1 1 1 !■.....* 
 
 
 PRINCESS SON I A 
 
 
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 M AG RUDER 
 
IN MEMORY OF 
 WILLIAM C. HABBERLEY 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
MAN ... HAD ST1 PPED 
 (SE1 PAl 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 BY 
 
 JULIA MAGRUDER 
 V 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 
 
 CHARLES DANA GIBSON 
 
 NEW YORK 
 THE CENTURY CO. 
 
 1895 
 
Copyright, 1895, by 
 The Century Co. 
 
 }Hl DC VINNE PRESS. 
 
Mz 
 
 TO GENEVIEVE 
 
 M598556 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 The beautiful young Woman . . 
 stepped back from her easel" 
 
 HAD 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 6 
 
 16 
 
 20 
 31 
 
 PAGE 37 
 
 39 
 43 
 5o 
 53 
 60 
 
 "A little American Chatterbox" 
 
 " A TALL OLD Man " 
 
 "The Princess was very tall" 
 
 " ' It will be quite safe, I see ' " 
 
 " ' Ah, I have made a Mistake, I see ' " 
 
 "'Alice has a fine Voice'" 
 
 " In the American Colony " 
 
 "Her Head in its large plumed Hat" 
 
 " ' Is it you, Martha ? ' " 
 
 " ' oh, i am so, so sorry ' " 
 
 "The Man who stood waiting to give the 
 
 Bride" 76 
 
 "'I knew it was Anguish to you"' page 92 
 
 "As she had seen her once before" 93 
 
 " ' Oh, Sonia, were you ever really as happy 
 
 AS THAT? "' 98 
 
 "'I beg your Pardon,' he said again" 104 
 
 "Among the Flower-stalls" 106 
 
 " Sonia passed very near him " 124 
 
 "She put on a long Cloak" 196 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 M 
 
 ARTHA KEENE had been at work 
 for several months in Etienne's atelier, 
 in the Latin quarter of Paris, and although her 
 appearance would have led one to believe her 
 frail in health, she had never missed a work- 
 ing-day, and always occupied a good position 
 well in view of the model, because she always 
 came among the earliest to secure it. Her 
 work was far from brilliant, and Etienne had 
 noticed her very little at first. If he did so 
 more of late, it was her ability to stick which 
 had won her this favor. So many students 
 had come and gone, rousing his hopes only 
 to disappoint them, that it had got to be rather 
 a comfort to the little old man to be sure of 
 one earnest worker always in her place ; and 
 while he could not say that her work was good, 
 it was certainly not bad. 
 
2 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Recently he had tokl Martha this several 
 times. "Not bad" was about the highest 
 praise that most of Etienne's pupils got from 
 him ; and when the young American girl heard 
 it for the first time applied to her work, she 
 experienced what was perhaps one of the most 
 thrilling sensations of her life. 
 
 It was followed by another thrilling sensa- 
 tion ; for, as she looked up from the canvas 
 which the master had thus commended, she 
 met the beautiful eyes of the princess, turned 
 upon her with a congratulatory smile. 
 
 It was almost too much for Martha. Her 
 heart thumped so that her breathing became 
 rapid and a little difficult. Instead of answer- 
 ing the princess's smile, a frown contracted her 
 forehead ; for she was afraid that she was 
 going to lose her self-control, and she needed 
 a stern effort not to do so. Martha had a heart 
 which was made for worshiping. Etienne and 
 the princess were two of the people that she 
 worshiped, and there was a third. 
 
 When Etienne had passed on, after smudg- 
 ing one part of her drawing with his thumb 
 until it was a dirty blur, and scratching an- 
 other part with ruthless streaks of soft char- 
 coal, slu: remembered she had received his 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 3 
 
 first words of encouragement rather coldly, 
 and had made the same sort of return for the 
 princess's smile. This plunged her from a 
 state of delight into one of wretchedness. She 
 looked toward the master with some hope of 
 making amends ; but he was too absorbed in 
 his next criticism, and it was only too evident 
 that her chance was gone. Then she glanced 
 at the princess, to receive the same impres- 
 sion from that quarter. The beautiful young 
 woman on whom her eyes rested had stepped 
 back from her easel, and with her head turned 
 sidewise, and her eyelids drawn up, was look- 
 ing at her picture. She held a brush in one 
 hand, with the fingers delicately poised, and 
 in the other her palette, laid with brilliant dabs 
 of color. Her lips were pursed critically, and 
 her whole attitude and expression showed 
 such absorption in her work that Martha felt 
 it would be absurd to imagine that she or her 
 behavior could have any part in that beautiful 
 lady's consciousness. 
 
 As usual, when Martha allowed herself to 
 look at the princess, she forgot everything 
 else. She had lono- aofo had to make it a rule 
 to place her easel so that she would be turned 
 away from her enchantress while she was work- 
 
4 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 ing ; otherwise she could see and think only 
 of her. At the present moment she was com- 
 pletely fascinated by the tall, strong figure, so 
 firmly poised, with one foot advanced, and her 
 body thrown backward from the slender waist, 
 where a belt of old silver confined the folds 
 of her red silk shirt-waist above the sweep of 
 her skirt of dark ereen ser^e. This was her 
 ordinary working-rig ; and as she wore no 
 apron, as most of the other students did, it 
 was more or less streaked with paint. Martha 
 herself wore her calico apron religiously, and 
 was always neatly clothed beneath it ; but she 
 would have protested utterly against seeing 
 her neighbor in an apron. It would have 
 looked so unprincesslike ! She was very tall 
 and straight, this princess, and " Serene High- 
 ness" seemed to Martha to be written on 
 every inch of her. 
 
 There was not much sociability among the 
 students in the atelier. They came from many 
 different countries, and spoke many different 
 tongues ; and they were such a mixture of 
 aristocrats and plebeians — some were so afraid 
 of patronizing and others of being patronized, 
 — that the conditions generally were such as 
 were opposed to much mixing. Talking was 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 5 
 
 forbidden during work-hours, except the little 
 absolutely necessary whispering ; and in the 
 intermission at noon the princess always went 
 away for lunch, and sometimes did not return. 
 Martha, too, went to her mother's apartment 
 for the midday meal, though nothing ever pre- 
 vented her from returning. Some of the stu- 
 dents had chums, with whom they chatted 
 glibly in the cloak-room ; but as a rule, these 
 intimacies had been formed outside. 
 
 Martha Keene was a girl who would never 
 have made the first advance toward an acquain- 
 tance with any one ; for, although she had 
 passed her twentieth year, she was incorrigi- 
 bly shy. This reserve of manner was so evi- 
 dent that it discouraged advances from others. 
 She knew this and regretted it, but could not 
 help it. 
 
 It had pleased Martha very much when, on 
 a single occasion, this wall of isolation which 
 she had built around herself had been broken 
 through by a little American chatterbox, who 
 had rattled away to her for ten minutes one 
 day as she was waiting for her carriage in the 
 cloak-room. This had been soon after her 
 entrance at Etienne's, and her voluble coun- 
 try-woman had vanished from the horizon the 
 
6 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 next day ; but in that one talk she had got al- 
 most all the knowledge of the atelier which 
 she possessed. 
 
 Her informant had told her that the stu- 
 dents were not supposed to inquire about one 
 another at all, the ideal of the atelier being a 
 place where high and low alike could lay aside 
 their disabilities and ^et the benefits of the com- 
 mon workshop. She added that there had been 
 several personages of importance studying 
 there since she herself had been a student, 
 but that she had always heard of it from the 
 outside, and they had generally left before she 
 had identified them. " I spotted the princess, 
 though," she had said. " As soon as I heard 
 that there w r as a Russian princess studying 
 here, I picked her out. Do you know which 
 one she is?" Martha had answered, "The 
 lady in the red blouse " — a guess at once con- 
 firmed. " Is n't she stunning?" her compan- 
 ion had gone on ; "I 'm dying to speak to 
 her! If she were not a princess, I 'd have 
 done it long ago. I can't go the Russian ; but 
 no doubt she speaks every language. Rus- 
 sians always do." At this point of the conver- 
 sation the lady herself had come into the 
 cloak-room. A neat French maid who was 
 
A LITTLE AMERICAN CHATTERBOX. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 7 
 
 in waiting had come forward, and held out 
 her lady's wrap, a magnificent sable thing, in 
 which the beautiful creature had quickly in- 
 folded herself, and left the room, the two girls 
 meanwhile making a tremendous effort to 
 cover their breathless interest by an air of 
 unconsciousness. 
 
 Ever since that day — indeed, even before it 
 — Martha had been a silent worshiper at the 
 shrine of the princess. She had a passionate 
 love of beauty, and her heart, for all her grave 
 and shy exterior, was packed as full of ro- 
 mance as it could hold. The discovery that 
 this beautiful being was a princess — and a 
 Russian princess, of all others — was meet food 
 for this appetite for the romantic ; and she 
 dreamed by the hour about this young woman's 
 life, and wondered what it had been and was 
 to be. She knew she could not be many years 
 older than herself, and she wondered, with 
 burning interest, whether she was or was not 
 married. Sometimes she would hold to one 
 opinion for days, and then something — a mere 
 turn of expression, perhaps — would convert 
 her to the opposite one. She wanted her to 
 be unmarried, so that she might be free to 
 construct from her imagination a beautiful 
 
8 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 future for her ; and yet she dreaded to find out 
 that she was married. There was certainly a 
 look about the princess which contradicted 
 Martha's ideal of her as the possessor of a 
 fair, unwritten life-page. Martha had watched 
 her hands to see if she wore a weddincr-rine ; 
 but those extraordinarily beautiful hands were 
 either loaded down with jeweled gauds of an- 
 tique workmanship or else quite ringless. Still, 
 many married women were careless about 
 wearing their wedding-rings, a thing which 
 Martha herself could not comprehend ; but she 
 felt that this wonderful creature was removed 
 as far as possible from her in both actuality 
 and ideas. 
 
 Martha had heard the sound of the princess's 
 voice only once or twice, and on those occa- 
 sions she had spoken French with what seemed 
 to the American girl an absolutely perfect ac- 
 cent. Once she had been near enough to hear 
 a little talk between the princess and Etienne, 
 as he was criticizing the former's work with 
 rather morehumanness, Martha thought, than 
 he showed to the students generally ; and once 
 or twice when the princess had been placed 
 near the model's little retiring-room, Martha 
 had had the joy of hearing her divinity give 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 9 
 
 the summons, in the usual atelier jargon, 
 " Cest Theure ! " It seemed to the ^irl a most 
 lovable act of condescension on the part of 
 her Serene Highness. 
 
 One day (it was the day after Etienne had 
 told her that her drawing was " not bad," and 
 the princess had smiled at her) Martha was 
 working away, when she became aware that 
 an easel was being pushed into the unoccupied 
 space at her right hand. She had known that 
 some one would soon take possession of this 
 place, and she did not even look round to see 
 who it was. Her whole attention was bent on 
 making Etienne see that his encouragement 
 had yielded good fruit, even though she had 
 made no verbal acknowledgment of it. She 
 went on drawing, with intense concentration, 
 until, weary at last, she put down her charcoal, 
 and stood resting her arms, with her hands on 
 her hips. As she finished her scrutiny of her 
 work, and looked around, she started to dis- 
 cover that it was the princess who was seated 
 at the easel next her own, and was looking 
 full at her. As Martha, confused and de- 
 lighted, encountered that gaze, the beautiful 
 lady's lips parted in a friendly smile, and she 
 whispered gently, 
 
io THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 " Bon jour." 
 
 Martha crimsoned with pleasure as she re- 
 turned the greeting, and then both fell to work 
 again. The princess was painting, laying on 
 her color in a broad and daring style that al- 
 most frightened her neighbor. Martha watched 
 her furtively while she crumbled her bread, 
 and pretended to be erasing and touching up 
 certain points in her picture. It was a bewil- 
 dering delight to her to stand so close to the 
 princess and see her at work, and she was 
 agreeably aware that the princess was also 
 aware of her, and perhaps even pleased at 
 their being together. 
 
 When the time came for the model to rest, 
 and the quiet of the room was a little relieved 
 by the whispered talk that sprang up among 
 the students as they waited, Martha felt that 
 the princess had inclined toward her a little, 
 and was looking at her work. She put down 
 as childish the impulse that rushed up in her 
 to cover the picture from sight, or to say how 
 bad she knew it was, and she stood very still 
 and very much embarrassed until the princess 
 said again, in that exquisite utterance of French 
 subtleties, 
 
 " C'est bien difficile, n'est-ce pas ? " 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA n 
 
 Martha answered her somehow — she never 
 knew what. 
 
 When the model came back, and they began 
 to work again, she felt that she had become 
 part of a wonderful experience. She had 
 never seen the princess talking to any one 
 else, and, amazing and undeserved as the trib- 
 ute was, she could not be mistaken in thinking 
 that the lovely lady wished to know her, and 
 perhaps to allow her the dear privilege of such 
 intercourse as their atelier life permitted. She 
 never expected it to go beyond that ; but that 
 was far more than anything she had imagined. 
 
 Across one corner of her canvas Martha's 
 name was scrawled in full, and she knew that 
 the princess must have seen it. She looked to 
 see if there was any signature upon the prin- 
 cess's picture, and, asif interpreting herthought, 
 her neighbor, with a brilliant smile, dipped her 
 brush in vermilion, and wrote in a bold, strong 
 hand the word " Sonia." This name (which 
 Martha did not know to be the Russian abbre- 
 viation of Sophia) seemed to the girl very odd 
 and beautiful, and peculiarly appropriate to its 
 possessor. 
 
II 
 
 Martha said nothing to her mother and 
 sisters of her encounter with the princess. She 
 had a way of locking very close in her heart 
 her most personal and sacred feelings, and all 
 that related to the princess was sacred to her 
 now. During her earlier years she had so 
 often been laughed at for an enthusiast that 
 she had learned to keep back what she felt 
 most strongly ; and for that very reason, per- 
 haps, the intensity of her feelings grew greater 
 as she grew older. The enthusiasm of her life 
 was for her only brother, whom she worshiped 
 with a blind idolatry of the extent of which 
 even he was unaware. There had been one 
 or two other divinities in her horizon, always 
 second to Harold ; but at this period of her 
 life she was suffering from a sense of disap- 
 pointment in these as, one after the other, they 
 had come short of her ardent expectations. 
 She was now, therefore, in the exact state of 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 13 
 
 mind to take on a new object of worship. This 
 the princess had become. 
 
 It was not surprising that Martha's ideal 
 had been so repeatedly unrealized, for it was 
 a difficult one. She had suffered acutely from 
 her former disappointments, and had even re- 
 solved never to pin her faith and hope on an- 
 other woman. But the princess was not to be 
 resisted. Martha felt that even if her goddess 
 never spoke to her again, she was worthy of 
 all adoration. 
 
 As the young girl drove through the streets 
 of Paris in the early morning of the day fol- 
 lowing her brief interview with the princess, 
 her heart was very happy. 
 
 In appearance Martha was small and rather 
 plain ; and no one would have noticed her, per- 
 haps, but for the concentration of expression 
 on her face as she looked out of the carriage 
 window on her way to her atelier in the Latin 
 Quarter. The people abroad at that hour were 
 not of a class to pay much attention to such a 
 look on a girl's face. The little army of street- 
 cleaners, occupying their brief hour with busy 
 industry to produce the beautiful effect of gay 
 cleanliness which the world enjoyed later in 
 the day, had no time to notice Martha, and 
 
14 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 she was as unaware of them. Even the ice 
 on the figures in the fountains of the Place 
 de la Concorde, which she generally admired 
 in passing, she did not so much as see to-day. 
 The "cold sea-maidens" wore an unusually 
 beautiful veil of mist, made by the freezing 
 spray, and Martha might have got an impres- 
 sion for some future picture if she had studied 
 it with the early sunlight on it. 
 
 But she was thinking only of the princess 
 as she drove alonir and crossed the bridge and 
 entered old Paris. Here, too, all was familiar, 
 for Martha had taken this drive daily for 
 months, and there was nothing to disturb her 
 preoccupation until she reached the Invalides, 
 where her hero-worshiping soul never failed 
 to offer a passing tribute of awe to the ashes 
 of Napoleon. 
 
 As she turned into a cross street farther 
 on, a little funeral procession met her. This 
 sight, too, was familiar; but no wont and 
 usage could keep Martha from being deeply 
 moved as often as she witnessed the pitiful 
 little ceremonial which attends the burial of 
 the very poor in Paris. 
 
 It is usually in the early morning that 
 these funerals occur, as there seems to be a 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 15 
 
 demand upon the poor to give up to the 
 more prosperous even the space in the streets 
 which they, with their dead, lay claim to for 
 so short a time. This was a child's funeral, 
 or, rather, it was the funeral of two children. 
 There was neither hearse nor carriage. Each 
 little coffin was borne upon a wretched bier 
 carried by rough and shabby men, who ap- 
 peared cross and reluctant in their miserable, 
 faded trappings of mourning. Looking care- 
 fully, Martha discovered that there was a 
 separate family of mourners to each little 
 bier; and as the whole procession was under 
 the command of a tall old man, who held his 
 shoulders very erect, as if to atone for a limp 
 in one leg, she comprehended that this be- 
 dizened old undertaker, with the ragged crape 
 on his cocked hat and the dirty bunches of 
 black and white ribbons on the end of his 
 long staff of office, had consolidated his du- 
 ties, probably at a slight and very welcome 
 discount to his poor patrons, and was bury- 
 ing the dead of two families at once. Directly 
 after him came the bearers of the light coffin, 
 and just behind it were five little children, 
 four girls and a boy, walking abreast, and 
 dressed in mourning. This mourning con- 
 
16 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 sisted of hastily fashioned aprons made of 
 dull black calico, and so carelessly fitted that 
 the many-colored undergarments of the chil- 
 dren showed plainly at every opening. The 
 children were regular little steps, the boy 
 being the youngest ; and cold as it was, they 
 were all bareheaded. Each carried a sprig 
 of yellow bloom, which resembled, if indeed 
 it was not, the mustard- flower. This they 
 held very stiffly and correctly in their right 
 hands, and they walked with an air of the 
 utmost decorum. Behind them came their 
 father and mother, the former looking more 
 apathetic than sad, and the latter carrying 
 with some complacency the dignity of a dingy 
 and draggled crape veil, in frank contrast to 
 a blue-and-green plaid dress. She was taller 
 than her husband, and leaned awkwardly 
 upon his arm, keeping no time whatever to 
 his shuffling' gait Then came the other cof- 
 fin and the second group of mourners, who 
 were evidently not so fashionable as the first ; 
 for they made no effort at mourning, and 
 walked after their little dead one with no- 
 thing like a flower, and in their common 
 working- clothes. 
 
 While Martha's carriage was passing this 
 
A TALL OLD' MAN." 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 17 
 
 procession, she saw on the other side of them, 
 eoine in the same direction with her, a smart 
 turnout in which a gentleman was driving, 
 with a eroom behind. The horses shone like 
 satin, and their harness jingled and glittered 
 in the morning sunshine. The gentleman and 
 his servant were dressed with a brilliant effect 
 of care and detail. The former was smoking 
 a cigarette, and had a scarlet flower in his coat. 
 
 As the little funeral procession passed this 
 carriage, the young swell who was driving 
 bared his head, with its smoothly parted blond 
 hair, remaining uncovered until the procession 
 had passed, his servant imitating his act. This 
 little tribute of homage to death which the 
 French take the pains to perform always 
 touched and pleased Martha. She thought of 
 the absurdity of this man's uncovering his head 
 to that pauper baby alive ; but the mystery of 
 death imparted to it a majesty which the equal 
 mystery of life could not. This child was a par- 
 taker of the knowledge of the unknown, into 
 which Napoleon, lying near by, had also en- 
 tered, and was, with him, divided from the 
 merely mortal. 
 
 Martha thought of this as she watched the 
 showy carriage, which had relaxed its speed 
 
i8 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 for a moment, whirling- rapidly away toward 
 the outskirts of the city. She wondered where 
 that handsome, prosperous-looking, well-bred 
 man was going at this early hour. Probably 
 to fight a duel, she thought, in her romantic 
 way ! Perhaps in a few hours' time he might 
 be as dead as the poor little baby ; and per- 
 haps there was some one who loved and adored 
 him as she did Harold ! 
 
 These were the ideas which filled her mind 
 as she reached the atelier, there to learn that 
 there was a disappointment about the model, 
 who had failed to come. 
 
 She was about to take off her wraps, and go 
 to work on some drawings from casts, when 
 an exquisite voice behind her said suddenly, 
 " Pardon, mademoiselle," and she turned to 
 meet the gaze of the princess fixed upon her 
 with a smile of lovely friendliness. 
 
 "What are you going to do?" she said in 
 that faultless French which Martha had already 
 admired. 
 
 For a moment the girl was quite overcome 
 at such unexpected graciousness. Then she 
 managed to say in her own faulty though per- 
 fectly fluent French, that she had thought she 
 would go on and do what she could without a 
 model. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 19 
 
 tl It is so dull, after having that glorious An- 
 tonio to pose for one," said the princess. " I 
 am not in the humor, and my carriage is gone. 
 Yours, perhaps, is gone also. Do you feel like 
 drawing to-day ? Or do you, perhaps, feel 
 more like calling a cab, and taking a drive 
 with me ? I should like it. Will you go ? " 
 
 Martha crimsoned with pleasure as she ac- 
 cepted the invitation. There was no mistak- 
 ing her delight at the suggestion. 
 
 " You are very good to go," said the other, 
 " especially as you know nothing of me, I 
 suppose." 
 
 " I know only that you are the princess — 
 the Russian princess," said Martha. 
 
 Her companion frowned slightly, and, Mar- 
 tha thought, looked a little annoyed. She re- 
 flected that she ought not, perhaps, to have told 
 her that her secret had been discovered. 
 
 The little frown soon passed, however, and 
 the princess smiled genially as she said : 
 
 " I am living incognito in Paris to study 
 painting, and I do not go into the world. When 
 I am not working I am often bored, and I fre- 
 quently long for companionship. You make 
 me very grateful by giving me yours this 
 morning." 
 
20 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 The princess was very tall — so tall that when 
 Martha walked at her side she had to turn her 
 face upward to speak to her. They walked 
 along in the most natural companionship until 
 they reached a cab-stand near by, and Martha 
 thought her divinity more worshipful than ever 
 as she stood wrapped in her long cloak, with a 
 large, black-plumed hat crowning her beautiful 
 head, and said some words of gentle pity about 
 the poor old, weak-kneed cab-horses drawn up 
 in a line. 
 
 When they had entered a cab, and were 
 seated side by side, the princess said abruptly : 
 
 "If you had not heard something of me, I 
 should have told you nothing. Why should 
 we ask questions about each other ? We meet 
 to-day, art students in a Paris atelier, and we 
 shall part to-morrow. What have we to do with 
 formalities? Of you I know that you are a 
 young American studying painting here, and 
 I think, in a way, sympathetic to me. I am 
 content to know that, and no more, of you. 
 Do you feel the same about me ? " 
 
 Martha replied eagerly in the affirmative, 
 and in five minutes the two had come to a per- 
 fect understanding. The snrl felt her awe at 
 being in "the presence" gradually fading away, 
 
THE PRINCESS WAS VERY TALI.," 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 21 
 
 as this winning young woman sat and talked 
 with her on a footing of friendly equality. It 
 was after a short silence between them that 
 the princess said : 
 
 " There are one or two things that it will be 
 necessary for you to know — that is, if you like 
 me well enough to come to see me, as I hope 
 you do. I am living in the Rue Presbourg, 
 and when you come to see me, you are to ask 
 for the apartment of the Princess Manner- 
 norff. You will come, will you not ? " 
 
 " Oh, if you will only let me, it will be my 
 greatest happiness ! " said Martha. " I can't 
 understand what has made you so good to 
 me!" 
 
 " Simply, I like you. It is n't hard to under- 
 stand. I 've noticed you a long time, and I 've 
 liked you more and more. I like your manner ; 
 I like your face ; I like your devotion to your 
 work ; and I like your work." 
 
 " My work ! My scratching and smudging, 
 you mean ! Oh, how can you notice it or care 
 for it when you look at yours ? Every one 
 must see that Etienne knows that you are his 
 best pupil. He does not speak to any one as 
 he does to you, and you must know as well as 
 I that it is not because you are a princess." 
 
22 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 " Yes, of course ; I know that perfectly well. 
 But I fancy that Etienne, in his little critical 
 heart, feels that he has n't got out of me what 
 he looked for at first. At least, I have that 
 idea ; and you see I have studied enough, com- 
 pared with you, to be a great deal further 
 ahead of you than I am. I have digged and 
 delved for that treasure more than you realize. 
 I hope to do something tolerable some day ; 
 but I 'm not as confident about it as I used to 
 be, and I fear Etienne is not, either. Oh, I 
 wish I could ! " 
 
 She said this with such fervor, and followed 
 it by such a wistful sigh, that Martha, who had 
 not yet taken in the idea that the princess 
 might not be the all-fortunate creature she 
 imagined, felt a sudden protest against the 
 thought of her wishing for anything vainly. 
 
 " Surely you will ! " she said. " I can't ima- 
 gine your wanting anything very much with- 
 out getting it." 
 
 The princess laughed, throwing up her 
 chin, and looking at Martha with an indul- 
 gent smile. 
 
 44 You can't ? " she exclaimed. <4 Well, if you 
 take the trouble to continue my acquaintance, 
 you will find that I Ye missed pretty much 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 23 
 
 everything in life that I very greatly wanted. 
 It is sad, but true." 
 
 Martha did not answer, but she looked as 
 if she would like to speak out something that 
 was on her mind, and her companion saw this, 
 and said : 
 
 "What is it? Speak! I give you full per- 
 mission." 
 
 " It was nothing," said Martha, rather con- 
 fusedly. "I was wondering about you — as, 
 of course, I can't help doing. I don't want to 
 be told things, however. I would far rather 
 imagine how they are." 
 
 "Very, very sensible. I see that I shall like 
 you more and more. There are a few things, 
 however, which it will be well for you to know. 
 For instance," — she paused, with a slight look 
 of reluctance, and then went on rapidly, — " no 
 doubt you wonder whether I am married." 
 
 Martha's eyes confirmed her. 
 
 A cloud seemed to have settled with sur- 
 prising suddenness upon the face of the prin- 
 cess. She looked fixedly at the passing pros- 
 pect outside the window as, after a moment of 
 difficult silence, she said almost brusquely : 
 
 " I am a widow." Then she turned and 
 looked at Martha. " You will understand, for 
 
24 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 the future," she went on more naturally, "my 
 wish for silence on this subject. I am living 
 temporarily in Paris with my aunt. I used to 
 know French society well, but I am out of it 
 now, and I don't regret it. Painting is the 
 only thing I really care for — that, and music, 
 and some books ; some, but not many. Books 
 give such false ideas of life. I think it was 
 what I read in books that led me to expect so 
 much. I was not to be convinced but that all 
 the happiness I imagined was quite possible ; 
 and when it would not come to me, I thought 
 there was a force in me which could compel it. 
 As a rule, I Ve given that idea up ; but there 
 are times even yet when it rises and conquers 
 me. I know it is very foolish, and that expe- 
 rience cures one of such feelings, but I 'm not 
 altogether cured yet, in spite of hard and re- 
 peated blows." 
 
 Martha had listened with intense interest, 
 and now, as her companion paused, she felt 
 that she ought to volunteer, on her part, some 
 sort of sketch of herself and her surroundings. 
 
 " I don't care to tell you anything about 
 myself," she said, " because it 's so uninterest- 
 ing. My father has been dead a great many 
 years ; mama is delicate ; and we live in Paris 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 25 
 
 so that I may study painting and the younger 
 girls may have lessons. We go to America 
 for the summers. My brother is the eldest of 
 us, and he lives there. The younger girls are 
 pretty, and mama wishes them to go into so- 
 ciety and to be admired. She used also to 
 wish this for me, but she saw how I hated it, 
 and how little chance I had in it, so she lets 
 me alone now, particularly since I got Harold 
 to speak to her." 
 
 "Are you sure that she would not disap- 
 prove of your friendship with me, knowing of 
 me only the little that you are able to tell 
 her? ' ' 
 
 "Yes; I'm certain of it. She would n't 
 mind. She knows I never get into mischief. 
 I feel perfectly free to do as I choose about 
 this, and I don't mean to mention you to any 
 one — not because there would be any objec- 
 tion, but because you are too sacred to me, 
 and if you let me be your friend, I can't share 
 that knowledge and possession with any one." 
 
 Martha was determined to say this, but she 
 did not accomplish it without a good deal of 
 hesitation and embarrassment. Her compan- 
 ion looked at her with a sort of wondering 
 scrutiny. 
 
26 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 " Where do you get that earnest, concen- 
 trated nature, I wonder — so different from 
 mine ! " she said. " Does it go with the Amer- 
 ican character ? Your words are very foolish, 
 child ; but it is so long since any one has 
 held me sacred that I am ridiculously touched 
 by it." 
 
 There was something that looked like rising 
 tears in the beautiful eyes of the princess ; but 
 a gay little laugh soon banished the shadow 
 from both her face and her voice. Suddenly 
 she sat upright and said : 
 
 " Suppose you come home with me now ! I 
 want you to learn the ways of the place, so 
 that you may come and go as you please. 
 Will you come with me there to-day ? " 
 
 Martha agreed at once, and with evident 
 satisfaction the princess leaned out of the win- 
 dow, and gave the address to the cabman. 
 
Ill 
 
 Martha felt herself in a dream of delight as 
 she descended from the cab, and, following the 
 princess into the courtyard of a large apart- 
 ment-house in the Rue Presbourg, mounted 
 the stairs at her side. 
 
 Their ring was answered by a foreign-look- 
 ing man-servant, to whom the princess spoke 
 in a tongue which Martha recognized as Rus- 
 sian, but of which she understood not a word. 
 She saw, however, that it related to herself; 
 for the servant, who wore a curious and elabo- 
 rate livery, looked at her and bowed. 
 
 " I have been telling him," explained the 
 princess, " that whenever you come you are to 
 be brought at once to my private sitting-room, 
 whether I am at home to other people or not. 
 If it should chance that I cannot see you, — 
 an unlikely thing, for I generally do what I 
 want, and I shall always want to see you, — 
 my maid can bring you word there. You see, 
 
23 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 I am not going to take any risk of having you 
 turned away from my door." 
 
 The antechamber into which they had been 
 admitted was charmingly furnished, not at 
 all in the French style ; and there was some- 
 thing in the whole environment of the princess 
 which commended itself strongly to Martha's 
 artistic taste. Everything that she saw, as 
 she passed along, deepened this impression. 
 She followed her companion in excited silence 
 through the antechamber, and into the large 
 and sunny salon, where two persons were 
 sitting. 
 
 One was a little old lady with very white 
 hair, elaborately arranged under a queer-look- 
 ing lace cap fastened with jeweled pins ; the 
 other was a dark and severely dressed woman, 
 who, Martha at once saw, was a sort of com- 
 panion or maid. As the princess approached, 
 this woman rose and courtesied. The old lady 
 looked up, with some surprise in her placid 
 face, and immediately laid down her embroi- 
 dery, and took up a silver ear-trumpet, holding 
 out her other hand to the princess. 
 
 The latter bent, and kissed the proffered 
 fingers lightly, and then, raising her voice 
 a little, uttered several sentences in Russian 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 29 
 
 into the trumpet, at the same time indicating 
 Martha in a way that made her understand 
 that this was an introduction. The girl also 
 bent, and kissed the hand now extended to 
 her, and then the princess led her away. 
 
 " My poor aunt is so deaf," she said, "that 
 it is almost impossible to talk to her, and I 
 could not go into any long explanation about 
 you. She never interferes with me, however, 
 and no questions will be asked. Come now 
 to my own room." 
 
 Martha, following her companion, found 
 herself in a small boudoir opening into a 
 bedroom. The door of the latter was open, 
 and the two apartments gave an impression 
 which she told herself she could best describe 
 by the word lovable. The musical instru- 
 ments stood open. The lounges and chairs 
 seemed to have taken the shapes of their 
 occupants. Flowers that looked as if they 
 had been willingly plucked were all about 
 in vases. Well-worn volumes and drawing- 
 books were scattered about, and some of the 
 princess's atelier studies were placed against 
 the walls on the floor. Martha, who could 
 hardly believe in her good fortune in having 
 received even the smallest notice from the 
 
30 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 princess, was yet more bewildered and de> 
 lighted when the latter crossed the little bou- 
 doir, and led her into the bedroom. 
 
 Here the French maid whom Martha had 
 seen at the atelier sat sewing. She stood 
 up, evidently surprised. As she courtesied, 
 and came forward to take her lady's wraps, 
 the latter hastily threw her cloak to her, and 
 then, striking her hands together with a 
 quick little clap, said : 
 
 "Va-t'en, Felicie!" 
 
 The maid smiled. She and her mistress 
 evidently understood each other well. Deftly 
 gathering up her work, she left the room, 
 and Martha found herself alone with her 
 divinity, in the privacy of her own bedroom. 
 She felt quite foolishly happy. Perhaps the 
 princess saw it, for she said, with her bewil- 
 dering smile : 
 
 " You like it, do you not ? You need n't 
 explain. I see you do, just as I saw that 
 you liked me, without your saying a word. 
 I am so glad." 
 
 "Like you!" said Martha, protestingly. 
 "Oh!" 
 
 Then the princess came and stood in front 
 of the young girl, and put her arms around 
 
IT WILL BE QUITE SAFE, I SEE. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 31 
 
 her neck, clasping her long hands at the 
 back, and looking down at her. 
 
 "It will be quite safe, I see," she said, still 
 smiling, "for me to make my confession to 
 you, and own that I was drawn to you in 
 quite an extraordinary way. I really did not 
 mean to go so fast, however; and if I had 
 stopped to think, I should probably not have 
 proposed to you to take this drive with me. 
 But for once I am glad that I did not stop 
 to think. My impetuosity is generally my 
 bane in everything. This time I feel that 
 it has brought me a blessing. I can prove 
 to you that it is not my habit to go out to 
 strangers in this way by the fact that I am 
 so friendless. I have no intimate friend in 
 Paris, though I know scores of people here. 
 If I like you, and want to see more of you t 
 and you have the same feeling toward me, 
 why should we not indulge ourselves ? Very 
 well ! So we will ! " and she bent, and kissed 
 Martha on the cheek. 
 
 The girl's heart quivered with joy ; but she 
 could find no words in which to express it, 
 so she was quite silent. She felt herself very 
 stupid as she let the princess take off her 
 wraps and hat, and lead her to a seat. 
 
32 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "Now," said the lovely lady, "as I am 
 one of those people who must be comfort- 
 able before they can be happy, I am going to 
 put on a loose gown. No excuses necessary, 
 I know." 
 
 She disappeared for a moment, and came 
 back in an exquisite garment of pale-blue silk 
 with borderings of dark fur. She had seemed 
 to Martha very splendid and beautiful before, 
 but now she was so winning, so sweet, so 
 adorable, that the young girl felt her whole 
 heart glow with delight as, with a long-drawn 
 sigh of ease, the princess threw herself on the 
 lounge at her side. 
 
 " Now," she said, as her hand closed on 
 Martha's, "talk to me." 
 
 Poor Martha ! What could she say? Her 
 gratefulness for this unexpected confidence 
 and friendliness moved her almost to tears, 
 but she was silent. 
 
 "Talk to me, Martha," said the princess, 
 coaxingly. " I may call you that, may I 
 not?" 
 
 She called it " Mart'a," with her pretty 
 foreign utterance ; and Martha thought her 
 homely name had suddenly become ador- 
 able. But she could not even tell this to 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 33 
 
 the princess. How dull and stupid she was ! 
 Her consent must have shown itself in her 
 eyes, however, for the princess went on : 
 
 "I can't call you Martha unless you call 
 me by my name, too. Will you? I have 
 a fancy to hear you say it now. Will you 
 call me by my little Russian name — Sonia?" 
 
 It was evident that the girl's silence did 
 not offend her. She must have understood its 
 basis, for she said, with an encouraging smile : 
 
 "Say it. Say ' Sonia.'" 
 
 " Oh, you are too good to me ! " exclaimed 
 Martha. " You spoke of knowing that I 
 liked you. I don't like you — I love you! 
 I don't love you — I adore you! O Sonia!" 
 and the girl actually slipped from the low 
 chair to her knees beside the lounge. 
 
 The princess jumped to her feet, and with 
 strong hands lifted Martha to hers; then 
 holding both the girl's hands, and stretching 
 her arms apart to their full length, as their 
 two faces were drawn together thus, she 
 kissed Martha with affectionate warmth. 
 
 " What a dear thing you are ! " she said. 
 " How good it is to see some one who can 
 really feel ! How tired one gets of the fin- 
 de-siecle spirit in both women and men ! 
 
34 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Bless you, my Martha ! You have come to 
 be a great joy in my life. I feel that we 
 are going to be friends for always — do 
 you ? " 
 
 " Oh, if you will let me ! If you will only 
 not be disappointed in me ! I am afraid to 
 speak, afraid to breathe almost, for fear that 
 you will find out that I am only a poor, com- 
 monplace little creature, in whom your good- 
 ness has made you see something which does 
 not exist. Oh, I pray I may not disappoint 
 you ! And yet how can I dare to hope ? " 
 
 " Listen, Martha," said the princess in a 
 matter-of-fact tone, as she drew the other 
 down to a seat beside her on the lounge ; 
 "let us take each other quite simply, and not 
 promise anything. We will just agree to be 
 perfectly natural with each other — just to 
 be ourselves. If you continue to like me, 
 and I you, it is all right. If not, we shall 
 have broken no pledges and done each other 
 no wrong. Now, with that basis to go upon, 
 we can both feel natural and satisfied. Only 
 don't cover up your real self to me, for you 
 may be concealing just what I love, and pre- 
 tending what I hate. It is because you are 
 different from others that I have been so 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 35 
 
 drawn to you. Now don't try to be like 
 other people, and ruin everything." 
 
 " Oh, I feel I can be myself with you. I 
 feel I can tell you everything that is in 
 my heart, and talk of things that I have 
 never been able to speak of to others. How 
 beautiful it is! How strange that such a 
 relationship between two women can come 
 about here in Paris in this age of the 
 world ! " 
 
 " It could not if we were Parisians ; but 
 both of us being foreign to this atmosphere, 
 it can. I love your being an American. I felt 
 sure you were even before I asked Etienne." 
 
 ''And did he tell you? I have always un- 
 derstood that he never answered questions 
 about his students." 
 
 11 So have I ; but I asked him all the same, 
 and he told me who you were. I had quite 
 fancied you before, and after that I fancied 
 you still more, as I love the ideal of the Amer- 
 ican, a creature newer from Nature's hands, 
 and nearer to her heart, than we of the Old 
 World ; and, fortunately or otherwise, I have 
 known too few of your people either to con- 
 firm or contradict this idea. So now I think 
 I shall go on liking you. And how is it with 
 
36 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 you ? Do you think you will not be disap- 
 pointed in me? " 
 
 Her beautiful lips widened in a smile of 
 broad amusement that made her eyes twin- 
 kle. Martha looked at her with a speechless 
 adoration which she could not have been 
 so dense as to misunderstand. 
 
 " How delightful ! " said the princess. " It 
 has been so long since I have permitted my- 
 self the luxury of a friend that my appetite 
 for one is all the keener." 
 
 She had thrown herself back on the lounge, 
 and as Martha sat down by her, the princess 
 again took her hand, saying as she did so : 
 
 " Now I will tell you two things about my- 
 self at the outset of our acquaintance : one is 
 that I love to ask questions ; the other is that 
 I hate to be questioned. Will you remember 
 these facts, and will you be as frank with me 
 if I do what you don't like ? I am very nearly 
 certain that we shall get on together admir- 
 ably, for the reason that I know you have no 
 vulgar curiosity about me or my affairs. You 
 have sense enough to be convinced by one 
 look at my aunt, if there were nothing else, 
 that I am respectable. Now I am pretty 
 confident that you have an impulse to talk 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 37 
 
 out freely to me, and to answer any ques- 
 tions that I may choose to put — all the more 
 
 "«AH, I HAVE MADE A MISTAKE, I SEE.'" 
 
 so because your general habit is one of strict 
 reserve." 
 
 The princess kept her eye on her compan- 
 ion's face while she was talking, and she could 
 tell by its expression that she had interpreted 
 her correctly. She said so, with a little laugh 
 of contentment, and then added : 
 
 "Tell me about yourself first of all." 
 
 Martha's countenance fell. 
 
38 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "Ah, I have made a mistake, I see," said 
 the princess. " We have not come to that yet ; 
 but we will come to it — you and I. Some of 
 these days you will find yourself telling me 
 all those close-locked secrets of your heart ; 
 and yet even they, I fancy, will relate more to 
 others than to yourself. So be it ! I can wait. 
 Tell me now about your people — your family 
 here in Paris." 
 
 "Well," began Martha, "there are mama 
 and we four girls — Alice, Marian, Florence, 
 and I. Alice is very handsome, and poor mama 
 has had to shift over to her and to the younger 
 girls, who also bid fair to be charming, all the 
 hopes which she once centered in me. I have 
 been struggled with for years, and finally let 
 alone. Mama agrees to my working at my 
 painting because she has made up her mind 
 that unless I amount to something in that I 
 shall never amount to anything at all ; but I 
 don't think she has much hope of me. She 
 is not far from beautiful herself, and is ac- 
 customed to being admired, and it took her 
 a long time to accept my indifference to it. 
 However, it 's quite accepted now ; and I even 
 think that, with three other girls to be taken 
 into society, she finds a certain relief in leav- 
 
ALICE HAS A FINE VOICE. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 39 
 
 ing me out of it. The other girls are study- 
 ing music and languages. Alice has a fine 
 voice." 
 
 " And your father is dead, is he not? Did 
 you not say you had a brother ? " 
 
 Martha's face grew quite white with the 
 concentration of mind which this thought 
 produced. 
 
 " Yes ; I have a brother," she said. 
 
 " Forgive me," said the princess, with swift 
 sympathy. " There is evidently some reason 
 why it pains you to speak of your brother. 
 Forget that I asked you." 
 
 The blood rushed to Martha's face as it 
 occurred to her that her companion might 
 misunderstand her reluctance to speak on 
 this subject. 
 
 " It 's not that I am not proud of him that 
 it is hard for me to speak," she said; "it's 
 expressly because I am. I made up my mind 
 long ago not to talk about Harold. I found I 
 must not, because I could not speak of him 
 with any freedom without saying things that 
 people would think no merely mortal man 
 deserved. I have worshiped him all my life, 
 and, as I 'm rather ashamed to own, I 've had 
 a great many other idols which turned out 
 
4o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 to be made of clay. This one, however, has 
 never proved for an instant unworthy of my 
 adoration." 
 
 The princess smiled. 
 
 " One would like to get a look at him," she 
 said. " An absolutely faultless being must be 
 interesting to look at." 
 
 " Don't laugh at me ! " cried Martha. " If 
 it were any one but you I could not bear it ; 
 but I know you would say or do nothing that 
 could hurt me really. I don't wish you to 
 understand that I think Harold faultless. He 
 is not. But to one who understands him as I 
 do, his very faults are part of his greatness. 
 They all have their seat in something noble, 
 and to see how he fights to conquer them is a 
 thing that thrills me. He is now off in Amer- 
 ica hard at work. He has done some quite 
 extraordinary things in electricity, and is ab- 
 sorbed in his career. When I am a little older, 
 and mama gives me up as a hopeless job for 
 society, I am to go and live with Harold, and 
 keep house for him. That is my dream and 
 his." 
 
 " Sooner or later, dear child, you will have 
 to wake from that dream. I do not find it as 
 unlikely as you seem to that you will marry ; 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 41 
 
 and even if you should not, your brother 
 probably will." 
 
 The princess was smiling, but her smile 
 faded at the look of tragic pain in her com- 
 panion's face. She could see that the young 
 girl had been touched in her heart's tenderest 
 place. 
 
 " No," she said, with that frown of sadness 
 unrelaxed, " he will never marry." 
 
 "Forgive me again, dear Martha," said the 
 princess. " Your brother has had some dis- 
 appointment, about which your heart is as 
 sensitive as his own. I see that, and you need 
 tell me no more. It is good that he has you 
 to comprehend and sympathize with him. It 
 is good that you have each other. If you gave 
 your heart and life to a husband as wholly as 
 you have given them to your brother, he would 
 probably break the heart and wreck the life, 
 and even the right to dream would be taken 
 from you. Living with this brother, whom you 
 love and worship so, whether he deserves it or 
 not, you may have many a sweet and joy-giv- 
 ing dream which no reality would equal. I 
 wish I could make you see how fortunate you 
 are." 
 
 " I care very little for my own happiness," 
 
42 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 said Martha, too absorbed to realize that she 
 was saying anything that called for comment. 
 " All that I care for is to give Harold a little 
 comfort and calm. He can never be happy 
 again." 
 
 " He tells you so, dear child, and no doubt 
 he believes it. I tell you it will pass. Men do 
 not grieve perpetually for women. I know 
 them better than you do." 
 
 " You do not know this man. If you ima- 
 gine that he is like any other man in the world, 
 you are wrong. He could not get over this 
 sorrow and be the man that he is. It is simply 
 a thing impossible to him. Not that he shows 
 it ! It has been two years since it happened, 
 and no doubt every one except myself thinks 
 he has recovered. I dare say he wants to have 
 it so, and he 's generally cheerful and bright. 
 Even to me he never says a word, but I think 
 he knows that I understand. At all events, he 
 knows that, though it is the desire of my life 
 to go and live with him, I would never do him 
 the wrong to suppose that I could make him 
 happy." 
 
 " He has, then, it would seem, the same ar- 
 dent temperament as yours. Dear me ! how 
 odd it would be to see a man like that in this 
 
IN THE AMERICAN COLONY 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 43 
 
 generation ! Was this woman very cruel to 
 him that you resent it so ? " 
 
 "Resent it!" said Martha, dropping her 
 companion's hand, to clasp her own hands to- 
 gether. " Even to you I can't talk about that. 
 I should either cry like a fool or rage like a 
 fury. I know very little about what happened, 
 except that she has utterly ruined Harold's 
 life, and cut him off from everything that 
 makes life sweet." 
 
 " You allow yourself to suffer too much for 
 him, perhaps," the princess said. " I am not 
 going to antagonize you at the outset by say- 
 ing all that I might say to you on this subject, 
 but believe me, my little ingenue, I could give 
 you points about men. I will not do it now, 
 however, and I will even show my willingness 
 to spare you by changing the subject. Tell 
 me about Alice. Is she really so handsome? 
 Does she go into society ? Where could one 
 see her? " 
 
 " Yes ; she goes out a good deal — in the 
 American colony, principally. I don't think 
 there is any doubt that she 's handsome." 
 
 " Then I 'm all the more unfortunate in hav- 
 ing no acquaintance in the American colony. 
 Does she look like you?" 
 
44 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "No; the fact is — " Martha blushed, and 
 was in evident confusion, as she went on — 
 " the fact is, I 'm considered like Harold. Not 
 really, you know, because no one can deny 
 that he 's magnificent ; but there 's said to be 
 a sort of family likeness." 
 
 " Well, I can believe that, my dear, without 
 absolute insult to your brother. Is Alice much 
 admired ? " 
 
 " Yes, a good deal ; but she 's engaged now, 
 and so she is not noticed as much as she was." 
 
 " Oh, she 's engaged, is she ? And when is 
 she to be married ? " 
 
 "The day is not fixed, but it will be before 
 long. The trousseau is being bought now. 
 Her fiance is an Italian officer of very good 
 family, though not much fortune. Still, Alice 
 is happy, and mama is satisfied, and Harold 
 has given his consent. He is coming over to 
 the wedding. Oh, if you could see him — and 
 he could see you ! " 
 
 " His seeing me is wholly unnecessary ; but 
 the other part might be accomplished. It 
 would be a good idea to give me a card to the 
 wedding if it takes place in a church. Then I 
 could see all your people without their seeing 
 me, and probably disapproving of our intimacy 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 45 
 
 and breaking it up — or else putting it on a 
 footing that would have no comfort in it." 
 
 " How could they disapprove ? " said Mar- 
 tha, deeply hurt. " How could they be any- 
 thing but honored that I should be noticed at 
 all by a great princess like you ? " 
 
 " Oh, there 's no greatness about this prin- 
 cess, child," said the other, laughing. " Don't 
 expect to see me going around with a throne 
 to sit on, in either a literal or a figurative 
 sense. To you I am only Sonia — a fact which 
 you seem to have forgotten, by the way ! I 
 wish you 'd call me Sonia, and stop thinking 
 about the princess. With your American ideas 
 it, no doubt, seems much more important than 
 it is. Are you going to tell your people about 
 me really or not ? " 
 
 " No," said Martha; " I wouldn't for the 
 world. It may be selfish, but I want you all 
 to myself." 
 
 This was perfectly true; but at the same 
 time, ignore it as she might, there was a lurk- 
 ing feeling in Martha's heart that the princess 
 was right in imagining that if her mother 
 knew of the friendship that had sprung up 
 between the two students at Etienne's, she 
 might insist upon investigating the princess 
 
46 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 — an indignity which Martha felt that she 
 could not endure. 
 
 The princess herself seemed pleased at Mar- 
 tha's evident wish to monopolize her ; and the 
 two parted at last with the confidence and 
 affection of old friends. 
 
IV 
 
 The days at the atelier had now a new 
 interest for both students, and their work was 
 manifestly the better for it. To Martha these 
 days were filled with a glorious delight, which 
 seemed to give her all that her nature craved; 
 and if it had not been for sad thoughts of her 
 brother and his loneliness, she would have felt 
 that she could ask for nothing. 
 
 To have the princess painting near her, 
 and to be able to look up and see her beau- 
 tiful figure, with its sinuous grace, posed be- 
 fore her easel, and to receive from her now 
 and then a brilliant smile of mutual com- 
 prehension, was quite enough of personal 
 bliss for Martha Keene. 
 
 Martha had an ardent and romantic tem- 
 perament, but she seemed to be capable of 
 satisfying its needs vicariously. There un- 
 doubtedly are such women, though the like 
 has possibly never existed in the other sex. 
 
48 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 For instance, it was a continual battle with 
 her now to put down the temptation, which 
 constantly assailed her, of imagining a meet- 
 ing, an attraction, and finally a union between 
 the brother who realized her romantic ideal 
 of man and the friend who realized his com- 
 plement in woman's form. She knew it was 
 impossible. She knew that Harold would 
 never marry; and she even realized that if 
 he could love again, after the manner in 
 which he had loved one woman, he would, 
 by that fact, compel her to lower her stan- 
 dard either of love or of him. 
 
 And yet Martha felt that the meeting and 
 blending of these two lives would, if she 
 could have seen it, have satisfied every need 
 of her heart. She believed that her pleasure 
 and contentment in looking on at such a 
 union as this would give her the greatest joy 
 that could be for her — would indeed, in a 
 way, give her the feeling of satisfied love. 
 
 It was very hard to put down these im- 
 aginings ; but she told herself that it must be 
 done. Harold's life and love had been given 
 once, and she knew he was right in saying 
 that they were not his to give again ; and on 
 the princess's part, no doubt the idea would 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 49 
 
 be a wild suggestion, indeed. Martha did 
 not know what rigid laws of etiquette and 
 convention might not bind the princess; and 
 condescending as the latter had chosen to be 
 with regard to herself, she felt that this beau- 
 tiful lady would never do anything unworthy 
 of her caste. Her husband, whether she had 
 loved him or not, had no doubt been a great 
 prince, whose name and title the woman on 
 whom he had bestowed them would never 
 consent to debase. The thing was hopeless 
 and wrong, of course, and the idea must be 
 put away from her. But it was hard to do, 
 with her hero constantly in her mind, and 
 her heroine constantly before her eyes. 
 
 One day, after an unusually hard morn- 
 ing's work, the princess invited Martha to 
 go home to lunch with her, and to spend 
 the afternoon at the Louvre, looking together 
 at the pictures which they had so often 
 enjoyed apart. 
 
 When they reached the apartment in the 
 Rue Presbourg, the princess was informed 
 that her aunt had already finished her sec- 
 ond breakfast, which she took with the regu- 
 larity of clockwork, not depending upon the 
 comings and goings of the rather erratic 
 
50 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 person who was the other member of the 
 family. This the princess explained lightly, 
 as she led the way to the dining-room. The 
 servants by this time all knew Martha; and 
 they looked upon her, as the friend of their 
 mistress, with the most amiable glances. Not 
 speaking the Russian language, Martha could 
 show her good will only by a pleasant smile, 
 in return for the evident pleasure which they 
 showed in serving her. 
 
 The princess threw her wrap backward over 
 the chair, as she sat at the head of the round 
 table, with her slender figure against a back- 
 ground of dark sable, and her head, in its large 
 plumed hat, standing out from a halo of many- 
 hued old stained-glass in the window behind. 
 Martha, sitting opposite, fell into an uncon- 
 sciously intent scrutiny of her face. 
 
 It was certainly safe, Martha thought, to 
 call this face beautiful, both for feature and 
 character. The eyes were large, dark, bril- 
 liant, and fervidly suggestive. One wondered 
 what those eyes had seen, were seeing, and 
 were capable of discovering for others. The 
 hair was a brilliant, waving brown, arranged 
 in a loose mass that was still firm and lovely 
 in its outline — hair, as Martha thought, that 
 
fm 
 
 HER HEAD. IN ITS LARGE PLUMED HAT. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 51 
 
 it must be sweet to touch with fingers and with 
 lips. Also the girl thought one might well 
 long to prove by touch whether that white skin 
 was as smooth and fine as it looked. The firm, 
 short nose was definitely pointed, and tilted 
 upward, slightly lifting with it the short upper 
 lip. Her chin was bewitching — at once strong 
 and alluring. The mouth was very individual, 
 and, as Martha studied it, she concluded that 
 if she could tell why it was so charming, half 
 the charm would be gone. For the first time 
 it occurred to her to wonder how old the prin- 
 cess was. 
 
 " You are wondering how old lam!" said 
 the princess, almost taking the girl's breath 
 away. 
 
 " I never knew anything so strange ! " ex- 
 claimed Martha. "It was the very thought I 
 had in my mind." 
 
 " Certainly, I read it there ! I can do that, 
 sometimes, with people who are very sympa- 
 thetic to me. I fancy it would be rather dan- 
 gerous for you to do any very private thinking 
 in my presence. I sometimes read, too, with- 
 out reading aloud. I think I have read some 
 of your thoughts lately, without your suspect- 
 ing it." • 
 
52 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 She looked at Martha, over her cup of bouil- 
 lon, and smiled. Martha felt herself blushing, 
 as she wondered if that persistent and domi- 
 nating thought about her brother, which had 
 been so often in her mind of late, could have 
 been perceived by this wonderful being. It 
 frightened her so that she quickly changed the 
 subject, and the remainder of the meal passed 
 in less personal talk. 
 
 When they were seated in the princess's 
 coupe, a little later, driving past the Arc de 
 Triomphe, Martha saw her companion turn- 
 ing her head to look at it with lingering, 
 earnest eyes. 
 
 " I always look at the Arc whenever I can," 
 she said ; " and it always has something to say 
 to me. Its expression of strong beauty and 
 repose always makes me feel that what is, is 
 right. If I am happy, it makes me feel that 
 joy is both good and permanent; and even 
 when in times of unhappiness it makes me feel 
 that sadness is permanent, it somehow seems 
 to tell me that that too is good. Did you ever 
 stand quite close to it and look up? " 
 
 "No," said Martha. 
 
 " We must, some day, together. It will give 
 you a new sensation." 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA S3 
 
 " I always thought that it appeared better 
 at a distance," said Martha. 
 
 "So it does, in a way; but the impression 
 is different. I love it from the Place de la Con- 
 corde, when the horse-chestnuts are in bloom. 
 Then it looks like a magnificent image of be- 
 neficence, stretching out two great arms to take 
 in all those people, in carriages and on foot, 
 who are thronging the Champs-Elysees, its 
 body vague and distant in the clouds. That 's 
 a sufficiently fantastic thought for you, if you 
 like ; but it is one that has comforted me. I 
 love Paris. It is the only city that has ever 
 seemed to me to be lovable. Its streets are 
 so gay and clean, and the faces of the people 
 one meets, along here at least, are so good- 
 humored and intelligent. I love this mixture 
 of fashion and ruralness. Look at the swells 
 and the peasants driving side by side ! Look 
 at those white-aproned men drawing hand- 
 carts, that mail-coach coming alongside, those 
 old peasants in their covered wagons, and that 
 superb mounted policeman with his gorgeous 
 trappings ! How friendly and at home they 
 all seem ! Even that omnibus, with its three 
 white Percherons abreast, looks sociable and 
 friendly by the side of the steppeurs of the 
 
54 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 haute ccole. Oh, it 's all very human and 
 charming ; or is it that you humanize me, and 
 make me feel its charm more than I have done 
 for many a day ? " 
 
 She was still in this delightful humor when 
 they reached the Louvre, and made their way 
 at once to pay their homage to the Venus 
 of Milo. They did not say much as they 
 looked at her, moving slowly from place 
 to place to get the different points of view. 
 Each knew what the other felt, and words 
 seemed out of place. Presently the princess 
 said : 
 
 " I have a fancy to try an experiment. Let 's 
 name her ! What I mean is, if that were a real 
 woman, what would you think the name best 
 suited to her? " 
 
 Martha smiled comprehendingly, and looked 
 at the statue with a gaze of deep concentration. 
 This changed, after a moment, into a smile, as 
 she said : 
 
 "I 've named her. It 's so absurd, how- 
 ever," she went on, "to give such a name as 
 I 've chosen to that ancient Greek statue, that 
 I 'm almost ashamed to tell it." 
 
 "You need n't be," said the princess, smil- 
 ing too ; " for I 've got a name about which I 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 55 
 
 have exactly the same feeling. Come ; I '11 say 
 mine first. It 's Gloriana." 
 
 "And mine is Georgiana ! How odd that 
 they should be so much alike ! " 
 
 /'Is n't it? It 's delightful, though; for it 
 shows that there 's something in my theory of 
 names, and that this statue has made almost 
 exactly the same impression on us. I 'm eager 
 now to name the Winged Victory. Come ; 
 let 's go and look at her." 
 
 They hurried away to the foot of the wide 
 staircase, where, looking up, they saw the 
 magnificent creature with her great wings 
 spread. 
 
 After standing before her in silence a few 
 moments, the princess exclaimed suddenly : 
 
 " Oh, have you named her yet? A perfect 
 name for her has come to me ! " 
 
 "And to me, too — perfect!" said Martha. 
 " How many syllables has yours? " 
 
 " One." 
 
 11 So has mine ! " said the other, breathlessly. 
 " Now let 's count three, and say the name." 
 
 Simultaneously they said : " One, two, three 
 — Ruth ! " 
 
 Then they looked at each other with an ex- 
 cited delight that the passers-by must have 
 
56 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 thought rather amazing even for two artists 
 looking at the Victory. 
 
 " It 's the most wonderful thin^ I ever heard 
 of," said Martha. " Don't you feel positively 
 creepy ? " 
 
 " I should think I did ! Little cold chills are 
 running all over me. Oh, how nice it is that 
 we can think and feel together in this way ! " 
 
 Her face, as she spoke, was glowingly beau- 
 tiful ; and Martha returned her gaze with a look 
 which expressed what no words could possibly 
 have done. 
 
One morning the princess did not come to 
 the atelier ; and Martha, after working along 
 without her for a while, thinking that her friend 
 might have been delayed and hoping that she 
 would come later, found her mind so preoc- 
 cupied by the absence of her usual compan- 
 ion that her work would not go at all, and at 
 last she concluded to stop trying, and to go 
 to look the princess up. 
 
 She called a cab, and drove to the apart- 
 ment in the Rue Presbourg, where she was 
 now well known. Even the old concierge, with 
 her shining white hair, brilliant black eyes, red 
 cheeks, and bearded upper lip, gave her a 
 smile of welcome as she passed through the 
 court ; and the princess's servant gave her an- 
 other as he conducted her at once to his mis- 
 tress's boudoir. 
 
 Here he left her. Martha tapped on the 
 door, and waited. Getting no answer, she 
 
 57 
 
58 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 turned the knob and entered, intending to 
 knock at the inner door; but no sooner had 
 she shut herself into the room than she be- 
 came aware, although it was almost wholly 
 darkened, that it was not unoccupied. 
 
 A stifled sound reached her ears, and she 
 could now make out the figure of the princess, 
 lying on the lounge, with her face buried in 
 her hands. 
 
 The girl's heart ached with pity, and she 
 did not know whether to yield to her own 
 impulse, and to go forward, or to consult the 
 possible preference of her friend, and go back. 
 
 While she hesitated, the princess took her 
 hands from her face, and saw her. As she 
 did so, she started up, touching her eyes with 
 her handkerchief, and clearing her voice to 
 speak. 
 
 "Is it you, Martha? Come in, child," she 
 said. " I have a headache to-day, and in- 
 tended to see no one. I forgot, however, that 
 I had given orders that you were always to be 
 the exception. I should not have let you see 
 me like this if I had known beforehand ; but 
 now that you have looked upon your poor 
 friend in this humiliated state, sit down, and 
 never mind." 
 
'"IS IT YOU, MARTHA?' 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 59 
 
 Martha had come near, and now took the 
 seat beside the lounge, her face tragic with 
 sympathy. 
 
 " I am so sorry you are ill," was all that she 
 could say. 
 
 " I am not ill, really," said the princess. She 
 was lying back upon the lounge, and fanning 
 her flushed face with her little gossamer hand- 
 kerchief, which Martha could see was limp 
 with tears. " My head does ache now, but I 
 brought it on by this wretched crying. It 's 
 all my own fault. You did not know that I 
 was such a weakling, did you ? " and she made 
 an effort to smile. 
 
 11 Oh, I am so, so sorry ! " said Martha, 
 helplessly. 
 
 "You needn't be, dear. Never be sorry 
 for any man or woman who is equal to his or 
 her life — and I am equal to mine. One time 
 out of ten it gets the better of me, but the 
 nine times I get the better of it. This mood 
 will surely pass. Indeed, it is passing now. 
 You have helped me already. It has been 
 very long indeed since I have found or wanted 
 human help, and it takes me by surprise." 
 
 Martha saw that she was preparing to lead 
 the talk away from her recent tears and their 
 
60 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 cause, and she passionately wished that her 
 friend should feel that she longed to enter into 
 her sorrow with her, if it could be allowed 
 her ; so she said impulsively : 
 
 " I don't suppose you feel like telling me 
 your trouble ; but oh, I wish you could ! " 
 
 "I do feel like it, you darling child ! I could 
 talk to you about it better than to any one on 
 earth ; but there are some things one cannot 
 speak of even to one's own heart. That is the 
 trouble now. If I were to let myself indulge 
 freely in imaginings and regrets, I should sat- 
 isfy the want of the moment, but it would undo 
 me utterly. My great temptation is regret, 
 and I must be strong enough not to regret." 
 
 " Oh, how sad life is!" cried Martha. "I 
 have always thought that you at least ought 
 to be happy. I gave you the name of ' The 
 Happy Princess, ' out of Tennyson. It has 
 seemed to me from the first that you were a 
 creature who had it in you to command happi- 
 ness." 
 
 " Ah, dear child, if you could only know 
 how helpless I am there! The best thing that 
 is in me is the power to command courage. 
 That I can, and for the most part do. While 
 that is so, I shall not complain." 
 
/, = 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 61 
 
 "Then you are really unhappy? Oh!" 
 said Martha, drawing herself up with an im- 
 pulsive movement. 
 
 " I know what that fervent exclamation 
 means as well as if you had put it into words," 
 said the princess. " You are wishing that 
 there were some way in which, by sacrificing 
 yourself, you could purchase happiness for 
 me." 
 
 Martha, startled at the correctness of this 
 guess, could say nothing in denial. 
 
 " I knew it," said the princess, reading her 
 face. " I have not the faintest doubt that you 
 would do it; and — now I am going to knock 
 over some of your idealizing of me — there 
 have been moments in my life when my 
 greed for happiness has consumed me so that 
 I believe I would have been willing to take 
 it, and to let another pay the price. That 's 
 a base thing for a woman to say of herself, 
 but so true it is that I thank God I was never 
 tempted when those moods were on me. 
 Something not wholly different from that pant- 
 ing after an impossible joy was upon me this 
 morning. Shall I never get the better of it 
 utterly? Can one overcome it? Did you 
 never have it, Martha? To me joy is im- 
 
62 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 possible, but it is not so to you. Don't you 
 ever long - for it? I will speak to you quite 
 openly, Martha, and tell you this — when I 
 say joy, I mean love. Is there a woman's 
 heart that does not long for that? Be as 
 honest with me as I have been with you, and 
 tell me." 
 
 "I will try," said Martha. " I will do my 
 best to be perfectly truthful. I do long for 
 happiness; but — this may seem strange to 
 you, and you may even think that I am pre- 
 tending to be better or more unselfish than 
 others — " 
 
 "That I never will ! I know that is n't so. 
 Go on." 
 
 " I was going to say that the craving of 
 my heart seems somehow to be impersonal. 
 I want happiness intensely, but the way in 
 which I want it is to see the beings whom I 
 love best have it. Now there are two crea- 
 tures in the world whom I love supremely — 
 my brother and you. You know that this is 
 so. If I could see both of you happy, in the 
 manner and degree that I want, I believe that 
 I could then be perfectly happy, too. I be- 
 lieve all the needs of my own heart could be 
 answered in that way ; and indeed I almost 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 63 
 
 think that my greed for joy is as great as 
 yours at times. It has strained my heart al- 
 most to bursting, in Harold's case, and I feel 
 now almost the same about you. I have never 
 spoken of this to any one ; indeed, I was 
 ne^er fully aware of it, I think, until I put it 
 into words now. It must seem quite incredi- 
 ble to you." 
 
 " Not in the least. I believe it utterly, or 
 rather it 's a stronger thing than belief with 
 me. I feel that it is true. I admire you 
 for it, and all the more because it is so 
 different from me. I want happiness and 
 love for myself — every ounce of flesh, every 
 drop of blood in me longs for it as well 
 as every aspiration of my soul. It is self 
 that I am thinking of when I get like this 
 — my own power to enjoy, and also — oh, 
 God knows that this is true ! — and also the 
 power to give joy to another. Martha, I will 
 tell you something," she said, with a sudden 
 change of tone, dropping her voice, and lean- 
 ing forward to take both of Martha's hands in 
 hers as she spoke, with her eyes fixed intently 
 on the girl's. " I have known this joy. I have 
 loved supremely, and been loved. You have 
 never tasted that cup of rapture as I have ; 
 
64 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 but then you have never known, as I have, 
 the anguish of that renunciation. Which of 
 us is the fortunate one? If you knew how I 
 suffer you would probably say that it is you ; 
 but if, on the other hand, you knew what ec- 
 stasy I have had, I think that you might de- 
 cide differently. Oh, if God would give me 
 one more hour of it, I think I would be con- 
 tent ! One more hour, to take it to the full, 
 knowing that I must, after that, come back to 
 what I suffer now ! I think those sixty joy- 
 absorbing minutes would make up to me for 
 everything. But to have it never again / " 
 
 She broke off, and, hiding her face in her 
 hands, turned away, and lay for some moments 
 quite silent and still. She was not crying — 
 Martha could see that ; and when she pres- 
 ently turned, and looked at the young girl, 
 holding out both her hands to her, although 
 there was no smile on her face, it showed that 
 she had conquered her dark mood, and was 
 strong again. 
 
 It was a very gentle sort of strength, how- 
 ever, that was not too self-sufficient to feel 
 pleasure in the words and looks and touches 
 of quiet sympathy which Martha gave her 
 now. They sat there, hand in hand, for a 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 65 
 
 long time; and presently the princess said, 
 with her own beautiful smile : 
 
 1 You have done me a world of good, Mar- 
 tha. My headache is gone, and also its cause. 
 Sometimes, do you know, — I 'm going to let 
 you see just how weak I am,— sometimes I 
 succumb for days to a mood like this. No- 
 body knows that tears have anything to do 
 with the headaches that I suffer from — at least 
 nobody but Felicie, and she gives no informa- 
 tion. My aunt loves me dearly, but is no 
 more acquainted with the real me than if I 
 were a stranger; and yet she adores me — 
 perhaps for that reason. I tell her nothing, 
 because the feelings that I have are quite out- 
 side her comprehension, while the headaches 
 are quite within it. She recommends various 
 powders and pellets, and is constantly getting 
 new prescriptions for me. She says my head- 
 aches are of a very obstinate type, and I 
 agree with her. To show you how completely 
 you Ve cured me," she added, rising to her 
 feet, with an entire change of tone, " I am 
 going to work this afternoon. You will stay 
 and take your lunch with me, and then we '11 
 be there in time for the second model's pose." 
 "I can't stay," said Martha, rising too; 
 
66 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "but I will meet you there promptly. I am 
 keeping my cab below, so that I may be back 
 at the atelier by the time the carriage comes 
 for me. You know how very quiet I am keep- 
 ing my little escapades with you." 
 
 " Oh, to be sure ! " exclaimed the other, 
 smiling. " I had forgotten the necessity of 
 that precaution. " What would ' mama and 
 the girls' say? I think I shall write them an 
 anonymous letter, saying that if madame had 
 been under the impression that her eldest 
 daughter devoted herself wholly to the pur- 
 suit of art during the hours of her absence 
 from home, it might have surprised her had 
 she seen the aforesaid young lady this morn- 
 ing come out of the atelier, call a cab, give a 
 number, go to a distant apartment (where she 
 was evidently well known to the concierge, 
 who passed her on to a servant in Russian 
 livery, who as evidently knew her well), enter, 
 by a special passage, a certain room, where 
 she remained shut in for a longr time, emercf- 
 ing finally in great haste to drive rapidly in 
 the cab, which she had kept waiting, back to 
 the atelier in time to meet her own carriage, 
 and come innocently home to join the family 
 circle at lunch ! Could n't I make out a case ? 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 67 
 
 And what would the mother and the little sis- 
 ters say ? " 
 
 Martha, too, laughed at the picture ; but in 
 spite of some discomfiture of feeling to which 
 it gave rise, she had no idea of changing her 
 tactics. The very thought of her mother's 
 going to work to investigate the princess, and 
 ascertain if she were a proper friend for her 
 daughter, smote the girl to the heart, and she 
 resolved to guard her secret more carefully 
 than ever. She determined that she would 
 ease her conscience for the deception by con- 
 fessing everything to her brother when he 
 came. This would make it all right. 
 
 As Martha drove back to the atelier, after 
 an affectionate au revoir to the princess, she 
 was conscious that something was rankling in 
 her mind. When she came to search for the 
 ground of this feeling, she found it to exist in 
 the confession of love which the princess had 
 made. This knowledge caused Martha to re- 
 alize that she had not even yet succeeded in 
 putting from her the imaginings by which she 
 had connected her brother and her friend. 
 Before knowing the princess she had always 
 cherished the belief that her brother would 
 sink below her ideal of him if he ever loved 
 
68 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 a second time. Lately, however, she had 
 imagined the possibility of his telling- her, 
 after knowing the princess, that the old love 
 was not the perfect one he had imagined it ; 
 and she could fancy herself forgiving him for 
 loving a second time, with the princess as his 
 apology. It had even seemed to her lately so 
 monstrously wrong and cruel that Harold's 
 life should be wantonly wrecked that she was 
 now prepared to accept a good deal more 
 than would once have seemed possible, in 
 order to see it mended. 
 
 Martha, for all her demure appearance, had 
 something that was more or less savage and 
 lawless in her nature, especially where Harold 
 was concerned ; and the same feeling, in a 
 lesser degree, dominated her in regard to the 
 princess. She had long ago admitted to her- 
 self the fact that Harold had missed his chance 
 of happiness in love ; but it was as painful as 
 it was unexpected to her to find that the prin- 
 cess too had loved before. She had known 
 that she had been married, but with very little 
 difficulty she had constructed for herself a 
 theory of that marriage in which the princess 
 had played the part of an innocent victim to 
 circumstance. For instance, she mi^ht have 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 69 
 
 been married by her parents in early youth 
 to a man perhaps far older than herself, whom 
 she had never loved, and for whose death she 
 could not have grieved much. 
 
 It was a surprise to Martha now to find 
 how entirely she had let this utterly un- 
 founded idea take possession of her. The 
 words of the princess this morning had shat- 
 tered it to atoms, and in spite of herself she 
 felt strangely heavy-hearted. 
 
VI 
 
 After the morning on which Martha had 
 been by accident a witness of the princess's 
 self-betrayal, there seemed nothing lack- 
 ing to the complete understanding of the 
 two friends, and their intimacy was now 
 stronger and closer than ever. It was not 
 practicable for Martha to visit the princess 
 very often, as she was compelled to take the 
 time for these visits out of her atelier hours, 
 and both women were too earnest in their 
 work not to begrudge this. Lately they had 
 fallen into the custom of the generality of the 
 students, and went for their midday meal to 
 the cremerie in the neighborhood, after they 
 had visited first the butchers shop, and se- 
 lected their own mutton-chop or bit of beef- 
 steak ; then they had it cooked according to 
 their directions. This, with fresh rolls and 
 baked apples and milk, made an excellent 
 meal, sometimes augmented by potato salad. 
 
 7 o 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 71 
 
 Martha had been initiated into these myste- 
 ries by an American girl whose acquaintance 
 she had made through the latter's having once 
 offered to help her on with her "josie," a word 
 which had established an easy footing be- 
 tween them at once. 
 
 Martha never exchanged more than a pass- 
 ing remark with the other students, partly be- 
 cause she had, in the beginning, built a sort 
 of barrier around her by her shyness, and, re- 
 cently, because she felt that her intimacy with 
 the princess, who knew none of the others, 
 set her more than ever apart. 
 
 One morning Martha came to the atelier 
 rather late, and showed, moreover, a certain 
 excitement in her movements and expression 
 which she accounted for at lunch-time by tell- 
 ing the princess that her sister's wedding had 
 been hurried up, and was to take place almost 
 immediately. 
 
 There were several good reasons for this ; 
 one being that it suited much better the plans 
 of the bridegroom elect, and another that Mrs. 
 Keene, being in rather delicate health, had 
 been urged by her physicians to leave Paris. 
 So, as soon as the wedding was over, she was 
 to go south with the younger girls and their 
 
72 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 governess ; and Martha, who rebelled against 
 being taken from her beloved painting, had a 
 beautiful plan of getting her brother to stay 
 awhile in Paris with her in their mother's 
 apartment. This she confided to the prin- 
 cess with breathless delight, saying that she 
 had written to Harold about it, and told him 
 to cable her if he were willing. Her friend 
 could see that, with her usual license of im- 
 agination, Martha had been making all sorts 
 of plans in connection with this scheme, and 
 she more than suspected that some of these 
 concerned herself. 
 
 "My dear Martha," she said, with a pene- 
 trating look into her friend's eager eyes, 
 "give it up at once, on the spot, if you have 
 been making any plans to introduce your 
 brother to me ! " 
 
 "Oh, why?" said Martha, in tones of the 
 keenest regret. 
 
 " Because, my dear, it is out of the ques- 
 tion. If you knew how sick to death I am of 
 men, you would not ask it. Please, if you love 
 me, don't speak of it again." 
 
 This, of course, was final, and Martha was 
 compelled to bear her disappointment with 
 what patience she could summon. She got a 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 73 
 
 promise from the princess, however, that she 
 would come to the wedding, which was to 
 take place in the American church. At least 
 this would give her the satisfaction of feeling 
 in the future that her friend had seen her 
 brother, and she hoped she might contrive in 
 some way that the latter should see the prin- 
 cess, since it was now decreed that the inter- 
 course could go no further. 
 
 Great as Martha's disappointment was, she 
 forced herself to recognize the fact that, 
 as things were, it might be all for the best 
 that these two should not meet. She could 
 imagine but one result of that meeting, and 
 that, under existing circumstances, might be 
 disastrous to both. Neither of them had fully 
 confided in her, but both of them had told her 
 plainly that a second love was the thing which 
 they most strongly repudiated. In Harold's 
 case, she knew that this feeling was one that 
 his conscience, no less than his heart, or- 
 dained ; and in the case of the princess, she 
 somehow felt that it was the same. 
 
 The princess, for some reason, did not tell 
 Martha what a notable exception to her rule 
 she made in going to this wedding. The fact 
 was, she had never been to any wedding since 
 
74 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 her own ; and it may have been that fact 
 which accounted for the state of intense ex- 
 citement which she was in as she drove alone 
 in her carriage through the streets of Paris to 
 the church in the Avenue de l'Alma. 
 
 As she got out, and instructed her coach- 
 man where to wait, this inward excitement 
 showed in every rapid movement and word. 
 Afterward, when she entered the church, and 
 walked, with a definiteness of manner which 
 would seem to have indicated a prearranged 
 plan, straight down the left-hand aisle to the 
 choir-stalls, her face was flushed and her eyes 
 were brilliant. It was early, and few people 
 had come as yet. 
 
 The princess wore a long, dark cloak, which 
 concealed her figure, and on her large hat, 
 which hid the outline of her head, a rather 
 thick Russian veil was fastened, so that her 
 features were scarcely distinguishable. 
 
 There was a shaded corner near the organ, 
 behind the chorister-stalls, that was quite 
 screened from the congregation, and so situ- 
 ated as to be almost out of view from the 
 chancel also, if one chose to protect one's self 
 behind the great pillar that stood there. The 
 day was dark and cloudy, but the chancel was 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 75 
 
 brilliant with lighted candles. The princess 
 with firm confidence walked to this place, and 
 took her seat. She did not seem to care 
 whether the church was filling up or not. She 
 scarcely noticed when some people came and 
 took the seats near her. In these moments 
 she was so lost in thoughts and reminiscences 
 that the furious beating of her heart almost 
 suffocated her. 
 
 When, from just behind her, a great organ- 
 note swelled forth, and filled the church with 
 tremulous vibrations, the princess gave a little 
 fluttered start. No one was near enough to 
 observe this, however, or to see the crouching 
 back into her seat which followed it. The 
 music seemed to heighten her emotion, and 
 she trembled visibly. She quite lost count of 
 time, and did not know how long it was before 
 she saw a clergyman enter the chancel and 
 stand there, waiting. Then, as two officers 
 in rich uniforms came and took their places in 
 front of him, the sonorous chords of the old 
 familiar Mendelssohn march swelled from the 
 organ, and the heart within her seemed to 
 stop and sink. It was the sound and influence 
 to which, in perfect joy, she had walked to 
 her own wedding. 
 
76 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 She knew that the bridal procession was 
 coming up the aisle, but she did not turn her 
 head to get a view into the church. She felt 
 the people about her rise to their feet, but she 
 sat still. Her trembling limbs would not have 
 held her up ; but she did not even know that 
 she was trembling. She knew only that she 
 was waiting — that all her heart and all her 
 soul were wrapped in a bewildering suspense 
 until the coining of what was very near her 
 now. They passed close to her, the girls in 
 their white dresses, and the officers in their 
 glittering uniforms, and stood in divided ranks, 
 leaving the space between them clear. 
 
 Into this space, directly in front of the 
 clergyman, there now advanced a woman cov- 
 ered with a cloud of gauzy tulle. She leaned 
 upon the arm of the only man in the party 
 who was not in uniform. 
 
 It was on this figure that the princess fast- 
 ened her eyes, never once removing them 
 until the short ceremony had come to an end. 
 The bride was a shapeless blur. The brides- 
 maids were a billowy cloud. The officers were 
 mere dazzles of color and gold lace. One 
 object there was that cut its way into her con- 
 sciousness with acute distinctness — the dark- 
 
THE MAN WHO STOOD WAITING TO GIVE THE BRIDE.' 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 77 
 
 clad, clearly outlined figure and pale profile of 
 the man who stood waiting to give the bride. 
 
 When the music ceased, and the minister 
 told the congregation that they were assem- 
 bled to join together this man and this woman 
 in holy matrimony, it was another man and 
 woman that she thought of; and so through 
 all the solemn charge and searching question- 
 ing that followed. 
 
 When the minister asked, "Who giveth 
 this woman to be married ? " and the man 
 that she had been watching gave up his com- 
 panion with a slight inclination of the head, 
 and moved aside, the gaze of the princess still 
 followed and rested on him. When, a moment 
 later, a strange foreign voice said painstak- 
 ingly, " I, Victor, take thee, Alice, to my wed- 
 ded wife," what she heard, in natural and fam- 
 iliar English utterance was this : " I, Harold, 
 take thee, Sophia, to my wedded wife, to have 
 and to hold, from this day forward, for better, 
 for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness 
 and in health, to love and to cherish, till death 
 us do part, according to God's holy ordinance, 
 and thereto I plight thee my troth." And it 
 was her own voice which made answer : " I, 
 Sophia, take thee, Harold." 
 
78 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 A hard clutch was on her heart. He was 
 there — the Harold who had made that vow 
 to her ; and she, Sophia, was here, in life, not 
 death! "Till death us do part," they had 
 both of them sworn, and they had let life part 
 them ! The terrible wrong of it all rushed 
 over her. The reasons which had made that 
 parting seem to her right before now vanished 
 into air. She felt that crime alone could ever 
 link one of them to another. She felt that 
 this separation between them was in itself a 
 crime, and she who had done it the chief of 
 criminals. 
 
 All this she felt with terrifying force, but a 
 feeling stronger than even any of these had 
 taken possession of her — a want and longing 
 had awakened in her heart which strained it 
 almost intolerably. She looked at the bride's 
 brother, standing there intensely still, in an 
 attitude of complete repose, and a feeling that 
 he was hers, and hers alone took possession 
 of her. She grew reckless of appearances, 
 and stood up in her place, with her face turned 
 full toward him. She heard the clergyman's 
 stern behest that man put not asunder those 
 whom God hath joined, and she heard him 
 pronounce that they were man and wife, in 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 79 
 
 the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
 of the Holy Ghost. Her heart said a sol- 
 emn amen. 
 
 Imagination lingered on these thrilling 
 thoughts while the blessing was pronounced 
 and the service ended ; and then the little pro- 
 cession, the bride and bridegroom at its head, 
 and the figure that she watched at his mother's 
 side behind them, passed her and went down 
 the aisle, while the familiar music was playing, 
 to which she had walked from the altar a 
 blissfully happy wife — and she was left alone ! 
 
 The organist quickly closed the organ, and 
 hurried away. The people near her moved 
 off too; and still she sat there motionless, 
 feeling herself deserted and most miserable. 
 A boy, putting out the candles, roused her to 
 consciousness, and somehow she got out of 
 the place. 
 
VII 
 
 Mrs. Keene's apartment on the Place de 
 la Madeleine was a scene of joyful commo- 
 tion and confusion. The small breakfast 
 which followed the wedding was an informal 
 affair ; and though it was supposed that 
 only the nearest personal friends were pres- 
 ent, the rooms were cheerfully crowded, and 
 the uniforms made a show and glitter. The 
 charming girls who were permitted to be their 
 sister's bridesmaids were the object of much 
 notice and attention ; and when the company 
 had risen from the table, the eldest sister, who 
 was so much the least pretty and vivacious, 
 was scarcely missed from the room. A few 
 people inquired for the bride's brother, who had 
 also disappeared ; but as he was a stranger 
 to every one, the fact of his absence was little 
 noticed. 
 
 Martha, when she went to look for Harold, 
 found him in his own room, smoking. 
 
 80 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 81 
 
 " I knew it was you," he said, as she came 
 in. closing the door behind her. " I thought 
 you would come to look me up ; but why did 
 you ? I 'm poor company for anybody to-day. 
 Well," he added, with a short, deep breath, 
 " thank the Lord, that 's over ! When you get 
 married, Martha, I want you to elope. I 've 
 no business at a wedding. I feel that I have 
 cast an evil eye on Alice and Victor." 
 
 " Oh, Harold, I was thinking of you more 
 than of them all the time," said Martha, ear- 
 nestly. " It did seem absolute cruelty to have 
 required it of you. How could mama ! " 
 
 Concentrated as her tone and manner were, 
 she was doubtful whether they even pene- 
 trated the consciousness of her companion, 
 who, with his chair tipped backward, his 
 frock-coat thrown open, with a ruthless dis- 
 regard of the smart gardenia which orna- 
 mented its lapel, and his hands thrust deep 
 into his trousers pockets, was smoking vig- 
 orously, and looking away from her out of 
 the window. 
 
 Martha had come here in the ardent hope 
 of giving comfort, and she felt a little hurt. 
 She smothered the feeling back into her heart, 
 however, as she said : 
 
82 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 " I knew it was anguish to you, standing 
 there and going through that ceremony." 
 
 He turned, and looked at her. 
 
 " Well, rather ! " he said, with a short laugh, 
 still keeping the cigar in his mouth, and talk- 
 ing with his teeth clenched upon it. Then he 
 turned his face toward the window again ; but 
 his glance was so va<nie that Martha felt that 
 he saw some picture in his mind, rather than 
 the scene below. " The service was the same," 
 he said, clasping his hands behind his head, 
 and narrowing his eyes as if to get the per- 
 spective. "The music was the same — and 
 those roses ! And that was not all. Vivid as 
 she always is to me in every other respect, I 
 have not always been able to hold on to her 
 voice ; but to-day I heard it perfectly, saying, 
 1 1, Sophia, take thee, Harold,' and all the 
 rest." 
 
 He got up suddenly, threw his cigar into 
 the grate, and walked across the room. 
 
 " Oh, poor Harold ! " Martha said, her voice 
 thick with tears. 
 
 The effect of her words was instantaneous. 
 He turned suddenly, and showed in both face 
 and figure a swiftly summoned and effectual 
 calm. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 83 
 
 " My dear girl," he said quickly, " you don't 
 suppose I 'm posing for an injured husband, I 
 hope ? I have suffered, of course ; but with a 
 man certain kinds of suffering sret to be a 
 business. To speak of it seems like talking 
 shop. It 's detestable to be talking it to you 
 now ; but the truth is, this wedding affair has 
 nearly knocked me out. I could have gone 
 on keeping up the bluff, of course, and talked 
 the usual bosh with the wedding-guests in 
 yonder ; but I found I had a contract with 
 myself that had to be seen to. It has cost me 
 something to smooth out and harden down 
 my thoughts and feelings about my own life ; 
 but I had got the thing done. This wedding 
 business, however, upheaved it all. When I 
 found that I was actually sinking into the 
 mushy swamp of self-pity, I thought it was 
 about time to come away, and steady up my 
 nerve a bit. I 'm all right now, however, and 
 I see clear again. The thing 's over, and no 
 harm is done." 
 
 Martha's eyes followed him wistfully as he 
 turned to the dressing-table, picked up a 
 brush, and smoothed the swart surface of his 
 thick, dark hair, brushed some specks of dust 
 from his coat, and carefully straightened the 
 injured flower. 
 
84 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "Shall we go back?" he said. "We may 
 be missed." 
 
 " Don't go quite yet. No one will think 
 about us," she said ; and then she added 
 doubtfully : " May I talk to you a little, Har- 
 old ? " 
 
 " Certainly, my dear. Talk all you want," 
 he answered, sitting down ; " only there 's no- 
 thing to say." 
 
 " Where is she? I 've so often longed to 
 now. 
 
 " I have n't the least idea. She asked me 
 not to follow her movements, and I never 
 have." 
 
 "Then you do not even know whether she 
 is living or dead? " 
 
 " Yes ; I know that much. She is not dead. 
 I feel her in the world. If she went out of it, 
 I believe I should know it. Besides, I would 
 have been informed of that. She spoke of it, 
 and said so." 
 
 There was a moment's pause, which Mar- 
 tha broke. 
 
 " Will you tell me this," she said, "whether 
 you are as hopeless about it all as you were 
 when I last spoke to you of it ? " 
 
 " Exactly as hopeless. When a thing is ab- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 85 
 
 solute, my dear, it does n't have degrees. I 
 have never been anything else than hopeless 
 since the hour of my last interview with her. 
 She told me then," he said, with a sort of cold 
 conciseness, " that her first wish was to set me 
 absolutely free. She said she wanted me to 
 marry again. She said that just as soon as 
 we had lived apart the time required by law 
 for a divorce, she wanted me to eet it. She 
 said she was sorry there was no way to get it 
 sooner. She said, also, that she would take 
 back her maiden name." 
 
 He got up, thrust his hands into his pock- 
 ets, and, walking over to the window, stood 
 there for a moment. Then he turned sud- 
 denly, and came and stood in front of Martha, 
 looking her directly in the eyes. She saw by 
 that look that he was calm and steady, and 
 so she ventured to question him a little fur- 
 ther. 
 
 " Do you know whom she lives with ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 " With an aunt, whose life, as she told me, 
 is utterly out of the world that we knew to- 
 gether. She said that, on this account, there 
 was good reason to hope that we would never 
 meet again." 
 
86 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Martha, who felt that this subject might 
 not be spoken of between them again, con- 
 tinued to question him as he stood and looked 
 down at her with a perfect consciousness of 
 self-possession. 
 
 " Was she so beautiful ? " she asked. 
 
 "Yes," he said. 
 
 " And are you still unchanged in giving her 
 the supreme place that you did give her from 
 the moment you first saw her ? " 
 
 "Yes," he said again. 
 
 " Oh, Harold," exclaimed the crirl, "I some- 
 times think it might have turned out differ- 
 ently if the marriage had not been so rash 
 and sudden." 
 
 He took a seat near her, and continued to 
 look at her as he said : 
 
 " It could have made no difference to me. 
 You don't fully understand it, Martha. It is 
 impossible that you should. I knew, the day 
 I met her, that I had been set apart and saved 
 for her. I know it now. It was the kind of 
 gravitation that comes once in a life." 
 
 " Then you do not regret it? " 
 
 11 For myself, not in the least. She was my 
 wife for a month. What I have gone through 
 since is a small price to pay for that. But 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 87 
 
 when I think of what it has cost her — that 
 most delicate of women — to face the odium 
 of it — that superb woman's life shadowed by 
 the vulgarity of a suddenly ruptured marriage; 
 and — deeper than that ! — to have her best 
 life maimed forever — God ! I curse the day 
 that I was born ! " 
 
 " And what has she brought on you, I 'd 
 like to know?" cried Martha. "It was she 
 who cast you off — not you her. Ah, Harold, 
 if she had been the woman she should have 
 been, she never could have done it ! " 
 
 He looked at her with some impatience in 
 his glance. 
 
 "Whether she was the woman she should 
 have been or not is a thing that neither con- 
 cerns nor interests me. She was the woman 
 I loved. The whole thing - is in that." 
 
 "And the woman you still love? Is that 
 true, Harold ? " 
 
 "True as death," he said; "but what does 
 it all matter ? Your relentlessness is the 
 friend's natural feeling. It shows how bootless 
 it is to give account. I care more for your 
 opinion than any other, but even your scorn 
 does not signify to me here. It misses the 
 point. The only pride that is involved is pride 
 
88 THE PRINCESS 50NIA 
 
 in my own immutability. Love ought always 
 to be a regeneration," he went on, as if putting 
 into shape the thoughts that were rising out 
 of the recent chaos in his mind. " It's easy 
 enough to keep true when the love, the joy, 
 the equal give and take, go on unbroken. It 's 
 when a man actually turns and walks out of 
 heaven, and the gates shut behind him for- 
 ever, that he finds out the stuff that 's in him. 
 Sometimes, when I think about it, I try to 
 fancy what would be my humiliation if I 
 found I had grown to love her less." 
 
 Martha was silent a moment. Then she 
 said, as if urged by the necessity of speaking 
 out, for this once, all that she had so long kept 
 back : 
 
 " Suppose, after you get the divorce, you 
 should hear that she was married ? " 
 
 " I 'm braced to bear that, if it comes," he 
 said. " I know it is possible, but I don't fear 
 it. I may, of course, be wrong ; but I don't 
 believe, with what has been between us, that 
 she could ever be the wife of another man 
 while I lived. She might think so. She might 
 even try — go part of the way; but I never 
 felt more secure of anything than that she 
 would find herself unable to do it." 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 89 
 
 " Then do you think that she possibly still 
 cares for you ? " 
 
 " No ; I 'm not a fool. She made that point 
 sufficiently plain. Did n't she tell me, in the 
 downright, simple words, that she did not love 
 me — had never loved me — had found out it 
 was all a mistake ? I believe she meant it ab- 
 solutely. I believe it was true. You don't 
 suppose, if I doubted it, I 'd have given her 
 up as I have done ? " 
 
 " Oh, Harold, what was it all about, that 
 quarrel that you had ? Could you bear to tell 
 me?" 
 
 "There 's nothing to tell. We thought we 
 were perfectly suited, perfectly sympathetic. 
 Our feelings had stood every test but mar- 
 riage. When it came to that, they failed. It 
 was a case of non-adjustment of feelings — 
 different points of view — different natures, 
 perhaps. I saw facing me the demand that 
 I should change myself, root and branch, and 
 become a different creature from what God 
 had made me. This I could not do. I migdit 
 have pretended and acted, but she was not 
 the woman to tolerate the wretched puppet 
 of a man which that would have made of me. 
 Her changing was a thing I never thought of. 
 
9 o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 I was never mean enough to think that a 
 woman was bound to sacrifice her individu- 
 ality in marriage. Why should a wife sur- 
 render that sacred citadel any more than a 
 husband ? How odious should I feel myself, 
 if I had ever taken that position in the slight- 
 est degree ! And shams were out of the 
 question with us. Neither of us could have 
 tolerated anything uncandid — anything that 
 smacked of a tacit convention." 
 
 There was a moment's pause, and then 
 Martha broke out impulsively : 
 
 " I can't help thinking' that it might have 
 been prevented. It may be that you were too 
 proud. Have you ever thought that ? " 
 
 " No," he said, with a certain grimness. " I 
 have never taken that view of the case. She 
 made it so entirely plain that she wanted 
 to be rid of me at once and forever — that 
 there was no room for reflection on that point. 
 If there is a man alive who could have held 
 her bound after her words to me, I hope I 
 may never make his acquaintance." 
 
 The appearance of agitation which had 
 marked the beginning of the interview was 
 now utterly gone from Harold. lie spoke 
 deliberately, and as if with a certain satisfac- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 91 
 
 tion in the sense of getting his thoughts into 
 form. 
 
 Again there was a pause. Then Martha 
 said, speaking very low : 
 
 " But, Harold, you are doing without love." 
 
 "I have had it," he answered, " and what 
 has been is mine, to keep forever. I have lost 
 my wife, but the greatness, the exaltation, of 
 my love increases. I have learned that love 
 is subjective and independent. A renunciation 
 is only an episode in it. I deserve no pity. 
 No, Martha; never fall into the mistake of 
 pitying me. I should pity you from my heart 
 if I thought you would miss what I have had ; 
 and the gods may be lenient to as sweet a 
 soul as yours. You may have the joy, some 
 day, without the renunciation." 
 
 "I don't want it! I wouldn't have it!" 
 cried the girl, vehemently. " No one will ever 
 love me, and I would n't have them to. It 
 would break my heart. It makes me seem 
 ridiculous even to speak of it. I want you to 
 have love and joy. That is all I ask." 
 
 " Well, I Ve had it. Be satisfied. Of the 
 two of us, — except that you have hope, which 
 I have not, — you are the one to be pitied." 
 
 " Oh, Harold, dorit! Unless you want to 
 
9 2 
 
 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 break my heart outright, don't talk to me 
 about being happy. I want happiness {ox you: 
 I *ve got no use for it." 
 
 She got up as she spoke, and moved toward 
 him. Harold stood up, too, and bent to kiss 
 her. Demonstrations between them were un- 
 usual, and it was a very Martha-like instinct 
 that made her now so incline her head as to 
 receive his caress upon her hair. 
 
 "We will go back to the others now," said 
 Harold. " Thank you, Martha." 
 
 So together they went back to the weddings 
 party. 
 
 
 M 
 
 m :: 
 
 I KNEW IT WAS ANGL'ISH TO YOU. 
 
VIII 
 
 The day after the wedding, when the bridal 
 pair had left Paris by one train and the bride's 
 mother and younger sisters by another, when 
 Harold had gone off to attend to some busi- 
 ness which formed one part of the reason of 
 his comine to Paris, Martha, having now full 
 use of the carriage, ordered it to wait outside 
 the atelier while she went in to see if the 
 princess was there. It confirmed a suspicion 
 which had somehow got into her head when 
 she found that her friend was absent. With 
 scarcely a glance at the model and the busy 
 students, she withdrew, and, reentering her 
 carriage, ordered her coachman to drive her 
 to the Rue Presbourg. 
 
 Upon going at once to her friend's private 
 rooms, she found her lying on the lounge in 
 semi-darkness, as she had seen her once be- 
 fore ; but now there were no tears, nor any 
 trace of them. 
 
94 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 " I have a real headache this time," she 
 said, as she stretched out her hand, with a 
 smile. " It 's better than it was, though, and 
 I am glad to see you." 
 
 " Were you at the wedding ? " was Martha's 
 first eager question, when she had kissed her 
 friend and taken the seat beside her. 
 
 "Yes, I was there," said the other promptly. 
 " How charming you looked in your brides- 
 maid's dress, and how handsome your Alice 
 really is ! " 
 
 She wondered what Martha would think if 
 she knew the truth — that she had seen Alice 
 and herself scarcely more than if they had not 
 been present ! 
 
 " And you saw Harold ? " was the next 
 question. 
 
 " Yes ; I saw your paragon of paragons," 
 was the answer, spoken in light and well- 
 guarded tones. 
 
 Martha's face fell. Still, she was too ear- 
 nest to be lightly rebuffed, so she went on : 
 
 " And what did you think of him? Now, 
 Sonia, don't tease me ! You know how im- 
 portant it is to me — what you think of 
 Harold. Do tell me, dear, and don't laugh." 
 
 In response to this earnest appeal the prin- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 95 
 
 cess's face grew grave. She did not look at 
 Martha, however, but occupied herself with 
 twisting up her loosened hair as she answered: 
 
 " I thought him handsome, dear. I thought 
 his face both strong and clever. I could un- 
 derstand you loving him so much. I could 
 see nothing in his face, or figure, or expres- 
 sion, that looked in the least degree unworthy 
 of the great ideal that you have of him. 
 There! Does that satisfy you?" 
 
 She caught Martha's chin between her 
 thumb and forefinger, and for a second she 
 met her gaze full. Then she got up hastily, 
 and walked across the room. 
 
 When she presently came back, she had the 
 air of a person thoroughly on guard, and con- 
 scious of her ability to cope with circum- 
 stances. She did not return to the lounge, 
 but sat upright on a stiff sofa which admitted 
 of no lounging. Martha, glowing with pleas- 
 ure at her heroine's praise of her hero, was 
 determined to follow up her advantage. 
 
 " Oh, you will take back what you said, 
 and let me bring him to see you — won't you, 
 Sonia?" she said ardently. "We are going 
 to have the apartment to ourselves for weeks, 
 Harold and I ; and we three could have such 
 
96 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 ideal times — such little dinners and jaunts to 
 the play! As things arc with you both, I 
 think there is all the more reason for you to 
 know each other. You could be such friends! 
 I should think a real man friend would be such 
 a comfort to you. You seem made for that 
 sort of camaraderie, as well as for love. And 
 what a comfort the friendship of such a woman 
 as you would be to Harold! I feel myself at 
 times so inadequate to him, and I have the 
 very same feeling, sometimes, with you. I 
 will confess to you, Sonia, that I did have a 
 hope once, even though you are a princess 
 and he just a simple American gentleman, 
 that you and Harold might some time, after 
 years, come to be something to each other ; 
 but I have given that up. I see that it is im- 
 possible to either of you. I had a talk with 
 Harold yesterday, and he is as much protected 
 by his past as you are by yours. So there 
 could be no danger to either in such an inter- 
 course. Oh, Sonia, wont you consent to it ? " 
 
 There was great gravity and deliberation 
 in the tones of the princess as she answered 
 impressively : 
 
 " Now, Martha, listen to me. I want you 
 to put that idea out of your head at once and 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 97 
 
 forever. You will do this, I am sure, when I 
 tell you how it distresses me and embarrasses 
 our whole intercourse. You are quite mis- 
 taken in supposing that I have either a need 
 or a desire for the friendship of any man alive. 
 You really must believe me when I tell you 
 that I am sick of men. One reason that I 
 have so entirely given up society is that they 
 fret me so with their offers of what you and 
 they call friendship. I did have men friends 
 once, and I know what they amount to. While 
 I was married, my — I mean the man I mar- 
 ried — was my friend. Since I lost him I have 
 never had another." 
 
 As she ended, she rose and walked across 
 the room. Her tone was so decided that 
 Martha felt that she could say nothing more, 
 and so, with a sigh, she gave up this dream 
 too. 
 
 In a moment the princess returned, bringing 
 two photographs, which she had taken from a 
 drawer. 
 
 " I have been looking at some old pictures 
 this morning," she said. " This one was taken 
 when, as a girl, I was presented at the Eng- 
 lish court." 
 
 She was silent while Martha was uttering 
 
9 8 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 her glowing words of praise, as she looked at 
 the photograph of the beautiful young girl in 
 her white court-dress with plumes and veil ; 
 and then she put the other into her hand, say- 
 ing quietly : 
 
 " This was taken in my wedding-dress, a 
 few days after my marriage." 
 
 Her manner indicated a controlled excite- 
 ment, but she was quite unprepared for the 
 effect that this photograph had upon Martha. 
 The girl fixed her eyes upon it with a sort of 
 greedy delight, and while she drew in her 
 breath with thick, short respirations, the hand 
 that held the picture trembled. 
 
 " I can see it all !" she exclaimed. " Oh, 
 Sonia, were you ever really as happy as that ? 
 What were you looking at, with your head 
 turned in that eager way ? " 
 
 " Yes, I was a Happy Princess once, my 
 dear. But you are a wonderful creature, Mar- 
 tha ! No one but you ever thought to ask 
 that question, so I have been saved the em- 
 barrassment of explaining. Since you have 
 asked me, I will tell you that I was looking at 
 my husband. While the photographer was 
 posing me in various ways, my husband was 
 waiting for me. He was supposed to be out 
 

 OH, SONIA, WERE YOU EVER REALLY AS HAPPY AS THAT?'" 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 99 
 
 of sight, but I heard a newspaper rustle, and 
 looked quickly around, and caught a glimpse 
 of him, between two screens, seated quietly 
 and unconsciously reading the paper. One 
 of those great rushes of passionate tenderness 
 which the sight of the man she loves can some- 
 times bring to a woman's heart came over me. 
 At that moment the photographer got the in- 
 stantaneous impression. I don't know why I 
 should tell you all this, except that you saw it 
 all there. To other people there never seemed 
 any special significance in the picture." 
 
 She reached out her hand to take back the 
 photographs, but Martha handed her only the 
 first. 
 
 " Oh, Sonia, let me keep this ! " she begged. 
 " It is such delight to me to look at it ! " 
 
 " No, dear ; I could n't. No one but myself 
 should ever see that picture. I ought not per- 
 haps to have shown it to you. It was just an 
 impulse. Promise never to speak of either of 
 these pictures — not even to me. You never 
 will ? " 
 
 " Never," said Martha, sadly, as she gave 
 the picture up. Her friend took it, and, with- 
 out glancing at it, locked it away in a drawer. 
 
 When she came back her whole manner had 
 
ioo THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 changed. She began at once to talk about 
 her work at the atelier, and told Martha that 
 Etienne wished her to enter a picture for the 
 Salon. The wedding preparations had kept 
 Martha at home a good deal lately, and the 
 princess had some interesting bits of news to 
 give her. She was very graphic in her account 
 of some of Etienne's last criticisms, and got 
 into high spirits, in which Martha, somehow, 
 could not entirely take part. 
 
 The girl went away at last rather heavy- 
 hearted. This conversation had deprived her 
 of her last hope of bringing the princess and 
 her brother together. She had an engage- 
 ment with Harold for the afternoon, so she 
 could not go to the atelier ; but she promised 
 to meet the princess there in good time next 
 morning. 
 
 That afternoon she indulged herself in giv- 
 ing her brother a brief account of her romantic 
 friendship. She did not, however, mention 
 the name by which the princess was known 
 to her, or any but the external facts in the 
 case. 
 
 As she had foreseen, her brother made no 
 objection to the intercourse, and told her she 
 had been very wise to keep the whole thing 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 101 
 
 to herself. He did not seem in the least sur- 
 prised that the princess refused to make his 
 acquaintance, and explained it to Martha by 
 saying that she was probably an independent 
 and self-willed young woman, who was dis- 
 posed to suit only herself in the matter of 
 friends ; but that this was not inconsistent with 
 a certain regard for conventionalities, and it 
 was probable that she did not care to bother 
 with her family, or even to take the trouble to 
 find out anything about them. Martha felt 
 that her brother was moderately interested in 
 the matter because of its relation to herself; 
 but in spite of all her enthusiasm she could not 
 feel that she had inspired him with any special 
 interest in the princess, or any appreciably 
 greater desire to make her acquaintance than 
 she had shown to make his. 
 
IX 
 
 A few days later Martha came to the atelier 
 in a state of only half-concealed excitement. 
 She had a plan which she broached to the 
 princess with some timidity. She began by 
 saying that her brother was compelled to be 
 absent from Paris during the whole of the next 
 day, and that, as it was Sunday, and there 
 would be no work at the atelier, she would 
 have the whole day on her hands. 
 
 " Come and spend it with me," said the 
 princess. 
 
 " Oh, if you would only come and spend it 
 with mc / " said Martha, so wistfully that her 
 friend laughed gaily, and said : 
 
 -Why not?" 
 
 " Harold takes an early train, and will not 
 be back until night," said Martha; "and it 
 would be such joy to have you in my own 
 room, sitting in my own chair, lying on my 
 own bed, standing on my own rugs, and giv- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 103 
 
 ing me sweet associations with these things 
 forever." 
 
 " Of course I '11 come — with pleasure," said 
 Sonia, pausing in her work to answer Marthas 
 whispered words. 
 
 So, in this dream, at least, Martha was not 
 to be disappointed ; and she parted from her 
 friend with the delightful expectation that she 
 was to see her next as her guest. 
 
 The young girl waked early next morning, 
 and had her first breakfast with her brother ; 
 and after he had gone she found the time long 
 while she waited for her visitor. No definite 
 hour had been agreed upon, and she was afraid 
 that the princess would come far too late to 
 suit her eager longing. Still she had not liked 
 to urge too much upon her. 
 
 Martha had ordered heaps of flowers to 
 make her room and the little boudoir which 
 adjoined it look attractive ; and she took Har- 
 old in to inspect them before he went away. 
 He rushed through hurriedly, said everything 
 was charming, gave her a hasty kiss, and was 
 gone. 
 
 She stood at the window, which looked 
 upon the Place de la Madeleine, and waited a 
 long time, thinking deeply. The flower-mar- 
 
io4 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 ket below was unusually rich, as the clay was 
 warm and springlike ; and it presently occurred 
 to her that among the glowing masses of bloom 
 exposed to view there were some varieties of 
 flowers which she did not have. She there- 
 fore determined to fill up a part of the time of 
 waiting by going down to get some of these. 
 Hastily putting on her hat, she ran down the 
 winding stairway, crossed the open space, and 
 was soon threading her way among the flower- 
 stalls under the shadow of the beautiful great 
 church. She kept her eye on the entrance to 
 her apartment-house, however ; and as she 
 knew the princess's carriage and livery, she 
 felt that there was no danger of failing to see 
 her friend, should she happen to arrive during 
 her brief absence. 
 
 The princess, however, did not come in her 
 carriage, or, rather, she sent it away after hav- 
 ing crossed the thronged streets of the Place 
 de la Concorde, and, wrapped in her dark 
 cloak, she walked quickly along with the foot- 
 passengers until she reached the house of 
 which she was in search. Then she slipped 
 quietly in, and mounted the steps to the third 
 story. 
 
 Her ring was answered by a man-servant, 
 
"'I BEG YOUR PARDON,' HE SAID AGAIN. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 105 
 
 who explained that his young mistress had 
 just gone down to the flower-market for a mo- 
 ment, and who ushered her into the laree salon 
 to wait. 
 
 Scarcely was she seated there when the bell 
 rang again, and the servant opened the door 
 to admit Harold. He had forgotten an impor- 
 tant paper, and had come back for it in great 
 haste. He knew that it was his part to avoid 
 the princess in case she should have arrived ; 
 but concluding that she would, of course, be 
 with Martha in her own rooms, he came di- 
 rectly into the salon, which was the nearest 
 way of reaching his own apartment. 
 
 When he had entered, and the door was 
 closed behind him, he took two or three steps 
 forward, and then stopped as if petrified in his 
 place. 
 
 The princess had risen to her feet, and stood 
 confronting him, her face as pale and agitated 
 as his own. 
 
 " I beg your pardon," he said, taking off his 
 hat mechanically ; " did you, perhaps, wish to 
 see me ? " 
 
 "No," she answered; " I wished to see 
 your sister. She has gone across to the flow- 
 er-market." 
 
106 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Her eyes had fallen under his, and she felt 
 that she was trembling as she stood in front of 
 him and answered his questions as mechani- 
 cally as a stupid child. 
 
 11 1 beg your pardon," he said again ; and 
 he seemed to grow paler still as he stood there 
 irresolute. 
 
 " Do you wish to see my sister alone? " he 
 then said. " I don't understand. Do you 
 wish me to stay or to go ? " 
 
 " I wish you to go," she said, rallying a lit- 
 tle as the thought occurred to her that Martha 
 might return. " Your sister is expecting me. 
 I came with the understanding that you were 
 to be away." 
 
 A light broke over him, but it cast a sudden 
 shadow on his face. 
 
 "You are, then, the princess of whom she 
 has spoken to me," he said. " I beg your 
 pardon." 
 
 " I am Sophia Rutledge," she said. " Mar- 
 tha believes me to be a princess, and I let her 
 think it. Some one in the atelier told her so. 
 What will you tell her now ? " 
 
 14 Exactly what you wish." 
 
 14 Say nothing. Let her keep her delusion. 
 Her friendship is dear to me ; I do not wish 
 it turned to hate." 
 
'AMONG THE FLOWER STALLS. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 107 
 
 " I shall say nothing," he said. 
 
 They both stood silent there a moment, 
 looking away from each other. Then the wo- 
 man, feeling her knees grow weak and trem- 
 bling under her, sank back into her seat ; and 
 the man, urged by some impulse of self-pro- 
 tection which demanded that he should fly, 
 had bowed and left the room before she had 
 quite recovered from the momentary dizziness 
 which had possessed her as she fell into her 
 chair. She heard the front door close behind 
 him presently, and knew that he was gone. 
 Then she felt that she must brace herself to 
 meet Martha calmly. 
 
 When the young girl, a few moments later, 
 came in with her load of flowers, and smilingly 
 uttered her apologies and surprise at having 
 missed her, her friend's senses seemed some- 
 how to return, and she was able to answer 
 calmly. 
 
 It seemed to Martha that the beautiful prin- 
 cess looked ill, and she was tenderly anxious 
 about her ; but she little suspected that during 
 those few moments of her absence Sonia and 
 her old love had been face to face, or, more 
 marvelous still, that Harold had seen again 
 the woman who had been his wife. 
 
X 
 
 The impression left upon the mind of Sonia 
 by that meeting with Harold was an intensely 
 disturbing one. Even the stirrings of old feel- 
 ing, and the memories of past pleasures and 
 pains, which the sight of him had recalled, 
 were less strong in her than a certain feeling 
 of humiliation. She felt that she had been 
 overcome by so great a weakness that she 
 must have made a self-betrayal of which it 
 nearly maddened her to think. Knowing how 
 completely she had been thrown off her guard 
 by this totally unexpected meeting, she felt 
 that every emotion of her heart, which she 
 herself was so conscious of, had been laid bare 
 to him, and she could not rest for the torment 
 of that thought. Her hours with Martha were 
 therefore disturbed and unsatisfactory to them 
 both ; and when, soon after the mid-day meal, 
 Martha asked her if she would like to drive, 
 she accepted the relief of that idea with alac- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 109 
 
 rity, only stipulating that they should not go 
 to the crowded Bois. 
 
 Martha ordered the carriage, and they drove 
 about for an hour or two, stopping several 
 times to go in and look at churches which they 
 had often seen, but never entered. In some 
 of these vespers were in progress, and they 
 paid their sous for seats near the door, and sat 
 down for a few moments ; but the music played 
 too dangerously upon Sonia's overwrought 
 feelings, and she hurried her friend away. 
 
 In one or two of the smaller churches there 
 were only silent kneeling figures here and 
 there, and the two women walked about, look- 
 ing at the mixture of dignified antiquity and 
 tawdry decoration on every side, and reading 
 the tablets all about the approach to the chan- 
 cel, erected as thank-offerings to Mary and 
 Joseph for favors granted. In spite of her in- 
 ward perturbation, Sonia could not help smil- 
 ing at the economy of words on some of these. 
 One or two had merely, " Merci, Joseph," or 
 " Merci, Marie et Joseph," while the more 
 elaborate ones recorded the thanks of the 
 giver of the tablet for a favor received — the 
 restoration of a beloved child from illness, the 
 conversion of an erring son, the rescue of a 
 
no THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 husband from shipwreck, and even the mirac- 
 ulous intervention of Mary and Joseph to re- 
 store to health a little boy who had been gored 
 by a bull. The very ignorance of it was touch- 
 ing to the two women, and the conviction that 
 it was in each of these poor hearts a reaching 
 upward kept them from feeling any scorn. 
 
 As they returned to their carriage, Martha, 
 who during the recent scene had been furtively 
 watching her friend's face, now saw upon it an 
 expression which she was at a loss to account 
 for. Was it, she wondered, religious devo- 
 tion, stirred by the associations of the church, 
 which made the lovely face beside her look so 
 passionately tense with feeling ? For the first 
 time it occurred to her to wonder what her 
 friend's religion was. 
 
 " Are you a Catholic, Sonia?" she said. 
 
 The answer came impulsively : 
 
 " No, I am not a Catholic. It is easier to 
 say what I am not than what I am — except 
 that, before and beyond all, I am a miserable 
 woman." 
 
 As these words escaped her the lack of self- 
 control of which they gave proof was so alarm- 
 ing to her that she bested her friend to take 
 her home at once, saying that she was really 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA ill 
 
 not well, and must be alone to rest. Martha 
 felt chilled and hurt. It was all so disappoint- 
 ing, and she seemed so completely put at a 
 distance. The day which she had looked for- 
 ward to with such eager joy had turned out 
 dreary and sad. There was nothing to do, 
 however, but to drive her friend back to her 
 apartment. 
 
 When they got there, Sonia turned and 
 kissed her warmly, but said nothing ; and 
 Martha drove home, feeling lonely and per- 
 plexed. 
 
 She did not expect to see the princess at 
 the atelier next morning ; but to her amaze- 
 ment, when she got there quite early herself, 
 the beautiful, lithe figure was already before 
 the easel, hard at work. There was, more- 
 over, an air of strength and self-reliance about 
 her which offered the greatest contrast to her 
 manner of the day before. 
 
 As Martha came into the room, Sonia, who 
 was one of the quiet group around the model 
 — a thin child who twitched and wriggled and 
 could not keep still for two consecutive min- 
 utes — waved her a welcome with a little 
 flourish of her brush, and gave her a bright, 
 decided nod. It was too late for Martha to 
 
ii2 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 get a position near her, so talk was impossible 
 until the midday recess ; but that gesture, 
 glance, and bow of the head were enough of 
 themselves to put new spirit into the girl, and 
 she found her place, and fell to work, going 
 ahead with more vim than she had been able 
 to command for a long time. 
 
 When rest- time came the two friends showed 
 their canvases to each other, and both of them 
 could see the improvement in their work. 
 Feeling much encouraged, they went off" to the 
 butcher's shop, selected their chops, and while 
 waiting for them to be cooked, sat at their 
 little table in the crajicric, and talked. 
 
 At first they spoke only of their atelier work 
 and Etienne's criticisms and suggestions ; but 
 when that was pretty much talked out for the 
 moment, Sonia, with a sudden change of man- 
 ner, said abruptly : 
 
 " I want to atone to you for the gruesome 
 mood that I was in when I went to see you 
 yesterday. If you '11 invite me again, I will 
 be different — and, oh, by the way, I 've got 
 over that foolish idea that I had about not 
 meeting your brother. If it would give you 
 any pleasure, I don't in the least object. It 
 would certainly be very silly to let him spoil 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 113 
 
 this beautiful chance of our being together, as 
 it would if I refused to meet him." 
 
 Martha looked at her in surprise. She had 
 so entirely made up her mind that the powers 
 had decreed that these two beings should not 
 meet that Sonia's words rather disconcerted 
 her. 
 
 " Oh, are you not pleased ? " said the latter, 
 disappointedly. " I thought it would delight 
 you." 
 
 " So it does," said Martha, quickly; " but, to 
 be perfectly frank, I had so entirely accepted 
 the idea that there might be some unknown 
 danger in a meeting between you two that I 
 had given it up ; and now that the likelihood 
 of it comes again, some sense of danger comes 
 with it. You both seem such tremendous 
 forces — in my eyes, at least, — that it is not 
 like any ordinary acquaintanceship. It is very 
 foolish, though ; for even two locomotives may 
 rush toward each other without daneer, if each 
 is solid on its own track, leading to its differ- 
 ent destination. And surely no harm is done 
 when they come very close, and exchange sig- 
 nals of friendliness, and then part, and go their 
 opposite ways." 
 
 " Perfectly sage and true! Most wisely 
 
U4 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 spoken!" said Sonia. " So you are reconciled 
 now, are you? What weathercocks we wo- 
 men are ! I am sure I may say it of you as 
 well as of myself, contrasting your former 
 eagerness with your present reluctance for 
 this meeting. Well, I suppose it 's a part of 
 our nature, and I don't know that men are so 
 very different." 
 
 " Harold is different," said Martha. 
 
 " Oh, no doubt he is quite, quite the imma- 
 culate," said her friend, lightly ; and then, 
 with a sudden change, she added in tones of 
 extreme earnestness : 
 
 " Martha, you have never told him one word 
 about me — have you ? Nothing, I mean, of 
 what I have told you or let you see concerning 
 myself. All that was and must remain sacred 
 between you and me." 
 
 " Not a word, not a syllable ! " cried Mar- 
 tha. " How could you even ask ? He knows 
 of you only as my atelier friend, and that you 
 are a Russian princess, and he knows of my 
 visits to you, and my love and admiration for 
 you; but not one word of what your confidence 
 has taken me into about yourself personally. 
 I told him how little I knew or cared to know 
 about you — that you were a young and beau- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 115 
 
 tiful widow, whose past history was wholly un- 
 known to me. What you have let me see of 
 the writing which that history has made upon 
 your heart was a sacred confidence which no 
 power could ever draw out of me." 
 
 " I knew it, dear. I never doubted it. Don't 
 defend yourself, as if I had distrusted you. It 
 is because I do trust you that I consent to 
 meet your brother. I would certainly not wil- 
 lingly make .the acquaintance of any man who 
 could possibly be supposed to know as much 
 of my heart and its weaknesses as I have re- 
 vealed to you." 
 
 " And when will you come to me again ? " 
 said Martha, allowing herself to feel unchecked 
 the joy which the prospect before her stirred 
 within her heart. 
 
 " I will dine with you to-morrow, if you 
 like," said Sonia, with an air of decision. 
 
 It was an intense surprise to Harold when 
 Martha told him that the princess was to dine 
 with her next evening. He at once proposed 
 to go out and leave them tete-a-tete, but his 
 wonder increased when he was told that the 
 princess had avowed her willingness to meet 
 him. After hearing that, there was but one 
 thing for him to do. This he saw plainly ; 
 
u6 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 but at the same time he realized that a more 
 difficult ordeal could not possibly bo put be- 
 fore him. What could be her object in a 
 course so extraordinary, and what could be 
 the feeling in her heart to make such a course 
 possible ? 
 
 He had believed her to be deeply moved, 
 as no sensitive woman could fail to be, by their 
 unexpected meeting of the day before ; but 
 that she should deliberately wish to repeat the 
 meeting looked like the most heartless caprice. 
 She had always been capricious, daring, and 
 impetuous, and had loved to do unusual and 
 exciting things ; but that he could excuse as 
 a part of her character and individuality. 
 Heartless he had never had occasion to think 
 her. Even her sudden recoil from him and 
 repudiation of their marriage he believed to 
 be the result of some commanding quality of 
 her fine nature, which he could not help rever- 
 encing, even though he did not comprehend it. 
 
 The courtship of Harold Keene and Sophia 
 Rutledge had been very short, and their wed- 
 ding sudden. He had met the young English 
 girl in London near the close of the season ; 
 had seen her first in her court-dress, at her 
 presentation ; and had afterward spent ten 
 days with her at a country house. Their urn- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 117 
 
 tual attraction had been a current which had 
 swept everything before it ; and when it had 
 to be decided whether or not she should go on 
 a voyage to Japan with her aunt, as had been 
 planned, — a prospect which would separate 
 them for months to come, — they took things 
 into their own hands, and were married at 
 short notice. The parents of Miss Rutledge 
 were both dead. Her father, an Englishman, 
 had married a Russian ; and it was her mo- 
 ther's sister with whom she was supposed to 
 live, though she had spent most of her grown- 
 up years, and all of her childhood, in England. 
 Her aunt was now a widow and a feverishly 
 enthusiastic traveler, and the girl had looked 
 forward with some pleasure to the long travels 
 ahead of them. Her sudden marriage to the 
 young American, introduced to her by some 
 common friends, changed her life absolutely ; 
 but Harold was determined that she should 
 realize at least one of her ardent dreams of 
 travel, and take a journey up the Nile. Soon 
 after their marriage they had set out on this 
 journey, and the history of its rapturous be- 
 ginning and miserable ending was known only 
 to themselves. 
 
 In this way it had happened that Harold's 
 wife had never been seen by his family, and he 
 
i lS THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 had even declined to send them a photograph 
 of her. He said he disliked photographs, and 
 none could ever give a fair representation of 
 his beautiful wife. He wrote Martha that she 
 must do her best to restrain her impatience, 
 as they were to come at once to America at 
 the end of their honeymoon on the Nile, and 
 to make their home there, while he settled 
 down to work. 
 
 Instead of this, however, came the brief an- 
 nouncement of their separation, which almost 
 broke Martha's heart. She had put aside any 
 natural feeling of deprivation and pain, to throw 
 herself, heart and soul, into the delight of 
 Harold's romantic marriage, and as the young 
 couple dreamed their way up the old Nile, she 
 dreamed it with them. It is probable that 
 few people in the world get the intense joy 
 out of their personal experiences of love that 
 this ardent and impassioned girl derived from 
 the mere imagination of her brother's happi- 
 ness. The blow that followed it was therefore 
 very keen and deep. The courage and com- 
 plete reserve which her brother had shown in 
 the matter had given her strength to bear it ; 
 but, in spite of that, a permanent shadow had 
 been cast upon her life. 
 
XI 
 
 As Sonia got out of her carriage before 
 the house in the Place de la Madeleine, and 
 mounted the steps with her maid, her heart 
 was beating violently, but she had never been 
 stronger in the sense of complete self-posses- 
 sion. She knew that a difficult ordeal was 
 before her, but she had no fear that her spirit 
 would falter. It was only necessary for her 
 to remember her former weakness, and how 
 she had paled and cowered before Harold, to 
 make her securer in her defiant resolution with 
 every pulse-beat. 
 
 At the door of the apartment she dismissed 
 her maid, and, dropping the train of her heavy 
 dress, swept into the little ante-chamber, re- 
 gally tall and self-collected, to the admiration 
 of the servants, who thought her every inch a 
 princess. 
 
 A door opposite opened, and Martha ap- 
 peared in a pretty evening gown and led her 
 friend into the salon. 
 
i2o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Near the table, holding the " Figaro" in his 
 hands, and bending his eyes upon its columns, 
 sat Harold. His severe evening dress, his 
 grave, dark face, with its close- trimmed, pointed 
 beard, and his straight, smooth hair, with its 
 definite part, all spoke of composure, delibera- 
 tion, and repose. 
 
 He rose to his feet, laid down the paper, 
 and stood in his place, waiting. His sisters 
 iniest had taken off her lace hood and thrown 
 open her cloak, between the parted folds of 
 which appeared a rich evening dress. She 
 came forward, moving lightly in her heavy 
 garments, and when Martha, with a fluttering 
 heart, which made her manner somewhat ex- 
 cited and confused, said, looking from one to 
 the other, "My brother, Mr. Keene — the 
 Princess Mannernorff," she looked him full in 
 the face with what Martha thought a rather 
 haughty look, and gave him a somewhat cere- 
 monious bow. 
 
 Harold met her gaze with unflinching eyes, 
 and bowed in his turn with an air which Mar- 
 tha thought unnecessarily formal and distant. 
 After all she had said to each about the other, 
 it disappointed her that their meeting should 
 be so absolutely without cordiality. She 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 121 
 
 asked her friend if she would come into her 
 room to lay aside her wraps ; but the latter 
 declined, and threw her cloak and hood upon 
 a chair before Harold had time to offer his 
 assistance. 
 
 She was dressed in a plain gown of thick 
 yellow satin, with trimmings of brown fur and 
 creamy lace. A diamond arrow pierced the 
 mass of her rich brown hair, and a great clasp 
 of many-colored jewels in an antique setting 
 held the folds of her gown at the waist. She 
 wore no other ornaments, and her beautiful 
 arms and hands were without bracelets or 
 rings. She did not seat herself, but opened a 
 fan, and stood waving it softly as she looked 
 down at Martha from her greater height. 
 The introduction had, of course, been in 
 French, and the conversation continued in 
 that language. 
 
 In strong contrast to her glowing brilliancy 
 of color Harold was very pale as he stood with 
 his shoulders braced against the mantel, and 
 talked to her. He was, however, quite as 
 collected as she. 
 
 Presently she began to wonder dimly if he 
 were not more so ; for underneath her assured 
 calm of manner there was a wild excitement 
 
122 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 of which she was intensely aware, and all the 
 force of her will was set upon the effort of 
 concealing it from her companions. 
 
 She did not wish Martha to know that she 
 was excited ; and to have this quiet man in 
 front of her get even a suspicion that she was 
 not fully as composed as he appeared to be, 
 was a thought that she could not endure. 
 
 She began to talk about the atelier where 
 she and Martha had met and made friends, 
 and she gave an amusing description of her 
 first encounter with Etienne when she had 
 gone there to enter her name as a pupil. 
 
 " It was my first venture into the Bohemia 
 of the Latin Quarter," she said; "and I felt 
 brave, but self-protective, when I reached the 
 place and went in, with my maid, to investi- 
 gate. The cloak-room was empty, and when 
 I got to the atelier, and walked around the 
 great piece of sail-cloth which turned its dirty 
 and undecorated side toward me, I saw a fat 
 little old man, in carpet slippers, and a dirty, 
 besmeared linen blouse, and black skull-cap, 
 washing brushes in some soft soap contained 
 in an old lobster-can. ' I wish to see M. 
 Etienne,' I said rather haughtily ; and to my 
 great indignation he answered, still dabbing 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 123 
 
 and flattening out his brushes in their lather 
 of soap, ' What do you want with him ? ' My 
 maid quite jumped with fright, and I, wishing 
 to show my courage, said severely, ' That is 
 what does not concern you.' Instead of show- 
 ing the self-abasement which I thought my 
 rebuke merited, he said amiably, still rubbing 
 his brushes round and round : 'But yes, it 
 does ; for I 'in the man you are looking for. 
 What will you have ? ' I was so honestly dis- 
 comfited that he kindly came to the rescue, 
 and, overlooking my blunder, began to talk 
 business. I have heard since that the mistake 
 which I made had been so frequently made 
 before that I suppose he scarcely noticed it." 
 
 As she ceased speaking, the readiness with 
 which Martha took advantage of the pause to 
 move toward the dining-room suddenly made 
 her aware that dinner must have been an- 
 nounced, — how long ago she could not tell, — 
 and that her garrulous speech and gesticula- 
 tion had prevented her from hearing it. Her 
 back was toward the door; but how excited 
 she must have been, and appeared, not to 
 have been aware of the announcement ! Her 
 face flushed, and she bit her lip with vexation. 
 
 Martha looked at her brother, supposing 
 
124 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 that he would offer his arm to their guest. 
 Instead of doing so, however, he merely stood 
 aside and waited for the two ladies to go into 
 the dining-room before him. In doing this, 
 Sonia passed very near him ; and with a 
 feeling of defiance in her breast she looked 
 straight at him. 
 
 He did not meet her gaze, however; for 
 his own eyes were gravely lowered and hid 
 behind a pair of heavy lids, the curves and 
 lashes of which were startlingly familiar to 
 her. 
 
 In the lull which the formalities of the mo- 
 ment occasioned, it was painfully borne in on 
 Sonia that she had been too talkative. Her 
 recent rapid speech smote annoyingly on her 
 ears ; and when she recalled the fact that she 
 had done all the talking, and must have made 
 an appearance of almost vulgar chattiness, she 
 felt humiliated and indignant. Was she ex- 
 posing her inward excitement to this quiet 
 man, who was now giving some low-toned 
 instructions to the butler with a self-possession 
 which she suddenly envied ? Feeling hurt and 
 angry, she fell into utter silence. 
 
 A constraint had fallen upon the party 
 which was even more marked than that which 
 
SONIA PASSED VERY NEAR HIM." 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 125 
 
 usually characterizes the first moments at a 
 formal table. Sonia felt that she would bite 
 her tongue in two before she would speak 
 again, and Martha had a helpless sense that 
 things were somehow going wrong. It was 
 Harold who broke the silence. 
 
 "Martha," he said, "the princess will say, 
 perhaps, what wine she prefers." 
 
 Sonia felt as if she hated him. He knew 
 all her little aversions and preferences as well 
 as she knew them herself, and had ordered 
 her dinners and wines times out of number. 
 How could he pretend that he had never 
 seen her before, with so much success as al- 
 most to impose upon herself? Was it really 
 a dream ? Which was the dream, the past or 
 the present? How could he seem to be so 
 indifferent, unless he really felt so ? Perhaps 
 he was. That might be the simple explana- 
 tion of what seemed mysterious. 
 
 As these thoughts hurried through her mind 
 while she made a pretense of eating her soup, 
 it suddenly occurred to her that her present 
 complete silence might look as odd as her for- 
 mer garrulousness. Harold, while eating his 
 dinner with apparent relish, was doing all the 
 talking now, but with how different a manner 
 
126 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 from hers! How quiet he was, and what well- 
 bred pauses interspersed his talk, and how 
 agreeably he deferred to Martha and herself, 
 and brought them into it! She had come to 
 this dinner with the proudest confidence of be- 
 in o- able to conform the conditions about her 
 absolutely to her will, and yet, in spite of 
 herself, she seemed to be sinking deeper and 
 deeper every moment into the slough of re- 
 gret and self-reproach which she had come 
 here to get out of. 
 
 As the meal proceeded, her self-dissatisfac- 
 tion increased, and presently, with a feeling 
 almost of panic, she realized that her conduct 
 must be so peculiar as to cause surprise to 
 Martha, if not to her brother. What inter- 
 pretation would be put upon the sudden 
 dumbness that possessed her? A very obvi- 
 ous one occurred to her, which it filled her 
 with anger to think of, and she felt she must 
 talk, must recover herself, must do away with 
 the impression of her present stupidity. 
 
 Martha, groping about for an agreeable 
 topic, had mentioned the young bridal cou- 
 ple, and a telegram which she had just re- 
 ceived from them, and that led her to some 
 remarks about the wedding. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 127 
 
 "Oh, it was a beautiful wedding — I was 
 there ! " said Sonia, in a breathless endeavor 
 to come naturally into the talk. 
 
 As she spoke she met Harold's eyes, and 
 thought that she discovered just a shade of 
 surprise in them. He only bowed, however, 
 in assent to her rather demonstrative expres- 
 sion of praise. Sonia felt at once that her 
 attendance at any wedding, particularly that 
 one, was a thing that grated on him. His 
 presence there was, of course, a necessity ; 
 but the odious taste of her going, out of pure 
 curiosity, as it would appear to him, to see 
 this marriage, must add one more item to 
 the evidence which was rolling up against 
 her. She was experiencing what was new 
 to her — a sensation of total inadequacy to 
 the social demands of her surroundings. 
 
 " Harold, do you think you can possibly 
 stay for the opening of the Salon ? " said Mar- 
 tha, presently, in another effort to make the 
 conversation go. This was a topic which she 
 thought Sonia should be interested in. Ap- 
 parently she was right. 
 
 " I 'm going to exhibit a picture," said So^ 
 nia, quickly. 
 
 Sonia had thought only of recovering her- 
 
128 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 self 1)\- talking naturally, and this speech, as 
 well as the last one, she regretted bitterly the 
 moment she had uttered it. Not only did it 
 seem in bad taste to speak of her exhibiting, 
 when Martha was so far removed from such 
 an honor, but it might also make the impres- 
 sion that she thought that the fact might be 
 an inducement for him to stay for the Salon. 
 It was maddening to have him look at her 
 again with polite interest, and express his con- 
 gratulations upon a fact of which she now felt 
 heartily ashamed. How he must despise her ! 
 What should she do ? 
 
 " I wonder," said Martha, at this point, in 
 her clear, low voice, " if Harold has ever seen 
 that striking picture that hangs in your room, 
 Sonia. It is Watts's ' Hope,' Harold. Do you 
 know it ? " 
 
 Harold answered that he did not, and So- 
 ma's sense of helpless misery increased as she 
 perceived that Martha was going to describe 
 it. She bit her tongue to keep from crying 
 out as Martha proceeded to give the following 
 description : 
 
 " It is a woman's figure lying on the globe 
 in an attitude of fatigue and dejection. The 
 scantily draped form is beautiful, but not youth- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 129 
 
 ful -looking, and the face, partly concealed by 
 a bandage over the eyes, is also beautiful, but 
 lined with care and sorrow. In her hands she 
 holds an old lyre with every string broken ex- 
 cept one. This one string, frayed and worn 
 and lax, she is striking with her thin, weak 
 fingers, and she is bending her dulled ears 
 to try to catch the note. When Sonia first 
 showed it to me, and said that it was one of 
 her favorite pictures, I did not understand it. 
 We have all been taught at Etienne's such a 
 fine contempt for English art that I was dis- 
 posed to treat it lightly. I soon saw, how- 
 ever, the wonderful, tragic meaning in the 
 picture, and I quite long to see the original." 
 This was too much. Sonia felt that if any- 
 thing else occurred to hold her up to contempt 
 in this man's eyes, she should give up, and 
 burst into tears. Her courage was fast oozing 
 to the last ebb ; and with a feeling of actual 
 desperation she looked involuntarily into the 
 face of her opposite neighbor, and met his eyes 
 fixed on her with a strong gaze that in an in- 
 stant supported and calmed her. She did not 
 quite read its meaning, but she felt that there 
 was kindness for her in it, and that there was 
 no contempt. A look from him had given her 
 
i 3 o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 courage many a time in the past, and it was 
 availing now. She felt suddenly self-possessed 
 and strong ; but the remainder of the meal 
 was a confused blur in her memory, and she 
 was devoutly thankful when her maid came to 
 fetch her home. 
 
 Martha thought it a little strange that her 
 brother did not go down to put their guest 
 into her carriage ; but she reflected that he 
 was far more familiar with the rules of foreign 
 society than she was, and she concluded that 
 he must be acting in accordance with them. 
 
XII 
 
 Martha felt herself genuinely surprised, 
 puzzled, and disappointed at the result of the 
 meeting which she had worked so hard to 
 bring about. Nothing could be more incon- 
 testably evident than that her brother and her 
 friend had not proved sympathetic — did not 
 "hit it off." What was the reason? How 
 could both of them be so perfectly congenial 
 to her and still uncongenial to each other? It 
 was a painful mystery, to which she tried in 
 vain to find the key. 
 
 Next morning Sonia did not come to the 
 atelier at her usual time, and Martha painted 
 on without her in pronounced despondency of 
 spirit. When she had quite given the princess 
 up, she looked around, and, to her delight, 
 saw Sonia placing her easel, and preparing to 
 go to work, a short distance off. She thought 
 her friend looked a little pale and ill ; but 
 when she managed presently to catch her eye, 
 
1 3 2 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 she received an affectionate smile from her, 
 which gave her a certain amount of reassur- 
 ance. 
 
 When the interval for lunch came, and they 
 went off together to the crcmcrie. Martha 
 waited for her friend to introduce the subject 
 so near to her heart, and was surprised when 
 she led the talk in an entirely different direc- 
 tion. 
 
 It had been much the same with Harold 
 after their guest had left the evening before. 
 Beyond a rather preoccupied and spiritless 
 assent to all she had to say about the beauty 
 of the princess, he had seemed more or less 
 indifferent on the subject, and had plunged 
 with zest into the discussion of other things. 
 Martha could not altogether wonder at this, 
 for she had never seen her adored friend ap- 
 pear to so little advantage. Her brother, how- 
 ever, had seemed to her charming, though not, 
 of course, at his very best, and she expected 
 that Sonia would at least say that he was 
 handsome and agreeable. When it appeared 
 that she was going to say nothing at all, Mar- 
 tha boldly took the initiative, and asked : 
 
 11 What do you think of Harold ? " 
 
 "Think of him? Oh, I think he \s very 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 133 
 
 good-looking, though less like his sister than 
 I could wish." 
 
 " Oh, Sonia, don't tease me ! If I thought 
 you meant that, I should give you up, both as 
 an artist and a friend. But, really, did you like 
 him or not ? " 
 
 "I could hardly say 'not' to that heartfelt 
 appeal," said Sonia, smiling; "and, indeed, I 
 don't feel inclined to. I liked him, of course. 
 But, my dear, I told you only the truth when 
 I said I was sick to death of men. Etienne is 
 the solitary exception. I like him for the rea- 
 son that he did say a decent word to me this 
 morning, and I really believe he thinks I am 
 beginning to daub with promise." 
 
 Martha saw that there was no hope, so with 
 profound disappointment she gave up, and said 
 no more. 
 
 As for Sonia herself, never had she been in 
 a state of such abject self-abasement. She had 
 donned her gorgeous raiment and gone off to 
 that dinner in exultant self-confidence, and had 
 never doubted her ability to conform circum- 
 stances to her will, and to make exactly the im- 
 pression upon Harold which she desired him to 
 have. What, then, was the secret of her com- 
 plete and humiliating failure ? She asked her- 
 
i 3 4 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 self this question, and immediately tried to shut 
 fast her ears to the answer which her heart 
 gave. She had confidently believed, up to this 
 hour of her life, that her woman's pride was 
 strong enough for any demands which she 
 could possibly make upon it ; but it had failed 
 her. She had passed a sleepless night after 
 that dinner, and it took tremendous effort to 
 go to her work next morning. She did it only 
 because she knew that if she did not the news 
 of her absence would reach Harold, and she 
 could not endure the thought of the motive to 
 which he might attribute it. Perhaps the most 
 poignant recollection which rankled in Sonia's 
 mind was the thought that, in her helpless- 
 ness, she had made an appeal to him by that 
 look which he had answered with such 
 strength-giving kindness. It had enabled her 
 to get through with the remaining time; but 
 now, as she thought of it, she felt that he had 
 taken it as an appeal of weakness which he 
 had been strong and merciful enough to re- 
 spond to. 
 
 This thought, whenever it recurred, made 
 her cheeks tingle. 
 
 And what could she do to right herself? She 
 dared not make any more self-confident plans, 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 135 
 
 only to have them end in fresh humiliation. 
 She now felt afraid of seeing Harold, and it 
 seemed to her that the utmost that was in her 
 power was to be regular and faithful to her 
 work, in the hope that the report of such a 
 sensible course would reach his ears. 
 
 Martha made a weak little effort to get her 
 friend to come to her again, but to this she 
 received such a faint response that she let the 
 subject drop. All sorts of conjectures were 
 busy in her mind to account for the present 
 phenomena. She even wondered if she and 
 her brother, with their American education 
 and ideas, could have done anything which 
 offered an affront to the state and dignity of 
 their princess-guest. But this could hardly 
 be. Sonia was as friendly and affectionate as 
 ever, though she now seemed to wish to con- 
 fine their intercourse to the limits of the atelier, 
 and did not even ask her to come to her own 
 apartments. So Martha was free to give up 
 all her spare time to her brother, and they had 
 numerous trips to the theater and opera ; but 
 somehow the solitude a, deux with her beloved 
 Harold had not the zest in it which she had 
 counted on beforehand. He was certainly 
 changed, this brother of hers. He had grown 
 
136 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 more serious, and was given to long silences. 
 She even thought that it was an effort to him 
 to be so much in her society, and that he would 
 perhaps prefer to be alone. This was a hard 
 blow to Martha, but she bore it without making 
 a sign, and was glad of the excuse which her 
 work gave her to be much away from him. 
 He also had important business in Paris, and 
 often worked for many hours at a time, which, 
 as Martha told herself, accounted for his rather 
 careworn expression. She even thought he 
 was getting thin, and begged him not to stay 
 on because of her, as she would far rather 
 give up her lessons and join her mother than 
 be a trouble and injury to him. This, how- 
 ever, he would not listen to, and he even 
 declared it his intention to stay in Paris until 
 after the opening of the Salon, now only a 
 week or so off. 
 
 Day after day went by, and although Sonia 
 and Martha were together at least one half of 
 their conscious time, they seemed to have in 
 some way gone backward instead of forward 
 in their intimacy. They still lunched together 
 daily, and had ample opportunity for talk ; but 
 there seemed now a dearth of topics such as 
 they had never been aware of before, and a 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 137 
 
 sense of distance had arisen which made it 
 hard for Martha to realize the familiarity and 
 nearness which had marked their former inter- 
 course. 
 
 One afternoon, when the work had been 
 going more than usually well, and the model 
 had been more than usually interesting, Sonia 
 and Martha, their easels side by side, had lin- 
 gered in the atelier after every one else had 
 gone. It was very agreeable to be able to 
 paint and talk together, and the princess, 
 whose carriage had been announced some 
 time before, gladly agreed to wait with Mar- 
 tha until hers should arrive. 
 
 While they were talking, a knock was 
 heard at the door, and as all rules were re- 
 laxed at this hour, both women called out, 
 " Entrez ! " 
 
 The door was opened, and around the cor- 
 ner of the old sail-cloth screen the tall figure 
 of Harold appeared. The day was raw and 
 chilly, and he wore a fur-lined coat with its 
 large fur collar drawn close around his throat, 
 and carried his high hat and his stick in his 
 hand. 
 
 At sight of him Martha uttered a little ex- 
 clamation of pleasure, and gaily called to him 
 
138 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 to come on. Sonia, in spite of the jerk at her 
 heart-strings and the rush of blood through all 
 her veins, felt, taken unprepared as she was, 
 a sudden sense of strength and self-possession. 
 Her color deepened, and by a swift motion 
 she drew herself erect; and as she stood there 
 in her old green skirt and red silk blouse, she 
 looked so workman-like and charming that, as 
 Martha drew her brother forward toward their 
 easels, her heart quite glowed with pride in 
 both her dear companions. She always 
 adored Harold in that coat, and Sonia in that 
 dress, and her sensitive organism seemed to 
 be receiving impressions of pleasure from 
 the minds of each. Harold stood still, a 
 little distance off, and bowed, with a look 
 that expressed some hesitation or uncer- 
 tainty. Looking past his sister and at her 
 friend, he said : 
 
 " Do you permit me to look at your work?" 
 " Oh, if you care to," said Sonia in a light 
 and natural tone. " It 's a mere daub of a 
 study. One goes through a great deal of dis- 
 couragement in a place like this, and a great 
 deal of one's time is spent in acquiring a 
 knowledge of one's ignorance. After that is 
 quite mastered, things get easier. I think I 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 139 
 
 may say that I have graduated in that branch 
 of study, and am now ready to go on to the 
 more advanced ones." 
 
 Harold stood still, and looked at her pic- 
 ture. She was thinking how natural it would 
 be to ask him if he thought she had improved. 
 He was thinking how natural it would be to 
 tell her that she had. Martha was thinking 
 how beautiful and full of charm they both 
 were, and almost wishing that the atelier 
 could be filled with students to look at such 
 models. 
 
 It occurred to her now that Harold re- 
 mained silent unnecessarily long, and she was 
 afraid that he did not appreciate her friend's 
 work ; so she herself began to speak in volu- 
 ble praise of it. 
 
 Sonia felt a strong impulse to check her, 
 and to explain to her that he was always 
 silent when he really liked a thing exceed- 
 ingly, and that she therefore felt delighted 
 that he said nothing. 
 
 Harold, however, forced himself to utter a 
 few words of praise that sounded very stiff and 
 conventional, and a sort of bewildered look, 
 which Martha could not understand, came into 
 his eyes. Sonia understood it by its reflec- 
 
i 4 o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 tion in her own heart. She felt as if she were 
 in some strange, confusing dream, where the 
 conditions around her were sad and con- 
 strained, and yet which she felt she must hold 
 on to and keep conscious of, lest they should 
 vanish and leave her utterly empty-hearted, 
 estranged, and desolate. While Martha ex- 
 hibited her own work, and proceeded to pick 
 it to pieces in imitation of what Etienne would 
 say to-morrow, the man and woman standing 
 behind her, so near that they almost touched, 
 were feeling, from this proximity, a force that 
 went to the very deeps of both their natures. 
 Hardness, resentment, wounded pride, regret 
 — all these were parts of this force in each ; 
 but there was in it, too, something stronger 
 than any of them, something that warned 
 Sonia that she had better not trust herself, at 
 the same moment that Harold turned abruptly 
 away, and said that he had an engagement, 
 and could not wait longer. He explained in 
 a hurried, confused speech, out of which it 
 was hard to get any intelligent meaning, that 
 he had forgotten Martha's need of the car- 
 riage, and had kept it waiting somewhere for 
 him, which was his excuse for coming to the 
 atelier to see if she had waited or was gone. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 141 
 
 Martha saw by his manner that something 
 was wrong, and made haste to put up her 
 brushes, and follow him into the cloak-room, 
 insisting that Sonia should come also, as she 
 objected to leaving her there alone. 
 
 Sonia obediently did as she was told, but 
 she felt as if she were stumbling along half 
 blindly, and had not the will-power to object 
 or protest. 
 
 She put on her hat, and was reaching for 
 her heavy cloak, when a strong, brown hand, 
 specked with two small dark moles just below 
 the thumb, took it down from the peg, and 
 folded it around her. 
 
 As she reached to draw to the collar, her 
 hand touched his. If the sight of that hand 
 had been familiar to her, what was its touch? 
 She felt herself trembling, and her quick 
 breaths almost suffocated her. She had just 
 power to control herself until she was in her 
 carriage, and alone. Then, falling back upon 
 the cushions, her eyes closed, and she passed 
 into a state of semi-consciousness. 
 
 She did not really faint, for she was all the 
 time aware that the necessity for self-control 
 was for the moment gone, and that she could 
 rest, and cease to fight. 
 
142 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Long before the carriage stopped at her 
 own door she had recovered, and realized it 
 all. She knew that, miserable as the last two 
 years had been, she had gradually been gain- 
 ing strength, and recovering her power for the 
 struggle of life. She might have gone on, 
 and met the future bravely, if she had never 
 seen this man again. Not now, however — 
 not after she had heard his voice, and met his 
 eyes, and touched his hand. This encounter 
 had deprived her of her strength so absolutely 
 that she longed only for the safety to be found 
 in flight. 
 
 But how would that sudden flight appear to 
 him ? That was the question. 
 
XIII 
 
 Sonia found herself, after that meeting, in 
 a state of helpless irresolution. She could 
 take no action. She could not even make 
 plans. She could only drift. There was only 
 one solace — work ; and she was now gen- 
 erally the last person at the atelier, staying 
 there until the light failed. She had got 
 over all her timidity about being there after 
 the others. The old concierge was apt to put 
 her head in now and then, to nod to her, and 
 give her a sense of protection ; and sometimes 
 she would come in and chat with her, while 
 she was doing such sketchy sort of tidying 
 up as an atelier admits of. 
 
 A few days had gone by without her having 
 seen or heard of Harold. Martha seemed to 
 divine that the princess wanted to talk only 
 of her work and her atelier interests, and had 
 tacitly adapted herself to her friend. They of- 
 ten worked together now, after regular hours, 
 
 143 
 
144 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 but Martha generally found it necessary to go 
 before her friend was ready. 
 
 One afternoon Martha had left rather earlier 
 than usual, in order to keep an appointment 
 with her brother, and Sonia was at work all 
 alone, save for the companionship of her little 
 terrier Inkling — a tiny, jet-black creature that 
 wore a collar of little silver bells, which, Sonia 
 had amused Martha by saying, had caused 
 some one to give him the name of "Tinkling 
 Inkling." She did not often bring her pet to 
 the atelier, for fear he might be troublesome. 
 This afternoon, however, she knew that Etienne 
 would not be there ; and when the little fel- 
 low, palpitating with eagerness, had looked 
 at her beseechingly from the seat of the car- 
 riage where she had just shut him in, she had 
 suddenly snapped her fingers and twisted her 
 lips into a sound of encouragement, and he 
 had leaped out of the carriage window, and 
 followed her with an air of perfect understand- 
 ing that this unusual privilege made a demand 
 on him to be on his best behavior. 
 
 He had been propriety itself all the after- 
 noon, and Sonia had seen and appreciated his 
 heroic self-control in not barking at the model, 
 whom he had looked at with inveterate disap- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 145 
 
 proval, only expressed by one little whispered 
 growl. The class of society to which the mod- 
 el belonged were Inkling's natural enemies; 
 and whether, in spite of nudeness, he recog- 
 nized this man as a member of that class, or 
 whether the nudeness itself outraged his sense 
 of propriety, certain it was that, during all the 
 hours in which his mistress was painting, Ink- 
 ling lay at her feet, with his eyes fixed unwink- 
 ingly upon his enemy, ready to take advantage 
 of the first excuse to fly at him. 
 
 No such occasion had arisen, however ; and 
 now the model was gone, and Inkling, off duty 
 at last, was enjoying the reaction of a sound 
 nap at his mistress's feet. 
 
 The room was so profoundly still that Sonia 
 was startled by a rap at the door, gently though 
 it was given. Even Inkling did not wake at 
 it. She looked up from her easel, expecting 
 to see her footman come to announce the car- 
 riage, or some workman delivering supplies 
 for the atelier, and saw, instead, Harold Keene 
 standing only a few feet from her. She knew 
 that the swing-door had closed behind him, 
 and that they were alone together. Her heart 
 shook, and for a moment she could not speak. 
 He came forward a little, and said in French : 
 
146 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 " I beg your pardon, princess. I came for 
 my sister to fill an engagement. Is she not 
 here?" 
 
 " She has just gone," answered Sonia, also 
 in French. " She expected to meet you at 
 the apartment." 
 
 " I have just been there. Not finding her, 
 I came on here. I suppose I passed her on 
 the way." 
 
 Inkling had opened his eyes at the sound 
 of voices, but, seeing that the model-throne 
 was empty and his enemy gone, he had not 
 troubled himself further. As Harold ceased 
 speaking, a look of sudden interest came over 
 the dog, and he got up, his little bells a-tinkle, 
 and trotted across to where Harold stood. 
 
 No sooner had he looked at him than he 
 uttered a gruff bark of surprise, and no sooner 
 had he snuffed once at the legs of his trousers 
 than he grew frantic with excitement. He 
 barked and yelped, and jumped up on him 
 with such evidences of wild delight that no 
 man with a kind heart in his bosom could 
 have refused some recognition of such a wel- 
 come. 
 
 1 Iarold stooped and patted him, speaking 
 to him in English. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 147 
 
 Somehow, to have him treat a dog like that, 
 and to address her in cold formality, in a for- 
 eign language, by a pompous title which did 
 not belong to her, seemed to Sonia wilfully 
 cruel. 
 
 Inkling, still frantic with delight, left Har- 
 old, and rushed over to her, yelping and bark- 
 ing, and shaking his tail violently, looking up 
 in her face with eloquent insistency. Then he 
 ran back to Harold, and a^ain back to her, 
 with fluttering agitation. 
 
 Soma's spirit did not falter, however, and 
 her voice was firm and steady as she said in 
 English : 
 
 "Why do you speak to Inkling in English, 
 and to me in French ? " 
 
 " Because Inkling and I are old friends, who 
 have a common language, while the Princess 
 Mannernorff is a stranger and a foreigner." 
 
 " It seems very childish to keep up that 
 farce." 
 
 " I thought it was your wish." 
 
 " And you despise me, probably, for the de- 
 ception I have practised in passing myself off 
 for the Princess Mannernorff ! I did not do it 
 deliberately," she said, with an almost child- 
 like air of contrition and confession. " It has 
 
i 4 8 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 hurt me all along to be deceiving Martha ; but 
 some one told her 1 was a Russian princess, 
 and as my mother had been one before her 
 marriage, and my aunt, with whom I live, is 
 the Princess MannernorfT, I let the false im- 
 pression remain, and even took advantage of 
 it. It was wrong, I know ; but I did want to 
 hold on to Martha's friendship a little longer. 
 However," she said, her face and voice harden- 
 ing, " it is simply a question of time ; and a few 
 weeks sooner or later, what does it matter?" 
 
 " Why is it a question of time ? " said Har- 
 old. " Why should you not keep that friend- 
 ship always, if you care for it ? Martha shall 
 know nothing from me." 
 
 There was a moment's silence. Then Sonia 
 said : 
 
 " I thought it possible that you might dis- 
 approve of our friendship." 
 
 "Why should I ? It is a thing absolutely 
 between Martha and yourself." 
 
 " She would cast me off immediately if she 
 knew the truth, and any moment an accident 
 may reveal it to her." 
 
 " Such an accident is most unlikely. It 
 could, as things are now, come about only 
 through me, and I shall be on my guard." 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 149 
 
 How confident and strong he was ! It roused 
 all the pride in her. The sense of weakness 
 which had overcome her at their last meeting, 
 and which for a moment had threatened her in 
 this one, was utterly gone. 
 
 " Besides," went on Harold, quickly, " I be- 
 lieve you are wholly wrong in thinking that 
 she would give you up if, by chance, she 
 should discover what you have so carefully 
 guarded from her. I see no reason why she 
 should." 
 
 He had spoken in English, since she had 
 criticized his using French, and Inkling seemed 
 at least partly satisfied, as he stood midway 
 between the two, with his front legs wide 
 apart, as if to keep his body firm, while his 
 tail wriggled wildly, and his head turned from 
 one to the other with a quickness which was 
 enough to make him dizzy. He was alertly 
 aware of them, but they had both forgotten 
 him, in the keen absorption in each other 
 which underlay their outward composure. 
 
 " Have you, then, told her nothing?" said 
 Sonia, in answer to his last words. 
 
 " Only the simple fact." 
 
 "What fact?" she said, looking him in the 
 face with a certain hardness and defiance. 
 
150 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 " That the woman whom I had loved no 
 longer loved me ; that she had repudiated my 
 name and every connection with me, and had 
 asked for a divorce, which I was taking all 
 possible steps to give her as soon as it could 
 be done." 
 
 " And do you think that Martha, feeling as 
 she does, would continue the acquaintance of 
 a woman who had cast off her brother with 
 no stronger reason than that ? " 
 
 "It was sufficient for me. There could not 
 be a stronger reason for divorce than absence 
 of love on either side." 
 
 "The world does not agree with you," she 
 said. 
 
 " Yet I fancy Martha would. If it came to 
 remarriage on either side, her verdict would 
 perhaps be condemnation ; but I think she 
 would consider separation a higher thing than 
 a loveless marriage." 
 
 Somehow, there was a spirit in these words 
 that touched her heart. Her voice, for the 
 first time, was a little unsteady as she said : 
 
 "You do believe that, at least! You do 
 feel that I could never think of another mar- 
 riage ! " 
 
 " I have always felt it. Indeed, I may say 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 151 
 
 I have known it. I know that you see the in- 
 evitableness of all this as clearly as I do. I 
 have often wished, for your sake, that I had 
 never seen you, to put this blight upon your 
 life." 
 
 " And have not I also blighted yours ? Do 
 you suppose that I never think of that ? " 
 
 " It need not trouble you, if you do. In my 
 case there was a compensation, and a sufficient 
 one. In your case there is none." 
 
 She knew what he meant ; that his love for 
 her, and that happy month of marriage, had 
 been enough to pay him for having afterward 
 lost her ; and she knew that he held the fact 
 that she had never really loved him to have 
 barred her from any compensation at all. 
 Why did she so resent his assuming this ? 
 Had she not told him, in language of such 
 emphatic decision that it rang even now in 
 her ears, that she had found out that she had 
 made a great mistake, and that she had never 
 loved him ? He had simply taken her at her 
 word. 
 
 She wilfully ignored the true meaning of 
 his last words, as she went on : 
 
 "It is a mistake to think that my life has 
 no compensations. My work, whether it ever 
 
152 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 amounts to anything or not, is a great com- 
 pensation. The friendship of Martha is an- 
 other. You are very good to wish not to take 
 that from me ; but the present sham condi- 
 tions cannot be kept up after we separate. 
 Fortune has favored us almost miraculously 
 as it is. She heard that there was a Russian 
 princess studying here, and some one mis- 
 takenly pointed me out for her. I had already 
 seen her name on her canvases, and knowing 
 that your mother and sisters were in Paris, of 
 course I knew exactly who she was. Inde- 
 pendent of this, her face and manner had 
 strongly attracted me, so I saw no reason why 
 we might not be friends, provided I could keep 
 from her who I was. As soon as I saw that 
 she believed me to be the princess, the fact 
 that my aunt was a Russian and had Russian 
 servants opened the way to my carrying on 
 the idea ; and so far there has been no trouble. 
 My little Russian name for Sophia helped me, 
 too. If she had known me as Sophia or So- 
 phie, she would probably have recoiled from 
 me, even if she had had no suspicion as to my 
 identity." 
 
 " I beg you not to have that thought," said 
 I larold. "If the time ever comes when the 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 153 
 
 truth must be declared to Martha, let me be 
 the one to tell her ; and I promise you there 
 shall be no recoil — no lessening of her friend- 
 ship for you." 
 
 "Thank you," said Sonia, coldly. "You 
 were always a generous man." 
 
 Her tone smote discordantly upon Harold. 
 It seemed a sort of compulsory tribute to him, 
 which he had no fancy for from her. 
 
 " I am thinking of Martha, too," he said. 
 " She is very lonely in her life, and rarely goes 
 out to any one, in spite of her ardent nature. 
 This friendship with you is very valuable to 
 her, and I am anxious that nothing shall dis- 
 turb it." 
 
 "Thank you for correcting me," returned 
 the other, quickly; "though I did not really 
 suppose that it was for my sake that you were 
 willing to take so much trouble." 
 
 She knew that this speech was silly, petu- 
 lant, and unworthy of her, but she wished him 
 to understand that she asked and expected 
 nothing of him. He could not be so cool and 
 steady during this interview unless he had 
 ceased to care for her. She quite realized that 
 he had, and she wished him to know that she 
 accepted it as a matter of course. 
 
154 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Inkling, meantime, had grown very uneasy. 
 He felt that things were not going well, and 
 he now began to show symptoms of distress, 
 instead of the wild delight of the moment be- 
 fore. He ran whimpering from one to the 
 other ; and when they took no notice of him, 
 he sprang upon the lap of his mistress, and, 
 uttering the most expressive plaints and be- 
 seechings, tried to lick her face. Sonia, in a 
 fit of irritation very characteristic of her, gave 
 him a hard little slap, which sent him out of 
 her lap, whining, and running to Harold for 
 pity. He was not really hurt ; and she felt 
 cross with the clever little brute for posing as 
 a victim so successfully. 
 
 " Don't touch him ! " she cried imperatively 
 to Harold. " He 's only pretending to get 
 your pity. You sha'n't pat him or speak to 
 him. If you do, I '11 be very angry." 
 
 The effect which these words had upon Har- 
 old would have surprised her, could she have 
 known it. They were so like her, so abso- 
 lutely herself, that they brought back the past 
 with a rush ; and it seemed such a hollow pre- 
 tense to suppose that they were separated, 
 and compelled to be as strangers to each other, 
 that he came nearer to losing his head than he 
 had done yet 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 155 
 
 Ignoring Inkling's fawnings and plaints, he 
 said suddenly : 
 
 " I am forgetting that Martha is waiting for 
 me " ; and then, changing his tone, and speak- 
 ing in French, he added : 
 
 " May I take you to your carriage, prin- 
 cess r 
 
 She answered him in French, as prompt and 
 easy as himself. She thanked him for his of- 
 fer, but declined it, saying that her servant 
 would let her know when her carriage arrived. 
 She added that she was not ready to leave the 
 atelier yet, as she had lost time, which she 
 must now make up. 
 
 He bowed in silence, turned, and walked 
 away. Inkling made a weak effort to follow 
 him, but was scared into a sudden and humili- 
 ated return by the imperious command of his 
 mistress. The little creature looked so ridicu- 
 lously distressed, as he sat on his haunches 
 near her, with his ears dropped and his tail 
 nerveless and still beneath him, that Sonia's 
 irritation deepened as she put up her brushes 
 and paints ; and when she had washed her 
 hands and was emptying the basin, she yielded 
 to a sudden impulse and dashed half the mea- 
 ger supply of water over him. 
 
156 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 "There, you little idiot! " she said crossly. 
 "That 's for your ridiculous nonsense in try- 
 ing to make out that I care one pin for him, 
 or anything about him. I '11 very soon con- 
 vince him that I don't; and if ever you dare 
 to act in such a way again, I '11 sell you to the 
 concierge on the spot ! " 
 
 Inkling gave every indication of a complete 
 understanding of this threat, which had the ef- 
 fect of brinorimr him at once to a state of cowed 
 dejection. 
 
XIV 
 
 Sonia said nothing to Martha of that meet- 
 ing and conversation at the atelier ; and as 
 Martha made no reference to it, she under- 
 stood that Harold also had been silent on the 
 subject. 
 
 A few days went by, which were fraught 
 with agitation to the pupils at Etienne's, as 
 they were the last days of April, and two or 
 three of the atelier students were to exhibit in 
 the Salon. Sonia's picture had been entered 
 under a fictitious name, rather against her 
 master's wishes ; but he had found it impos- 
 sible to move her on this point. She had made 
 both Etienne and Martha promise her most 
 solemnly to tell no one which was her picture ; 
 and so she looked forward to the great exhi- 
 bition with a pleasure which had no disturbing 
 element in it. 
 
 This pleasure had, however, grown paler 
 recently, as her hold on all outward things, 
 
 157 
 
158 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 slight as she had thought it before, had grown 
 weaker. She had felt a real emotion when 
 told that her picture had been admitted by the 
 jury, and an intense anxiety as to how it would 
 be hung. In contrast to this was the languid 
 interest which she experienced when she found 
 that it was on the line. 
 
 Martha and she had gone to the Vernissagc 
 on the thirtieth of April, and had stood before 
 the picture together ; but it was Martha who 
 had flushed and fluttered with delight at the 
 remarks upon it which they had overheard. 
 Sonia herself seemed to have lost interest 
 in it. 
 
 On the morning of the Vcmissage Harold 
 had gone to London, to be absent until the 
 next day, when he was to take Martha to the 
 formal opening of the Salon. 
 
 There was, therefore, no reason why Sonia 
 should not accept her friend's invitation to dine 
 and spend the evening. When she saw what 
 pleasure her acceptance gave the girl, her 
 heart suddenly smote her with the reflection 
 that she did very little to reward such ardent 
 love, and she impetuously offered to spend the 
 night also, saying that she had not done such 
 a thing since her school-days. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 159 
 
 Martha was overjoyed ; and when Sonia 
 duly arrived, prepared to spend the night, the 
 two women made a great effort to get the 
 amount of enjoyment which they felt ought to 
 be foreach iniheir tete-d-tete dinner andevenine 
 together. Their talk, however, seemed rather 
 desultory and unproductive, and both of them 
 felt that their endeavors to return to their for- 
 mer attitude of free and natural mutual confi- 
 dence were strangely unavailing. 
 
 After a rather dull discussion of Paris apart- 
 ment-houses, and their advantages and disad- 
 vantages, Martha proposed to show her guest 
 over this one ; and Sonia went with her into 
 all the rooms, with a civil effort to seem inter- 
 ested, until she came to one on the threshold 
 of which Martha said : 
 
 "This is the girls' room, which Harold has 
 now. It is just next to mama's, which is the 
 one you have. The governess has a room on 
 the other side of the salon, in order to protect 
 me. They tell such frightful stories about the 
 crimes and murders in these Paris apartments 
 that I used to be quite timid, though I 've got 
 over it now." 
 
 Sonia, while she appeared to be listening 
 to her companion, was in reality so inwardly 
 
160 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 shaken by certain influences received in this 
 room that she felt as if her mind were stagger- 
 ing. ( )n the dressing-table just in front of her 
 were several toilet articles in old German sil- 
 ver which it seemed to her that she had seen 
 and touched but yesterday. A clothes-brush 
 with fantastic decorations of women's figures, 
 entwined with fish and garlands of roses, had 
 a large dent in it, of which she knew the whole 
 history. She could even have told why one 
 of the three bottles in the leather-case was 
 without a stopper, and what had become of 
 the smallest pair of scissors, the place of which 
 in the dressing-case was empty. On a table 
 near by was a leather portfolio with the letters 
 " H. R. K." on one corner in a silver mono- 
 gram. 
 
 While Martha moved about the room and 
 talked, Sonia's eyes searched eagerly among 
 the familiar objects for certain others which 
 she would have given the world to see. Her 
 search was in vain, however. There was not 
 one thing of his own in sight which had not 
 been a possession of his bachelor days. This 
 was quite evident, and of course was entirely 
 as it should be. 
 
 When they returned to the salon, Martha, 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 161 
 
 observing that her friend looked tired, pro- 
 posed that they should go to bed early — an 
 idea received with evident favor. They were 
 quite safe in the protection of the man-servant, 
 who had been brought with the family from 
 America. Harold had given him orders to 
 sleep for the night in the antechamber, and 
 Martha had one of the maids in the room back 
 of hers. When she asked her guest if she felt 
 at all timid, and saw the smile of amused de- 
 nial that answered her, she went with her to 
 her room, lingered a few moments to see that 
 all was comfortable about her, then kissed and 
 embraced her friend, and said good night. 
 
 Left alone, Sonia stood an instant silent in 
 her place ; then, with movements of swift de- 
 cision, she locked the door by which Martha 
 had gone out, and, crossing the room to an- 
 other door, softly turned the handle. She had 
 her bedroom candle in her hand, and as the 
 door yielded and opened, she passed into the 
 room beyond it, and stood still once more, as 
 if possessed by that presence from out the 
 past. 
 
 The lights in this room had been put out, 
 and all the doors and windows closed. She 
 knew that she was safe in her solitude, and 
 
162 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 need no longer struggle with the feelings 
 which crowded her heart. 
 
 She went to the dressing-table, and took up 
 the old clothes-brush, and put her lips to the 
 dent which she herself had made there once, by 
 using the brush as a hammer. Then silently 
 dashing away the heavy tears that rolled from 
 her eyes, she looked closely at the grotesque 
 figures of women and fish, and recalled such 
 amusing things which had been said about 
 them that she began to laugh, even while more 
 tears were gathering, and straining her throat 
 with pain. The nervous little laugh died away 
 as she pressed the brush again to her lips. 
 Then she lifted, one by one, all the familiar 
 objects that lay before her, and looked at 
 them, while her tears fell like rain. 
 
 Presently she took up the portfolio from the 
 table near by, and turned over the thick sheets 
 of blotting-paper within. She could see plainly 
 the inverted and almost illegible, but charac- 
 teristic, impression of a woman's writing. In 
 some places this was lost in very different 
 characters, but in others it was distinctly rec- 
 ognizable. She walked to the dressing-table 
 with it, and "held it before the mirror, and read 
 distinctly in one place the words, " Yours al- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 163 
 
 ways, Sophie," and in another, "Yours faith- 
 fully, Sophia Keene." Her heart trembled. 
 She had no idea to whom she had so signed 
 herself, but she wondered passionately if Har- 
 old had ever tried this experiment, and seen 
 those signatures from the faithless woman who 
 had been his wife. 
 
 Suddenly she put the book back on the ta- 
 ble, and fell on her knees before it, laying her 
 face upon its pages, and sobbing upon them 
 until they were saturated with her tears ; for, 
 underneath her own handwriting, she had 
 seen, reflected in the glass, writing which 
 seemed almost as familiar, in which she had 
 deciphered the words, " Your loving hus- 
 band." 
 
 She had destroyed every word of that hand- 
 writing which she had ever possessed, and 
 thousands of times her heart had hungered to 
 see it in these very words. It was upon this 
 spot that her lips were laid now, while they 
 whispered out, in inarticulate sobs and gasps, 
 words of heartbroken pain. 
 
 She had told him that she did not love him, 
 and had demanded a divorce from him. She 
 must never contradict those words, or try to 
 undo that act. She knew that she was weak, 
 
1 64 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 but she knew that she had courage enough to 
 stand to this resolution. He should never 
 know how, slowly at first, and afterward with 
 increasing force and swiftness, the knowledge 
 of her mistake had come to her. For a while 
 she had fought it off with furious denial. She 
 had argued and talked with herself, and re- 
 called past feelings of resentment, anger, and 
 desperate antagonism, to prove to herself that 
 she had been right in vowing that she did not 
 love him; but in the end nothing had availed. 
 Long before their paths had met again she 
 had known that she was wrong ; that she had 
 made a hideous mistake of her life ; and that, 
 with all the force, fire, energy, and passion of 
 her heart, she loved the man whom she had 
 repudiated. But, even with this knowledge, 
 she might have borne it, she mi^ht have lived 
 and died without making a sign, if only she 
 had not seen him again ! 
 
 Now, however, that she had seen him, heard 
 him, felt the atmosphere of his presence about 
 her, felt his thoughts of her surrounding her, 
 and felt through all her pulses his touch upon 
 her hand, what was she to do? How was she 
 to stumble on, and pretend to fight, when a 
 mere look from his eyes made her sword-arm 
 nerveless ? 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 165 
 
 Oh, she must give way this once, she felt, 
 and shed a few of those millions of pent-up 
 tears ! Now that she was here in the very 
 room that he had slept in yesterday, and would 
 come back to to-morrow, she must let the 
 spirit of love and grief within her have its way. 
 Perhaps some remnant of it might linger 
 after she was gone, and speak to his heart 
 from hers. 
 
 As her mind formed this idea, she sprang 
 to her feet. Was she losing control of herself ? 
 Was her mind weakening or deserting her ? 
 How had she so forgotten herself as to have 
 this thought, which was in its nature a wish ? 
 She knew that in her proper senses she would 
 choose to die a death of torture rather than 
 that he should have one suspicion of her feel- 
 ing for him. No, no ! She passionately re- 
 canted that moment's impulsive wish as she 
 took her candle, and, more tranquil now, went 
 over and stood by his bed. 
 
 It was not swathed in a great cretonne cover, 
 as French beds are apt to be, but was made 
 in the American fashion, with smooth white 
 coverlet and fair linen sheets. Still holding 
 the candle in her hand, she sank on her knees 
 beside this bed, and closed her eyes, and moved 
 
166 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 her lips in prayer. Her long hair was hang- 
 ing in a thick mass down her back. The 
 white gown that she wore was almost as plain 
 as a religious habit, and she looked, with her 
 taper burning in front of her, like a nun before 
 a shrine. 
 
 She felt a certain power of renunciation 
 come into her, and a strength to do what right 
 and duty demanded. She rose from her knees, 
 and bent over the bed, and for a moment laid 
 her cheek against the cool white pillow. Oh, 
 might God be very good to him, she prayed ! 
 Might He make up to him for all the pain and 
 grief and woe that she had caused him ; and 
 some time in heaven mi^ht he come to know 
 how wholly and completely she had loved 
 him ! 
 
 She felt a sense of inward calm and strength 
 as she turned from the bed, crossed the room, 
 and entered her own apartment, closing and 
 locking the door behind her. 
 
 This peace was on her still as she presently 
 went to bed, and fell almost immediately into 
 a dreamless sleep. 
 
XV 
 
 Sonia was awakened early by sounds in the 
 room next her own, and as she opened her eyes 
 with perfect recollection of all that had passed 
 the night before, she wondered if it could pos- 
 sibly be that Harold had returned. It might 
 be only the maid opening and airing the room ; 
 but whatever it was, she could not sleep again, 
 and she began to devise a plan for getting 
 away early, so that she might avoid the possi- 
 bility of meeting Harold. She got out of bed, 
 parted the curtains, and opened the casement 
 of the low French window. The early sun- 
 shine had washed everything with its faint 
 golden glow, and the little new-born leaves 
 that covered the trees in the place with a foli- 
 age of feathery green, paler than ever in its 
 transparence against the sun, made a delicate 
 filmy screen, through which she looked down 
 on an exquisite moving picture. 
 
 The doors of the beautiful, great Madeleine 
 i6 7 
 
168 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 were open wide, and through them was pour- 
 ing a lonir white rivulet that seemed to have 
 its source in the little covered doorway in the 
 side of the basement of the great building, and 
 flowed thence in an even stream around the 
 corner, and up the great steps of the building, 
 passing between its central pillars, and so into 
 the interior of the church. This stream was 
 composed of what seemed an unending num- 
 ber of little girls dressed for their first com- 
 munion. They were all in spotless white, with 
 thin, transparent veils reaching to the hems of 
 their gowns, white wreaths upon their heads, 
 white stockings, shoes, and gloves, and each 
 of them carried a tall white taper, to be pres- 
 ently lighted in the church. Stationed like 
 sentinels along the line were gray-clad, white- 
 bonneted sisters of charity, who directed the 
 children's movements as they walked with an 
 awed stateliness out of the little door, up to 
 the corner and around it, and then through 
 the gate and up the steps, and were lost to 
 sight beyond the wide church-door. 
 
 Sonia could see the very expressions of their 
 faces as they would look up for direction to 
 the sisters as they passed, lifting their meek 
 and timid glances with an air of solemnity 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 169 
 
 which in some instances struggled with a sense 
 of pride in their unwonted paraphernalia. 
 Somehow, the sight of so much ignorance, 
 trust, and innocence, and the thought that 
 each one of them possessed a woman's heart, 
 with all its capacity for suffering, for hoping, 
 for loving, for regretting, absolutely overcame 
 her. How ignorant they were of what lay be- 
 fore them ! How fearlessly their little feet 
 were entering upon the long journey of life, 
 so blind to the pains and bitterness of its way ! 
 It seemed heartrendingly cruel to her, to think 
 how they must suffer from the mere fact that 
 each one of them was a woman-child. O God, 
 that women had to suffer so! — that even love, 
 the one delight, should bring in its wake such 
 pain ! She could see none of the joy ahead 
 of these sweet children ; she thought only of 
 what her own heart suffered now — the regret, 
 the longing, the unfathomable sadness, the 
 blight, the disappointment, the despair ! The 
 passionate pain of her heart broke forth in 
 violent sobbing as she stood between the parted 
 curtains, fascinated by the lovely sight, but 
 scarcely able to see it for her tears. 
 
 "O God, have pity on them — have pity on 
 them!" she sobbed aloud; and then, while her 
 
170 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 whole frame shook with her violent weeping, 
 she suddenly became aware of the stealing on 
 of a new influence. What was it? Nothing 
 so definite as sight or sound, but something 
 subtly powerful in its significance to her. It 
 was the pungent odor of a certain kind of 
 cigar which had once made part of the fa- 
 miliar atmosphere of her life. It dominated 
 her now, as if by a spell. She was instantly 
 calmed, and, as if by magic, swept back into 
 the thrilling past. Then, suddenly, penetrat- 
 ing this familiar atmosphere, there came a 
 familiar sound — no articulate utterance, but 
 just a sound in the throat, which seemed 
 somehow meant to challenge attention. She 
 would have known that voice in the most 
 distant and unlikely spot of earth ; and now 
 it became quite plain to her that Harold had 
 returned, and was watching the scene oppo- 
 site from his open window, scarcely a yard 
 away. 
 
 He must have heard her words and sobs ! 
 He must have understood them, he was so 
 well practised in reading her heart. It had 
 been an open book to him once, though now 
 it must be forever locked and sealed. 
 
 Her hands had fallen from the curtains, and 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 171 
 
 she had moved backward. There had seemed 
 to come into her strength and support from 
 the mere sound of that voice. There was no- 
 thing new in this. Often, often had she felt it 
 before. And once it had been in her power to 
 summon this support at will, in any hour of 
 grief or trial. That power was gone now, 
 never to come again ; but for this once this 
 supreme and availing help had been afforded 
 her. She felt within her the power to be 
 strong, to collect herself, and to form and ex- 
 ecute plans of getting away from this place of 
 temptation and danger. 
 
 She fell on her knees. Her soul uttered a 
 prayer of mingled thanksgiving and entreaty. 
 As she raised her eyes she could see through 
 the slightly parted folds of the curtains the 
 pointed arch that topped the Madeleine. 
 Carved in enduring stone, that generations 
 to come might see and gather comfort from 
 it, was the gracious figure of Jesus, spread- 
 ing out his arms of welcome to the poor 
 Magdalen, who knelt in supplication at his 
 feet. At his side was a glorious, great an- 
 gel, who, with drawn sword, stood over the 
 woman, and thrust back with his other hand 
 the evil creatures who in vain besieeed her. 
 
i 7 2 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 On the right hand of Christ another angel, 
 with wings at rest, held a crreat horn of tri- 
 umph, and behind him were women crowned 
 and garlanded, with little children clinging to 
 them. Farther still was a woman on a bed of 
 illness, over whom another angel of mercy had 
 spread its wings as she came to Christ to have 
 her body healed. 
 
 The center of it all was the beneficent fig- 
 ure of the human Saviour; and Sonia, looking 
 down from this immutable image carved in 
 stone to the flowing, changing, passing stream 
 of young human creatures beneath, felt calmed 
 and comforted. So they could keep their 
 childish faith, there was a refuge for them, and 
 she saw them now without any prompting to 
 tears. 
 
 She got up from her knees, bathed her face, 
 smoothed her hair before the mirror, and then, 
 after darkening the room a little, rang for the 
 maid, and asked for her coffee. 
 
 By the time it came she was almost dressed, 
 and she instructed the servants very carefully 
 not to disturb her young mistress, but to call 
 a cab for her at once, — as she found it neces- 
 sary to go home earl)-, — and to tell Martha, 
 when the latter awoke, that she was very well, 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 173 
 
 but was obliged to be at home at a certain 
 hour. 
 
 Her plan worked perfectly, and on her way 
 to the cab she saw no one except the Ameri- 
 can maid, who went down with her. In pass- 
 ing through the antechamber she noticed a 
 man's covert-coat, stick, and hat, together 
 with some crushed newspapers, thrown on a 
 sofa. But she had not needed this to convince 
 her of the fact that Harold had returned, and 
 had been in his room, watching, as she had 
 watched, the stream of little girls beginning 
 their celebration of the month of Mary by 
 taking their first communion. 
 
 The first of May being also what is known 
 as " Labor Day," it was a strange contrast 
 to the unworldliness and other-worldliness of 
 these little religieuses to see the alert military 
 forces now beginning to fill the streets, in an- 
 ticipation of possible insurrection and danger, 
 of which there was strong menace that year. 
 
 Gendarmes in groups of six and eight, and 
 sometimes even more, dotted the streets in all 
 directions, and the mounted guard was out in 
 full force. Sonia, looking from her cab win- 
 dow, heard repeated orders given to small 
 groups of citizens to disperse. Even two men 
 
174 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 were not permitted to stand and talk together, 
 and she was conscious of a certain amuse- 
 ment at seeing two groups of gendarmes com- 
 bine forces to separate these little knots of 
 two and three. Occasionally there was some 
 resistance, and she saw several arrests made, 
 which frightened her. She felt lonely and un- 
 protected, driving through the streets of Paris 
 with an unknown cabman at that early hour, 
 when there was even a possibility of such a 
 horror as an insurrection of the French lower 
 orders. 
 
 It came over her with piercing power how 
 Harold would once have felt about her being 
 in such a position, and how strange, how in- 
 explicable, how unnatural, it was that it could 
 be nothing to him now — that, even if he knew 
 it, he would feel bound to accept it passively ; 
 for nothing, she w r as certain, could induce him 
 to exercise the semblance of a ri^ht over her. 
 
 She got out of the cab at her own door, safe 
 in body, but more excited and confused in 
 mind than she had ever been in her life — and 
 perhaps, in this moment, more wretched also. 
 
XVI 
 
 Harold's condition of mind and feeling on 
 that morning of the first of May was so com- 
 plicated and perplexed that he felt for the first 
 time in his life utterly unable to see his way. 
 He was accustomed to having things, no mat- 
 ter how difficult, look definite to him. He 
 had not hesitated in deciding on his sudden 
 marriage with Sophia Rutledge, nor had he 
 felt the least hesitation as to his course a 
 month later, when she demanded a divorce 
 from him. His path had been clear and open 
 before him, and he had taken it unflinchingly. 
 He felt the same ability to do, and the same 
 courage to endure, now, if he could only see 
 his way. He knew himself too well to sup- 
 pose that, after having been married to this 
 woman, he could ever love another, and he 
 had quite decided to accept his life and to put 
 the thought of happiness out of it. In mak- 
 ing this decision he had had the strongest 
 
176 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 possible conviction of the truth of his wife's 
 declaration that she did not love him, and it 
 was this which had made submission to her 
 decision the only possible course for him. 
 She was such a strong and resolute woman 
 that he had imagined her, after the stern or- 
 deal of the first few months of separation, 
 going resolutely on, with her life adjusted to 
 its new conditions ; and although he was cer- 
 tain that her marriage, separation, and the 
 coming divorce would make too deep marks 
 in her womanly consciousness for her ever to 
 think of marrying again, he quite believed 
 that she was the calm and self-poised woman 
 for which he knew nature had intended her. 
 
 It was therefore a great surprise to him, on 
 meeting her again, to see such marked indi- 
 cations of indecision, nervousness, and lack 
 of control. He felt that she often said and 
 did what she had meant not to say and do, 
 and he was aware that she was a prey to vari- 
 ableness, fluctuation, and caprice. What did 
 it mean ? This was the question which he set 
 himself to consider with all the concentration 
 of his mind. He did not know — what was 
 the truth — that these new qualities in her ex- 
 isted only with regard to himself, and that to 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 177 
 
 her aunt, her acquaintances, her servants, and 
 all who came in contact with her, she was 
 more than ever decided, self-collected, and 
 even self-willed. If he could have known 
 that, it would have let in light upon a subject 
 and situation which seemed to him impenetra- 
 bly dark. Every time that he had seen her 
 she had left upon his mind a different impres- 
 sion. Sometimes he wondered if she could 
 be ill, to account for such a change ; and some- 
 times he told himself that it was an unpardon- 
 able demand upon her nervous endurance for 
 him to come into her presence. Still, when 
 he reflected, he had never thrust himself upon 
 her, and on the only occasion when their meet- 
 ing had not been accidental, it had been her 
 deliberate doing. What must he conclude 
 from this? 
 
 It would be conceit only which could make 
 him think, after that, that she either feared or 
 disliked to meet him. He certainly had no 
 right to suppose that she sought or wished it. 
 He must, therefore, conclude that she was 
 quite indifferent to him, and wished him to ac- 
 cept that view of the case. 
 
 He tried hard to do this, but there was 
 something in her manner and in his own con- 
 
i 7 8 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 sciousncss which positively prevented his hold- 
 ing to this idea. It was not that she appeared 
 to him to be unhappy, but she did seem dis- 
 turbed, restless and fitful. After his interview 
 with her in the atelier, he felt that she had so 
 definitely conveyed to him her wishes in the 
 case that now he had only to follow them and 
 to keep out of her way, so far as it rested with 
 him to do so. 
 
 On this course he fully resolved ; but her 
 beauty, her voice, her movements, haunted 
 him by day and night. He knew that he was 
 as absolutely under her spell as he had ever 
 been. He knew that a point might come when 
 his self-control would be powerfully threat- 
 ened, and then there would be nothing for it 
 but to flee. He was not afraid of the conse- 
 quences to himself which might lie in this be- 
 trayal of his past. He was thinking of her, 
 and of the increased trouble which it would 
 bring into her life if she should come to real- 
 ize how he still loved her. This was a quite 
 unnecessary trial for her, and one which he 
 was resolved she should not have. 
 
 He had not known of any plan of Martha's 
 for having her friend spend the night of his 
 absence with her, so it took him completely 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 179 
 
 by surprise when he returned at an earlier 
 hour than he had expected, and, inquiring of 
 the man servant if all was well, was told that 
 the Princess Mannernorff had dined and 
 spent the night with his sister. He ascer- 
 tained what room she was occupying, and 
 when the servant, who carried his bag, went 
 into his own room ahead of him, he reproved 
 the man rather severely for opening the win- 
 dow with such a noise. Then immediately 
 he sent the servant away. 
 
 He had seen, from below, the beginning of 
 the little procession going into the Madeleine ; 
 and as he stood half unconsciously watching it, 
 possessed by the thought that the woman who 
 had once been his adored and adoring wife was 
 asleep in the next room to him, he heard the 
 window of that room open, and he knew that 
 she was awake, and standing very near. He 
 heard her draw the curtains back by the cords 
 and rings above. He even heard the little ef- 
 fort in her breathing caused by the strong pull. 
 Each of them, he knew, was looking at the 
 same sight — the beautiful, moving panorama, 
 seen through the flecks of sun-washed, young 
 green leaves ; but while she was thinking of 
 those trustful and unconscious children, his 
 
i8o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 thoughts were wholly of her. His heart was 
 tilled with longings so intense and masterful as 
 to crowd out everything else. Then, in a flash, 
 his humor changed ; for there came to him her 
 stifled sobs, and her calls on God to pity them — 
 those sweet, unknowing little ones, born to be 
 suffering women. With his old swift compre- 
 hension of her, he knew why this sight had 
 touched her so, and he realized what he had 
 only dimly felt before, that she was a miser- 
 able woman, wearily walking a via dolorosa. 
 
 He did not ask to know what it might be. 
 He longed only to help and comfort her. He 
 could not speak, but at least he could let her 
 know that he was near; and then it was that 
 he had made the sound which Sonia had heard. 
 
 That sound was followed by silence. Was 
 she perhaps indignant, he asked himself, that 
 he should dare to make this demand upon her 
 attention ? She would have a right to be ; for 
 he could make no pretense that he had not 
 deliberately intended to do this. Yet she was 
 alone there, sad and troubled, and he was 
 close at hand, with a heart that ached to com- 
 fort her. He could not have rested, feeling that 
 she was unaware of his knowledge of her pres- 
 ence, and no matter what consequences to 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 181 
 
 himself the act might carry, he deliberately 
 said to her in that sound: " I am here, and I 
 know that you are there." 
 
 If she had made a siom in answer, he would 
 have thanked God on his knees ; but she had 
 withdrawn from the window in silence, and he 
 had felt only that she was gone. 
 
 An hour later, when, the servant brought his 
 coffee and the morning papers, he brought also 
 the information that the princess had gone off 
 alone some time before in a cab. 
 
 Harold felt, at hearing this, a perfect fury 
 of anger and indignation. With the possibil- 
 ity of a riot in view, and the knowledge that 
 ladies had been warned not to venture unpro- 
 tected on the streets, it made his blood boil to 
 think she — the delicate woman-spirit and 
 woman-body that he knew so well — should 
 have gone forth alone from under the very roof 
 with him ; and that even if he had known of it, 
 he would have had no right to interfere. The 
 legal right, of course, he had ; but that fact only 
 made it the more impossible for him to assert 
 upon her any claim. Not all the laws that were 
 ever made could have bound or loosed him so 
 indomitably as did her wish and will. The 
 fact that it was still within his power to assert a 
 
182 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 legal claim upon her constituted in itself the 
 strongest possible demand upon a man of his 
 nature to leave her as free as air from any bon- 
 dage or emancipation which could exist by any 
 right but that of love. If she had loved him, 
 he would have asserted his power and right to 
 control and influence her. As she did not love 
 him, there was no creature living who was so 
 free from him as she — this woman whom once 
 he had held in as binding fetters as ever love 
 had forged. 
 
XVII 
 
 On reaching home, Sonia went immediately 
 to her room, and sent word to her aunt that 
 she was feeling ill, and desired not to be dis- 
 turbed. Her maid brought her a message of 
 condolence in reply, and she knew that she 
 was now safe in her solitude for the remainder 
 of the day. 
 
 She undressed quickly, threw on a loose 
 dressing-gown, unfastened the thick coil of her 
 hair, and then, telling her maid not to come to 
 the room until she should ring, she threw her- 
 self at full length on the lounge, and lay there 
 with her eyes closed, profoundly still. She had 
 caused the blinds to be shut and the curtains 
 drawn. The beautiful spring sunshine flooded 
 everything without, but about her all was gloom 
 and darkness. She could hear the whir of in- 
 numerable wheels and the click of horses' feet 
 on the smooth pavement outside, and she knew 
 that the streets were alive and abloom with 
 
 183 
 
1 84 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 smartly dressed men and women in open car- 
 riages, driving between the long lines of flow- 
 ering horse-chestnuts down the beautiful 
 Champs Elysees to the Palais de l'lndustrie. 
 
 Long ago she had ordered a charming cos- 
 tume for this occasion, selected with much 
 care and thought; and it had come home more 
 than a realization of her expectations. She 
 had fancied that she would have pleasure in 
 joining a party of friends, and perhaps linger- 
 ing about the neighborhood of her own pic- 
 ture to hear any comments that might be made 
 upon it. She had not allowed herself to hope 
 that it would be on the line ; but there it was 
 this moment, as she knew ; and the pretty 
 gown and bonnet and parasol, all so pains- 
 takingly selected, were neatly put away, and 
 she was lying nerveless in this lonely room. 
 
 She lay on her back, with her arms, from 
 which the sleeves fell, thrown over her head, 
 and her face turned to one side, so that her 
 cheek rested against the smooth flesh of one 
 inner arm. The folds of her scant gown lay 
 thin and pliant over her long, slim figure, and 
 the pointed toes of her little gray mules 
 showed at the end of the lounge where her 
 feet were crossed one over the other. To-day 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 185 
 
 she had given up the long, long struggle for 
 self-control and strength. She abandoned 
 herself absolutely to the dark, unbroken grief 
 which she felt to be her only natural and hon- 
 est life. She did not even long for happiness 
 to-day : she longed only for the peace of 
 death — the nothingness of the grave. Oh, to 
 be taken so, without the need to stir or move, 
 and lowered into a cool, deep, still grave, — 
 breath, consciousness, hope, regret, memory, 
 individuality, all, all gone, — and earth and 
 grass and flowers over her ! That instinct of 
 weak self-pity, to which the strongest of us 
 yield now and then, overcame the lethargy of 
 her mood, and the springs of tears were 
 touched. Two large drops rose and forced 
 their way between her close-shut lids. 
 
 " O, what have I done, what have I done, 
 to have to suffer so?" she whispered — " to 
 have to give up all, all joy, and take only 
 pain and misery and regret for all my life ! 
 It was only a mistake. It was no sin or 
 crime that I committed when I sent him away, 
 and said that I did not love him. It was only 
 an awful, fatal, terrible mistake. I have 
 feared so for a long, long time ; but, oh ! I 
 know it now! I want him back — I want 
 
1 86 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 him back ! I want his love, and his patience, 
 and his care. I want him for my friend, and 
 my protector, and my husband. And though 
 I want him so, I am farther away from him 
 than if I had never seen him. When this hide- 
 ous divorce is got, and our beautiful marriage 
 has been undone, any other woman in the world 
 might hope to win his love. I shall be the 
 one free woman on earth to whom that hope 
 would be shame and outrage and humiliation. 
 O my God, help me, help me ! Show me 
 what to do. Give me back at least my pride, 
 that I may not have to suffer his contempt. 
 O God Almighty, if his love for me is quite, 
 quite dead, in mercy let my love for him die 
 too! Oh, no — no — no! My God, I take 
 it back ! I do not ask it. I do not want to 
 stop this agony of pain that comes from lov- 
 ing him. O God of pity and compassion, 
 give me now a little help, and show me what 
 to do. Kill me now — strike me dead, O 
 God — rather than let me do anything to 
 cause him to despise me ! " 
 
 She buried her face in her hands, and went 
 on, speaking between her fingers in thick, 
 sobbing whispers. 
 
 " God did not hold me back before from 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 187 
 
 cutting my own throat," she said; "and yet I 
 prayed to him with all my soul, as I am pray- 
 ing now ! Perhaps I was too self-willed, and 
 wanted my own way too much, and so he 
 would not hear me. Oh, I want to do his 
 will — I want to let him choose for me ; but, 
 oh, far more than that I want my love, my 
 darling, my husband ! We have been joined 
 together by God, and he has not put us asun- 
 der, nor has man put us asunder. Neither 
 did he do it! It was I, — I myself, — out of 
 my weak selfishness and self-will, because I 
 wanted to make everything conform to me — 
 because I wished him to love me by a rule 
 and ideal of my own — to treat me according 
 to my fancy — to make every sacrifice of him- 
 self and his nature and thoughts and feelings 
 to me, and I was willing to consider him in 
 nothing ! But oh, my God, I have been 
 shown my wickedness and selfishness ! The 
 scorching light of truth has come, and now I 
 see it all. If I could have him back ! If I 
 could wipe out the past, and be once more in 
 my wedding-dress and veil, and give him my 
 vows again, O God, thou knowest whether I 
 could keep them now or not ! It cannot be, 
 it cannot be ! He pities me and would be 
 
i88 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 kind to me, but he does not love me any 
 longer. O God Almighty," she cried aloud, 
 writhing her body from the lounge, and get- 
 ting on her knees, with her hands and her 
 face lifted upward, "take me and work in 
 me, and give light to my blinded eyes ! Give 
 me the strength to do what is right — to give 
 him up — to stop thinking of him ! I cannot 
 bear this tearing struggle any more. I can 
 fight no longer. I beg thee only, only for 
 this — that I may somehow grope and stumble 
 through this time without the loss of the one 
 thing that is left to me — my woman's pride!" 
 She fell forward, with her face buried in 
 the lounge, and great sobs shaking her body. 
 Gradually these subsided; but long after they 
 had ceased she knelt there with her face con- 
 cealed, alone in the silence and darkness. 
 
 At the same moment, only a little distance 
 off, the sunlight was pouring down in floods 
 upon the palms, the stuffs, the pictures, the 
 statues, and the crowd of fashionable men and 
 women who thronged the great exhibition of 
 the spring Salon. 
 
 Voices of men and women rose melodi- 
 ously, whether in praise or blame. Lorgnettes 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 189 
 
 were raised, hands clasped in delight, and 
 shoulders shrugged in disapproval. Fans 
 were waved in delicate, gloved hands, whose 
 every movement stirred the air in waves of 
 sweet perfume from flowers, or delicate odors 
 wafted from women's gowns. Smartly dressed 
 men and women stood about in groups, and 
 now and then a hum arose as some great 
 man, decorated with orders, and smiling with 
 confident good humor, passed along, bowing 
 to right and left, and receiving compliments 
 — too familiar to be anything but gently stimu- 
 lating — on the beauty of his latest pictures. 
 
 There were groups, larger or smaller, be- 
 fore many of the canvases ; and in one of these 
 groups, standing a little apart from the rest, 
 were Harold and Martha Keene. 
 
 The picture before which they had paused 
 was a rather small canvas on which was 
 painted a woman leaning with her elbows on 
 a table, and her chin resting in her hands, 
 which met at the wrists, and then closed upon 
 the cheeks at either side. The little table 
 before her was perfectly bare. There was a 
 striking absence of detail. The one thing 
 which was accentuated by careful and distinct 
 painting was a plain gold ring on the third 
 
i 9 o THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 finger of the left hand. The loose drapery 
 which wrapped the shoulders, leaving bare 
 the throat and arms, was simply blocked in 
 with creamy white paint and heavy shadows. 
 The hair was gathered in a thick coil at the 
 top of the head. There was beauty in its 
 coloring, and merit also in the flesh-tints of 
 the face and throat ; but the power of the pic- 
 ture was in the eyes, which looked directly at 
 one. The brows above them were smooth, 
 definite, and uncontracted. The lines of the 
 face were youthful and round. The lips were 
 firm and self-controlled. All the expression 
 was left to the eyes, which, large, honest, 
 courageous, and truthful, met those of the 
 gazer, and gave their message — the message 
 of despair. 
 
 " It is called in the catalogue simply ' A 
 Study,' " said a man standing close to Harold 
 Keene ; " and certainly there is no need to 
 name it. The artist's name is given as ' G. 
 Larrien.' Does any one happen to know it? " 
 
 No one did, and the group of people soon 
 passed on ; but Harold stayed and looked. 
 Martha, who stood at his elbow, was palpitat- 
 ing with excitement. She knew the picture 
 and the artist, but she was determined not to 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 191 
 
 betray, even by a look, the secret which she had 
 promised her friend to keep. She saw that 
 Harold studied the picture with intent interest, 
 and she schooled her face to express nothing, 
 in case he should look at her. She was watch- 
 ing him closely, and she thought that his color 
 changed a little, but he gave no other sign of 
 feeling. He did not look toward her. Indeed, 
 there was neither question nor curiosity in his 
 eyes, but a look of conviction and, she thought, 
 a look of pain. 
 
 A man and woman had paused beside them 
 now, and stood gazing at the picture. 
 
 "It 's quite a remarkable thing," said the 
 man ; "and it appears to be by a new exhib- 
 itor. I do not know the name. It certainly 
 tells its story." 
 
 " Yes," said his companion ; " I believe that 
 it is only through marriage that despair comes 
 to a woman. If one painted that look in a 
 man's eyes, one would have to invent some 
 better explanation of it than a wedding-ring." 
 
 Harold glanced toward the speakers, and 
 then began to move away, without looking 
 again at the picture. Martha waited to hear 
 what he would say ; but as to this particular 
 picture, he said nothing. 
 
i 9 2 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 Why was it that she felt a sudden certainty 
 that he knew who had painted it? It seemed 
 absurd to suppose that he could, and yet she 
 had a conviction about it impossible to shake 
 off. 
 
 The picture, as Martha knew, had been the 
 hasty work of a few days, and had been painted 
 at home. When Sonia had brought it to show 
 to Etienne, he had been so surprised and de- 
 lighted at it that he had insisted upon substi- 
 tuting it for the careful and painstaking piece 
 of work which she had done in the atelier on 
 purpose for the exhibition. It was evident that 
 he recognized some rare quality in this picture, 
 and that others had now recognized it also. 
 Martha, looking back, saw that another group 
 had formed in front of it, and that animated 
 comment was in progress. 
 
 It came over Martha now — a thing she had 
 not thought of before — that in spite of the 
 different contour and coloring of the whole 
 face, there was a certain vague resemblance to 
 Sonia in it. It was not the eyes themselves, 
 for they were blue in the picture ; but there 
 was something in the shape and setting of them 
 which su^crested Sonia. She wondered if the 
 lovely princess could have been aware of this 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 193 
 
 herself, for she had shown a strong reluctance 
 to exhibit this picture, and had required of 
 Etienne and herself a very strict promise of 
 secrecy about it, saying that it had been seen 
 by them only. Martha, who knew that her 
 friend was unhappy, and that her sorrow had 
 come to her through her marriage, felt in her 
 heart that Sonia had painted this picture from 
 the look of her own eyes in a mirror when off 
 her usual guard. She wondered if by chance 
 Harold had had the same idea. 
 
 13 
 
XVIII 
 
 The next morning Martha drove to the 
 apartment in the Rue Presbourg, and found 
 her friend in bed, suffering from a headache 
 which had been so severe that she had had a 
 doctor. She had passed a sleepless night, and 
 it distressed Martha much to see how really 
 ill her beautiful princess looked. There were 
 dark rings around the lovely eyes, and the 
 sweet mouth, which the girl so loved, had a 
 pathetic droop which showed that tears were 
 not far off. 
 
 Martha tried to cheer her up, by telling her 
 how much her picture had been noticed, and 
 repeating some of the comments which she 
 had overheard. 
 
 It was strange how little all this was to 
 Sonia. Her pulses did not quicken, by one 
 beat, until suddenly Martha said that Harold 
 had been fascinated by it, had lingered before 
 it and gone back to it, and that somehow she 
 
 i 94 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 195 
 
 could not help thinking that he suspected that 
 she had painted it. 
 
 " How could he ? It is impossible ! " Sonia 
 cried, a faint flush rising to her face. 
 
 " Yes ; I suppose it must be," Martha con- 
 ceded ; " and yet there was something special 
 about the picture to him ; and after he had 
 seen it, he certainly took no further interest 
 in looking yours up, which, in the beginning, 
 he had told me he was going to do." 
 
 " Martha, you must never let him know it ! 
 I trust you for that. I shall never own the 
 picture as long as I live ; and I have the sol- 
 emn pledge of both you and Etienne not to 
 betray me. You know it was against my will 
 that I consented to exhibit it, and I could not 
 endure to have it known that a melodra- 
 matic thing like that (for that is what it will be 
 called) had been painted and exhibited by me. 
 Did your brother laugh at it? Tell me the 
 truth. If he laughed at it, I wish to know it." 
 
 She had raised herself in the bed, and sat 
 upright, looking at Martha with commanding 
 eyes. 
 
 " Laugh at it, Sonia? Could anyone laugh 
 at that picture — least of all Harold? It is 
 one of the most deadly things that I ever 
 
196 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 looked at. No; he did not laugh. Indeed, 
 I think it took from him all power of being 
 amused for the rest of the day. I only say 
 this to prove that the impression which your 
 picture made was a serious one. He said 
 nothing about it, but I know he was im- 
 pressed by it." 
 
 The princess fell back on her pillows, with 
 a face so flushed and eyes so brilliant that 
 Martha feared that she must be in a fever, and 
 blamed herself for having talked to her on a 
 subject so exciting as the Salon. In a few 
 moments she rose to go. Her friend, although 
 she declared that the visit had done her no 
 harm, did not try to keep her, for a sudden 
 and excited fancy had seized her. 
 
 No sooner was Martha gone than she rose 
 quickly, rang for her maid, and began to 
 dress, regardless of the fact that her head felt 
 light, and her limbs were trembling. She 
 put on a long cloak and a large black hat ; 
 and, ordering her carriage, had herself driven 
 to the Palais de Tlndustrie. 
 
 A feverish desire to see the picture again 
 had laid hold upon her. She wanted to look 
 at it after knowing that Harold had done so, 
 and to judge how much she had betrayed of 
 
"SHE PUT ON A LONG CLOAK.' 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 197 
 
 what her own heart had felt, and her own 
 eyes had expressed, when she had painted 
 that picture before her mirror, trusting in the 
 complete disguise of the decided changes in 
 features and coloring which she had made. 
 She had painted the expression as faithfully 
 as she could, knowing that no one who had 
 never seen her completely off guard would 
 recognize it. She felt now that if she should 
 discover that there was a trace of possible 
 identification in either features or expression, 
 she could not endure it. Harold would think, 
 and would have a right to think, that she had 
 made capital out of her most sacred shame 
 and sorrow ; and he was the sort of man to 
 whom that idea would be monstrous. She 
 knew that she never could have painted it if 
 she had had the least idea of exhibiting it ; 
 but when it was done, and she had shown it 
 to Etienne to get his criticism on the tech- 
 nique, and he had been so plainly delighted 
 with it, and urged her not to carry it any 
 farther, but to exhibit it as it was, she had 
 agreed to it for three reasons. One was to 
 please her master, who was not very easily 
 pleased ; another was because she knew she 
 could keep it secret by telling no one except 
 
198 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 the two people who already knew ; and the 
 third and decisive one was that it was a way 
 suddenly opened to her of giving her message 
 to the world impersonally. She felt a sort of 
 exultation in the thought that in this way she 
 could say : " Look in my face, and see. This is 
 marriage ! " 
 
 When Sonia got out of her carriage she 
 dismissed it with the maid, and mounted the 
 steps with a look of greater firmness and reso- 
 lution than she really felt, for physically she 
 was ill and weak. She knew, however, that 
 she might meet with acquaintances here, and 
 might attract the attention of strangers by be- 
 ing quite alone, and therefore she realized the 
 necessity of calmness in her outward manner. 
 Her face was partly hid by a veil, and she 
 had managed to avoid the gaze of one or two 
 people whom she had recognized as she made 
 her way quickly to the room in which she 
 knew that her picture was hung. 
 
 In spite of her preoccupation, it quickened 
 her pulses a little to see that there was a small 
 group of people in front of it, evidently talk- 
 ing about it. As she stood behind these, and 
 looked full at the face on the canvas, which 
 was looking full at her, a sudden sense of con- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 199 
 
 scious power, the knowledge that she had 
 created a thing of intrinsic character, came 
 over her, and she could hardly realize that it 
 was she who had done it. 
 
 There was certainly no trace of her feature 
 and coloring in this picture, and yet she 
 shrank back, and had an impulse to conceal 
 herself, for what she saw before her was un- 
 doubtedly the picture of her soul. Her heart 
 fluttered, and she felt herself beginning to 
 tremble. Was she going to faint here, alone ? 
 A wild sense of helplessness seized her, and 
 at the same moment she was conscious of a 
 certain familiarity in the outline of a shoulder 
 and arm between her and the picture. She 
 glanced quickly up at the head of this man, 
 and saw that it was Harold. A little sound — 
 scarcely more than a stifled breath — escaped 
 her, and he turned suddenly, just in time to 
 go to her and take her arm in his steady, re- 
 assuring grasp, which seemed to nerve her 
 soul as well as her body to make a desperate 
 effort for self-control. 
 
 " You are ill. You should not have ven- 
 tured out alone," he said. (Oh, the strong, 
 protecting voice ; the firm, availing touch !) 
 Then he led her to a seat, with some quiet 
 
200 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 words that seemed to put new power into her 
 to endure and to resist. 
 
 "I must go home," she said, rising as she 
 felt her strength return. " I have been ill. I 
 did not know how weak I was." 
 
 " 1 will take you to your carriage," he said ; 
 and without seeming to recognize the possi- 
 bility of resistance, he drew her arm in his, and 
 led her from the room and down the steps. 
 
 It came to her, suddenly, that her carriage 
 was not there. 
 
 "I sent the carriage away," she said. " I 
 thought I would stay awhile, and see the pic- 
 tures." 
 
 He signaled to a waiting cab, and as it drew 
 up to the sidewalk, and he put her in, he said 
 quietly, but with resolution : 
 
 " I cannot let you go alone in this cab, ill 
 and faint as you are. I beg your pardon, 
 princess ; but I must go with you "; and he 
 gave the number to the cabman, and got in 
 beside her. 
 
 That word Princess stung her pride, and 
 gave her a sudden feeling of strength. She 
 knew that he meant to convey by its use the 
 idea that it was only as a matter of formal cour- 
 tesy that he felt bound to care for and protect 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 201 
 
 her now. She drew herself upright with a 
 slight bend of the head in acknowledgment of 
 his civility. 
 
 For a few moments they drove along in si- 
 lence, utterly alone together. Harold won- 
 dered if the thoughts of other days and hours 
 were in her mind. At the same instant she 
 was wondering the same thing about him. 
 She had forgotten that he had just spoken of 
 her with formality, and called her princess. 
 Apparently he had forgotten it, too; for he 
 now said in a low tone and with suddenness : 
 
 "Your picture is remarkable. You have 
 told your story well." 
 
 She felt that denial would be useless. Since 
 he had found her standing there before it, she 
 was certain that he knew the truth as well as 
 she did. 
 
 " I never meant that it should be known 
 that I painted it," she said. " You must know 
 that." 
 
 "Why should it not be known?" he said. 
 " If a woman has looked on what those eyes 
 have seen, surely she is called upon to give 
 her warning. If that is what marriage meant 
 to you, God pity you ! God be thanked that 
 you are out of it ! " 
 
202 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 At his words there rushed across her mind 
 the memory of a thousand acts and thoughts 
 and words of tenderness, of love, of strong 
 protection, of help in need and comfort in dis- 
 tress, which this man beside her had given 
 her. How could she tell him, though, that 
 the ground of the despair which she had 
 painted had been the renunciation of these — 
 the thought that she had had a vision of what 
 the love of man and woman could be in a 
 wedded life, and had been shut out from it? 
 Where were now the reasons that had seemed 
 so powerful and sufficient for the course which 
 she had taken ? Why was it that, try as she 
 might, she could get no sense of support and 
 satisfaction from recalling these ? Was it be- 
 cause she felt them to be the foolish qualms 
 of an ignorant girl, who was prepared to fight 
 against any and all conditions of life which 
 did not answer to her whim ? O God, the 
 hideous possibilities of error and of wrong 
 that were about one ! How confident of right 
 one might be in doing an act of weakness and 
 of shame ! 
 
 She could not answer his last words. She 
 felt herself suddenly so possessed of the sense 
 of his nearness that she could neither collect 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 203 
 
 nor control her thoughts. Her eyes were 
 lowered, and she could not see his face ; but 
 the very sight of his strong brown hand lying 
 ungloved upon his knee, the very bend of that 
 knee and fold of the gray trousers, seemed as 
 familiar to her as her own body. 
 
 Suddenly she seemed to feel that he was 
 hers, and that she was his, whether they chose 
 to recognize the fact or not; that God had 
 joined them, and no man, not even themselves, 
 had power to put them asunder. 
 
 Harold, meantime, was wondering at her 
 silence. Why was it that, after her old defiant 
 fashion, she had had no answer ready for his 
 bitterly felt and spoken words ? That picture 
 had stung his soul, and he would have died 
 sooner than have owned to himself even a wish 
 to have her back. 
 
 In spite of this, he could not forget that they 
 were alone together, and that she was ill and 
 weak, and needed pity. He wondered sud- 
 denly if he had been cruel in what he had said 
 to her, and had put too great a tax upon her 
 strength. 
 
 As this thought crossed his mind the cab 
 stopped, and he became aware of a din of sound, 
 made by the tramping of men and horses, and 
 
204 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 the blare of brass instruments and the beating 
 of drums. The cabman leaned down and called 
 to him, saying that the way had been crossed 
 by a procession. It would be some time pass- 
 ing. Was monsieur in a great hurry? Harold 
 answered no; and as he turned from the win- 
 dow he glanced toward the woman at his side, 
 and saw that she was leaning back weakly in 
 her corner, deadly pale. Her eyes met his, 
 however, with a wide, direct, unflinching look, 
 and he saw that there was no danger of her 
 fainting. Consciousness, acute and powerful, 
 was written in those eyes. 
 
 Outside, the crowd pushed and jostled by, 
 while the clatter of hoofs and feet came more 
 distinctly to the ears as the sound of the band 
 moved off in the distance. An instinct to pro- 
 tect that pallid face from being gazed upon 
 made him draw down the thick silk blinds. 
 He did this, explaining his motive to his com- 
 panion in a few quick words. Then he turned 
 and looked at her, and in the suddenly created 
 gloom their eyes met. 
 
 He was striving with all his might to keep 
 the fire out of his ; but suddenly he became 
 aware of the same effort on her part, as she 
 closed her lids an instant, and then, as if mas- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 205 
 
 tered by a feeling stronger than her will, opened 
 them wide, and looked at him again. 
 
 His heart leaped. His pulses throbbed. His 
 cheeks flushed darkly. He moved a little 
 nearer to her, so that their faces were close, 
 and still her eyes met his with that wild, burn- 
 ing, concentrated gaze. 
 
 " For God's sake, what is it ? " he said. But 
 she did not move a muscle or an eyelash. She 
 only gave her eyes to his, as one would hold 
 up the printed page of a book to be read and 
 understood. 
 
 " What is it ? " he said again, coming so near 
 as to speak in the lowest whisper, while his 
 hands grasped hard the top of his stick, and 
 his breath came thick and fast. 
 
 Her eyes still clung to his, but her lips were 
 wordless. 
 
 " I do not understand," he said. " For God's 
 sake, speak ! I do not want to lose control of 
 myself, but I cannot forget that you have been 
 my wife." 
 
 These words, which moved him so that he 
 shook visibly, made apparently no impression 
 upon her. Her breathing was so scant and so 
 light as scarcely to lift the lace upon her breast; 
 and, near as he was to her, he could not hear 
 
2o6 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 it. Was she, perhaps, unconscious ? He might 
 have thought so, but for the deep, intense con- 
 sciousness in the gaze that she fixed upon him, 
 and the flutter of her long-lashed lids as she 
 shut and opened them occasionally from the 
 strain of that prolonged look. 
 
 Outside, the drum throbbed distantly, like 
 the beating of a great excited heart. The thin 
 call of a trumpet sounded keenly like a sigh of 
 pain. Nearer the tramp of men and horses 
 could be heard. But all these things only made 
 them feel more absolutely alone together — 
 this man and this woman who had once been 
 one in marriage ! With his breast heaving 
 quickly with deep, uneven breaths, he suddenly 
 uttered her name in a thick whisper. 
 
 Still she remained as she had been before, 
 motionless and wordless, while he read her 
 eyes. He dropped his stick, and seized her 
 hands in both his own, which were cold and 
 shaking. 
 
 "Speak!" he said commandingly. "In God's 
 name, what do you mean, unless it is that you 
 love me still ? " 
 
 Her hands were quiet and nerveless in his 
 grasp, and in another instant he would have 
 lost control and consciousness of what he was 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 207 
 
 doing. But at this very moment the cabman 
 called to his horse and cracked his whip, the 
 carriage gave a lurch forward, and they rattled 
 rapidly away, 
 
 Recollecting himself, Harold dropped the 
 hands which he had seized so recklessly, and 
 touched the springs of the curtains, which in- 
 stantly flew up, letting in the full light of day. 
 
 The fresh air which came in seemed to 
 calm his heated blood, and he was master of 
 himself again. 
 
 When he turned to look at his companion, 
 she was leaning back in exactly the same po- 
 sition, only her heavy, richly fringed white 
 lids were dropped over her eyes. 
 
 In this way she remained quite still until 
 the carriage stopped before the door of her 
 apartment. Harold, who thought that she 
 had now really fainted, was about to summon 
 help from the concierge, when she opened her 
 eyes with a look of entire self-possession in 
 them, got out of the cab without the aid of 
 his offered hand, and, bowing her thanks, 
 without speaking walked past him into the 
 house, with a look of cool dismissal which 
 made it impossible for him to follow. 
 
 Puzzled, confused, bewildered almost to the 
 
2o8 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 point of frenzy, he got back into the cab, and 
 ordered the driver to drive in the Bois until 
 he should tell him to turn. 
 
 Sonia, during that same time, was shut 
 within her room, thinking as intensely as he. 
 She had been able, by dint of enormous will- 
 power, to control herself in all other points 
 while indulging herself in one. She had said 
 to herself during those crucial minutes in the 
 cab, while she consciously threw open the 
 windows of her soul to this man in that clear 
 and unrestricted gaze, that she would neither 
 speak nor stir, though the effort should kill 
 her. She found that she could best carry out 
 this resolve by relaxing her body utterly, 
 while her will got every moment tenser in its 
 strain. She had said to herself over and over 
 to what seemed a thousand times: " Don't 
 move — don't speak. Don't move — don't 
 speak " ; and the very consciousness that she 
 was equal to this effort made her the more 
 free in the abandonment with which she had 
 let him read her heart in her eyes. 
 
 Now, as she threw her wraps aside, and 
 paced up and down her room, a feeling of de- 
 licious exultation possessed her, and the phys- 
 ical weakness which she had lately felt was 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 209 
 
 gone and forgotten. It had been a draught 
 of intoxicating joy simply to look at him with 
 free and unbridled eyes. Was he not her 
 husband, who could not be, by any act of man, 
 really parted from her ? What had she shown 
 him but a woman's feeling for her wedded 
 lover? Was she crazy, she wondered, that 
 she could have done it then, and could feel 
 now no regret — only a wild delight — in hav- 
 ing done it ? O God, O God, how long it 
 was that she had shut herself off from feeling, 
 and how good it was to feel once more ! She 
 was alive in every nerve and pulse, as she had 
 not been for so long ; and the throbbing of 
 life was sweet, sweet, sweet ! Never mind 
 about the future ; she would meet it boldly, 
 and make up some excuse — that she had been 
 ill or unconscious in the cab — pretend that 
 she had forgotten the whole thing — do any- 
 thing that was needed, as to that ! — but the 
 throbbing bliss of that one half-hour, she ex- 
 ulted that she had been bold enough to make 
 her own. 
 
XIX 
 
 The C07irswas closed at Etienne's, but Sonia, 
 who could not bear to face the hours of idle- 
 ness which each day must contain during the 
 few weeks which her aunt was still to spend 
 in Paris, got permission to come and work in 
 the atelier during the afternoons. She was 
 privileged to get her own models as she re- 
 quired them, and Martha was to come also 
 when she had time and inclination. 
 
 The day after her encounter with Harold at 
 the Salon, Sonia, strong in purpose and confi- 
 dent in will, went to the atelier with only Ink- 
 ling to protect her and keep her company, 
 and set resolutely to work to do some severe 
 drawing. 
 
 She had abundance of both time and space 
 now, and she settled herself with great care 
 and deliberation, with the anatomical figures 
 and numerous copies of Ingres' drawings full 
 in view. She had not worked very long, how- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 211 
 
 ever, before her enthusiasm began to ebb, and 
 she put down her charcoal and went across to 
 the model-throne, where she sat down with 
 her elbows on her knees and her chin in her 
 hands, and fell to thinking deeply. Inkling 
 came and jumped up in her lap, but she pushed 
 him away with a roughness unusual to her, 
 and he had to content himself with curling up 
 on her skirt. As she sat there, conscious of 
 being quite alone, she was as absolutely still 
 as any of the customary holders of this posi- 
 tion ; but the varied expressions which crossed 
 and changed her face would have made any 
 class of students in the world despair of such 
 a model. Sometimes she would look quite 
 happy for an instant, as if a thought of joy had 
 forced its way uppermost. Then again deep 
 pain would come into her face, and shadows 
 of doubt, perplexity, and hopelessness. 
 
 She sat so for a long time. Inkling had had 
 a deep and peaceful sleep on the soft folds of 
 her gown, from which he was startled by a 
 knock at the door. His mistress sprang up 
 suddenly, rolling him over, and he began to 
 bark furiously, while Sonia, with an attitude 
 of studious absorption, took her place at the 
 easel, and seized her bit of charcoal. She 
 
212 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 thought it was probably only some boy on an 
 errand, but she was also acutely conscious of 
 whom it might possibly be. So she was not 
 entirely unprepared for the sight of Harold 
 appearing quickly around the edge of the old 
 sail-cloth screen. 
 
 He bowed with a brevity and formality 
 which seemed to imply that she need fear no 
 agitating disturbance from him ; but instead 
 of standing in his place and stating the rea- 
 son of his presence, he came forward. 
 
 Inkling, wild with excitement, began a repe- 
 tition of his frantic performances of the for- 
 mer occasion ; but his mistress, determined to 
 have nothing of that sort, promptly sup- 
 pressed him, and he slunk away and lay down 
 with great meekness. 
 
 Harold, seeming to take no cognizance of 
 the dog, came nearer, and waited until the 
 absorbed figure before the easel should no- 
 tice him. Presently she did this by saying 
 formally : 
 
 " Martha is not here. She has not been 
 here to-day." 
 
 " She is at home. I have just left her," he 
 answered. 
 
 "Oh, I beg your pardon! I thought you 
 had come to see her." 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 213 
 
 " No ; I have come to see you." 
 
 44 To see me ? " lifting her eyebrows in light 
 surprise. 
 
 11 If you are at leisure." 
 
 "I am busy, as you see; but I can talk to 
 you as I draw, if you don't mind." 
 
 " If you will allow me, I will wait until your 
 drawing is done." 
 
 "That would take up too much of your 
 time," she said, laying down her charcoal, and 
 elaborately brushing off her fingers with her 
 handkerchief. 
 
 " Not at all. I have nothing to do." 
 
 " I would rather speak to you first — what- 
 ever it is you have to say — and go on with 
 my work afterward. I dislike to draw with 
 people looking on." 
 
 " In that case I will ask you to give me 
 your attention at once. Will you, perhaps 
 take this seat ? " 
 
 He indicated an old wooden arm-chair ; 
 but she declined it with a quick motion, and 
 went over and took her old place on the 
 model-throne, lifting Inkling to her lap. Har- 
 old seated himself on a bench directly facing 
 her. 
 
 " I am sorry if I am annoying you," he said ; 
 
214 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "but I cannot take the consequences of not 
 speaking to you now." 
 
 "Consequences?" she said. "What con- 
 sequences ? " 
 
 " Consequences to you and to me. I will 
 ask you to be kind enough to look at me 
 while I explain them." 
 
 Her eyes were fastened upon Inkling, and 
 she kept them so, while she began to twist 
 his soft ears. There was a moment of intense 
 stillness throughout the room. Then the man, 
 in a voice of deep concentration, spoke her 
 name. 
 
 " Sophie," he said. 
 
 " Pray don't call me by that name," she an- 
 swered quickly. " I have never liked it, and 
 I wish now to forget it." 
 
 " Sonia, then, if you prefer it. I want simply 
 to make plain the fact that I am speaking to 
 you, the woman who bears that name, and not 
 to the princess, as you are supposed to be." 
 
 " Go on," she said. 
 
 He was silent. She kept her eyes fixed on 
 the dog until she was afraid that her stubborn- 
 ness would look childish, or, worse even than 
 that, timid. Then she looked up. 
 
 The next instant she wished that she had not, 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 215 
 
 for the compelling look that met her own did 
 for a moment make her feel afraid. She sum- 
 moned all her force, however, and looked at 
 him defiantly, her head raised, her eyes steady. 
 
 " I want you to explain to me what you meant 
 yesterday," he said. 
 
 "What I meant yesterday? What do you 
 mean ? " 
 
 " What you meant yesterday, driving home 
 in the cab." 
 
 " What I meant yesterday by driving home 
 in the cab ? I suppose my meaning was the 
 obvious one — that I was tired and ill, and that 
 my own carriage was not there." 
 
 The timidity which she had felt before grew 
 now into positive terror, as she felt the master- 
 ful force of this man's power over her. So 
 strong was her sense of it that she felt abso- 
 lutely reckless of what she said or did, so long 
 as she was able to resist him. 
 
 "You will not move me, or change my in- 
 tention — my determination to get an answer 
 to my question. Your evasion of it is childish 
 as well as useless." 
 
 u I will be childish if I choose. Who is to 
 prevent me ? " she said defiantly. 
 
 " I will. I have no intention of submitting 
 
216 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 to any such childishness now. You are a wo- 
 man, and you are the only woman who exists 
 for me. In that character I mean to have your 
 answer to my question." 
 
 His words made her heart throb quick, with 
 a feeling outside of the terror of self-betrayal 
 by which she was possessed. She gave no 
 outward sign, however, as she looked down, 
 and began once more to pull at Inkling's ears. 
 
 Before she realized what he was doing, Har- 
 old had bent forward, and lifting the dog from 
 her lap, he set him on the floor, with a shove 
 that sent him half-way across the room. As 
 the little creature ran off frightened, Harold 
 turned to the woman facing him, and forcibly 
 took both her hands in his. 
 
 She jerked them from him with a powerful 
 wrench, as she sprang to her feet, retreating a 
 few paces until she was stopped by some 
 benches and easels huddled together on that 
 side of the room. 
 
 " Don't touch me ! " she cried, in a voice of 
 real terror. 
 
 He let his hands drop to his sides, but he 
 followed, and stood very close to her, as he 
 said : 
 
 " You had better answer me, and let me 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 217 
 
 have my way. I am not to be turned now. 
 This interview between us must be final, and 
 I promise you that after it you shall be safe 
 from any persecution from me. Now, how- 
 ever, the present moment is my own. I have 
 you in my power — and that power I intend 
 to use ! " 
 
 " An honorable and manly thing to say ! " 
 she panted, her eyes blazing and her lips 
 curled. " Do you mean me to understand 
 that you would use force to make me comply 
 with your wish ? " 
 
 "I mean just that," he answered, bending 
 over her with eyes that gave her the feeling 
 of a physical touch. " I will prevent your 
 leaving this room until you have honestly and 
 fairly spoken to me, and have either confirmed 
 or denied what your eyes plainly said to me 
 yesterday." 
 
 "You are cowardly and cruel!" she cried. 
 "You are taking a mean advantage of me ! I 
 was ill yesterday. I was half unconscious — " 
 
 "You may have been ill," he interrupted. 
 " I know indeed that you were, and that phys- 
 ical weakness may have led to self-betrayal ; 
 but you were not unconscious. Far from it. 
 You were never more acutely conscious in 
 
218 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 your life than during those long moments 
 when you looked at me with love." 
 
 " I deny it ! " slie cried angrily. 
 
 " Useless ! " he answered. " It is not to be 
 denied." 
 
 She tried to draw farther away, but the bar- 
 ricade of easels stopped her. Then he him- 
 self stepped backward, and put some feet of 
 space between them. 
 
 " I cannot bear to see you shrink from me," 
 he said. " You will have to forgive a persis- 
 tence that may seem to you brutal ; but fate 
 has put this opportunity into my hands, and 
 I 'd be a fool not to use it." 
 
 " And what do you expect to get from it ? " 
 she asked. 
 
 "An answer in plain words to this ques- 
 tion, Do you, or do you not, love me ? " 
 
 " I do not! " she cried hotly ; but her breast 
 was heaving so, her heart was throbbing so, 
 that she could scarcely catch her breath ; and 
 she felt that not for all the world dared she 
 look him in the face. 
 
 "Your eyes yesterday contradicted your 
 words of to-day," he said. " I will not be 
 content until I have had both. So help me 
 God, you are not going to trifle with me 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 219 
 
 now ! I will make you look at me, and con- 
 firm with your eyes the words you have just 
 spoken, or I '11 have you for my wife again ! " 
 
 He caught her in his arms, and drew her 
 close against him. She opened her mouth as 
 if to scream, but he laid his palm upon it, not 
 forgetting, for all his strength, to touch her 
 gently. 
 
 " Oh, my darling, my precious one," he 
 said, " don't call out for protection from me, 
 as if I were your enemy ! Surely you know 
 that I would die by torture before I would 
 hurt you — body or soul. But something 
 — a wicked pride, perhaps — is making you 
 struggle against the truth ; and, for your sake 
 as well as for my own, I must make a fight 
 for it. Look ! I offer you the chance. If 
 you can look me in the face, and say with eyes 
 and lips together, ' Harold, I do not love you,' 
 then you are as free as air. If you can do that, 
 I will go, and never cross your path again." 
 
 He had taken his hand from her mouth, for 
 fear her panting breaths would cease. He 
 could feel the violent beating of her heart 
 
 <z> 
 
 against his side. An overwhelming tender- 
 ness and pity for her filled him, and his arm, 
 relaxing its stern pressure, drew her close, 
 
220 THE PRINCESS SOMA 
 
 with an embrace whose only constraint was 
 that of love. Her ear was very close to him, 
 and he spoke to her in the lowest whispers. 
 
 " Dear one," he said, "what is it you are 
 fighting against, if it be not the coming back 
 of love and joy ? " 
 
 He could not see her eyes. He did not 
 wish to see them yet. This waiting was bliss, 
 because there was hope in it. 
 
 She had ceased to struggle, and was quiet 
 in his arms. They stood so, many seconds, 
 their hearts throbbing against each other, 
 their cheeks pressed. In the unspeakable 
 sweetness of his nearness, Harold felt against 
 his face the moisture of a tear. 
 
 "What is it? "he whispered. "You are 
 crying ! For God's sake, tell me why ! " 
 
 A gentle little head-shake answered him; 
 but she made no motion to draw herself away, 
 and he, enraptured, held her close. 
 
 "There is nothing — nothing that you can- 
 not tell to me," he said, still in that whisper 
 that thrilled the silence of the room. " Per- 
 haps you do not understand. Listen, and I 
 will make it all plain. I loved you then. I 
 love you now. I have loved you through all 
 the pain and silence in between. Oh, dear- 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 221 
 
 est, never dream but that you are still my own 
 — wholly and unchangeably as I am yours — 
 if only you love me ! " 
 
 She kept so still that he was puzzled. 
 He made a motion to draw back his head and 
 look at her, but she put up her hand and 
 pressed his cheek still closer against hers. 
 He passionately wished that she would speak ; 
 but there was no sound except that fluttered 
 breathing, no motion but that little tremor 
 which he felt against his side. She was weak- 
 ening, weakening, weakening — he was sure 
 of this ; but he was in such an absolute terror 
 of misunderstanding her mood that he dared 
 not move or speak. 
 
 As they stood there so, he felt a sudden 
 tightening of the pressure of her arms. They 
 strained him close against her. His heart 
 leaped ; but he was not sure. There was 
 something that alarmed him even in that clasp 
 of love. 
 
 "Are you happy?" he whispered in the 
 lowest murmur. But with a sudden wrench 
 she tore herself away from him, and when he 
 tried to follow, waved him back with a ges- 
 ture which he could not disregard. 
 
 " Happy ! " she said in a voice that mocked 
 
222 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 the thought, as she wrung- her hands together, 
 and then, for a moment, hid her face in the 
 curve of one tensely bended arm. " What 
 have I to do with happiness ? " she cried out, 
 flinging wide her arms, and looking upward, 
 as if appealing to some invisible presence 
 rather than to him or to herself. " I had it 
 given to me once in boundless measure, and 
 I played with it, and tossed it from me. It 
 was lightly and easily done, and now it can- 
 not be undone." 
 
 Harold stood where her imperious gesture 
 had stopped him, and looked at her in con- 
 sternation. 
 
 "What do you mean?" he said. "You 
 will not try now to deny your love for me ! 
 You have owned it in that close embrace 
 which can mean nothing but — " 
 
 " Good-by ! " she interrupted him. " It 
 means inevitable parting. You must go, or, 
 if not, I must fly to some place where we can- 
 not meet again." 
 
 " But, dearest, we cannot part. I have told 
 you how I love you in plain words. You 
 have told me the same, without the need of 
 words." 
 
 She looked at him, — a deep, inscrutable 
 gaze, — and shook her head. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 223 
 
 " I have had perfect love once," she said, 
 "and from you — the one man whose love 
 could ever have any meaning for me — love 
 that included perfect trust, perfect confidence, 
 perfect respect. I refuse to take from you a 
 smaller thing. It is easier to give you up 
 than to face that thought." 
 
 " But Sonia ! Darling ! You have got that 
 love ! I tell you it is just the same ! " 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " It cannot be," she said. " You would feel 
 that what had been once might be again. 
 You could never feel secure for even one mo- 
 ment. I could not bear it. You must re- 
 member what I felt in that one embrace. Oh, 
 Harold, I wci7it you to remember that ! And 
 now you must let me go." 
 
 "Go?" he said. "Where should you go, 
 but here to me — to your right place, your 
 home, your husband ? " 
 
 At this last word she gave a sharp cry. She 
 had been standing unsupported, and now a 
 sudden trembling seized her, and she half 
 tottered toward a chair. In an instant he was 
 at her side, his arms about her, fast and sure. 
 It was too sweet, this strong and tender hold- 
 ing up of her weak body. She let it be, but 
 she was motionless and wordless in his arms. 
 
224 THE PRINCESS SONIA 
 
 "My own child," he said, "there can be no 
 question as to our future now. It was all a 
 mistake — the past ! If we acknowledge it — " 
 
 " Oh, the past, the past ! " she said. " I can 
 never get away from it. We have lost two 
 years. No matter if we had the whole future 
 of time and eternity, we could never get those 
 back — and it was I that did it ! It is good of 
 you to say that you forgive me ; but I — oh, I 
 never can forgive myself! You never can be- 
 lieve in me again. I dare not ask or look for 
 it. I don't deserve it. You would be wrong 
 and foolish if you did." 
 
 "Then wrong and foolish I will be!" he 
 said. " I will believe in you again and again, 
 forever! You have forgotten something, Sonia. 
 There is no question of judgment between you 
 and me, because you are myself. Do you not 
 feel that that is so ? " 
 
 She did not answer, and he said again, in 
 that compelling tone she knew so well : 
 
 " Do you not feel it so, my wife ? " 
 
 She raised to his, unswervingly, eyes that 
 were clear as stars after their recent tears. 
 She unveiled her soul to him as daringly as 
 she had done yesterday, and the message that 
 they gave him was the same — abundant, free, 
 unstinted love, without reserve or fear. 
 
THE PRINCESS SONIA 225 
 
 He drew her quickly closer, still holding 
 
 her eyes with his. 
 
 " Speak! Tell me!" he said. 
 Then voice and look together spoke : 
 " I love you, Harold — my husband ! " 
 He took the dear words from her lips with 
 
 his. 
 
 Afterward, when they were seated to- 
 gether on the model-throne, they were star- 
 tled by a timid little tinkling, and as they both 
 with a sense of compunction called to Inkling 
 to come, and he sprang up between them 
 quivering with joy, and making frantic efforts 
 to lick both their faces at once, their laughs 
 and struggles made such a commotion that 
 they did not hear the door open, admitting 
 Martha. 
 
 She half crossed the room, and then stood 
 still, transfixed with amazement, till they drew 
 her down between them and told her every- 
 thing. 
 
 " So you are not a princess, after all I " said 
 Martha. 
 
 " Oh, yes I am," Sonia answered quickly. 
 " I 'm 'The Happy Princess' — and this is 
 my Prince ! " 
 
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