"But we _can_, Daddy; there is plenty of water in the world."

"Yes, of course; but when the mother is ill, and the father in
trouble! For poor Mr. Vail has had no end of misfortune; he has no
resource but the little dairy, and three of his cows have been ill
this spring."

And Helen's incorrigible mirth lighted up her face again. "Oh!" she
cried. "Is _that_ it! I saw him struggling away at the pump as I
came by; but I had no idea it was anything so serious!"

Mr. Davis looked grieved; Helen, when her first burst of glee had
passed, noticed it and changed her mood. She put her arms around her
father's neck and pressed her cheek against his.

"Daddy, dear," she said coaxingly, "haven't I done charity enough
for one day? You will surfeit me at the start, and then I'll be just
as little fond of it as I was before. When I must let dirty children
climb all over me, I can dress for the occasion."

"My dear," pleaded Mr. Davis, "Godliness is placed before
Cleanliness."

"Yes," admitted Helen, "and of course it is right for you to
inculcate the greater virtue; but I'm only a girl, and you mustn't
expect sublimity from me. You don't want to turn me into a president
of sewing societies, like that dreadful Mrs. Dale!"

"Helen," protested the other, helplessly, "I wish you would not
always refer to Mrs. Dale with that adjective; she is the best
helper I have."

"Yes, Daddy," said Helen, with the utmost solemnity; "when I have a
dreadful eagle nose like hers, perhaps I can preside over meetings
too. But I can't now."

"I do not want you to, my love; but--"

"And if I have to cling by the weaker virtue of cleanliness just for
a little while, Daddy, you must not mind. I'll visit all your clean
parishioners for you,--parishioners like Aunt Polly!"

And before Mr. Davis could make another remark, the girl had skipped
into the other room to the piano; as her father went slowly out the
door, the echoes of the old house were laughing with the happy
melody of Purcell's--

  Nymphs and shepherds, come a-way, come a-way,
  Nymphs and shepherds, come a-way, come a-way, Come,
  come, come, come a-way!






CHAPTER III





  "For you alone I strive to sing,
    Oh, tell me how to woo!"

When Helen was left alone, she seated herself before her old music
stand which had been brought down to welcome her, and proceeded to
glance over and arrange the pieces she had learned and loved in her
young girlhood. Most of them made her smile, and when she reflected
upon how difficult she used to think them, she realized that now
that it was over she was glad for the German regime. Helen had
accounted herself an accomplished pianist when she went away, but
she had met with new standards and learned to think humbly of
herself in the great home of music. She possessed a genuine fondness
for the art, however, and had devoted most of her three years to it,
so that she came home rejoicing in the possession of a technic that
was quite a mastership compared with any that she was likely to
meet.

Helen's thoughts did not dwell upon that very long at present,
however; she found herself thinking again about Arthur, and the
unexpected ending of her walk with him.

"I had no idea he felt that way toward me," she mused, resting her
chin in her hand; "what in the world am I going to do? Men are
certainly most inconvenient creatures; I thought I was doing
everything in the world to make him happy!"

Helen turned to the music once more, but the memory of the figure
she had left sunken helplessly upon the forest seat stayed in her
mind. "I do wonder if that can be why he did not wait for me," she
thought, shuddering,--"if he was too wretched to see me again; what
CAN I do?" She got up and began walking restlessly up and down the
room for a few minutes.

"Perhaps I ought to go and look for him," she mused; "it was an hour
or two ago that I left him there;" and Helen, after thinking the
matter over, had half turned to leave, when she heard a step outside
and saw the door open quickly. Even before she saw him she knew who
it was, for only Arthur would have entered without ringing the bell.
After having pictured him overcome by despair, it was rather a blow
to her pride to see him, for he entered flushed, and seemingly
elated.

"Well, sir, you've treated me nicely!" she exclaimed, showing her
vexation in spite of herself.

"You will forgive me," said Arthur, smiling.

"Don't be too sure of it," Helen said; "I looked for you everywhere,
and I am quite angry."

"I was obeying your high command," the other replied, still smiling.

"My command? I told you to wait for me."

"You told me something else," laughed Arthur. "You spent all the
morning instructing me for it, you know."

"Oh!" said Helen. It was a broad and very much prolonged "Oh," for a
sudden light was dawning upon the girl; as it came her frown gave
place to a look of delight.

"You have been writing me a poem!" she cried, eagerly.

"Yes," said Arthur.

"Oh, you dear boy!" Helen laughed. "Then I do forgive you; but you
ought to have told me, for I had to walk home all alone, and I've
been worrying about you. I never once thought of the poem."

"The muses call without warning," laughed Arthur, "and one has to
obey them, you know."

"Oh, oh!" exclaimed the other. "And so you've been wandering around
the woods all this time, making verses! And you've been waving your
arms and talking to yourself, and doing all sorts of crazy things, I
know!" Then as she saw Arthur flush, she went on: "I was sure of it!
And you ran away so that I wouldn't see you! Oh, I wish I'd known;
I'd have hunted you up and never come home until I'd found you."

As was usual with Helen, her momentary vexation had gone like April
rain, and all her seriousness had vanished with it. She forgot all
about the last scene in the woods, and Arthur was once more the
friend of her girlhood, whom she might take by the hand when she
chose, and with whom she might be as free and happy as when she was
alone with the flowers and the wind. It seemed as if Arthur too had
vented all his pent up emotion, and returned to his natural cheerful
self.

"Tell me," she cried, "did you put in all the things I told you
about?"

"I put all I could," said Arthur. "That is a great deal to ask."

"I only want it to be full of life," laughed Helen. "That's all I
care about; the man who wants to write springtime poetry for me must
be wide awake!"

"Shall I read it to you?" asked Arthur, hesitatingly.

"Yes, of course," said Helen. "And read it as if you meant it; if I
like it I'll tell you so."

"I wrote it for nothing but to please you" was the reply, and Arthur
took a much bescrawled piece of paper from his pocket; the girl
seated herself upon the piano stool again and gazed up at him as he
rested his elbow upon the top of the piano and read his lines. There
could not have been a situation in which the young poet would have
read them with more complete happiness, and so it was a pleasure to
watch him. And Helen's eyes kindled, and her cheeks flushed brightly
as she listened, for she found that the verses had taken their
imagery from her very lips.

  In the May-time's golden glory
    Ere the quivering sun was high,
  I heard the Wind of Morning
    Through the laughing meadows fly;

  In his passion-song was throbbing
    All the madness of the May,
  And he whispered: Thou hast labored;
    Thou art weary; come away!

  Thou shalt drink a fiery potion
    For thy prisoned spirit's pain;
  Thou shalt taste the ancient rapture
    That thy soul has sought in vain.

  I will tell thee of a maiden,
    One who has thy longing fanned--
  Spirit of the Forest Music--
    Thou shalt take her by the hand,

  Lightly by her rosy fingers
    Trembling with her keen delight,
  And her flying steps shall lead thee
    Out upon the mountain's height;

  To a dance undreamed of mortal
    To the Bacchanal of Spring,--
  Where in mystic joy united
    Nature's bright-eyed creatures sing.

  There the green things of the mountain,
    Million-voiced, newly-born,
  And the flowers of the valley
    In their beauty's crimson morn;

  There the winged winds of morning,
    Spirits unresting, touched with fire,
  And the streamlets, silver-throated,
    They whose leaping steps ne'er tire!

  Thou shalt see them, ever circling
    Round about a rocky spring,
  While the gaunt old forest-warriors
    Madly their wide branches fling.

  Thou shalt tread the whirling measure,
    Bathe thee in its frenzied strife;
  Thou shalt have a mighty memory
    For thy spirit's after life.

  Haste thee while thy heart is burning,
    While thine eyes have strength to see;
  Hark, behind yon blackening cloud-bank,
    To the Storm-King's minstrelsy!

  See, he stamps upon the mountains,
    And he leaps the valleys high!
  Now he smites his forest harp-strings,
    And he sounds his thunder-cry:--

  Waken, lift ye up, ye creatures,
    Sing the song, each living thing!
  Join ye in the mighty passion
    Of the Symphony of Spring!

And so the young poet finished, his cheeks fairly on fire, and, as
he gazed down at Helen, his hand trembling so that he could hardly
hold the paper. One glance told him that she was pleased, for the
girl's face was flushed like his own, and her eyes were sparkling
with delight. Arthur's heart gave a great throb within him.

"You like it!" he exclaimed.

"Oh, Arthur, I do!" she cried. "Oh, how glorious you must have
been!" And trembling with girlish delight, she took the paper from
his hand and placed it in front of her on the music rack.

"Oh, I should like to write music for it!" she exclaimed; "for those
lines about the Storm-King!"

And she read them aloud, clenching her hands and shaking her head,
carried away by the image they brought before her eyes. "Oh, I
should like music for it!" she cried again.

"I don't know very much about poetry, you know," she added, laughing
excitedly. "If it's about the things I like, I can't help thinking
it's fine. It's just the same with music,--if a man only makes it
swift and strong, so that it leaps and flies and never tires, that
is all I care about; and if he just keeps his trombones till the
very last, he can carry me off my feet though he makes the worst
noise that ever was! It's the same as a storm, you know, Arthur; do
you remember how we used to go up on our hillside when the great
wind was coming, and when everything was growing still and black;
and how we used to watch the big clouds and the sheets of rain, and
run for home when we heard the thunder? Once when you were away,
Arthur, I didn't run, for I wanted to see what it was like; and I
stayed up there and saw it all, singing the 'Ride of the Valkyries,'
and pretending I was one of them and could gallop with the wind. For
the wind is fine, Arthur! It fills you so full of its power that you
stretch out your arms to it, and it makes you sing; and it comes,
and it comes again, stronger than ever, and it sweeps you on, just
like a great mass of music. And then it howls through the trees and
it flies over the valleys,--that was what you were thinking of,
weren't you, Arthur?"

And Helen stopped, breathlessly, and gazed at him; her cheeks were
flushed, and her hands still tightly clasped.

"Yes," said Arthur, half mechanically, for he had lost himself in
the girl's enthusiasm, and felt the storm of his verses once more.

"Your poem made me think of that one time that was so gloriously,"
Helen went on. "For the rain was almost blinding, and I was
drenched, but I did not even know it. For oh, the thunder! Arthur,
you've no idea what thunder is like till you're near it! There fell
one fearful bolt quite near me, a great white, living thing, as
thick as a man's body, and the crash of it seemed to split the air.
But oh, I didn't mind it a bit! 'Der Sanger triumphirt in Wettern!'
I think I was a real Valkyrie that time, and I only wished that I
might put it into music."

The girl turned to the piano, and half in play struck a great
rumbling chord, that rolled and echoed through the room; she sounded
it once more, laughing aloud with glee. Arthur had sunk down upon a
chair beside her, and was bending forward, watching her with growing
excitement. For again and again Helen struck the keys with all the
power of her arms, until they seemed to give forth real storm and
thunder; and as she went on with her reckless play the mood grew
upon her, and she lost herself in the vision of the Storm-King
sweeping through the sky. She poured out a great stream of his wild
music, singing away to herself excitedly in the meantime. And as the
rush continued and the fierce music swelled louder, the phantasy
took hold of the girl and carried her beyond herself. She seemed to
become the very demon of the storm, unbound and reckless; she smote
the keys with right royal strength, and the piano seemed a thing of
life beneath her touch. The pace became faster, and the thunder
rattled and crashed more wildly, and there awoke in the girl's soul
a power of musical utterance that she had never dreamed of in her
life before. Her whole being was swept away in ecstasy; her lips
were moving excitedly, and her pulses were leaping like mad. She
seemed no longer to know of the young man beside her, who was bent
forward with clenched hands, carried beyond himself by the sight of
her exulting power.

And in the meantime, Helen's music was surging on, building itself
up into a great climax that swelled and soared and burst in a
deafening thunder crash; and while the air was still throbbing and
echoing with it, the girl joined to it her deep voice, grown
suddenly conscious of new power:

  "See, he stamps upon the mountains,
    And he leaps the valleys high!
  Now he smites his forest harp-strings,
    And he sounds his thunder cry!"

And as the cry came the girl laughed aloud, like a very Valkyrie
indeed, her laugh part of the music, and carried on by it; and then
gradually as the tempest swept on, the rolling thunder was lost in a
march that was the very tread of the Storm-King. And the march
broadened, and the thunder died out of it slowly, and all the wild
confusion, and then it rose, glorious and triumphant, and turned to
a mighty pean, a mightier one than ever Helen could have made. The
thought of it had come to her as an inspiration, and as a refuge,
that the glory of her passion might not be lost. The march had led
her to it, and now it had taken her in its arms and swept her away,
as it had swept millions by its majesty. It was the great Ninth
Symphony Hymn:

  "Hail thee, Joy! From Heaven descending,
    Daughter from Elysium!
  Ecstasy our hearts inflaming,
    To thy sacred shrine we come.
  Thine enchantments bind together
    Those whom custom's law divides;
  All are brothers, all united,
    Where thy gentle wing abides."

And Helen sang it as one possessed by it, as one made drunk with its
glory--as the very Goddess of Joy that she was. For the Storm-King
and his legions had fled, and another vision had come into her
heart, a vision that every one ought to carry with him when the
great symphony is to be heard. He should see the hall in Vienna
where it was given for the last time in the great master's life, and
see the great master himself, the bowed and broken figure that all
musicians worship, standing up to conduct it; and see him leading it
through all its wild surging passion, almost too frantic to be
endured; and then, when the last towering climax has passed and the
music has ceased and the multitude at his back has burst forth into
its thundering shout, see the one pathetic figure standing there
aloft before all eyes and still blindly beating the time. There must
have been tears in the eyes of every man in that place to know the
reason for it,--that he from whose heart all their joy had come, he
who was lord and master of it, had never heard in his life and could
never hope to hear one sound of that music he had written, but must
dwell a prisoner in darkness and solitude forever.

That was the picture before Helen's eyes; she did not think of the
fearful tragedy of it--she had no feeling for tragedy, she knew no
more about suffering than a child just born. But joy she knew, and
joy she was; she was the multitude lifted up in its ecstasy,
throbbing, burning and triumphant, and she sang the great choruses,
one after another, and the piano beneath her fingers thundered and
rang with the instrumental part. Surely in all music there is no
utterance of joy so sustained and so overwhelming in its intensity
as this; it is a frenzy almost more than man can stand; it is joy
more than human--the joy of existence:--

  "Pleasure every creature living
    From kind Nature's breast receives;
  Good and evil, all are seeking
    For the rosy path she leaves."

And so the torrent of passionate exultation swept Helen onward with
it until the very end, the last frantic prestissimo chorus, and then
she sprang to her feet and flung up her hands with a cry. She stood
thus for a moment, glowing with exultation, and then she sank down
again and sat staring before her, the music still echoing through
every fiber of her soul, and the shouting multitude still surging
before her.

For just how long that lasted, she knew not, but only that her wild
mood was gradually subsiding, and that she felt herself sinking
back, as a bird sinks after its flight; then suddenly she turned.
Arthur was at her side, and she gave a cry, for he had seized her
hand in his, and was covering it with burning kisses.

"Arthur! Arthur!" she gasped.

The young man gazed up at her, and Helen remembered the scene in the
forest, and realized what she had done. She had shaken him to the
very depths of his being by the emotion which she had flung loose
before him, and he seemed beside himself at that moment, his hair
disordered and his forehead hot and flushed. He made a move as if to
clasp the girl in his arms, and Helen tore her hand loose by main
force and sprang back to the doorway.

"Arthur!" she cried. "What do you mean?"

He clutched at a chair for support, and stood staring at her. For
fully a minute they remained thus, Helen trembling with alarm; then
his head sank, and he flung himself down upon the sofa, where he lay
sobbing passionately. Helen remained gazing at him with wide open
and astonished eyes.

"Arthur!" she exclaimed again.

But he did not hear her, for the cruel sobbing that shook his frame.
Helen, as soon as her first alarm had passed, came softly nearer,
till she stood by the sofa; but still he did not heed her, and she
did not dare even to put her hand upon his shoulder. She was afraid
of him, her dearest friend, and she knew not what to make of him.

"Arthur," she whispered again, when he was silent for a moment.
"Please speak to me, Arthur."

The other gazed up at her with a look of such helpless despair and
longing upon his face that Helen was frightened still more. He had
been sobbing as if his heart would break, but his eyes were dry.

"What is the matter?" she cried.

The young man answered her hoarsely: "Can you not see what is the
matter, Helen? I love you! And you drive me mad!"

The girl turned very pale, and lowered her eyes before his burning
gaze.

"Helen," the other went on impetuously, "you will break my heart if
you treat me in this way. Do you not know that for three long years
I have been dreaming of you, and of the promise that you gave me?
You told me that you loved me, and that you always would love me!
You told me that the night before you went away; and you kissed me.
All this time I have been thinking of that kiss, and cherishing the
memory of it, and waiting for you to return. I have labored for no
other reason, I have had no other hope in the world; I have kept
your image before me, and lived in it, and worshiped before it, and
the thought of you has been all that I had. When I was tired and
worn and ill I could only think of you and remember your promise,
and count the days before your return. And, oh, it has been so long
that I could not stand it! For weeks I have been so impatient, and
so filled with the thought of the day when I might see you again
that I have been helpless and half mad; for I thought that I should
take your hand in mine and claim your promise. And this morning I
wandered about the woods for hours, waiting for you to come. And see
how you have treated me!"

He buried his face in his hands again, and Helen stood gazing at
him, breathing very fast with alarm, and unable to find a word to
say.

"Helen," he groaned, without looking up again, "do you not know that
you are beautiful? Have you no heart? You fling your soul bare
before me, and you fill me with this fearful passion; you will drive
me mad!"

"But, Arthur," she protested, "I could not think of you so; I
thought of you as my brother, and I meant to make you happy."

"Tell me, then," he gasped, staring at her, "tell me once for all.
You do _not_ love me, Helen?"

The girl answered with a frank gaze that was cruel, "No, Arthur."

"And you can never love me? You take back the promise that you made
me?"

"I told you that I was only a child, Arthur; it has been a long time
since I have thought of it."

The young man choked back a sob. "Oh, Helen, if you only knew what
cruel words those are," he groaned. "I cannot bear them."

He gazed at her with his burning eyes, so that the girl lowered hers
again. "Tell me!" he exclaimed. "What am I to do?"

"Can we not remain friends, just as we used to be?" she asked
pleadingly. "Can we not talk together and help each other as before?
Oh, Arthur, I thought you would come here to live all summer, and
how I should like it! Why can you not? Can you not let me play for
you without--without--" and Helen stopped, and flushed a trifle; "I
do not know quite what to make of you to-day," she added.

She was speaking kindly, but to the man beside her with his burning
heart, her words were hard to hear; he stared at her, shuddering,
and then suddenly he clenched his hands and started to his feet.

"Helen," he cried, "there is but one thing. I must go!"

"Go?" echoed Helen.

"If I stay here and gaze at you I shall go mad with despair," he
exclaimed incoherently. "Oh, I shall go mad! For I do love you, and
you talk to me as if I were a child! Helen, I must get this out of
my heart in some way, I cannot stay here."

"But, Arthur," the girl protested, "I told father you would stay,
and you will make yourself ill, for you have walked all day."

Every word she uttered was more torment to the other, for it showed
him how much his hopes were gone to wreck. He rushed across the room
and opened the door; then, however, he paused, as if that had cost
him all his resolution. He gazed at the girl with a look of
unspeakable yearning, his face white, and his limbs trembling
beneath him.

"You wish me to go, Helen?" he exclaimed.

"Wish you!" exclaimed Helen, who was watching him in alarm. "Of
course not; I want you to stay and see father, and--"

"And hear you tell me that you do not love me! Oh, Helen, how can
you say it again? Can you not see what you have done to me?"

"Arthur!" cried the girl.

"Yes, what you have done to me! You have made me so that I dare not
stay near you. You _must_ love me, Helen, oh, some time you must!"
And he came toward her again, stretching out his arms to her. As she
sprang back, frowning, he stopped and stood for an instant, half
sinking; then he whirled about and darted out of the door.

Helen was scarcely able to realize at first that he was gone, but
when she looked out she saw that he was already far down the street,
walking swiftly. For a moment she thought of calling him; but she
checked herself, and closed the door quietly instead, after which
she walked slowly across the room. In the center of it she stopped
still, gazing in front of her thoughtfully, and looking very grave
indeed. "That is dreadful," she said slowly. "I had no idea of such
a thing. What in the world am I to do?"

There was a tall mirror between the two windows of the room, and
Helen went toward it and stood in front of it, gazing earnestly at
herself. "Is it true, then, that I am so very beautiful?" she mused.
"And even Arthur must fall in love with me!"

Helen's face was still flushed with the glory of her ride with the
Storm-King; she smoothed back the long strands of golden hair that
had come loose, and then she looked at herself again. "It is
dreadful," she said once more, half aloud, "I do not think I ever
felt so nervous in my life, and I don't know what to do; everything
I did to please him seemed only to make him more miserable. I wanted
him to be happy with me; I wanted him to stay with me." And she
walked away frowning, and seated herself at the piano and began
peevishly striking at the keys. "I am going to write to him and tell
him that he must get over that dreadfulness," she muttered after a
while, "and come back and be friends with me. Oakdale will be too
stupid without him all summer, and I should be miserable."

She was just rising impatiently when the front door opened and her
father came in, exclaiming in a cheery voice, "Well, children!" Then
he stopped in surprise. "Why, someone told me Arthur was here!" he
exclaimed.

"He's gone home again," said Helen, in a dissatisfied tone.

"Home!" exclaimed the other. "To Hilltown?"

"Yes."

"But I thought he was going to stay until tomorrow."

"So did I," said Helen, "but he changed his mind and decided that
he'd better not."

"Why, I am really disappointed," said Mr. Davis. "I thought we
should have a little family party; I haven't seen Arthur for a
month."

"There is some important reason," said Helen--"that's what he told
me, anyway." She did not want her father to have any idea of the
true reason, or to ask any inconvenient questions.

Mr. Davis would perhaps have done so, had he not something else on
his mind. "By the way, Helen," he said, "I must ask you, what in the
world was that fearful noise you were making?"

"Noise?" asked Helen, puzzled for a moment.

"Why, yes; I met old Mr. Nelson coming down the street, and he said
that you were making a most dreadful racket upon the piano, and
shouting, too, and that there were a dozen people standing in the
street, staring!"

A sudden wild thought occurred to Helen, and she whirled about. Sure
enough, she found the two windows of the room wide open; and that
was too much for her gravity; she flung herself upon the sofa and
gave vent to peal after peal of laughter.

"Oh, Daddy!" she gasped. "Oh, Daddy!"

Mr. Davis did not understand the joke, but he waited patiently,
taking off his gloves in the meantime. "What it is, Helen?" he
enquired.

"Oh, Daddy!" exclaimed the girl again, and lifted herself up and
turned her laughing eyes upon him. "And now I understand why
inspired people have to live in the country!"

"What was it, Helen?"

"It--it wasn't anything, Daddy, except that I was playing and
singing for Arthur, and I forgot to close the windows."

"You must remember, my love, that you live in a clergyman's house,"
said Mr. Davis. "I have no objection to merriment, but it must be
within bounds. Mr. Nelson said that he did not know what to think
was the matter."

Helen made a wry face at the name; the Nelsons were a family of
Methodists who lived across the way. Methodists are people who take
life seriously as a rule, and Helen thought the Nelsons were very
queer indeed.

"I'll bet he did know what to think," she chuckled, "even if he
didn't say it; he thought that was just what to expect from a
clergyman who had a decanter of wine on his dinner table."

Mr. Davis could not help smiling. And as for Helen, she was herself
all over again; for when her father had come in, she had about
reached a point where she could no longer bear to be serious and
unhappy. As he went on to ask her to be a little less reckless,
Helen put her arms around him and said, with the solemnity that she
always wore when she was gayest: "But, Daddy, I don't know what I'm
to do; you sent me to Germany to study music, and if I'm never to
play it--"

"Yes, but Helen; such frantic, dreadful noise!"

"But, Daddy, the Germans are emotional people, you know; no one
would have been in the least surprised at that in Germany; it was a
hymn, Daddy!"

"A hymn!" gasped Mr. Davis.

"Yes, honestly," said Helen. "It is a wonderful hymn. Every German
knows it nearly by heart."

Mr. Davis had as much knowledge of German music as might be expected
of one who had lived twenty years in the country and heard three
hymns and an anthem sung every Sunday by a volunteer choir. Helen's
musical education, as all her other education, had been
superintended by Aunt Polly, and the only idea that came to Mr.
Davis' mind was of Wagner, whose name he had heard people talk about
in connection with noise and incoherency.

"Helen," he said, "I trust that is not the kind of hymn you are
going to sing to-morrow."

"I don't know," was the puzzled reply. "I'll see what I can do,
Daddy. It's dreadfully hard to find anything in German music like
the slow-going, practical lives that we dull Yankees lead." Then a
sudden idea occurred to the girl, and she ran to the piano with a
gleeful laugh: "Just see, for instance," she said, fumbling
hurriedly amongst her music, "I was playing the Moonlight Sonata
this morning, and that's a good instance."

"This is the kind of moonlight they have in Germany," she laughed
when she found it. After hammering out a few discords of her own she
started recklessly into the incomprehensible "presto," thundering
away at every crescendo as if to break her fingers. "Isn't it fine,
Daddy?" she cried, gazing over her shoulder.

"I don't see what it has to do with the moon," said the clergyman,
gazing helplessly at the open window, and wondering if another crowd
was gathering.

"That's what everybody's been trying to find out!" said Helen; then,
as she heard the dinner bell out in the hall, she ended with half a
dozen frantic runs, and jumping up with the last of them, took her
father's arm and danced out of the room with him.

"Perhaps when we come to see the other side of the moon," she said,
"we may discover all about it. Or else it's because the moon is
supposed to set people crazy." So they passed in to dinner, where
Helen was as animated as ever, poor Arthur and his troubles seeming
to have vanished completely from her thoughts.

In fact, it was not until the meal was nearly over that she spoke of
them again; she noticed that it was growing dark outside, and she
stepped to the window just as a distant rumble of thunder was heard.

"Dear me!" she exclaimed. "There's a fearful storm coming, and poor
Arthur is out in it; he must be a long way from town by this time,
and there is no house where he can go." From the window where she
stood she had a view across the hills in back of the town, and could
see the black clouds coming swiftly on. "It is like we were
imagining this morning," she mused; "I wonder if he will think of
it."

The dinner was over soon after that, and she looked out again, just
as the first drops of rain were falling; the thunder was rolling
louder, bringing to Helen a faint echo of her morning music. She
went in and sat down at the piano, her fingers roaming over the keys
hesitatingly. "I wish I could get it again," she mused. "It seems
like a dream when I think of it, it was so wild and so wonderful.
Oh, if I could only remember that march!"

There came a crash of thunder near by, as if to help her, but Helen
found that all efforts were in vain. Neither the storm music nor the
march came back to her, and even when she played a few chords of the
great chorus she had sung, it sounded tame and commonplace. Helen
knew that the glory of that morning was gone where goes the best
inspiration of all humanity, back into nothingness and night.

"It was a shame," she thought, as she rose discontentedly from the
piano. "I never was so carried away by music in my life, and the
memory of it would have kept me happy for weeks, if Arthur hadn't
been here to trouble me!"

Then, however, as she went to the window again to watch the storm
which was now raging in all its majesty, she added more unselfishly:
"Poor boy! It is dreadful to think of him being out in it." She saw
a bolt of lightning strike in the distance, and she waited
breathlessly for the thunder. It was a fearful crash, and it made
her blood run faster, and her eyes sparkle. "My!" she exclaimed.
"But it's fine!" And then she added with a laugh, "He can correct
his poem by it, if he wants to!"

She turned to go upstairs. On the way she stopped with a rather
conscience-stricken look, and said to herself, "Poor fellow! It
seems a shame to be happy!" She stood for a moment thinking, but
then she added, "Yet I declare, I don't know what to do for him; it
surely isn't my fault if I am not in love with him in that mad
fashion, and I don't see why I should make myself wretched about
it!" Having thus silenced her conscience, she went up to unpack her
trunks, humming to herself on the way:

  "Sir Knight, a faithful sister's love
    This heart devotes to thee;
  I pray thee ask no other love,
    For pain that causes me.

  "Quiet would I see thee come,
    And quiet see thee go;
  The silent weeping of thine eyes
    I cannot bear to know."

While she was singing Arthur was in the midst of the tempest,
staggering towards his home ten miles away. He was drenched by the
cold rain, and shivering and almost fainting from exhaustion--for he
had eaten nothing since early dawn; yet so wretched and sick at
heart was he that he felt nothing, and scarcely heard the storm or
realized where he was.






CHAPTER IV





  "Dosn't thou 'ear my 'erse's legs, as they canters awaay?
  Proputty, proputty, proputty--that's what I 'ears 'em saay.

  But I knawed a Quaaker feller as often 'as towd ma this:
  'Doant thou marry for munny, but goa wheer munny is!'"

Helen had much to do to keep her busy during the next few days. She
had in the first place to receive visits from nearly everybody in
Oakdale, for she was a general favorite in the town, and besides
that everyone was curious to see what effect the trip had had upon
her beauty and accomplishments. Then too, she had the unpacking of
an incredible number of trunks; it was true that Helen, having been
a favored boarder at an aristocratic seminary, was not in the habit
of doing anything troublesome herself, but she considered it
necessary to superintend the servant. Last of all there was a great
event at the house of her aunt, Mrs. Roberts, to be anticipated and
prepared for.

It has been said that the marriage of Mr. Davis had been a second
romance in that worthy man's career, he having had the fortune to
win the love of a daughter of a very wealthy family which lived near
Oakdale. The parents had of course been bitterly opposed to the
match, but the girl had had her way. Unfortunately, however, the
lovers, or at any rate the bride, having been without any real idea
of duty or sacrifice, the match had proved one of those that serve
to justify the opinions of people who are "sensible;" the young
wife, wearying of the lot she had chosen, had sunk into a state of
peevish discontent from which death came to relieve her.

Of this prodigal daughter Aunt Polly was the elder, and wiser,
sister. She had never ceased to urge upon the other, both before and
after marriage, the folly of her conduct, and had lived herself to
be a proof of her own more excellent sense, having married a wealthy
stockbroker who proved a good investment, trebling his own capital
and hers in a few years. Aunt Polly therefore had a fine home upon
Madison Avenue in New York, and a most aristocratic country-seat a
few miles from Oakdale, together with the privilege of frequenting
the best society in New York, and of choosing her friends amongst
the most wealthy in the neighborhood of the little town. This
superiority to her erring sister had probably been one of the causes
that had contributed to develop the most prominent trait in her
character--which is perhaps the most prominent trait of high society
in general--a complete satisfaction with the world she knew, and
what she knew about it, and the part she played in it. For the rest,
Aunt Polly was one of those bustling little women who rule the world
in almost everything, because the world finds it is too much trouble
to oppose them. She had assumed, and had generally succeeded in
having recognized, a complete superiority to Mr. Davis in her
knowledge about life, with the result that, as has been stated, the
education of the one child of the unfortunate marriage had been
managed by her.

When, therefore, Helen had come off the steamer, it had been Mrs.
Roberts who was there to meet her; and the arrangement announced was
that the girl was to have three days to spend with her father, and
was then to come for a week or two at her aunt's, who was just
opening her country home and who intended to invite a score of
people whom she considered, for reasons of her own, proper persons
for her niece to meet. Mrs. Roberts spoke very condescendingly
indeed of the company which Helen met at her father's, Mr. Davis
having his own opinions about the duty of a clergyman toward the
non-aristocratic members of his flock.

The arrangement, it is scarcely necessary to say, pleased Helen very
much indeed; the atmosphere of luxury and easy superiority which she
found at her aunt's was much to her taste, and she looked forward to
being a center of attraction there with the keenest delight. In the
meantime, however, she slaked her thirst for happiness just as well
at Oakdale, accepting with queenly grace the homage of all who came
to lay their presents at her feet. Sunday proved to be a day of
triumph, for all the town had come to church, and was as much
stirred by the glory of her singing as Arthur had predicted. After
the service everyone waited to tell her about it, and so she was
radiant indeed.

By Tuesday, however, all that had come to seem a trifling matter,
for that afternoon Aunt Polly was to come, and a new world was to be
opened for her conquest. Helen was amusing herself by sorting out
the motley collection of souvenirs and curios which she had brought
home to decorate her room, when she heard a carriage drive up at the
door, and a minute later heard the voice of Mrs. Roberts' footman in
the hall.

Mrs. Roberts herself did not alight, and Helen kept her waiting only
long enough to slip on her hat, and to bid her father a hurried
farewell. In a minute more she was in the carriage, and was being
borne in state down the main street of Oakdale.

"You are beautiful to-day, my dear," said her aunt, beaming upon
her; "I hope you are all ready for your triumph."

"I think so," said Helen. "I've about seen everybody and everything
I wanted to at home; I've been wonderfully happy, Auntie."

"That is right, my dear," said Aunt Polly. "You have certainly every
cause to be, and you would be foolish not to make the most of it.
But I should think this town would seem a somewhat less important
place to you, after all that you have seen of the world."

"Yes, it does a little," laughed Helen, "but it seemed good to see
all the old people again."

"Someone told me they saw Arthur here on Saturday," said the other.
"Did you see _him?_"

"Oh, yes," said Helen; "that's what he came for. You can fancy how
glad I was to meet him. I spent a couple of hours walking in the
woods with him."

Mrs. Roberts' look of dismay may be imagined; it was far too great
for her to hide.

"Where is he now?" she asked, hastily.

"Oh, he has gone home," said Helen; and she added, smiling, "he went
on Saturday afternoon, because he's writing a poem about
thunderstorms, and he wanted to study that one."

The other was sufficiently convinced of the irresponsibility of
poets to be half uncertain whether Helen was joking or not; it was
very frequently difficult to tell, anyway, for Helen would look
serious and amuse herself by watching another person's
mystification--a trait of character which would have been
intolerable in anyone less fascinating than she.

Perhaps Aunt Polly thought something of that as she sat and watched
the girl. Aunt Polly was a little woman who looked as if she herself
might have once made some pretense to being a belle, but she was
very humble before Helen. "My dear," she said, "every minute that I
watch you, I am astonished to see how wonderfully you have grown. Do
you know, Helen, you are glorious!"

"Yes," said Helen, smiling delightedly. "Isn't it nice, Aunt Polly?
I'm so glad I'm beautiful."

"You funny child," laughed the other. "What a queer thing to say!"

"Am I not to know I am beautiful?" inquired Helen, looking at her
with open eyes. "Why, dear me! I can look at myself in the glass and
be just as happy as anyone else; I love everything beautiful."

Aunt Polly beamed upon her. "I am glad of it, my dear," she laughed.
"I only wish I could say something to you to make you realize what
your wonderful beauty means."

"How, Aunt Polly?" asked the girl. "Have you been reading poetry?"

"No," said the other, "not exactly; but you know very well in your
heart what hopes I have for you, Helen, and I only wish you could
appreciate the gift that has been given you, and not fling it away
in any foolish fashion. With your talents and your education, my
dear, there is almost nothing that you might not do."

"Yes," said Helen, with all of her seriousness, "I often think of
it; perhaps, Auntie, I might become a poetess!"

The other looked aghast. Helen had seen the look on her aunt's face
at the mention of her walk with Arthur, and being a young lady of
electrical wit, had understood just what it meant, and just how the
rest of the conversation was intended to bear upon the matter; with
that advantage she was quite in her glory.

"No, indeed, Aunt Polly," she said, "you can never tell; just
suppose, for instance, I were to fall in love with and marry a man
of wonderful genius, who would help me to devote myself to art? It
would not make any difference, you know, if he were poor--we could
struggle and help each other. And oh, I tell you, if I were to meet
such a man, and to know that he loved me truly, and to have proof
that he could remember me and be true to me, even when I was far
away, oh, I tell you, nothing could ever keep me--"

Helen was declaiming her glowing speech with real fervor, her hands
dramatically outstretched. But she could not get any further, for
the look of utter horror upon her auditor's face was too much for
her; she dropped her hands and made the air echo with her laughter.

"Oh, Aunt Polly, you goose!" she cried, flinging one arm about her,
"have you really forgotten me that much in three years?"

The other was so relieved at the happy denouement of that fearful
tragedy that she could only protest, "Helen, Helen, why do you fool
me so?"

"Because you fool me, or try to," said Helen. "When you have a
sermon to preach on the impropriety of walking in the woods alone
with a susceptible young poet, I wish you'd mount formally into the
pulpit and begin with the text."

"My dear," laughed the other, "you are too quick; but I must
confess--"

"Of course you must," said the girl; and she folded her hands meekly
and looked grave. "And now I am ready; and if you meet with any
difficulties in the course of your sermon, I've an expert at home
who has preached one hundred and four every year for twenty years,
all genuine and no two alike."

"Helen," said the other, "I do wish you would talk seriously with
me. You are old enough to be your own mistress now, and to do as you
please, but you ought to realize that I have seen the world more
than you, and that my advice is worth something."

"Tell it to me," said Helen, ceasing to laugh, and leaning back in
the carriage and gazing at her aunt. "What do you want me to do, now
that I am home? I will be really serious if you wish me to, for that
does interest me. I suppose that my education is finished?"

"Yes," said the other, "it ought to be, certainly; you have had
every advantage that a girl can have, a great deal more than I ever
had. And you owe it all to me, Helen,--you do, really; if it hadn't
been for my insisting you'd have gotten all your education at
Hilltown, and you'd have played the piano and sung like Mary Nelson
across the way."

Helen shuddered, and felt that that was cause indeed for gratitude.

"It is true," said her aunt; "I've taken as much interest in you as
in any one of my own children, and you must know it. It was for no
reason at all but that I saw what a wonderful woman you promised to
become, and I was anxious to help you to the social position that I
thought you ought to have. And now, Helen, the chance is yours if
you care to take it."

"I am taking it, am I not?" asked Helen; "I'm going with you, and I
shall be just as charming as I can."

"Yes, I know," said the other, smiling a little; "but that is not
exactly what I mean."

"What do you mean?"

"Of course, my dear, you may enter good society a while by visiting
me; but that will not be permanently. You will have to marry into
it, Helen dear."

"Marry!" echoed the girl, taken aback. "Dear me!"

"You will wish to marry some time," said the other, "and so you
should look forward to it and choose your course. With your charms,
Helen, there is almost nothing that you might not hope for; you must
know yourself that you could make any man fall in love with you that
you wished. And you ought to know also that if you only had wealth
you could enter any society; for you have good birth, and you will
discover that you have more knowledge and more wit than most of the
people you meet."

"I've discovered that already," said Helen, laughing.

"All that you must do, my love," went on the other, "is to realize
what is before you, and make up your mind to what you want. You know
that your tastes are not those of a poor woman; you have been
accustomed to comfort, and you need refinement and wealth; you could
never be happy unless you could entertain your friends properly, and
live as you pleased."

"But I don't want to marry a man just for his money," protested the
girl, not altogether pleased with her aunt's business-like view.

"No one wants you to," the other responded; "you may marry for love
if you like; but it is not impossible to love a rich man, is it,
Helen?"

"But, Aunt Polly," said Helen, "I am satisfied as I am now. I do not
want to marry anybody. The very idea makes me shudder."

"I am not in the least anxious that you should," was the answer.
"You are young, and you may choose your own time. All I am anxious
for is that you should realize the future that is before you. It is
dreadful to me to think that you might throw your precious chance
away by some ridiculous folly."

Helen looked at her aunt for a moment, and then the irrepressible
smile broke out.

"What is the matter, child?" asked the other.

"Nothing, except that I was thinking about how these thoughts were
brought up."

"How do you mean?"

"Apropos of my woodland walk with poor Arthur. Auntie, I do believe
you're afraid I'm going to fall in love with the dear fellow."

"No," said Aunt Polly; "it is not exactly that, for I'd never be
able to sleep at night if I thought you capable of anything quite so
ghastly. But we must have some care of what people will think, my
dear Helen."

As a matter of fact, Aunt Polly did have some very serious fears
about the matter, as has been hinted before; it was, perhaps, a kind
of tribute to the divine fire which even society's leaders pay. If
it had been a question of a person of her own sense and experience,
the word "genius" would have suggested no danger to Mrs. Roberts,
but it was different with a young and probably sentimental person
like Helen, with her inflaming beauty.

"As a matter of fact, Aunt Polly," said Helen, "everybody
understands my intimacy with Arthur."

"Tell me, Helen dear," said the other, turning her keen glance upon
her; "tell me the honest truth."

"About what?"

"You are not in love with Arthur?"

And Helen answered her with her eyes very wide open: "No, I
certainly am not in the least."

And the other drew secretly a great breath of relief. "Is he in love
with you, Helen?" she asked.

As Helen thought of Arthur's departure, the question could not but
bring a smile. "I--I'm afraid he is," she said.--"a very little."

"What a ridiculous impertinence!" exclaimed the other, indignantly.

"Oh, that's all right, Auntie," said Helen; "he really can't help
it, you know." She paused for a moment, and then she went on: "Such
things used to puzzle me when I was very young, and I used to think
them quite exciting; but I'm getting used to them now. All the men
seem to fall in love with me,--they do, honestly, and I don't know
how in the world to help it. They all will make themselves wretched,
and I'm sure it isn't my fault. I haven't told you anything about my
German lovers, have I, Auntie?"

"Gracious, no!" said the other; "were there any?"

"Any?" laughed the girl. "I might have robbed the Emperor of a whole
colonel's staff, and the colonel at the head of it. But I'll tell
you about Johann, the funniest one of all; I think he really loved
me more than all the rest."

"Pray, who was Johann?" asked Aunt Polly, thinking how fortunate it
was that she learned of these things only after the danger was over.

"I never will forget the first time I met him," laughed the girl,
"the first day I went to the school. Johann was a little boy who
opened the door for me, and he stared at me as if he were in a
trance; he had the most wonderful round eyes, and puffy red cheeks
that made me always think I'd happened to ring the bell while he was
eating; and every time after that he saw me for three years he used
to gaze at me in the same helpless wonder, with all lingers of his
fat little hands wide apart."

"What a disagreeable wretch!" said the other.

"Not in the least," laughed Helen; "I liked him. But the funniest
part came afterwards, for when I came away Johann had grown a whole
foot, and was quite a man. I sent for him to put the straps on my
trunks, and guess what he did! He stared at me for a minute, just
the same as ever, and then he ran out of the room, blubbering like a
baby; and that's the last I ever saw of him."