Olive Part 52

It was a new and pleasant thing to wake beneath the same roof as Harold Gwynne; to know that his face would meet her when she descended--that she would walk and talk with him the whole day long.

Never did any woman think less of herself than Olive Rothesay. Yet as she stood twisting up her beautiful hair, she felt glad that it _was_ beautiful. Once she thought of what Marion had told her about some one saying she was "like a dove." Who said it? Not Harold--that was impossible. Arranging her dress, she looked a moment, with half-mournful curiosity, at the pale, small face reflected in the mirror.

"Ah, no! There is no beauty in me. Even did he care for me, I could give him nothing but my poor heart. I can give him that still. It can do him no harm to love him--the very act of loving is blessedness to me."

So thinking, she left her chamber.

It was long before the old lady's time for rising. There was no one in the breakfast-room, but she saw Harold walking on the garden terrace.

Very soon he came in with some heliotrope in his hand. He did not give it to Olive, but laid it by her plate, observing, half-carelessly,

"You were always fond of heliotropes, Miss Rothesay."

"Thank you for remembering my likings;" and Olive put the flowers in her bosom. She fancied he looked pleased; and suddenly she remembered the meaning given to the flower, "I love you!" At the thought, she began to tremble all over, though contemning her own folly the while. Even had the words been true, she and Harold were both too old for such sentimentalities.

They breakfasted alone. Harold still looked pale and weary, nor did he deny the fact that he had scarcely slept. He told her all the Harbury news, but spoke little of himself or of his plans. "They were yet uncertain," he said, "but a few more days would decide all." And then he remained silent until, a little time after, they were standing together at the window. From thence it was a pleasant view. Close beneath, a little fountain rose in slender diamond threads, and fell again with a soft trickling, like a Naiad's sigh. Bees were humming over the richest of autumn flower-gardens, which sloped down, terrace after terrace, until its boundary was hid in the little valley below. Beyond--looking in the clear September air so close that you could almost see the purple of the heather--lay the Braid Hills, a horizon-line soft as that which enclosed the Happy Valley of Prince Ra.s.selas.

Harold stood and gazed.

"How beautiful and calm this is! It looks like a quiet nest--a _home_ for a man's tired heart and brain. Tell me, friend, do you think one could ever find such in this world?"

"A home!" she repeated, somewhat confusedly, for his voice had startled her.--"You have often said that man needed none; that his life was in himself--the life of intellect and of power. It is only we women who have a longing after rest and home."

Harold made no immediate reply; but after a while he said,

"I want to have a quiet talk with you, Miss Rothesay. And I long to see once more my favourite haunt, the Hermitage of Braid. 'Tis a sweet place, and we can walk and converse there at our leisure. You will come?"

She rarely said him nay in anything, and he somehow unconsciously used a tone of command, like an elder brother;--but there was such sweetness in being ruled by him! Olive obeyed at once; and soon, for the thousandth time, she and Harold were walking out together arm-in-arm.

If ever there was a "lover's walk," it is that which winds along the burn-side in the Hermitage of Braid. On either side

The braes ascend like lofty wa's,

shutting out all but the small blue rift of sky above. Even the sun seems slow to peep in, as if his brightness were not needed by those who walk in the light of their own hearts. And the little birds warble and the little burnie runs, as if neither knew there was a weary world outside, where many a heart, pure as either, grows dumb amidst its singing, and freezes slowly as it flows.

Olive walked along by Harold's side in a happy dream. He looked so cheerful, so "good"--a word she had often used, and he had smiled at--meaning those times when, beneath her influence, the bitterness melted from him. Such times there were--else she could never have learned to love him as she did. Then, as now, his eyes were wont to lighten, and his lips to smile, and there came an almost angelic beauty over his face.

"I think," he said, "that my spirit is changing within me. I feel as if I had never known life until now. In vain I say unto myself that this must be a mere fantasy of mine; I, who am marked with the 'frost of eild,' who will soon be--let me see--seven-and-thirty years old. What think you of that age?"

His eyes, bent on her, spoke more than mere curiosity; but Olive, unaware, looked up and smiled.

"Why, I am getting elderly myself; but I heed it not. One need mind nothing if one's heart does not grow old."

"Does yours?"

"I hope not. I would like to lead a life like Aunt Flora's--a quiet stream that goes on singing to the end."

"Look me in the face, Olive Rothesay," said Harold, abruptly.

"Nay--pardon me, but I speak like one athirst, who would fain know if any other human thirst is ever satisfied. Tell me, do you look back on your life with content, and forward with hope? Are you happy?"

Olive's eyes sank on the ground.

"Do not question me so." she said trembling. "In life there is nothing perfect; but I have peace, great peace. And for you there might be not only peace, but happiness."

Again there fell between them one of those pauses which rarely come save between two friends or lovers, who know thoroughly--in words or in silence--each other's hearts. Then Harold, guiding the conversation as he always did, changed it suddenly.

"I am thinking of the last time I walked here--when I came to Edinburgh this summer. There was with me one whom I regarded highly, and we talked--as gravely as you and I do now, though on a far different theme."

"What was it?"

"One suited to the season and the place, and my friend's ardent youth.

He was in love, poor fellow, and he asked me about his wooing. Perhaps you may think he chose an adviser ill fitted to the task?"

Harold spoke carelessly--and waiting Olive's reply, he pulled a handful of red-brown leaves from a tree that overhung the path, and began playing with them.

"You do not answer, Miss Rothesay. Come, there is scarcely a subject that we have not discussed at some time or other, save this. Let us, just for amus.e.m.e.nt, take my friend's melancholy case as a text, and argue concerning what young people call 'love.'"

"As you will."

"A cold acquiescence. You think, perhaps, the matter is either above or beneath _me_--that I can have no interest therein?" And his eyes, bright, piercing, commanding, seemed to force an answer.

It came, very quietly and coldly.

"I have heard you say that love was the brief madness of a man's life; if fulfilled, a burden--if unfulfilled or deceived, a curse."

"I said so, did I? Well, you give my opinions--what think you _of me_?

Answer truly--like a friend."

She did so. She never could look in Harold's eyes and tell him what was not true.

"I think you are one of those men in whom strong intellect prevents the need of love. Youthful pa.s.sion you may have felt; but true, deep, earnest love you never did know, and, as I believe, never will! Nay, forgive me if I err; I only take you on your own showing."

"Thank you, thank you! You speak honestly and frankly--that is something for a woman," muttered Harold; and then there was a long, awkward pause.

How one poor heart ached the while!

At last, fearing that her silence annoyed him, Olive took courage to say, "You were going to talk to me about your plans. Do so now; that is, if you are not angry with me," she added, with a little deprecatory soothing.

It seemed to touch him. "Angry! How could you think so? I am never angry with you. But what do you desire to hear about? Whither I am going, and when? Do you, then, wish--I mean, advise me to go?"

"Yes, if it is for your good. If leaving Harbury would give you rest on that one subject of which we never speak."

"But of which I, at least, think night and day, and never without a prayer--(I can pray now)--for the good angel who brought light into my darkness," said Harold, solemnly. "That comfort is with me, whatever else may--But you wanted to hear about my going abroad?"

"Yes, tell me all. You know I like to hear."

"Well, then, I have only to decide, and I might depart immediately; to America, I think. I should engage in science and literature. Mine would be a safe, sure course; but, at the beginning, I might have a hard struggle. I do not like to take any one to share it."

"Not your mother, who loves you so?"

"No, because her love would be sorely tried. We should be strangers in a strange land; perhaps poverty would be added to our endurance; I should have to labour unceasingly, and my temper might fail. These are hard things for a woman to bear."