The Line of Heart

Southland Times, Issue 14333, 29 April 1899, Page 1 (Supplement)

The Line of Heart

‘Do you believe in it ?’ ‘I don’t know,’ he answered doubtfully, ‘I never had opportunity of judging.’ ‘Then I’ll read your hand.’ ‘What, you ?’ ‘Yes. really,’ she replied, nodding her pretty head, ‘l’ve been studying it Books and all that sort of thing, you know. Come over by the light.’ He rose and followed her to the corner, where a softly-shaded lamp diffused a mellow glow. Outside the wind was howling bitterly, but an old-fashioned wood fire blazed comfortably in an old-fashioned grate, for this was an old-fashioned house. He had never noticed how round and white her arms were until the loose sleeve fell back when she took his hand. The touch of her cool fingers thrilled him. ‘I thought so,’ she began; ‘you are a dreamer, and you do not want the w’orld to find it out. It’s been rather a hard life in some ways—you haven’t always had all that you wanted.’ He shaded his eyes with his other hand and rested his elbow on the table. ‘Safe observation,’ he remarked. For the tiniest part of a second he gazed into a pair of reproachful brown eyes. ‘Don’t chaff, please,’ she said, ‘I can’t do anything if you do.’ ‘"All right, litt'e girl,’ he responded, half caressingly; ‘go on.’ ‘Your palm is elastic. That shows a hopeful nature and a strong one. Your lines are deep; j’ou will get the full of living —in suffering and joy.’ The piano sounded softly in the next room. Her sister was playing; half to herself and half to her father, who sat nodding in the library. ‘The Mount of Jupiter is well developed,’ she went on. ‘That means pride, ambition, desire for power; not a snobbish pride, you know, but that which will not let you stoop to baseness.’ He smiled to himself. She was reading him very well. ' ‘Saturn is rather weak. I’m afraid you’re not very fond of quiet or study. Yet you have an ideal of a home—which you have not yet found. Apollo is good. You like music, pictures, books. Religion appeals to you from the standpoint of the senses ; it’s the stained glass windows, the organ, and the vested choir witli you, not the doctrine.’ ‘How well you know me,’ he began, but she paid no heed to the interruption. The girl in the next room drifted in the opening bars of the Serenade. It sounded like some far off melody. ‘You like money, but not so well as you do other things. Books and pictures and travel and your own way come first.’ He colored, and his lips twitched temptingly. ‘This is Mars. You know there are two Mounts of Mars. This one, under Mercury, means passive courage, self-control, resignation, and strength of resistance against wrong; the other one, over by your thumb, means temper. I’m glad to see that it is less prominent than this.’ She looked up at him with an adorable mischievousness that made him feel a queer tightening around his heart. ‘Here’s Luna, down here. This means romance, ideality, imagination, and mysticism. If it swells here it means a reverence for—well, for the “eternal womanly-” That’s the best part of you—you want to put a woman on a pedestal and keep her there.’

The bewildering sweetness of the Serenade sounded dimly through his consciousness and mingled with the breath of the roses—his roses—on her breast. ‘You are sympathetic and charitable,generous to a fault ; friendship means much to you—ah, I know that,’ she said to herself. ‘But this Line of Heart! It’s too far in your hand ; feeling is your court of first and last appeal. See how deep it lies ; how it dominates your hand I There’s a marriage line, too—only one—there’s only one woman in the whole world for you.’ The lamp flickered. ‘lt must need filling,’ she said. ‘Lmust hurry, or we’ll be left in darkness.’

Woven in with .Serenade, her voice vibrated on his heart strings—now merry,now serious,now so wholly sweet and tender that it sounded like the vision of Schubert in the room beyond. ‘She will be all the world to you,’ she said wistfully, ‘there will be no room for’your old friend then. That ideal home you have dreamed of will be yours—and hers.’ Her eyes rested full upon his, and almost in a whisper she added : ‘lt is not far away I’ For a moment he searched her face intently, but the lamp was almost out now. Then something that he saw there gave him courage, and he slipped swiftly out of his chair and knelt beside her, taking daring possession of her. ‘ls that little home to bo truly mine ?’ he whispered. ‘Ah, sweetheart—don’t you know ?’ Pale and frightened,she tried to slip away from him, but he held her fast. ‘Oh, no ! no !’ she cried half sobbing. ‘Please, darling !’ He tried to draw her down to him, but she resisted,and he wisely waited for her to come to him. ‘Can’t we go on just as we were ?’ she ventured; ‘friends, and all that? You will find someone else for—the other—but no such friend as I !’ ‘There’s no going on, dear,’ he said gently, ‘this is the parting of the ways. There is only one woman in the whole wide world—and the little home? Why, my life, it wouldn’t be a home without you, don’t you know ?’ The roses were scattered on the floor among their drifted petals, and even in the shadow she saw his face, tense with appeal His arms were drawing her closer; the lamp flickered and went out. She could feel his heart throbbing-against her; she fancied she could hear it too. The Serenade was almost finished now, and thoroughly humble in her surrender, yet wholly womanly, she bent down and kissed him in the dark Truth.