten she got up resignedly and, follow- 
 ing the guide with a moan of protest, disappeared 
 through the dark doorway like a train entering a 
 tunnel. 
 
 " Is the fortune-teller in that back room? " I asked 
 the young man when he returned without Sarah. 
 
 " Yes, mademoiselle, the fortune-teller has been 
 waiting there." 
 
 " A gypsy woman ? " 
 
 The guide began to play with a coin hanging from 
 his silver watch-chain. 
 
 " Oh, the fortune-tellers, they all gypsies here. 
 This a very good wan." 
 
 " But how can my friend understand what the gypsy 
 says, if you don't stay there to translate?" 
 
 " The fortune-teller can spik French and leetle 
 Englis." 
 
 In a few minutes Sarah came back, with an excited 
 and puzzled air. 
 
 " What a short fortune ! " I said, rising to take my 
 turn in the dark room. " It ought to be half-price." 
 
 " Old folks have got only short fortunes," said
 
 no THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Sarah. " But, honor bright, it was real queer. I 
 don't know as I'd of made such a point o' your comin' 
 to have yours told if I'd thought what 'twould be like. 
 Not that there's anything bad. But maybe, if you 
 feel as if you don't want to, you'd better not." 
 
 Her look and her words pricked my curiosity. I 
 had not wished to have my " fortune " told, but now 
 it would have been hard to persuade me to go without 
 hearing what the gypsy had to say. 
 
 " I won't give it up, as I'm here," I answered. 
 " I'm not afraid. You make me quite excited." 
 
 Sarah offered no more objections, though as I went 
 into the inner cave I knew that she was looking after 
 me anxiously. I wondered what the fortune-teller 
 could have said to upset her, and determined to find 
 out after we got home. 
 
 The guide went only as far as the door with me, 
 calling out in French, " The young lady," like a foot- 
 man who announces the name of a guest. I thought 
 it odd that he should speak in French instead of his 
 native Spanish, to a gypsy, although he had mentioned 
 that the fortune-teller knew the language. 
 
 After all, this back room of the cave was not quite 
 dark, though it had appeared so when looking at the 
 deep doorway from the lighted front room. On a 
 shelf, burned a floating wick in a saucer of oil, flick- 
 ering as if in a breeze, though the cave was airless 
 and seemed to have no ventilation except from the 
 front of the house. Near the doorway were two 
 large, very neat beds, made with plump bags of feath-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 111 
 
 ers, and covered with coarsely knitted lace counter- 
 panes over Turkey red. The place was cool, with 
 the peculiar coolness of a cellar. I could see no 
 furniture except the beds, and two chairs put at the 
 far end of the cave in a rough kind of alcove. In 
 one, with its back turned toward the door, sat stoop- 
 ingly a figure with head and shoulders covered with 
 a shawl. It did not move, but as there was no one 
 else in the room, and no way in or out except by the 
 door at which I stood, I knew it must be the fortune- 
 teller. 
 
 I groped my way toward the alcove, nearly catching 
 my foot once or twice in a large rug apparently made 
 of all sorts of colored rags. 
 
 " Shall I take this chair opposite you? " I asked, in 
 French, as I hovered on the verge of the hollo wed-out 
 alcove, and still the gypsy had not turned her head. 
 
 " Yes, if you please," came a whisper in the 
 same language. The deepness of the voice was pe- 
 culiar. 
 
 I squeezed past her chair into the alcove, and 
 took the chair facing her. The little light there 
 was, fell on my face, but though I tried to see what 
 the gypsy was like I could not. The large shawl 
 she wore over her head and stopping shoulders was 
 pulled forward so that it hung down as far as her 
 eyes, and narrowing at the cheeks was fastened at the 
 point of the chin. What with this muffling of the 
 face and throat, and the fact that her back was turned 
 to the room and its glow-worm light, I was unable to
 
 112 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 make out a single feature. I could not see even a 
 gleam of the eye; and the effect on my nerves of be- 
 ing alone in the cave-room with this vague presence, 
 was disturbing. I was ashamed of myself for fall- 
 ing a victim to the clap-trap arranged to impress me. 
 Still, I could not help thinking this might be a skeleton 
 wrapped in a shawl, and a skull grinning out of the 
 shadow. 
 
 I had to remind myself how near Sarah was, and 
 the guide from our old hotel, before I could make up 
 my mind to sit down. But it was over in a minute. 
 I did not think the fortune-teller would suspect that I 
 had been silly enough to hesitate. Sitting down, so 
 near the gypsy that my knees almost touched hers, I 
 inquired in a matter-of-fact tone what I was to do 
 next. 
 
 " Mustn't we have more light ? " I asked in French. 
 " You can't see the lines of my hand." 
 
 " It is not dark to me," the woman whispered. 
 " Lay your hand palm upward in mine." 
 
 I did so, and felt my wrist supported by her hand, 
 large and warm, with little pulses in it which to my 
 imagination were like magnetized needles. 
 
 For a long minute we rested thus, and, my arm 
 growing tired, I relaxed my muscles and let the full 
 weight of my hand fall suddenly into the old woman's, 
 to see what she would do; but the support did not 
 give way. The large throbbing palm felt warm and 
 strong under mine. 
 
 " Why don't you begin to tell me my fortune or my
 
 THE LIFE MASK 113 
 
 character?" I wanted to know. "I'm afraid I must 
 hurry. It's getting late." 
 
 " I am thinking," she answered, still in the deep 
 whisper, which I thought a theatrical affectation. 
 " I am thinking about you." 
 
 " Please tell me, if I don't interrupt you too much," 
 I said, " how it is you have learned to speak French ? " 
 
 " I have been to France," she whispered, " and other 
 countries." 
 
 "Telling fortunes?" 
 
 " Perhaps. And seeking my own." 
 
 " A long time ago ? " 
 
 " It is not yesterday, lady. But now your hand has 
 begun to tell me things. Let me speak of them." 
 
 " In one minute. Do you know English ? The 
 guide said you did." 
 
 " I can understand, but I would rather not try to 
 talk it. French is better." 
 
 " Very well. Go on. What does my hand tell 
 you?" ' 
 
 " A great deal, lady. For one thing it tells that 
 you are sensitive ; that you have strong and deep feel- 
 ings. You wonder about yourself. You do not al- 
 ways understand. You do not know yourself through 
 and through. You sometimes misjudge your own ac- 
 tions and then you are unhappy. If you are ever 
 unjust to any one, it is to yourself. You are afraid 
 of hurting others. You would not for the world do 
 that, even in little things. You would rather suffer 
 than others should. Am I right, so far ? "
 
 114 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 "I don't know," I said. 
 
 " Ah, I told you, lady, that you did not truly know 
 your own nature. You fear yourself. I read that 
 in your eyes." 
 
 " But you can't see my eyes ! " 
 
 "You think I can't?" 
 
 " It seems impossible that you can," I answered, 
 more doubtfully. 
 
 " Then I will prove to you that I can, by describing 
 your eyes. They are very large, and dark long in 
 shape, which gives them a sad look even when you are 
 not sad. But when you are sad it is heartbreaking. 
 You have thick black eyelashes, lady, long and straight, 
 not curling at all; and the under lashes are almost as 
 long as the upper ones, so that at the outer corners 
 near where your hair droops they mingle together in 
 a way that is disturbing to the men who look at you. 
 There, lady, have I described your eyes? And your 
 eyebrows too are long, sweeping downward a little 
 toward the temples, which adds to that look you have 
 of something fatal as if you had been destined to 
 know the deepest suffering of life. Yet that is not to 
 say you are meant to be unhappy forever. Now do 
 you think I cannot see in the darkness ? " 
 
 " You are a strange woman ! " I said. 
 
 " Yes. You are right. I am strange. But no 
 matter for me! It is you we are talking of. I 
 will tell you something else about yourself, before 
 I speak of what has happened in your past, or may 
 be to come in your future. It is this : I see you as one
 
 THE LIFE MASK 115 
 
 of those few women in the world one in ten thou- 
 sand there may be, or perhaps not so many of 
 whose love a man could not tire. You would never 
 grow old for him. You would always be the most 
 beautiful one. To think of you would send a thrill 
 through his nerves whether you were near or far 
 away. You would be for him a quenchless thirst, a 
 fever in his blood. You would be his heart, the pulse 
 of his life, and the breath that keeps his life in him. 
 If you did not love the man it would be the same. 
 From the first moment he saw you, and knew you 
 were in the same world with him, he could not for- 
 get. His torture would be his joy. This is because 
 you have a soul, and a heart. But it may be you 
 have not found them yet. I said you did not know 
 yourself. It seems to me, it may be that your soul 
 and heart are asleep." 
 
 " What do you mean by asleep? " I asked. I could 
 not help trembling a little. 
 
 " I do not mean," the gypsy said slowly, " that you 
 have never suffered. I think you have suffered, too 
 much for one who is young. What I mean is, per- 
 haps you have never yet loved a man. Answer me, 
 whether that is true, because it will be more easy to 
 tell you other things." 
 
 " I don't see why I should tell you anything," I 
 said. "If you can read my fate, you ought to find 
 out for yourself. It is a very simple thing." 
 
 " Ah, if you think it a simple thing, there is my 
 answer. You have not loved a man, though many
 
 n6 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 must have loved you, whether you knew or not. But 
 some day you will love. And loving will bring you 
 happiness." 
 
 " Does love bring happiness ? " I asked, trying to 
 laugh. 
 
 " Such love as a man will give you, must bring 
 happiness, because it is the best thing in the world. 
 It will be for him to make you feel that. I see the 
 man, and I think he will try." 
 
 "All the trying in the world would do him no 
 good ! " I broke out. 
 
 " You can't be sure. You think so, because per- 
 haps you have known more sorrow than joy. That 
 explains what I see in your face. You have lived too 
 much alone. Am I right?" 
 
 " It's true, I have been very much alone." I could 
 hear the bitterness in my own voice, and I half de- 
 spised myself for being hypnotized thus into answer- 
 ing the gypsy's questions, taking her so seriously that 
 my hands were cold, and my heart beating fast. 
 
 " You have thought, maybe, that happiness would 
 never come to you ? " 
 
 " I haven't only thought it, I've been sure." 
 
 " Wait. I am going to tell of something I see, 
 which has happened already, but is connected with 
 your future." 
 
 "Don't!" I exclaimed. "I'd rather not hear it." 
 
 " It is nothing sad or painful. I see a great 
 mirror. It is very large immense. The sky is re- 
 flected in it. It must be out of doors. But some-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 117 
 
 thing moves under the surface: Then it is not a 
 mirror of glass. It is water. I see you looking 
 into it. You are kneeling on one knee, your hands 
 clasped. A veil falls over your head, but does not 
 hide your face. You bend down very low. You are 
 thinking sad thoughts. Your face is sad, but how 
 beautiful! Another figure comes into the mirror 
 a man. He sees you. At first he thinks you cannot 
 be so lovely, so wonderful as you seem. No woman 
 could. But he comes nearer. The face in the mir- 
 ror is sweeter than the face of any human woman, 
 and sadder. It is like the face of a water spirit, in 
 prison. He longs to set it free. He would give his 
 life to do that, for he has fallen in love with the face. 
 It is not a fancy. He knows it is the only face in 
 the world for him, the one he has been waiting for. 
 He will love it always." 
 
 I sprang up and snatched my hand away. 
 
 " Some one has paid you to say this ! " 
 
 " I swear to you by my religion that no one has 
 spoken to me of any such scene or paid me or even 
 told me to describe it. I see it with my own eyes as 
 clearly as a picture, in the dark." 
 
 " It is all nonsense," I said, my mind in confusion. 
 " It seems mysterious. But it isn't. There's some ex- 
 planation." 
 
 " I have told you the truth." 
 
 " Well ! I don't want to hear any more such truths 
 or anything else at all. There's no man like 
 that"
 
 ii8 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " There is. He has been looking for you since he 
 saw your face." 
 
 " Please tell me what I owe you," I said. " I must 
 
 go." 
 
 " Give the money to your guide, lady. He will 
 
 settle with me." 
 
 "But how much?" 
 
 "Whatever you think the fortune worth." 
 
 " As a fortune it is worth nothing," I said, " be- 
 cause there's nothing in it, and it can never come to 
 anything at all. You assure me you're speaking the 
 truth ; but if any man who has seen me has told you to 
 arrange this scene if you've somehow managed it 
 through that guide you may tell your employer 
 that I am very angry. That I don't wish ever to see 
 him. That I want no man in my life, and won't let 
 one come into it. That it's not possible for him to 
 meet me." 
 
 " I swear to you again, lady, I have no employer. 
 And to a man who is worth calling a man there is no 
 such word as impossible." 
 
 " Good-night," I said ; " and I suppose I ought to 
 thank you for quite an interesting quarter of 
 an hour. You are a clever woman. You might 
 have been an actress. Perhaps you have been. 
 I will give the guide twenty pesetas for you. 
 Will you be satisfied with that, from my friend and 
 myself?" 
 
 " It is too much," answered the fortune-teller. 
 "Five pesetas each is enough."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 119 
 
 " Very well," I said. " You are honest about that, 
 anyhow. Good-night." 
 
 " Good-night," replied the whispering voice. 
 
 I pushed past the chair again, and went into the 
 front room without looking back.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 WHAT did the gypsy woman tell you? " 
 Sarah inquired as eagerly as a young girl, 
 the moment we had got rid of the guide, 
 and were in our own garden, relocking the gate upon 
 the outside world. 
 
 " Oh, the usual thing, I suppose they always tell," 
 I answered vaguely. " Unhappiness in the past 
 happiness in the future. A man coming into my 
 life." 
 
 " Nothing queer, to make you feel she could read 
 things?" 
 
 " Nothing that couldn't be easily explained in 
 one way or another. What did she say to you ? " I 
 hoped that Sarah would be more frank with me than 
 I with her. 
 
 " Oh, well, I reckon when you think of it, maybe 
 'twasn't anything so wonderful. But it did make 
 me feel kind o' creepy at the time. Then says I to 
 myself, when you was in, bein' done, ' I wouldn't put 
 it past that hotel guide to ha' told the woman every- 
 thing he could find out.' I expect they was in it to- 
 gether." 
 
 " Of course they were," I said. " The gypsy told 
 me to give the money to the guide, who would settle 
 with her. That meant the guide would take his com- 
 
 120
 
 THE LIFE MASK 121 
 
 mission and give the old woman the rest. She seemed 
 very honest, asking only ten pesetas for us both, when 
 I offered twenty; but probably she was afraid I should 
 find out afterward what the price really was, if she 
 accepted more." 
 
 " I reckon that must ha' bin it," said Sarah, thought- 
 fully, as we walked slowly along the path to the house 
 door. " But she didn't seem just like an or'nary 
 cheatin' gypsy fortune-teller, did she? There was 
 something 'bout her I hardly know what. Only I 
 felt all of a heap afterward, for a minute or two, till 
 I'd kep' on tellin' myself I was right silly." 
 
 "What did she say to you?" I insisted, though I 
 had no intention of giving Sarah any more definite 
 information concerning my " fortune " than I had 
 given. And I thought that she would like to avoid 
 answering my questions. 
 
 " Well it don't seem much now, lookin' back." 
 
 " Never mind. Do tell me what it was. I won't 
 go indoors till you do." 
 
 Sarah laughed her rare laugh, which, seldom as I 
 had heard it since I was a child, always struck me as 
 being self-conscious, as if in her meekness and humil- 
 ity she felt that she ought to apologize for making 
 even so small a noise in the world. 
 
 " I reckon that old gypsy woman plumb disliked me 
 without seein' me, except in that dark little cubby- 
 hole. I said, did she want to hold my hand? She 
 kind o' hesitated, then took it as if it was a mouse, 
 an' dropped it quick. She made a sort of excuse,
 
 122 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 sayin' she'd been in the dark so long she could see my 
 face real clear. She told me I'd worn myself out 
 somehow or other by my feelin's, till I was no more 
 than a bundle o' nerves, an' I had a look in my eyes as 
 if I expected a sword to fall on my head any minute. 
 Of course, she used different words from them, an' 
 that whisperin' voice seemed to go rustlin' through 
 me, like as if somebody was rubbin' my skin with 
 dried up, dead leaves. That was about all. An' I 
 suppose any one with eyes in their heads could tell 
 I was jumpy with my nerves. It was her 'way, an' that 
 queer cave, an' her face covered up so it might ha' bin 
 a skull" 
 
 " You thought of that, too ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Well, yes, I did, Miss Nita. I got to imaginin' 
 I could see eyes like coals o' fire sparklin' in the black- 
 ness under that shawl o' hers. That very idea come 
 into my head, an' I reckon it was why I wasn't so set 
 as I had been on your goin' in to talk to the woman." 
 
 " Well, it was an adventure," I said. " And seeing 
 the gypsy cave and the dancing was nice. You were 
 quite right to want me to go, Sarah dear. It was a 
 change for us. It has taken us out of the rut or it 
 would have, if we could get into a ' rut ' in this ador- 
 able garden." 
 
 "You don't feel yet as if you was in one?" she 
 asked wistfully. 
 
 " No, indeed thank Heaven ! " I cried, with my 
 eyes on the stars. " If I ever feel I am in a * rut ' 
 here, and pine to go on somewhere else because I'm
 
 THE LIFE MASK 123 
 
 bored and want a change of scene, I shall know that 
 it's a punishment for sin, that I'm doomed never to 
 find peace or rest, but must always flit from place 
 to place like a poor ghost who has no home in this 
 world." 
 
 " You never did anything to deserve punishment," 
 Sarah said, with the obstinacy her manner always took 
 on when I was tempted to break into some tirade 
 against myself or fate. " It's a good sign, our gettin' 
 this garden you like so much. It looks as if things 
 might be comin' our way. Why shouldn't you have 
 a little happiness ? It's high time ! Maybe that gypsy 
 was right about you. I feel in my bones she was." 
 
 " Let's go indoors," I said. "If we don't, we shall 
 hate to, more and more every minute." 
 
 " My ! Do you hate to go in, Miss Nita ? That's 
 the way I was feelin', but I didn't mean to say 
 a word. Not that there's a thing to be afraid of, but 
 I kind o' wish Marta was in the house to-night. It's 
 that fortune-teller, whisperin' in her dark cave, that's 
 made us both different from ourselves, that's all." 
 
 " Yes, that's all," I echoed, cheerfully. 
 
 We went in, put the subject of the gypsy out of our 
 conversation, if not our minds, and talked of other 
 things loudly and almost gaily. But afterward as I lay 
 wide awake in bed the thought came back. It came 
 promptly and quietly as if it had been waiting for the 
 moment when I could give it all my attention. It 
 seemed to belong to the beauty of the night, which was 
 so sweet that it was sad. The moon had gone long
 
 124 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 ago, but the sky was as thickly crusted with stars as 
 the walls of the Alhambra with arabesques. My win- 
 dow was wide open, uncurtained and unshuttered, so 
 that the lovely silent things of the garden, the trees 
 and the grass and flowers, could talk to me in their 
 language, all night till morning, without my missing 
 a word they said, even in my sleep. I loved to feel 
 that they were not barred away from me. I knew just 
 how they were looking, the lilies and roses and moon- 
 white magnolias, out there in the starlight which shone 
 only on the surface of the darkness, leaving the deep 
 velvety shadows unfathomed, like bottomless wells. 
 
 What a place the garden was to be happy in, and for 
 love to walk into ! It did not seem right that a woman 
 to whom love was forbidden, should live there. 
 
 Again and again I went over in my mind the scene 
 in the gypsy house. I could remember every word the 
 fortune-teller had said, and what I had answered. 
 How could she have found out about the man in the 
 Patio de la Alberca? It seemed to me that there was 
 only one explanation. The man had remembered my 
 face in the water-mirror, as I had remembered his. 
 He had made up his mind to attract my attention in 
 some way, and meet me if he could. I did not like this 
 theory, for it cheapened my romance that the hero of 
 it should bribe a hotel guide and a gypsy. I had not 
 had time to realize this at first, but I saw now, in the 
 stillness of the night, how almost repulsive it was that 
 the man should have coached the fortune-teller to de- 
 scribe our meeting if it could be called a meeting
 
 THE LIFE MASK 125 
 
 and to tell me that he had fallen in love with my 
 face seen in the water. I had to admit that it would 
 not displease me to know he remembered, or even that 
 he thought himself in love with me, as with a dream- 
 woman; but it spoiled everything that he should have 
 talked with the gypsy. It was as if he wanted an ad- 
 venture. 
 
 I could piece together the little separate bits of the 
 puzzle, very easily; so easily, I thought, that even the 
 glamour of mystery faded. 
 
 I knew now, and had known ever since I looked out 
 of my window to see him on the restaurant balcony, 
 that the man of the mirror had been staying in the 
 same hotel with me. I had believed, though I could 
 not be entirely sure, that he was the owner of the 
 leather portmanteau. This might or might not be 
 true; but if Captain Shannon had gone away he might 
 have come back. Our moving so soon and quietly to 
 the Carmen de Santa Catalina had prevented our meet- 
 ing at the hotel. Since then I had never been outside 
 the garden, so, if he had searched for me perhaps 
 at the Alhambra as well as in the hotel he must 
 almost have given up hope of going on with his ad- 
 venture. Very likely he had looked in the visitors' 
 book, if he cared to take a little trouble. The manager 
 might have described the latest arrivals. The descrip- 
 tion of my veil and traveling dress would have told 
 him that I must be the " Miss Nelson " or the " Mrs. 
 Lippincott " who had taken the Carmen de Santa Cata- 
 lina. Probably he supposed me to be Miss Nelson.
 
 126 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Next, he had wondered how he could bring himself 
 to my notice, as I never showed myself anywhere. 
 Then the idea of the gypsy fortune-teller had occurred 
 to him, and he had got hold of her through the guide. 
 I had called the gypsy honest because she refused 
 twenty pesetas and took ten; but no doubt she had 
 got something worth while from her employer. And 
 poor Sarah had been beguiled by the guide who, now 
 I remembered it, had even suggested the time for our 
 visit to the gypsy quarter. The more I thought the 
 more indignant I grew, and disappointed. I had 
 hidden in my mind a delicate idyll as a souvenir of 
 my first day in the Alhambra, and nothing would have 
 induced me to speak of it, even to Sarah. But he 
 
 the man whose eyes had held mine in the mirror 
 
 he had had no scruples. Really, he had been far 
 more to me than I to him, though he wanted me to 
 think he had fallen in love. He must have a poor 
 opinion of women! I had been right, indeed, in not 
 wishing to see his real face. Now he betrayed him- 
 self as being made of very poor clay, and I was sorry 
 
 sorry, because the picture was ruined. In my mind 
 I shattered it by breaking the crystal.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE next morning Sarah was not well. After 
 she had tried to get up as usual, she had an 
 attack of faintness and was obliged to lie 
 down again. With difficulty I persuaded her to stay 
 in bed, letting Marta do the work; and though she 
 fretted at first, later she enjoyed the unknown luxury 
 of a rest-cure. Propped high in the narrow bed, her 
 thin hair neat, and a large old-fashioned flower-mosaic 
 brooch at the throat of her plain nightgown, she lay 
 reading verses in " The Changed Cross," one of her 
 dozen favorite books. I put a small table near the 
 bed, with a vase of moss-roses on it and a jug of cold 
 tea, flavored with lemon, of which she was fond. 
 There was room on the table for other things, but, 
 according to a habit I remembered since childhood, 
 when Sarah Nicholls was my nurse, she preferred to 
 stow a strange collection of objects under her pillow. 
 When she twisted about, all sorts of odds and ends slid 
 from their hiding-place, like insects scuttling from be- 
 neath an overturned stone : an old silver watch ; a hand- 
 kerchief ; a box of wax matches ; a box of cough-drops ; 
 a black Bible; and a tiny bottle of amyl, a heart tonic. 
 She read, or let me read to her, until luncheon time. 
 After she had eaten, very sparingly according to her 
 custom, she thought that she would try to make up 
 
 127
 
 128 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 for her bad night by dozing for an hour or two. But 
 at four o'clock I tiptoed to the half -open door and 
 peeped in, to find her still asleep. She had slipped 
 lower down in bed and looked very peaceful, though 
 older than when awake. She had the air, I thought, 
 of one who would sleep for a long time, and as I was 
 sure she had lain awake nearly all night, I decided not 
 to risk disturbing her by coming in again till six or 
 seven o'clock. There was still plenty of cold tea in 
 her jug, and biscuits on a plate, if she should rouse 
 and want anything meanwhile. 
 
 The house was so quiet that my light footsteps, 
 pattering along the tiles of the corridors, seemed 
 loud, for it was a fete day in the church, and Marta 
 as well as Pepe had asked my permission to go out. 
 I had not told Sarah of this, for if she had known 
 that I was left alone to prepare our simple dinner she 
 would have insisted on getting up. Pepe had dis- 
 played to me a poster with red letters on yellow paper, 
 advertising a great " corrida " or bull-fight for the 
 afternoon, a grand event for Granada in the summer. 
 He seemed surprised, even grieved, when I shook my 
 head, showing disgust; but when he understood that 
 it was for myself, not for him, I had this unnatural 
 prejudice, he brightened. Marta had been dumb on 
 the subject of the bull-fight, but I had seen her and 
 Pepe talking together excitedly, and I was certain that 
 she was going. He vanished from the garden before 
 noon, leaving Marta to lock the gate; and when I 
 finished my solitary luncheon she too had disappeared.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 129 
 
 Knowing that Sarah was resting, and would be 
 better alone, I enjoyed the thought of having the gar- 
 den entirely to myself. I liked Pepe, and it was com- 
 forting in the morning to see him pottering about, but 
 sometimes I grew a little tired of him in the afternoon. 
 He seemed to make unnecessary errands in my direc- 
 tion, when I was reading, or when I wished to sit on 
 the stone seat by the fountain I liked best, and dream, 
 as happier women dream. 
 
 When I left Sarah asleep, I went straight to that 
 fountain, with my Browning, whom I was beginning 
 to read again with something of the old enchantment. 
 It was the fountain most distant from the house and 
 gate, almost at the end of the garden, and not far 
 from one of the miradors that rose from the low front 
 wall. The reason I liked this fountain better than the 
 others was because of the arbor built over it; a large 
 round arbor with a domed roof like a pagoda, so 
 thickly covered with grape-vines and honeysuckle that 
 it was cool by day, with a fragrant, green coolness, 
 and mysterious in the evening, like an out-of-doors 
 house, which shut away the night. Now, in June, the 
 grapes were but tiny clusters, emerald brooches and 
 pendants; and sprays of honeysuckle had contrived to 
 push themselves through the masses of leaves to twine 
 among the little thick-growing grapes. 
 
 This afternoon the sun was intensely hot in the 
 garden, and drew out all its sweetness, like burning 
 lips sucking wine from a wide-mouthed cup. The 
 paths seemed paved with gold ; but it was exquisite in
 
 130 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 the arbor. I pretended that I was a Moorish princess 
 of old days, in a temple of jade. I had brought out 
 several red cushions from the house, and on the old, 
 lichened stone seat, under a canopy of green, the scar- 
 let color and my white dress pleased my eyes. The 
 perfume of the honeysuckle, the sweet, yet faintly bit- 
 ter smell of the hot young grapes, and the heavy sweet- 
 ness of magnolias outside the arbor made me drowsy. 
 I tried to read " The Last Duchess " but could not 
 concentrate my mind. I thought that I might as well 
 sleep for a while, perhaps till five o'clock when the 
 sound of the fountain and the waters of the garden 
 beginning to flow would wake me. According to the 
 old Moorish custom the waters of the Alhambra are 
 given to the different gardens for a certain time each 
 day. Ours came at five, and went on until ten in 
 the summer. 
 
 I arranged my cushions, and composed myself for 
 a nap, for I too had slept badly in the night, though I 
 had not told Sarah. 
 
 By and by it seemed to me that I had waked up, and 
 strolled out of the garden to the palace of the Alham- 
 bra, for the first time since the day we arrived in 
 Granada. I stood for a while in the Patio de la Al- 
 berca, looking down into the green water, where 
 the tower and the gallery roof and the pillars were 
 mirrored. I was afraid that something else might 
 come into the picture, and yet if it did not come I 
 knew I should be disappointed. Suddenly a figure 
 moved under the archway; but at the same instant,
 
 THE LIFE MASK 131 
 
 though there was no wind, the surface of the pond 
 was ruffled, so that I could see nothing. " The 
 Alhambra is spoiled for me. I can never go there 
 again, so long as that man stays!" I heard myself 
 saying. 
 
 Then, a very soft, silky thing touched my hand, and 
 I really did wake, starting up from the cushions. The 
 soft thing that had touched me was the head of a white 
 dog, tall and slender and feathery. His face had been 
 on a level with mine as I lay on the seat, and he seemed 
 surprised to see me leap up so abruptly. He shrank 
 back, but finding that I did not mean to drive him 
 away, and meeting my eyes with his soft gaze, he sidled 
 toward me again. 
 
 I could hardly believe that I was awake after 
 all. 
 
 " I'm dreaming you," I said to him. " You can't 
 possibly be here." 
 
 His plume of a tail waved to and fro, and I made 
 the dream last longer by patting his head. I had 
 never seen any dog quite like this even in a picture. It 
 was nonsense that he should appear so real, for there 
 was no way in which a dog could have got into the gar- 
 den. The wall was twice too high for him to have 
 jumped, no matter how agile he might be, and the gate 
 was always locked. Pepe had a key, and we had got a 
 duplicate made for Marta, as it was inconvenient for 
 her to be without one. The third key Sarah and I were 
 to use between us, though I had never wanted it yet. 
 I knew where it was at this moment, and could see it
 
 132 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 in my mind's eye, hanging from a nail behind the front 
 door of the house. 
 
 The dog was of a lordly chivalry which pretended 
 gratitude for my caresses. He laid his head on my 
 knee, looking up at my face with brown eyes that had 
 half-moons of bluish white at their corners. He 
 seemed to say, " As much of this as pleases you." 
 
 Stroking him, I saw the silver gleam of a collar un- 
 der a silver ruffle of well-kept hair. There was a name 
 engraved on the plate, and something else below, in 
 smaller letters, probably the name and address of the 
 dog's owner. I was beginning to spell out, upside 
 down, a word which I thought would prove to be 
 " Gelert," when I heard a footstep. I looked up, and 
 saw in the path just outside my arbor, the man of the 
 mirror. 
 
 Our eyes met as they had met in the reflection. 
 He stopped instantly, taking off his hat the rather 
 shabby Panama I had noticed in the water-picture. 
 I half rose, then sat down again quickly. I knew 
 that the blood was rushing up to my face. I could 
 feel it tingling in my cheeks and in the tips of my 
 ears. I was angry, and confused, and astonished, 
 all at once; angry with myself for growing red, and 
 angry with him for getting into my garden. But 
 under the anger there was another feeling which I 
 knew was there, though I did not wish to know, or to 
 understand, or even believe it existed. Something in 
 me, in some obscure corner of my soul was sing- 
 ing. Something was almost savagely happy and
 
 THE LIFE MASK 133 
 
 satisfied. Something was clapping its hands in a kind 
 of triumph, then holding them out in welcome to this 
 man; in defiance of the self I knew best. To punish 
 that something which was myself yet not myself, 
 and to show it that it could not control me, I deter- 
 mined to be cold and even rude. The man deserved it 
 for coming here, and he must know how much he 
 deserved it. If I were not rude he would think I was 
 pleased with everything he had done, and that I had 
 wanted him to come. 
 
 " You did want him to come ! " something insisted. 
 " You want him to stay here with you now. You will 
 be sorry after you've sent him away." 
 
 I would not listen to that voice; but before I had 
 time to throw my sharp little javelin, " Don't you know 
 this is a private garden? No one has any right to 
 come here ! " a thought flung itself in front of the 
 words, as a woman might fling herself between two 
 duelists. " Suppose, after all, that the gypsy told the 
 truth? Suppose she really saw the vision, by read- 
 ing your mind, if such things can be. Then this 
 man would not be to blame. He would know nothing 
 about her, or what she told you, and he would not 
 deserve to be roughly treated. He would be sur- 
 prised and hurt, and think you a rude woman." 
 
 Maybe it was the same inner voice which said this, 
 in a different tone, trying to be subtle and conquer me 
 in that way. I knew it might be so, but I couldn't re- 
 sist the argument. Instead of speaking, I sat looking 
 at the man, while the dog bounded to him, wagging a
 
 134 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 feathery tail. And all my thoughts for aud against 
 him had passed through my head while I might have 
 counted three. 
 
 " Forgive me ! " he said ; and somehow I was glad 
 it had not been, " I beg your pardon ! " for I have al- 
 ways disliked that expression and associated it with ill 
 at ease, underbred people. " I came to find my dog. 
 Your gate was open, and he ran in " 
 
 " Our gate open ! " I exclaimed. " That's very 
 strange. It's always kept locked." 
 
 Suddenly I remembered that Marta had gone out 
 after Pepe. She seldom had to lock the gate. Excited 
 as she was about the fete and the bull-fight, she must 
 have forgotten. Perhaps some friend had been wait- 
 ing for her outside, and between them they had left 
 the gate ajar. It must have been so, since the dog 
 had got in. 
 
 The man echoed the thought in my mind. 
 
 " I suppose your servants were thinking more about 
 the bull-fight than anything else. I hope my dog didn't 
 frighten you ? " 
 
 He spoke in a pleasant, commonplace way, in a 
 charming voice, not looking at me too earnestly or in- 
 tently, or doing anything to make me self-conscious. 
 
 " No," I answered. " But it waked me up. I really 
 believed at first I must have dreamed the dog. It 
 didn't occur to me that the gate could be open. It 
 never has been before." 
 
 " I know," said the man, smiling. " I've been in 
 Granada a long time nearly a month and the gate
 
 THE LIFE MASK 135 
 
 has always been shut and locked. I tried it once when 
 I first came, I wanted so much to see what kind of 
 garden there was on the other side. It looked myste- 
 rious the old cedarwood gate in the high wall, with 
 frills of flowers on top like things in pictures and 
 stories, you know, that you loved when you were a 
 little boy." 
 
 At this a smile would come. 
 
 " Yes, I do know," I said, " though unfortunately I 
 never was a little boy. / felt like that when I first saw 
 the gate so we took the house and garden." 
 
 " I envy you," said the man. " No, I don't 
 though! I'm glad you've got the place." 
 
 His smile and his voice won me though I was trying 
 to steel myself against him. It was the mellow, warm 
 kind of voice, I thought, that would make a blind per- 
 son conscious of joy, as if he felt steal through his 
 veins sunshine he could not see. I was almost sure, 
 in hearing him speak, that the man must be Captain 
 Shannon, my next door neighbor at the hotel, because 
 of the whistling and singing I had never been able to 
 put out of my memory. I waked up sometimes in the 
 night thinking of it, and yes, wishing to hear it 
 again. 
 
 Now I was hearing it ; and his face, seen so near and 
 in bright sunlight was not a disappointment as I had 
 told myself it would be, after the picture in the water. 
 It was brave and fine, and stronger than I had thought 
 it. His eyes were the bluest eyes I ever saw, or else 
 the black hair and brows made them seem bluer
 
 136 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 than they really were. They had a clear, straight 
 look, as of one who does not lie or do anything that is 
 mean or underhand. He brought into my garden the 
 one good thing that had been missing the joy of 
 life. He was not smiling, but I thought that his eyes 
 could be merry, and that he would enjoy a joke, and 
 have a sense of humor. He might enjoy adven- 
 tures, too, but he had the look of a man too proud 
 for such an adventure as I had in my mind accused 
 him of wanting. That he should be here in my gar- 
 den was evidence that he had wanted it, and was do- 
 ing his best to succeed ; but somehow I could not help 
 believing his eyes instead. And it was nice of him 
 to be glad I had the Carmen de Santa Catalina. 
 
 " Thank you," I answered. " That is good of you. 
 I'm glad too for myself and the friend I live with." 
 
 " It is rather good of me ! " he said, laughing. " I 
 think it shows I have an unselfish nature. Don't you 
 feel I deserve, as a reward for not envying you, per- 
 mission to see the garden ? " 
 
 I hesitated. 
 
 "If you only knew how badly I've wanted to!" 
 he went on. " I believe I've thought of the place 
 and longed to get in at this gate, every one of my 
 twenty-six days at Granada ! " 
 
 As he put it in this way, I could hardly refuse. 
 Sarah and I had had the Carmen for only eleven days. 
 He had been in Granada, according to his own ac- 
 count, twice as long. And he had a reassuring air of 
 caring as much for the garden as for me.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 137 
 
 "Of course, if you like, walk about and explore," I 
 said, finding it easier every minute to speak in an or- 
 dinary tone, without self-consciousness. " There's a 
 lovely view over the Vega from the terrace in front of 
 the house. I am never tired of it." 
 
 " Is that why you don't come to the Alhambra? " he 
 asked, suddenly. 
 
 I looked up at him, startled. He was still outside 
 the arbor, but he had come nearer, and stood with a 
 hand on the frame of the rustic archway. 
 
 I did not know what to answer, or whether to answer 
 at all. 
 
 " I saw you there," he went on in a very quiet, grave 
 tone, without waiting for me to speak. " It was just 
 before closing time, in the Patio de la Alberca. I was 
 on my way out. You were kneeling down on one 
 knee, looking into the water at the goldfish." 
 
 An odd trembling went through me. Still I did 
 not speak. But I was asking myself the question : did 
 he know that the goldfish were not all I had been look- 
 ing at ? I felt confused and anxious. I wished that I 
 were a better judge of character, and especially of men. 
 I had an impression that the sort of man who would 
 bribe a gypsy to tell a woman he loved her, and 
 wanted to know her, would not frankly allude to 
 that scene. If I could be sure whether I were right or 
 wrong ! 
 
 " I saw your face only in the water," he said, " but 
 it was like a looking-glass. I knew if I should ever 
 meet you again I should recognize you, no matter
 
 138 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 where. I didn't think then it would be in my garden 
 of mystery." 
 
 " Is that what you call it ? " I asked stiffly, in haste 
 to seize the excuse of taking up another subject. I 
 was half afraid he would cling to the first, but he did 
 not. He let it go. 
 
 " Yes, from the day I saw the gate, and tried it. 
 Even now, I think it's a good name. It's like coming 
 into a hidden world, here. I might have tumbled down 
 the rabbit-hole." 
 
 I laughed. 
 
 " Perhaps you have. Though you won't have any 
 interesting adventures exploring it, I'm afraid." 
 
 This was a hint for him to go and look at the view ; 
 but he did not take it. I ought to have been sorry, and 
 was not. 
 
 " The whole thing is interesting," he said, and did 
 not move. 
 
 For a moment we were silent; then I hurried to 
 break a kind of spell which was falling upon me, as it 
 had fallen in the Alhambra. 
 
 " Did you know that any one had come to live in 
 the Carmen ? " I briskly asked. 
 
 " Yes, I knew two ladies had taken the place. They 
 told me that at the hotel, the evening I came back from 
 the mountains. I went away late on the night of the 
 day I saw you in the Alhambra, or rather early 
 the next morning. It was an expedition into the 
 Sierra Nevada I'd promised to make to see a 
 friend."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 139 
 
 **A friend living in the Sierras?" 
 
 " A shepherd such a wonderful fellow ! Spanish, 
 of course. He's never been down out of the moun- 
 tains, though he's over forty years old. A glorious 
 philosopher has thoughts like stars. You would 
 like him." 
 
 " Should I? How can you tell? You don't know 
 what I would like." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I do." 
 
 I frowned. 
 
 " Perhaps you think you know a great deal about 
 women? " 
 
 " Heaven, no ! I'm a fool about a lot of things, but 
 not such an ass as to think I know women. Only 
 I wonder if you'll very much mind my saying it? 
 When I saw your face in that big looking-glass at the 
 Alhambra, I couldn't help feeling it was the face of a 
 friend that is, of some one I would give a great 
 deal to have for a friend; and and ought to have. 
 Are you angry? " 
 
 " You know best whether I should be angry or not," 
 I answered, looking straight up into his eyes, " for 
 you know exactly what you mean." 
 
 " Yes," he said, without hesitation, " I do know ex- 
 actly what I mean, and so I know that there's no reason 
 for you to be angry. I should be horribly sorry to do 
 or say anything at which you'd have a right to be angry. 
 You see, for eleven days I've been thinking about you 
 and hoping the time might soon come when I should 
 meet you; so I almost feel as if I knew you a little.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Wanting to have people for your friends is going part 
 way toward getting them. Whereas, you haven't 
 thought or felt anything about me at all, till now and 
 I see by your face that I haven't gone about this right, 
 for I'm making you angry even if you weren't be- 
 fore." 
 
 " I think I am a little angry," I said coldly. But 
 my heart was beating fast. I did not want to be disap- 
 pointed in him. It was ridiculous, but I felt I could 
 hardly bear it now. 
 
 " Perhaps that's because and it would be very nat- 
 ural you may believe that wanting to meet you, I 
 did something toward getting your garden gate to open. 
 But if you think that, you misjudge me. It was an ac- 
 cident, even though I knew you lived here. Nearly 
 every day since I first noticed the gate, I've walked 
 past it. To-day I could hardly believe my eyes when 
 I saw it open ; but Gelert believed his. He shot in 
 and I followed. The only thing is I'm not sorry, 
 unless you're annoyed with us both. And, honestly, 
 I think it would be unjust to feel annoyed." 
 
 " Then I won't," I said, giving him the faint smile 
 his eyes were asking for. " You and your beauti- 
 ful Gelert are welcome to see our garden. It's be- 
 ginning to be the best time of day now except the 
 early morning; for the fountains have come on, and 
 the water is running round the flower-beds. Isn't it 
 a heavenly sound? But I shall have to go in, because 
 my friend is not well, and I must see if she is awake. 
 She may be needing something. Stay in the garden
 
 THE LIFE MASK 141 
 
 as long as you like, but please shut the gate when you 
 go out ; and later, I'll lock it." 
 
 I got up; and I was ashamed to realize the pleasure 
 it gave me to see his blank look of chagrin. I wanted 
 to laugh, and to have him laugh with me. Also I 
 wanted him to beg that I would stay. Of course I 
 should say it was impossible. But I felt somehow as if 
 I had known him a long time. The garden had never 
 seemed so beautiful, so poetic and altogether enchant- 
 ing as it seemed at that minute. I hated to go into 
 the house and leave him. He made me, with his gay, 
 kind manner, feel like a lonely child who has found 
 a playmate. 
 
 " I'm sorry," he said. That was all. And there 
 was nothing left for me to say in return but, 
 " Good-by. I hope you may enjoy the garden." 
 
 I came out of the arbor, and he stood a little aside 
 to let me pass, but he was very near. The dog Gelert 
 pushed a cool nose against my hand, and I could not 
 resist lingering an instant to smooth the silky head. 
 It is so dreadful and irrevocable to hurt a dog's feel- 
 ings, since it is impossible ever to explain. 
 
 " You like dogs ? " the man asked. 
 
 " I love them. A great many people are noble, no 
 doubt, but all dogs are, I think." 
 
 " Yes, and Gelert's one of the noblest. I have sev- 
 eral good friends, but he's the best of the lot so 
 far; till to-day." 
 
 "Gelert's a Welsh name, isn't it?" I said, still lin- 
 gering, with the dog for an excuse. " There was a
 
 142 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 great dog-hero, Gelert, I remember. I cried over 
 his story. I used to think if I ever had a dog, I'd 
 name him Gelert. But I was never allowed to have 
 one." 
 
 " Not even now ? " 
 
 " Oh, I could, now," I said. " But I don't know 
 how long we may be in one place. It's hard to travel 
 with a dog." 
 
 " Gelert's traveled far and long with me. He came 
 from Persia. I've had him from a puppy jolly 
 little beast he was. He ought to have a Persian name, 
 oughtn't he? But I was like you, about Gelert. Only 
 I made a vow when I was ten or so. Some day if 
 I got a dog grand enough, he was to be Gelert. This 
 boy comes after a humble procession of fox-terriers. 
 He's been the first to grace the name. And oh, I for- 
 got may I tell you mine? It's Hugh Shannon 
 Captain Shannon as Irish a name as Gelert is 
 Welsh. At least the Shannon is. I don't know about 
 Hugh do you ? " 
 
 I had begun to move away, ever so little; and this 
 question might or might not be an attempt to keep me. 
 
 " No," I said, laughing, " I know nothing whatever 
 about ' Hugh ' ! Good-by again, to you and Gelert. 
 You won't forget to shut the gate ? " 
 
 "I won't forget anything!" he said. "But am 
 I never to come here again ? " 
 
 "Of course not!" I answered promptly. "We 
 don't know each other. And I'm too busy 
 learning Spanish to make new friends."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 143 
 
 " This friend is made already. And I could teach 
 you Spanish," he said. 
 
 " Thanks. You're very kind ! But I've arranged 
 to have a teacher of languages, from Granada." 
 
 And now I was actually moving away from him, 
 down the path toward the house. 
 
 " In the Alhambra, then, we shall meet ! " he ex- 
 claimed, not daring to take a step after me. " Some- 
 times you'll come there. I shall see you." 
 
 " I may not stir out of this garden for days," I said. 
 " Perhaps you will have left Granada. Now, really, 
 I must go to my friend." 
 
 I turned resolutely, and my friend had come to 
 me! Sarah, dressed as usual, looking neat and mild, 
 was advancing from the house with a tea-tray in her 
 hands. She walked with short steps, pointing her 
 toes. 
 
 For a minute I suspected her of knowing something 
 of having contrived something I hardly knew 
 what. Then I remembered how, at the last minute, 
 she had not wanted me to consult the fortune-teller 
 after all, because she had been startled by what the 
 woman had said. This proved that she was not in 
 any plot concerning the gypsy. Dear, dear Sarah! 
 If I could not trust her, I could not trust myself or 
 even heaven. But I did trust her, utterly. 
 
 " Oh, what made you get up ! " I reproached her. 
 " You promised to rest all day." 
 
 " Not all day," she contradicted me, with her meek 
 obstinacy. " I said all the morning. Such a lovely
 
 144 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 dog came into my room as I was waking up. He 
 didn't wake me oh, no, I was awake already. But 
 when I saw him I knew you'd got company, Miss Nita, 
 so I just slipped out of bed and dressed myself. I 
 was right well rested, and it's done me good to come 
 out. I was that curious about the dog, I felt plumb 
 crazy to see him again. Here he is, the beauty! 
 And this gentleman. I suppose the dog's yours, sir? 
 I've brought tea for two, Miss Nita, reckoning you'd 
 got a visitor." 
 
 " Captain Shannon is here by accident," I said, 
 looking at her meaningly. " I let Marta go out. She 
 must have left the gate open. I'm afraid we shall 
 have to scold her ! The dog ran in, and Captain Shan- 
 non followed to get him back. They're just going." 
 
 " Why, Miss Nita! " exclaimed Sarah, ignoring my 
 look, which she must have understood. " You ain't 
 a real proper Southerner if you turn a stranger away 
 from your door when tea's ready, without so much 
 as offerin' him a drop ! " In her eagerness, her ex- 
 citement, she talked almost like a Southern darkey. 
 
 " Miss Nelson doesn't dare offer me tea," said Cap- 
 tain Shannon, with laughing impudence, " because she 
 knows if she did, I'd accept." 
 
 Sarah looked suddenly so puzzled, turning her eyes 
 from him to me, that I should have absolved her from 
 any secret knowledge, even if I had not done so 
 already. 
 
 " My friend is Miss Nelson," I explained coolly. 
 " I am Mrs. Lippincott."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 145 
 
 " Oh ! " His face changed, in frank disappoint- 
 ment, like a boy's. He looked young, and rather un- 
 happy. The gay impudence died out of his blue eyes. 
 " Forgive me. I thought and she called you ' Miss 
 Nita.' " 
 
 " That's our Southern way," I said. " We're both 
 Southerners." 
 
 " I guessed that, from your voices." He turned 
 again to Sarah. " Will you invite me to tea, Miss 
 Nelson? If you've made some for me, it does seem 
 a pity to waste it, don't you think ? " 
 
 " I sure do," said she, with unusual decision. 
 " An' if it rested with me, I'd invite you mighty quick, 
 Captin. Down where I was raised we never let 
 folks go out of our doors without somethin' to eat or 
 drink, if we could help it, and I can't forget the old 
 ways. But it ain't for me to invite. Miss Nita's 
 so mighty sweet to me, she calls me her ' friend,' 
 though I'm really just nothin' more'n an old family 
 servant. I was her nurse once, sir. So you see, I 
 haven't got any rights here." 
 
 "How dare you say that!" I cried out, half in 
 love, half in anger. "You have every right more 
 right than I have ! " 
 
 "May she invite me, then?" asked Captain Shan- 
 non, slyly. 
 
 I should not have been human if I hadn't laughed. 
 
 " Yes, she may," I answered. " But you'll be her 
 guest. And I'm not certain that I'll stay." 
 
 " I know ! " he said. " You feel as if you'd been
 
 146 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 ' had.' But of course we won't stop, Gelert and I, if 
 you're sure you don't want us." 
 
 " What, not want that lovely dog ! " exclaimed 
 Sarah. 
 
 At this Captain Shannon and I both burst out laugh- 
 ing, catching each other's eyes. It seemed very 
 strange to me to laugh like that. 
 
 " I think you had both better stay to tea," I said. 
 
 " And you'll stay, too ? " 
 
 " Yes. We'll have it in the arbor, where I always 
 have mine. Why, Sarah, there are only two cups. 
 I thought where's yours ? " 
 
 " I drank some of the cold tea when I got up," she 
 said. " I couldn't take more now, thank you, Miss 
 Nita. I want just to run in an' make you a junket 
 for your dinner, before it's too late for it to get nice 
 an* cold an' set. The other day it wouldn't junk. 
 'Twas the first time in my life a junket turned on me." 
 
 Captain Shannon laughed again. 
 
 " I can see it turning on you," said he, " like a little 
 cinnamon-colored bull ! " 
 
 He was too well pleased at the prospect of Sarah's 
 departure; and I gave her a warning look. 
 
 " Please, let's have only fruit and not a junket to- 
 night. Even if you don't care for tea, the air will 
 do you good." 
 
 By this time Captain Shannon had taken the tray 
 from her, and now I showed him where to put it, on 
 the wide stone ledge of the fountain's basin, which we 
 used for a table when we had tea in the arbor. Sarah,
 
 THE LIFE MASK 147 
 
 resigning herself to the inevitable, filled the two cups, 
 and handed them to Captain Shannon, that he might 
 give one to me. There were thin, buttered slices of 
 " salt-rising " bread which Sarah made herself, be- 
 cause she considered Spanish bread " fit only for poor 
 white trash." There were also little drop-cakes, and 
 preserved cherries, samples of her good Southern 
 housekeeping; and Captain Shannon said that he had 
 tasted nothing half so nice for years. His compli- 
 ments pleased Sarah, who, if she were vain of any- 
 thing, was vain of her cooking. I could see that she 
 liked and admired him; and sitting humbly at the 
 farthest end of the stone seat, where she resolutely 
 isolated herself to play chaperon, she gazed at him with 
 eager, almost stealthy interest when she was sure that 
 his eyes were turned another way. As he looked 
 mostly at me, she had plenty of opportunity to observe 
 the only man who had come even as far as the thresh- 
 old of our lives, for many years. Almost it seemed 
 as if he did not wish to look at Sarah. If, in talk- 
 ing, he glanced at her, he glanced quickly away again. 
 It was not only that he preferred to look at me, which 
 without too much vanity, I might have found not 
 unnatural. There was more than that in his avoid- 
 ance. Yet I could not see how it was possible for 
 Sarah's delicate, primly refined face of sweet middle- 
 age to be distasteful to any one. She had been kind 
 to Captain Shannon. He had really wanted to stay 
 to tea, and he owed his invitation entirely to her. He 
 ought to be grateful, and perhaps he was. Maybe, I
 
 148 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 thought, I merely imagined that he turned his eyes 
 from her whenever he could without discourtesy; 
 for Sarah appeared to be far from noticing that she 
 was not appreciated. Having reluctantly abandoned 
 her plot to leave us alone together, she was making the 
 best of her failure in quite a surprising manner. 
 Though she sat as far from us as possible, she atoned 
 for my taciturn mood by inducing Captain Shannon 
 to talk. I sat quietly amused, fancying that I could 
 read her like a book. All her simple guile was di- 
 rected toward " showing off " the unexpected guest, 
 enabling him to appear at his best, so that I might 
 want to see him again, and have a new interest in my 
 life. I was sure that her thoughts were already run- 
 ning far and fast into the future; that mentally she 
 saw us in love with each other. It was bewildering 
 that she could not realize how sad and fatal a thing it 
 would be for me to care for a man, and how, instead 
 of bringing me happiness, it would plunge me into mis- 
 ery. Surely she had never read " Maud," and cried 
 out with those prim, pretty old lips, " What matter if 
 I go mad, so I have had my day ? " Tennyson was 
 not among the E. P. Roe novels and " Stepping 
 Heavenward " and " The Changed Cross " on her be- 
 loved bookshelf. Yet some such thought the wild 
 joy of having lived, even to suffer all that is possible 
 for the human heart to suffer seemed the only ra- 
 tional explanation of Sarah's confessed desire for me 
 to " fall in love." 
 
 Drawn on by her, and perhaps as an excuse to pro-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 149 
 
 long his visit, Captain Shannon told us a few things 
 about his life which made me wish more passionately 
 than I ever had, that I'd been born a man. How I 
 envied him his experiences! 
 
 He came of an " army sort of Irish family," he 
 said. They were nearly all soldiers from generation 
 to generation. He was immensely proud of his 
 father, who was a V.C., dead many years ago. No 
 one was left now of his very own people, except his 
 sister, or rather, a half-sister, for his mother was a 
 widow with one daughter when she married his 
 father. He himself had always been " keen on lan- 
 guages," especially languages of the East, and his 
 father had encouraged him to learn them as a boy, 
 thinking they might help him to " some sort of a 
 career." Well they had. Through them he had 
 gained the great desire of his life : to " see a lot of 
 the world, and to have things happen ; not to be a sort 
 of old stick-in-the-mud, living in a rut, like so many 
 soldiers." He had been sent on a " jolly interesting 
 mission to East Africa," because he " knew some 
 African dialects " ; after that to Persia, as he had " got 
 a grip on the language." Now he had lately come from 
 away up the Nile. There he had fallen in for some 
 " pretty good adventures," and at the end for a 
 " pretty bad fever," just to balance things. It was 
 indirectly on account of the fever that he was in 
 Granada now. When he was well enough to travel, 
 by easy stages, he had stopped a while to rest in Cairo, 
 and again in Alexandria; but as it was supposed to be
 
 150 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 an abnormally cold, wet summer in England, the doc- 
 tors wouldn't let him go straight home. He'd been 
 told to break the journey and get a bit used to a 
 change of climate at " Gib," or Algeciras ; but he 
 wanted to see the Alhambra, so he had taken things 
 into his own hands, and had come to Granada instead. 
 
 " I meant to stop a fortnight or three weeks," he 
 said, " but here I am still, and I don't know when I'm 
 going to tear myself away. I've had some splendid 
 trips in the mountains, picking up pals there. And 
 I'm polishing my Spanish no end! I always liked 
 the language. It's more manly and musical than 
 Italian. I've been lucky enough to strike up a friend- 
 ship with a clever chap in the Alhambra sort 
 of official interpreter there, quite a swell in his way 
 knows the place from A to Z, and has let me see all 
 the hidden things and places, where the public aren't 
 admitted. I can get you in, if you like. Would 
 you?" 
 
 " Why, yes, thank you, we'd like it right well, if 
 you'll be so kind," Sarah flung herself into the breach, 
 when I hesitated. 
 
 For this, he did give her a grateful look and word. 
 He would be delighted to be our guide, whenever we 
 wished. Couldn't we make up a plan to-day? 
 
 " Perhaps, if we meet you there, thanks, we may 
 arrange something," I said evasively. 
 
 And I wanted him to understand that I meant to be 
 evasive. It was much, much better so. Sarah was 
 almost frightening me by her extreme politeness to
 
 THE LIFE MASK 151 
 
 the man. And yet, underneath the ruffled surface, 
 down in the depths of me I knew it would now be a 
 sickening loss not to meet him, not to see him again. 
 Already it had come to that. 
 
 He was willing to take what he could get, and did 
 not urge me to decide anything there and then. Yet 
 the dogged look of his mouth and chin when I coolly 
 put him off, gave me the thrill that I suppose a 
 man's strength is intended to give a woman. I knew 
 somehow that his yielding the point did not mean giv- 
 ing it up, or that he was not keen on pressing it. I 
 knew also that he would have his way. I might re- 
 fuse to meet him; I might try to avoid him; yet we 
 should see each other again. It might be that we 
 should walk as far as the great barrier, beyond which 
 we could not go together. 
 
 He was still talking of the Alhambra, while my 
 thoughts had followed the ghosts of ourselves into 
 the dimness past knowledge. 
 
 " On the night of the full moon," I heard him say. 
 Evidently I had missed something, for his eyes were 
 on me, expecting an answer. 
 
 " What is it that's to happen then? " I asked. And 
 my cheeks were hot. 
 
 He did not seem vexed that I had not listened. 
 
 " I am going to happen," he said, with a gleam in 
 his blue eyes. " In the Alhambra, on the night 
 of the full moon. The enchanted palace is mine 
 from moon-rising to moon-setting, and I invite you 
 and Miss Nelson to 'happen' with me. Will you?
 
 152 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 There'll be nobody else. I've been promised that." 
 
 " It's mighty kind of the Captin to ask us, ain't it, 
 Miss Nita? " Sarah prompted me with a wistful look. 
 " I'd like to go real well. I haven't been over to the 
 r Alhambra yet. Something kind o' told me to wait, 
 an' I reckon this was meant. 'Twould be nice to see 
 the place for the first time by moonlight, with no 
 other folks there but just us." 
 
 " I fancy there are very few ' other folks ' there 
 at any hour now," I said. " But of course it's kind 
 of Captain Shannon to share his privilege. We must 
 think it over a little, if he'll let us, and decide whether 
 we can afford it." 
 
 Captain Shannon flushed very red, which made him 
 look extremely young, and his eyes extremely blue. 
 
 " Afford it ! " he repeated, horrified or angry. 
 " There's no question of money. I've invited you to 
 be my guests." 
 
 " Oh, but we couldn't accept the invitation in that 
 way," I said, knowing that I was exasperating, and 
 rejoicing obscurely in my power over the man. I 
 wished to tantalize him, and when I saw his face grow 
 red, and his eyes flash, I could have laughed. Yet I 
 did not want to laugh at him, but with him. I wanted 
 to torture him first, and then suddenly to see his face 
 light up with unexpected pleasure given by me. I 
 thought of his name, Hugh, and liked it, feeling a 
 kind of tenderness for it, because it suited him par- 
 ticularly well. I wondered if there was any one in 
 the world who called him Hughie ? " Hughie
 
 THE LIFE MASK 153 
 
 Hughie," I said twice over to myself; and then went 
 on to explain aloud, judicially, that I knew from the 
 guide-books, the price of a moonlight visit to the Al- 
 hambra was two hundred pesetas. " If we go, we 
 must pay two-thirds of the price," I insisted. 
 " There's no use discussing anything else." 
 
 " Even though I have to pay for myself alone, just 
 the same as if it were a party, and it would add to 
 my pleasure so much to have you and Miss Nel- 
 son ! " he pleaded. 
 
 I was ruthless. No, we must pay, or we would not 
 go. And in any case we should have to think it over 
 before deciding. 
 
 Sarah had poured a saucerful of milk for Gelert, 
 and walked out of the summer-house to set the dish 
 down in the middle of the path. She had taken one 
 of the small cakes with her, and proceeded leisurely 
 to break it into a number of pieces, which she put into 
 the milk. The dog ate, more in the wish to be polite, 
 than because he wanted the food, and he took his 
 time in eating, as if his master had said to him 
 " Good boy ! Be as long as you can, please ! " 
 
 I knew so well why Sarah had gone out! And I 
 was ashamed, because of course Captain Shannon 
 must know too. He was quick to take advantage of 
 the chance she gave him. 
 
 " You are wrong about the two hundred pesetas," 
 he said. " I don't believe it's as much. Anyhow, I 
 can get the price reduced. You must do as you like 
 about paying only I shall hate it. But I should hate
 
 154 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 it a good deal worse for you not to go. I want you 
 to see moonlight in the Alhambra. Think of it 
 in the court of the pond in that mirror. Think of 
 it! Say you'll go. And say I may come here to see 
 you again. Please say it now." 
 
 " Why should I ? " I was afraid that my voice 
 shook a little. 
 
 " Because I want it so much." 
 
 " Answer me a question, then ! " I said. " Did you 
 tell any one any one at all man or woman 
 about seeing me in the Patio de la Alberca that 
 day? " 
 
 I looked him straight in the eyes, and he gave back 
 my look without flinching. 
 
 " On my honor, I have told no one. Not a soul 
 knows but myself and you." 
 
 " Then you may come here again, to see the gar- 
 den and us. And perhaps we'll go with you to 
 the Alhambra on the night of the full moon." 
 
 " Thank you. Thank you a thousand times ! " he 
 said, somehow contriving to get hold of my hand, 
 which he wrung rather than shook. " Then at last 
 I will go away. I couldn't have gone till you'd made 
 me that promise." 
 
 I found myself on my feet, looking after him as 
 he went out of the summer-house. He bade Sarah 
 good-by, and walked briskly off, with Gelert loping 
 after him. If only he had known how I longed to 
 go with him to the gate! 
 
 I expected Sarah to burst into praises of the visitor;
 
 THE LIFE MASK 155 
 
 but she had singularly little to say about him. She 
 seemed anxious to talk of other things, as if she were 
 afraid of being scolded for her encouragement of a 
 strange man, unless she could turn my attention quickly 
 to something else. She said only that it had done her 
 good to hear about a life so different from ours, and 
 she felt quite cheered by having " company." Such 
 a nice young gentleman, who was so merry in his 
 ways ! Then it struck her that it was almost time to 
 be thinking of dinner. Would I let her go in alone 
 and make something for a " surprise " ? The poor 
 soul no doubt hoped that I might forget her sins, in 
 the excitement of a new pudding. Often she went 
 back in her mind to the time when I was a child. 
 
 I would not let her do the work alone; but I made 
 her go to bed early that night, and afterward I sat in 
 the arbor, listening to the trickle of the fountain, and 
 watching the moon rain silver through the grape- 
 vines, into the splashing water. I felt Captain Shan- 
 non near me there. I could see how his eyes would 
 look in the moonlight. I could hear him singing un- 
 der his breath, " Weep no more, my lady." He was 
 closer to me than he had been in the afternoon when 
 I had to harden myself against him. Almost, I 
 could hear his breath coming and going, and feel his 
 hand touch mine. 
 
 I hated to go into the house, because I was leaving 
 him behind in the garden. And I knew that when he 
 went away from Granada, he would still be with me 
 in the Carmen de Santa Catalina.
 
 AFTER Sarah told me that the Moffats had left 
 Granada, I meant to go again to the Alham- 
 bra. I meant to go every day, and spend 
 hours there; but the coming of Captain Shannon to our 
 garden made me change my mind. I dared not let him 
 see me in the palace, because he had told me how much 
 time he spent there, and would perhaps think I ex- 
 pected to meet him. I dared not even walk in the 
 long avenues of the Alhambra grove, lest I should 
 pass him under the elms; yet for the first time my 
 heart was not at peace in the garden. It opened 
 the gate and went out, and my thoughts followed. I 
 was restless, and my nerves jumped for every new 
 sound; but it was not the restlessness which had been 
 part of my old self. In Granada I had lost it; and 
 now it had not come back. This was not the fretful 
 ache I knew as well as I knew the monotonous beating 
 of my heart. It was like the restlessness of sap in 
 young trees when the spring is near. I had never 
 felt it before, but I knew instinctively that it was what 
 Sarah had wished for me: a new interest in life, youth 
 calling to youth. I had thought my youth was dead 
 without having lived ; but it had only lain in a trance. 
 The next day in the garden I sat with a book which 
 I could not read; and the magnolia trees and rose 
 
 156
 
 THE LIFE MASK 157 
 
 bushes were no longer individual friends : they blended 
 together as a screen, hiding the future that pressed 
 close upon me. Something was coming near which I 
 could almost see, but could not escape. 
 
 Captain Shannon did not call that day, though in 
 the afternoon Sarah's wandering eyes betrayed that 
 she expected him, and I caught myself listening for 
 the jangle of the old bell by the gate. The rusty iron 
 rod which had to be violently pulled, was almost hid- 
 den by the trails of convolvulus and ivy that hung 
 over the wall; but I had discovered it, the day when 
 Sarah and I first came to look at the house, and he 
 could find it if he searched. No one had ever rung 
 the bell since we entered into possession, for Marta 
 or Sarah brought all our provisions; and perhaps no 
 hand had jerked that rusty rod for years; yet I seemed 
 to know exactly how the bell would sound, and I 
 fancied often that I heard it begin to ring. But it 
 was only fancy. The day passed as all the other days, 
 except yesterday, had passed. 
 
 I was disappointed when evening came, and there 
 was no more hope or fear. Still, it was not dull 
 disappointment. There was a tingle of excitement 
 in it, as thereis when a violin suddenly stops playing 
 because a string has broken. The string can be 
 mended, and the music will go on. It may not be 
 the same. There is the doubt. But it may be even 
 sweeter. 
 
 My heart, which had opened the gate and gone out, 
 leaving the rest of me like an empty shell among the
 
 158 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 flowers, knew why my playmate had not come again. 
 It said that he had hoped I would go to the Alhambra, 
 that he had been there, waiting ; that when he gave me 
 up, he thought it wiser not to pay another visit so 
 soon. It was not that he did not wish to come. He 
 was wishing to see me more even than I wished to see 
 him. The reason why I felt him near me in the gar- 
 den was because in heart he was there. He, too 
 the part of him that was not with me was an empty 
 shell. 
 
 How pleased Sarah would be, I thought, if she 
 knew what wild, schoolgirl ideas were racing through 
 my mind while I talked with her in the arbor, about 
 a long cloak of white Shetland wool she was knitting 
 for me. If our real thoughts hers and mine 
 could cry out aloud and drown our spoken words, 
 what a strange clamor there would be in the garden! 
 
 The day after that day, still I did not go out. The 
 little far-down voice in me kept asking, " What will 
 happen now? " 
 
 What did happen, was that the gate bell jangled 
 in the afternoon at half-past four, and sounded 
 precisely as I had known it would. It was one of 
 those strident bells which could not speak at all, except 
 at the top of its dreadful voice; but its clamor made 
 my heart bound. 
 
 Pepe was working or dozing near the gate, 
 and unlocked it, doubtless in astonishment. I could 
 imagine him opening it a little way, to peer out with 
 his blinking eyes; then, at sight of a visitor who
 
 THE LIFE MASK 159 
 
 seemed to him desirable, wrinkling his nose with a 
 lazy smile the smile of a monk on a poster, who 
 tastes one of his own liqueurs. 
 
 The visitor was Captain Shannon. 
 
 He had come, he explained, to tell us that the " price 
 of the moonlight" in the Alhambra had been reduced 
 by more than half. If we were determined to pay 
 two-thirds of the sum, it would not be very formid- 
 able. Had he given us a long enough time for making 
 up our minds, and would we put him out of his sus- 
 pense by saying yes? 
 
 One side of me wanted to say no ; but I said yes. 
 
 He did not stay long; yet the garden was different 
 afterward from what it had been before he came. 
 Everything seemed to sparkle: the leaves, and the 
 fountains; and there was a vital quality in the sun- 
 shine. 
 
 Sarah did not leave us once. She sat near, and 
 timidly tried to win the affection of Gelert, who was 
 unresponsive though not rude. But Hugh Shannon's 
 eyes asked, "Are we friends?" and mine answered, 
 " We are friends." 
 
 The morning after, I made Sarah go with me to the 
 Alhambra, though she would have liked to excuse her- 
 self on the plea of waiting to see the palace first by 
 moonlight. He met us there, and after walking 
 through all the beautiful courts and rooms, we sat 
 for a long time in the little inner garden of Lindaraja. 
 When we walked through the Patio de la Alberca, I 
 would not stop to look down at the water. Sarah
 
 160 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 was always with us, and though he talked to her, and 
 was polite, I noticed still that he turned his eyes away 
 from her quickly, whenever he could. This puzzled 
 me very much, and even depressed me. I felt that I 
 ought not to want him for a friend if he had taken 
 some unreasonable dislike for one who was everything 
 to me. " I must find out whether I imagine it or 
 not," I said to myself. I decided that sometime when 
 I got a chance I would ask him a frank question. 
 
 The chance did not come until two days later, 
 though only one day had passed, since he first strayed 
 into the garden, on which we had not seen each other 
 either there or in the Alhambra; and sometimes it 
 had been both. Lately we all three took it for 
 granted that he would ring the gate bell every after- 
 noon, not later than half-past four. 
 
 Sarah was unwinding a skein of white wool for my 
 garden-wrap, when he arrived, and I was trying to 
 teach her a little of the Spanish I had learned. 
 
 " Why don't you ask Captain Shannon to hold your 
 skein for you?" I suggested. 
 
 As I said this, I watched his face, and saw it change, 
 ever so slightly, yet unmistakably, as I was afraid it 
 would. 
 
 " Miss Nelson needn't ask. I'll help her with great 
 pleasure," he answered promptly. " But I know a 
 dodge better than holding the stuff on my hands. I 
 invented it for my sister, who is always doing fancy 
 work or whatever you call it. You put the skein 
 over the backs of two chairs, like this," and he pro-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 161 
 
 ceedecl to illustrate his idea with a couple of chairs 
 Marta had brought out to the arbor because a high 
 wind had blown water from the fountain on to the 
 stone seat. 
 
 I felt the blood spring to my cheeks as if he had 
 struck me. His plan was quite an ingenious one, and 
 worked very well, but I knew that he had proposed 
 it because he did not wish to sit knee to knee with 
 Sarah, facing her closely while the wool was un- 
 wound. 
 
 She appeared to be grateful for his help, but I 
 thought the faded pink in her cheeks was a little 
 brighter than usual, and that when she glanced at 
 him as she often did, in an odd, fascinated, expect- 
 ant way her eyes looked wistful. 
 
 It was years since anything had roused my temper, 
 which used to flame up hotly long ago, if any one I 
 cared for intensely or disliked heartily, offended me. 
 Never could I be enraged with a person to whom I 
 was indifferent. It must be one extreme or the other 
 to wake me; but now a flame of fury swept through 
 my veins. It did not matter whether I loved Hugh 
 Shannon too much, or hated him. At that moment I 
 could not have told which it was, but it was all I 
 could do not to let my anger break out against him. 
 If I had spoken, I should have said something to re- 
 gret later, so I sat silent until, when Sarah had 
 finished winding her skein into a ball, she proposed 
 going to the house to make tea. 
 
 As soon as she was out of sight I turned on Captain
 
 162 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Shannon. The change in me must have surprised 
 him, for his lips tightened as if he had to meet some 
 sudden call upon his strength. An odd thought 
 flashed through my brain: that he might have had 
 such a look on his face, out in Africa, when the enemy 
 sprang on him and his men from behind an ambush. 
 But I did not mind being the enemy. I even wished 
 to use any power I might have, to hurt him, because 
 he was strong and had always been happy, while Sarah 
 and I were weak and had known years of sadness and 
 terror. I was trembling all over, but I controlled my 
 voice to quietness. 
 
 " Why do you dislike my good Sarah, who is so 
 kind to you ? " I asked. 
 
 His whole personality was changed in a moment. 
 The air of gaiety and abounding joy of life which 
 characterized him was struck away. When he was 
 happy he looked so young that sometimes I wondered 
 if I were older than he. In laughing he threw his 
 whole heart into it, and had an engaging boyish way 
 of flinging his head back a little, so that one saw the 
 under part of his chin, which was whiter than the 
 brown throat, and cleft in the middle. His eyes nearly 
 shut, so that the black curly lashes stood out, and the 
 upper and under ones drew close together, showing 
 just a bright glint of blue. 
 
 He had been laughing like that at a trick of Gelert's 
 just before Sarah went, and while my fury against 
 him was rising. Now, he looked five years older, his 
 jaw square, his eyes large and grave. One of his
 
 THE LIFE MASK 163 
 
 hands was hidden behind Gelert's head. I saw the 
 other clench itself nervously. It seemed a long time 
 that I waited for his answer ; then he said : 
 
 "What have I done to make you think I dislike 
 Miss Nelson? I hope I haven't been rude?" 
 
 "You know very well you have not been rude!" 
 I exclaimed. " I almost wish you had ! It would 
 be something to take hold of. You have been worse 
 than rude. You have looked as if you couldn't 
 bear the sight of her. It it makes me hate you ! " 
 
 " I see it does," he said. " I'm sorry from the bot- 
 tom of my heart." 
 
 "Sorry for what?" 
 
 " That I make you hate me. I'd a good deal rather 
 be dead than be hated by you." 
 
 " Why are you so cruel, then ? " I asked, my lips 
 very dry. 
 
 " You know I would do anything sooner than be 
 cruel to you, don't you or to any one you love? 
 And it isn't true that I dislike Miss Nelson." 
 
 " You look at her as if you couldn't bear to see 
 her face her sweet, kind face." 
 
 He blushed deeply. I could see the red blood 
 mounting under the brown skin of his throat, and 
 slowly up to his temples, where the veins swelled and 
 beat with the rush of it. 
 
 " I am most frightfully sorry," he lamely repeated. 
 
 " I'm sorry, too," I said, " because I can't have a 
 friend who who is disloyal and unjust to Sarah." 
 
 " Unjust I may be, but I can't be disloyal, because
 
 164 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 disloyalty implies treachery to friendship; and it was 
 your friend I asked to be, not Miss Nelson's," he de- 
 fended himself. 
 
 " You are ungrateful ! " I exclaimed. " She has 
 liked and admired you, and she has been very kind 
 kinder than I have been." 
 
 " Yes, perhaps. But do you blame me because I 
 can't feel to her as I do to you ? Look at Gelert. He 
 goes to you and lies down at your feet while you're 
 forgetting his existence. Miss Nelson calls him and 
 tries to tempt him with lumps of sugar, which he 
 loves, yet he goes to her reluctantly, and only goes 
 at all because he is a thorough gentleman and wouldn't 
 hurt a lady's feelings. Why is that can you ex- 
 plain?" 
 
 " No, I can't," I said sullenly. 
 
 " Do you hate him because he is devoted to you 
 and indifferent to Miss Nelson ? " 
 
 " He knows no better. He can't discriminate." 
 
 " I can. That's why I lie at your feet and not at 
 Miss Nelson's, though she is always kind to me and 
 you are not." 
 
 "Yet you just denied that you disliked her!" 
 
 " I deny it again." 
 
 "What do you feel toward her? It's something 
 that I should hate, I know." 
 
 "I really, I can hardly tell what the feeling is. 
 I hoped I was hiding it." 
 
 " Then you confess there's something in your mind 
 against her ! "
 
 THE LIFE MASK 165 
 
 " In my mind? I'm not sure. I think it's in my 
 instinct." 
 
 "If it is your instinct, it doesn't deserve the 
 name! " I cried out. " Sarah is a saint an angel." 
 
 " Very likely you're right," he admitted, almost 
 humbly, though I had never seen him humble before, 
 except in fun. And he was far from being in fun 
 now. 
 
 A new spurt of anger rose in my heart. 
 
 " Do speak out plainly! " I exclaimed, " if you want 
 me to have patience with you." 
 
 " I do want you to have patience, and not hate me 
 if you can help it," he said. " But I will speak out, 
 if you insist. I am grateful to Miss Nelson, very 
 grateful. She has been kind to me, and it's made me 
 feel a brute. If you think I've offended her, I'll 
 apologize most abjectly. All the same I can't 
 change what's in me. I don't dislike her for my- 
 self. But I do dislike to know that she's so constantly 
 near you. I can't get rid of the impression that 
 there's something terrible about her. It's in her 
 eyes. Was she ever out of her mind?" 
 
 I was so amazed that for a moment I forgot to be 
 angry. 
 
 "Sarah out of her mind?" I gasped. "Good 
 heavens, no! She's the sanest creature in the world. 
 Nothing could shake her balance. If it could, she 
 would have " I stopped short, and bit my lip. 
 " What what can you find terrible about Sarah ? " 
 
 " I can't put it into words, any more than I could
 
 166 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 the fear there is in a nightmare. It sounds nonsense 
 when it's explained. But she has a way of looking 
 at you when you don't know; her eyes are on 
 you" 
 
 " What a bad reader of faces you must be ! " I said 
 scornfully. "Don't you know can't you see that 
 she looks at me as Gelert looks at you in worship ? 
 And I don't deserve it. If I served her for fifty 
 years I couldn't begin to deserve her wonderful devo- 
 tion. Oh, it makes me shudder to hear you say there 
 is something terrible about Sarah. It kills me! If 
 there is, it's all because of what her love for me has 
 cost her; but no stranger could know that. It's 
 heart-breaking to think any one could feel a horror 
 of Sarah because of I suppose it must be because of 
 that, you feel so her nervousness, and the wild look 
 her poor eyes have sometimes." 
 
 " They are very strange, and she is very strange," 
 he said. " It makes me anxious when I think of it. 
 Of course she is devoted to you, and sincere and all 
 that. But when it gets on my nerves at night I I 
 tell you I hate to have you living here with her alone." 
 
 " Be silent ! " I stammered, tears springing to my 
 eyes. " Now I do hate you. Now I can't forgive 
 you. It is as if you'd struck her she, who is so 
 defenseless so faithful. Oh, if I could only tell 
 you the truth about her the truth about us two! 
 I can't tell you that. It's not possible, even for her 
 sake, to justify her. But this much I will tell you: 
 she saved my life, and more than my life. She has
 
 THE LIFE MASK 167 
 
 sacrificed her health, and her best years, and her 
 money, for me. There is nothing she hasn't done for 
 me. She had a legacy which might have made her 
 almost rich a person who asks so little, who has 
 such simple tastes. She has spent scarcely a penny 
 of it on herself. Nearly all has gone for me. She 
 calls herself my servant and in a way she was, for 
 she was my nurse when I was a child, then my 
 mother's maid, then my maid, when I grew up; yet 
 she has been more to me oh, a thousand, thousand 
 times more than my mother ever was or could have 
 been. I believe she would have died for me over and 
 over again, but she has done something better and a 
 great deal more difficult. She's lived for me, and for 
 me only. She never thinks of herself at all poor 
 Sarah! and you hate to have her live with me! Oh, 
 go, Captain Shannon! Go now! You are no friend 
 of mine! " 
 
 Tears poured over my face, and I covered it with 
 my hands, to hide it from him. 
 
 " Can't you forgive me ? " he asked. 
 
 I looked up, and dashed the tears away. 
 
 " Will you take it all back, and promise never to do 
 Sarah such a cruel injustice again? " 
 
 " I can't promise that," he said, heavily. " Per- 
 haps it is an injustice I hope to God it is. But I 
 can't help it." 
 
 Suddenly I had no longer any wish to cry. I felt 
 icily cold to him, though I knew that it could not last. 
 
 " Then you must certainly never come here any
 
 168 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 more," I said. " Nothing, and no human being on 
 earth, shall ever stand between Sarah and me. I 
 couldn't bear to see you or speak to you after this." 
 
 " You are very cruel." 
 
 As he spoke, he rose. I saw that he was ready to 
 take me at my word, and the pang that stabbed me to 
 the heart brought a strange joy with it. At last it 
 was my turn to make a sacrifice for Sarah. What a 
 sacrifice it was, I should only realize by and by when 
 the fire in my heart had died down to ashes. 
 
 " You are far more cruel," I retorted. 
 
 He stood up very straight and rigid, like a soldier 
 waiting to be shot. 
 
 " Then this is to be the end of it all? " he said 
 in a half whisper, his eyes seeming to draw the best 
 there was of me slowly into himself, to keep for a 
 memory. 
 
 " The end of it all! " I echoed, filling my voice with 
 contempt. " There has been so little nothing we 
 can't easily forget." 
 
 " You are punishing me terribly. Well come, 
 Gelert." 
 
 He turned away, and walked quickly down the path 
 toward the gate, as he had on the first day. But 
 this time he did not look back.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 I DID not hear Sarah come into the arbor, 
 for I had forgotten that she was due at any mo- 
 ment, and I was sobbing away my nervous ex- 
 citement, with my head on my arms, on the back of 
 the stone seat. 
 
 I started guiltily when I heard her cry, " Why, Miss 
 Nita why, my lamb, what's the matter?" I was 
 ashamed and sorry to have her see me. I had given 
 her so much sorrow, it was time I tried to heal the 
 wounds, instead of making new ones, in that devoted 
 heart. 
 
 " I got worked up into a stupid nervous fit," I ex- 
 cused myself, wiping my eyes with a damp handker- 
 chief, and trying to smile at the pathetic figure, mo- 
 tionless with the big tea tray, in the doorway of the 
 arbor. " What a silly idiot! I haven't done any- 
 thing as foolish as this for ages." 
 
 " The Captin's gone! " breathed Sarah, almost in 
 a whisper, her eyes startled. She pronounced the 
 word " Captin " with a thin, drawling emphasis on 
 the last syllable. I had liked hearing her say it. 
 
 " Yes," I said, anger coming back in a gust. " He 
 has gone, and he is never coming back. I sent him 
 away." 
 
 Sarah turned very pale, and hurrying into the ar- 
 
 169
 
 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 bor, set the tray quickly down, with a slight crash 
 and tinkle of china, as if in another instant she might 
 have dropped it. 
 
 " Mercy me, Miss Nita," she gasped, in the Southern 
 darkey accent she unconsciously used when her agi- 
 tation was greatest. " Mercy me! No wonder 
 you're cryin', if you've done such a thing as that!" 
 
 " I'm not crying because I sent him away," I 
 flashed out at her. " I'm glad I did it very glad. 
 I hate him! I never hated any one in my life so 
 much!" 
 
 My excitement seemed to have a calming effect on 
 her. She placed the tea-tray more securely on the 
 edge of the fountain-basin, and changed the position 
 of the cups and plates. 
 
 " Dearie me, honey," she said gently. " This is 
 just like old times when you was a little girl in the 
 nursery. I do believe you've bin flyin' into one of 
 your real old tantrums." 
 
 " Yes, I have," I admitted, and would have been 
 glad to laugh at myself, but I could not. " I have 
 been furious. I am still. Every flower in this gar- 
 den looks bright red. There's no use pouring out tea 
 for me. I couldn't touch anything. Drink some 
 yourself, please. I've given myself a headache. But 
 I don't care. And I am not sorry for anything I've 
 done or said. I wish my tongue had been a sword ! " 
 
 Sarah did not coax me to eat or drink, as she some- 
 times did if I refused. She pretended to sip her own 
 tea, and crumble a piece of layer jelly-cake, which she
 
 THE LIFE MASK 171 
 
 had made in the morning especially for Captain Shan- 
 non. I imagined that she looked at it sadly. 
 
 " I shouldn't wonder a mite if you was sorry by 
 an' by," she ventured, " if you was mad with the 
 Captin for something he did, maybe meanin' no harm. 
 I'm plumb sure he couldn't ha' meant harm, because 
 he likes you so much, and it would hurt him mighty 
 bad to lose you for a friend." 
 
 " Well, he has lost me and if he really cares 
 enough to be sorry, he deserves it," I said, in defiance 
 of myself more than of her. 
 
 " Poor Captin ! " Sarah murmured. " I'm as sorry 
 for him as I can be." 
 
 " Maybe you wouldn't be so sorry, if you could 
 have heard what he said ! " I broke out, and then re- 
 gretted the impulse, lest she should suspect that she 
 was somehow concerned in the quarrel. I did not 
 intend to hurt her feelings by letting her know that. 
 
 She had poured out very little tea for herself, but 
 now she drained the last drop, slowly, holding the cup 
 up before her face, which it almost hid, for the cup 
 was unusually large : one of the ugliest we had, which 
 she always selected for her own use. 
 
 At last she set it down in its saucer, and began to 
 arrange some tea leaves at the bottom in a pattern, 
 by prodding them with her spoon. 
 
 " Honey," she began slowly, " I want you should 
 tell me something. It's no good your tryin' to hide 
 it, 'cause I'm mighty sharp in one or two ways, though 
 I'm pretty poor in others. Was this trouble with the
 
 172 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Captin what you're blamin' him for anything to 
 do with me? Don't you go to say no, for I'm right 
 sure it was. I feel it in my bones." 
 
 " Please don't ask me what it was about, or what 
 he said," I answered, almost crossly. " It will make 
 me as angry as ever again, just when you've been 
 calming me down by being so good. I want to for- 
 get it." 
 
 " So you shall, dearie, by an' by. That's just what 
 I'd like best. But I want you should forget it in the 
 right way. You don't need to tell me what the Cap- 
 tin said, Miss Nita, because I seem to know most as 
 well as if I'd heard every livin' thing that passed be- 
 tween you. Don't you s'pose I've seen since the 
 very fust day I come into this arbor and found him 
 here ? A woman knows such things even a woman 
 like me. It's sort of in the air. 'Twas the same 
 with his dog." 
 
 " O Sarah, you break my heart ! " I exclaimed. 
 " That any one should try to be my friend and hurt 
 you! I ought to have sent him away before. But I 
 wasn't sure. I " 
 
 " Lord, honey, / was sure, from the minute he 
 clapped his eyes on me and took 'em away again as 
 quick as he could. But do you think I minded? No, 
 indeed, dearie. I've got more hoss sense. The only 
 thing I was afraid of, was that you might get to no- 
 tice, and fly out at him. Then, to-day, I understood 
 about that skein o' worsted. I seen how your eyes 
 sent out sparks, but I couldn't say anything. He
 
 THE LIFE MASK 173 
 
 didn't see. It must ha' come on him like a shock to 
 find out suddenly you was mad with him. I reckon 
 now I oughtn't to ha' gone away. 'Twas real thought- 
 less. But I figured it out that the longer I stayed the 
 worse it would be, for, without knowin' it, he'd ha' kep' 
 eggin' you on to be madder. So I just made myself 
 scarce and tea had to be got, anyhow. I prayed 
 to the Lord I did, honor bright, Miss Nita ! that 
 you two would get talkin' about somethin' else, an' it 
 would all blow over, like it has before when I've seen 
 you a weeny bit riled up for my sake, the same way. 
 I could just ha' sunk into my shoes, dearie, when I 
 come back to find you cryin', an' the Captin gone. I 
 could knock my head against the wall; I could, 
 honest!" 
 
 " It would be more to the point to knock his head 
 against the wall," I returned, bitterly. 
 
 " I reckon that's just about what you've gone an' 
 done, honey. An' it ain't fair, anyways. He can't 
 help his feelin's more than that lovely dog can, an' 
 I don't bear one of 'em any more grudge for not likin* 
 me, than I do the other. You mustn't either, Miss 
 Nita. You mustn't really, if you don't want me to 
 be right down sick abed. Why, I like the Captin 
 better for showin' straight out what he feels, an' 
 not bein' sneaky about it, for all he's got so much to 
 lose in goin' against you." 
 
 " I told -him you were an angel, Sarah," I said, 
 " and so you are. You ought to have a halo." I 
 laughed a little. "You would look a darling in it."
 
 174 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 She shrank, and shivered faintly in the nervous way 
 I knew well. " Please don't, Miss Nita. It's 'most 
 sacrilegious. I respect the Captin for how he feels 
 about me. Don't folks talk about aurums or some- 
 thing? I reckon they're some kind o' halo, though 
 maybe not very nice ones always. I was readin' 
 about such things in a magazine once. It said 
 we'd all got them, different colors accordin' to our 
 characters, and sort o' like electricity. It sounded 
 pretty queer, but if it's true, I reckon my one kind 
 of joggles against the Captin's, without my meanin' 
 it and rubs him up the wrong way. His is all right. 
 I can 'most see it. It's mighty fine, like a Victoria 
 Cross, or a lot of decorations for brave things he's 
 done. And he's got a heart that can be merry, and 
 full o' deep down thoughts at the same time. I make 
 out he's a real man, Miss Nita, an' it's goin' to hurt 
 me worse than anything ever has except one thing 
 we don't speak about if you throw him over because 
 of me." 
 
 " You are too good, Sarah," I said. " How his 
 ears would tingle to hear you! I couldn't have done 
 anything but what I did, and now the episode is over. 
 We shall forget all about it and about him 
 soon." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " We can't do that. I reckon you know we can't, 
 dearie. And love's too fine to throw away for a trifle." 
 
 " Love ! " I repeated. " There's no love in ques- 
 tion."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 175 
 
 " Why, now, Miss Nita, even his dog could see the 
 Captin loves you." 
 
 " Then if he does, I'm glad, for it will punish him 
 more for his injustice," I said, hardening my heart, 
 which was beginning to lose its numbness, and to ache 
 because he was gone, never to come again. I knew that 
 I had been harsh, though it was true, what I had told 
 Sarah: I did not see what else I could have done. 
 " Please, please let's change the subject," I added 
 quickly. " The thing is past. I think Captain Shan- 
 non will perhaps go away from Granada now. He 
 said the other day that he'd stayed twice as long as he 
 meant to and it must be a long time since he's seen 
 the sister he talks of." 
 
 Meekly, Sarah subsided into silence at last. She 
 poured herself out more tea, and drank it in little 
 sips, though it had stood too long, and made her cough. 
 
 Neither of us spoke again of Captain Shannon that 
 day; and I made only the vaguest reference to him 
 when I said to Sarah at dinner (which I could not 
 eat) that my headache was caused by my own bad 
 temper not by what she supposed. 
 
 I went to bed early, assuring her that a long sleep 
 would cure me; and Sarah brought me a decoction 
 made of steeped orange leaves. It was an old rem- 
 edy which she used to give me " down South," when 
 I had set my nerves jangling in one of my baby fits 
 of fury. I thanked her for it, and when I had drunk, 
 turned my face to the wall, saying that now I should 
 rest well. But it would have taken more than orange- 
 leaf tea to give me peace that night.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 BEFORE Captain Shannon came, I had been 
 contented with only my flowers. But now 
 that he had gone, I knew that the happiness 
 they gave me was only leading up to him. It was as 
 if they had said, " We'll give you back your youth, 
 and make you ready for love." Then I had shut the 
 gate on love, when it knocked ; and now I saw the gar- 
 den dull and drab, as through a piece of smoked glass. 
 
 I thought of him constantly. There was an under- 
 tone of him in whatever I tried to do. My mind was 
 like a shell washed up from the ocean, and remem- 
 brance of him was the voice of the sea always mur- 
 muring through it. 
 
 Three days passed, and I had heard nothing of him. 
 He might be gone, for all I knew. In some moods I 
 was sure that he had gone. In others, I told myself 
 that he had not really cared enough to leave Granada 
 because of me. He had all the world. Why should 
 I be of importance in his life I who had nothing, 
 and was nothing? A hundred times I longed to call 
 him back; yet if I had known he was waiting day 
 and night outside the gate I would not have called 
 him. In my wise moments I realized that, though I 
 suffered now, the suffering was as nothing to what I 
 must have endured, if the hopeless little idyll in the 
 
 176
 
 THE LIFE MASK 177 
 
 garden had lasted a few weeks, or even a few days, 
 longer. It was providential, really, that things had 
 ended quickly and suddenly as they had. 
 
 The fourth day was the day of the full moon. I 
 knew it by my Spanish calendar. If our friendship 
 had been undisturbed, we should have gone with 
 Captain Shannon to the Alhambra that night. He 
 was to have dined with us, and Sarah had planned 
 a, little feast. The table was to have been placed 
 on the terrace, not too far from the house for dishes 
 to be hot. She had spoken of buying red silk candle 
 shades which would look pretty with a decoration of 
 crimson ramblers; and she had even hinted at the 
 extravagance of an ice-cream freezer. She was long- 
 ing to try her hand again, she said, at peach ice, and 
 the captain was sure to love it, because coming from 
 the east where there was no cooking, he was like a 
 boy about nice things to eat. 
 
 Of course we were not to have any feast now; and 
 I thought I should always feel a pang if Sarah ever 
 again suggested an ice-cream freezer. 
 
 She went down to Granada in the morning, as she 
 occasionally did. How she contrived to make herself 
 understood in the shops, I did not know, but she 
 seemed to enjoy the expeditions, returning pink with 
 excitement and with many parcels which she had some- 
 how obtained. I questioned her once, how she made 
 a shopkeeper understand that she wanted honey, and 
 she said that was quite simple: she made a buzzing 
 sound like a bee.
 
 178 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 This morning she was gone a long time, although 
 there was little to buy. When it was almost luncheon 
 time, and she had not come home, I began to be anx- 
 ious, turning over in my mind everything I could 
 think of, which might possibly have happened to her. 
 
 Marta laid the table in the cool dining-room, and 
 got ready our simple meal of eggs, goat's^milk cheese, 
 and fruit. Would the sefiorita begin without the 
 sefiora? she asked, for she and Pepe both persisted 
 in mixing us up in this way, though they had been 
 told, until we were tired of telling, that it was the 
 other way round. Now we left it alone, and answered 
 to the names they chose to give us. 
 
 No, the sefiorita would not eat without the seiiora. 
 She would wait. (If I could have put more heart 
 into the lessons, I should have been quite proud of my 
 progress in Spanish.) The sefiorita would go to the 
 gate, and look out to see if the sefiora were coming. 
 
 Sarah had our key, and Pepe unlocked the gate for 
 me, interested in my anxiety, and probably hoping, 
 unconsciously, for the excitement of some accident. 
 
 " But there is the sefiora," said he, in an almost in- 
 jured tone, " walking along as slowly as if it were 
 nine o'clock instead of one, and she is with the English 
 Capitano ! " 
 
 Everything danced before my eyes for a second or 
 two: the shady green background of trees; against it, 
 moving leisurely, Sarah's neat black figure; Hugh 
 Shannon carrying her parasol, and an enormous par- 
 cel. As soon as I realized that they were not an
 
 THE LIFE MASK 179 
 
 optical illusion, I would have turned and rushed back 
 into the garden ; but it was too late. They were close 
 upon me, and Pepe would have been too deliciously 
 scandalized if I had run away. 
 
 Sarah called to me. 
 
 " It's all right, Miss Nita. The Captin and I have 
 bin talkin' things over, an' I'm just goin' to be friends 
 with him, whether you are or not. So I don't see, 
 as you quarreled on my account, how you can stay 
 mad with him if I'm not." 
 
 " Will you forgive me, for Miss Nelson's sake? " 
 he asked, hanging back a little, with his great parcel. 
 " If she's forgiven me, don't you think I've been pun- 
 ished enough? Look at me and see." 
 
 His eyes called to mine, as they had often called be- 
 fore, and my eyes were compelled to answer. It was 
 true : he had changed in the few days since I had seen 
 him. His eyes looked hollow and tired as if he had not 
 slept, though he was smiling at me now. Even it 
 seemed that he was thinner, and that the ruddiness 
 was gone from under the brown of his tanned skin. 
 If I had met him for the first time to-day I should have 
 thought him older than I had thought before. 
 
 " Miss Nelson is what you said she was a saint," 
 he went on, when I did not speak. " I've confessed 
 everything to her, and she has absolved me, even 
 though our ' auras ' don't fit, and maybe never will. 
 Won't you let me come back on these terms ? " 
 
 All the time, as he spoke, he smiled faintly; but 
 when he asked this question, and still I stared at him
 
 i8o THE LIFE MASK 
 
 without answering, the smile was struck from his face. 
 His lips tightened and his first deep flush faded into 
 pallor. He looked as if he were suffering physical 
 pain. 
 
 " Is it possible for one to care so much, and the 
 other not at all ? " he said, in a low voice. 
 
 Electricity ran through my nerves. Suddenly I 
 held out my hand to him, and springing forward, he 
 grasped it. 
 
 The groves and the garden were singing in the sun- 
 shine, "Friends again! Friends again!" 
 
 " I thought I'd better just buy the ice-cream 
 freezer," said Sarah. 
 
 Afterward, I made her confess what she had done. 
 Before going down to shop in Granada, she had walked 
 into the Alhambra, in deliberate search of Captain 
 Shannon. There she had found him, looking, as she 
 said, " so peaked, her heart just bled." She had been 
 wondering what she should do: whether she could 
 have the courage to march up to him and begin at once 
 what she wanted to say; but, " like a soldier," he had 
 come to her, and they had " had it out." 
 
 " He may not like me," she went on, " an* I don't 
 know as he ever can; but he ain't my enemy, an' he 
 thinks I've got some real good points. He's said his 
 say to you about me, an' he don't need to say any more, 
 for that's all there is in his head on that subject, I 
 reckon. And he's paid me a right nice compliment, 
 that's kind of set me up. He says he never come 
 across any woman before who would like a man bet-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 181 
 
 ter for speakin' out his mind about her, an' forgive 
 him just like one man to another. Nobody except 
 you, Miss Nita, ever said anything to me I set such 
 store on. I've got a mighty soft spot for that young 
 man in my heart, an' I couldn't get a minute's peace 
 knowin' he was eatin' out his because our door was 
 shut in his face. I made up my mind if I could help 
 it, the thing wasn't goin' to be. An' as for his leavin' 
 Granada, I knew mighty well he hadn't. If I'd 
 thought there was any danger of that, I'd ha' gone to 
 him before. But I felt as if 'twould be best to hang 
 on a few days, till you'd kind o' simmered down. 
 Now we ain't goin' to miss the moon in the Alhambra 
 after all! An' I reckon you won't grudge me bein' 
 happy? " 
 
 I wound my arms round the flat, frail waist, and 
 kissed her cheek, which was cool and soft, like the flesh 
 of a quite old person. 
 
 "How wonderful you are, Sarah!" I said. "All 
 the same, I haven't forgiven Captain Shannon for not 
 appreciating you, and I shan't forgive him until he's 
 learned what you really are." 
 
 But she loosed my arms, gently. 
 
 "You know, Miss Nita," she reminded me, "I 
 can't bear to hear you talk that way. I'm so un- 
 worthy." 
 
 We spread the feast on the terrace; and though I 
 said I had not forgiven him, I could have kissed the 
 dishes I laid with my own hands at his place, know- 
 ing he would touch them, that he would be in the gar-
 
 182 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 den again, that he would sit with us at our table, and 
 eat our food. 
 
 Just once, while I was making up a boutonniere of 
 orange blossoms to put on his napkin, a voice seemed 
 suddenly to scream in my ear: " If he knew!" But 
 I silenced it by answering quickly : " What harm 
 for him to come here without knowing, and call him- 
 self for a little while my friend? Soon he will go 
 home to his real friends, and I will fade in his memory, 
 like one of these flowers, pressed in a book and keep- 
 ing always something of its perfume." 
 
 Yet in my heart I knew very well that our friend- 
 ship would not end in half sad, half sweet peaceful- 
 ness, like this. Now that he had come back we should 
 both have to suffer. But I could silence the voice 
 which said so, in order not to darken our " feast " ; and 
 I was keyed to a pitch where I was willing to endure 
 anything afterward, just for the sake of this one night.
 
 WHY, Captin, you look like a real prince!" 
 exclaimed Sarah, when he came to us on 
 the terrace. 
 
 It was the first time I had seen him in evening dress. 
 He looked very handsome, I thought, and seemed to 
 belong to a world far from mine which was bounded 
 by a garden wall. I wondered how I had ever had 
 the effrontery to be harsh with him, as if my place 
 were far above him in power, and how he could have 
 borne himself humbly as he had, in return. I had 
 never thought much about other women in connection 
 with him, but now when as Sarah said I saw him 
 looking so " like a prince," it seemed to me that a 
 great many beautiful girls in his own world must be 
 in love with him, or wanting to make him fall in love 
 with them. Here, he talked always of us, or of im- 
 personal things; of his thoughts about life and people, 
 hardly ever of himself or of what he had done, except 
 in a glancing way; but I could not help knowing that 
 he must be a distinguished soldier. Perhaps this un- 
 assuming young man, who allowed himself to be 
 snubbed by a woman standing outside life, was a hero 
 in the eyes of his country people. He would probably 
 be lionized when he went home, and made much of 
 by pretty women, and invited to official sort of enter- 
 
 183
 
 184 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 tainments where he would have to appear wearing 
 medals he had won. He had never told me about any 
 medals, but I was suddenly convinced that he had 
 earned many honors of which lie had not spoken. I felt 
 jealous of England, and especially of the women there 
 whom he knew, or would meet when he went back; 
 but there was an almost tigerish satisfaction in the 
 thought that for this hour he was mine if I chose to 
 claim him, and that I could make him forget the exist- 
 ence of any other woman. 
 
 " I have brought peace offerings to you both," were 
 the first words he said. " Don't scorn them, please ! 
 Don't dash my joy on this glorious night; maybe 
 they're not very nice, but pretend they are. Gelert 
 and I chose them. We did our best." 
 
 He had something white bundled up carelessly un- 
 der his arm. Now he unrolled a creamy film of old 
 Spanish lace, in the shape of a mantilla. In it he had 
 wrapped a fan whose chased and gilded ivory sticks 
 sparkled faintly in the dusk which rose from the 
 Vega-like spangled blue gauze. An envelope dropped 
 out of the parcel also, but he let that fall to the 
 ground unnoticed. It lay on the pink tiles of the 
 terrace, back uppermost, and I saw a crest, and a pur- 
 ple seal. 
 
 " Will you let me give you the mantilla ? " he asked. 
 " I so much want you to take it. And most awfully 
 I want to see you in it to-night. Do wear it to the 
 Alhambra will you ? " 
 
 I would not quite promise to accept the mantilla
 
 THE LIFE MASK 185 
 
 as a gift, but I promised to "think it over," and in 
 any case to wear it that night. I tried it on at once, 
 he and Sarah helping me to arrange it on my hair, 
 and over the shoulders. The fan was for her, old 
 and very beautiful, with the paintings on chicken skin 
 that Spanish women value. Sarah made no difficulty 
 about accepting her gift. She seemed delighted with 
 it, though she protested that it was too grand for her, 
 and she must often lend it to me. 
 
 It was only as we were sitting down to dinner, with 
 the red-shaded candles lighted, that Captain Shannon 
 saw the letter he had dropped. 
 
 " Oh, I was wondering where that had disappeared 
 to," he said, retrieving it from the floor. " I must 
 have mixed it up with the mantilla somehow. It came, 
 and I read it just before I started out from the hotel. 
 A tirade from my half-sister, Lady Mendel, threaten- 
 ing to look me up if I don't come home soon," he 
 laughed, and put the envelope in a breast pocket of 
 his coat. As he did this, I had a glimpse of a strong, 
 almost masculine handwriting, with very thick, up- 
 right black letters. 
 
 "Do you think she really will come, sir?" Sarah 
 asked. 
 
 "Not she!" he replied, gaily. "She's in Paris. 
 Granada in July wouldn't suit her book at all." 
 
 " It isn't July yet," I said, looking down over the 
 blue Vega with its spangling lights. 
 
 " No, but it soon will be." 
 
 " Perhaps you will have taken her advice and gone
 
 i86 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 home by that time," I suggested with an air of care- 
 lessness. 
 
 " I have very seldom taken her advice," said he, 
 " though she thinks it's her duty to go on giving it ; 
 and I shall take it less than ever now. I say, Miss 
 Nelson, did you make this cold consomme? It's gor- 
 geous." 
 
 And we talked of other things. 
 
 The Alhambra might have been carved all of ala- 
 baster in the moonlight, with here and there a glowing 
 jewel. And we had it to ourselves: we three, and the 
 interpreter, Captain Shannon's friend. 
 
 He could speak English, and Sarah began by ask- 
 ing him more or less intelligent questions, and hang- 
 ing on his words, I very well knew why. He seemed 
 flattered by her interest in what he could tell, and they 
 fell behind us, as he explained to her the meaning of 
 the horseshoe windows, and small supporting pillars. 
 " Tent poles and drapery they represented to that na- 
 tion of tent dwellers," I heard him saying. Then his 
 voice ceased. I looked back for the two figures in the 
 shadow under the gallery, but they were out of sight. 
 
 " He will show her what they call the boudoir of 
 Lindaraja," Captain Shannon said. " It's his favorite 
 place. And by and by he will take her into the Court 
 of Lions, and tell her how Gautier once spent a night 
 there, at the time of the full moon." 
 
 " Shan't we go with them? " I asked. " He seems 
 very interesting."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 187 
 
 " He is, but not half as interesting to you as I am, 
 I hope. And I want you to be with me alone in the 
 Court of Lions. I love the dear old beasts, don't you ? 
 . with their square teeth and different kinds of 
 carved fur, and their wrinkled-up, obliterated faces 
 that look as if they were brooding on their pasts. 
 Now, by moonlight, if only we knew the right call, 
 you and I could lure them all twelve from their places. 
 First they would sit stealthily down, slip the fountain 
 off their backs, and leap to us, still spouting crystal 
 jets from their mouths. We could soon train them 
 not to spout in the house, though; and they would 
 follow us to Egypt, on shipboard and railway trains 
 and everywhere." 
 
 " But I'm not going to Egypt," I laughed. 
 
 " That's where I hope to persuade you're mistaken," 
 he said, in a suddenly changed voice. " I hope you 
 are going there." 
 
 " Some day a long time from now, maybe." 
 
 " No, soon. Stop here a moment, please. This is 
 the exact spot where you were kneeling when I saw 
 your face reflected in the pond. I know the very 
 stone by heart the stone where your knee 
 rested." 
 
 He laid his hand on my arm, and made me stand 
 still. 
 
 We were in the Patio de la Alberca, looking down 
 into the water as we had looked then, only now we were 
 together for a little while ; still, we were to- 
 gether, as I had never thought we could be in this
 
 i88 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 place. And the full moon was rising above the high 
 white walls of the court. 
 
 The water was not green, but silver, and deep 
 indigo blue where the moon had not yet touched 
 it. Our figures showed, floating far down under 
 the surface, as if the pool were a deep azure sky 
 sprinkled with stars, and we were spirits wandering 
 in space. Standing side by side, we blended into one 
 image. 
 
 " I made a vow here that day," he said, in a hushed 
 voice. " I vowed that I'd leave no stone, precious, 
 or otherwise, unturned to get you. But before I ask 
 you to be my wife, and to go to Egypt with me when 
 I go, I have a confession to make " 
 
 "Please stop!" I broke in. "I can't" 
 
 " No, I won't stop. You shall not speak till 
 you've heard me to the end. I didn't lie when I said 
 that never to a soul had I mentioned meeting you 
 here. But I was the gypsy." 
 
 " You the gypsy ! " 
 
 " Yes. I've felt a brute. But I always meant 
 to confess at this very place, when I could tell 
 you here, in my own person, what I made the gypsy 
 tell for me: that I love you with all there is of me, 
 that I'll love you through eternity. That's my only 
 excuse for what I did. The guide knew I'd been in- 
 quiring where Miss Nelson and Mrs. Lippincott had 
 gone for I guessed your name must be one of those 
 two signed in the visitors' book, from the description 
 of your dress and veil, and your beautiful tall figure.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 189 
 
 He told me he was engaged to take you both to the 
 gypsy quarter that night, to see the dancing and hear 
 your fortunes. Then the plan jumped into my mind 
 for I'd been there often, and I knew what the 
 place was like. I knew I'd only to keep my head and 
 whisper sepulchrally, and shroud myself with shawls, 
 sitting humped up, with my back to what little light 
 there'd be, to do the trick all right. But it was a trick. 
 I didn't realize that it was a pretty low down sort of 
 thing to do, till after it was done. The only thing 
 was, I simply had to make you think of me, somehow 
 or other, till I could get to know you. I couldn't let 
 time run on, and not even exist for you. You can't 
 conceive what a blow it was, to find you'd left the 
 hotel, when I got back from my mountain tramp. I'd 
 promised my shepherd to come there and see him again, 
 with some books and tobacco. I couldn't bear to fail 
 a fellow of that kind, or I wouldn't have gone a step 
 after seeing you. But the hotel people said the elder 
 of those two ladies I asked about had engaged rooms 
 for several days, so I believed if I hurried like mad, 
 it would be all right. You were never out of my 
 thoughts once, from the minute those wonderful eyes 
 looked up at me out of this big mirror, till they looked 
 up at me again in your garden ; and you never will be, 
 now, till our eyes meet in some other world beyond 
 this. Then came the shock of losing you. God! it 
 was a shock. When I got that chance to let you know 
 by the gypsy, how I was loving you, sooner than I 
 could possibly manage it any other way without kid-
 
 190 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 napping you why, I just snatched it. You'll have 
 to forgive me." 
 
 He seized my hands and crushed them against his 
 breast. My fingers could feel his heart pounding, like 
 a bird that beats its wings in a cage. 
 
 " I am always forgiving you ! " I said breathlessly, 
 as if I had been caught by a whirlwind. 
 
 "Then you do!" 
 
 " You say I must. So " 
 
 " But you do, of your own accord ? because I 
 love you so frightfully ten thousand times more 
 than at first, now I know you for what you are 
 my life eternal, my soul ! " 
 
 " I forgive you! I can't help it," I said. "But 
 you don't know me as I am. If you did, you wouldn't 
 love me." 
 
 He kissed the palms of my hands. 
 
 " This at first," he said, " for my love of you. 
 Your lips when I've made you love me. Not know 
 you? Why, the instant our eyes met down there in 
 the water, I knew I was seeing for the first time in my 
 life a woman the woman related to my soul. 
 Not love you, if I knew you as you are? Why, you 
 can't help revealing yourself through your eyes 
 your blessed, beautiful eyes and your dear, soft 
 voice, as southern as these orange blossoms you gave 
 me, and sweeter. I know you better than you know 
 yourself. Can it be possible that you, who belonged 
 to me always from the beginning of things, didn't 
 recognize that we were meant for each other, the
 
 THE LIFE MASK 191 
 
 first day? I dare you to tell me you didn't?" 
 
 " I thought of you afterward," I said. " It was 
 mysterious and romantic, like a face of a man com- 
 ing into a crystal. But I didn't suppose I should ever 
 see you again. I didn't even want to." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Because I was sure if I saw you I should be 
 disappointed." 
 
 " That's just contrary to what I felt. I knew the 
 real you would be more wonderful. But if you're dis- 
 appointed " 
 
 " I was mistaken, because I'm not disappointed." 
 
 " My darling ! Do you mean that you care for 
 me?" 
 
 " Not not " I stammered, holding myself away 
 from him, " in the way you want." 
 
 But he would not let me go. 
 
 " Look me in the face," he said, " and tell me that 
 again if you can." 
 
 I lifted my eyes, and looked at him. Chiseled by 
 the moonlight and glorified by love, his face seemed 
 to me supernaturally beautiful. His eyes called my 
 chilled soul out of the shadows and warmed it with 
 divine fire. 
 
 " I can't say it," I whispered. " But, oh, I implore 
 you, don't try to make me say anything else. Let 
 us be happy. Let us be friends. It's the only way 
 we can keep each other. I swear to you that's the 
 truth. You don't understand." 
 
 " What don't I understand ? " he asked more gently,
 
 1Q2 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 but still holding me in his arms. "If you can't say 
 you don't love me, that means you do. Yes, we'll be 
 happy good heavens, how happy! And we'll be 
 friends. But above all we'll be lovers ! " 
 
 " No," I said, " that can't be ! We can't be any- 
 thing to each other unless you'll be my friend. Oh, 
 how I wish you could ! It will be so hard to lose you, 
 now." 
 
 He opened his arms and freed me; but when I 
 would have moved a step away, he took my hands and 
 drew me near to him again. So we stood, looking 
 at each other, while his hands held mine down at my 
 sides. 
 
 "We won't lose each other, never fear," he said. 
 " But you'll have to tell me what you mean. Dearest 
 is there another man ? Miss Nelson told me long 
 ago that you that you're free. I couldn't wait, 
 when I heard you were Mrs. Lippincott; I asked her 
 the second day I came to your garden. You haven't 
 promised yourself to any one else? Because if you 
 have, you'll have to break the promise. You couldn't 
 possibly keep it, for you belong to me." 
 
 " There's no other man," I said. " But you 
 spoke a little while ago about asking me to be your 
 wife. What I mean is that I can't marry you 
 or any one ever. It isn't just some silly, woman's 
 reason. There's a barrier between us as high as the 
 wall of China, and it can't be climbed." 
 
 " If you think that, you don't know what a man 
 will do when he loves a woman as I love you, Nita.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 193 
 
 Oh, the dear little name ! I've called you that a hun- 
 dred times to myself since I first heard it from Miss 
 Nelson! If the wall were as high as the stars, and as 
 thick as a mountain, and as slippery as glass, I'd climb 
 it somehow, if it were the one way to get you. You've 
 only to tell me what it is.'* 
 
 " Ah, that's just what I can't do ! " I cried. " At 
 least I will not. If I told, it would be the same 
 thing as sending you away forever, and I don't want 
 to oh, I don't want to do that yet, if I can help 
 it." 
 
 " You're as mysterious and secret as a castle on a 
 rock with a deep moat round it ! " he exclaimed, al- 
 most angrily. " I know that in the castle noble 
 knights and lovely ladies live, but you seem to want 
 me to think you're the stronghold of a robber horde." 
 
 In spite of myself I laughed, though tears were near. 
 My heart seemed drowning in them, though my eyes 
 were dry. 
 
 " That is what I am," I said, with the bitter laugh 
 the picture called up. "A robber stronghold." 
 
 " Then I'll take it by assault ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 "You'd find it dark and full of pitfalls, and not 
 worth taking. Oh, if you'd believe me, and if you 
 would be my friend! The part of the castle where 
 you'd come as my friend, isn't quite uninhabitable, like 
 the rest." 
 
 " Don't let's speak in parables to each other, my 
 dearest one," he said. " And before we go any far- 
 ther, let me assure you of this; once and for all : noth-
 
 194 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 ing you could tell me about yourself would make me 
 believe the castle wasn't worth taking, and nothing 
 could make me want less to take it than I do now 
 which is about one hundred thousand times more than 
 I ever wanted or will want, to do anything else in the 
 world. Now that's understood, isn't it?" 
 
 " I love you for thinking so," I told him, " but 
 you simply don't know what you are talking about. 
 For a minute you carried me off my feet, though even 
 then I kept my senses just enough to realize that noth- 
 ing nothing can come of this but heartbreak for me 
 and for you, if you really care as you say. Un- 
 less" 
 
 "Unless what?" 
 
 " Only what I said before," I persisted. " Unless 
 you will be my friend, and let us take what happiness 
 we can find in each other's friendship. Perhaps I 
 might let myself have that though even so much 
 wouldn't be fair to you, really. Still, while you stay 
 here if you don't go at once " 
 
 " I shall never go, till I take you with me, or your 
 promise." 
 
 " Ah, but that's nonsense ! Think of your ca- 
 reer" 
 
 " You are my career." 
 
 I tried very hard to draw my hands away from him, 
 but he was too strong, and too determined. 
 
 " You are going to make me very unhappy ! " I 
 said, and my voice began to tremble. " You would be 
 sorry to do that if you knew what a life I have had,
 
 THE LIFE MASK 195 
 
 and how up to this you've been the one bright 
 spot in it since I was a little. girl. If you would only 
 be kind, and take what I can give or else go away 
 at once, you would still be to me like a bright ray of 
 sunshine in a dark room. Your love would be so per- 
 fect a thing for me to remember that I wouldn't grudge 
 one of the steps which has led me up to it. I should 
 regret nothing, even though I had to suffer in future, 
 because it seems to me that with such a memory, such 
 suffering would be better than many women's happi- 
 ness." 
 
 He kept my hands, but his grasp, though as firm, was 
 somehow different. It was as if the convulsiveness 
 died out of it. 
 
 " Tell me exactly what you want me to do," he said. 
 " I can't promise to do it, because I'm only a man, 
 not a marble saint, and I don't want to be one. But 
 perhaps we'll agree on an armistice to last till I can 
 bring you to my way of thinking." 
 
 " That will be never," I sighed. " Still, I should be 
 thankful to have the armistice, because you're so 
 much to me. I didn't want to let you mean so much, 
 but" 
 
 " It was God did that or fate, or whatever you 
 like to call it." 
 
 " Very well," I agreed. " It has come into my life, 
 without my wish, but now that it has come, I cling to 
 what it can give me. If I can have anything at all 
 without making you suffer too much." 
 
 " I don't care how much I suffer, so I win in the
 
 196 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 end," he said. " And even if I fail but I won't 
 fail! Tell me what you want me to do." 
 
 " Not to tear my heart out by asking me to marry 
 you, or anything like that." 
 
 " By asking you to marry me, or anything like that. 
 Very well. What else?" 
 
 " That's all for the immediate present." 
 
 " Then for the immediate present I promise. 
 But what do I get in return? " 
 
 " My friendship, with all my heart." 
 
 " In all your heart, there's room for more than 
 friendship. Do you give me your love?" 
 
 I was silent for an instant. Then I said, in a very 
 little voice: 
 
 " If I tell you something, will you make me another 
 promise? Not to do anything but just hold my hands, 
 as you're holding them now, kindly, and like like 
 an affectionate friend ? " 
 
 " If you imagine that I'm holding them now like an 
 affectionate friend, you're most awfully mistaken. 
 But never mind. Let it pass at that. I'll do nothing 
 to-night that you ask me not to do. And sufficient 
 for the night is the good thereof since you won't 
 of your free will grant me anything better yet. 
 Now, tell me the something. Is it that you love me ? " 
 
 " Yes," I said, " but that isn't quite all. You are 
 good to me now so good ! And I'll tell you a little 
 more. I loved you from the first minute, when I saw 
 you here in the water. I didn't know it then, but I 
 was afraid of it. I called you to myself * the man in
 
 THE LIFE MASK 197 
 
 the mirror,' and I couldn't keep you out of my 
 thoughts day or night. I dreamed of you some- 
 times, and that did me good, for it was always a pleas- 
 ant dream, and sent away a hateful one I used to 
 have. After the gypsy " 
 
 "Yes, dearest; after the gypsy? If you only knew 
 how hard you're making it, though, to keep that arctic 
 promise ! " 
 
 " I was so afraid my dream of you was to be spoiled 
 < that you'd done something I should hate to think 
 of your doing. That's why I asked you, in the gar- 
 den, whether you'd ever spoken of me to any one." 
 
 " I understood. I guessed what was in your mind. 
 It was a bad moment for me, because I was thoroughly 
 ashamed of myself, and that's not a good feeling. I 
 didn't lie ; but still I vowed then and there to make 
 a clean breast of the whole business to-night." 
 
 "To-night? You planned then to do that?" 
 
 " Yes, because I couldn't do it owing to what the 
 gypsy said about me, till the time came when I could 
 tell you the same thing she told. I thought to-night 
 would be the soonest I should dare to speak out for 
 fear of frightening you away like the fairy fawn in 
 the story. By Jove, it was all I could do, though, to 
 keep myself bottled up till now! It seemed as if this 
 night would never come. You see you simply had 
 to love me. I believed such love as mine must create 
 love. It's like a forest fire in the wind. It had to 
 set you on fire too, you beautiful proud young pine- 
 tree on a hill."
 
 ig8 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " Young ! " I echoed. " There's another obstacle 
 - oh, but one of the little ones, small as a pebble 
 compared to the rest. I'm afraid horribly afraid 
 I'm older than you are. You you look such a 
 boy sometimes." 
 
 " Because I'm in love. Why, I must be a good ten 
 years older than you are, you dark shadowy child 
 maybe more. I'm thirty-two." 
 
 "Oh, I'm thankful!" I exclaimed. "I should 
 have hated to be older than you. But I'm not young. 
 I'm twenty-nine. Next October I'll be thirty." 
 
 " An opal for our engagement ring, then," he said. 
 " That's not breaking my promise. October's a long 
 way off quite out of the * immediate present.' ' 
 
 We both laughed a little, and it was good to laugh 
 with him. It seemed, almost, as if he had taught me 
 to laugh. I had forgotten how, before he came. 
 
 "If only the other bugbears are no worse than this 
 one ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 "You must have no hope of that sort," I assured 
 him quickly. " Tell me one thing, since I've for- 
 given you the gypsy. Why did you make her say she 
 swore by her religion? It sounded so sincere, some- 
 how, it forced me to believe her." 
 
 " And so it was sincere, for I meant my own reli- 
 gion; and that's a lot to me. It didn't come out of 
 anything I ever read or heard, but just from oh, 
 well, listening to the beautiful things that speak with- 
 out voices, and tell you how you're related to the uni- 
 verse. You know ! "
 
 THE LIFE MASK 199 
 
 " Yes, I know," I said. " Sometimes when I've 
 been very unhappy, I've had no religion at all; but 
 since I came to my garden here, it's been different. I 
 thought it was the flowers who were teaching me, but 
 now I know it was you and love. Oh, whatever 
 happens, and no matter how soon we part it must 
 come sooner or later when you remember me you 
 can say to yourself : ' I brought her happiness and 
 light she'd been starving for.' Among all the mis- 
 sions you've carried out, maybe that may count among 
 your greatest successes." 
 
 For answer, he kissed both my hands again, very 
 softly and gently. I told myself that when I went 
 home I would kiss them where his lips had been. 
 
 " If the world has been cruel to you, it's a brute," 
 he said. " It shall never get another chance to hurt 
 you. I'll see to that, as your trusty knight. You 
 were born to be a queen of hearts, and it's time you 
 came into your own, instead of living like royalty in 
 exile. Meanwhile, do what you choose with my heart. 
 But before we arrange the terms of our friendship 
 for the * immediate present ' I'm going to ask you a 
 question I have no right to ask. It will keep your hand 
 in, forgiving me. Have you ever loved any man 
 much? I don't suppose for a minute you'll answer." 
 
 " Oh, but I will ! " I said, rejoiced there was some- 
 thing I could tell, which would make him glad. " I 
 haven't loved any man ever, till now. And not 
 even a boy since I was fourteen." 
 
 "You adorable darling! Bless you, I knew it,
 
 200 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 somehow. There's something about you that told me. 
 And I've been so disgustingly jealous of your of 
 Lippincott, sometimes. Then again I had a really 
 weird feeling that there never was a Lippincott: that 
 you just called yourself ' Mrs.' as a kind of protection 
 from droves of silly young men when you traveled 
 round the world; because I said to myself, you were 
 too young and beautiful to be Mrs. Anybody ex- 
 cept Mrs. Hugh St. John Shannon ! " 
 
 " That was before you knew I was nearly thirty. 
 Isn't that just a little, little disillusion to begin with ? " 
 
 " Good heavens, no ! I wouldn't care if you were 
 as old as Ninon de 1'Enclos. I know you'll be more 
 beautiful when you're eighty than you are now. Any- 
 how I shall think so." 
 
 " You won't be there. You'll be a charming old 
 gentleman celebrating your golden wedding, with 
 crowds of grandchildren round you." 
 
 " That may be, with you for the golden bride. Be- 
 cause, though I'm going to do what you wish, and 
 not make love to you in the ' immediate present ' (this 
 isn't making love, you know) I won't disguise from 
 you that I have very different intentions for the fu- 
 ture. While we're being ' friends,' you will be like 
 a sort of glorious bird of Paradise I've snared, and 
 chained round the foot with a jeweled chain. I let 
 you run, but each day I pull you in by the length of 
 one jewel. I haven't had time to count yet, how many 
 jewels there are! Or else, you're like that castle on 
 the rock we were talking about. You think you're
 
 THE LIFE MASK 201 
 
 impregnable, because you always have been. But al- 
 ready I've swum across the moat, and I'm cutting 
 steps up the rock: one step higher each day. Now, 
 I'm not going to let you answer that, for fear you say 
 something I shan't like. And if I don't like it, you 
 won't either really. Come with me into the Court 
 of Lions, and get their blessing. They must have 
 seen a good many lovely women in their time but 
 never one like my woman." 
 
 His woman! By and by he would have to know 
 what woman I was, if I could not make him leave me 
 in some easier way. But not now; for I had set this 
 night of the full moon apart in my mind as my happy 
 night. 
 
 Hand in hand, we went through the doorway into 
 the Court of Lions where the fountain was minting 
 moonlight into silver, and where the bleak stone faces 
 of the twelve great beasts seemed to gaze at us aa 
 kindly as if we were real lovers.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 IT was a beautiful thing to be friends with Hugh, 
 yet to know that all the while love stood close by, 
 in the background; that though we talked of im- 
 personal things, there was nothing of overwhelming 
 importance in our world, really, except each other. I 
 knew that I was selfish in this happiness. But, after 
 all, I should have to suffer for it in the end more than 
 he. He would learn some day, not to forget, but to 
 look back on all this as a dream, very sweet while it 
 lasted. For he would have his career, and I should 
 have only memories. 
 
 I don't know if he was as happy in this interlude 
 as I was. Perhaps not, for he expected far more of 
 life, and I had learned to grasp at a moment's pleas- 
 ure without looking beyond. 
 
 Sarah asked no questions, even with her eyes. I 
 think she did not wish me to tell her what had hap- 
 pened between Hugh and me, or what were our plans 
 for the future, lest I should commit myself in words 
 to some dutiful decision she would long to combat. 
 Yet certainly she was hopeful, and, as always, sub- 
 limely selfless. 
 
 Her one desire was for me to have happiness at 
 any price, and maybe she thought I was uncon- 
 sciously drifting toward a safe harbor. Often I heard 
 
 202
 
 THE LIFE MASK 203 
 
 her singing in her thin, sweet little voice, the two songs 
 she used once to love best : " Ev'ry day will be Sun- 
 day by and by ! " and " Weep no more, my lady." 
 This meant that joy which she could not quite keep 
 down was bubbling up from within. 
 
 I told Hugh how I had heard him sing that old 
 darkey air, breaking off in the midst; and how I had 
 longed to finish the tune on the other side of the wall. 
 And I told him about the exchange I had made: my 
 magnolia for his oleanders, not guessing till later that 
 Captain Hugh St. J. Shannon with the much traveled 
 portmanteau, was my " man of the mirror." 
 
 " My subconscious self that had known yours for 
 ages was talking to you, and telling you to weep no 
 more," Hugh said. " Don't you think that was it, 
 honor bright? Very intelligent of him to choose that 
 room, too, knowing somehow as he must have done 
 that you were coming a fortnight later to live next 
 door. How I wish you had finished the song for me ! 
 And how I wish I'd known that magnolia was yours. 
 It would have made all the difference. But anyhow, 
 thank goodness, I didn't leave it to fade in the room. 
 I took it with me and carried it a long way in my hand, 
 thinking of you, till the cold air of the mountains sud- 
 denly killed it after a few hours, and I buried it honor- 
 ably in a rock-pocket of snow." 
 
 " Just as the cold air of reality will kill this 
 flower we call our friendship, after a few days," I 
 thought. But I did not speak the thought to him. 
 We talked mostly like good comrades, who understand
 
 204 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 each other, and desire nothing more than they have 
 already. It was only sometimes when twilight fell in 
 the garden, and silence fell between us, that I felt a 
 thrill of danger when our eyes met and we had no wish 
 to speak at all. 
 
 He came every day, and we wandered in the Alham- 
 bra, or went to walk in the Generalife, the most 
 lovely garden in the world. Often he dined with us, 
 bringing Gelert; and always he was studiously pleas- 
 ant to Sarah. But there was just that one fault in 
 his manner with her: it was studious. It no longer 
 irritated me, however, for I knew the worst, and I 
 saw that he was trying to be more just. Besides, I 
 was vain enough to imagine that his feeling toward 
 her was prompted by an unconscious jealousy of my 
 love for the best friend I ever had, or could have. 
 This idea made me lenient to his lack of sympathy 
 with Sarah, while it glorified her forgiving admira- 
 tion of him into nobility. 
 
 When July came, the heat grew intense, and tried 
 her strength a little. She found it too tiring to walk 
 until after sundown, so she never went even to the Al- 
 hambra. I spent hours there alone with Hugh, or 
 with him and the interpreter; for except on Sundays 
 when people came up from the town or a few young 
 soldiers strolled in because entrance was free, the pal- 
 ace was our own. In the mornings we sat oftenest in 
 the spicy-smelling cypress court of Lindaraja, the 
 Moorish maiden; and late in the afternoons we liked 
 best the alcove called her boudoir, opening on to the
 
 THE LIFE MASK 205 
 
 Court of Lions. With her windows behind us, green 
 as emeralds because of the tall trees outside, we would 
 watch the sun leave one stone lion after the other, 
 until all were in shadow, and only the little fountain 
 jet in the Court of the murdered Abencerrages danced 
 in the light. 
 
 So more than a week passed, and then one evening 
 Hugh announced that the next day would be his birth- 
 day. 
 
 " I want you to celebrate it with me in a special 
 way," he said. "Will you?" 
 
 " I should like to if I can," I answered. " But 
 have you thought of the way? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, I've mapped it all out," he replied 
 promptly. " The obvious part of the plan's very sim- 
 ple and above board. It is, for you and me to spend 
 the afternoon in the Generalife. I was pretty sure 
 you wouldn't mind doing it, so without waiting to 
 consult you I got an order to have all the fountains 
 and all the rivulets of the gardens set going, just for 
 you and me. It will be our show. Nobody who 
 doesn't belong to us will be let in. Not that any one 
 would be likely to come and bother us there, this 
 blessed hot weather, but I thought it would be just 
 one's luck to have some idiot turn up that day of all 
 others and spoil everything; so I've made very extra 
 special sort of efforts to keep the entertainment pri- 
 vate. It had to be done down in the town with the 
 owner's agent, and there was such a lot of red tape 
 about the business, that I began it days ago the day
 
 206 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 in the curiosity-shop when you bought the picture of 
 the fountains playing, and said you'd give anything 
 to see them. Does the plan please you? " 
 
 " Of course it does," I said. " Shouldn't I be un- 
 grateful if it didn't, when you've remembered my wish, 
 and taken so much trouble to grant it ? " 
 
 " I'm afraid it wasn't very unselfish, as far as that's 
 concerned. I haven't seen the waters playing there, 
 and I want to. But that's only the obvious part of 
 the celebration. I expected you to consent to that. 
 It's in the esoteric part where the difficulty comes in, 
 I'll have to break it to you." 
 
 " What can it be ? You almost frighten me. I'd 
 hate to refuse you anything on your birthday, yet you 
 know " 
 
 " Yes, I do know, alas ! But this isn't anything to 
 frighten you. It's just a a sort of game I want 
 you to play with me, for that one afternoon, to 
 make this birthday stand out white and glittering for- 
 ever, like a pearl. Then, whatever comes, I shall have 
 had a day which it would be worth my while to have 
 been born for. We've been playing the game of 
 friendship for over a week, haven't we? It's been 
 a glorious game, though only a game and we 
 both knew that. For my birthday afternoon, with 
 you and me in the garden of Paradise, I want you to 
 change that game for another. ' Let's pretend,' as 
 the children say, that we're a happy, engaged couple. 
 Oh, I know what you're opening your lips to say! 
 Just kindly wait till I've explained. I won't beg any-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 207 
 
 thing of you that you aren't willing to give. I 
 won't ask more than to kiss your hand as you let me 
 do now, every night when I say good-by. The game 
 shall be so to speak on the ' spirit level/ 
 But all the same it will be next door to heaven, to 
 play it, if you will. What do you say, dearest 
 friend?" 
 
 " You will have to tell me a few rules of the 
 game," I laughed, my cheeks growing warm, " before 
 I know whether I shall be clever enough to play 
 or not." 
 
 " You shall make the rules yourself," he promised. 
 " The one thing I hold out for is, that from the time 
 we go into the Generalife until we come out, we are 
 really to ' pretend ' in word if not in deed that 
 we are engaged lovers, who are going to be happy to- 
 gether always. You are to let me hold your hand, 
 and tell you what our life will be like. I don't mean 
 to entrap you. It won't commit you to anything 
 after the game's played out my birthday game. It 
 isn't so very much to ask, is it? considering what 
 I want you to give ? " 
 
 I tried to laugh, and to think calmly through the 
 beating of my heart. I longed to say yes, and have 
 a day his birthday to add to the wonderful 
 evening which was already mine to remember. Still, 
 I was afraid of him and of myself. 
 
 " You'd promise not to go on asking me to ' pre- 
 tend ' anything of that sort afterward ? " I began to 
 bargain.
 
 208 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " Yes, I promise not to ask you to pretend anything 
 afterward." 
 
 " Very well, if I may make the rules of the game " 
 
 " With the restrictions mentioned " 
 
 " We'll take them for granted. As it's your birth- 
 day yes, we'll ' pretend.' ' 
 
 " Thank you a thousand times ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 I looked up at him a little sadly, though I was smil- 
 ing. After all, it seemed that he was able to snatch 
 the joy of a moment or a few hours more lightly 
 than I could do. I thought that his birthday, and 
 the " celebration " that he asked for, had better mark 
 the end of our eight days' " friendship." The end 
 would have had to come soon, for he must go back to 
 England. He was well again; I alone was keeping 
 him in Granada; and there were communications con- 
 cerning his late mission that should be made person- 
 ally to the War Office. I saw that here was the turn- 
 stile where we must say farewell, for it would be too 
 difficult in any case to drop back into comradeship 
 after a day of " pretending " to be lovers. I said 
 nothing of what was in my mind, for that would 
 turn his day of happiness into night. Afterward, he 
 himself would surely see, if he were reasonable, that 
 since we could not marry, we had reached the parting 
 of the ways. If he would not see, and go of his own 
 accord, I thought that rather than tell him what might 
 make him glad to go, I would simply shut myself up 
 in the Carmen de Santa Catalina, and refuse to see 
 him again. It might seem selfish in me to send him
 
 THE LIFE MASK 209 
 
 away without any real explanation, but in truth it was 
 kind, since in this case ignorance was nearer to bliss 
 than knowledge could be. 
 
 It was very hot walking to the Generalife gardens, 
 in the July sunshine, but a breeze from the Sierras 
 made it tolerable. Hugh shaded my eyes with my 
 green parasol, and carried a parcel, which was to be 
 Sarah's " birthday surprise " for him at tea time. We 
 did not talk much to each other, for we were both 
 thinking of the " game," and planning how each was 
 to play it. 
 
 A dark, smiling young man opened the gate for us, 
 and locked it once more when we were inside the gar- 
 den. 
 
 " Don't forget that the Generalife is mine for the 
 rest of the day, and that it's quite understood no 
 strangers must be admitted," Hugh said in his almost 
 perfect Spanish. 
 
 " Now," he went on to me, as we turned up the 
 wonderful avenue of cypresses, " we are luckier than 
 Adam and Eve, because the angel with the flaming 
 sword has shut us into Paradise instead of shutting us 
 out." 
 
 " Paradise for a day ! " I said. " It sounds like 
 the name of a poem." 
 
 " It's going to be a poem," he answered, " and you 
 and I are to live it. A poem set to music. Listen to 
 the waters! They are for us, too. Everything for 
 us. This is our world."
 
 210 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " To-day," I added. 
 
 "Hush!" he exclaimed. "That isn't fair. It's 
 not playing the game, to talk about endings, or any- 
 thing sad. We've got the whole future before us. 
 What's the difference between sixty minutes and sixty 
 years? If there's any, we aren't going to think of it 
 or measure it now." 
 
 " Oh, I didn't know we'd begun to play yet," I ex- 
 cused myself. 
 
 " We began the minute we came in at the gate. 
 And this isn't the Generalife really ; and we're not even 
 in Spain. It is let me see ! it's Kashmir, which 
 is about as near Paradise as any country can be that 
 doesn't owe its best charm to your being in it. It's 
 Kashmir, and you are in it with me. We're going 
 to be married to-morrow, and this is our last walk to- 
 gether as two lovers. To-morrow we'll be one." 
 
 " I thought I was to fix the rules of this game," I 
 reminded him. 
 
 " My darling girl, it isn't playing the game to al- 
 lude to its being a game. Don't you see that? It's 
 real now. And anyhow, you are only to tell me what 
 I mustn't do, not what I must do; and you have no 
 right of jurisdiction at all over what I'm to say." 
 
 " We must see how that works," I said, laughing. 
 
 " It will work beautifully. Now, just put your 
 mind to it, and remember that you're walking in a 
 garden of Kashmir with your lover, who'll be both 
 husband and lover to-morrow." 
 
 " Wouldn't it be more to the point if I put my
 
 THE LIFE MASK 211 
 
 heart to it ? " I asked, pressing ever so lightly the arm 
 into which he had slipped my hand. 
 
 " I know your heart's in it, or you wouldn't be 
 here," he said. " That's the principal reason why I'm 
 so happy. Listen while I tell what's going to happen 
 to you. We're going to have our honeymoon in a 
 houseboat the most beautiful, glorified sort of 
 houseboat you can imagine, miles away from every- 
 body. In the mornings I shall wake you up with of- 
 ferings of cool waterlilies, and warm roses. At night 
 I shall put you to sleep with kisses, such kisses as you 
 don't know exist, and I've been starving to give you." 
 
 " Don't ! " I said. " You're going beyond the 
 rules." 
 
 " No, for I'm not giving you the kisses, I'm only 
 talking about them." 
 
 "You mustn't," I pleaded. "I can't bear it 
 Hugh." 
 
 He looked at me suddenly, as we walked slowly 
 side by side, under the immense trees where a treach- 
 erous sultana once met her lover. 
 
 " That's the sweetest thing you ever said to me," 
 he answered in the hushed voice with which he could 
 make me feel as if I were in a dim church, full of in- 
 cense and organ music. 
 
 " Could we play as well in silence for a little 
 while?" I asked. "Because just for a few minutes 
 I don't want to talk." 
 
 " We can play even better with our lips silent," he 
 said, " for then our thoughts can hear themselves
 
 212 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 speak. You know what mine are telling you, don't 
 you, my darling? " 
 
 " Yes," I whispered. 
 
 We walked on with my hand on his arm, not saying 
 anything for a long time. I was on his left side, and 
 I could feel his heart beating against my bare wrist. 
 It was as if it were telegraphing messages to me, by 
 a code of signals, messages which we could not have 
 dared to put into spoken language. I never fully real- 
 ized before how much nearer how dangerously 
 much nearer one is brought to a person one loves 
 by silence, than by the most passionate love-making 
 in words. His silence kissed me, and drew my heart 
 to his, through my eyes, though we were not even 
 looking at each other; his silence held me in his arms 
 and drowned me in its tenderness. 
 
 We came to the end of the long avenue of cypresses 
 and roses, which screen white glimpses of snow moun- 
 tains far away. Hugh rang the house bell, and a girl 
 let us into the court of the first water-garden, made 
 by some Moorish king for a woman he loved. I cried 
 out in surprise, for as the door opened I looked along 
 a flowery vista arched over and roofed with crystal. 
 I knew the place was beautiful, but I had not dreamed 
 what it could be, with its long double line of fountains. 
 
 " Isn't this a good way of celebrating my birthday 
 and our marriage eve in Kashmir ? " Hugh asked, 
 when the girl had vanished, and the garden full of 
 moving rainbows was ours alone. 
 
 " Yes, a beautiful way," I agreed.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 213 
 
 " Are you happy, O queen ? " 
 
 " I am happy, O king." 
 
 " Then here we will reign together, and may our 
 reign be long and blessed. I know it will be! Look, 
 this lace canopy of water is like a wedding-veil 
 for you, woven of diamonds by the fairies, our 
 subjects. Come now and see our transfigured realm, 
 terrace by terrace. The best of all is where the water 
 cascades down the hollowed out balusters or walls of 
 the steps to the fourth garden the highest terrace." 
 
 " But I hate to leave this ; it's so marvelous ! " I 
 said. 
 
 " It will be better by and by, as the sun sinks lower, 
 and it will be ours still, you know. Everything that 
 belongs to our love will grow more marvelous as time 
 goes on." 
 
 I did not answer. Again in dangerous silence we 
 walked through the cloisterlike gallery to the belve- 
 dere at the end of the garden court. On the opposite 
 hill, across a valley like a chasm full of sunshine, rose 
 the red towers of the Alhambra with their brown tiled 
 roofs like heaps of autumn leaves. I glanced across 
 dreamily. It seemed as if the green gulf separated 
 me from the real world. This was a dream world, 
 beautiful as heaven, where Hugh and I lived, and no- 
 body else. 
 
 " I can keep this world separate always in my mem- 
 ory," I thought. " Age and years can't change it. I 
 shall only have to go into the secret room of my spirit, 
 and lock the door, to find it just as it is now, and Hugh
 
 214 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 and me, young and happy, walking here together. So 
 I need never be utterly miserable, whatever happens, 
 with such a possession." 
 
 We went slowly up from terrace to terrace. It was 
 good to know that we could linger as long as we liked 
 with no danger that the fountains of the first garden 
 might stop while we. were in the second or third or 
 fourth. This was our day, and the waters would 
 make music for us till night came and the last verse 
 of the poem. 
 
 The highest terrace, though not of such sensational 
 beauty as the famous patio of the fountains, seemed 
 more secret and more our own, like a house walled 
 with box and myrtle, and roofed with magnolia trees. 
 Hugh sat on a bench under a flowery ceiling of green, 
 patterned with white stars. Then gently he pulled 
 me down beside him. 
 
 " This is the deck of our houseboat," he said. 
 " We're not married yet, of course, and won't be till 
 to-morrow; but I'm showing my dear bride-elect 
 where she's to live with me, until she's tired of Kash- 
 mir. Do you think that will be soon ? " 
 
 I shook my head. I knew he wanted me to look 
 up at him, but I would not. 
 
 " We shall just live under our hats, you know," he 
 went on, his voice changing from tenderness to gaiety, 
 in a disconcerting way it had. " You and I together 
 
 what does anything else matter ? We'll eat up the 
 world, and see all that's worth seeing in it, till we go 
 
 still together to one even better. But we'll
 
 THE LIFE MASK 215 
 
 never forget this day or this place, or lose touch with 
 it. We'll be like the children in fairy stories, and 
 drop white stones all along the road as we go toward 
 eternity, so we can just take hands and find our way 
 back here to Granada I mean, to Kashmir." 
 
 As he spoke, his hand covered mine, then grasped 
 and held it. I did not try to take it from him. We 
 sat quietly for a moment. Then he said, in a voice 
 that was not quite steady: 
 
 " You have little pulses in your fingers." 
 
 " So have you," I whispered. 
 
 I think that a whisper is nearly as dangerous as 
 silence. It is a faint breeze that wakes sleeping 
 thoughts, like flowers. I felt his hand grasp my hand 
 almost fiercely, as if he were afraid it would be 
 snatched away. I looked up. His eyes plunged deep 
 into mine. There was nothing of me that he did not 
 take and hold in that gaze. I forgot that we were 
 playing a game, and that I had the right to fix the 
 rules. My breath came fast. There were just his 
 eyes in the world and his hand on mine. Then the 
 clasp was loosed for a second, and his arm went round 
 me, held me close. Still my eyes looked up, and my 
 breath came fast through parted lips till his took 
 them. 
 
 " Do you forgive me? " he asked, when we remem- 
 bered. " I swear I didn't mean to kiss you when I 
 brought you here unless you changed your 
 mind. Have you oh, Nita, have you changed your 
 mind?"
 
 216 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 "No," I said. "Yet there's nothing to forgive. 
 It was my fault that you kissed me. I knew it 
 but I couldn't care then." 
 
 " I love you so ! " he said. " I made you give me 
 that kiss. I felt as if I should die without it. And 
 it was worth dying for. It's too late to go back now, 
 Nita, to playing games of love or friendship. The 
 real thing has got us. It's a tidal wave carrying us 
 on to life or death. Let it be life. Why not, my 
 soul ? You know now that we can't part." 
 
 I clung to him, and he held me tight against his 
 breast. 
 
 "We must part," I said. "But I love you I 
 love you! I wish I could die now, this moment, in 
 your arms ! " 
 
 " Then you want me to die, too," He answered. 
 " Well, it would be very good to die, so. But it will 
 be better to live. We're young, and not cold. God 
 knows I'm not! There's a whole life full of love be- 
 fore us. And we've got to face it. There's no way 
 back, now." 
 
 " No, there is no way back," I repeated. 
 
 " Thank God you see that." 
 
 " I see the way on, into the future ; and I see my- 
 self walking alone. Let me go, Hugh. We'll have 
 to end this somehow since we can't go back to 
 the foolish game we were playing. Oh, if only we 
 hadn't begun it ! " 
 
 "Do you wish that?" he asked. 
 
 " No! " I cried out. " I don't wish that. I can't.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 217 
 
 I'm glad you have kissed me. I shall have one more 
 sweet thing to remember." 
 
 "You shall have a thousand of them to remem- 
 ber ! " His eyes suddenly laughed to mine, as if he 
 were sure that after all he was going to be happy. 
 " Don't you know that one kiss leads to another? 
 Nita, " 
 
 I pushed him gently away, very gently, with my 
 hand on his lips. They clung to it. 
 
 " No," I said. " No." 
 
 " But you're driving me mad you, and the 
 magnolias which are your own flowers, soft and 
 white, and sweet as life and love and death. We've 
 got to go on now, as we've begun. You'll have to be 
 my wife, in spite of yourself and all your bad resolu- 
 tions." 
 
 " Remember your promise if I played the game. 
 It was all to end to-day." 
 
 " Yes, the game was to end and it has ended, of 
 itself, much sooner than we meant. I promised, in 
 so many words, not to ask you to go on pretending. 
 We're up against realities now, and if there's to be 
 no more playing, there must be no more mysteries. 
 I wouldn't be a man, but a sickly sentimentalist if I 
 let you go on saying you can't marry me or anybody, 
 without making you tell me the reason, and give me 
 a chance to beat it down with a better one. Our 
 friendship has lasted us beautifully for eight days; 
 but it's worn out now, and you know it. I've been 
 unnaturally good, and haven't worried you once, have
 
 218 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I? Though I must admit I wouldn't have tried to 
 be quite so obedient if I hadn't thought the days might 
 be useful in making you like me a little better, and 
 perhaps feel the need of me in your life." 
 
 " Oh, I do feel the need of you," I said. " But , 
 I can't have you. It isn't just some silly woman's 
 reason you can break down, as you seem to think. 
 If it were, I'd tell you now, this moment, and hope 
 that you could break it." 
 
 " Then don't tell, but marry me all the same. 
 There's nothing I need know about you, except what 
 I do know, as I told you before. That you are you, 
 and that life can never be life again without you. 
 Marry me to-morrow as we were playing you would 
 in the game. Surely I can get a special license or 
 something. The consul " 
 
 "Ah, if I could!" I cried. "If I could! If we 
 could go to the end of the earth together, where we 
 should never see any one except each other, then 
 maybe " 
 
 " We will go to the end of the earth, if that's the 
 price of you," he broke in. " We'll live in tents in 
 the desert if you like. I've done it for months, and 
 could do it forever." 
 
 " It would be heaven," I murmured, shutting my 
 eyes for a minute, to see the picture of the tent among 
 sand dunes. "If you hadn't a career. Do you think 
 I'd let you give it up for me ? " 
 
 " Damn my career ! " he said. " I've cared for it, 
 yes such as it is But if there's to be a question
 
 THE LIFE MASK 219 
 
 of choosing between a woman I adore, and pottering 
 along in the army with now and then some special 
 mission any other fellow could do as well or better, 
 why, I " 
 
 " You think so now," I interrupted him. " But 
 as the years went on, and you saw other men doing 
 what it had been your ambition to do, it would break 
 your heart " 
 
 " It wouldn't, I tell you," he said, looking dogged, 
 and, I thought, adorable. 
 
 " I wouldn't risk it for anything on earth, neither 
 for my own sake nor yours," I insisted. " Not even 
 for your love, though now after to-day I don't 
 see how I am to go on existing it won't be living 
 without you." 
 
 " Tell me what keeps us apart, and let me judge," 
 he said again. 
 
 " I would, if it could do any good. But if I told 
 you, even if you said you'd take me in spite of every- 
 thing though I don't think you or any man would 
 do that I'd rather die than marry you yes, Hugh, 
 because I love you so much. I should have to send 
 you away simply because I couldn't bear to look you 
 in the face again, after you knew." 
 
 " I'd take my oath that you make a thousand times 
 more of the thing than you need, whatever it is," he 
 tried to soothe me. " I'm certain as of life and love, 
 that you've done nothing evil. It's beyond your na- 
 ture." 
 
 " Don't be too sure! "
 
 220 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " I am sure. If you told me with your own lips. 
 in a detailed statement, that you were the greatest sin- 
 ner who ever lived, I wouldn't believe you. I'd be- 
 lieve you'd dreamed it." 
 
 " Dreamed it ! Oh, Hugh, what I've suffered in 
 dreaming it ! " 
 
 I covered my eyes with my hands, to shut out the 
 gray figure in the gray dream that rose before me. 
 And as I so shut out the sunlight, gray shadows 
 seemed to close coldly around me, until Hugh took me 
 in his arms. 
 
 I did not try to push him away again. I let him 
 hold me, so that I might feel and know, just once, the 
 dear comfort and protection a man can give the woman 
 he loves. His arms felt strong and hard, like warm 
 iron. 
 
 " Dearest," he said, " what are we going to do about 
 this? The tyranny of the weak over the strong is a 
 lot worse than the other way round, and I can't force 
 you, without being a brute. But we're not going to 
 lose each other for a scruple. I've got you, and 
 somehow I mean to hold you fast. Don't harden 
 your heart against me on my birthday, here in this 
 garden where the perfume of your own flower is 
 incense on the altar of love. Say you'll marry me and 
 live in the desert, if the desert is what you want." 
 
 Incense on the altar of love! Yes, the perfume 
 was like that, and it was in my head, making me for- 
 get right and wrong. 
 
 " I want you in the desert, Hugh my Hugh," I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 221 
 
 whispered, clinging to him. " I want you as much as 
 you want me more, maybe, because you're all my 
 life. I didn't know there were such men as you. 
 You're so dear so dear. I love all your ways 
 
 everything you are. Oh, take me, if you will 
 not to the desert, because you must have your career. 
 There'd be no happiness for me if I broke it. But if 
 I'm willing to give you everything, and take nothing 
 from you except your love, surely I shouldn't be 
 harming you after all? It's only as your wife I 
 should hurt you. But hide me somewhere, and let no- 
 body know but Sarah. We'll love each other so much 
 
 and if I see I'm hurting you, I'll go away " 
 Suddenly he pressed me so tight against his breast 
 
 that my breath went. I could not speak another 
 word. 
 
 " Be still, Nita! " he said in a strange voice. " For 
 the love of God, don't tempt me like that! I won't 
 have you at such a price! I'd rather die and let 
 you die. It isn't as if there were a real obstacle of 
 flesh and blood between us. If you were the wife of 
 some brute you hated, who ill-treated you, it would be 
 different. I'd take you from him like "a shot. But 
 as it is, if I took you at your word, / should be the 
 brute. I won't do it ! " 
 
 Now it was he who tried to put me from him, 
 but I wound my arms round his neck, and would 
 not let him go. For the first time I kissed him of my 
 own accord. I kissed his strong brown throat, and 
 the dent in his square chin, until he forgot that he
 
 222 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 had meant to tear himself away from me. He set his 
 mouth against mine, while the beating of our two 
 hearts was as the beating of one. For a moment 
 I was happy. I thought that in spite of all, a way 
 opened for us to belong to each other, without my 
 spoiling his life, since no one need know of my exist- 
 ence. 
 
 But it was only while the kiss lasted. Then he 
 sprang up, though I would have held him if I could. 
 
 " Nita, I can't stand this ! " he said, in a choked 
 voice which frightened me. " I daren't touch you 
 daren't kiss you again, now. If I did I'd forget 
 everything and that would be damnable! Stay 
 where you are. I'm going to walk away, and not even 
 look at you for a minute or two, until I'm myself 
 again." 
 
 He turned, and took a step or two along the path, 
 his head down. A great pity for us both and a great 
 shame for myself welled up in my heart. I rose, look- 
 ing after him, but not calling him back. Then, stand- 
 ing under the magnolia, I saw what I could hardly be- 
 lieve to be real, for the garden was ours. Two women 
 were mounting the steps from the terrace below.
 
 CHAPTER X) 
 
 HUGH also saw them. Somehow I realized by 
 the expression of his back, the sudden tense- 
 ness of his figure, that he knew who they 
 were. 
 
 I stood still, watching 1 , not sure yet what I ought 
 to do. They came up the steps slowly, as if they 
 were tired. Both were dressed in light traveling 
 dresses, and wore very fashionable hats crushed 
 forward on their heads. They carried large, pagoda- 
 shaped parasols of the newest kind, and it seemed to 
 me that smartness was their chief characteristic. One 
 was tall and rather stout, with a finely disciplined fig- 
 ure ; the other, much younger, was tall and slim. The 
 elder woman had on a white veil with a large pattern 
 of butterflies or some other insect which gave her the 
 appearance of having several hideous birthmarks. 
 The younger wore no veil, and was pretty, with deli- 
 cate features, fair skin, large gray eyes, and yellowish 
 brown hair. 
 
 There would have been no time for us to escape 
 before they caught sight of us, even if we had tried. 
 After the first shock of dismay at their awful irrele- 
 vance, I was thankful that, at least, they had not 
 come a minute sooner. If they had, they must have 
 seen me in Hugh's arms. As it was, they could see 
 
 223
 
 224 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 only that he was with a woman in the garden and 
 that perhaps he looked agitated. But I hoped 
 they might put this down to surprise. 
 
 " Here you are, then, Hugh ! " exclaimed the 
 woman with the veil, in a voice so cheerful as to 
 sound affected. " We have had a chase to find you 
 oh, such a hot one! Poor Kath didn't want to 
 come, but I made her, when the hotel guide said he 
 was sure you were in the Generalife garden. I've 
 heard so much of it." 
 
 Hugh, without having said a word, went to meet 
 them as the lady talked on, and his air of reluctance 
 was so marked as to be almost offensive. 
 
 I glanced about anxiously, to see if I could get 
 away without actually passing them. If there were 
 any hope of doing so, now was the moment, while 
 they were saying " How do you do " to each other, 
 and Lady Mendel (I felt sure it was she, come to spy 
 out what was really keeping Hugh in Granada) told 
 how the guide had brought them to the gate, and they 
 had been let in after some difficulty, by saying they 
 were not strangers. " I assured the man I was your 
 sister, and then it was all right," the too cheerful voice 
 explained. 
 
 Already she and the girl had looked at me without 
 seeming to look. I felt in every nerve exactly what 
 they were thinking. They were putting me down as 
 some adventuress who had beguiled Hugh from his 
 duty. He would perhaps have the stupid, mannish 
 idea that he ought to introduce us, in order not to
 
 THE LIFE MASK 225 
 
 give them a wrong impression. I could not go 
 through that ceremony! 
 
 Already I knew that they had taken him away from 
 me. I had lost him. Not that he had ever been 
 mine, really; but he might have yielded, and accepted 
 me on my own terms, if they had not come at the 
 moment of crisis. Even this would have been better 
 than nothing. And if I had won him in that way, I 
 could have left him when I saw that he did not want 
 me any more, or that my association with him was 
 likely to do him harm. Now we were parted, 
 without hope of any union. I must go. My time 
 was over. 
 
 On the seat where we had been sitting was poor 
 Sarah's " surprise." We had forgotten it, Hugh and 
 I. In my eyes it seemed pathetic, done up in its neat 
 white paper, tied daintily with narrow ribbon by 
 Sarah's deft fingers. I knew what was inside. A 
 thermos bottle she had bought for a birthday gift 
 for Hugh, and filled with iced tea, flavored with lemon, 
 as he liked it. There were also cream cakes, with 
 little white, self-satisfied faces. I thought that he 
 would go with his sister and her friend, and forget 
 Sarah's surprise. He would never know what it was. 
 She would ask me when I went home : " Well, was 
 the Captin pleased with my little present?" I felt 
 dully miserable, and even injured, because I could 
 not tell her that he had been delighted. 
 
 Suddenly I turned, as the three still talked together, 
 and swiftly and silently walked along a path leading
 
 226 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 away from the group. The ladies could see me go, 
 but Hugh could not. I was sure that they would not 
 say anything until I was out of sight. 
 
 Sarah was sitting on the terrace near the house door. 
 I knew when I saw her there that she could not resist 
 taking a place where she was certain not to miss me 
 as I came home. There was a look of expectation on 
 her face. Her eyes sprang to mine, then searched for 
 some one she did not see. 
 
 " Why ! " she exclaimed, trying to suppress an anx- 
 ious note in her voice. " You're back sooner than I 
 thought you'd be. It must be mighty hot in the sun. 
 Where's the Captin? Ain't he comin' in with you?" 
 
 I had been thinking what to say, as I walked alone 
 along the golden way of sunlight we had traveled to- 
 gether, Hugh and I, not two hours before. 
 
 " I ran off and left him," I answered with a heavy 
 attempt at gaiety. " His sister, Lady Mendel, sud- 
 denly appeared to surprise him, and brought a girl 
 quite a pretty girl. I don't know who she is, for 
 I disappeared while they were all shaking hands. Of 
 course I didn't want to stay and be introduced." 
 
 " No-o, I suppose not," Sarah said doubtfully, end- 
 ing with a sigh. " But, still, I wouldn't want you to 
 do anything that would seem rude to the Captin's re- 
 lations." 
 
 " Little they cared whether I was rude or not. I 
 was lucky to escape. Oh, it was hot coming home. 
 The wind's gone down." 
 
 "Did you have your tea?" she asked. She was
 
 THE LIFE MASK 227 
 
 working slyly up to the question of the birthday pres- 
 ent. Poor Sarah! 
 
 " No, we hadn't had time, when Lady Mendel 
 came. Perhaps they will all three have it in the 
 garden there. And when he is able, Captain Shannon 
 will come and thank you for the bottle, and for mak- 
 ing him the cakes. He's sure to be pleased." 
 
 I did not dream that he would ever find the gift, 
 much less thank her for it; but I could not bear to 
 tell her that it had been forgotten. I did not be- 
 lieve that Hugh would come that night. I did not 
 see how he could. His sister would be certain to 
 keep him. 
 
 I was mistaken, however. I had not been at home 
 an hour when I heard his voice. I was upstairs in 
 my room, where I had taken off my frock and put 
 on a tea-gown. I had told Sarah that the heat had 
 given me a headache, and that I would lie down until 
 time to get ready for dinner, or perhaps if I did not 
 feel better I would not dine. I could not help know- 
 ing that she must suspect something had gone wrong, 
 but, tactful and delicate-minded always, she hid her 
 disappointment. I felt how she yearned to be with 
 me, but I could not ask her to stay ; I had to be alone. 
 She understood without the slightest hint, and let me 
 know that she was far away by singing " Weep no 
 more, my lady." 
 
 Then Hugh came. He must have walked fast, in 
 spite of the heat, for he asked breathlessly, " Where 
 is your Miss Nita ? " He always called me that in
 
 228 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 speaking of me to Sarah. He hated to say " Mrs. 
 Lippincott." 
 
 I listened in my room over the door. He had come 
 he had come! Hiding behind the window- frame, 
 I caught a glimpse of his dear dark head as he walked 
 across the terrace. 
 
 " Miss Nita's upstairs lyin' down," said Sarah. " I 
 reckon the hot sun was too much for her, comin' 
 home." 
 
 " I'm afraid so," said Hugh. " Do you think it's 
 possible she would see me? I'd wait any length of 
 time. I wouldn't have her hurried. But if she's 
 well enough I do want to see her so much ! Will 
 you ask her? And, oh, Miss Nelson, a thousand 
 thanks for that splendid birthday present my only 
 one. It's just what I've always been wanting, and 
 nobody but you ever thought to give it to me." (I 
 was grateful to him for that.) 
 
 " Well, I'm real pleased," exclaimed Sarah. " I'll 
 run and ask Miss Nita. I reckon I can get her 
 to come down. You go along to the arbor and wait. 
 It's cooler than on the terrace." Then there was si- 
 lence. She was coming upstairs. 
 
 "You needn't tell me; I've heard," I said. "Do 
 you think I might go down in this tea-gown ? " 
 
 " My goodness me, yes, honey. You look prettier 
 in it than most anything else you've got." 
 
 She had chosen and bought it for me, as she had 
 most of my things. , 
 
 Hugh was walking up and down impatiently in
 
 THE LIFE MASK 229 
 
 front of the fountain arbor, dusty and hot, but pale, 
 not red. If his sister had seen him then, she might 
 have thought that he needed a longer stay in Granada, 
 on account of his health. 
 
 When he saw me coming, he hurried to meet me, 
 taking long strides which made him look even taller 
 than he was. It seemed as if a young giant was rush- 
 ing toward me, strong and determined as the Roman 
 men who stole the Sabine women. 
 
 " How thankful I am to see you again! " he said, 
 seizing my hands as if we had not met for a year. 
 " I felt as if you'd eluded me somehow, and I could 
 never get you back where I had you before as if 
 everything were over." 
 
 " So it is," I answered. " I've lost your respect 
 by what I said. If I were a conventional woman, I 
 should be thanking heaven that your sister appeared 
 just then. It was rather dramatic, wasn't it?" 
 
 " Don't be bitter, darling. It doesn't suit you, and 
 it hurts me, rather badly. I wish my sister were in 
 Jericho and she ought to be there, instead of here, 
 anyhow. She'd no business to come, and the Lord 
 knows why she did ! " 
 
 " So do I, and so do you. I realize now that 
 I felt she would come after that letter. ,You never 
 answered it, did you? " 
 
 " No. I was always going to. But there was no 
 hurry. Well, here she is. Good heavens, what I 
 went through, trotting those two around that beastly 
 garden "
 
 230 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I laughed, shrilly. 
 
 "Our Generalife!" 
 
 " It wasn't ours when you'd melted away like a 
 ghost. I hated the place. It was beastly. And 
 they would guzzle our dear tea and cakes my birth- 
 day cakes. I wouldn't have been sorry if they'd 
 choked." 
 
 " You're very unbrotherly," I said ; but I began to 
 be lighter of heart. " And ungallant, too. That 
 pretty girl ! " 
 
 " Pretty, do you call her ? She's got a face like a 
 Christmas card, or a soda-water advertisement, and 
 a sort of blotting-paper intelligence which only ab- 
 sorbs knowledge from outside, and keeps it the 
 opposite of what it really is. There's nothing in 
 her. I always thought so, and I think so more than 
 ever now. As for being unbrotherly, Beatrice is 
 only my half-sister, you know. We never had any 
 tastes in common. If she agrees with me in anything, 
 I always feel I must have been wrong, and change my 
 mind. Wants me to call her ' Bee.' Can you see any 
 one calling her Bee? She has drunk up my vitality 
 like water since she came to-day. I'm a squeezed 
 sponge." 
 
 " You haven't come just to tell me all this, though, 
 have you?" I said. "If there's anything special, re- 
 member we haven't much time together. You will 
 have to go back to her and the pretty girl. I'm sur- 
 prised you were able to come at all." 
 
 "Are you really? Didn't you know I'd chuck
 
 THE LIFE MASK 231 
 
 them, and make for this house as fast as my legs 
 could carry me? My word, I nearly walked them off 
 theirs, getting to the hotel! It gave me the only 
 pleasure I've got out of their coming. I believe 
 they're having baths now. Look here, my dearest, 
 will you and Miss Nelson ask me to dinner ? " 
 
 " Certainly not ! " I exclaimed. " Do you think it 
 would please me for you to be rude to your sister and 
 her friend, who have traveled such a long way 
 from Paris, isn't it ? to see you ? " 
 
 " I could say I had a previous engagement I couldn't 
 break." 
 
 "You must say no such thing," I said. "You 
 must go back, and dine with them, and not give Lady 
 Mendel cause to think I'm more of a monster than 
 she thinks me already." 
 
 Hugh looked astonished. 
 
 " What possesses you to imagine she thinks badly of 
 you? As a matter of fact, she admired you im- 
 mensely, and so did Kathleen oh, I forgot, you 
 don't know who she is. Lady Kathleen Arnott, a 
 great chum of Beatrice's, though she's almost young 
 enough to be her daughter. Beatrice and Kath both 
 said, 'What a wonderfully beautiful girl!' and of 
 course they were dying to know who you were, and all 
 about you." 
 
 "Of course, Hugh, dear! That goes without say- 
 ing. What did you tell them? " 
 
 " Why, what could I tell them, except that you were 
 a Mrs. Lippincott, a young widow, living in a villa
 
 232 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 near by with a benevolent dragon of a companion, 
 and that you had a miniature Generalife of a garden 
 you'd redeemed from wilderness, where you and Miss 
 Nelson kindly let me browse sometimes." 
 
 I laughed. 
 
 " The minotaur had a nice garden in his labyrinth, 
 I dare say. Oh, I don't blame Lady Mendel for con- 
 sidering me a monster. Indeed, she's right. I 
 oughtn't to exist. And I think she's right, too, in 
 coming to save you and bringing an antidote to the 
 poison." 
 
 " I wish you wouldn't talk in riddle j. You make 
 me feel like some baited animal in a cage." 
 
 My heart melted toward him. 
 
 " Hugh," I said, holding out my hand, " I'm a 
 wretch for trying to hurt you. I was trying to do it, 
 I'm afraid because all my world's in such a tur- 
 moil, and I'm so miserable. But none of it is your 
 fault, or your sister's or anybody's except my own. 
 I can't help seeing, of course, that Lady Mendel must 
 have said to herself when you stayed on here, in 
 the heat of summer, ' Cherchez la femme/ So when 
 she wrote and didn't hear from you, things seemed 
 desperate, and she came to seek la femme for herself 
 bringing another, as attractive as possible. Then 
 she found us in the garden, which you'd paid to keep 
 to yourself for the afternoon, as of course that intelli- 
 gent guide told her. No strangers were to be ad- 
 mitted. What could she think?" 
 
 " Whatever she thinks, she'll get my version soon.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 233 
 
 I haven't seen her alone yet, for I rushed off and left 
 the two of them at the door of their suite they'd 
 taken rooms at the hotel before they came on to the 
 Generalife, so that saved me a little bother. Some 
 time this evening, I shall tell Beatrice that you're the 
 woman I adore, and have asked to marry me." 
 
 "If you do, you must please tell her at the same 
 time that I have refused," I said, as softly and kindly 
 as I could, to make the words sound less harsh. 
 
 " I'll tell her that if you insist; but I shall tell her 
 also that I intend to devote the next few months or 
 years if necessary, to making you change your mind." 
 
 " Don't, my dearest," I implored, " for it will only 
 worry and distress her for nothing. I shall never 
 marry you. It would be a crime to change my 
 mind, just as much of a crime and more much more 
 ' than for you to to take me at my word to-day 
 when I " 
 
 " When you made me love you a million times more, 
 if possible, by offering the most magnificent self-sac- 
 rifice a woman can offer to a man who worships her. 
 That's the way I look at it, though I'd shoot myself 
 and you too, I think sooner than accept it, when 
 I'm dead sure there's nothing really to keep us from 
 marrying." 
 
 " Oh please ! please ! " I stammered. " I can't 
 bear any more to-night. I'm tired, body and 
 soul." 
 
 " Poor child, I won't bruise you any more. I 
 oughtn't to have routed you out when Miss Nelson
 
 234 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 said you were lying down. But I simply had to see 
 you for a minute, before night. I even thought you 
 might not be sorry to see me, after " 
 
 " I'm thankful. I couldn't have closed my eyes to- 
 night if you hadn't come though I wasn't sure you 
 could." 
 
 " Angel ! Wild horses or even unicorns couldn't 
 have kept me from you, to say nothing of half- 
 sisters. But Beatrice was one excuse for my coming. 
 I had to ask you what to do for I know a man is a 
 first-rate ass about such things, and I was afraid if I 
 acted on my own initiative I might make some stupid 
 blunder from your point of view. You see, she and 
 Kathleen Arnott admired you so much, and Beatrice 
 made no end of a fuss about my begging you to let 
 them call on you, and see your wonderful garden. I 
 wish to goodness I hadn't been wool-headed enough 
 to mention the garden! My impulse was to say I 
 couldn't ask permission, because you were not strong 
 yet after a long illness, and never received anybody 
 except a few old friends. Of course if I had, she'd 
 have wanted to know how old our friendship was, 
 and I could have told a lie, or said it was none 
 of her business. But I wasn't sure whether 
 either way would be the proper dodge, so I promised 
 I would ask you. Don't say you'll have her for my 
 sake." 
 
 I thought the thing over for a minute. 
 
 " I'm glad you didn't tell her not to come," I said. 
 " Lady Mendel will never see or hear of Mrs. Lippin-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 235 
 
 cott again, away from Granada, so why need it mat- 
 ter to me what her opinion is? Still I'm just foolish 
 enough to feel I can't let any one who's near to you 
 think of me as she might if I refused to receive her 
 here. You see I've no excuse except one that 
 would make things worse. .When does she want to 
 call?" 
 
 "Well I hope she'll go away day after to-mor- 
 row. I only wish it might be to-morrow ! " 
 
 " She wants you to go with them, of course." 
 
 Hugh laughed. 
 
 " As the servants say, she'll have to ' take it out in 
 wanting.' ' 
 
 " But I hope you will go, Hugh. Yes, I do hope 
 it. I ask it! To stay is only prolonging the agony 
 for us both. The sooner you're gone, the better it 
 will be for you and for me too." 
 
 " I don't believe you mean that with your heart. 
 If I did, it would be the end of me, I think." 
 
 " I mean it with my soul and that ought to rule 
 my heart. Bring Lady Mendel and Lady Kathleen 
 Arnott to see me to-morrow, then at any time they 
 like to come." 
 
 " Thank you," he said, almost indifferently. " But 
 what about this evening? You'll let me come to you 
 again after dinner, won't you? Do, Nita! Do say 
 I may come. After our talk this afternoon, I can't 
 stay away from you all those hours, and hang about 
 with Beatrice and Kathleen Arnott ! " 
 
 I shook my head.
 
 236 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " You mustn't come until you bring them." 
 
 The thought in my mind was, that I must call upon 
 all my strength, and refuse to see him alone again, 
 ever. I must write and tell him this, saying that it 
 would be useless to stay on after Lady Mendel went, 
 for the gate of the garden would be shut henceforth. 
 I had not the courage to tell him face to face. I 
 should suffer too much, and his agony, his arguments 
 would break me down. I could not stand against 
 them. 
 
 " Then why not let us all three call this evening ? " 
 he asked, unexpectedly. Could it be possible, I asked 
 myself, that he suspected what I was resolving to do 
 afterward ? "I know they're dying to come. It's 
 curiosity, of course, but I don't think, honestly, it's 
 as bad a variety of it as you give them credit for. 
 They told me they were starving after their long jour- 
 ney straight through from Madrid, so they'll dine 
 early, and I know you do, because you love sitting in 
 the garden afterward. Mayn't we walk over here 
 about half-past eight? The garden's at its best then, 
 in the dusk, and you've got a nightingale or two left, 
 haven't you ? " 
 
 The thought that flashed through my head was: 
 " Prying eyes can't see so clearly by twilight as by 
 day," and I answered promptly: "Yes, come to-night, 
 if they're not too tired." 
 
 "Oh, I know they're not," he said. "Beatrice 
 asked me herself if to-night would suit but of 
 course I couldn't answer for you. And I wonder
 
 THE LIFE MASK 237 
 
 anyhow if I ought to let her come near you at all ? " 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " I don't know. There's no reason particularly, ex- 
 cept well, a sort of feeling I have. She was charm- 
 ing about you, very complimentary and all that; but 
 she and I never really understood each other. 
 We're no more alike than the North Pole is to the 
 South, though of course we're fond of each other in a 
 way, and she's tried to be nice to me according to 
 her lights. Lately it's become a kind of superstition 
 with her that her whole life has been devoted to help- 
 ing me on in the world, and that she married a man 
 old enough to be her father for my sake." 
 
 "Did she do that?" I asked, suddenly interested. 
 
 " She did marry an elderly man I think not in 
 the least for my sake, though I give her credit for 
 sincerely believing so now. I couldn't talk about her 
 like this, to any one except you, darling; but I want 
 you to have some idea of what she is, before she bears 
 down on you with all sails set." 
 
 " It sounds formidable ! " I tried to laugh. 
 
 " Oh it won't be that, exactly. But she has ' 
 er an idea of her own importance, and she's in- 
 clined to exaggerate mine, as a member of her family 
 1 except when she talks to me. Beatrice is ten years 
 older than I am, you know. She was eight or so 
 when her mother and mine married my father. Not 
 long ago she was awfully good looking. Now she's 
 growing stout and losing her beauty er promptly 
 if not prematurely. Sir Joseph Mendel married her
 
 238 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 because she was supposed to be the handsomest girl 
 of her season, and thought himself lucky to get her. 
 He was a jolly good old fellow, though : a Jewish City 
 man who'd got knighted for some charity or other, 
 before my time. He was rolling in money, and 
 Beatrice now is anxious to impress upon me the fact 
 that her one motive in taking him was to relieve me 
 of her support. That's rather funny, you know, be- 
 cause she always adored jewelry and frocks, and boxes 
 at the opera and everything women like. They had 
 to be a shade better than anybody else's, to please her. 
 And my father's money, which he left entirely to me 
 mother being dead long before only amounts to a 
 thousand a year. If I'd given her the lot, she 
 wouldn't have had what she uses up for pin money. 
 So you see her contention's rather weak; but she has 
 every other kind of sense except a sense of humor. 
 She would rather like to ' run ' me, as a reward for 
 what she calls ' sacrificing her youth,' but she wouldn't 
 respect me as much as she does if I let her do it for a 
 minute." 
 
 " Do forgive me, Hugh," I ventured, " for saying 
 things I've no right to say even to you. But it's 
 in my thoughts it so longs to come out ! She does 
 want you to marry Lady Kathleen Arnott ? " 
 
 " My dear child, what an imagination you've got ! 
 I don't suppose Kathleen would have me if I asked 
 her which nothing earthly would induce me to do. 
 I've known her ever since she was a kid. Lord Black- 
 burn, her father, is a widower without much money,
 
 THE LIFE MASK 239 
 
 and Joe Mendel bought a place adjoining his in War- 
 wickshire. The next year poor old Joe died. Bea- 
 trice has taken Kathleen about a lot. If she wants to 
 make any match in that family it's between herself 
 and Blackburn, who's an earl, you know, and rather 
 by way of being a swell though church mice are 
 financiers beside him. And he's got an old black and 
 white Elizabethan house Beatrice is quite mad about. 
 Altogether " 
 
 "Yes, I see," I said, when he paused for a word. 
 
 I saw more than he, probably, saw himself. And 
 I realized that it was spiteful in me to blame Lady 
 Mendel. It was natural in every way that she 
 should be anxious for Hugh to marry Kathleen Arnott. 
 " Altogether " as he had said, with some other mean- 
 ing in his mind, it would be " most suitable." I could 
 imagine the exact tone in which Lady Mendel or any 
 worldly-wise woman I used to know in other times 
 would say that of such a proposed match. And very 
 likely, though he did not dream now that it could 
 happen, some day it would come about. The pretty 
 girl with the large eyes and the tiny mouth, and the 
 " blotting-paper intelligence " would be Hugh's 
 wife, the mother of his children, loved by him for 
 their sake. Somehow this last thought was a bolt 
 of hot iron shot through my brain. I could have cried 
 out with the anguish of it. I could see those little 
 babies, that should be mine. I, and I only, ought to 
 call them into existence for him, down the primrose 
 path of love.
 
 240 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I felt, with that picture in my mind, that I should 
 scream, or burst into ridiculous tears, unless I made 
 him go. I told him that the sooner he went, the 
 sooner he could return. Sarah would be coming 
 to call me in. She knew I was tired I must rest, 
 especially as I was to meet his sister. 
 
 " I want to look my best for her and Lady Kath- 
 leen," I said. 
 
 " You look your best as you are now," he answered. 
 " You are like a tall white lily growing in the shadow. 
 Will you let me kiss you just once very gently 
 before I go? " 
 
 " Yes, kiss me good-by," I said. And though 
 I smiled at him, I told myself that it was our last kiss.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 WHEN Hugh had gone my heart went on 
 beating heavily, as if he were still with me. 
 I could not keep my hands quiet, and it 
 seemed as if I could feel a separate vibration in every 
 nerve. I was afraid of Lady Mendel. I was afraid 
 that I could guess why she wanted to see me. 
 
 A flash of fear passed across Sarah's face, when 
 I told her, but she forced herself to smile, and say that 
 I must make myself beautiful for the captain's sister. 
 " I reckon her ladyship wants to find out what's bin 
 keepin' her brother from his folks all this time," she 
 remarked in the sprightly way with .which she used 
 to " cheer " me in the past, when hope was to be 
 awakened, or terror put to sleep. " You just show 
 her, that there's bin somethin' worth while stayin' for." 
 
 I did not need Sarah's urging to try and " make 
 myself beautiful " for Lady Mendel. Not that I had 
 anything to gain from her by winning reluctant ad- 
 miration ; rather the contrary, for the more dangerous 
 she found me, the more would she sharpen her 
 weapons. But I suppose, when the Roman gladiators 
 went into the arena to fight, they took pains with their 
 appearance, that those about to die who saluted Csesar 
 might shine with brief glory as they passed his throne. 
 
 Perhaps even the women thrown to the lions smoothed 
 
 241
 
 242 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 their hair and arranged their draperies before their 
 cell doors opened, and pinched color into their cheeks 
 in order that the staring eyes of other women might 
 find them brave. 
 
 But it was not only for Hugh's sister that I wished 
 to be at my best, nor was it half for Lady Kath- 
 leen Arnott. More than all I wished him to think me 
 more beautiful than the woman he might some day 
 marry. I expected never to meet him again after this 
 night; and so, I thought, his last memory of me would 
 be side by side with a sheltered, flowerlike girl, ten 
 years younger and twenty years happier than I. A 
 vanity which I realized to be selfish, made me long 
 to have the comparison in my favor. 
 
 An ideal woman would have moved into the back- 
 ground, so that the man she loved and could not 
 marry might forget more easily, and be happy all the 
 sooner. Yet, though I saw my own selfishness, I 
 could not even try to conquer it. 
 
 There was no dinner for Sarah and me that night. 
 I told her that I could not eat, but asked for a cup of 
 strong coffee, which she brought to my room with her 
 favorite dose of orange-leaf tea to soothe the nerves. 
 I begged her not to go fasting unless she wished to 
 distress me, and she promised to make herself tea and 
 toast. 
 
 " I couldn't swallow anything else, an' you keyed 
 up the way you are," she said piteously. " I seem 
 to be livin' in you to-night somehow, and all your 
 feelin's come through me, like they was telegraphed
 
 THE LIFE MASK 243 
 
 right to my heart. An' a body can't eat with elec- 
 tricity shootin' through them in every direction, like 
 it is with you an' me; though all the same I reckon 
 we're both mighty foolish to get worked up for no 
 cause. Nothin' bad is goin' to happen, honey. Now 
 don't you be afraid." 
 
 " I'm not afraid," I answered. " Only " 
 
 " I know," she soothed me, when I choked on the 
 next word. " It's right natural. But I reckon it's 
 only somethin' in the air a sort of breathlessness." 
 
 Yes. Something in the air. A sort of breathless- 
 ness. 
 
 Marta and Pepe had gone as usual, and Hugh had 
 been told that the gate would be left unlocked, so that 
 he could bring Lady Mendel and Lady Kathleen in 
 without ringing. 
 
 At a quarter past eight I was dressed in the gown I 
 had worn to the Alhambra for the full moon, and was 
 walking in the garden. I tried to sit still on the ter- 
 race, where Sarah had grouped several chairs for 
 the expected visitors, and to quiet my nerves by 
 reading; but my muscles seemed to have turned into 
 springs which I could not control. I bounded up and 
 began to walk almost involuntarily. Besides, it was my 
 dear volume of Browning which I had brought out to 
 read, as a test of strength. I meant to compose my 
 mind with the organ strains of " Sordello," but the 
 book opened to " Pippa Passes," which I had been 
 reading that night when the gray dream first began. 
 It seemed an omen. With a shiver, I tossed the
 
 244 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 volume away on to another chair, as I jumped up. 
 
 I dreaded to hear the big clock somewhere down in 
 Granada strike the half hour after eight; but when it 
 had struck, and the minutes passed on I longed to hear 
 the voices which would tell me the visitors were in the 
 garden. I felt I could not wait to know the worst; 
 and I reproached myself and I reproached fate be- 
 cause I had not parted with Hugh finally before his 
 sister came and saw my face. Perhaps all this 
 sick terror was of my imagination, only worse than 
 what I had suffered at Margate because what I 
 feared was of so much more importance to me now 
 than then. Every shadow in the garden where I had 
 once found peace was a dark cave of presentiment, 
 stored full of sinister things that were alive and rus- 
 tling. 
 
 I prayed for the voices; but when suddenly the 
 prayer was broken by the sound of them, my heart 
 hammered, and I wished that one of the blows might 
 kill me before I had to meet Lady Mendel. I won- 
 dered if Sarah's heart ever felt like that, and if so, 
 how she managed to live and look so calm, except 
 when the wild light flashed into her eyes. 
 
 I forced myself to walk slowly toward the gate, and 
 the pounding in my breast stopped, because my heart 
 seemed to have turned to water. I could feel the 
 trickling of it through my veins just as the water was 
 now running along the edges of the paths and the 
 flower-beds. 
 
 Lady Mendel was talking. Although I had heard
 
 THE LIFE MASK 245 
 
 it only once, for a moment, I was sure it was her voice, 
 and not the girl's, because it sounded almost old, and 
 full of self-confidence and importance. " What a 
 charming garden, yet how un-English! " she was say- 
 ing. 
 
 I heard Hugh's laugh yet not quite his own, as 
 when he laughed with me. " That ' yet ' is thoroughly 
 characteristic of you," he said. " Nothing un-English 
 can be quite perfect ! " 
 
 " You two young Irish people forget that I am 
 English," the reply came clearly, linking Hugh and 
 Lady Kathleen purposely together. I wondered if she 
 hoped that I was near, and hearing? As Sarah would 
 have said, I did not " put it past her." I was very glad 
 that Lady Mendel was only Hugh's half-sister. I 
 should have hated myself for feeling toward one 
 wholly of his flesh and blood, very dear to him as well 
 as very near, as I felt toward her already. 
 
 At that minute we came into sight of each other ; and 
 the thought shot through me that my sudden stony 
 calmness must be like that of an actress who loses her 
 stage- fright only when she hears her " cue." Hugh's 
 last words were my " cue " to greet the visitors, and I 
 said my words in a voice which sounded pleasant and 
 natural enough. It rather interested something in 
 me that was not me, but had come to help me through, 
 to feel that this was like a scene on the stage. I was 
 the heroine of the play, in my own eyes, yet it was 
 like acting a great part in a dream, because I did 
 not know any more of my words, or what must come
 
 246 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 next, for there had been no rehearsals. I must 
 stumble along as best I could, and make up what 
 I had to say from cues coming from the other act- 
 ors. 
 
 Hugh was looking at me with encouragement and 
 love in his eyes, which he gave to me as a message. 
 He did not seem to care if his sister or even Lady 
 Kathleen saw it. Perhaps he wanted them to see 
 because of something which had happened. I won- 
 dered and the thought set my heart to pounding 
 again, so that for an instant the three figures were 
 clouded. Then I steadied myself with an effort. The 
 mist cleared. I saw Lady Mendel even taller, hand- 
 somer, more important than in her traveling dress, 
 at the Generalife. 
 
 Her head was uncovered, and her chestnut hair, 
 which looked as if it might be cleverly dyed to hide 
 its own fading color, was exquisitely arranged. I 
 felt sure in spite of Lady Mendel's preference for 
 things English, that this was the latest fashion in 
 Paris. There were waves round the long, yet full 
 face, and flat auburn bands held in place with large 
 pins of greenish jade. She wore an evening cloak 
 of purple chiffon, through which her bare neck and 
 arms, and her green satin gown glimmered mysteri- 
 ously. Lady Kathleen's frock was of some pale, rose- 
 colored material, girlishly made, and the two graceful 
 figures moving between the hedges of cut myrtle had 
 the effect of blowing flowers. When they came near, 
 Lady Kathleen lost nothing in charm of tint and out-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 247 
 
 line, but Lady Mendel was no longer flowerlike. I 
 saw that her features, though handsome, had grown 
 hard and massive, more as if molded by her thoughts 
 and experiences of life, than by time. 'She did not 
 look old, but I could not fancy her as ever having been 
 a girl. Her brows were set remarkably high above 
 the eyes, which gave a large sweep of drooping white 
 lid and an expression of haughtiness. Her nostrils 
 were thick and small, with no perceptible quiver as she 
 breathed, which made her appear peculiarly unsensi- 
 tive, and her upper lip was straight and long. In 
 the soft twilight her complexion appeared to be 
 beautiful, though in the afternoon I had thought her 
 too florid. When Hugh introduced us to each other, 
 she threw back folds of purple chiffon and put out a 
 superb hand and arm with a gesture which told that 
 both were generally admired. I caught a glitter of 
 rings, but the wrist was too perfect to be hidden with 
 bracelets. She took my hand in hers with an air of 
 cordiality, but when she had it, gave no pressure, so 
 that my hand was at a loss what to do with itself in 
 the loose, cool cage. It was released, however, in an 
 instant. 
 
 " How do you do, Mrs. Lippincott ? It is so nice 
 of you to let us come," she said in a full, clear voice, 
 which gave to each word the value of an heirloom, and 
 somehow produced an impression of royal patronage. 
 But when she spoke to Lady Kathleen immediately 
 after, she became more human, almost motherly. " It 
 is even more charming here than we expected from
 
 248 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Hugh's account, isn't it, dear? Quite refreshing after 
 our long journey in that blazing train." 
 
 Lady Kathleen did not offer me her hand. She kept 
 both arms hanging straight and stiffly down under a 
 filmy pink cloak, as if she were shy and self-conscious. 
 She was very pretty, very delicate and elusive looking 
 in the blue twilight, like a tall wood-nymph feeling 
 awkward in modern costume. She seemed, at a 
 glance, all eyes and fluffy hair, for the pink down-curv- 
 ing mouth was so small, and the little white chin so 
 short, that one's gaze seemed to focus on the big violet 
 eyes and pass the rest unnoticed. 
 
 " Will you come to the terrace ? " I asked. " It is 
 our view place, and all the lights are beginning to come 
 out down below. It's the most beautiful moment, we 
 think. Afterward we must walk through the garden, 
 if you care to see it, before it grows too dark." 
 
 " Please take us where you please," said Lady Men- 
 del, in the nobly patronizing tone which sounded to me 
 like that of a great personage opening a bazaar. 
 "Are we to meet your friend, Miss er Nelson, 
 who is such a devoted person, according to Hugh ? " 
 
 " Thank you, I'm afraid not," I answered. " She 
 isn't strong, and is not feeling well this evening." 
 So far I spoke the truth. Sarah had begged to 
 hide herself, unless I needed her to " stand by me," 
 and, taking pity upon her, I had said there was no 
 reason why she should trouble to appear. But my 
 next words were far from true. " She will be very 
 sorry to miss you." They sounded insincere as I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 249 
 
 mechanically spoke them, but I did not care whether 
 Lady Mendel thought them so or not. 
 
 We talked a little on the terrace, all four together 
 looking over the low wall at the stars of light coming 
 to birth on the Vega. Hugh tried to draw me out, so 
 that his sister might realize what a wonderful person 
 I was. His ingenuous wish to make me shine came 
 nearer to making me cry and laugh, for the funni- 
 ness and pathos of it. Lady Kathleen scarcely spoke 
 at all, except when Lady Mendel or Hugh asked 
 her some question. I realized that she felt herself 
 out of place, that she had not wished to come, and was 
 anxious to get away. She seemed to me like a creature 
 of a different world from mine, a world of nice girls 
 and jolly young men, and country house parties, and 
 an interest in dancing and bridge and cricket and polo. 
 She would probably laugh and have plenty to chatter 
 about in that world and she would look lovely in a 
 white satin wedding-dress with a silver brocade train, 
 and floating film of tulle veil. 
 
 When I could think of no more to say, and Lady 
 Mendel seemed a little tired of telling about the hot 
 journey from Paris to Madrid, the broiling journey 
 from Madrid to Granada, I suggested going to look at 
 the garden. 
 
 " I wonder if you'll mind my sitting here with you, 
 and letting Hugh show Kathleen about? He's so in 
 love with your garden he must know it all quite well," 
 said Lady Mendel. " I feel the reaction coming on 
 now, in this delicious cool air, and suddenly realize
 
 250 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 how tired I am. I can't think of anything more at- 
 tractive than resting in one of these basket chairs, 
 while other people not so lazy take exercise." 
 
 " Do, please, show Lady Kathleen everything, Cap- 
 tain Shannon," I said. 
 
 The girl brightened a little, smiling her pretty, 
 turned-down smile, and Hugh, though not enthusiastic, 
 did not seem surprised. I saw that the proposal had 
 been planned, and this told me in a flash that Hugh and 
 Lady Mendel must have had some private talk about 
 me, since I saw him last. She had probably put 
 questions and he had answered; or else he had vol- 
 unteered the information that he cared for me. 
 No doubt she had showed sisterly interest, and asked 
 him to give her time for a good talk with me. He 
 did not entirely trust her, I knew, but if she had ap- 
 peared sympathetic, he could hardly refuse such a 
 reasonable request. 
 
 " It is coming," I said to myself, as Hugh and Lady 
 Kathleen turned away. I could hear my heart beat- 
 ing, yet I was no longer frightened. I hoped Hugh 
 would not take the girl to our arbor. I wondered if 
 Sarah were in her room, sitting behind the window 
 curtain, and if she could hear our conversation. I 
 almost hoped she could, because, if my presentiment 
 were right, I should be saved the pain of telling the 
 
 story. 
 
 *. 
 
 "I'm so pleased to be able to have a talk with 
 you, quite by ourselves," Lady Mendel began. " I've
 
 THE LIFE MASK 251 
 
 been hearing so much about you from my brother." 
 She waited a second or two to see if I would speak; but 
 when I did not, she went on, in her clear, level voice, 
 with so slight a hesitation in choosing words, that it 
 seemed she must have rehearsed the scene in her mind, 
 getting her part in it by heart. " I do hope you won't 
 think I'm too dreadfully abrupt, in beginning such a 
 subject, but there's so little time, isn't there? And 
 there's so much I want to say so much I must say. 
 May I go on, Mrs. Lippincott ? " 
 
 " Please do," I said. 
 
 " Well I am years older than Hugh, and as our 
 mother died when he was a boy, I've always tried to do 
 my best by him, in every way. I felt there was some- 
 thing odd about his not coming home, for one doesn't 
 stop in Granada in summer, does one? Oh, it's dif- 
 ferent with you, of course. You have your villa and 
 garden but my brother I wrote to him several 
 times, saying if he were ill, he must let me know, 
 and I'd come out to him, no matter how hot. He 
 always insisted that he was well, and enjoying his 
 rest. But I felt there was something. And then 
 I begged him to meet me in Paris, where I was, 
 with Kathleen. He dic'n't even answer so that's 
 why I came. As for Kathleen her father's gone to 
 Canada. I couldn't leave the dear child behind. She 
 feels she's in a false position but that can't interest 
 you. Still, it was rather awkward for us both in the 
 Generalife gardens. It was almost as if we came to 
 spy on my brother though I assure you it was an
 
 252 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 accident. He saw that from my point of view 
 
 and perhaps from yours. Before dinner this eve- 
 ning he came to my room and told me of your great 
 friendship, and that he'd asked you to marry 
 him." 
 
 "Then," I answered in a voice which would not 
 rise much above a whisper, " he must have told you 
 at the same time that I that I have not said 
 yes." 
 
 " He did tell me that," replied Lady Mendel, lower- 
 ing her tones also. " If not that is, if he had told 
 me the opposite I should have felt obliged to say 
 something which would have been unpleasant for 
 us both. As it was, I said nothing. I assure you 
 of that. Already I'd begged him to bring us to 
 see you and the garden, of course. That was a 
 good excuse. When he told me of his feeling for you, 
 the visit was arranged, so I offered no objections. I 
 simply waited. And I asked him to give me a chance 
 for making your acquaintance you and I alone to- 
 gether for a few minutes." 
 
 " I thought it must have been so," I murmured. 
 
 " It won't be long so it's the more difficult. But 
 
 you know when I first saw you this afternoon I 
 felt it seemed as if I must have seen you before 
 somewhere." 
 
 Ever since she came into the garden Lady Mendel's 
 worldly looking eyes under the large lids had fixed 
 themselves on my face whenever possible. They told 
 me what she was going to say before her lips said it :
 
 THE LIFE MASK 253 
 
 if the news had needed to be broken. I knew that I 
 did not flush or turn pale. I met her eyes steadily, not 
 defiantly, but gravely, with a question. 
 
 " I couldn't be sure then," she began once more, 
 " but frankly, I must confess, Mrs. Lippincott, that 
 instinct told me to associate the likeness with some- 
 thing er something notorious" 
 
 Perhaps she expected me to break into angry words, 
 but she did not appear relieved of any fear by my 
 silence. No doubt she had prepared herself to deal 
 with an outburst. 
 
 " Of course I wasn't so indiscreet as to speak of my 
 idea to my brother," she assured me. " He has 
 been away so much in the East, for years and years, 
 that I was certain he but I did ask Kathleen if your 
 face struck her as at all familiar, and she had the same 
 impression I had, though more vague. That was one 
 reason why I felt I must meet you again at once, 
 before more harm could be done. It was only when 
 Hugh came to my room after seeing you for the sec- 
 ond time and began telling me of his feeling for you, 
 that suddenly in the most extraordinary way, like a 
 kind of flash, I remembered." She paused an instant, 
 then said more impressively : " I remembered who 
 you were. I know I'm not mistaken. Though I 
 never saw you before, nobody who read the newspa- 
 pers could help recognizing you from the photographs. 
 And it's only a few months ago I saw them the first 
 time they appeared, too, of course but it's so long 
 since then, I might have forgotten. I suppose these
 
 254 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 were the same, published again: they looked old- 
 fashioned. But you've changed singularly little, when 
 one realizes what you " 
 
 " Oh, please, Lady Mendel, need we talk of that ? " 
 I could not help imploring, though the instant the 
 words were out, I wished them unspoken. I wished 
 that I could have ended with her as I had begun, seem- 
 ingly a stoic. 
 
 " Forgive me," she said politely. " I was carried 
 on without thinking. Of course I don't want to hurt 
 you more than can be helped. It's all so painful. My 
 heart really breaks for my poor brother. It will be 
 such a terrible disillusionment to him a man of 
 ideals, as he is." 
 
 " He knows there is something," I said. In spite 
 of myself my voice sounded humble. " He knows 
 that's why I can't marry him." 
 
 " Ah, I suppose, poor fellow, he has a vague idea of 
 a ' past,' such as women have in plays or novels. Hugh 
 is so romantic. But this Mrs. Lippincott, you must 
 tell him who you are, and everything, or I shall have 
 to. And it will be so much better for us all, to have 
 it come from you. That's why I called; for when I 
 remembered quite distinctly the photographs, I should 
 have made an excuse of being tired, if I hadn't felt 
 it my bounden duty to have this talk with you, per- 
 sonally. I want you to tell Hugh to-night, Mrs. 
 Lippincott, after I have taken Kathleen poor little 
 Kathleen! back to the hotel. Because, if you're 
 really fond of him, you must see that the best thing
 
 THE LIFE MASK ' 255 
 
 ' the only thing is for him to go away with us. 
 If I could get him off to-morrow morning for Gi- 
 braltar, I should be thankful." 
 
 " I do see that it would be best," I said. " But you 
 misunderstand some things, I think, Lady Mendel. I 
 didn't tell Hugh about myself, because there was 
 never, never any idea in my mind of marrying him. I 
 do love him " I was ashamed because my voice 
 would break. " I love him a thousand times too well 
 to hurt him now or in the future. I tried to send him 
 away, but he wanted to stay just a little while. 
 And we tried being friends. To-day was to be the 
 last his birthday. He didn't know but I'd made 
 up my mind not to let him come again. I meant to 
 write a letter and tell him he must go. Then you 
 came and we hadn't said good-by and I had to 
 see him just once, to find out whether you had told 
 him anything. Of course I thought about the photo- 
 graphs. That's why I wanted to live quietly where I 
 needn't wear a veil always, as I did in England if I 
 went out. And this garden seemed a place of peace. 
 But I realize now, there can be no peace. If it hadn't 
 been that you asked to call, I shouldn't have let Hugh 
 come to me again. And he would soon have gone away 
 if I'd told him in a letter that I should have to live 
 shut up in the garden till after he went. He would 
 have understood that that it was ended. Now you 
 know why there was no need for me to tell him, and 
 make him sick at heart." 
 
 " I don't know that," Lady Mendel said sharply.
 
 256 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " Quite the contrary. If you won't tell him, I shall 
 have to, that's all." 
 
 "But why why?" 
 
 " For one thing, you might change your mind, and 
 yield to temptation ; for though Hugh is my brother, I 
 can see that he is extraordinarily attractive to women. 
 And to a woman whom he loves and who loves him, 
 as you say you do, I should think he must be irresist- 
 ible." 
 
 " I swear to you I won't change my mind. Noth- 
 ing could make me change it." 
 
 " Hugh could make you change it. He is very 
 determined, and when he wants a thing he wants it so 
 much that he moves heaven and earth to get it. Un- 
 fortunately he wants very much to marry you." 
 
 " But when he knows it's impossible " 
 
 " He'll still go on wanting it. I see and admit that 
 you are a woman a man wouldn't easily forget, 
 especially such a man as Hugh, unless he had a sudden 
 revulsion of feeling which tore the love out of his 
 heart." 
 
 " Oh ! " I cried, as if she had struck me. For im- 
 passable as I knew the barrier to be, I had not quite 
 realized until I heard it from her, how revolting I must 
 be if the truth were known. I had hated the thought 
 of telling Hugh, partly because it would be terribly 
 painful to him, but partly, too, because I had imagined 
 it not quite impossible that he would want to marry 
 me in spite of all. And then I should find it still more 
 difficult to resist him. Because I had lived face to
 
 THE LIFE MASK 257 
 
 face with the horror so long, I had not understood 
 thoroughly that it would turn me into a leper in 
 Hugh's dear eyes, as his sister took for granted. 
 
 Thoughts roared in my ears like thunder. I forgot 
 to answer, and I heard Lady Mendel going on with her 
 arguments. Her voice sounded far away. 
 
 " Even if he consented to go, he would always be 
 regretting you," she said. " The memory of you in 
 your high-walled garden would remain in his mind 
 like a portrait in a beautiful frame. Yes, that is just 
 it a portrait in a beautiful frame. And it won't 
 do!" 
 
 11 The poor portrait has been skied in life's picture 
 gallery ! " I heard myself cry out, bitterly. " Now, 
 it's stored away forever in the world's lumber-room, 
 with its face to the wall." 
 
 " Don't feel like that about yourself," said Lady 
 Mendel. " I am most sorry to distress you. But 
 what can I do ? And there are many occupations left 
 for you on this earth. Slum work, for instance in 
 any country except England, naturally, and perhaps 
 America, where it would be disagreeable to be con- 
 stantly recognized. Maybe the people er might 
 resent that class is so ungrateful. But still, there 
 are many consolations, I am sure. And if you have 
 the courage to save Hugh by telling him, you will have 
 the reward of " 
 
 " Save Hugh by telling him ! " I echoed. " Are you 
 very, very sure that he would look upon me as being 
 so horrible ? "
 
 258 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " I am quite sure," she answered promptly, " that 
 neither Hugh nor any other man would feel the slight- 
 est temptation to make you his wife knowing who 
 you are." 
 
 " But he might believe in me." 
 
 " There would always be the doubt. That would be 
 enough to send a shudder through his heart at the most 
 passionate moment, Mrs. Lippincott. And when a 
 shudder goes through a man's heart at the thought of 
 a woman it kills love." 
 
 " Oh, you are cruel ! " I stammered. 
 
 " If I'm cruel to you, it's in order to make you kind 
 to my brother. I assure you again, if I allowed you 
 simply to send him away, without telling him what is 
 the real obstacle between you, even if he bowed to 
 your decision, his life would be ruined. He would be 
 haunted by you and your mystery. He would never 
 be able to turn his thoughts to anything or anyone else. 
 Not only would he lose interest in his career, which is 
 so promising, and forget his ambition, but he would 
 lose interest in life. I know him better than you do, 
 you see! There would be no home ties for him: 
 no sweet innocent young wife: no little children to 
 console him. Whereas, if you tell him the truth to- 
 night, there will be one short, sharp pang, and the thing 
 will be over." 
 
 " Oh, my God ! " I heard some one saying, and knew 
 that it was I. My head was bowed down into my 
 hands, and I forgot that I had hoped to seem a stoic. 
 I did not look up at Lady Mendel, but somehow I felt
 
 THE LIFE MASK 259 
 
 that my agony had frightened her. I heard the soft 
 swish of her satin dress as she rose from the low 
 chair which she had drawn close to mine. 
 
 " Do compose yourself," she murmured, laying her 
 hand on my shoulder. " I think they're coming back. 
 You wouldn't like Hugh to see to know and I 
 shouldn't. This is not the time. And it would be so 
 dreadful, before Kathleen. She hated coming but 
 I made her so there would be some one to take 
 Hugh away from us. If you're determined not to 
 tell Hugh yourself I must do it; but I should have 
 thought you would prefer and it will be so long 
 drawn out, because he won't believe at first. We shall 
 all be tortured " 
 
 " I will tell him," I said, lifting my head and rising 
 to stand by Lady Mendel. " I see that you are right. 
 It was stupid of me not to realize before but he shall 
 know, and and as you say, it will be over." 
 
 " They are coming ! " exclaimed Lady Mendel. 
 " Will you tell him to-night? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " I may depend upon you ? " 
 
 " I promise. If he comes back " 
 
 " I will send him," said Lady Mendel, briskly. 
 " He can take Kathleen and me to the door of the hotel, 
 and return at once. It shall be settled before we leave 
 the garden. I'll think of something to say. While he 
 is with you, I'll speak to the hotel people about going 
 to-morrow. When it's all over, Hugh will be thank- 
 ful to have everything arranged and to get away."
 
 260 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " Yes, he'll be thankful," I heard myself saying. 
 
 And as the merciful darkness had fallen, he could 
 not see my face when he came near. By keeping si- 
 lent under cover of Lady Mendel's talk, I was safe.
 
 HUGH, Mrs. Lippincott has kindly promised 
 to look up a book for me," said Lady Men- 
 del at last. " Will you come back when 
 you've dropped us at the hotel, and ask her if she's 
 found it?" 
 
 The excuse was as good as any other. She 
 was willing Hugh should think that she was searching 
 a pretext to send him back to me, and that he should 
 be grateful for a little while. 
 
 From the Carmen de Santa Catalina it was not more 
 than ten minutes' walk to the hotel. Hugh would 
 come to me again in twenty minutes, and I would 
 tell him the thing which must make him hate me. 
 
 I did not try to prepare, or think what I should 
 say first, or wonder how I could make myself seem less 
 terrible to him than Lady Mendel believed I should 
 seem. Besides, according to her the way to save him 
 was to show myself at the worst. 
 
 When they had gone, I felt extraordinarily tired, as 
 if I had been battered by waves in a high sea. I had 
 a physical longing, almost a necessity, to lie down, 
 and stretch myself out flat; but it seemed, if I yielded 
 to this craving, I should never have the courage or 
 strength to get up again. 
 
 I had not gone to the gate with my visitors, but 
 261
 
 262 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 had bidden them good-by standing on the terrace, 
 and then, for fear Sarah might come down or call 
 me when the garden was quiet, I walked quickly and 
 softly away to the arbor of the fountain. I knew 
 that if Sarah found me gone, she would under- 
 stand, and leave me alone, even if she had overheard 
 something and suspected more. As for Hugh, not 
 seeing me on the terrace or in the dimly lighted draw- 
 ing-room, he would soon look for me in my favorite 
 resting place. It was taken for granted between 
 us that if I were not on the terrace, I would be there. 
 
 When by and by I heard his footsteps coming fast 
 along the path to the arbor, as if he were in a hurry, 
 I had not thought of anything at all, except that I 
 would have to make him turn from me with repulsion. 
 
 " Nita are you in the arbor ? " he called to me in 
 a low voice before he reached the doorway. 
 
 " Yes, I'm here waiting for you," I answered. 
 
 He came in, and I could see him as a shadow, 
 for now it was night, and under the heavy vines and 
 creepers very dark. 
 
 " I can just catch the glimmer of your white dress," 
 he said. " You look like a ghost. But " and find- 
 ing his way to me he took my hand " you don't feel 
 like one, dear, beautiful, beloved woman. Oh, how 
 glorious to come back to you, and have you to my- 
 self! I didn't dream of any such good luck. It's a 
 splendid ending for my birthday, after all." 
 
 His birthday . . . My poor Hugh ! . . . 
 
 " Is there really a book for my sister? " he inquired.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 263 
 
 " Or was it just a kind excuse to let me say good- 
 night to you ? By Jove, I hadn't given Beatrice credit 
 for being such a decent chap. I believe I'll take to 
 calling her ' Bee ' after this. You know I told her 
 about us: that I worshiped the ground you walked 
 on, and that I meant to get you for my wife in spite 
 of your ' No.' She was quite sympathetic for her. 
 But I took her sympathy with a grain of salt, until 
 she sent me back for the book. How did you get 
 on together?" 
 
 " Very well," I answered mechanically. The words 
 of the story I would have to tell began drumming in 
 my ears. 
 
 " I hung about with Kathleen as long as I could, 
 because I'd promised and Beatrice seemed to want to 
 be kind, according to her lights. Only I kept think- 
 ing what if she'd fooled me, and was trying to play 
 me some trick ? like a dastardly cat. Heaven alone 
 knows what I talked about to that girl. I must have 
 bored her badly. She behaved like a lump. Of course 
 you knew I wouldn't bring her into the arbor our 
 arbor where we've been so happy?" 
 
 " We've been unhappy, too," I said. " At least, I 
 have." 
 
 " I think you caused me some qualms here, once or 
 twice, but I deserved them, perhaps ; and you've atoned 
 for them all, my darling, since then, so they're for- 
 gotten." 
 
 " And now I have to make you unhappy in a way 
 you don't deserve, and I can never atone for ! " I
 
 264 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 said. " But I hope and pray you will forget the 
 unhappiness and me too." 
 
 " I can't have you being melodramatic, sweet," he 
 laughed, " and you may as well understand that I 
 won't let you make me unhappy, and I never intend to 
 be far enough away to forget. Dearest, why do you 
 shiver? Your hand is suddenly like ice." He found 
 and took the other. " And this one is just as bad. I 
 must warm them since the July night can't." He 
 lifted both my hands to his lips, but before his mouth 
 touched them, I slipped them away. 
 
 " Don't kiss even my hands to-night, dear," I said 
 to him very softly. " Not that I don't want you to, 
 but because afterward you may shiver as I did a min- 
 ute ago, thinking how you'd kissed them just before 
 just before I told you something I'm going to tell 
 now." 
 
 " What are you going to tell ? " he asked, almost 
 sharply. " Have I made you understand, I wonder, 
 that I don't want to hear anything you don't want to 
 tell? It's your present and future I'm particularly 
 concerned with, not your past." 
 
 " I've changed my mind," I answered. " I do want 
 to tell you." 
 
 " Very well," he said. " I wish you would change 
 your mind about other things as easily; but I shall 
 make you do that. Tell me, dearest one on earth or 
 in heaven, just what you wish to tell me and no more ; 
 and let me kneel down here at your feet, with your 
 head on my heart while you tell whatever it is."
 
 THE LIFE MASK 265 
 
 Before I could stop him he was on his knees, his 
 arms round me, drawing me gently but firmly toward 
 him. As gently but as firmly too, I held him back 
 with both my hands on his breast, so that he could 
 bring me no nearer without using force that would 
 hurt. 
 
 " Listen, Hugh," I began, " have you ever wondered 
 why I wear my hair short ? " 
 
 " It isn't really short," he said, " and it goes all into 
 waves and lovely soft rings. Every woman would wear 
 her hair short if it could be like that. I supposed you 
 did so because it was pretty and quaint, fastened with 
 those pins and tortoise-shell buckles. Besides, Miss 
 Nelson told me you'd been very ill not even ex- 
 pected to live, so of course your hair had to be cut " 
 
 " It used to come nearly down to my knees. But 
 it was cut long before I was ill," I said in a mumbling 
 voice, because my tongue and lips were so dry it was 
 hard to speak at all. " Ten years before. It was cut 
 
 in prison." 
 
 That took him out of himself. I understood so 
 well how he had believed that nothing I could say 
 would startle him, that nothing could ruffle the deep 
 calm of his love; but those two words " in prison " 
 
 spoken of myself were the words of all others 
 he had not schooled himself to expect. They stung 
 like a whip, and made him cry out, " Good God ! " 
 Then he crushed me tighter, not thinking whether 
 or no he might hurt my resisting arms. He seemed 
 to snatch me from the world which marched an
 
 266 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 army against the woman he would defend. I felt 
 the anguish in him run through me like fire, and the 
 passion of his sorrow because I had not always had 
 the defense of his arms. But he knew only the begin- 
 ning yet; and because of the change that must come in 
 him when he heard the rest, even in his arms I felt 
 weak, as though my flesh were frail as flower petals, 
 beaten by a storm. For he could not defend me 
 against the revolt of his own soul. As this was the 
 beginning, so that would be the end. 
 
 " I was in prison ten years," I told him. 
 
 He drew in a breath like a sob. " God, what devils 
 men are! I'd give my life to have stamped out their 
 lives, all who put you there and kept you there 
 my white dove." 
 
 " I was put there for that," I blundered on somehow 
 " because they accused me of taking a life. But 
 they had just enough doubt not to hang me. I 
 should have been in prison now and as long as I 
 lived, only for Sarah what she did for me and 
 because I was dying sti it seemed to them I might 
 as well come out to die. Then Sarah saved me again. 
 She wouldn't let me die. She is Sarah Nicholls really, 
 not Nelson. Now do you know who I am what 
 woman it is you have loved, and kissed? " 
 
 " I only know," he said, " that it's the woman I 
 love still just as much more for what she's 
 suffered unjustly. Ten years ! How shall I make up 
 to you for it?" 
 
 " How good you are, how good ! " I breathed to him.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 267 
 
 " You believe in me without asking one question. 
 My darling, the only way I can reward you is to end 
 this as soon as I can, and tell you without need of 
 questions. I was Anita Durrand. You didn't dream 
 it would be as terrible as that the thing I had to tell ? 
 O Hugh let me go ! I know it is making you sick 
 sick to have me in your arms, but you keep me for 
 pity you can't bear that I should know ! " My 
 voice rose shrill and sharp, then broke. I struggled 
 to escape, and release him from the bonds of his own 
 loyalty. But where was the horror of me which 
 Lady Mendel had predicted with confidence? If he 
 felt it, he concealed it well and bravely. Still, he did 
 not know the worst yet. 
 
 " It is terrible," he agreed ; " more terrible than I 
 thought, but for you, dearest, not for me; except to 
 think of the cruelty and I not there to save you or 
 bear it for you. Why, don't you see, I want a thou- 
 sand times more than ever to take you for mine, so 
 as to make all the years to come happy enough to blot 
 out the past ? Ten years ! Why, I'll make you look 
 back on them as an ugly minute or, better still, 
 wipe them out of your memory." 
 
 " I didn't suppose there could be men like you in the 
 world," I said. " It's worth everything to have met 
 one and to have had his love. But even yours 
 can't live on the rocks where I must dash it, Hugh. 
 You're hardly in sight of them yet. I think the 
 mist of your own goodness hides them. Tell me 
 this, and answer truly. Don't keep anything back,
 
 268 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 for both our sakes. You read the trial of Anita 
 Durrand ? " 
 
 " No, thank heaven, I didn't," he answered, unhesi- 
 tating. " I hate and loathe murder cases in the pa- 
 pers always did, from a boy, for the same reason 
 that I saw red whenever there was any worrying of 
 rats with terriers, which some chaps called sport. The 
 thought of any defenseless thing at the mercy of 
 something bigger and stronger than itself always made 
 me wild." 
 
 " Even if the defenseless thing was evil, and had 
 killed in its turn?" 
 
 " Yes, even then. How people can swallow such 
 doses in the papers, with their breakfasts ! They must 
 have the blood and sensibility of toads." 
 
 " But surely," I insisted, " you knew about the case. 
 You heard people talk of it express their opinions ? 
 Half England wanted me hanged." 
 
 " Don't ! " he begged. " I can't stand it ! " 
 
 Still he held me close, and would not let me go. I 
 had ceased to try, for I thought that in a few minutes 
 more the words I had to say would be like a steel 
 key to unlock the warm clasp. 
 
 " You did know, didn't you? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, I knew to a certain extent," he re- 
 plied almost angrily, his tone that of a man who is suf- 
 fering bodily pain. " Some things are in the air. 
 You can't avoid them." 
 
 " And didn't you unconsciously perhaps form 
 an opinion that the woman was guilty? "
 
 THE LIFE MASK 269 
 
 " Woman ! Why, you were a child. Ten years 
 ago you were barely nineteen." 
 
 " That isn't an answer. But I know what it means 
 all the same, my poor Hugh. You did think she was 
 guilty." 
 
 " I thought very little about it. If you were a child, 
 I wasn't much more than a boy it seems now 
 like most fellows of my age, taken up with my own 
 concerns. I wasn't even in England then; I was on 
 the way out to India at the time, I remember now " 
 
 " Ah ! what makes you remember particularly ? " 
 
 " It comes back to me that people were were 
 talking on the ship. Cooped up like that, one had to 
 listen sometimes at the table or in the smoking- 
 room and all that." 
 
 " You must tell me what you thought of the 
 woman you heard your friends call a murderess. 
 If you refuse, I shall only believe it perhaps worse 
 than it was." 
 
 " I suppose I took my opinion more or less from 
 those around me. But if I'd read the case, Nita 
 or seen your picture, as some of the others had I 
 remember they said you were beautiful and young 
 I should have had the sense and decency to think for 
 myself. I should have known you were innocent. 
 God ! I wish I could have fought for you ! " 
 
 " But " and now the supreme moment had come 
 " what if I were not innocent? " 
 
 I felt his blood leap and his muscles contract as a
 
 270 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 man's must in the electric chair. For an instant He 
 was dumb. The plashing of the fountain seemed sud- 
 denly very loud. It wept for the death of love. The 
 drip of its tears was cold in my heart. In the dark 
 we could not see each other's faces, or it would have 
 been harder to go on, sentence by sentence, telling 
 him these things, poisoning his ideal with deadly 
 acid. But suddenly I knew that he had lifted his head, 
 and was seeking my eyes. I felt his breath on my 
 hair. 
 
 "If you swore to me that you were not innocent, 
 I shouldn't believe you ! " he said. And his arms did 
 not loose me yet.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 STILL there was more to come. And I was not 
 trying to test him. I was telling my story as 
 best I could, fragment by fragment, until he 
 should know of me all that I knew of myself. 
 
 I longed to bend forward, and kiss his hair in my 
 gratitude, but there was no fire of passion in me now, 
 to carry me away and make me forget my unworthi- 
 ness, as I had forgotten in the afternoon. Face to 
 face with the reconstructed image of my old self, I 
 did not understand how I had offered my body or my 
 soul to him in any way, with the idea that my near- 
 ness, without a legal tie, could not hurt him. 
 
 " It's no use trying to thank you, Hugh, for what 
 you say, for what you are to me," I sighed. " It 
 goes far beyond words as far and high as heaven 
 is. But, could you bear to listen if I told you the 
 story from the beginning? I should like to tell you, 
 if you could go through it with me." 
 
 " Let me live it through with you," he answered. 
 
 " It's a long story, if I go back to the place where 
 I want to begin. I can't have you like that on your 
 knees before me, while I tell you. It isn't right and 
 you will be so tired." 
 
 " I'll stay as I am, dearest," he insisted. 
 271
 
 272 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 And so I began to make pictures for him of what 
 my life had been : just a few of my childhood, and of 
 my mother; then of the convent; but only quick 
 sketches until I came to the time when mother made 
 me join her in Paris. 
 
 " I was seventeen," I said, " but older than most 
 of the girls at school. The Superior wrote that it 
 was time for me to be taken away so mother sent 
 Sarah. Sarah was her maid just then but it was 
 me Sarah loved. And I loved her. Mother had a 
 flat, and knew lots of people, who used to come there 
 on her * day ' and she was asked everywhere. She 
 was beautiful. She looked almost as young as I, 
 and loved to be admired. She didn't like having a 
 daughter taller than herself. People were surprised, 
 if they saw me and asked who I was but I wasn't 
 supposed to be ' out/ I think mother lived extrava- 
 gantly, for she wasn't rich and there was some dis- 
 appointment, about a French Marquis she cared for, 
 who couldn't marry her when he found out how little 
 money she had. I have all that's left of it now, and 
 it's less than two hundred pounds a year. Perhaps 
 she had about twice as much then. Anyhow, she was 
 worried how to make ends meet, and have pretty 
 things. I didn't understand about helping her as I 
 ought, or she might have grown fonder of me. But 
 there was a man who used to call on her some- 
 times, who met me one day with Sarah as I was com- 
 ing upstairs from a walk. He knew Sarah by sight, 
 and stopped her to ask who I was. It surprised him
 
 THE LIFE MASK 273 
 
 to hear that I was Mrs. Duprez's daughter. His 
 name was Durrand Woodruffe Durrand, and he 
 lived in England but of course you know that; 
 and how he had a house in London, and a moor in 
 Scotland, and a flat in Paris, and turned out to be a 
 money lender who did all his business under another 
 name. People hadn't discovered that secret then. 
 But mother knew he was rich, and liked young girls. 
 I'm afraid that was the real reason she answered the 
 Superior's letter by taking me out of the convent so 
 quickly. 
 
 " After the morning he met us on the stairs, Mr. 
 Durrand came nearly every day, though Sarah said 
 he hadn't been very often before; and mother made 
 me entertain him, although it bored me dreadfully 
 and I couldn't think what to say to an old man. 
 He wasn't so very old really not more than fifty- 
 six or seven, but he never took any exercise, and 
 liked eating, so he'd grown fat, with a bulging sort of 
 figure, and cheeks and chin that hung down over his 
 collar. His hair was not gray, but black, and so was 
 his mustache a bluish black that I used to think 
 looked like stove polish but they were thin, and 
 the bald part of his head was yellow, like his face. 
 His nose was large, and he was always patting it 
 with his silk handkerchief soaked in some strong per- 
 fume; and I couldn't help seeing that a little black 
 came off his mustache on the white silk. But, al- 
 though he was fat and ugly, he dressed very well, and 
 cared a great deal about his clothes. I hardly ever
 
 274 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 saw him in the same things twice. Sarah believed 
 that he wanted to marry mother, but I was sure she'd 
 never accept ; she liked handsome people. So you can 
 think whether I was surprised when mother told me 
 one night that Mr. Durrand had proposed for me. I 
 thought she was joking a horrid sort of joke 
 at first, but soon I saw it was deadly earnest. She 
 cried and sobbed, and said she didn't know what would 
 become of us if I refused we couldn't go on living 
 as we were, and she would have to kill herself, or 
 worse. All night she stayed in my room, begging me 
 to say yes, and telling me how happy I should make 
 her and that it was better marrying an old man 
 than a young man, if you didn't love him, because you 
 could do as you pleased. She said he'd be good to us 
 both, and generous, and her troubles would be over. 
 And, best of all, she said she would love me dearly. 
 I had always wanted her love so much! She was so 
 beautiful, with such wonderful, soft eyes, and sang old 
 songs in such a lovely voice that it called my heart out 
 of my body. Only she never wanted it ! 
 
 " Before morning I promised to do what she begged 
 me to do; then everything was hurried up quickly, or 
 even for her sake I don't believe I should have been 
 able to keep my word. Mr. Durrand had to go back 
 to England soon, and he wanted to be married and 
 and have a short honeymoon on the Italian Lakes 
 first. That was a bribe to me to see the Italian 
 Lakes. I'd always longed to. My best friend at the 
 convent lived on Lake Como. And Mr. Durrand
 
 THE LIFE MASK 275 
 
 did nothing to frighten me. He was just polite 
 and kind as he had been before, and gave me a 
 diamond and emerald ring an antique. He was a 
 great judge of antiques. He talked to me about his 
 house in London, and what a good time I should have 
 there, and how I should love Scotland. He didn't 
 tell me he'd been married before when he was young, 
 and had a daughter years older than I. Not that it 
 would have made any difference. 
 
 " Just as soon as it could be managed legally, we 
 had the marriage the civil one first ; and that day, I 
 began to feel as if I couldn't go on. I cried and was 
 horribly unhappy that night, and mother had to prom- 
 ise I should have Sarah for my maid, to take to the 
 Lakes and to England, or else I should have refused 
 to go on with the religious part of the marriage. I 
 remember before I could sleep, mother gave me a huge 
 dose of bromide or something, and the next day I felt 
 dazed and strange. I didn't seem to care what hap- 
 pened, and I had a sick headache for the first time in 
 my life. 
 
 " We started away two hours after the wedding 
 Mr. Durrand and Sarah and I, and his valet. He 
 Mr. Durrand began wanting me to call him * Sam/ 
 and I said I couldn't; I should have to go on calling 
 him Mr. Durrand. He was angry, and there was a 
 look in his eyes that made me a little afraid. I got 
 to know it very well afterward. 
 
 " We didn't) travel far that day. We went only 
 to a hotel at St. Germain, which seemed to me beauti-
 
 276 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 ful. I'd never been in a hotel before, since I was a 
 little girl, just after mother brought me away from 
 down South, so I was dying to have dinner in the big 
 restaurant, to look at all the people, and the lovely 
 view from the window. But he wouldn't consent to 
 that. He said he wanted me to himself. We had a 
 private sitting-room, and he ordered dinner there. 
 
 " I couldn't say anything about that scene to you, 
 only it had a great influence on the case, afterward 
 just a year afterward. You didn't read the papers, 
 so you won't remember. The only thing I need tell 
 you is, that he frightened and disgusted me dreadfully, 
 and I screamed, and tried to run out into the hall. But 
 he laughed, and locked the door, while he held my 
 wrists, and his teeth were so big and yellow he was 
 like the ogre in fairy stories Sarah used to read to me 
 when she was my nurse. He called me a little devil, 
 and said I was making him feel a young man. I 
 twisted myself away, and then because I was really 
 afraid, truly thinking he must have gone out of his 
 mind, I lost my head in a sort of panic. I seized a 
 glass full of champagne and threw it at him as he 
 stood in front of the door. I didn't know what I was 
 doing I was so frantic at being alone with such a 
 man and married to him. The wine-glass struck 
 him on the chin, and broke. The champagne went all 
 over his white shirt 'front, mingling with a little blood 
 from the cuts the glass made. 
 
 " I covered my eyes with my hands and shrieked 
 when I saw what I had done. He started to come
 
 THE LIFE MASK 277 
 
 toward me again I think in his rage he meant to 
 strike but he began to stagger, and then, though he 
 tried to save himself by seizing a chair, he fell and 
 rolled over on his side. His eyes were wide open, but 
 they went up into his head, showing only the whites, 
 and I thought I had killed him. The key of the door 
 was in his pocket, and I would have jumped out of the 
 window sooner than touch him, to find it; so I only 
 screamed for help. And at last they broke the door 
 down. His valet was one of the first in the room : an 
 Englishman who didn't like me at all, or want his 
 master to marry any one. He asked me what I had 
 done, and I said I'd thrown a wine-glass at Mr. Dur- 
 rand because I was angry. 
 
 " They sent for a doctor, and it turned out that the 
 glass or the fall hadn't done much harm, but the ex- 
 citement had caused a fit of some kind. Mr. Durrand 
 wasn't strong, and there was too much fat round the 
 heart, it seemed. He was very ill there at St. Ger- 
 main, a long time. The wedding trip was given up; 
 and it was weeks before we were able to travel to 
 London. I hoped he would let me go away, but he 
 wouldn't and mother couldn't have taken me back. 
 She was traveling in Italy with friends, and had let 
 her flat. 
 
 " You don't remember, I suppose, what he said at 
 the trial but you can imagine what the valet made 
 of that scene, when he was called as a witness against 
 me a year later. It was perfectly true that Mr. Dur- 
 rand was never the same man again after the fit he
 
 278 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 had ; it was my fault, for exciting him and dashing the 
 wine-glass at his face. But it wasn't my fault in the 
 way Burton made it out. He swore that I was like a 
 mad fiend, when he found me in the room, and his mas- 
 ter on the floor covered with blood. And he lied when 
 he said in court that I screamed ' I hope he is dead ! ' 
 I may have cried out that I was ' afraid ' he was dead 
 for I was afraid, and sick at heart with a cold, 
 guilty feeling. I forgot how terrible Mr. Durrand had 
 been to me, in my fear that I'd killed him. And al- 
 though I must have begun to hate him even then, with- 
 out quite knowing it, I'm sure I would have given my 
 life to save his at that minute. 
 
 " His own doctor was sent for from London to 
 come to St. Germain ; and he traveled back to England 
 with us, and always attended Mr. Durrand afterward. 
 When he was called as a witness in the trial, he had 
 to say that his patient had never been strong after the 
 fit, and illness, at St. Germain; but he wasn't against 
 me, as Burton was. I know Burton was sorry I wasn't 
 hanged. And if it hadn't been for him and the lies 
 he told about my life, the things he twisted into wrong 
 meanings, I think I should have been acquitted. 
 
 " I had such a sense of guilt when I saw Mr. Dur- 
 rand ill and feeble, that I tried to be gentle and good, 
 after he'd refused to let me go away. He kept 
 me with him a great deal, when he was getting better, 
 but wasn't allowed to leave his room that was after 
 he'd been taken to London, to the great big house 
 where I spent that awful year of being married. He
 
 THE LIFE MASK 279 
 
 liked me to read aloud he had a library full of splen- 
 did books, and loved them. That was the best thing 
 about him and his love of music. Whenever I 
 happened to look up from a page, I almost always 
 found him watching me, with a queer, brooding sort 
 of look; but when he caught my eyes, he turned his 
 away, or shut them, and pretended to be asleep. 
 
 "I hoped he would get well, of course yet I 
 dreaded the time. When he began to creep about, 
 he made me help him and Burton was jealous 
 but, oh, I forgot to tell you, the daughter I didn't 
 know about, used to come and see her father when he 
 was ill. She married some one he didn't like, and 
 he'd never forgiven her still, he didn't seem to mind 
 seeing her when there was nothing he wanted to do. 
 Her husband had lost a lot of money and Mr. Dur- 
 rand wouldn't give her any. But I found out after- 
 ward that she'd hoped always he would leave her 
 everything, and so she was dreadfully upset when he 
 married. She couldn't bear me, and it amused her 
 father to try and pit us against each other. She was 
 rather common, because Mr. Durrand had married 
 when he was quite young, before he was rich, a woman 
 of his own class; but he, being very intelligent and 
 fond of having beautiful things round him, rose above 
 it. Though he was so ugly to look at, he seemed 
 hardly common at all except when he was angry, 
 or in a mood to say coarse things. Mrs. Frenshaw 
 the daughter was like her mother, and being poor 
 had got into a different set of people from her father's.
 
 280 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 She lived in Clapham but she used to come often to 
 Eaton Square, till Mr. Durrand was well, and they had 
 a quarrel about her husband and children, whom he 
 wouldn't have in the house. 
 
 " One day when he was strong enough to go to his 
 business, which I knew vaguely was somewhere in the 
 city, he came home in the evening acting rather 
 strangely. Afterward it turned out that he had been 
 drinking a good deal of port, which he'd been told never 
 to touch. He called me to his room mine was next 
 to it send tried to kiss me, and frightened me again ; 
 but I must have looked at him with a terrible look, for 
 he shrank away as if he thought I would throw some- 
 thing at him again or stab him. He rang for his 
 valet, but when Burton came, he only asked for his 
 medicine. Still, I saw the man suspected something. 
 Mr. Durrand wouldn't let me go, but when he had 
 taken the medicine and sent Burton away, he called 
 me a great many horrible names I had never heard be- 
 fore, and said it was the same as if I had murdered 
 him. Because of the attack my cruelty had brought 
 on the day we were married, his doctor had told him 
 that any excitement might kill him, in a moment. 
 
 " ' You did it on purpose, so you could live on my 
 money, and I could never make love to you again for 
 fear of falling dead,' he yelled at me. And Burton 
 must have been listening at the door, because he 
 knocked and opened it instantly, saying, ' Did you call 
 me, sir? ' 
 
 " I think Mr. Durrand's great pleasure was in pun-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 281 
 
 ishing me, after that, in all the ways he thought I 
 should hate most. He promised to help my mother 
 pay her debts, but he wrote a letter which he showed 
 me, saying she'd given him such a young devil for a 
 wife she couldn't expect any payment. He hadn't 
 bargained for what he'd got. I never had a penny of 
 my own to spend. He made me wear handsome 
 dresses, too rich and old for a girl of eighteen, but the 
 bills came to him. I couldn't even buy a book, and 
 when he found out that I loved books, he locked the 
 library and kept the key. He gave dinners and I had 
 to write the invitations, but to his friends, not to mine. 
 I wasn't allowed to make friends and the few I had, 
 girls I'd known at school, or their brothers, he wouldn't 
 let me see. He wanted me to wear his first wife's 
 jewelry, and when I wouldn't, he boxed my ears and 
 grew so excited, Burton and the medicine had to be sent 
 for. Once, when his daughter, Florence Frenshaw, 
 came crying to me, begging me to get her a hundred 
 pounds somehow, I took off my engagement ring and 
 gave it to her. I hated wearing it, so it was no sacri- 
 fice, but I got into awful trouble. Her father ac- 
 cused me of selling it and Florence never told him. 
 I couldn't. I was afraid of what he might do to her. 
 And I grew a coward for myself, too it was so 
 dreadful always having storms, and being afraid he 
 might fall down in a fit. If ever I had any little pleas- 
 ure, like meeting a friend by accident, or receiving 
 a present my Browning, for instance, which I have 
 to this day I got into the habit of fibbing, rather
 
 282 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 than he should find out. I was like Nora with the 
 macaroons, in 'The Doll's House.' 
 
 " Things went on like that for a year, until one day 
 he came home unexpectedly much earlier than usual, 
 and found an old friend of mine with me in the draw- 
 ing-room I had no boudoir. It was a young man, 
 named Willy Mackinnon a silly boy, more like a 
 nice girl than a man, though once for a few weeks, in 
 a vacation from the convent, when I was fourteen, I 
 was in love with him. I wrote about him in my diary. 
 OBut he had grown up without a chin. He was just 
 better than nobody, because he reminded me of old 
 times. It was his cousin the girl who lived on 
 Lake Como who gave me the Browning; and he 
 hadn't been in London very long that day when he 
 called. I think, though, Burton must have heard me 
 tell Sarah that Willy would call, and have telephoned 
 his master to come and find us together. 
 
 " There was no scene till Willy had gone but 
 he went soon, because Mr. Durrand glared, and was 
 grumpy. But afterward if you'd read the trial, 
 I shouldn't have to tell you all this. Yet per- 
 haps I should want to tell you just as it really hap- 
 pened, not as it sounded in the papers, when Burton 
 gave evidence about Willy coming secretly. And it 
 went against me, that he and I had known each other 
 a long time. Afterward, the scene came, when Willy 
 had got safely out of the house. Then things were 
 almost as bad as at St. Germain, for Mr. Durrand 
 was taken very ill again. Just because Burton had
 
 THE LIFE MASK 283 
 
 gone out on some errand, and wasn't there to help him 
 he seemed to think the man careless and ungrateful, 
 and refused to take medicine from him afterward. It 
 was only a whim but Burton was sullen about it, 
 and afterward I found that he blamed me, thinking I 
 had influenced his master. I suppose that is why Bur- 
 ton bore no grudge against Mr. Durrand. And now, 
 Hugh, you know exactly what my life had been, be- 
 fore the horror that crushed me." 
 
 Hugh had listened, scarcely moving; and as I talked 
 on, calling up those old ghosts of the past, to trail past 
 me in the darkness, he shielded me from them with 
 his arms. 
 
 " That fellow wasn't a man. He was a monster ! " 
 he said, in a hard voice. " If you had killed him, I 
 wouldn't have blamed you. But I know you didn't." 
 
 " Wait. Hear what happened," I went on. " This 
 part that I'm going to tell you now, was in none of the 
 papers. It didn't come out at the trial. Only Sarah 
 and I knew. I pleaded innocence but listen. 
 
 " He Mr. Durrand had a relapse, and was al- 
 most as ill as before. Still, though he said to me more 
 than once that I was the cause, he wanted me to 
 nurse him. Perhaps I've thought sometimes 
 he was afraid if he let me go for long out of his sight, 
 I might run away. He refused to have a professional 
 nurse engaged, and Burton was allowed to do nothing 
 but turn and lift him heavy work that Sarah and I 
 couldn't do. Afterward, Burton gave evidence that 
 his master had said that it was I who refused to have
 
 284 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 a nurse brought into the house. Sometimes Sarah 
 sat up at night, sometimes I did, but I liked the night 
 work better, because then he slept most of the time, and 
 I could read, out of sight from the bed, with a green- 
 shaded light. There was nothing much to do, but give 
 him medicine always the same kind, only stronger 
 than when he was well. Sarah preferred the day 
 work, for he didn't talk to her, and grumble or nag 
 as he did with me. Besides, dear Sarah's one fault 
 is that she's a coward physically not morally. In 
 that way she's the bravest woman I ever knew. It was 
 an old house, and there were lots of mice in it. Some- 
 times they came out at night, more in Mr. Durrand's 
 room, it seemed, for some reason or other, than any 
 in the house ; and Sarah couldn't bear to sit there alone, 
 with him asleep, for fear a mouse might run across 
 her foot. Once, one did or she fancied it, and she 
 gave a little squeak of fear, which waked Mr. Dur- 
 rand out of a good sleep so after that I took all 
 the night work. It was only a week before the 
 night. 
 
 " At first, the doctor had thought there was danger 
 that he might die, but there was less anxiety that week, 
 unless there should be a sudden turn for the worse. 
 And O Hugh, I was sorry when I heard that ! My 
 heart sank. Things had been so dreadful, I didn't 
 see how I was to go on when he got well again. I'm 
 afraid I burst out with wicked words to Sarah, when 
 I was nervous and tired. It was the morning before 
 the dreadful thing happened when Sarah had come
 
 THE LIFE MASK 285 
 
 to relieve me, and for a few minutes we had both 
 left the sick-room in charge of Burton. I cried on 
 her shoulder and said things I hardly knew what 
 
 and she soothed me. Burton must have listened at 
 the keyhole. At the trial he told in his evidence what 
 I had said, and more, that I didn't say. It couldn't 
 have been very bad, really, or Mr. Durrand wouldn't 
 have wanted me to come and sit by him again as usual, 
 while he slept that night. 
 
 " I was good about keeping awake, generally. I 
 would have a sleep the last thing; then Sarah would 
 wake me, and give me a cup of strong coffee to 
 keep me up through the six hours of watching. But 
 that night, in spite of the coffee, I felt drowsy, al- 
 most from the first; I couldn't think why, for I'd 
 done nothing to tire myself, and I was enthralled with 
 ' The Ring and the Book.' I was reading it for the 
 first time, and I'd just got to the most wonderful part. 
 A strange coincidence, that I should have been read- 
 ing it just then. Mrs. Frenshaw found the volume 
 lying open the next day at the place where I'd stopped 
 reading. I'm sure she knew nothing about Brown- 
 ing, but she must have glanced at things on the page 
 
 and told her lawyer what she'd seen; for in her 
 evidence she contrived to bring it up, in a clever, 
 damaging way she would never have thought of her- 
 self. It's the same Browning you've seen me read- 
 ing. I found it in a trunk Sarah kept, and I wouldn't 
 let myself be treacherous enough to hate the book 
 for what wasn't its fault.
 
 286 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " I told you how much Mr. Durrand liked old things. 
 All the furniture in the house was antique ; and his bed 
 was a four-poster, with heavy curtains. They were 
 looped at the sides, to give air, but hung down at the 
 head and foot. I sat when I watched by him at night, 
 at the foot of the bed, where the thick gray silk cur- 
 tains made a screen between him and the green-shaded 
 electric lamp on my little table. His medicine and a 
 water carafe, and glasses and all sorts of things for 
 an invalid, were on that table, too; and on a smaller 
 table by the bedside, where he could reach it himself, 
 nothing but a glass of water, and one of those tiny, 
 fragile bottles to crush in a handkerchief if the heart 
 is suddenly oppressed. The stuff in it is called amyl, 
 and it smells rather nice. Sarah has it, too. Isn't 
 it strange, though she's so different so thin and as- 
 cetic, and he was so fat and self-indulgent she has 
 some of the same symptoms that Mr. Durrand had? 
 I could never dare say that to her, for she detested 
 him, and it almost broke her heart that I should be 
 married to such a man. He was old and she wanted 
 me to have a splendid, beautiful, young husband 
 like you. I believe she went on her knees to mother 
 the day I told her about Mr. Durrand ; and she was so 
 superstitious, poor darling, that she thought 'chang- 
 ing the name but not the letter ' in marriage brought 
 dreadful misfortune. 
 
 "When I grew too sleepy to read, that night, I 
 laid the book open on the table and tried to wake 
 myself up by going softly to look, and make sure
 
 THE LIFE MASK 287 
 
 whether everything was right with Mr. Durrand. 
 There was a dim, greenish gray light in the room, 
 partly from my lamp, and partly from a night lamp 
 that he was fond of, even when he was well, for he 
 hated sleeping in the dark, on account of burglars. It 
 had a thick, domelike shade, of some kind of glass, 
 like opal, and it made a gray twilight that he thought 
 soothing. The entire room was gray, except for the 
 old mahogany furniture: gray wall-paper, gray cur- 
 tains, gray carpet; and I had on a gray satin dress- 
 ing-gown, edged with gray chinchilla. In a minute 
 you'll see why I tell you all this, and how such a small 
 detail has had an influence on my whole life. 
 
 " I had no kind, soft feeling of pity in my heart for 
 Mr. Durrand as I stood by the bedside and stared at 
 him in the gray light. He was asleep, with his mouth 
 open, and I said to myself how disgusting he looked. 
 I'd never thought of him as being my husband; I'd 
 never used the word in speaking to him or of him. I 
 couldn't have done it! Although he'd been so ill, he 
 was fatter than ever, and with his muscles relaxed his 
 face looked all loose and baggy under his yellow skin, 
 that was gray in the gray light. His big body made 
 a great lump under the cover, and those words of 
 Shakespeare's jumped into my head. * How like a 
 swine he lies! ' I felt rather ashamed of myself then, 
 because it was as if I said something horrid behind 
 his back and I never had done that, except to Sarah 
 so I went to my chair again and sat down. He 
 seemed so fast asleep, it would surely be a long time
 
 288 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 before he waked up and the doctor's orders were 
 not to disturb him for his medicine: good rest was 
 more important at night. I thought I might safely 
 close my eyes for a few minutes, and doze off, as I 
 was so drowsy. Then I should feel brighter after- 
 ward. I felt certain of waking if he called, or even 
 moved, because I'd got in the habit of sleeping lightly, 
 as older people do. 
 
 " I began to dream about c The Ring and the Book.' 
 I seemed to be one of the characters, I couldn't tell 
 which, and that worried me so dreadfully, that I had 
 the sensation of waking up. There I was, in the gray 
 room, sitting with my head bent forward uncomfort- 
 ably against the high back of the gray brocaded chair. 
 The light was grayer than before, as if there were a 
 faint mist before my eyes. I was not certain whether 
 I was really awake, or whether I was dreaming that 
 my eyes were open. I wanted to lift my hand and 
 look at it. Then I could be sure; but just as I was 
 trying to move, and couldn't, I saw a figure at the far 
 end of the room. Its back was toward me. It was 
 reaching up, doing something I couldn't make out. 
 Then it turned, without the slightest sound, and I 
 knew that it was myself. 
 
 " I stood, in my gray dressing-gown, with my hair 
 hanging over my shoulders in two long braids. I 
 was pouring something dark out of a queer shaped 
 bottle which I seemed to have seen somewhere before, 
 and to know all about in a secret part of my brain, far 
 under the surface of things. I was pouring the stuff
 
 THE LIFE MASK 289 
 
 into a glass. I wanted to look at the table by the chair, 
 and see if it was Mr. Durrand's medicine glass, but I 
 couldn't move my eyes from the gray figure that was 
 mine, yet not mine. It was just as if I were frozen 
 or bound with ropes to the chair. I had a feeling that 
 the other one had done something to keep me still, 
 so I shouldn't interfere ; yet through it all a far away, 
 very small voice was saying, ' This is a nightmare. 
 Wake up wake up ! ' 
 
 " But I couldn't wake up, I could only watch the 
 figure in the gray dressing-gown, flitting softly about 
 like a big gray moth in the gray light. It came and 
 looked at me in the chair, from a little distance; then 
 when it was satisfied that there was no danger of my 
 calling out, it moved to the bed. 
 
 " From where I sat, I couldn't really have seen what 
 it did next, if there had been such a figure, but in the 
 dream I could see. It bent over the bed, and gently 
 shook Mr. Durrand's shoulder, which showed above the 
 cover. He waked up with a slight start, and I saw his 
 eyes roll down in the white. He looked at the figure, 
 as if he were dazed with sleep still. ' Take your 
 medicine,' it whispered. It lifted up his head a little 
 on its hand, as I always did, and made him drink all 
 there was in the glass. Then it laid him carefully 
 back on the pillow, and flittered away, gray in the 
 gray light, till it came to the bathroom door, which 
 stood ajar. There, it simply vanished; and in the 
 dream this was the most terrible part, for I knew that 
 it had killed Mr. Durrand and now it would hide itself
 
 2go THE LIFE MASK 
 
 by getting back into my body again. The horror of 
 waiting for it to come was so intense that it helped 
 me to struggle. It was as if I broke something like a 
 glass case that held me fast. I could hear it jingle 
 in breaking, and I tore myself awake. 
 
 " Even then, when my eyes really were wide open, 
 and my heart beating almost like the quick-firing of a 
 machine gun, I hadn't the strength to move. I sat, 
 feeling sick and faint, with my hands on the arms 
 of the chair. But I was so thankful to be out of the 
 dream, that nothing else mattered. After a long time 
 I don't know how long I dragged myself up, and 
 went to look at Mr. Durrand. He lay asleep, as I 
 had seen him before when I first put down my book: 
 in the same position, with his mouth a little open. 
 
 " After that, the night wore on till six o'clock, and 
 I wasn't surprised that he didn't wake to take his 
 medicine, because the night before and all day he'd 
 been restless. I thought it was the reaction. At half- 
 past six, I suppose, Burton came to the door, as usual, 
 to see if he were wanted; but I didn't hear him, for 
 I'd gone to sleep sound asleep, or I should have 
 heard him come. The first thing I knew, he'd touched 
 me on the shoulder. I jumped up, astonished. 
 
 " ' I can't rouse Mr. Durrand,' he said, in a queer, 
 scared voice. 
 
 " ' Why do you want to rouse him ? ' I asked. ' He's 
 not to be roused when he's asleep.' 
 
 " ' He looks awful, that's why, and he's icy cold. I 
 believe he's dead,' Burton answered.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 291 
 
 " I rushed to the bed, and it was true. Even in the 
 gray light but it was brighter then, because it was 
 April and a glimmer came through the curtains I 
 saw he had changed. Burton pushed back the cur- 
 tains quickly and the poor, dreadful face I'd thought 
 so hideous but I needn't tell you all that. I hardly 
 remember what happened next. I can only remember 
 feeling faint, and calling Sarah. Some one telephoned 
 for the doctor, and he came soon. He lived not far 
 away. He said Mr. Durrand must have been dead 
 at least three hours; and he was very kind, when I 
 reproached myself for sleeping. One could tell that 
 Mr. Durrand had passed quietly away without waking 
 up or struggling for breath, he lay so peacefully. And 
 the doctor reminded me that there'd always been a 
 chance of heart failure. There would have been no 
 suspicion of anything else, and perhaps I should have 
 forgotten my dream (I did forget it at first in the 
 fright and confusion) if it hadn't been for Florence 
 Frenshaw and Burton. They got together and talked 
 it over, I suppose. Perhaps Burton told her what 
 was in his mind. Anyhow, she insisted on a post 
 mortem examination indeed, she almost accused me 
 in so many words, of poisoning her father because I'd 
 hated him from the first. And she told what Burton 
 had overheard me say to Sarah, that I didn't know 
 how to bear my life, because he was getting better and 
 everything would go on as before. There was idiotic 
 talk about Willy Mackinnon, who'd gone to America 
 and all Mr. Durrand's money being left to me.
 
 292 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Burton thought I'd 'meant to do it from the first,' 
 and that I had influenced his master not to have any 
 one but me sit in the room at night. I can't tell you 
 What I went through in that house, the day of the 
 post mortem examination when they found mor- 
 phia in the body enough to have caused death." 
 
 " Why didn't some one accuse the beast Burton of 
 poisoning him ? " Hugh broke out indignantly, as if 
 he could no longer keep silent. " He came into the 
 room while you were asleep. If he could do that at 
 half-past six without waking you, he could have done 
 it in the night. And there was motive a grudge 
 against his master for ingratitude, and jealousy of you." 
 
 " No, there was no motive, dear," I said. " Burton 
 had very large wages, and his master often gave him 
 presents. There was nothing left him in the will. 
 He knew there would be nothing for him or for any 
 of the servants. It was a whim of Mr. Durrand's to 
 make his servants look after him well : paying splendid 
 wages, but warning them to expect not a penny after 
 his death. I was the only one who wanted him to die. 
 But if it hadn't been for the gray dream I could have 
 borne everything, and fought for my life, with a brave 
 heart. It was the dream that made it most horrible 
 the secret thought that while I was pleading my in- 
 nocence and being defended, maybe I I had in 
 my sleep done the thing I saw the gray figure do. 
 Even the years in prison would not have been such tor- 
 ture without the dream. I was always having it 
 again. I was afraid to go to sleep. Just as some
 
 THE LIFE MASK 293 
 
 people feel they are falling over a precipice, so I felt 
 about the dream. It was that which nearly killed me 
 < being haunted by it, as if it were sent as a punish- 
 ment for guilt. It wasn't being in prison. I could 
 have borne the hardships and the shame, if I'd known 
 for certain the gray dream wasn't true ! "
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 THEN HugH, instead of loosing his arms 
 when at last he had heard the worst of all, 
 gathered me more closely, and I was so tired, 
 so broken in the telling of the story, that I had no 
 strength to try and put him away, as I had half prom- 
 ised Lady Mendel. To rest for a few minutes on his 
 heart was the one taste of heaven I could know. 
 
 " It wasn't true, darling, it wasn't true," he mur- 
 mured, as if I were a child to be comforted after some 
 great terror. " You couldn't have done it. Not that 
 there would have been anything to repent if you had 
 in your sleep. But you didn't." 
 
 " Sarah always said that," I sighed wearily. " I 
 couldn't keep the secret all alone. I had to tell her. 
 I used to tell her everything. She was the only friend 
 I ever had." 
 
 " Now you have me, forever and ever." 
 " I love you too much to keep you, Hugh." 
 " Too much to keep me ? Why, to let you go would 
 be the end of me. I love you so, that if you went out 
 of my life now, heart and soul, I should be like a 
 stopped clock, run down at our last moment together." 
 I clung to him, and he held me as if he would never 
 let me go. But I knew that I should make him let 
 me go by and by. I knew how I should have to do it. 
 
 294
 
 THE LIFE MASK 295 
 
 " Now you can see what Sarah is to me," I said. 
 " The circumstantial evidence was tremendous. You 
 would hardly believe the way it piled up and up. 
 There I had been, alone with the sick man for six 
 hours of the night, and when they found out what had 
 happened, he'd been dead only three hours. And there 
 was a solution of morphia in a medicine cupboard on 
 his wall the place where I saw myself standing when 
 the dream began. The bottle had been there a long 
 time. I knew about it only because I heard Doctor 
 Severn ask Mr. Durrand once, in a sharp way, if he'd 
 kept his promise about giving up his doses of morphia. 
 He answered that he had that the doctor had given 
 him such a fright about the stuff, he'd not dared to 
 touch it since. Then Doctor Severn turned to me, ex- 
 plaining that Mr. Durrand had once been given very 
 small doses of morphia for severe pain which pre- 
 vented him from sleeping, but that the tiniest dose 
 would be dangerous in his present condition. He ad- 
 vised me to remember this, in case Mr. Durrand ever 
 asked me for the medicine. If he did, I was to re- 
 fuse. He inquired, too, what had become of the old 
 bottle, and Mr. Durrand said it was in the medicine 
 cupboard still, behind all the other bottles, but the 
 doctor needn't fear that after such a warning he would 
 be tempted, because he didn't want to die." 
 
 " All the same, probably he broke his word, and did 
 get up and take some, while you were asleep," said 
 Fugh. 
 
 " He couldn't. He was too weak to move without
 
 296 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 help. And, besides, the tumbler by his bedside was evi- 
 dently washed after the morphia or else it was 
 given him in another glass which was never found. So 
 far as came out in the trial, nobody but myself and the 
 doctor and Mr. Durrand knew about the bottle 
 being in the medicine cupboard not even Burton, 
 who was forbidden to touch anything there hair- 
 dyes and things Mr. Durrand used. And they knew 
 it was that bottle, for after the post mortem, when 
 the doctor told at the inquest about the solution of 
 morphia and our conversation, they found that some 
 of the stuff had quite lately been poured out. Every- 
 thing was against me. I saw it as the days of the trial 
 went on. I felt that people thought me a monster 
 so young, yet so cruel and evil : marrying an old man 
 for his money, and nearly killing him by throwing a 
 wine-glass at his head on the wedding-day: having a 
 man come to see me, against my husband's will, when 
 I thought he was absent poor, girlish Willy Mackin- 
 non! That part made the jury hate me. It was an 
 awful picture the prosecuting attorney conjured up 
 in his speech : Mr. Durrand coming home to find 
 a man he'd forbidden his wife to have in the house 
 and falling in one of the fits caused by her violence, 
 yet loving her enough, in spite of all, to want her near 
 his bedside. It was said afterward that the jury were 
 not unfavorable really, but the judge summed up 
 against me, so they were almost obliged to find me 
 guilty. But it seemed, when I listened to the awful 
 speech of the prosecuting attorney, that my death was
 
 THE LIFE MASK 297 
 
 already decided. I wasn't surprised at all when I 
 heard the verdict or the sentence. I only wished 
 I might somehow die before it was carried out for 
 my mother's sake. I knew what the disgrace and 
 horror would mean to her, though she didn't care for 
 me perhaps she didn't even believe in me. All her 
 friends were cold to her because she'd become notori- 
 ous the mother of " 
 
 " Don't ! I won't hear the word ! " Hugh cut me 
 short. 
 
 " I'll not speak it, dear. But they would have 
 hanged me, I'm sure, if Sarah hadn't been so wonder- 
 ful. She moved heaven and earth to get me reprieved. 
 She let herself be interviewed in the papers, timid and 
 retiring as she is, and by the things she said, started a 
 revulsion of feeling in my favor. She worked night 
 and day, and got a petition signed by a huge number 
 of people, thousands of important names, all over the 
 country and there was another petition started in 
 America too. Perhaps my being very young helped a 
 little I was only nineteen ; but it was mostly through 
 Sarah, I know, that my life was saved. Do you wonder 
 I'm grateful? Not that I wanted to live for living's 
 sake. But to die like that it would have been too 
 horrible ! Sarah was always sure from the first that I 
 would be saved. She said ' I promise you,' as if her 
 love made her certain of performing a miracle. And 
 afterward, when the sentence of death had been 
 changed to imprisonment for life, she gave up her 
 whole time and spent most of a legacy from a relative,
 
 298 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 working to get me out of prison. There was no other 
 money but hers, for a long time, for my mother was 
 alive till three years ago, and needed all she had for 
 herself. Mr. Durrand hadn't altered his will, but as 
 I was suspected of taking his life, it was null and the 
 money all went to his daughter. Even if that had 
 been different, I wouldn't have touched a penny of 
 his! I heard Mrs. Frenshaw was sorry I wasn't 
 hanged, for she really believed I did kill her father; 
 and I suppose she was disgusted when the new Home 
 Secretary decided to let me out, as a dying woman, at 
 the end of ten years." 
 
 "O Nita, if you had died and I'd never seen 
 you ! " Hugh whispered, as he kissed my hair. 
 
 " For you, it would have been better," I said. " But 
 for me I shall be able to bear the rest of my life, 
 whatever it may be in future, because of this precious 
 memory. And do you know, since the first day I 
 saw you that day when you were the * man in 
 the mirror ' I've never once dreamed the gray 
 dream all the way through to the end? So you 
 see, besides teaching me what love is like, you have 
 broken the curse which made my life a constant 
 terror." 
 
 " Thank you for telling me that," he said. " Nita, 
 you must marry me as soon as it can be done, be- 
 cause I can't leave you alone after this. I want to be 
 with you night and day, always, close to you and 
 make you forget." 
 
 " You want to be with me in spite of the dream
 
 THE LIFE MASK 299 
 
 which may be true? That seems to me wonder- 
 ful!" 
 
 " It isn't true. And if it were, I should want you 
 just the same. Or if you'd been awake and yes, 
 I'd want you even then. Wouldn't you me, if it were 
 the other way round ? " 
 
 " Yes," I said; " but that's different" 
 
 " I told you before, that nothing you could have 
 done, or could do, would change my love, except to 
 make it stronger. You believe me now ? " 
 
 " Yes, I believe you now," I echoed. " You've 
 proved it as I should think no man ever proved his love 
 for a woman." 
 
 " Lots have though not to such a woman. Nita, 
 when will you marry me ? " 
 
 My lips opened for the word " Never ! " but I closed 
 them again. There was no change in my decision. 
 His loving me so wonderfully through all, was not a 
 reason why I should love him little enough to spoil his 
 career. He believed in me, but others would not. I 
 was not even sure whether I believed in myself. The 
 woman he married must be one he could be proud of, 
 his love for her a pedestal, and not a screen. But I 
 knew that holding me in his arms he would not let me 
 go, and that all my arguments he would beat down. I 
 was too weary to fight. All I could do was to play 
 the coward with him as a reward for his courage; to 
 temporize, to persuade him to leave me, and then to 
 send a letter of good-by. It was turning out differ- 
 ently from what Lady Mendel had planned. It was
 
 300 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 not going to be easy to make Hugh leave Granada, 
 even when the gate of the garden was shut; but I 
 thought I saw the way: a hard and dreary way, yet I 
 would take it. And some day, if he ever saw clearly 
 enough to understand and forgive, he might thank me. 
 
 " Why don't you answer ? " he asked. 
 
 " I can't answer to-night," I said. " I'm broken, 
 Hugh - in spite of your goodness. I'm broken to 
 pieces. I must rest. Will you go, dearest, now that 
 I've done what I had to do, and told you the story? 
 Will you go, and let me sleep? " 
 
 He rose from his knees to his feet with one swift 
 movement, carrying me with him, so that we stood to- 
 gether, I still in his arms. It made me feel how 
 strong he was, how capable of taking care of me 
 and how masterful he would be if I were his. I was 
 glad I should have this feeling to remember among 
 other sweet things. All things associated with him 
 were sweet, though by and by they would be bitter 
 sweet. 
 
 "Yes, I'll take you to the house," he said. "I 
 oughtn't to have let you talk on, when you were so 
 tired after all I've made you go through to-day. 
 But I thought it would be best not to stop you best 
 to get it over and done with, forever. Now I'm go- 
 ing to carry you. No use resisting." 
 
 He picked me up as if I were a baby, with an arm 
 round my waist and the other slipped under my knees. 
 He put his face down against mine, and kept it so, as 
 he walked slowly along the path to the house.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 301 
 
 " I shall carry you like this on our wedding night," 
 he said. 
 
 Then he kissed me, and set me down on my feet, 
 before the open front door. 
 
 " Shall you sleep? " he asked. 
 
 "I don't know. Shall you?" 
 
 " No, I shan't try. I want to lie awake thinking of 
 you. Tell me one thing before I leave you to rest. 
 Had my sister anything to do with this ? " 
 
 " What do you mean ? " I asked, startled, hardly 
 knowing what to answer. 
 
 " Was she fooling me when she pretended to sym- 
 pathize and wanted to meet you and all that? 
 Did she know somehow who you were? Don't try 
 and spare her to me. I'll have it out of her to-night 
 anyhow, if you won't tell me now." 
 
 " If I must yes. She recognized me from photo- 
 graphs that were in the papers last December when 
 I was let out of prison. The old interest was revived 
 a little, I suppose. Every one thought I was dying. 
 So did I. The photographs were the ones taken ten 
 years ago, but Lady Mendel knew me from them." 
 
 " Oh, so that was it ! I might have guessed it was a 
 pretense. Did she make you promise to tell me all 
 this that you have told ? " 
 
 " Not exactly that. She made me see it was best. 
 I didn't see at first, or I would have told you before. 
 But she was right. You mustn't blame her, Hugh. It 
 was for your sake." 
 
 " I suppose she threatened to tell me, if you didn't? "
 
 302 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " It wasn't a threat. She didn't frighten me into 
 this, Hugh. I made up my mind that I'd rather speak 
 than let her do it, because without being too kind to 
 myself I might show you the best as well as the worst. 
 And, besides, there was the dream. I had to tell you 
 about that. Don't be angry with Lady Mendel. Don't 
 reproach her." 
 
 " You needn't worry about us, darling. It will be 
 all right. Sleep if you can and dream only good 
 dreams. Dream that we're happy." 
 
 " But they say dreams go by contraries ! " 
 
 " This won't. It can't. When will you let me come 
 back ? You mustn't keep me waiting too many hours, 
 or I shall be gray-haired because the hours will seem 
 years." 
 
 "And to me, dearest. I'll I'll write a note 
 and let you know how I feel and everything. 
 Sarah will take it." 
 
 " Early to-morrow morning 1 as soon as you wake 
 up?" 
 
 " Yes. Early to-morrow morning. As soon as I 
 wake up."
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 SARAH had left a lamp for me in the drawing- 
 room, turned low, but many white moths and 
 gauze-winged night insects had flown through 
 the open window to beat themselves against the lumi- 
 nous porcelain shade, and fall, spinning madly in a 
 death dance on the table. Mechanically I glanced at a 
 little traveling clock among the flowers on the mantel- 
 piece. It said only ten minutes past midnight. I had 
 lived through all those years in three hours! 
 
 I hoped that Sarah had gone to bed and dropped 
 asleep by this time, because, though I meant to tell her 
 that Hugh knew my tragedy, I wanted to write my 
 letter to him without oeing disturbed. I was deadly 
 tired, so tired that I could not yet feel the full anguish 
 of loss; and I realized that it would be easier to write 
 the kind of letter I must write, before my second cal- 
 vary began. I thought that I could write almost 
 calmly now, without letting my longing for him show 
 between the lines. And that would be better for him 
 as well as for me, because if he understood all it cost 
 me to send him out of my life he would not go. He 
 would wait, believing that the gate might open. 
 
 I carried the lamp to the queer, old-fashioned Span- 
 ish writing table in a corner of the room, and the moths 
 
 303
 
 304 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 that were left alive blundered after me. When I had 
 turned up the wick, they began dashing their thick 
 bodies on the shade again, until I felt that each blunt, 
 horned head struck against a nerve. My thoughts, 
 wandering and distracted, though I had hoped at first 
 to concentrate them quickly, were to me like these 
 wretched insects of the night, wounding themselves to 
 death for no purpose, dying because of the light by 
 which they might have lived; or, rather, the fluttering 
 creatures seemed like my thoughts, dreadfully " come 
 alive," to show me how futile they were. 
 
 I began letter after letter. Knowing exactly what I 
 wanted to say, it was extraordinary how impossible it 
 was to make it take the right form on paper. 
 
 " I wonder if God ever finds it hard to choose the 
 right body for a soul he has made," I caught myself 
 vaguely thinking. 
 
 The letter I headed " Darling Hugh " turned into a 
 cry of love. That was the last thing I must send him! 
 Another was as laconic as though written at a stran- 
 ger's dictation. A third was so rambling and stupid 
 that he would not know what I meant to do or wished 
 him to do. A hundred little hammers were knocking 
 in my brain when I had torn up six sheets of paper, and 
 was beginning again for the seventh time. 
 
 " Seventh, successful," I repeated dully to myself, 
 in a silly, childish way. 
 
 " This is good-by, dear Love," I wrote, " and be- 
 cause you love me I ask you to take me at my word. 
 You see, it's for my own sake as well as yours that I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 305 
 
 ask it. The more I love you the more miserable I 
 should be if I were v/icked and mad enough to marry 
 you. It was only because I was quite, quite mad to- 
 day in the Generalife gardens that 1 offered to go away 
 with you. I'm not ashamed of that conventionally, 
 but I am ashamed that it entered my mind as a possible 
 solution. Now that I have made myself sane again 
 by telling you my story, I see it would never have done 
 not because it wouldn't have been fair to me, as you 
 thought, but because it would have been almost as bad 
 for you as my being your wife. I couldn't have been 
 hidden. I should have been a plague spot. ' That 
 horrible woman that murderess, who ought to have 
 been hanged who was smuggled out of prison by a 
 trick, pretending she was at death's door a hypo- 
 crite to the last ! And now she's got her claws on that 
 splendid young fellow who might have reached any 
 height.' I can hear the words your friends your 
 truest friends would say. And if you dream I 
 could be happy with you, it's because you don't know 
 women. Our life together would be a living death for 
 me. I couldn't stand it long. I should kill myself to 
 escape, and to save you from repenting your sacrifice. 
 Even if you didn't repent, I should believe you did, 
 and so it would be the same thing for me. And I 
 should know that sooner or later, your love would be 
 drowned in regret for what you had given up all 
 a brave man's best ambitions. I shouldn't love and 
 respect you as I do, if the best woman in the world 
 could make up to you for such a loss; and I am, oh,
 
 306 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 so drearily far from being the best woman in the 
 world ! 
 
 " I was at peace before you came, in my garden. 
 Go, beloved, for my sake, and let me try to find peace 
 again. Some day you will be glad, my soldier, that I 
 ordered you to take up your sword which you would 
 have had to lay down for me so unworthy. And I 
 shall be glad in thinking of you, in reading of 
 noble things you have done for your country. I 
 shall feel I sent you to do them, as my knight; and 
 so you will still be mine, in the best way our only 
 way. 
 
 " Perhaps, when you have read so far, you may still 
 be saying to yourself that you will stay. But if you do 
 stay, I tell you that you will be signing my death war- 
 rant. I will not live to hamper your life and to suffer 
 remorse. / will end everything. You can keep me 
 from doing this only by leaving Granada at once with- 
 out trying to see me again, or to write asking me to 
 change my mind. This is what I meant when I said 
 good-by to you a little while ago. It is not a new 
 decision, since you left me alone. If you go we shall 
 both find peace, I in my garden, you wherever your 
 soldier's life may take you. 
 
 " In certain convents there is always a light on the 
 altar and a nun praying. My heart will be such a con- 
 vent, with the light of love unquenchable, and a never- 
 ending prayer for your happiness. Good-by, with all 
 the word means of blessing. NITA." 
 
 I addressed the envelope, and folded the letter
 
 THE LIFE MASK 307 
 
 quickly, feeling that it was safer not to read it through. 
 But as I was ready to seal it up, an irresistible long- 
 ing came over me to see again the words which Hugh's 
 eyes would see to-morrow. It must be some such 
 longing as a lover has to look just once more on the 
 body of his dead love, before the coffin lid is screwed 
 down. But I should have been wise if I had obeyed 
 my instinct. Reading the letter I had written brought 
 suddenly and terribly home to me the future I decreed 
 for myself. 
 
 Hugh gone Hugh forgetting me Hugh marry- 
 ing and being happy ! The best in me wanted all this 
 to happen; but the other me I had never been able to 
 get away from, was near and close, the better part re- 
 mote and coldly white as the praying nun in the con- 
 vent I pictured for Hugh. " Tear up the letter ! Let 
 him stay just for a little while longer, to be your 
 friend as he has been these eight days," the human love 
 I had condemned cried out to me on its knees. " He 
 would rather have that than nothing. Just a little 
 while, till you both get used to the thought of parting. 
 Think what your garden will be without him ! " 
 
 What platitudes I had been writing about peace 
 coming back to me in the garden! It would be no 
 longer a garden, but a burnt up wilderness, where the 
 flowers were little charred corpses. Hugh had come 
 and brought love instead of peace, and I would not 
 have that pale ghost again, at the cost of not knowing 
 that for which a woman is made. But there would be 
 no peace for me any more.
 
 308 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I sealed the letter, weeping, but I let no tears fall 
 on it, or on the envelope. Then, when it was ready, 
 and there was no more to do, my soul sickened and my 
 heart turned to water. I had no strength left, nor 
 courage, nor wish to go upstairs and try to rest. Cry- 
 ing and whimpering desolately, like a lost child, I let 
 myself fall on a poor imitation Moorish divan near the 
 desk where I had written the letter. For a time I lay 
 there; then I slid off from the low bank of cushions 
 which smothered me in the hot stillness of the night, 
 and lay along the floor, on the cool tiles. I cried softly, 
 with some vague wish, instinctive rather than active, 
 not to wake Sarah. I wished that I might die without 
 the sin and weakness of taking my own life, or else that 
 years might pass on like this, in a dim dream of falling 
 tears and a cool, hard resting-place where all was very 
 quiet. 
 
 I thought that I wished to be alone ; but when, after 
 what might have been a very long time or a very short 
 time, I heard Sarah's footsteps coming downstairs I 
 was suddenly glad in a strange, childlike way. Noth- 
 ing she could say would comfort me, but it would be a 
 comfort to feel her love, as I had felt it in prison on 
 the days when her visits were allowed. It seemed 
 selfish to let her find me lying on the floor, abandoned 
 to misery, but when I heard her, there was not time to 
 scramble up and make a pretense, to save her feelings. 
 At the doorway she saw me, and ran across the room 
 like a young woman. 
 
 " My lamb! " she crooned, and folding herself down
 
 THE LIFE MASK 309 
 
 beside me gathered me into her arms. " Tell Sarah 
 what's the matter ! " 
 
 I nestled my face against her thin breast, in stiff old- 
 fashioned corsets, for she was not even undressed. 
 
 " I hoped you were asleep," I sighed, as she smoothed 
 my hair with a trembling hand. 
 
 " No, indeed, I was just waitin' up there," she 
 said. " But it's 'most three o'clock. I left you to 
 yourself after I heard you come in, as long as I could, 
 till I got scared. Oh, I hope you don't mind your 
 Sarah knowin' you're in trouble ? Maybe she can help 
 a little?" 
 
 " Nobody can help, dear," I answered, " but I don't 
 mind your knowing. I was going to tell you to-mor- 
 row. I thought I'd let you sleep to-night." 
 
 " Did you truly think I could sleep when my only one 
 was breakin' her heart? I've just bin on pins an' 
 needles every livin' minute since that woman came to 
 call!" 
 
 " Did you hear our talk? " I asked. We stayed as 
 we were, on the floor. We had no thought of moving. 
 
 " Only a few words at first, but I didn't try to listen, 
 honest and true. I was sittin' by the window be- 
 cause it was cool; an' afterward you both talked too 
 low for me to hear. It was the tones of the voice, 
 told me things were goin' wrong. I seemed just to 
 know in my bones, what 'twas." 
 
 " Well, you were right," I said. " Sarah, I've told 
 Hugh the whole story the dream and every- 
 thing."
 
 310 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 "Lord o' Mercy, Miss Nita, have you done that?" 
 she gasped. " He the Captin what did he say ? 
 He didn't fail you?" 
 
 " No, Sarah," I answered, with a thrill of joy and 
 pride in my lover, " he didn't fail me. He was a saint 
 an angel no, better still, a man." 
 
 " Heaven be praised, my lamb ! Then why why 
 are you cryin', just when God's goin' to let you be 
 happy ? " 
 
 " I'm crying because I'm a coward," I said, " and 
 because I hate giving him up. But I shall give him up, 
 of course. I'd be a wretch a devil to take advantage 
 of his love. I couldn't argue it all out with him to- 
 night. I was too tired. But I've written a letter, to 
 tell him he must go away at once that I'll not see 
 him again." 
 
 " I'm plumb sure he won't go," said Sarah. " He 
 ain't that kind of a man." 
 
 " I've told him in the letter that unless he gives me 
 up and leaves Granada, I'll end everything." 
 
 " Oh, my precious, not not kill yourself ? " 
 
 " I'd have to do it if he stayed, rather than his whole 
 future should be wasted and ruined," I explained to 
 her. " But by saying that, I've made it impossible for 
 him to stay. It was the one way I could think of, 
 for he'd know that I would keep my word if he drove 
 me to it." 
 
 I felt Sarah's bosom rise convulsively under my head, 
 as she held me clasped. 
 
 " I thought we'd suffered all we had to suffer,"
 
 THE LIFE MASK 311 
 
 she said in a piteous, breaking voice, " but now to 
 have this come! It seems 'most worse than what 
 went before. It don't seem right. You'll be breakin' 
 his heart as much as your own. Don't make up your 
 mind so quick, on the spur o' the minute like this. 
 'Most always, second thoughts are best. If he wants 
 you as bad as he thinks he does, won't you be makin' 
 a big mistake sendin' him out into the world alone? 
 Give him the chance to sacrifice something for you. 
 He asks nothin' better. He's a real man. Why not 
 marry him an' go 'way off somewheres, you an' he 
 together not even me, 'cause he don't like me, an' 
 it wouldn't be fair somewheres nobody'd know 
 who you'd bin. Then it couldn't do the Captin any 
 harm." 
 
 " There's no such ' somewhere,' " I said. " Even if 
 there were, at the other end of all things, it would be 
 no place for him to waste his life. We came here 
 to Granada, and shut ourselves up in a walled garden, 
 to escape eyes. And I just missed meeting the Moffats 
 whom I used to know. Then conies Lady Mendel, 
 who recognizes me from the old photographs in the 
 newspapers. And even Lady Kathleen Arnott thought 
 when she saw me at the Generalife, my ' face looked 
 familiar/ No, there's no escape for a woman like 
 me." 
 
 "Don't say that, as if you was a bad woman!" 
 Sarah cried. " You're just like a white fawn, with an 
 arrow shot into its side by a wicked hunter." 
 
 " The world his world, thinks I'm a bad woman,"
 
 312 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 I reminded her. " There's no getting away from that. 
 If they could say no more than ' Hugh Shannon has 
 married a woman who was tried for murder, but 
 proved innocent and acquitted,' it would be a different 
 thing oh, my God, what a different thing ! " 
 
 " Then, you'd marry him ? " Sarah murmured. 
 
 " I'd marry him to-morrow. There'd be no reason 
 why not, since only suffering and not crime or sup- 
 posed crime would have made me notorious. But 
 what's the good of talking like this ? ' Might have 
 beens ' only make me more sad in thinking of them. 
 Don't let's talk any more, dear. Will you go to the 
 hotel with the letter early to-morrow morning? I 
 won't trust Pepe or Marta." 
 
 " 'Deed, yes, honey, I'll go to the hotel," she agreed. 
 " I reckon you're right about the talk. You're fagged 
 out. Will you let me help you upstairs to bed ? " 
 
 "I don't need any help," I said. "I'm all right 
 now only so tired. It's made me better, telling you. 
 But we've had enough, haven't we ? " 
 
 " Yes, we've had enough," she repeated. 
 
 Slowly I dragged myself upstairs, and Sarah fol- 
 lowed, having closed the drawing-room windows and 
 locked the front door which I had forgotten to fasten. 
 In thinking of this, I remembered suddenly that Hugh 
 still had the key to the gate. I mentioned it to Sarah, 
 as she helped me to undress. 
 
 " Ask him for it if you can see him at his hotel in 
 the morning," I began, then changed my mind as I 
 spoke. " No, better not see him. I'd rather you
 
 THE LIFE MASK 313 
 
 wouldn't. You might break down. It would be too 
 dreadful to have a scene at the hotel! Besides, he 
 would ask you questions about me. It would be har- 
 rowing for him too. I won't open my letter again. 
 But leave a line at the hotel, and say you'll send Pepe 
 for the key Hugh needn't write. I don't want him 
 to write to either of us." 
 
 " I'll do everything for the best, as well as I can," 
 Sarah soothed me. " Now let me put you to bed, and 
 you try to sleep. Maybe you can, you're so tired out. 
 And don't feel you must wake up in the morning, to 
 remind me of what you want me to do. I shan't for- 
 get one single thing. There won't be any scene at 
 the hotel, no fear. I'll write the line, just as you 
 say, and get the key back. 'Twould do you more good 
 than anything in the world except the one thing you 
 won't take to sleep right plumb through to-morrow, 
 till evening. Suppose I tell Marta and Pepe they can 
 have a holiday, so as there won't be any noise about 
 the house or in the garden? Those two folks won't 
 keep quiet." 
 
 " But what about the key of the gate, if Pepe goes 
 off for the day ? " I asked. 
 
 " That'll be all right. I'll think of a way to fix 
 everything. Just you trust me, and put it out of your 
 mind, will you, lovey? " 
 
 " Yes. I always do trust you, Sarah," I said. " No- 
 body ever deserved it more." 
 
 " I ain't talkin' about what I deserve," she protested, 
 in the quick anxious way she had pf hiding from
 
 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 praise. " Would you like to take a few grains of ver- 
 onal in a little milk, dearie ? " 
 
 " We haven't any veronal, have we ? " 
 
 " There's a few tabloids left they gave me when you 
 came out of the nursing home, along with a lot of 
 other things you hadn't finished up." 
 
 " Oh, I'm glad," I exclaimed. " I didn't think it 
 would be possible to sleep, but with veronal I might. 
 Do give me ten grains." 
 
 " No, five's enough," she said decisively. " That's 
 the dose the nurses used to give, I know." 
 
 When she had put me into bed, between cool sheets, 
 she flitted away, and soon came back with the tabloid 
 of veronal, and a glass of milk. 
 
 I did not expect the drug to take effect for half an 
 hour at least, but almost at once I felt myself slipping 
 away into darkness and peace. I knew even then that 
 peace would not last, but my tired brain grasped it 
 with thankfulness, even for a little while.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 WHEN I waked up with a start sunlight was 
 streaming on to my face. 
 For a minute I felt only a vague, dull 
 ache of physical wretchedness. Needles of pain 
 threaded through my temples and I had a sensation 
 that my eyes had grown very old ! Then, like a weight 
 of lead dropping from the ceiling onto my breast, 
 came the consciousness of what had happened. A 
 door seemed to open in front of me, showing the future 
 like a long, dusty road. 
 
 Hardly knowing why, I sprang out of bed, as if to 
 escape from under the weight. I felt that I must do 
 something 'anything to get away from myself. 
 I wavered a little, and caught the back of a chair. 
 The veronal was still in my brain. In a moment, how- 
 ever, the swimming in my head passed, and sliding 
 my feet into the soft heelless slippers Sarah had made, 
 I walked to the window. The air revived me. I 
 wished that I were dressed, so that I might walk in 
 the garden, among the dewy flowers. I could see a 
 diamond glitter still on the great hydrangeas, in pots on 
 a shadowed part at the west end of the terrace, so I 
 knew it must be early. My bracelet watch was on 
 the dressing-table, and I was sorry I had forgotten to 
 wind it up last night. I supposed it would be run
 
 316 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 down ; but no, it must have been wound by thoughtful 
 Sarah. A quarter to eight! I wondered if she had 
 gone to bed and had slept; but I thought it more like 
 her to have spent hours on her knees, crying and pray- 
 ing for me. It would not be the first time she had 
 passed a night so. 
 
 All wish to sleep was gone. My brain, though it 
 throbbed, felt terribly alive. I could not go back to 
 bed. I longed for the garden, but dared not go out if 
 Sarah were asleep, for fear of waking her by unlock- 
 ing the front door, whose bolts were stiff. 
 
 Her room and mine were next each other, but not 
 communicating. I slipped out into the corridor, and, 
 half in regret, half in relief, saw that her door was 
 open. I peeped through. Her bed had not been lain 
 in, or else she had made it up early in the morning. 
 Going to the head of the stairs I called her. 
 
 "Sarah Sarah!" 
 
 There was no answer. The blood rushed to my 
 head, drumming in my ears. 
 
 " She has gone out already," I thought, " to take my 
 letter to Hugh. Perhaps by this time he has it. 
 Maybe he's reading it now ! " 
 
 I felt that I could hardly bear the waiting till Sarah 
 should come. To see her, to hear what had hap- 
 pened at the hotel though if all had gone according 
 to my hope, nothing would have happened seemed 
 the one thing I had to live for. After that, dark- 
 ness. 
 
 I went to my room, and bathed in the tub which was
 
 THE LIFE MASK 317 
 
 always ready overnight. I brushed my hair away from 
 my face, with a wet brush, and the short waves fell 
 over my ears and throat with cool touches, like birds' 
 wings. Then I dressed quickly, putting on the tea- 
 gown I had worn to speak with Hugh in the arbor, 
 and ran down to look for Sarah, though I was sure 
 beforehand that she had not come. 
 
 " I'll walk on the terrace till I hear her," I thought. 
 
 I was thankful she had given Pepe and Marta a holi- 
 day. She must have seen them already, or they would 
 be here by this time. Probably she had waited at the 
 gate to send them home. It would be like her to 
 think of that, when almost any one else would have 
 forgotten. 
 
 The hot sun found me on the terrace, and seemed to 
 press upon my head a tight golden helmet, so I took 
 the path to the fountain arbor. It was silent and al- 
 most sad, for the water was not playing. It would not 
 come on until afternoon. 
 
 " But even when the fountain speaks again," I 
 thought, " it will never say the same things." 
 
 Looking at it with dull eyes, which still felt very old, 
 I heard a sound; and thinking that Sarah must have 
 returned, I stepped outside the arbor on to the path. 
 My lips were open to call her, when a voice spoke. It 
 was Hugh's. I could not hear what he said, but I 
 knew he was in the garden ; and I started to run back 
 into the house. Then I stopped abruptly. Walking 
 up from the gate, he would come between me and the 
 villa. I should meet him on the way. Yet I should
 
 3i8 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 not be safe in the arbor. If he were looking for me, 
 he would search there, as always. 
 
 Fear seized me fear of him and of myself, and of 
 destiny. Hugh must have read the letter, and have 
 come in spite of it. Then he did not believe I would 
 keep my word! He still hoped to persuade me. It 
 was all to do over again, and I had not strength for 
 the battle. The only way was to carry out my threat, 
 now, before he could stop me. I remembered the 
 mirador close by. There might be just time to get there 
 without being seen. As the thought came into my 
 head, I flew to the place, and up the broken steps at 
 the side of the rickety flower-draped building. To get 
 in, I had to part with both hands the cataract of bou- 
 gainvillea and ivy and convolvulus that billowed over 
 roof and windows. Trailing branches curtained even 
 the entrance; and the open back of the mirador, facing 
 the garden, was completely screened with a leafy 
 tapestry. 
 
 Once inside, I was out of sight, even if Hugh came 
 to the arbor, though the path there would lead him 
 directly under the summer-house. All I had to do for 
 the moment was to keep still. Then I must make up 
 my mind what to do next. The front of the mirador, 
 looking down over the old town, was built on the verge 
 of a precipice. I could pass out of Hugh's life 
 since he refused to let me go in an easier way sim- 
 ply by leaning against the slight bar of crumbling 
 wood which had once guarded the opening. 
 
 Sarah had turned giddy the first and only time I
 
 THE LIFE MASK 319 
 
 brought her into this secret, sad retreat. Her face 
 was drained of blood, and with a little squeal of fear, 
 she had run blindly past me, down the steps; then, 
 ashamed of her panic, she had begged my pardon for 
 going first, making me promise never to sit in the 
 mirador. I was not breaking the letter of that prom- 
 ise now, though I broke it in spirit. 
 
 " This will kill Sarah when she finds out," I thought. 
 " What a reward for her long years of love ! " Yet 
 Hugh was more to me than Sarah, Hugh, whom I 
 had known less than a month. 
 
 I hesitated, with strange lights dancing before my 
 eyes, reddening the sunshine. Then I saw Hugh com- 
 ing, Sarah with him. I turned away from them, in 
 blind haste to lean against the broken barrier before 
 my spirit of courage failed. But Sarah spoke, and 
 something in her tone forced me to stop and listen. 
 
 " In the arbor, Captin, where you and she used to 
 sit, I can tell it better, for I'll have to sit down. I 
 ain't strong on my feet this morning. And it's the 
 furthest place away from the house, where we can't 
 wake her up. Walk in." 
 
 It was odd, perhaps, that sheer curiosity should 
 hold me back from death, but I could not die without 
 knowing what Sarah had to tell Hugh. It seemed 
 like treachery to me that she should have brought him 
 into the garden, after what I had said, but perhaps 
 there was some excuse. I did not want to go out of 
 the world wronging her as well as breaking her heart. 
 Before I died I must know what they were going to
 
 320 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 say about me, and why Hugh had come in spite of my 
 letter. 
 
 They went into the arbor. I could peep through 
 the thick flowery curtain and see them, though they 
 could not see me. Sarah sank, rather than deliberately 
 sat, on the stone seat. Her side face was turned to 
 me, as she looked up to Hugh, who stood near her, 
 close to the fountain. I could see only his back as he 
 stood so, his hands clasped behind him. He seemed 
 immensely tall, towering above the small, seated figure 
 of Sarah, and she very little and shrunken, crouching 
 limply forward. I was afraid that the night's vigil 
 had told sorely upon her, for she sat with her arms 
 stretched out, one on either side, holding on tensely 
 by the edge of the seat. 
 
 " I am mighty glad I met you, Captin," she said, 
 " for I shouldn't have dared wait any longer away 
 from Miss Nita, and I wouldn't have left the letter 
 at the hotel, with you out. When I heard you wasn't 
 in, I made pretty sure you'd be comin' round here early 
 to ask how Miss Nita was, so I just hurried along 
 home, and caught you up just in time. This is better 
 than you readin' my letter. And in it I asked you to 
 come and see me, anyhow." 
 
 I wondered what she could mean, what she had 
 written to Hugh instead of the request I had told her 
 to make for the key. 
 
 " What did you write in your letter ? " Hugh seemed 
 to speak out my thought, as if I had communicated it 
 to his mind. " You're frightening me a little, you 
 know. You say there's no bad news, yet there's some-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 321 
 
 thing you couldn't tell at the gate, to put me out of 
 suspense." 
 
 " When a body has to confess, it can't be done in a 
 hurry, Captin. It's a hard thing to do, anyways. 
 I've got to confess to you. I couldn't to Miss Nita, 
 not in words, to her face. 'T would be the death of 
 me!" 
 
 " Something you can tell me, but not her ? " Hugh 
 echoed, evidently puzzled, and a little stiff in manner 
 as he was apt to be with Sarah, in spite of his good 
 resolutions. 
 
 " Yes, because you don't like me, and she my 
 precious lamb loves and trusts me with all her 
 heart. I've bin real glad from the first you didn't 
 like me, sir. It give me a respect for you, your seein' 
 through me. You felt there was' somethin' wrong, 
 didn't you?" 
 
 " Not wrong exactly. Strange," Hugh answered. 
 
 " Ah, you want to be kind an' not hurt me, for her 
 sake ! I reckon you're afraid to do an injustice. But 
 you couldn't be unjust to me, Captin. I'm the black- 
 est sinner on this earth. I let Miss Nita suffer all those 
 years, because I was too vile a coward to give myself 
 up, and be hung. 'Twas for her I did what I did, 
 and I don't repent that part so much. I meant to 
 save her from that beast, an' it seemed as if 'twas no 
 worse than to kill a mad dog. But when 'twas found 
 out that's where I failed! I never calc'lated it 
 would be found out. I thought they'd believe he 
 just died in his sleep; an' so they would a' done, if it 
 hadn't been for Mis' Frenshaw and that Burton.
 
 322 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 They were two fiends together, plottin' against my 
 girl." 
 
 Hugh's voice cut, sharp and incisive, into the ram- 
 blings which held me dazed. 
 
 " Do you know what you're saying? Do you mean 
 me to understand that you poisoned Durrand ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir. I did it. I gave him the morphia. 
 I wanted him to be out of her way, he was so dread- 
 ful, an' she was so young an' sweet. At first I hoped 
 he was goin' to drop off of his own accord, for he was 
 mighty sick, but the doctor thought he was gettin' 
 better, so there was no time to wait, and I just did the 
 best I could." 
 
 " Good God ! And you'd have let them hang her ! 
 That's your love ! " 
 
 " Oh, no, sir, I wouldn't. I do believe I'd ha' got 
 the courage to speak if it had come to that. Just 
 wait, sir, till I tell you. I don't mind your bein' hard 
 on me. You can't hate me no worse than I have my- 
 self all these years, an' she worshipin' me for a saint. 
 My, how I've lived through it I don't know. But I 
 just had to live till I could get her free an' make her 
 well, an' maybe find some one to love her when she 
 hadn't me. Oh, I don't want to get confused. I want 
 to tell you the way it was, so you can know how to do 
 what's best, but your eyes are like swords, sir, they'll 
 not let me think." 
 
 " I won't look at you. Go back to the beginning. 
 I'll try not to interrupt. Tell me what happened that 
 night." 
 
 "The night when I"
 
 THE LIFE MASK 323 
 
 " Yes ; when you gave Durrand the morphia. Had 
 you been planning it? " 
 
 " When the doctor said he'd get well, that's when 
 it came into my head. It made me feel sick, but it 
 seemed as if I must do it, to save her. I thought if he 
 lived, maybe she'd kill herself, she was so desperate 
 with the life he led her. If I could, I'd ha' done it one 
 of the nights when I was sittin' up with him, but before 
 I had the idea, she'd taken on the night work. I tried 
 to coax her to let me go on for every other one, but 
 she wouldn't, an' she was so queer and nervous I was 
 afraid if I said too much she might guess what was in 
 my head. I wasn't sure then whether she knew I'd 
 heard the doctor askin' Mr. Durrand about the mor- 
 phia, and his sayin' the bottle was in the medicine 
 cupboard. 'Twas only afterward I found out she 
 didn't know I was in the next room when they were 
 talkin' that day. It seemed providential my hearin' it 
 was there, as if the thing was meant to be; like with 
 Jael and Sisera. God wanted Jael to kill him, an' her 
 name's gone down in glory for what she did. Only 
 that was different. She didn't let the blame fall on 
 some one else. But I never dreamed I was goin' to 
 do that. I prayed for strength to carry it all out just 
 right ; an' the idea come to me, to give Miss Nita some 
 chlorodyne in her coffee. You can buy that at any 
 drug store, you know, sir, and she was always right 
 easy to affect with any sleepin' medicines." 
 
 " Then it was you she saw in what she calls the 
 gray dream." 
 
 " On my word, I don't know, sir. It might ha' bin
 
 324 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 all a dream or I might ha' bin mixed up in it, with her 
 half asleep an' half awake. I wasn't in a gray wrap- 
 per. I had on a black dress. But I did just those 
 things she dreamed about. I went to the medicine 
 cupboard an' found the queer shaped bottle back o' 
 the other bottles, an' I poured out the stuff, an' mixed 
 it in a tumbler with his heart-medicine. But not the 
 tumbler on his table. I brought one with me, an' 
 washed it out afterwards. Then I put back the bottle 
 where I'd got it. The next thing I went over an' 
 touched Mr. Durrand on the shoulder. Before he was 
 quite waked up, I had the stuff down his throat, and 
 a drink o' water after it, so it wouldn't leave a smell: 
 an' I praised the Lord, sendin' up a prayer there an' 
 then, that the thing was over an' Miss Nita free. If 
 I'd a' dreamed they'd think anything was wrong, I'd 
 not have dared, for her sake, especially with her sittin' 
 there in the room alone with him. But the talk al- 
 ways was that he might die of his heart just stoppin' 
 short Everything seemed goin' on all right. It never 
 entered the doctor's head 'twasn't a natural death, till 
 the valet and Mis' Frenshaw put their heads together. 
 Even then, he thought 'twas a foolish thing to have 
 the post mortem. That man Burton and Mr. Dur- 
 rand's daughter were our bad geniuses. If it hadn't 
 bin for them, Miss Nita would ha' lived a happy life 
 from that day to this, an* had cause to bless me. 
 When they arrested her, I wanted to say 'twas me they 
 must take to prison, but I just couldn't open my lips. 
 'Twas like as if I had lockjaw an' palsy both together
 
 THE LIFE MASK 325 
 
 whenever I tried. An' I says to myself I might wait 
 and see first what the verdict was ; then, if 'twas against 
 her, I'd have to tell, rather than harm should come to 
 Miss Nita. But what I hoped, even when things 
 looked blackest, was that the jury'd never find a beau- 
 tiful young girl like her guilty, nor the judge sentence 
 her to die." 
 
 " But when she was sentenced ? " 
 
 " Oh, sir, you're so brave, you don't know what it 
 is to be a coward. It's 'most like a disease. I reckon 
 it's worse than drink with a drunkard. I put off, even 
 then. Not that I minded the thought of dyin' or goin* 
 before my God. 'Twas the thought of me, a woman 
 o' my age, who'd bin respectable an' church-goin' all 
 her life, bein' trussed up an' blindfolded an' hung with 
 a rope around my neck. A long time ago when I 
 wasn't much more'n a child, I seen a picture in a paper 
 of some woman that was hung, in the time of the War 
 between the North and South. Her name was Mrs. 
 Surratt, an' she was a respectable woman, too. There 
 she was in her dress, like she wore for every day, with 
 her limbs all twined up in rope, so she couldn't strug- 
 gle, an' her dress tied down an' her poor feet danglin' 
 like a rag doll's. It made me right down sick, that 
 picture, an' I couldn't never forget it. Since that day 
 I couldn't read a word about an execution or any kind 
 of killin', without feelin' as if I should faint away. I 
 could just see the photograph of that woman before 
 my eyes, while I was wrestlin' with my soul to speak 
 out an' tell I done it, as if it might ha' bin me I saw.
 
 326 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 It wasn't decent to have to end like that. I went to 
 work to save Miss Nita some other way, and there was 
 petitions signed, and all the newspapers in our favor. 
 I reckon a day didn't pass but I talked with some re- 
 porter, an' told our story, how young an' good Miss 
 Nita was; an' how impossible she should poison her 
 husband, though he was no better than a beast. A 
 gentleman who owned several papers, an' who was al- 
 ways takin' up the cause of those who were weak or 
 injured, had long articles in his newspapers, about how 
 easy 'twould ha' been for Mr. Durrand to get up an' 
 take the morphia in spite of what the doctors said; 
 an' other doctors wrote letters to the newspapers in 
 our favor. At first opinion seemed against Miss Nita, 
 but when she was sentenced it all turned the other way, 
 an' everybody said what a wicked shame to hang a 
 young girl like that on circumstantial evidence. It 
 wasn't long before the sentence was changed to im- 
 prisonment, an' though it was for life, I knew I'd save 
 her somehow. Even then I wanted to tell the truth, 
 but she was out o' danger of death, an' they'd ha' hung 
 me without any manner o' doubt if I confessed. I 
 thought to myself, she's better off in prison than she 
 would be if he'd lived; I was sure if she could choose 
 she'd rather stay there a few years than have her old 
 Sarah killed such a way as that." 
 
 " You might at least have let her choose, instead of 
 leaving her to be cursed by that awful dream repeating 
 itself, and making her believe she was guilty. It's a 
 wonder fear didn't drive her mad ! " 
 
 " Oh, I know, sir, I know ! But there was my
 
 THE LIFE MASK 327 
 
 cowardice again. I loved her so, an' she loved 
 me an' called me her good angel. How could I tell 
 her what would lose me her love, in a minute? Not 
 so much about the poison, for that was for her sake, 
 an' I was never ashamed of it, in itself, if you can un- 
 derstand. But to have her know that while she 
 was believin' in me, I'd sent her to prison an' let 
 her risk worse! No, I couldn't. But I've been pun- 
 ished for my sin as I wouldn't punish my worst enemy. 
 While she was in prison, I died a new kind o' death 
 each day an' night that passed over my head, thinkin' 
 of her there she who loved out of doors an' flowers 
 an' me free to go an' come. I reckon 'twould ha' 
 bin a heap less sufferin' to give myself up to be tried 
 an' hung, than live as I did for ten years. They made 
 a wreck o' my health, such as I had, an' I'm glad. I 
 never eat a decent meal or took a walk in the fresh air 
 for exercise, because she couldn't. I didn't want to 
 have luxuries she hadn't got. Maybe when I die, I 
 shall have to burn with the goats in hell, but I don't 
 believe it can be so much worse than what I've gone 
 through already from bein' a coward." 
 
 " But why, if you held back all those years when 
 she was suffering tortures of mind and privations and 
 shame in prison, do you come forward and confess 
 now, you strange woman ! " 
 
 " Just because, sir, I see it would be worse for Miss 
 Nita than anything that's come yet, to lose you. She 
 won't have you nothin' on earth can make her 
 change her mind as long as she thinks perhaps she 
 killed her husband, who never was her husband. I 1
 
 328 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 can't tell her myself, but you can; an' you must just 
 help me to get away somehow before you do tell, so I 
 won't have to meet her eyes again afterwards. Will 
 you do that, Captin ? " 
 
 11 Wait a minute. Let me think. You want to go 
 away to disappear ? " 
 
 " It's the only thing. I couldn't stand havin' her 
 hate me, after all these blessed years of love." 
 
 " Blessed years ! " 
 
 " I wasn't thinkin' what I said, sir ; though in some 
 ways they was blessed for me in spite of all. I'll go 
 before to-morrow mornin', sir, but I'd like you to grant 
 me till then. You wouldn't grudge my seein' her once 
 more ? Besides, she ain't well. She ain't fit to be left. 
 I know just how to comfort her an' nurse her up, an' 
 make the food that she can eat. If I walk right out 
 of the house now, before she's better, it will give her 
 a shock." 
 
 " I can't bear to think of your being near her ! " 
 Hugh said, as he had said once before. " But I 
 don't know what's best for Nita. There's one thing, 
 though. You will have to write out this confession 
 just as you have told it to me, and sign it, or it won't 
 be of any use. It would probably be thought we'd co- 
 erced you and that's maybe what they'll think any- 
 how" 
 
 " But I have written it, sir. Did I forget to men- 
 tion that? I meant to tell you, when I'd come to 
 where I was tryin' to get her reprieved. That's the
 
 THE LIFE MASK 329 
 
 time I wrote it, because I was determined if I failed, 
 I'd just take some of the same stuff I give him, so as 
 to escape the worst, an' leave the true story to save her 
 life. I give the sealed envelope to the manager of 
 the bank where I put my legacy: a very kind gentle- 
 man who took a great interest in Miss Nita and me, 
 though he never saw her that I know of. I just said I 
 wasn't strong, an' as I might die sudden somehow, I 
 wanted him to see that certain instructions were car- 
 ried out if I went. He promised that the minute news 
 came of my death, he'd break the seal and read the let- 
 ter, but meanwhile it should stay in the safe till it was 
 wanted, an' he hoped it would be years. There it is 
 now, in his keepin', Captin, with a lot more details 
 than I've give to you. But but you don't mean 
 you want me to let him use it, do you without my 
 bein'dead?" 
 
 " I want you to telegraph no, I suppose he 
 wouldn't act on that I want you to write a letter 
 telling the bank manager to open the envelope at 
 once ! " 
 
 " Oh, Captin, but it will all come out, and they can 
 arrest me ! I'd be hung even now ! Do give me time 
 to hide myself somewheres. I'll write you a letter to 
 send. I'll do it now when I go in, before Miss Nita 
 wakes up. She's pretty sure to sleep a good while yet. 
 Won't that suit you ? " she pleaded, hands pressed to 
 thin breast, hunted eyes looking up. 
 
 " What about her Nita ? You say she won't have
 
 330 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 anything to do with me that she's made up her mind. 
 Then she's suffering because she loves me. You 
 haven't given me her letter, but " 
 
 " No, because I knew what she said in it. She 
 didn't want you to come here again, an' I had to have 
 you come. That's why I hurried to find you, so she 
 would be asleep. But I'll tell you what I'll do, Captin ; 
 I'll say I've seen you, an' you've got a plan by which 
 you're 'most sure you can prove her innocence, a plan, 
 she'd never guess. An' all you ask is for her to wait 
 just one day, till to-morrow morning, before she de- 
 cides to give you up. She will wait. I know I can 
 make her wait ! " 
 
 " I can't give you as long. I don't trust you 
 enough." 
 
 " I don't blame you, sir ! How long will you give 
 me, then?" 
 
 He thought for an instant. 
 
 " Till two o'clock this afternoon. She'll wake be- 
 fore that. You must persuade her to see me when she 
 does. When I come you can give me the letter for 
 your bank manager. Then you must go away, while 
 I'm with her, telling what you've told me. Meanwhile 
 I'll arrange where it's best for you to go first. After 
 that it will be wiser, when the thing comes out, that we 
 shouldn't know what's become of you. I'll find a 
 place and look up trains; and I'll give you plenty of 
 money." 
 
 " I don't want that, sir, thank you. I've always 
 kept a good sum by me in case of some sudden need
 
 THE LIFE MASK 331 
 
 like this. I've got six hundred dollars of my own in 
 the house. That's enough to last me a year. I've 
 lived on less." 
 
 "And afterward?" 
 
 " Oh, I reckon a year'Il about see me through to the 
 end o' my tether. I'm mighty near wore out, thank 
 God. But you'll give me a little grace before you send 
 the letter to London, won't you, sir ? " 
 
 " That's for Nita to decide." 
 
 " Yes, sir, I reckon you're right. That ought to 
 be for her to decide." 
 
 " I'll have to see that she doesn't put it off too long. 
 Is it understood, at two o'clock you'll send her here to 
 me, and be ready to go ? " 
 
 "I'll be ready, for sure!" 
 
 " I wonder if I can trust you? " 
 
 " Oh, do, sir! You won't be sorry." 
 
 " I'll run the risk unless something new turns up. 
 I have the key of the garden, and I'll keep it. If you 
 don't persuade Nita to see me I'll come anyhow. 
 .Where's her letter? I want it." 
 
 " Captin, I never took it to the hotel. I only took 
 a letter from me. I didn't want you to have hers, 
 ever. An' I can't get it, without wakin' her, for I 
 slipped it under her door on purpose. I reckon she 
 wouldn't find it even if she woke up, because it went 
 under the rug that lies inside the door. But it would 
 rouse her, sure, for me to fetch it; an' she needs her 
 rest." 
 
 " You've got the cunning of madness about you! "
 
 332 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 " It's more the cunning of love, sir, maybe. For I 
 do love Miss Nita better'n my soul, though you mayn't 
 believe it. Would you would you please just go, 
 now, sir? for if I'm to write that letter I must be by 
 myself, an' try to get back a little strength an' wit be- 
 fore I can begin. An' there's a good deal to do before 
 I before I" 
 
 " Yes, I'll go now," said Hugh, as promptly as he 
 had said the same words to me last night. " I'll come 
 back at two o'clock and open the gate ; and I shall look 
 for Miss Nita here ! " 
 
 His head down, hardly glancing at Sarah, he 
 walked out of the summer-house, but before he had 
 taken many steps she ran after him, calling. He 
 stopped and turned, only a yard or two past the mira- 
 dor. 
 
 " You'll break it gently to her, won't you, Captin ? " 
 Sarah asked in a quavering voice. " You'll begin 
 somehow, so as to work up to what's comin', not to 
 shock her too much ? " 
 
 " You can trust me to be gentle," Hugh said, and 
 walked on as if anxious to get away. 
 
 But Sarah followed, and caught up with him, pant- 
 ing. I heard her say: 
 
 " It ain't for myself; it's for her. You see I've bin 
 with her since she was a baby, and " 
 
 The rest was lost. With short steps she hurried 
 on beside him. I was sure she would not leave him 
 till they reached the gate.
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 SARAH'S first rambling words gave their secret 
 to me even before Hugh seized it. The shock 
 of their true meaning was a lightning stroke. 
 It was as if I had been half electrocuted, and then al- 
 lowed to live. My mind received impressions, but 
 could make no use of them. Sarah's weak voice dro- 
 ning on was like a gramophone. I understood all 
 she said, but something kept it from seeming impor- 
 tant. I listened as if to a character in some scene at 
 a theater, in which I was interested only because it was 
 so well acted. I felt that it was realistic, that the 
 two persons who were acting would do as they did 
 now, if it were life and not the stage. I did not hate 
 Sarah in the least, nor even love her less, nor feel any 
 horror of her because she had killed some one, nor 
 did I rejoice because the gray dream of myself doing 
 the thing was not true. Everything was to me as it 
 had always been, and this scene that was going on in 
 the arbor had nothing at all to do with my past or 
 future. 
 
 This was the state of my mind until Hugh asked for 
 my letter, and Sarah told him that she had not taken it 
 to the hotel, but had slipped it under my door. Then, 
 suddenly, the whole thing became real and intimate. I 
 
 333
 
 334 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 was indignant with her for not taking the letter that I 
 had written as if with my heart's blood. An instant 
 after, something seemed to laugh bitterly and horribly 
 in my brain. It said, " You are angry with her for 
 hiding the letter. What about the rest ? What about 
 her letting you spend the best years of your youth in 
 prison while she pretended to move heaven and earth 
 to save you? " 
 
 I looked down through the flowery curtain of the 
 mirador on to her meek gray head, and loathed it. 
 " Hypocrite ! Wretch ! " were the words that burned 
 in my mind. It disgusted me to think how I had wor- 
 shiped her, how I had kissed her lying lips, her hands 
 of a murderess. I thought of the dream and my 
 slavery to it, how she had comforted me stammer- 
 ingly, saying it was only a dream, she was sure, and 
 not true. How sure she had been, and had never told 
 me! I wondered that Hugh could stand there and 
 question and not kill her. 
 
 Then it leaped into my comprehension that the hor- 
 ror of my own guilt was over. I had not got up in 
 my sleep and gone to the medicine cupboard and poured 
 out the poison. Sarah had done it; Sarah had 
 done it all. She had let me suffer, but I was free at 
 last ! There was no stain on my soul. For a moment 
 I forgot my hatred of Sarah. I was wildly happy. 
 " Free free ! " I said in my thoughts, and clasped 
 my hands in thanksgiving, as I never had when I came 
 out of prison; for then I was still in bondage to the 
 dream.
 
 THE LIFE MASK 335 
 
 " I must tell Sarah," I found myself thinking, with 
 my old habit of going to her with everything; but the 
 dreadful laugh came in my brain again, and I remem- 
 bered that I had lost Sarah. There was not and never 
 had been such a saintly, splendid Sarah as I had loved. 
 She was not gone, for she had never existed. The lit- 
 tle crumpled old woman down there in the arbor was 
 a cruel, treacherous, whining thing to turn away from 
 with detestation. I felt alone in a world empty of my 
 Sarah's kind presence, and almost I would have crept 
 back under the shadow of the old fear, if I could have 
 found my beloved nurse and friend waiting there for 
 me with arms open. 
 
 I still hated Sarah while she promised to persuade 
 me into seeing Hugh, and agreed to leave me forever. 
 When she ran after him I did not think, with a pang 
 of fear, as I would yesterday, how bad it was for her 
 heart that she should run. I did not care what hap- 
 pened to her, or how much she suffered. I thought 
 only of myself and my ruined youth, and how I was 
 to avoid meeting that woman when she came back from 
 the gate. My reason for hiding in the mirador was en- 
 tirely forgotten. I did not even remember to be thank- 
 ful that I had not thrown away my life before know- 
 ing Sarah's secret. The wish to die had been swept 
 violently out of my mind. Suddenly, however, it oc- 
 curred to me that I need not stay in the mirador. I 
 could make a quick dash into the house while Sarah 
 was gone, and lock my door upon her for the first 
 time. For awhile she would believe me to be asleep.
 
 336 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 After that but when would I begin to realize that 
 it no longer mattered to me what she thought or 
 felt? 
 
 She must have lingered in the garden for some rea- 
 son, because ten minutes passed after I had darted 
 into the house and fastened my bolt, before I heard 
 the soft patter of feet on tiptoe outside my door. 
 Sarah had come upstairs, and was listening, wonder- 
 ing if I were awake. I lay on the bed, quite still ex- 
 cept for the pounding of my heart. If she peeped 
 through the keyhole, she could see nothing but a ray 
 of sunlight from the window, falling perhaps upon the 
 silver toilet things on the dressing-table silver things 
 she had given me. 
 
 It seemed mysterious and horrible to know that she 
 was there, the wicked new Sarah in place of the one 
 who had been so dear, and that I was hiding from her, 
 that I was hoping to avoid speaking to her, or seeing 
 her again, ever in this world. 
 
 By and by she went away. It was very still in the 
 corridor, with a stillness which was deathly in my 
 ears. Of course she had not begun yet to think it 
 strange that I had not waked. It was only half -past 
 nine. What was she doing now? Was she getting 
 ready for her long journey? Was she writing the 
 letter she had promised Hugh to write, or was she per- 
 haps putting on paper some rambling excuses for me 
 to read when she was gone, and Hugh had " broken 
 the truth gently " to me ? In mind I reluctantly fol- 
 lowed the frail figure about the house, where I could
 
 THE LIFE MASK 337 
 
 feel that it was wandering, flitting like a lost spirit 
 to and fro, unable to decide upon anything. I could 
 not get away from Sarah for an instant, though the 
 door was locked between us. 
 
 In an hour she came back and tiptoed uneasily about 
 again. I thought I heard her breathing, but I told my- 
 self that I imagined the sound. Once more, silence. 
 I felt faint, and began to realize that I was very hun- 
 gry. I had not eaten since luncheon time yester- 
 day, and then scarcely anything, for I had been too 
 excited in the thought of an afternoon with Hugh at 
 the Generalife, to care for food. Now I despised my- 
 self for wanting it. It made me seem heartless, soul- 
 less; yet I longed for a glass of milk. As I lay on the 
 bed, with the thought of milk putting other thoughts 
 out of my head, I heard Sarah at the door for the 
 third time. She tapped lightly, as if with the points 
 of her fingers. My heart gave a leap, and my temples 
 throbbed. I was no longer hungry. If I had had the 
 milk, the sight of it would have made me sick. 
 
 When I did not answer, she tapped more loudly than 
 before. 
 
 "Are you awake?" she half whispered. 
 
 I lay rigid, and after waiting a minute she called out 
 anxiously : 
 
 " Dearie, do wake up ! I'm frightened about you ! " 
 
 I wanted to answer, but I could not. It was im- 
 possible to speak naturally, and something would not 
 let me cry out the horror I had of her. 
 
 She tried the door cautiously. I saw the handle
 
 338 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 turn. She had found out that it was locked. With 
 a moan of fear, she rattled the knob, then beat on one 
 of the panels. 
 
 " Dearie ! Dearie ! " she screamed. " Oh, my 
 Lord, has anything happened to her ? " 
 
 Then I had to answer, or she would go away, and 
 get help, and people would come and break the door 
 open. 
 
 " Nothing has happened to me," I called out, in a 
 harsh voice, not like mine. " I can't open the door ; I 
 want to rest." 
 
 " You oughtn't to have locked yourself in," she 
 reproached me. " You did give Sarah a fright ! 
 Couldn't you just get up a minute and slip the bolt 
 back? Seems as if I must have one peep at you, to 
 see you're all right, heart's dearest." 
 
 " I can't now," I persisted. " Please go away, 
 Sarah, and leave me alone." 
 
 She was silent for an instant, as if stricken by my 
 refusal to see her. 
 
 " Your voice sounds so so kind of strange," she 
 said, after that slight pause during which perhaps many 
 thoughts, many questions had run confusedly through 
 her mind. 
 
 " I am tired. I don't want to talk ! " I cried out 
 sharply. 
 
 But she would not give up. In the meek yet obsti- 
 nate tone I knew well, and had loved and laughed at, 
 she went on : 
 
 " You ought to have something to eat. What
 
 THE LIFE MASK 339 
 
 could you fancy? An egg beaten up in nice fresh 
 milk?" 
 
 "No no! Nothing!" 
 
 " Maybe you would feel different if you let me tell 
 you about the Captin. I've seen him, and and had 
 a talk. He give me a message for you. Maybe there's 
 good news. Wouldn't you like to hear it ? " 
 
 " Not now." 
 
 " Dearie, you're not cross with Sarah ? " 
 
 " You're making me ill ! Please, please go ! " 
 
 She went away, crying. I heard her make little 
 whimpering sounds of grief. For a moment my heart 
 softened. I half sat up, feeling I must open the door. 
 I could not let her go like that. Then I reminded myself 
 how she had let me suffer, not for moments but years, 
 how she had betrayed me to spare her cowardly self. 
 " She deserves anything," I mumbled. Yet the pitiful 
 whimpering sounds echoed in my ears, and I felt them 
 stinging my nerves like tiny, invisible but very sharp 
 whips. I almost wished she would come back, and 
 begin to plead again. Not that I would have let her in, 
 but it seemed unbearable somehow not to know what 
 she was doing. 
 
 Once in a while I looked at my watch, and the little 
 white face of it said, " She gave me to you." 
 
 Well, why not? She had taken everything from 
 me ; no wonder her conscience had urged her to try and 
 atone. It added to her hypocrisy. There was no 
 cause to be grateful. 
 
 I thought it very strange that I did not feel more
 
 340 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 poignantly. My emotions seemed to be shut up in 
 some dim, dark place whence they could not call loudly 
 enough for me to hear and understand. I could think 
 only of Sarah, hardly at all of myself or of Hugh, 
 for more than a moment or two at a time. 
 
 Twelve o'clock came; twelve-thirty. In an hour 
 and a half, Hugh would look for me in the arbor. 
 
 Sarah again at the door ! 
 
 " Dearie, I've brought that egg and milk. I won't 
 ask to come in. I'll just leave it and go. I've got 
 some work to do. When you feel hungry, you open 
 your door, and you'll find a nice little tray waitin' for 
 you. There's just a line written on a piece of paper, 
 tellin' you about the Captin and his news, so I won't 
 have to bother you talkin'. But if you want me, why 
 all you've got to do is to give one little call. I'll 
 be in my room." 
 
 This time she did not ask for any answer. In a 
 minute, I heard her door shut. I thought she had 
 closed it loudly on purpose, so that I might know she 
 was not lurking in the corridor, in case I wanted to 
 take in the tray without being seen. 
 
 But I did not go out, I had little curiosity about the 
 writing on the piece of paper. I was sure it was in 
 accordance with the plan she had proposed to 
 Hugh. 
 
 " Good news! " I said to myself. " There's no such 
 thing! Even if she'd hidden away, I couldn't use her 
 confession, and risk naving her hanged. She knows 
 very well I couldn't. She must know. It's the strong-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 341 
 
 est, not the weakest, who must go to the wall. She's 
 an old woman. I shall have to bear the shame be- 
 fore the world, and save her, just as I always did 
 before I knew for certain it wasn't mine. Hugh and 
 I are no nearer to each other than we were unless she 
 dies. I won't let him tell the truth, and I won't marry 
 him while people think me a murderess. We must 
 wait till she's dead ; or he must give me up." 
 
 The words kept saying themselves over and over in 
 my head. " Unless she dies . . . unless she dies. 
 We must wait until she's dead." But, very strangely, 
 the thought of Sarah's dying sent a pang of anguish 
 through my heart. 
 
 I did not know why this was, or why it should be, 
 for it was impossible for me to love her now. " She 
 is a wicked and terrible woman, a cruel old woman," 
 I said. Yes, cruel, and old certainly old. Her 
 voice had sounded very old and deadly tired. Poor 
 little Sarah no, wicked old Sarah . . . little 
 old, tired Sarah. 
 
 In days long ago we could not have believed that 
 this would happen. Days when Sarah held me on her 
 lap, and rocked me in her arms, crooning me to sleep, 
 singing me to sleep with, " Weep no more, my lady, 
 weep no more for me ! " . . . Sarah coming to 
 meet me at the convent . . . Sarah . . . 
 
 She was crying again in the next room. I could 
 hear it through the wall, a sudden burst of sobbing, 
 quickly stifled. I buried my head in the pillows, and 
 quivered.
 
 342 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 Lying thus with my eyes shut, and darkness pressing 
 upon them after the irritating brightness and heat of 
 the sunshine, it was as if my spirit released itself from 
 some sort of dull tyranny imposed upon it by the body. 
 My thoughts, more than my thoughts, myself, went to 
 Sarah in her room. My thoughts became Sarah's 
 thoughts. Then, because they were her thoughts, they 
 pleaded for mercy, only a little mercy ! I saw her no 
 longer as the angel of goodness she had been in my 
 eyes, nor as the wicked, cruel old woman who had 
 thrown me to the wolves to save herself. I saw her a 
 creature of weakness and of strength, weighted down 
 by the tragic load of her cowardice. 
 
 There was no more sobbing now. The room next 
 door was as still as mine, yet even as I felt the beating 
 of my own heart, so did I seem to feel the beating of 
 Sarah's, and the ache of it, as though it were in my 
 own breast. 
 
 She was a murderess, but why ? She had taken the 
 life that was in my way. Then her dreadful courage 
 had failed. But it had not gone out like a flame that 
 is dead. Some spark must have lived under the ashes, 
 must have been fanned into life again by my great need, 
 or she could not have confessed to Hugh. 
 
 She knew that he did not like or trust her. She 
 could not have been sure of mercy from him. He had 
 everything to gain by giving her up, yet she had gone 
 to him with her story. 
 
 I guessed now how she had spent what was left of 
 the night after putting me to bed. She had been mak-
 
 THE LIFE MASK 343 
 
 ing up her mind to this step, in order, as she said, that 
 I should not lose my happiness. 
 
 If she had not sinned, if I had not gone to prison and 
 spent all those years there, I should never have known 
 Hugh. I owed him to Sarah, and Sarah's cowardice. 
 His love was the flower of my pain. 
 
 If Sarah had confessed long ago what she had done, 
 and died for it, I could never have been happy. And 
 was it not the truth, as she had said to Hugh, that I 
 would have chosen prison rather than let her go to 
 death? Yes, it must have been so. The thing once 
 done, she could not have saved me if she would. But 
 now, she had brought me to Hugh. She had done her 
 best to give us to each other, and some day 
 
 The words began to say themselves over in my head 
 again, very quickly and mechanically, " When Sarah 
 dies when Sarah dies." 
 
 She was going away to-day, to leave me forever, 
 and to hide, so that I might be free as she thought 
 to marry Hugh. When she died, she would be far 
 off, alone, without friends . . . the little old 
 woman. But she mustn't go. 
 
 I was off the bed, and at the door, unbolting it. 
 
 There was the tray, with the glass of egg and milk, 
 covered with a glass saucer, that had a rose in it. On 
 a plate was very thin bread and butter ; and by the side 
 of the plate, a little three-cornered note, folded up, 
 without an envelope. It was addressed in Sarah's 
 handwriting, more shaky and indistinct than usual, 
 " Miss Nita." But I did not stop to read. I went to
 
 344 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 her door, and called, as she had called at mine ; and now 
 it was her turn not to answer. 
 
 I twisted the handle of the door. It yielded, and I 
 pushed the door open. 
 
 Sarah was sitting at a table, in the middle of the 
 neat, bare room. Her back was turned to me, and her 
 head was bowed down on her arms. So she must have 
 bowed it when she gave those few strangled sobs I had 
 heard through the wall ; but she was not sobbing now. 
 She sat quite still, tired out with grief, the little old 
 woman who had first loved me, then wronged me, and 
 loved me through all. 
 
 I went nearer, and looking over her shoulder saw 
 that she had interrupted herself in the midst of writing 
 a letter. Her arms and face were resting on it, so that 
 even if I had tried I could not have seen what was writ- 
 ten ; but I thought it must be the letter she had prom- 
 ised, for by her elbow lay an envelope addressed to 
 " John Upwood, Esq., Manager of the Northwest- 
 ern Bank, Kensington, London, England. Private. 
 Urgent." 
 
 A wave of pity surged up in me, making the tears 
 spring from my heart. I had never hated her, never 
 for a moment, really. 
 
 I laid my hand on the bowed gray head, with its neat 
 cap and tuft of ribbon. " How pathetic a back 
 is," I thought, " and how defenseless it looks, some- 
 how." 
 
 " Sarah," I said, " Sarah, dear, forgive me for not 
 letting you in. I thought then I had something to
 
 THE LIFE MASK 345 
 
 forgive you, a very big thing and hard to forget. I 
 heard all you said to Captain Shannon, but I do for- 
 give, and I don't want you to go away. We'll bear it 
 together, and we won't let the old love go. Oh, Sarah, 
 Sarah, I should die if I couldn't love you and I know 
 how you have loved me." 
 
 I thought she would raise her head, and look at 
 me, that she would stretch out her arms, and that I 
 should take her in mine. But the head lay still on the 
 folded arms which pillowed the hidden face. Gently 
 I slipped both my hands under her chin, and so lifted 
 the head that I might see her face in profile. Some- 
 thing fell from the table a fragment or two of thin 
 glass which had been in her handkerchief. I knew 
 what it was bits of a broken phial of amyl. She had 
 had a heart attack, and used this stuff to revive her- 
 self, as I had seen her do, more than once. But now 
 it had not been enough. 
 
 I knew that she was dead, not fainting, yet I went 
 on talking to her, as if she could hear what I said : 
 
 " Sarah, dear, I would not have let you go away. 
 No love could have made up to me for yours. And 
 you haven't spoiled my life. You have given me the 
 only things in it worth having, your love and Hugh's. 
 I shall love you always, as long as I live, and if I am 
 happy it will be through you. I'll make Hugh feel 
 all this too, dear. And as / forgive you, may God for- 
 give you, and forgive me for any pain I've caused you 
 to-day. He will forgive you, I know." 
 
 Her face, lying on my hand, was warm still, and wet
 
 346 THE LIFE MASK 
 
 with tears. It seemed to me as I looked that it smiled 
 up at me, and that a great peace was softly smoothing 
 the tired lines away. I would have given all the world 
 if I had been ten minutes sooner, yet even now I was 
 not too late. Her spirit had lingered to take my for- 
 giveness before it went away. I felt it near me in the 
 room, in the bright sunlight. 
 
 I was not unhappy, nor shocked, for the smile on the 
 prim little face was too sweet ; but sobs would come. 
 
 " Oh, if Hugh were here ! " I cried out aloud. 
 
 Perhaps by this time he was in the garden, waiting 
 for me. But I could not leave Sarah. 
 
 " Hugh ! " I called, again and again. 
 
 I heard his footstep. He was at the door. 
 
 " She is dead," I said, " but I have forgiven her. 
 And she knows." 
 
 Then I laid the smiling face down very gently, 
 and let Hugh take me in his arms. 
 
 THE END
 
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