Unheeding, he had reached the northern limits of the grounds, and now when he raised his gaze from the moss-tinged path he found himself in front of two great iron gates, which barred his way, and beyond which the avenue led straight on again, for all the world as though the gates were a mirror, and the vista ahead was but the reflection of that behind. But the form which stood some ten yards beyond the gate was no reflection of the figure which, motionless, with startled, enraptured eyes, gazed fixedly upon it.
In the center of the graveled way she stood, a tall, graceful woman in a white morning gown, guiltless of color save where the skirts, held up from the ground, exposed a gray and silken-clad ankle emerging from a foam of creamy lace, and ending at a small, high-arched shoe. In the hand not engaged with her skirts was a closed, white parasol. But Roger saw nothing of this, save as one may see dimly, unknowingly, the frame surrounding the picture upon which the gaze is fixed. His eyes were on the oval, delicately hued face, and his heart was beating tumultuously, exultantly; he had found his heroine! Before him stood in the flesh the image of his brain!
In age she might have been anywhere from twenty to twenty-five. The face was almost perfectly oval in contour, with a broad, high forehead, from which a mass of golden-brown hair waved backward. The eyes—at the moment more than ordinarily wide open—were far apart, large, of a color neither gray nor blue, but which in certain lights was almost a true violet. Above them dark brows arched delicately, like finely penciled lines. The nose was straight and long, starting well up between the shadowed eyes, and the nostrils were clear-cut and sensitive. The space beneath was short, and the cleft from nose to rosy lip was deep, and a little shadow dwelt within it.
The mouth was the fairest feature of all. A rosebud would have proved a poor simile for it, since it would have suggested something tiny and inadequate. The mouth was not small, nor was it large. The gently parted lips were at once generous and delicate. The upper was caught up into the truest of Cupid’s bows, and at each corner it ended in a little droop, that gave a touch of gravity to the face. The rounded chin was firm and strong, and a little hollow that held no likeness to a dimple lent a saving grace of gentleness. The head was poised with dignity above a full, rounded throat, and the whole carriage of the body suggested a gracious regality, just as the countenance bespoke a strong capacity for emotion.
Her complexion was fair, with a soft creaminess like that of a rose petal. The faint color that had sprung into her cheeks was rather a soft, warm glow than a blush, like a rosy light seen through ivory.
Above her head, clear against the background of distant verdure, the overhung branches were less closely woven, and the sunlight, screened and filtered, fell upon her in a flood of tender, pale green radiance, toning the white gown to hues of chrysoprasus and of beryl, tinging the fair face, in light and shadow, with its glamour, and bathing the whole figure in its strange and soft effulgence. It was a Whistler “Symphony in Green.”
Some of this Roger saw in the brief moment she allowed; much of it escaped him at the time, only to come to him later, when his senses, benumbed by the loveliness of the vision, recovered their powers. It is probable that she had become aware of his presence no whit earlier than he had discovered hers, for his rubber-soled shoes had made no sound on the smooth walk. During the moment that she stood there in a charming attitude of startled surprise, her eyes looking widely into his, her lips just parted for the exclamation that never came, the cheeks faintly glowing under his gaze, Roger stared silently, devouringly, reprehensibly, into her face, never asking himself whether what he saw was vision or reality, only joyed that he had found what he had so long sought. And then
Then there came a deep challenging bark as a slim-bodied, ridiculously important black-and-tan dachshund wiggled out from beneath a bush and faced Roger with belligerent brown eyes. And at the sound the woman’s startled attitude relaxed, her gaze broke from Roger’s, and, with the merest inclination of the head, she turned slowly and as slowly passed up the green-roofed avenue, the dachshund, after having emitted a final resentful woof in Roger’s direction, trotting importantly at her heels like a guard of honor.