No Surrender. E. Werner
completed Raven, as she paused. "It may be so--but, Gabrielle, are you really so fond of this spring? Would it positively distress you to see it stopped?"
"Yes," said Gabrielle, in a low voice, looking up at him. Her lips uttered no word of entreaty; but her eyes besought him earnestly, pleading for the doomed fountain.
Raven was silent. For some minutes he stood by her without speaking. Then he began again:
"I frightened you just now with my harsh views of life, but no one says you must share them. I forgot for a moment that youth has a right to dream, and that it would be cruel to rob you of the privilege. Keep your faith still in the golden far-off future, in the promise of the blue mountains. You may yet put gentle confidence in the world and in mankind; it is little likely you will ever incur their hostility and hatred."
His voice was veiled and wonderfully soft, and all austerity had vanished from his look, as it rested half sadly on the young girl's countenance; but Arno Raven was not one to be long influenced by such emotions; and, indeed, it seemed that no chance of yielding to them was to be afforded him, for at this moment steps were heard approaching, and, as they turned, the lodge-keeper, accompanied by an elderly man--a mechanic, apparently--entered the garden. They stopped on perceiving the Governor, and uncovered respectfully.
Raven's mildness had already vanished. He had quickly shaken off the unwonted mood.
"What is it?" he asked, in the curt, authoritative tone habitual to him.
"Your Excellency has given orders that the Nixies' Well should be broken up, and the spring stopped," answered the master-mason. "It was to be done today, and my men will be here in half an hour or so. I only wanted to see beforehand whether there would be any difficulty, and if the work was likely to take up much time."
The Baron glanced at the fountain, and then at Gabrielle standing by his side. There was the hardly perceptible delay of a second, and then he pronounced his decree:
"Send your people away. The work is not to be done."
"What! your Excellency?" asked the mason, in astonishment.
"The demolition of the fountain would injure the garden. It is to remain. I will take other measures."
A wave of the hand dismissed the two men. They, of course, ventured on no reply, but surprise was plainly written on their countenances as they left the garden. It was the first time an order so circumstantially given by the Governor himself had ever been withdrawn.
Raven had stepped to the edge of the basin, and was watching the constant falling shower. Gabrielle had remained in her place by the parapet, but now she drew near slowly, hesitatingly--presently, with a sudden movement, she held out both hands to him.
"Thank you--oh, thank you!"
He smiled, not with his usual sardonic smile. A ray of sunshine seemed to flit across his face, as he took the offered hands, and, gently raising Gabrielle's head, stooped to kiss her brow.
There was nothing unusual in this. He was in the habit of thus saluting her when she appeared at breakfast and wished him "Good-morning," and hitherto she had received his caress most unconcernedly; while he, her guardian, had but in cool, grave fashion made use of his 'fatherly rights.'
To-day, for the first time, the young girl involuntarily sought to evade it; and Raven felt that the hand he held in his own trembled a little. He drew himself up suddenly, without having touched her forehead with his lips, and dropped her hand.
"You are right," he said, in a troubled voice. "There is a magic in the Nixies' Well. Let us go."
They turned away. Behind them the spring babbled and murmured, the fountain plashed, throwing its white veil of spray ever on high. That cruel doom of destruction was averted now. The beseeching prayer of those brown eyes, and the glittering tears which stood in them, had saved the well.
Perhaps at this moment the cold, stern man, who had long passed the prime of life, may have felt that his boast had been premature, that not even he in his strength was entirely proof against "the nixies' charm."
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