“travelling, sir,” a curt parlour-maid announced from mrs. donald paul’s threshold in kensington; adding, as young willis french’s glance slipped over her shoulder down a narrow and somewhat conventional perspective of white panelling and black prints: “if there’s any message you’d like to write” —

he did not know if there were or not; but he instantly saw that his hesitation would hold the house-door open a minute longer, and thus give him more time to stamp on his memory the details of the cramped london hall, beyond which there seemed no present hope of penetrating.

“could you tell me where?” he asked, in a tone implying that the question of his having something to write might be determined by the nature of the answer.

the parlour-maid scrutinized him more carefully. “not exactly, sir: mr. and mrs. paul are away motoring, and i believe they’re to cross over to the continent in a day or two.” she seemed to have gathered confidence from another look at him, and he was glad he had waited to unpack his town clothes, instead of rushing, as he had first thought of doing, straight from the steamer train to the house. “if it’s for something important, i could give you the address,” she finally condescended, apparently reassured by her inspection.

“it is important,” said the young man almost solemnly; and she handed him a sheet of gold-monogrammed note-paper across which was tumbled, in large loose characters: “hotel nouveau luxe, paris.”

the unexpectedness of the address left willis french staring. there was nothing to excite surprise in the fact of the donald pauls having gone to paris; or even in their having gone there in their motor; but that they should be lodged at the nouveau luxe seemed to sap the very base of probability.

“are you sure they’re staying there?”

to the parlour-maid, at this point, it evidently began to look as if, in spite of his reassuring clothes, the caller might have designs on the umbrellas.

“i couldn’t say, sir. it’s the address, sir,” she returned, adroitly taking her precautions about the door.

these were not lost on the visitor, who, both to tranquillize her and to gain time, turned back toward the quiet kensington street and stood gazing doubtfully up and down its uneventful length.

all things considered, he had no cause to regret the turn the affair had taken; the only regret he allowed himself was that of not being able instantly to cross the threshold hallowed by his young enthusiasm. but even that privilege might soon be his; and meanwhile he was to have the unforeseen good luck of following mrs. donald paul to paris. his business in coming to europe had been simply and solely to see the donald pauls; and had they been in london he would have been obliged, their conference over, to return at once to new york, whence he had been sent, at his publisher’s expense, to obtain from mrs. paul certain details necessary for the completion of his book: the art of horace fingall. and now, by a turn of what he fondly called his luck — as if no one else’s had ever been quite as rare — he found his vacation prolonged, and his prospect of enjoyment increased, by the failure to meet the lady in london.

willis french had more than once had occasion to remark that he owed some of his luckiest moments to his failures. he had tried his hand at several of the arts, only to find, in each case, the same impassable gulf between vision and execution; but his ill-success, which he always promptly recognized, had left him leisure to note and enjoy all the incidental compensations of the attempt. and how great some of these compensations were, he had never more keenly felt than on the day when two of the greatest came back to him merged in one glorious opportunity.

it was probable, for example, that if he had drawn a directer profit from his months of study in a certain famous parisian atelier, his labours would have left him less time in which to observe and study horace fingall, on the days when the great painter made his round among the students; just as, if he had written better poetry, mrs. morland, with whom his old friend lady brankhurst had once contrived to have him spend a sunday in the country, might have given him, during their long confidential talk, less of her sweet compassion and her bracing wisdom. both horace fingall and emily morland had, professionally speaking, discouraged their young disciple; the one had said “don’t write” as decidedly as the other had said “don’t paint”; but both had let him feel that interesting failures may be worth more in the end than dull successes, and that there is range enough for the artistic sensibilities outside the region of production. the fact of the young man’s taking their criticism without flinching (as he himself had been thankfully aware of doing) no doubt increased their liking, and thus let him farther into their intimacy. the insight into two such natures seemed, even at the moment, to outweigh any personal success within his reach; and as time removed him from the experience he had less and less occasion to question the completeness of the compensation.

since then, as it happened, his two great initiators had died within a few months of each other, emily morland prematurely, and at the moment when her exquisite art was gaining new warmth from the personal happiness at last opening to her, and horace fingall in his late golden prime, when his genius also seemed to be winged for new flights. except for the nearness of the two death dates, there was nothing to bring together in the public mind the figures of the painter and the poet, and willis french’s two experiences remained associated in his thoughts only because they had been the greatest revelations of temperament he had ever known. no one but emily morland had ever renewed in him that sense of being in the presence of greatness that he had first felt on meeting horace fingall. he had often wondered if the only two beings to whom he owed this emotion had ever known each other, and he had concluded that, even in this day of universal meetings, it was unlikely. fingall, after leaving the united states for paris toward his fortieth year, had never absented himself from france except on short occasional visits to his native country; and mrs. morland, when she at last broke away from her depressing isolation in a staffordshire parsonage, and set up her own house in london, had been drawn from there only by one or two holiday journeys in italy. nothing, moreover, could have been more unlike than the mental quality and the general attitude of the two artists. the only point of resemblance between them lay in the effect they produced of the divine emanation of genius. willis french’s speculations as to the result of a meeting between them had always resulted in the belief that they would not have got on. the two emanations would have neutralized each other, and he suspected that both natures lacked the complementary qualities which might have bridged the gulf between them. and now chance had after all linked their names before posterity, through the fact that the widow of the one had married the man who had been betrothed to the other! . . .

french’s brief glimpses of fingall and mrs. morland had left in him an intense curiosity to know something more of their personal history, and when his publisher had suggested his writing a book on the painter his first thought had been that here was an occasion to obtain the desired light, and to obtain it, at one stroke, through the woman who had been the preponderating influence in fingall’s art, and the man for whom emily morland had written her greatest poems.

that donald paul should have met and married the widow of horace fingall was one of the facts on which young french’s imagination had always most appreciatively dwelt. it was strange indeed that these two custodians of great memories, for both of whom any other marriage would have been a derogation, should have found the one way of remaining on the heights; and it was almost equally strange that their inspiration should turn out to be willis french’s opportunity!

at the very outset, the wonder of it was brought home to him by his having to ask for mrs. paul at what had once been mrs. morland’s house. mrs. morland had of course bequeathed the house to donald paul; and equally of course it was there that, on his marriage to mrs. fingall, donald paul had taken his wife. if that wife had been any other, the thought would have been one to shrink from; but to french’s mind no threshold was too sacred for the feet of horace fingall’s widow.

musing on these things as he glanced up and down the quiet street, the young man, with his sharp professional instinct for missing no chance that delay might cancel, wondered how, before turning from the door, he might get a glimpse of the house which was still — which, in spite of everything, would always be — emily morland’s.

“you were not thinking of looking at the house, sir?”

french turned back with a start of joy. “why, yes — i was!” he said instantly.

the parlour-maid opened the door a little wider. “of course, properly speaking, you should have a card from the agent; but mrs. paul did say, if anyone was very anxious — may i ask, sir, if you know mrs. paul?”

the young man lowered his voice reverentially to answer: “no; but i knew mrs. morland.”

the parlour-maid looked as if he had misunderstood her question. after a moment’s thought she replied: “i don’t think i recall the name.”

they gazed at each other across incalculable distances, and willis french found no reply. “what on earth can she suppose i want to see the house for?” he could only wonder.

her next question told him. “if it’s very urgent, sir — ” another glance at the cut of his coat seemed to strengthen her, and she moved back far enough to let him get a foot across the threshold. “would it be to hire or to buy?”

again they stared at each other till french saw his own wonder reflected in the servant’s doubtful face; then the truth came to him in a rush. the house was not being shown to him because it had once been emily morland’s and he had been recognized as a pilgrim to the shrine of genius, but because it was mrs. donald paul’s and he had been taken for a possible purchaser!

all his disenchantment rose to his lips; but it was checked there by the leap of prudence. he saw that if he showed his wonder he might lose his chance.

“oh, it would be to buy!” he said; for, though the mere thought of hiring was a desecration, few things would have seemed more possible to him, had his fortune been on the scale of his enthusiasm, than to become the permanent custodian of the house.

the feeling threw such conviction into his words that the parlour-maid yielded another step.

“the drawing-room is this way,” she said as he bared his head.