Miss Burton's bearing toward Van Berg was very friendly,but he failed to detect in her manner the slightest proof that she had ever thought of him otherwise than as a friend.There was no sudden drooping of her eyelashes,or heightening of color when he spoke to her,or permitted his eyes to dwell upon her face with an expression that was rather more than friendly.He could detect no furtive glances,nothing to indicate that she had caught a glimpse of that secret so interesting to every woman that she would look again,though cold as ice toward the man cherishing it.Nor was there the slightest trace of the constraint and reserve by which all women who are not coquettes seek to check,as with an early frost,the first growth of an unwelcome regard.Her manner was simply what would be natural toward a gentleman she thoroughly respected and liked,with whom her thoughts,for no hidden cause,were especially preoccupied.
Why then had she looked at him so strangely the preceding evening?
Why had she apparently shrunk from the expression of his face,as if she had seen there a revelation so sudden and overwhelming that she trembled at it as a shy,sensitive maiden might in recognizing the fact that a strong,resolute man was seeking entrance to the very citadel of her heart?He felt himself utterly unable to explain her action.
What was more,he was puzzled at himself.The sympathy he felt for Miss Burton the previous evening had not by any means left him,but it was no longer a strong and absorbing emotion.His pulse was as calm and quiet as the breathless summer morning.He was conscious of no premonitory chills and thrills,which,according to his preconceived notions of the "grand passion,"ought to be felt even in its incipiency.He even found himself criticising her face,and wondering how features so ordinary in themselves could combine in so winning and happy an effect;and then he mentally cursed his cold-bloodedness,and positively envied Stanton in whose manner,in spite of his efforts at concealment,an ardent affection began to manifest itself.
During the day it occurred to him more than once that her course was changing toward Stanton.There was no less return on her part of his light bantering style of conversation.Indeed,she seemed to take great pains to give a humorous twist to everything he said,as if she regarded even the words in which he tried to unfold his deeper thoughts as mere jests.But Van Berg imagined she began to make herself more inaccessible to Stanton.She entrenched herself among other guests in the parlor;she took pains to be so occupied as to make him feel that his approach would be an interruption;and whenever they did meet at the table and elsewhere,it appeared as if she were trying to teach him by a smiling,friendly indifference that he was not in her thoughts at all.
The positive coldness and aversion Ida sought to manifest toward Van Berg would not have been so disheartening as Miss Burton's device of seeming to be so agreeably preoccupied with other people that she could not or would not see the offering Stanton was eager to lay at her feet.
He felt this keenly,and chafed under it;but her woman's tact made her shining armor invulnerable.She persisted in regarding him as the gay,self-seeking,pleasure-loving man of the world that she had recognized him to be on the fist day of their acquaintance.He imagined that a great and radical change had taken place in his nature,but she gave him no opportunity of telling her so.At first she had,with laughing courtesy,ignored his gallantry,as if it were only a fashion of his towards any woman who for the time happened to take his fancy;but so far from shunning him she had seemed inclined to employ what she regarded as a caprice or a bit of male coquetry,as the means of adding to the enjoyment of as many as possible;and Van Berg had often smiled to see his languid friend of yore seconding Miss Burton's efforts with an apparent zeal that was quite marvellous.To Stanton's infinite relief,Van Berg did not twit him concerning this surprising departure from his old ways.Indeed,Miss Burton had become too delicate and sacred a theme in both of their minds to permit of their old banter.They had been friends and were so still,yet each recognized the fact that events were coming that would sorely test and perhaps destroy their friendship.While they gradually fell aloof,as men will who are learning that their dearest interests are destined to conflict,they each tried nevertheless to maintain an honorable rivalry,and their bearing toward each other,although tinged with a growing reticence and dignity,was genuinely kind and courteous.
As the week drew to a close,however,it gave Van Berg pleasure--though not by any means in the same degree that it caused Stanton pain--to observe that Miss Burton was shunning the latter's society as far as politeness permitted.
At the same time,while she evidently enjoyed his companionship,Van Berg observed that she did not seem to specially crave it;nor in truth did he find himself when away from her "distrait,"vacant,and miserable,as was manifestly the case with his friend.He concluded that it was difference of temperament--that it was his nature to be governed by judgment and taste,as it was that of Stanton to be swayed by feeling and passion.All the higher faculties of his mind gave their voice for this woman with increasing emphasis.
His heart undoubtedly would slowly and surely gravitate in the same direction.