Isham Frederic Stewart
The Strollers

“Was it not that you thought it a good joke for a dying man to discharge his servant?”

“My lord is quick to catch the humorous side of anything,” returned François.

“Begone, idiot! You are waiting for my death to discharge you. I can see it in your eyes. Yet stay, François, for, if you leave me, I shall be alone. You will not leave me?”

“As my lord desires,” was François’ response.

“I imagine I should feel better if I had my footbath.”

The servant removed the shoes and silken stockings from his master’s feet and propped him up in a chair, throwing a blanket over his shoulders and heaping more wood upon the fire in the grate.

“More fire, you idiot!” cried the marquis, peevishly. “Do you not see that I am freezing?”

“It is ten degrees above the temperature my lord always ordered,” retorted François, coolly.

“Ten degrees! Oh, you wish to remind me that the end is approaching? You do not dare deny it!” The valet shrugged his shoulders.

“But I am not gone yet.” He wagged his head cunningly and began to laugh to himself. His mind apparently rambled, for he started to chant a French love song in a voice that had long since lost its capacity for a sustained tone. The words were distinct, although the melody was broken, and the spectacle was gruesome enough. As he concluded he looked at the valet as if for approbation and began to mumble about his early love affairs.

“Bah, François,” he said shrilly, “I’ll be up to-morrow as gay as ever. Vive l’amour! vive la joie! It was a merry life we led, eh, François?”

“Merry indeed, my lord.”

“It kept you busy, François. There was the little peasant girl on the Rhine. What flaxen hair she had and eyes like the sky! Yet a word of praise–a little flattery–”

“My lord was irresistible,” said the valet with mild sarcasm.

“Let me see, François, what became of her?”

“She drowned herself in the river.”

“That is true. I had forgotten. Well, life is measured by pleasures, not by years, and I was the prince of coxcombs. Up at ten o’clock; no sooner on account of the complexion; then visits from the tradespeople and a drive in the park to look at the ladies. It was there I used to meet the English actress. ’Twas there, with her, I vowed the park was a garden of Eden! What a scene, when my barrister tried to settle the case! Fortunately a marriage in England was not a marriage in France. I saw her last night, François”–with an insane look–“in the flesh and blood; as life-like as the night before we took the stage for Brighton!” Suddenly he shrieked and a look of terror replaced the vain, simpering expression.

“There, François!” Glancing with awe behind him. And truly there stood a dark shadow; a gruesome presence. His face became distorted and he lapsed into unconsciousness.

The valet gazed at him with indifference. Then he went to an inner room and brought a valise which he began packing carefully and methodically. After he had completed this operation he approached the dressing table and took up a magnificent jeweled watch, which he examined for a moment before thrusting it into his pocket. A snuff box, set with diamonds, and several rings followed. François with the same deliberation opened a drawer and took out a small box which he tried to open, and, failing, forced the lid with the poker. At this, my lord opened his eyes, and, in a weak voice, for his strength had nearly deserted him, demanded:

“What are you doing, François?”

“Robbing you, my lord,” was the slow and dignified response.

The marquis’ eyes gleamed with rage. He endeavored to call out, but his voice failed him and he fell back, trembling and overcome.

“Thief! Ingrate!” he hissed, hoarsely.

“I beg you not to excite yourself, my lord,” said the stately valet. “You are already very weak and it will hasten the end.”

“Is this the way you repay me?”

“My lord will not need these things soon.”

“Have you no gratitude?” stammered the marquis, whose physical and mental condition was truly pitiable.

“Gratitude for having been called ‘idiot,’ ‘dog,’ and ‘blockhead’ nearly all my life! I am somewhat lacking in that quality, I fear.”

“Is there no shame in you?”

“Shame?” repeated François, as he proceeded to ransack another drawer. “There might have been before I went into your service, my lord. Yes; once I felt shame for you. It was years ago, in London, when you deserted your beautiful wife. When I saw how she worshiped you and what a noble woman she was, I confess I felt ashamed that I served one of the greatest blackguards in Europe–”

“Oh, you scoundrel–” exclaimed the marquis, his face becoming a ghastly hue.

“Be calm, my lord. You really are in need of all your energy. For years I have submitted to your shameful service. I have been at the beck and call of one of the greatest roués and villains in France. Years of such association would somewhat soil any nature. Another thing, my lord, I must tell you, since you and I are settling our last accounts. For years I have endured your miserable King Louis Philippe. A king? Bah! He fled from the back door! A coward, who shaved his whiskers for a disguise.”

“No more, rascal!”

“Rascal yourself, you worn-out, driveling breath of corruption! It is so pleasant to exercise a gentleman’s privilege of invective! Ah, here is the purse. Au revoir, my lord. A pleasant dissolution!”

But by this time the marquis was speechless, and François, taking the valise in hand, deferentially left the room. He locked the door behind him and thrust the key into his pocket.

CHAPTER XII
IN THE OLD CEMETERY

The engagement at the new St. Charles was both memorable and profitable, The Picayune, before the fifties, an audacious sheet, being especially kind to the players. “This paper,” said a writer of the day, “was as full of witticisms as one of Thackeray’s dreams after a light supper, and, as for Editors Straws and Phazma, they are poets who eat, talk and think rhyme.” The Picayune contained a poem addressed to Miss Carew, written by Straws in a cozy nook in the veranda at the Lake End, with his absinthe before him and the remains of an elaborate repast about him. It was then quite the fashion to write stanzas to actresses; the world was not so prosaic as it is now, and even the president of the United States, John Quincy Adams, penned graceful verses to a fair ward of Thalia.

One noon, a few days after the opening performance, several members of the company were late for rehearsal and Barnes strode impatiently to and fro, glancing at his watch and frowning darkly. To avenge himself for the remissness of the players, he roared at the stage carpenters who were constructing a balcony and to the supers who were shifting flats to the scenery room. The light from an open door at the back of the stage dimly illumined the scene; overhead, in the flies, was intense darkness; while in front, the auditorium yawned like a chasm, in no wise suggestive of the brilliant transformation at night.

“Ugh!” said Susan, standing in one of the entrances. “It is like playing to ghosts! Fancy performing to an audience of specters! Perhaps the phantoms of the past really do assemble in their old places on occasions like this. Only you can’t hear them applaud or laugh.”

“Are you looking for admirers among ghosts?” remarked Hawkes, ironically.

“Don’t,” she returned, with a little shiver.

“So, ladies and gentlemen, you are all here at last?” exclaimed Barnes, interrupting this cheerful conversation. “Some of you are late again to-day. It must not happen again. Go to Victor’s, Moreau’s, or Miguel’s, as much as you please. If you have a headache or a heartache in consequence, that is your own affair, but I am not to be kept waiting the next day.”

“Victor’s, indeed!” retorted the elastic old lady. “As if–”

“No one supposed, Madam, that at your age”–began the manager.

“At my age! If you think–”

“Are you all ready?” interrupted Barnes, hastily, knowing he would be worsted in any argument with this veteran player. “Then clear the stage! Act first!” And the rehearsal began.

If the audience were specters, the performers moved, apparently without rhyme or reason, mere shadows on the dimly lighted stage; enacting some semblance to scenes of mortal life; their jests and gibes, unnatural in that comparatively empty place; their voices, out of the semi-darkness, like those of spirits rehearsing acts of long ago. In the evening it would all become an amusing, bright-colored reality, but now the barrenness of the scenes was forcibly apparent.

“That will do for to-day,” said the manager at the conclusion of the last act. “To-morrow, ladies and gentlemen, at the same time. And any one who is late–will be fined!”

“Changing the piece every few nights is all work and no play,” complained Susan.

“It will keep you out of mischief, my dear,” replied Barnes, gathering up his manuscripts.

“Oh, I don’t know about that!” returned Miss Susan, with a defiant toss of the head, as she moved toward the dressing-room where they had left their wraps. It was a small apartment, fairly bright and cheery, with here and there a portrait against the wall. Above the dressing-table hung a mirror, diamond-scratched with hieroglyphic scrawls, among which could be discerned a transfixed heart, spitted like a lark on an arrow, and an etching of Lady Gay Spanker, with cork-screw curls. Taglioni, in pencil caricature, her limbs “divinely slender,” gyrated on her toes in reckless abandon above this mute record of names now forgotten.

“What lovely roses, Constance!” exclaimed Susan, as she entered, bending over a large bouquet on one of the chairs. “From the count, I presume?”

“Yes,” indifferently answered the young girl, who was adjusting her hat before the mirror.

“How attentive he is!” cooed Susan, her tones floating in a higher register. “Poor man! Enjoy yourself while you may, my dear,” she went on. “When youth is gone, what is left? Women should sow their wild oats as well as men. I don’t call them wild oats, though, but paradisaical oats. The Elysian fields are strewn with them.”

As she spoke, her glance swept her companion searchingly, and, in that brief scrutiny, Susan observed with inward complacency how pale the other was, and how listless her manner! Their common secret, however, made Susan’s outward demeanor sweetly solicitous and gently sympathetic. Her mind, passing in rapid review over recent events, dwelt not without certain satisfaction upon results. True, every night she was still forced to witness Constance’s success, which of itself was wormwood and gall to Susan, to stand in the wings and listen to the hateful applause; but the conviction that the sweets of popular favor brought not what they were expected to bring, was, in a way, an antidote to Susan’s dissatisfaction.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing and can sometimes be made annoying; in Susan’s case it was a weapon sharpened with honeyed phrase and consolatory bearing, for she was not slow to discover nor to avail herself of the irritating power this knowledge gave her. Constance’s pride and reticence, however, made it difficult for Susan to discern when her shafts went true. Moreover, although harboring no suspicion of Susan’s dissimulation, she instinctively held aloof from her and remained coldly unresponsive. Perhaps in the depths of Susan’s past lurked something indefinable which threw its shadow between them, an inscrutable impediment; and her inability to penetrate the young actress’ reserve, however she might wound her, awakened Susan’s resentment. But she was too world-wise to display her irritation. She even smiled sweetly now, as confidante to confidante, and, turning to her impulsively, said:

“Let me help you on with your cloak, dear?”

Out of the quiet, deserted theater, isolated from external din, to the busy streets, where drays went thundering by, and industry manifested itself in resounding clatter, was a sudden, but not altogether unwelcome, change to Constance. Without waiting for the manager, who paused at the rear entrance to impress his final instructions upon a stolid-looking property-man, she turned quickly into the noisy thoroughfares.

On and on her restlessness led her, conscious of the clangor of vehicles and voices and yet remote from them; past those picturesque suggestions of the one-time Spanish rulers in which the antiquarian could detect evidence of remote Oriental infusion; past the silken seductions of shops, where ladies swarmed and hummed like bees around the luscious hive; past the idlers’ resorts, from whence came the rat-a-tat of clinking billiard balls and the louder rumble of falling ten-pins.

In a window of one of these places, a club with a reputation for exclusiveness, a young man was seated, newspaper in hand, a cup of black coffee on a small table before him, and the end of a cigar smoking on the tray where he had placed it. With a yawn, he had just thrown aside the paper and was reaching for the thick, dark beverage–his hand thin and nervous–when, glancing without, he caught sight of the actress in the crowd. Obeying a sudden impulse, he arose, picking up his hat which lay on a chair beside him.

“Yo’ order am ready in a moment, Mr. Mauville,” said a colored servant, hurrying toward the land baron as the latter was leaving.

“I’ve changed my mind and don’t want it,” replied the other curtly.

And sauntering down the steps of the club with ill-concealed impatience, he turned in the direction the young girl had taken, keeping her retreating figure in view; now, so near her in the crowded street, he could almost touch her; then, as they left the devious ways, more distant, but ever with his eyes bent upon her. He had almost spoken, when in the throng he approached within arm’s length, but something–he knew not what–restrained him, and a press of people separated them. Only for a moment, and then he continued the questionable pleasure of following her.

Had she turned, she would probably have seen her pursuer, but absorbed in thought, she continued on her way, unconscious of his presence. On and on she hurried, until she reached the tranquil outskirts and lingered before the gate of one of the cemeteries. At the same time the land baron slackened his footsteps, hesitating whether to advance or turn back. After a moment’s indecision, she entered the cemetery; her figure, receding in the distance, was becoming more and more indistinct, when he started forward quickly and also passed through the gate.

The annual festival of the dead, following All Saint’s day, was being observed in the burial ground. This commemoration of those who have departed in the communion–described by Tertullian in the second century as an “apostolic tradition,” so old was the sacrifice!–was celebrated with much pomp and variety in the Crescent City. In the vicinity of the cemetery gathered many colored marchandes, their heads and shoulders draped in shawls and fichus of bright, diversified hues; before them, perambulating booths with baskets of molasses candy or pain-patate. Women, dressed in mourning, bore to the tomb flowers and plants, trays of images, wreaths, crosses, anchors of dried immortelles and artificial roses. Some were accompanied by priests and acolytes with censers, the former intoning the service:

 
Fidelium Deus omnium conditor–
 

A solemn peace fell upon the young girl as she entered and she seemed to leave behind her all disturbing emotions, finding refuge in the supreme tranquillity of this ancient city of the dead. She was surrounded by a resigned grief, a sorrow so dignified that it did not clash with the sweeter influences of nature. The monotonous sound of the words of the priests harmonized with the scene. The tongue of a nation that had been resolved into the elements was fitting in this place, where time and desolation had left their imprint in discolored marble, inscriptions almost effaced, and clambering vines.

 
– Animabus famulorum–
 

To many the words so mournfully intoned brought solace and surcease from sorrow. The sisters of charity moved among the throng with grave, pale faces, mere shadows of their earthly selves, as though they had undergone the first stage of the great metamorphosis which is promised. To them, who had already buried health, vitality and passion, was not this chant to the dead, this strange intoning of words, sweeter than the lullaby crooned by a nurse to a child, more stirring than the patriotic hymn to a soldier, and fraught with more fervor than the romantic dream of a lover?

 
Ut indulgentiam, quam semper optaverunt–
 

The little orphan children heard and heeded no more than the butterfly which lighted upon the engraven words, “Dust to dust,” and poised gracefully, as it bathed in the sunshine, stretching its wings in wantonness of beauty.

 
Piis supplicationibus consequantur–
 

Now Constance smiled to see the little ones playing on the steps of a monument. It was the tomb of a great jurist, a man of dignity during his mundane existence, his head crammed with those precepts which are devised for the temporal well-being of that fabric, sometimes termed society, and again, civilization. The poor waifs, with suppressed laughter–they dared not give full vent to their merriment with the black-robed sisters not far away–ran around the steps, unmindful of the inscription which might have been written by a Johnson, and as unconscious of unseemly conduct as the insects that hummed in the grass.

“Hush!” whispered one of the sisters, as a funeral cortège approached.

The children, wide-eyed in awe and wonder, desisted in their play.

“It is an old man who died last night,” said a nun in a low voice to Constance, noticing her look of inquiry.

The silver crucifix shone fitfully ahead, while the chanting of the priests, winding in and out after the holy symbol, fell upon the ear. And the young girl gazed with pity as the remains of the Marquis de Ligne, her father, were borne by.

 
Qui vivis et regnas. Glorificamus te.
 

CHAPTER XIII
AN INCONGRUOUS RÔLE

Longer and longer trailed the shadow of a tall tombstone until, as the sun went down, it merged into the general twilight like a life lengthening out and out and finally blending in restful darkness. With that transition came a sudden sense of isolation and loneliness; the little burial ground seemed the world; the sky, its walls and ceiling.

From the neighborhood of the gates had vanished the dusky venders, trundling their booths and stalls citywards. As abruptly had disappeared the bearers of flowers and artificial roses with baskets poised upon their heads, imparting to their figures dignity and erectness. The sad-eyed nuns had wended their way out of the little kingdom of the departed, surrounded by the laughing children and preceded by the priests and acolytes. All the sounds and activities of the day–the merriment of the little ones, the oblations of the priests, the greetings of friends–were followed by inertness and languor. Motionless against the sky spread the branches of the trees, like lines etched there; still were the clambering vines that clasped monolith and column.

But suddenly that death-like lull in nature’s animation and unrest was abruptly broken, and an uproarious vociferation dispelled the voiceless peace.

 
“For Jack ashore’s a Crœsus, lads,
 With a Jill for every Jack–”
 

sang a hoarse voice as its owner came staggering along one of the walks of the cemetery; for all his song, no blue-water sailor-man, but a boisterous denizen of the great river, a raftsman or a keel-boatman, who had somehow found himself in the burial ground and now was beating aimlessly about. How this rollicking waif of the grog shop came to wander so far from the convivial haunts of his kind and to choose this spot for a ramble, can only be explained by the vagaries of inebriety.

 
“With a Jill in your wake,
A fair port you’ll make–”
 

he continued, when his eye fell upon the figure of a woman, some distance ahead, and fairly discernible in the gathering twilight. Immediately the song ceased and he steadied himself, gazing incredulously after the form that had attracted his attention.

“Hello!” he said. “Avast, my dear!” he called out.

Echoing in that still place, his harsh tones produced a startling effect, and the figure before him moved faster and faster, casting a glance behind her at the man from the river, who with snatches of song, started in uncertain but determined pursuit. As the heavy footsteps sounded nearer, she increased her pace, with eyes bent upon the distant gate; darker seemed to grow the way; more menacing the shadows outstretched across the path. Louder crunched the boots on the shell walk; more audible became the words of the song that flowed from his lips, when the sound of a sudden and violent altercation replaced the hoarse-toned cadence, an altercation that was of brief duration, characterized by longshoreman oaths, and followed by silence; and then a figure, not that of the tuneful waterman, sprang to the side of the startled girl.

“Miss Carew!” exclaimed a well-remembered voice.

Bewildered, breathing quickly, she gazed from Edward Mauville, who thus unexpectedly accosted her, to the prostrate form, lying motionless on the road. The rude awakening from her day-dream in the hush of that peaceful place, and the surprising sequence had dazed her senses, and, for the moment, it seemed something tragic must have happened.

“Is he dead?” she asked quickly, unable to withdraw her glance from the immovable figure, stretched out in the dim light on the path.

“No fear!” said Mauville, quietly, almost thoughtfully, although his eyes were yet bright from the encounter. “You can’t kill his kind,” he added, contemptuously. “Brutes from coal barges, or raftsmen from the head waters! He struck against a stone when he fell, and what with that, and the liquor in him, will rest there awhile. He’ll come to without remembering what has happened.”

Turning moodily, the land baron walked slowly down the road, away from the gate; she thought he was about to leave her, when he paused, as though looking for something, stooped to the ground, and returned, holding out a garment.

“You dropped your wrap, Miss Carew,” he said, awkwardly. “The night is cold and you will need it.” She offered no resistance when he placed it over her shoulders; indeed, seemed unconscious of the attention.

“Don’t you think we had better go?” he went on. “It won’t hurt him”–indicating the motionless body–“to stay here–the brute!”

But as he spoke, with some constraint, her eyes, full of doubts, met his, and he felt a flush mantle his face. The incongruity of his position appealed forcibly to him. Had he not been watching and following her himself? Seeing her helpless, alone, in the silent spot, where she had unconsciously lingered too long, had he not been almost on the point of addressing her? Moved by vague desires, had he not already started impetuously toward her, when the man from the river had come rollicking along and insinuated himself after his fashion in the other’s rôle?

And at the sight–the fleeing girl, the drunken, profane waterman!–how his heart had leaped and his body had become steel for the encounter; an excess of vigor for a paltry task! Jack, as he called himself, might have been a fighting-man earlier in the day, but now he had gone down like straw. When the excitement of this brief collision was over, however, the land baron found his position as unexpected as puzzling.

As these thoughts swiftly crossed his mind, he could not forbear a bitter laugh, and she, walking more quickly toward the gate, regarded him with inquiry, not perhaps unmingled with apprehension. A picture of events, gone by, arose before her like a menacing shadow over the present. He interpreted her glance for what it meant, and angry that she doubted him, angry with himself, said roughly:

“Oh, you haven’t anything to fear!”

Her answering look was so gentle, so sad, an unwonted feeling of compunction seized him; he repented of his harshness, and added less brusquely:

“Why did you remain so late?”

“I did not realize how late it had become.”

“Your thoughts must have been very absorbing!” he exclaimed quickly, his brow once more overcast.

Not difficult was it for him to surmise upon whom her mind had been bent, and involuntarily his jaw set disagreeably, while he looked at her resentfully. In that light he could but dimly discern her face. Her bonnet had fallen from her head; her eyes were bent before her, as though striving to penetrate the gathering darkness. With his sudden spell of jealousy came the temptation to clasp her in his arms in that silent, isolated place, but the figure of the sailor came between him and the desire, while pride, the heritage of the gentleman, fought down the longing. This self-conquest was not accomplished, however, without a sacrifice of temper, for after a pause, he observed:

“There is no accounting for a woman’s taste!”

She did not controvert this statement, but the start she gave told him the shaft had sped home.

“An outlaw! An outcast!” exclaimed the patroon, stung beyond endurance by his thoughts.

Still no reply; only more hurried footsteps! Around them sounded a gentle rustling; a lizard scrambled out of their path through the crackling leaves; a bat, or some other winged creature, suddenly whirred before them and vanished. They had now approached the gate, through which they passed and found themselves on the road leading directly to the city, whose lights had already begun to twinkle in the dusk.

The cheering rumble of a carriage and the aspect of the not far-distant town quickened her spirits and imparted elasticity to her footsteps. Upon the land baron they produced an opposite effect, for he was obviously reluctant to abandon the interview, however unsatisfactory it might be. There was nothing to say, and yet he was loath to leave her; there was nothing to accomplish, and yet he wished to remain with her. For this reason, as they drew near the city, his mood became darker, like the night around them. Instinctively, she felt the turbulent passions stirring in his bosom; his sudden silence, his dogged footsteps reawakened her misgivings. Furtively she regarded him, but his eyes were fixed straight before him on the soft luster above the city, the reflection of the lights, and she knew and mistrusted his thoughts. Although she found his silence more menacing than his words, she could think of nothing to say to break the spell, and so they continued to walk mutely side by side. An observer, seeing them beneath the cypress, a lovers’ promenade, with its soft, enfolding shadows, would have taken them for a well-matched couple, who had no need for language.

But when they had emerged from that romantic lane and entered the city, the land baron breathed more freely. She was now surrounded by movement and din; the seclusion of the country gave way to the stir of the city; she was no longer dependent on his good offices; his rôle of protector had ended when they left the cypress walk behind them.

His brow cleared; he glanced at her with ill-concealed admiration; he noticed with secret pride the attention she attracted from passers-by, the sidelong looks of approval that followed her through the busy streets. The land baron expanded into his old self; he strode at her side, gratified by the scrutiny she invited; assurance radiated from his eyes like some magnetic heat; he played at possession wilfully, perversely. “Why not,” whispered Hope. “A woman’s mind is shifting ever. Her fancy–a breath! The other is gone. Why–”

“It was not accident my being in the cemetery, Miss Carew,” said Mauville, suddenly covering her with his glance. Meeting her look of surprise unflinchingly, he continued: “I followed you there; through the streets, into the country! My seeing you first was chance; my presence in the burial ground the result of that chance. The inevitable result!” he repeated softly. “As inevitable as life! Life; what is it? Influences which control us; forces which bind us! It is you, or all; you or nothing!”

She did not reply; his voice, vibrating with feeling, touched no answering chord. Nevertheless, a new, inexplicable wave of sorrow moved her. It might be he had cared for her as sincerely as it was possible for his wayward heart to care for any one. Perhaps time would yet soften his faults, and temper his rashness. With that shade of sorrow for him there came compassion as well; compassion that overlooked the past and dwelt on the future.

She raised her steady eyes. “Why should it be ‘I or nothing,’ as you put it?” she finally answered slowly. “Influences may control us in a measure, but we may also strive for something. We can always strive.”

“For what? For what we don’t want? That’s the philosophy of your moralists, Miss Carew,” he exclaimed. “That’s your modern ethics of duty. Playing tricks with happiness! The game isn’t worth the candle. Or, if you believe in striving,” he added, half resentfully, half imploringly, “strive to care for me but a little. But a little!” he said again. “I who once wanted all, and would have nothing but all, am content to ask, to plead, for but a little.”

“I see no reason,” she replied, wearily, yet not unkindly, “why we should not be friends.”

“Friends!” he answered, bitterly. “I do not beg for a loaf, but a crumb. Yet you refuse me that! I will wait! Only a word of encouragement! Will you not give it?”

She turned and looked into his eyes, and, before she spoke, he knew what her answer would be.

“How can I?” she said, simply. “Why should I promise something I can never fulfil?”

He held her glance as though loath to have it leave him.

“May I see you again?” he asked, abruptly.

She shook her head. His gaze fell, seeing no softening in her clear look.

“You are well named,” he repeated, more to himself than to her. “Constance! You are constant in your dislikes as well as your likes.”

“I have no dislike for you,” she replied. “It seems to have been left behind me somewhere.”

“Only indifference, then!” he said, dully.

“No; not indifference!”