They made plans for him and carried them out to a certain length;there the plans failed.Floyd might be led up to the water, but none could make him drink; there he took the bit in his teeth and went his own way.He would be invited to meet a girl at a dinner got up for his benefit, that he might meet her, and would spend the evening hanging over a little unheard-of country cousin with a low voice and soft eyes, entertaining her with stories of his country days or of his wanderings; or he would be put by some belle, and after five minutes' homage spend the time talking to some old lady about her grandchildren."You must marry," they said to him.
"When one rises from the dead," he replied.At length, his friends grew tired of helping him and gave him up, and he dropped out and settled down.Commiseration is one of the bitter things of life.
But Floyd had what is harder to bear than that.It did not affect his work.
It was only his health and his life that suffered.He was like a man who has lost the senses of touch and taste and sight.If he minded it, he did not show it.One can get used to being bedridden.
One thing about him was that he always appeared poor.He began to be known as an inventor and writer.It was known that he received high prices for what he did; but he appeared to be no better off than when he made nothing.
Some persons supposed that he gambled; others whispered that he spent it in other dissipation.In fact, one lady gave a circumstantial account of the way he squandered his money, and declared herself very glad that he had never visited her daughters.When this was repeated to Floyd, he said he fortunately did not have to account to her for the way he spent his money.He felt that the woman out under the marble cross knew how his money went, and so did the little cousin who was named after her, and who was at school.He had a letter from her in his pocket at that moment.
So he drifted on.
At length one evening he was at a reception in a strange city whither his business had taken him.The rooms were filled with light and beauty.
Floyd was standing chatting with a child of ten years, whom he found standing in a corner, gazing out with wide questioning eyes on the throng.
They were friends instantly, and he was telling her who the guests were, as they came sailing in, giving them fictitious names and titles.
"They are all queens," he told her, at which she laughed.
She pointed out a tall and stately woman with a solemn face, and with a gleaming bodice on like a cuirass, and her hair up on her head like a casque."Who is that?""Queen Semiramis."
"And who is that?" It was a stout lady with a tiara of diamonds, a red face, and three feathers.
"Queen Victoria, of course."
"And who am I?" She placed her little hand on her breast with a pretty gesture.
"The Queen of Hearts," said Floyd, quickly, at which she laughed outright.
"Oh! I must not laugh," she said, checking herself and glancing around her with a shocked look."I forgot.""You shall.If you don't, you sha'n't know who another queen is.""No, mamma told me I must not make a bit of noise; it is not style, you know, but you mustn't be so funny.""Good heavens!" said Floyd.
"Oh! who is this coming?" A lady richly dressed was making her way toward them."The Queen of Sheba -- coming to see Solomon," said Floyd, as she came up to him."Let me introduce you to a beautiful girl, Sarah Dangerlie," she said, and drew him through the throng toward a door, where he was presented to a tall and strikingly handsome girl and made his bow and a civil speech, to which the young lady responded with one equally polite and important.Other men were pressing around her, to all of whom she made apt and cordial speeches, and Floyd fell back and rejoined his little girl, whose face lit up at his return.
"Oh! I was so afraid you were going away with her.""And leave you? Never, I'm not so easily disposed of.""Everyone goes with her.They call her the Queen.""Do they?"
"Do you like her?"
"Yes."
"You don't," she said, looking at him keenly.
"Yes, she is beautiful."
"Everyone says so."
"She isn't as beautiful as someone else I know," said Floyd, pleasantly.
"Isn't she? As whom?"
Floyd took hold of the child's hand and said, "Let's go and get some supper.""I don't like her," said the little girl, positively.
"Don't you?" said Floyd.He stopped and glanced across the room toward where the girl had stood.He saw only the gleam of her fine shoulders as she disappeared in the crowd surrounded by her admirers.
A little later Floyd met the young lady on the stairway.
He had not recognized her, and was passing on, when she spoke to him.
"I saw you talking to a little friend of mine," she began, then --"Over in the corner," she explained.
"Oh! yes.She is sweet.They interest me.I always feel when I have talked with a child as if I had got as near to the angels as one can get on earth.""Do you know I was very anxious to meet you," she said.
"Were you? Thank you.Why?"
"Because of a line of yours I once read.""I am pleased to have written only one line that attracted your attention,"said Floyd, bowing.
"No, no -- it was this --
"The whitest soul of man or saint is black beside a girl's.""Beside a child's," said Floyd, correcting her.
"Oh! yes, so it is -- `beside a child's.'"Her voice was low and musical.Floyd glanced up and caught her look, and the color deepened in her cheek as the young man suddenly leant a little towards her and gazed earnestly into her eyes, which she dropped, but instantly raised again.
"Yes -- good-night," she held out her hand, with a taking gesture and smile.
"Good-night," said Floyd, and passed on up the stairs to the dressing-room.
He got his coat and hat and came down the stairway.A group seized him.
"Come to the club," they said.He declined.
"Roast oysters and beer," they said.
"No, I'm going home."
"Are you ill?" asked a friend.
"No, not at all.Why?"
"You look like a man who has seen a spirit.""Do I? I'm tired, I suppose.Good-night, -- good-night, gentlemen,"and he passed out.
"Perhaps I have," he said as he went down the cold steps into the frozen street.
