"It is very true," Eugenia rejoined, "that one's reason is dismally flat. It 's a bed with the mattress removed."
But the brother and sister, later in the evening, crossed over to the larger house, the Baroness desiring to compliment her prospective sister-in-law. They found the usual circle upon the piazza, with the exception of Clifford Wentworth and Lizzie Acton; and as every one stood up as usual to welcome the Baroness, Eugenia had an admiring audience for her compliment to Gertrude.
Robert Acton stood on the edge of the piazza, leaning against one of the white columns, so that he found himself next to Eugenia while she acquitted herself of a neat little discourse of congratulation.
"I shall be so glad to know you better," she said; "I have seen so much less of you than I should have liked. Naturally; now I see the reason why! You will love me a little, won't you? I think I may say I gain on being known." And terminating these observations with the softest cadence of her voice, the Baroness imprinted a sort of grand official kiss upon Gertrude's forehead.
Increased familiarity had not, to Gertrude's imagination, diminished the mysterious impressiveness of Eugenia's personality, and she felt flattered and transported by this little ceremony. Robert Acton also seemed to admire it, as he admired so many of the gracious manifestations of Madame Munster's wit.
They had the privilege of making him restless, and on this occasion he walked away, suddenly, with his hands in his pockets, and then came back and leaned against his column. Eugenia was now complimenting her uncle upon his daughter's engagement, and Mr. Wentworth was listening with his usual plain yet refined politeness. It is to be supposed that by this time his perception of the mutual relations of the young people who surrounded him had become more acute; but he still took the matter very seriously, and he was not at all exhilarated.
"Felix will make her a good husband," said Eugenia. "He will be a charming companion; he has a great quality—indestructible gayety."
"You think that 's a great quality?" asked the old man.
Eugenia meditated, with her eyes upon his. "You think one gets tired of it, eh?"
"I don't know that I am prepared to say that," said Mr. Wentworth.
"Well, we will say, then, that it is tiresome for others but delightful for one's self. A woman's husband, you know, is supposed to be her second self; so that, for Felix and Gertrude, gayety will be a common property."
"Gertrude was always very gay," said Mr. Wentworth. He was trying to follow this argument.
Robert Acton took his hands out of his pockets and came a little nearer to the Baroness. "You say you gain by being known," he said. "One certainly gains by knowing you."
"What have you gained?" asked Eugenia.
"An immense amount of wisdom."
"That 's a questionable advantage for a man who was already so wise!"
Acton shook his head. "No, I was a great fool before I knew you!"
"And being a fool you made my acquaintance? You are very complimentary."
"Let me keep it up," said Acton, laughing. "I hope, for our pleasure, that your brother's marriage will detain you."
"Why should I stop for my brother's marriage when I would not stop for my own?" asked the Baroness.
"Why should n't you stop in either case, now that, as you say, you have dissolved that mechanical tie that bound you to Europe?"
The Baroness looked at him a moment. "As I say? You look as if you doubted it."
"Ah," said Acton, returning her glance, "that is a remnant of my old folly! We have other attractions," he added. "We are to have another marriage."
But she seemed not to hear him; she was looking at him still. "My word was never doubted before," she said.
"We are to have another marriage," Acton repeated, smiling.
Then she appeared to understand. "Another marriage?" And she looked at the others. Felix was chattering to Gertrude; Charlotte, at a distance, was watching them; and Mr. Brand, in quite another quarter, was turning his back to them, and, with his hands under his coat-tails and his large head on one side, was looking at the small, tender crescent of a young moon. "It ought to be Mr. Brand and Charlotte," said Eugenia, "but it does n't look like it."
"There," Acton answered, "you must judge just now by contraries. There is more than there looks to be. I expect that combination one of these days; but that is not what I meant."
"Well," said the Baroness, "I never guess my own lovers; so I can't guess other people's."
Acton gave a loud laugh, and he was about to add a rejoinder when Mr. Wentworth approached his niece. "You will be interested to hear," the old man said, with a momentary aspiration toward jocosity, "of another matrimonial venture in our little circle."
"I was just telling the Baroness," Acton observed.
"Mr. Acton was apparently about to announce his own engagement," said Eugenia.
Mr. Wentworth's jocosity increased. "It is not exactly that; but it is in the family. Clifford, hearing this morning that Mr. Brand had expressed a desire to tie the nuptial knot for his sister, took it into his head to arrange that, while his hand was in, our good friend should perform a like ceremony for himself and Lizzie Acton."
The Baroness threw back her head and smiled at her uncle; then turning, with an intenser radiance, to Robert Acton, "I am certainly very stupid not to have thought of that," she said. Acton looked down at his boots, as if he thought he had perhaps reached the limits of legitimate experimentation, and for a moment Eugenia said nothing more. It had been, in fact, a sharp knock, and she needed to recover herself. This was done, however, promptly enough. "Where are the young people?" she asked.
"They are spending the evening with my mother."
"Is not the thing very sudden?"
Acton looked up. "Extremely sudden. There had been a tacit understanding; but within a day or two Clifford appears to have received some mysterious impulse to precipitate the affair."
"The impulse," said the Baroness, "was the charms of your very pretty sister."
"But my sister's charms were an old story; he had always known her." Acton had begun to experiment again.
Here, however, it was evident the Baroness would not help him. "Ah, one can't say! Clifford is very young; but he is a nice boy."
"He 's a likeable sort of boy, and he will be a rich man." This was Acton's last experiment. Madame Munster turned away.
She made but a short visit and Felix took her home. In her little drawing-room she went almost straight to the mirror over the chimney-piece, and, with a candle uplifted, stood looking into it. "I shall not wait for your marriage," she said to her brother. "To-morrow my maid shall pack up."
"My dear sister," Felix exclaimed, "we are to be married immediately! Mr. Brand is too uncomfortable."
But Eugenia, turning and still holding her candle aloft, only looked about the little sitting-room at her gimcracks and curtains and cushions. "My maid shall pack up," she repeated. "Bonte divine, what rubbish! I feel like a strolling actress; these are my 'properties.'"
"Is the play over, Eugenia?" asked Felix.
She gave him a sharp glance. "I have spoken my part."
"With great applause!" said her brother.
"Oh, applause—applause!" she murmured. And she gathered up two or three of her dispersed draperies. She glanced at the beautiful brocade, and then, "I don't see how I can have endured it!" she said.
"Endure it a little longer. Come to my wedding."
"Thank you; that 's your affair. My affairs are elsewhere."
"Where are you going?"
"To Germany—by the first ship."
"You have decided not to marry Mr. Acton?"
"I have refused him," said Eugenia.
Her brother looked at her in silence. "I am sorry," he rejoined at last. "But I was very discreet, as you asked me to be. I said nothing."
"Please continue, then, not to allude to the matter," said Eugenia.
Felix inclined himself gravely. "You shall be obeyed. But your position in Germany?" he pursued.