THE ORDEAL OF ISABEL,

Press, Volume LVII, Issue 10756, 8 September 1900, Page 2

THE ORDEAL OF ISABEL,

chin tt m tbfi morn -«S- * gay littl. hm--3,J ™™™m*e meeting of * chariubla XTT a ih , e e%rlie * t ««"> *» «' the If t L and f**™** a vi«t to an r.M h-vc seemPd crowded to some of th* toiler* _-riS_*7i d, , , ? Ut to lMbel VilJton - an M* rnnnrf t fft * h, ,° n - 5t ™ mfT « W ths ™™* Z „►'♦ /"Ending to -, to a bill later, she 1 i ~ , room a{t * r diM er to lie down, rr»d the letters brought by the bat post, • n ;' l% . k »v« 'he «vcn:n_ paper. M'-r I»ttr-rs were circulars. She opened ine nnd ?pnn- : up. gww; with shining eyes at a bli-k — rrATT*J ,AlrrnfAN ' H I>T -UM. VCiKiyaui) <;oFS TO BRILIJ.VNT YOUNG EDITOR. WILL ACXTKPT THB POST. No douU now ?!:;■' K„>! Parthian will I*; new. Mu.ivttr to Italy. Bnca»s»rnl of tho young author-elitor. Aeith/r did l--ab?l doubt his decision Rucccssful , w } lc already was, she knew the ambition he cherished to be in th* service f .f his country, and the serene dicnitv of shis appointment befitted the »en.dtife pnd- w.hJch would shrunk from a position whose winning involved the personalities f.f a political contest. "His heart's d«?ire has come to him in the best ynar* of his manhood." She flushed v;vidly. Self -remembrance rushed across her ftr-rt selfless rejoicing-. "His heart's desire!" she repeated so ft Iv. "And mm/?"

She sank buck a,mx>n;r the pillow?, while memory and in«tinct assured her that this wa« tha tri-is of life for her as well as for lum.

At eighteen, half a child, and dazzled by the dawn of her trirnrmrn as a bcu'v a'-'d an hcires?, Isabel Vinton had refused with a:ry pcremntorincv-f tho pennikss voting lover whom summer chances had in her way During .«ix years she did not see bun, and only thought of him when a poem of bis recalled him to her reinnabunce. Then, after an absence'in Europe, she found him conspicuous am on;* her favourite clique, editor of ~ kedinct marine, a p'.et'of eminence as poets rank nowaday. The rttaivved acquaintance thus forced upon tMjh had lon# sim-e readied the point acaln whrre love had b;:c« exiled. m,d in tho months which intervened Isalx-l h„d grown to believe that tho exile of the past would return to become tht, isovortHLrn' «f the future if It wtw a mffhty "it" which at times darkened all the horizon of the woman's dreams with the shadow of the girl's folly. He loved her, bjit he had not forgiven her. If Konie day be could offer her a fortune or a position greater than sho possessed he might come to her aijain; never otherwise; and she, Fearching her own heart, know that -he justified him. To-nitfht—whkh had crowned his ambition—would it glorify her belief in his love?

► lie w_s dressing for the ball when ber maid brought her a note from him: —

"I missed you everywhere this afternoon, and this' « versing I am forced to fulfil an engagenrent which mc no hope of seeing you! Will you be so pracious as to let mc come to you, alone, to-morrow afternoon?"

The bold writing had faltered. Isabel could almost divine the passionate entreaty of his eves.

"You havo by this time heard part of that which I desire to tell you, and you must understand that I am half mad with the longing to tell you the rest of it, but pen and ink will not utter it; and so, because a roadman dares apk what a sane man would not venture, I beg you to keep all your dances for mc to-night at the ball, where I -hail not see you." Her reply was a couplo of lines: — "This is your day of days, when nothing fa refused you. Nor is to-morrow likely to withhold anything worth having that to-day •jwould havo given you." When her maid returned after taking 1 the Bote to the messenger Isabel sat gazing into the fin;, "I shall not go to the ball," she fsaid softly. "Good night." Isabel Vinton was a woman appreciative of the re-pomrtbilitiea of her wealth, and she would not shrink from a business appointment next morning, though she would rather have idly contemplated her tender assurance of happiness. Aa she drove Wnieward up Kith Avenue about noon, sho paled with a curious presage of eviL Madame de Roux's victoria waited before a certain publishing house, while Parthian talked to that charming person and popular author with such interest that Isabel (kis-wk! unseen.

Now M_>l;-itne de Hoax had been au influence of unt-o-„»ess to Isabel during recent months, because ber intimacy with Parthian seemed but scan tils explained by their assertion of collaboration in a play. Bitter, therefore, was it that he who last night had detired to poswss all her thoughts—even such as are bestowed on chance waltzes—should bo to-day .«r> far from remembrance of her that abe con Id pass unobserved. The next instant sho „s«ured herself that he and Madame do Itou_ had, of course, important affairs to discuss, aa that lady was about to sail for Europe. And was not the earnestness of his attention to every present interest a characteristic charm?

Ho had not asked for a special hour of the afternoon, and though she had fancied he Would come early, five o'clock sounded before she grew impatient. At nix impatience had lapsed into anxiety, and between si_ and eight she endured that torture of impotence which women suffer, with fear for men in whom they have no authorised possession which could seek news of them to whom their hearts belong. But if iiie could not seek news, nhe could go to meet it. .At eight she drove to a dinner where he also was bidden. Every tick of the clock hurt her while the hostess waited for a tardy gueat, and she knew that laggard to be Parthian. finally, with a shrug of her white shouldm, thts hostt'B.l put her hand on the arm ot her chief guest. "Mr I'wrth tan's new glories seem to have his memory, or his manners," she said somewhat tartly. "I have given him lull mm sum of grace and be has neither come nor written."

"I>id wo wait for Parthian?" ber escort demanded with the frank regret of a hungry xnau for that quarter of -an hour's fntile waiting. "I could Imvo told you he would not turn up. A» I parsed the Union Station he dasl-xl from a hansom, making an evident spurt for 11 train." The next day to Isabel was a flutterof expectancy for "a letter or telegram. Tha day following was devoured by a growing flam© of resentment. Watt this ignominy of suspense the penance imposed'bv that mi forgiveness she had always divined "in his love for her? If she were but sure, sho would refuse her life to tha keeping of such a tyrant, even though her heart should break aa the price of her

freedom. , The newspapers, meantime, teemed with -altering paragraphs on Parthian's work or his inersonalitv ; a new edition of his poems was advertised by his publishers; but there was never a word of his whereabouts or _is movements. With hrr first glance at the columns of nn evening paper oa the third day, tha feverish atmosphere of suspense and anger in which she had lived for days grew sudtkn'y chill. Those staring headlines which for hours Isabel saw whenever she closed her eye.", announced that Parthian bad declined this ministry to Italy, and that at tho office of his magazine it was ertated th-t ho hud resigned the editorship on tbe sim* tdea of urgent private affairs which he had assigned to the President, Further, it had b«en ascertained that a cabin was yewved in his numo on the Cunard steamer aaOinir next week, and it was assumed that Si*- vitally important private affairs were takin - him away from the country ha had if feire to serve. The article ended with rearet for the sacrifice of a career which SomLsed brilliantly along either of two __eh widely different hues, and with the suca vi_« 'J epitaph on a tombT l be '' 1118 poet incompre-ensiDie. . « ,io_b* e*i more prone than their fellow-erta-t«res to the mad abandon of repute and ■3v__t_i- for the jjmtificatioo of a pas-

-if.vf _-i.«-_ « { uriiird steamer. *» *- »i>-pi> th:iM a coinciueute, *»»» __«„- '.ho _»••»_£*• S« of publicly »pp_ec--tea wenm -™wu-.

other uttered excuse than urgent private affairs?

The power of feigning developed by even the frankest woman in on?-specid need is a wonder as old a_ the hrst love-story." Isabel was never more radiant than at- a dance that night when she —renely o.«cr;bed ParJhian's con-iucf: to nn imp'ovkicnt poeticsl temperamein which preferred leisore tor literary work to tbe aoUd benefits of the two positions from which ho bad withdrawn. And nobody guessed, unlem, perhaps, wme other w«mn, th-'.t her vivid face and brilliant eyes were lit by burning humiliation. Several days elapsed, during which, muc_ mention as "fhe heard of Parthian, she gained no personal news of him except that visitors at his lodgings had been tcid that he was absent from tne city. The«e were days for which Isabel afterward made a grave in her memory—lays when every faith tottered with the wreck of her love, and when, beneath even the bitter memory of her reply to his nr>te. the very dregs of misery to her was the degradation of the man she had set s.o hi^h. Friday i.-anw without sight or sign of Paithiah, and he was to pail on the morrow. It happened to he JK-r afternoon at honfe, and he wa* talking <ir.d making tea when "Mr Parthian" was announced. Even in the haii-lig-lir vi shsd«?d lamps he looked worn and ill, but he barely touched her fingers, and his voice was cheery as he c_claimed : — "Please accept, for various broken engagements, the he_rt:ek regards of a man who has not Mr hi* bid since nearly <? week" "We hc-rd that you were out of town." "I am L'.tssed with a servant who lies with so honest a countenance that he would deceive the Father of Lies instead of merely the average newspaper reporter, he answered kghtly. "And'my physician insisted upon solitary coriSnement for mc if I intended to sail to-mc-rrow." A chor-s of que&tious broke from the group about tlle fire. "Are you really ctf to-moirow?" "What has been the matter with you?" "Is your health the 'urgent private affair which has made you exst. aside two s_c_pretty baubles?" Isabel alone was silent as she gave him a cup of tea. and with a gay'gestur_ of protect against the enshught of inquiry he emptied ths cup hurriedLy before he replied. "My :llnc-?3 waa mo*tiy overwork/ hi said, dropping into a chair. "My private affairs are still exclusively my own, and I realiv start fur Europa to-morrow." "\Vc are mubbed ! '." a pretty woman laughed, uttering the resentful dumbness of the other.-*. Parthian glanced quickly about the circle with the sniib which made charming his thin, clear-cut countenance. | "Forerive some abruptness, my friends. I hate going away too much to like talking about it," he exclaimed, nnd turned to a pretty woman who lamented that a wir.ter m Europe- was to be bestowed upon one who did not desire euch. a good fortune.

Everybody rose presently with a flutter of farewells. Then Parthian and Isabsl were alone. He made no movement toward a chair, and she a'so'stood motionless during an instant, in which she saw that speaking was vet more difficult to him than to herself. "

"If you do not return within a few months you will not see mc," -be began, formally. • "I shall not see you!" be repeated, just aloud. Her words had been the utterance of plans she had scarcely considered, and merely announced a final severance from any anticipation of his return. But the tone of his low voice pierced her love of him through her armour of contemp- ; tuous jealousy. | "What has happened to you? Tell mc!" she entreated. He caught her hand in one of his own, while with the other he lifted the silken shade from a lamp near by. Of the remembered looks -which stir a woman's heart to youth when she is old, Isabel will most cherish that with which his haggard eyes adored her when the white, unshielded light fell full upon her. Such. Jonging, such despair was in those eyes —the eyes she loved—that she forgot all but her impulse to«eomfort bim."" ""'Nothing should take you away if it is so great a gnef to go!" she whispered. He shut his eyes and dropped her hand. "Good-bye!" he murmured. Half a- "dozen people bustled gayly into the room, and while she was greeting them he went away. A couple of hours later Isabel sealed into ber heart an anguish of debate as she drove to a dinner. If ever love and surrender had gazed at a woman from the eyes of man she had seeti them in Parthian's eyes that afternoon—yet no shame? Ah, yes! she reminded herself with scornful lips, men called it honour to keep a shameful bond and sacrifice their highest love to it. He was gone. She had done with love ar.d happiness. In the thirty or forty years that stretched before her there remained much she might find worth doing, and time for heartache over every glance and word of his. But now she must so play her part among curious critics that none should dare say that she had been forsaken. f he dinner was a small ons. Eight friendly people gathered about, a round, rose-crowned tabte. The women were pretty and clever: the men eminent in ways which contrasted without clashing. Even Isabel was roused to a fitful pleasure in the gay talk, and her attention was at last fixed by the celebrated physician who was hc-r neighbour. "It is a monopoly which is good for us," he replied to the laughing self-pity of the host, a well-known judge, who had iamentea that his profession left him scant time for sympathetic contemplation of the world's progress. "Neither mind nor heart could bear the addition of outside sympathies to the demands our professions makeupon us." "You are right, as I prove more Ktren- j uo_3ly than you," the judge agreed gravely.

I "To prono_ac* a death sentence is ! even apon aec_sto_ted nerves, urrguessed by i those who h«_r." . ! "I maintain my work to be beset wiOi i severer t«sts," ths doctor said. "Yoa pronounce s-nteoce on a wretch whose mmea r have made him a menace to society, wftie-, i through your lips, decides to be nd of _m_ i Your'"flesh shivers, perhaps, with pity for I his flesh, but your spirit approves tbjttj" 1 is to be rewarded a~cerdi_g to his &**&. ! Whereas ■!-_** pronoutce sentence not upon j.i criminal's _o_v t bat upon the innocent happiness of a gi'ri, or upon the coble ambition of a man whose strong hands gnusp • the gnat prizes of talect and energy. J? or, as you know. I am an oculist, and bh_dtt» in most caws limits ac finally as death either happirjeAs or ambition. ' Such words spoken with such 3olejnr_ty were not to be answered quickly. In the silence which followed, Isabel -svoke for tbe first time ia a week from the absorption of her own life's crisis to an aching pity for the. weltschmenc which throbs through tbe centuries. -A few days ago," the doctor went on, "a maai came to me—a widely known man in the early prime of life, with the world at his feet—and I delivered a sentence whicb he-eft him of all he had won and all ac ytt hoped to win. I believe I speak_ with authority on the disease from which he suffers, and. so far as my knowledge goes* he will ba blind within a'few months." 4. shock as from clectricit- thrilled Babel. She was arjain in her drawing-room, saying with forced steadiness. "If you do not return within a few months you will not see tne. Again she heard Parthian's low echo of words. "I shflll not see yoa!" A train he thrust the shade from tbe lamp and gazed as her with such eyes as a lost soul mic-lit gaze with upon the blessed. Presently the hostess arose. '•Talk of something" more chtjerv, if you can, you men." she exclaimed. "We women are too well aware o." the lumps in our throats to talk at all T' * Isabel looked up at the doctor as be stood while she passed. "Com* to mc soon," she murmured. 'My need is vital." "I see that it is," he answered. "I will follow you in a moment." A plea of headache permitted ncr to escap? to the comparative solitude of a bow window at the farther end of the drawingroom. ..." " She had no doubt that she had heard the story of Parthian's doom. For a moment her "spirit was at his knees, repenting the base motives with which her jealousy had poisoned her judgment of him. But the shame of hr injustice was swept away by her yearning to" the. misery which overwhelmed him, whose capacity for suffering she knew to be more intense tmjx that oi tou-her-fibred natures. What was there that he had striven for all the years of his manhood which had not been torn irom him in ths instant of realisation? —ambition, usefulness, lov? "No! Nof Not love, my dear!" Isabel murmured with passionate pardon for his doubt of her tenderness which she now believed to be the reason of his silence. S'..e quiv«red with eagerness. The evening was going. The steamer was advertised to sail at dawn on the morrow. Would ih* t?oc-tor never come to make her guessing certninty? He walked down the room to her with

simple directness. j "I was ui)professional to allude to a case j evtn so vaguely," he said with a smile which j was like the reassuring pressure of a strong i hand. "But my patient is persistently in mv thoughts." ""iVhuf you said would only betray him to ens to whom it explains his sudden sweep of his future," she answered with soft rehemencx-. "I know that it is like Noel Parthian so to resign the dignities to which he had meant to add honour —like him to stand aside from a happiness he had. meant to claim on equal terras —like him to rush away to hide his hopelessness as if he were some savage-, hurt creature " "He is not quite hopeless," the doctor interposed. "The oculist to whom he went in Boston confirmed my view. But I have sent him to a German specialist who is more expalenced in such c.'iee3 than I, and whose word. I. will accept with conviction-should i he give it against mine." --•-. ■••■ Isanti's hands were flung out to him, and he patted them as though she-had been one of his children. j "You guesr.—you understand," she murI mured presently. "Why do I not- mind?" "Doctors are the confessore of all creeds,** be said gently. VAnd this doctor must confess himselr also. After Parthian had written his letters of resignation to the President and to his magazine people, on his return from Boston, he was prostrate with '■ fever for several days, and I heard your name many timed when he was unconscious of its utterance. Will you forgive mc that, meeting ;.o>; here. I have urged strategy hoping to gain for him. that which may save him to happiness and usefulness—even if the German specialist decides against him?" Isabel rose. "You have saved mc in try- j ing to save him," she murmured. "God bless you for both!" Isibfi's mood had passed beyond the con* sideration of conventionality when she stepped into ber carriage. She gave Parthian's address to her footman as mechanically as j if she had said "Home," and she confronted j Parthian"*s servant, when he opened his ' master's door, with a like forgetiuiuess of curiosity or conjecture. '"Mr Parthian is in?" , "Yes. Miss Vinton, but " She passed him, and entered the sittingroom, where she had made tea for many a gay assemblage. Parthian, who leaned idly on the high mantel-shelf, lifted his head from his folded arms and stared at her dumbly. The haggard helplessness of his silence was more £io<]uent to her than many words. "N<kl—l know," sht faltered, and stretched out Wo trembling hands to him, but he stood passive. "ALTthese years I have meant to come to

yon with my triumph," he said. _ "You shall not come to my defeat with pity." "If your triumph was to -- mine, your defeat must be mine also," she *&&&. "And only love could bring mc to -either." With a sob he caught her in. bis art-*, aad his head sank on her shoulder. "My defeat will be m entire— the year* of it may _* so many," he murmured presently. "How can I not doubt that your touth, votir bri_ia_co will so_o« day regret—lf* "Some day I will forgive your doubts and you shall forgive ory injustice," she whispered, her wet cheek clo'ss to his dark hair. •'But now—and then —and always—no defeat shall be entire to either of us if I may be—your eyes to you I "