Between Friends | Page 7

had been subdued by a
newer knowledge, with a newer seriousness, this unaccustomed gravity
had left her heart no less tender, and had deepened her capacity for
emotion to depths as profound and unexplored as the sudden mystery
of their discovery by herself.
Always, now, while she posed, she was looking at him with a still
intentness, as though he really wore a mask and she, breathlessly
vigilant, watched for the moment when he might forget and lift it.
But during the weeks that followed, if the mask were indeed only the
steady preoccupation that his visage wore, she seemed to learn nothing
more about him when his features lost their dark absorption and he
caught her eye and smiled. No, the smile revealed nothing except
another mask under the more serious cast of concentration--only
another disguise that covered whatever this man might truly be deeper
down--this masculine and unknown invader of frontiers surrendered ere
she had understood they were even besieged.
And during these weeks in early spring their characteristics, even
characters, seemed to have shifted curiously and become reversed; his
was now the light, irresponsible, half-mocking badinage--almost
boyishly boisterous at times, as, for instance, when he stepped forward
after the pose and swung her laughingly from the model-platform to her
corner on the sofa.
"You pretty and clever little thing," he said, "why are you becoming so
serious and absent-minded?"
"Am I becoming so?"
"You are. You oughtn't to: you've made a new and completely different
man of me."
As though that were an admirable achievement, or even of any
particular importance. And yet she seemed to think it was both of these

when, resting against him, within the circle of his arm, still shy and
silent under the breathless poignancy of an emotion which ever seemed
to sound within her depths unsuspected.
But when he said that she had made a new and completely different
man of him, she remembered his low-voiced when that change
impended as he held her by her wrists a moment, then dropped them.
He had said, half to himself: "You should have let me alone!"
Sometimes at noon she remembered this when they went out for
luncheon realizing they would never have been seated together in a
restaurant had she not satisfied her curiosity. She should have let him
alone; she knew that. She tried to wish that she had--tried to regret
everything, anything; and could not, even when within her the faint
sense of alarm awoke amid the softly unchangeable unreality of these
last six weeks of spring.
Was this then really love?--this drifting through alternating dreams of
shyness, tenderness, suspense, pierced at moments by tiny flashes of
fear, as lightning flickers, far buried in softly shrouded depths of cloud?
She had long periods of silent and absorbed dreaming, conscious only
that she dreamed, but not of the dream itself.
She was aware, too, of a curious loneliness within her, and dimly
understood that it was the companion of a lifetime she was
missing--her conscience. Where was it? Had it gone? Had it died?
Were the little, inexplicable flashes of fear proof of its disintegration?
Or its immortal vitality?
Dead, dormant, departed, she knew not which, she was dully aware of
its loss--dimly and childishly troubled that she could remember nothing
to be sorry for. And there was so much.
Men in his profession who knew him began to look askance at him and
her, amused or otherwise, according to their individual characters.
That Cecile White went about more or less with the sculptor Drene was

a nine days' gossip among circles familiar to them both, and was
forgotten--as are all wonders--in nine days.
Some of his acquaintances recalled what had been supposed to be the
tragedy of his life, mentioning a woman's name, and a man's--Drene's
closest friend. But gossip does not last long among the busy--not that
the busy are incapable of gossip, but they finish with it quickly, having
other matters to think about.
Even Quair, after recovering from his wonder that his own
condescending advances had been ignored, bestowed his fatuously
inflammable attentions elsewhere.
He had been inclined to complain one day in the studio, when he and
Guilder visited Drene professionally; and Guilder looked at his dapper
confrere in surprise and slight disgust; and Drene, at first bored, grew
irritable.
"What are you talking about?" he said sharply.
"I'm talking about Cecile White," continued Quair, looking rather oddly
at the sculptor out of his slightly prominent eyes. "I didn't suppose you
could be interested in any woman--not that I mind your interfering with
any little affair between Cecile and me--"
"There wasn't any."
"I beg your pardon, Drene--"
"There wasn't any!" repeated Drene, with curt contempt. "Don't talk
about her, anyway."
"You mean I'm not to talk about