Edith Wharton - Novel 14 Read Online Free Page A

this way to
George.”
                 Mrs.
Brant lifted a startled gaze.
                 “What
do you mean? If war is declared, you can’t expect me not to speak of it to
him.”
                 “Speak
of it as much as you like, but don’t drag him in. Let him work out his own case
for himself.” He went on with an effort: “It’s what I intend to do.”
                 “But
you said you’d use every influence!” she protested, obtusely.
                 “Well—I
believe this is one of them.”
                 She
looked down resignedly at her clasped hands, and he saw her lips tighten. “My
telling her that has been just enough to start her on the other tack,” he
groaned to himself, all her old stupidities rising up around him like a fog.
                 Mr.
Brant gave a slight cough and removed his protecting hand from his lips.
                 “Mr.
Campton is right,” he said, quickly and timorously. “I take the same
view—entirely. George must not know that we are thinking of using … any means .. .” He coughed again, and groped for the cigar-case.
                 As
he spoke, there came over Campton a sense of their possessing a common ground
of understanding that Campton had never found in his wife. He had had a hint of
the same feeling, but had voluntarily stifled it, on the day when Mr. Brant,
apologetic yet determined, had come to the studio to buy George’s portrait.
Campton had seen then how the man suffered from his failure, but had chosen to
attribute his distress to the humiliation of finding there were things his
money could not purchase. Now, that judgment seemed as unimaginative as he had
once thought Mr. Brant’s overture. Campton turned on the banker a look that was
almost brotherly.
                 “We
men know …” the look said; and Mr. Brant’s parched cheek was suffused with a
flush of understanding. Then, as if frightened at the consequences of such
complicity, he repeated his bow and went out.
                 When
Campton issued forth into the Avenue Marigny, it came to him as a surprise to
see the old unheeding life of Paris still going on. In the golden decline of
day the usual throng of idlers sat under the horse-chestnuts of the Champs
Elysées, children scampered between turf and flowers, and the perpetual stream
of motors rolled up the central avenue to the restaurants beyond the gates.
                 Under
the last trees of the Avenue Gabriel the painter stood looking across the Place
de la Concorde. No doubt the future was dark: he had guessed from Mr. Brant’s
precipitate arrival that the banks and the Stock Exchange feared the worst. But
what could a man do, whose convictions were so largely formed by the play of
things on his retina, when, in the setting sun, all that majesty of space and
light and architecture was spread out before him undisturbed? Paris was too triumphant a fact not to argue down
his fears. There she lay in the security of her beauty, and once more
proclaimed herself eternal.
                   
     
  III.
 
 
                 The
night was so lovely that, though the Boulogne express arrived late, George at once
proposed dining in the Bois.
                 His
luggage, of which, as usual, there was a good deal, was dropped at the Crillon,
and they shot up the Champs Elysées as the summer dusk began to be pricked by
lamps.
                 “How
jolly the old place smells!” George cried, breathing in the scent of sun-warmed
asphalt, of flower-beds and freshly-watered dust. He seemed as much alive to
such impressions as if his first word at the station had not been: “Well, this
time I suppose we’re in for it.” In for it they might be; but meanwhile he
meant to enjoy the scents and scenes of Paris as acutely and unconcernedly as ever.
                 Campton
had hoped that