Lion and the Unicorn | Page 9

about placing his plays. Helen soon made
other friends, and deserted the artists, with whom her work had first
thrown her. She seemed to prefer the society of the people who bought
her paintings, and who admired and made much of the painter. As she
was very beautiful and at an age when she enjoyed everything in life
keenly and eagerly, to give her pleasure was in itself a distinct pleasure;
and the worldly tired people she met were considering their own
entertainment quite as much as hers when they asked her to their

dinners and dances, or to spend a week with them in the country. In her
way, she was as independent as was Carroll in his, and as she was not
in love, as he was, her life was not narrowed down to but one ideal. But
she was not so young as to consider herself infallible, and she had one
excellent friend on whom she was dependent for advice and to whose
directions she submitted implicitly. This was Lady Gower, the only
person to whom Helen had spoken of Carroll and of his great feeling
for her. Lady Gower, immediately after her marriage, had been a
conspicuous and brilliant figure in that set in London which works
eighteen hours a day to keep itself amused, but after the death of her
husband she had disappeared into the country as completely as though
she had entered a convent, and after several years had then re-entered
the world as a professional philanthropist. Her name was now
associated entirely with Women's Leagues, with committees that
presented petitions to Parliament, and with public meetings, at which
she spoke with marvellous ease and effect. Her old friends said she had
taken up this new pose as an outlet for her nervous energies, and as an
effort to forget the man who alone had made life serious to her. Others
knew her as an earnest woman, acting honestly for what she thought
was right. Her success, all admitted, was due to her knowledge of the
world and to her sense of humor, which taught her with whom to use
her wealth and position, and when to demand what she wanted solely
on the ground that the cause was just.
She had taken more than a fancy for Helen, and the position of the
beautiful, motherless girl had appealed to her as one filled with dangers.
When she grew to know Helen better, she recognized that these fears
were quite unnecessary, and as she saw more of her she learned to care
for her deeply. Helen had told her much of Carroll and of his double
purpose in coming to London; of his brilliant work and his lack of
success in having it recognized; and of his great and loyal devotion to
her, and of his lack of success, not in having that recognized, but in her
own inability to return it. Helen was proud that she had been able to
make Carroll care for her as he did, and that there was anything about
her which could inspire a man whom she admired so much, to believe
in her so absolutely and for so long a time. But what convinced her that
the outcome for which he hoped was impossible, was the very fact that

she could admire him, and see how fine and unselfish his love for her
was, and yet remain untouched by it.
She had been telling Lady Gower one day of the care he had taken of
her ever since she was fourteen years of age, and had quoted some of
the friendly and loverlike acts he had performed in her service, until
one day they had both found out that his attitude of the elder brother
was no longer possible, and that he loved her in the old and only way.
Lady Gower looked at her rather doubtfully and smiled.
"I wish you would bring him to see me, Helen" she said; "I think I
should like your friend very much. From what you tell me of him I
doubt if you will find many such men waiting for you in this country.
Our men marry for reasons of property, or they love blindly, and are
exacting and selfish before and after they are married. I know, because
so many women came to me when my husband was alive to ask how it
was that I continued so happy in my married life."
"But I don't want to marry any one," Helen remonstrated gently.
"American girls are not always thinking only of getting married."
"What I meant was this," said Lady Gower, "that, in my experience, I
have heard of but few men who care in the way this young man seems
to care for you. You say you