'
Gradually
his voice became a mere murmur.
Yeats
'
'Yes,' she answered, 'the same, only I have had some new prints hung
up--prints of fruits and leaves and bird-nests. It was only done last
week. When people choose pictures and poems for children they choose
out such domestic ones. I would not have any of the kind; children are
such undomestic animals. But, John, I am so glad to see you in this
old schoolhouse again. So little has changed with us here. Some have
died and some have been married, and we are all a little older and the
trees a little taller. '
'I have come to tell you I am going to be married. '
She became in a moment perfectly white, and sat down as though attacked
with faintness. Her hand on the edge of the chair trembled.
Sherman looked at her, and went on in a bewildered, mechanical way: 'My
betrothed is a Miss Leland. She has a good deal of money. You know my
mother always wished me to marry some one with money. Her father, when
alive, was an old client of Sherman and Saunders. She is much admired
in society.
' Gradually his voice became a mere murmur. He did not seem
to know that he was speaking. He stopped entirely. He was looking at
Mary Carton.
Everything around him was as it had been some three years before. The
table was covered with cups and the floor with crumbs. Perhaps the
mouse pulling at a crumb under the table was the same mouse as on that
other evening. The only difference was the brooding daylight of summer
and the ceaseless chirruping of the sparrows in the ivy outside. He
had a confused sense of having lost his way. It was just the same
feeling he had known as a child, when one dark night he had taken a
wrong turning, and instead of arriving at his own house, found himself
at a landmark he knew was miles from home.
A moment earlier, however difficult his life, the issues were always
definite; now suddenly had entered the obscurity of another's interest.
Before this it had not occurred to him that Mary Carton had any
stronger feeling for him than warm friendship.
He began again, speaking in the same mechanical way: 'Miss Leland
lives with her mother near us. She is very well educated and very well
connected, though she has lived always among business people. '
Miss Carton, with a great effort, had recovered her composure.
'I congratulate you,' she said.
'Yes,' she answered, 'the same, only I have had some new prints hung
up--prints of fruits and leaves and bird-nests. It was only done last
week. When people choose pictures and poems for children they choose
out such domestic ones. I would not have any of the kind; children are
such undomestic animals. But, John, I am so glad to see you in this
old schoolhouse again. So little has changed with us here. Some have
died and some have been married, and we are all a little older and the
trees a little taller. '
'I have come to tell you I am going to be married. '
She became in a moment perfectly white, and sat down as though attacked
with faintness. Her hand on the edge of the chair trembled.
Sherman looked at her, and went on in a bewildered, mechanical way: 'My
betrothed is a Miss Leland. She has a good deal of money. You know my
mother always wished me to marry some one with money. Her father, when
alive, was an old client of Sherman and Saunders. She is much admired
in society.
' Gradually his voice became a mere murmur. He did not seem
to know that he was speaking. He stopped entirely. He was looking at
Mary Carton.
Everything around him was as it had been some three years before. The
table was covered with cups and the floor with crumbs. Perhaps the
mouse pulling at a crumb under the table was the same mouse as on that
other evening. The only difference was the brooding daylight of summer
and the ceaseless chirruping of the sparrows in the ivy outside. He
had a confused sense of having lost his way. It was just the same
feeling he had known as a child, when one dark night he had taken a
wrong turning, and instead of arriving at his own house, found himself
at a landmark he knew was miles from home.
A moment earlier, however difficult his life, the issues were always
definite; now suddenly had entered the obscurity of another's interest.
Before this it had not occurred to him that Mary Carton had any
stronger feeling for him than warm friendship.
He began again, speaking in the same mechanical way: 'Miss Leland
lives with her mother near us. She is very well educated and very well
connected, though she has lived always among business people. '
Miss Carton, with a great effort, had recovered her composure.
'I congratulate you,' she said.
