The Line of Love | Page 7

and a sense of youth and well-being everywhere. Certainly
it was not a morning wherein pessimism might hope to flourish.
Instead, it was of Adelaide that Florian thought: of the tall, impulsive,
and yet timid, fair girl who was both shrewd and innocent, and of her
tenderly colored loveliness, and of his abysmally unmerited felicity in
having won her. Why, but what, he reflected, grimacing--what if he had
too hastily married somebody else? For he had earlier fancied other
women for one reason or another: but this, he knew, was the great love
of his life, and a love which would endure unchanged as long as his life
lasted.
3. What Comes of Marrying Happily The tale tells how Florian de
Puysange found Adelaide in the company of two ladies who were
unknown to him. One of these was very old, the other an imposing
matron in middle life. The three were pleasantly shaded by young
oak-trees; beyond was a tall hedge of clipped yew. The older women
were at chess, while Adelaide bent her meek golden head to some of
that fine needlework in which the girl delighted. And beside them
rippled a small sunlit stream, which babbled and gurgled with silver
flashes. Florian hastily noted these things as he ran laughing to his
wife.
"Heart's dearest--!" he cried. And he saw, perplexed, that Adelaide had
risen with a faint wordless cry, and was gazing at him as though she
were puzzled and alarmed a very little.

"Such an adventure as I have to tell you of!" says Florian then.
"But, hey, young man, who are you that would seem to know my
daughter so well?" demands the lady in middle life, and she rose
majestically from her chess-game.
Florian stared, as he well might. "Your daughter, madame! But
certainly you are not Dame Melicent."
At this the old, old woman raised her nodding head. "Dame Melicent?
And was it I you were seeking, sir?"
Now Florian looked from one to the other of these incomprehensible
strangers, bewildered: and his eyes came back to his lovely wife, and
his lips smiled irresolutely. "Is this some jest to punish me, my dear?"
But then a new and graver trouble kindled in his face, and his eyes
narrowed, for there was something odd about his wife also.
"I have been drinking in queer company," he said. "It must be that my
head is not yet clear. Now certainly it seems to me that you are
Adelaide de la Forêt, and certainly it seems to me that you are not
Adelaide."
The girl replied, "Why, no, messire; I am Sylvie de Nointel."
"Come, come," says the middle-aged lady, briskly, "let us make an end
to this play-acting, and, young fellow, let us have a sniff at you. No,
you are not tipsy, after all. Well, I am glad of that. So let us get to the
bottom of this business. What do they call you when you are at home?"
"Florian de Puysange," he answered, speaking meekly enough. This
capable large person was to the young man rather intimidating.
"La!" said she. She looked at him very hard. She nodded gravely two or
three times, so that her double chin opened and shut. "Yes, and you
favor him. How old are you?"
He told her twenty-four.

She said, inconsequently: "So I was a fool, after all. Well, young man,
you will never be as good-looking as your father, but I trust you have
an honester nature. However, bygones are bygones. Is the old rascal
still living? and was it he that had the impudence to send you to me?"
"My father, madame, was slain at the battle of Marchfeld--"
"Some fifty years ago! And you are twenty-four. Young man, your
parentage had unusual features, or else we are at cross-purposes. Let us
start at the beginning of this. You tell us you are called Florian de
Puysange and that you have been drinking in queer company. Now let
us have the whole story."
Florian told of last night's happenings, with no more omissions than
seemed desirable with feminine auditors.
Then the old woman said: "I think this is a true tale, my daughter, for
the witches of Amneran contrive strange things, with mists to aid them,
and with Lilith and Sclaug to abet. Yes, and this fate has fallen before
to men that were over-friendly with the dead."
"Stuff and nonsense!" said the stout lady.
"But, no, my daughter. Thus seven persons slept at Ephesus, from the
time of Decius to the time of Theodosius--"
"Still, Mother--"
"--And the proof of it is that they were called Constantine and
Dionysius and John and Malchus and Marcian and Maximian and
Serapion. They were duly canonized. You cannot deny that this thing
happened without asserting no