Julia's glance, full of affectionate appreciation, showed how wholly she divined his spirit of self-sacrifice. “We wouldn't care in the least for it,” she declared. “We enjoy being a little party by ourselves every whit as much as you do--and we both hate the people you get at table d'hotes--and besides, for that matter, if there are any real swells here, you may be sure they dine in their own rooms.”
“Why, of course!” Thorpe exclaimed swiftly, in palpable self-rebuke. “I don't know what I could have been thinking of. Of course they would dine in their rooms.”
Next morning, Thorpe rose earlier than ever--with the impression of a peculiarly restless and uncomfortable night behind him. It was not until he had shaved and dressed that he noted the altered character of the air outside. Although it was not fully daylight yet, he could see the outlines of the trees and vinerows on the big, snow-clad hill, which monopolized the prospect from his window, all sharp and clear cut, as if he were looking at them through an opera-glass. He went at once to the sitting-room, and thrust the curtains aside from one of the windows.
A miracle had been wrought in the night. The sky overhead was serenely cloudless; the lake beneath, stirring softly under some faint passing breeze, revealed its full breadth with crystalline distinctness. Between sky and water there stretched across the picture a broad, looming, dimly-defined band of shadow, marked here and there at the top by little slanting patches of an intensely glowing white. He looked at this darkling middle distance for a moment or two without comprehension. Then he turned and hurriedly moved to the door of Julia's room and beat upon it.
“Get up!” he called through the panels. “Here's your sunrise--here's your Alpine view. Go to your window and see it!”
A clear voice, not unmirthful, replied: “I've been watching it for half an hour, thanks. Isn't it glorious?”
He was more fortunate at the opposite door, for Alfred was still asleep. The young man, upon hearing the news, however, made a toilet of unexampled brevity, and came breathlessly forth. Thorpe followed him to the balcony, where he stood collarless and uncombed, with the fresh morning breeze blowing his hair awry, his lips parted, his eyes staring with what the uncle felt to be a painful fixedness before him.