ATALANTA IN THE SOUTH.
CHAPTER I.
The time, a December afternoon within the memory of a child of ten; the place, Jackson Square, better known to history as the old Place d'Armes, the centre of all that is most interesting in the French quarter of New Orleans.
The bronze effigy of the hero whose name the square now bears is surrounded by a group of belated rose-bushes full of a sober wintry bloom. Outside of these runs the shell-strewn path, dazzling white, and harsh to tread upon. The flowers are all dead, save the hardy northern roses, but the orange-trees are heavy with their golden fruit. A group of black-skinned children are playing at leap-frog, and their young voices sound cheerfully in the ears of Philip Rondelet as he sits at the window of his modest apartment high up in one of the famous Pontalba buildings. Two sides of the square are flanked by long brick houses of a somewhat imposing character, alike in all particulars to the very monogram of their owner, wrought in fine ironwork above the central windows, where the façade rises to a high peak. The lower floors are now occupied by shops of a more or less unsavory aspect, for fashion, which once was at its height in Jackson Square, has flown to a newer and less attractive part of the city. Among the tenants of the fine old Pontalba buildings there are few to-day who claim any connection with polite society. Rondelet might have been classed with the exceptionals in this respect, as he should be in many others. He certainly was exceptional in his appearance, and no less so in his tastes, if we may judge by the glimpse we catch of him sitting in his small study under the leads, staring dreamily out into the square below. There were very few articles of furniture in the room, and the floor lacked a carpet. A third of the space, that part where the sun lay longest, was devoted to a miniature garden, where the flowers bore all the marks of a careful and loving hand. Rare and splendid orchids hung from the wall, and a superb oriental flower, looking like a vast vegetable butterfly, bloomed serenely forth from the neck of a broken wine-bottle. A row of Japanese dwarf-oaks made a sombre background for a vivid staff of Mexican cactus-flowers. In the midst of all this tropical bloom stood a large aviary, where a dozen birds twittered and trilled and dipped their dainty wings in a tiny fountain playing in the centre of the cage. A bare deal table, a lounge which had lost its cover, a worn horsehair armchair, and a set of unpainted pine shelves laden with books, completed the contents of the apartment, with one notable exception. On the mouldy, unpapered wall hung an unframed picture representing the head and shoulders of a man. At the first glance it might have passed for an ancient copy or original study of a head of Christ. On closer examination it was seen to be only the portrait of a man whose features bore the stamp of the highest intellectual beauty,—a long, delicate face, with a broad, unruffled forehead, large eyes of that indefinable gray-blue tint which neither color describes, a thin, delicate nose, and a mouth of rare beauty and sensitiveness. The hair and beard, of a golden brown, fell about the shoulders, and below, folded upon the breast, were the white, nervous hands, with a delicate blue tracery of veins. If any one unsatisfied with this examination should have looked more closely at the picture, he would have been able to make out this inscription: "Philip Rondelet, from his friend Hans Makart." By the fading light of that short winter day let us look into the face of the man who is still gazing out into the sunlight slowly waning from the square below. It is the same face as that in the picture; Hans Makart, friend to Philip Rondelet, having painted the man as he was, with that superficial resemblance to the Master which at a second glance was almost lost. The beauty, the gentleness, the love, are all there; but the power which raises these elements to achieve the salvation of man is lacking.
It is already dark on the stairway, though the last sunbeam is resting for a moment on the golden cross of the cathedral over the way. A sound of stumbling in the passage causes Rondelet to glance rather nervously towards the door. He is not in the mood for visitors, if we may judge from the impatient sigh which escapes him. The sound of voices in altercation reaches him, a silence follows, and from an inner door his black servant enters the apartment.
"Well, Hero?"
"A gentleman to speak with you, sar."
"Say that I am not at home."
"I did, Marse Philip; but he says he knows yer are."
"Tell the gentleman that you have searched the extensive apartment, and that I positively am not to be found."
"Very good, sar."
Hero disappeared. Rondelet listened. There was the sound of a dispute, then a scuffle in the passage, a noise as of a person falling heavily against the wall, an exclamation in Hero's voice; and the door was thrown violently open, a stranger stood upon the threshold bowing civilly, hat in hand.
"Dr. Rondelet?"
"Rondelet is my name, sir."
"I have forced myself into your presence, in spite of your servant's refusal of admittance, because I must speak with you on a matter of the utmost importance."
Rondelet bowed and remained silent. His visitor continued,—
"You are a physician?"
"I have my degree as doctor of medicine, but I am not a practising physician."
"I was told that, Doctor, by Mr. Robert Feuardent, at whose instance I have come to ask your services in a matter of the strictest confidence."
The two men had remained standing. At the mention of Feuardent's name, Rondelet motioned his visitor to his solitary arm-chair and took his seat upon the coverless sofa.
"Feuardent assured us of your great skill, especially in a case of this description."
"Surgical?"
"Yes."
"A wound?"
"It is feared a fatal one."
"It is an affair?—"
"Of honor."
"It would be wiser to seek some one of the established physicians here. I have not as yet undertaken any practice since my return from Paris. I am almost a stranger in my native city."
"It is for this reason that you would not be suspected of any connection with the affair, should it come out."
"There is danger, then, of a thorough investigation?"
"Possibly."
"I do not like the business. Besides, I don't see how I can go. I have an engagement at six o'clock which I cannot break."
"A dinner?"
"Yes."
"At Mrs. Darius Harden's?"
Rondelet looked somewhat annoyed at this cross-questioning, but nodded assent.
"Feuardent was to have been of the party. I am to carry his excuses. It is now half past five. At exactly a quarter past six I shall call for you at the Hardens'. A physician is always liable to be called away, and you will be absolved of all blame if you only put in an appearance at six."
The visitor rose, and Rondelet noticed for the first time that he wore evening-dress. His linen was crushed and tumbled, and as he buttoned his over-coat closer across his breast, the doctor's eye caught a dark-red stain on the shirt.
"The affair took place this morning?"
"Yes; I drove out from the ball."
The man was going. Rondelet made a struggle to free himself from this mystery into which he was being forced against his will.
"Monsieur, neither you nor Robert Feuardent have the right to ask this thing of me. Your name I do not even know. I refuse to be accessory to this affair. You must have had some other practitioner upon the field."
"A mere boy, who has lost his nerve and insists upon a consultation with some one less unskilled and timid than himself."
Philip flushed, and his visitor, with a formal bow, vanished.
"Till a quarter past six," he called from the lower hall.
The two men had begun their conversation in English, but had quickly lapsed into French, after the manner of their kind under all strong excitements.
To these people, with whom the two languages are spoken indifferently from the cradle, the Latin tongue is the natural expression of all strong emotions.
Mechanically Rondelet changed his dress; and as he was about to go forth, he paused irresolute, unlocked a drawer beneath the bookshelves, and took out a case of surgical instruments. The dust was thick upon the box. He touched the spring, to make sure that everything was in its place; and at the sight of the shining steel the old repugnance came over him with stronger force than ever. He closed the box with a quick movement of disgust, and threw it back into the drawer. At that moment the stranger's words echoed in his ear: "Some one less timid than himself." That decided him. He slipped the instruments into the pocket of his over-coat and ran lightly down stairs into the street. It was very cold; the wind spitefully wrenched open the garments of the few people who were abroad, and rattled the great iron gates of the ancient court-house. It had come from the northern ice-fields, and gloried that the South could not rob it of all its fierce pain. Enough was left to pinch the faces of the poor folk, wretchedly housed for such weather, and to make the rich wish regretfully that their fireplaces were more in accordance with Northern notions. At Mr. Darius Harden's comfortable house on Esplanade Street, however, there was little needed to complete the air of warmth and cheer.
The large drawing-room was lighted comfortably, though not brilliantly. The guests already assembled had drawn into a semicircle before the fire, and were listening to Mrs. Harden's last good story, when the door opened, and Philip Rondelet entered.
"Forgive me if I am late, kind hostess," he said; "and," he added, looking over Mrs. Harden's shoulder, "tell me, while she is not looking, who that young girl in white is. Do I know her?"
"No; it is Miss Margaret Ruysdale, a stranger from the North,—here for the winter with an invalid papa, the gentleman with one arm. I will present you to her, as you are to take her in to dinner. Miss Ruysdale, Mr. Philip Rondelet."
The young man made a deep obeisance, and the girl bowed simply to him, with nothing of the drooping of the lids or sudden uplooking into his eyes which he had often noticed in his introductions to young women in society. This Margaret Ruysdale from the North looked at him as quietly and civilly as she would have looked into the face of his grandmother.
"I have seen you before, Mr.—should I not say Dr. Rondelet?"
"I hardly know, mademoiselle; this is the second time to-day I have been so called. I had thought that I had left my title, along with my profession, on the other side."
"In Paris; it was there I saw you."
"In Paris?" Rondelet smiled, his whole face lighting up with a look of unspeakable pleasure. It was as if a lover had suddenly heard the name of his absent mistress.
"Yes; ah, how you miss it! I feel it in your voice," said Miss Ruysdale, her own voice growing, in sympathy, a trifle less like the murmur of cool running water than at first.
"Miss it? Ye gods, how I miss it! I suffer for it. Where did you see me? I never can have seen you; I should not have forgotten your face."
"It was at the hospital, where I went once to make the portrait of a dying child for its mother. You took care of the little fellow André; don't you remember him,—the son of your concierge?"
"To be sure, poor little soul! How bravely he bore it all! It was better that he died; he could never have walked again. You, then, mademoiselle, are the young art student who paid—"
Miss Ruysdale interrupted him,—
"Yes, yes, I was his friend. How long is it since you left Paris?"
"A month, a year, a cycle,—I cannot say. It seemed very long ago this morning; but you have brought it back to me so vividly, it might have been yesterday. Have you neglected your profession as I have mine? You were modelling in those days, were you not?"
"Yes, I am a sculptor, and am always at work."
Looking down, Rondelet noticed that her small, bare hands, lying loosely clasped, were unusually firm-looking for those of so young a person. Margaret Ruysdale, sculptor, could hardly have more than attained her first score of years. He was ten years her senior, and since his last birthday had known the pain of finding himself no longer in the twenties. His feet were still hesitating what life-path to tread, and this slim girl quietly claimed the profession which had counted among its followers some of the greatest men the world has known. Her assertion had been made very simply and without assumption. She was a sculptor, and used as best she could the tools of Phidias and Angelo.
"I am to take you in to dinner," said Rondelet, as a general move was made in the direction of the dining-room.
"I am very glad," answered Margaret Ruysdale, sculptor, laying her small white hand upon his arm with the air of a comrade. She had put aside all coquetry, if she had ever possessed it, which to Philip Rondelet seemed very doubtful; and yet nothing could be more feminine than her face and figure, her well-modelled white gown and appropriate ornaments of yellow gold.
"Tell me, is Mr. Robert Feuardent among the guests? I heard I was to meet him to-night."
Robert Feuardent! Rondelet started at the name and glanced at the clock. It was nearly half-past six. At that moment the door-bell was violently rung, and immediately afterwards a servant whispered a message in Mrs. Harden's ear.
"Mr. Rondelet, a messenger has come for you, summoning you to a sick person; can you not send him for some other physician?"
Philip set down untasted the glass of wine he had raised to his lips, and said, "Tell the person that it is not possible for me to leave at present. He should summon another physician. Dr. N lives half a block from here."
In two minutes the man returned. "The gentleman says, sir, that he can wait, but that you will hardly like to keep a lady waiting in the carriage on such a night as this."
"Mrs. Harden, you must excuse me. Mademoiselle, I cannot express to you my regrets at being forced to lose the pleasure of knowing you better."
"I am very sorry too; but of course your professional duties must take precedence of everything else. Good night, and god-speed to you," said Margaret Ruysdale, sculptor, with a smile, the first she had given him. Her smiles were not plentiful, and this one was to the unwilling Samaritan like a draught of the rich strong wine he had left untasted.
In the hall he found the young man, who was still a stranger to him, looking wan and pale beside the merry circle he had just quitted.
"You look ill yourself, my friend; you are not fit to be out on such a night."
The stranger made an impatient gesture of dissent and threw open the door. A whiff of the chill north wind burst in at the opening, and fanned the flame in the chandelier, and blew into the face of the girl from the North, as if it bore her a greeting from her home. Outside, the street was empty and silent. A chill dense rain was beginning to fall, and the horses of the carriage which awaited them were fretting and tramping uneasily. "Get in as quickly as you can," said the stranger; "there is one person on the back seat."
Rondelet placed himself beside the person on the back seat, the young man sprang into the carriage, and the horses leaped forward into a gallop. As his eyes became accustomed to the darkness, the young physician observed that the person beside him was a woman.
A lace scarf was thrown about her head and shoulders, bare, save for this slight protection, through which sparkled a profusion of jewels.
"Madame, have you no cloak?"
There was no audible answer; but the woman shook her head, indifferent alike to the cold and his solicitude. Rondelet wrapped her quietly in his own coat and leaned back in the carriage, absently watching the woman who sat beside him with hands closely locked and wild eyes staring out into the night.