Evans_Infelice.txt topic ['13', '324', '378', '393']
CHAPTER I.
"Did you tell her that Dr. Hargrove is absent?"
"I did, ma'am; but she says she will wait."
"But, Hannah, it is very uncertain when he will return, and the night
is so stormy he may remain in town until to-morrow. Advise her to
call again in the morning."
"I said as much at the door, but she gave me to understand she came a
long way, and should not leave here without seeing the Doctor. She
told the driver of the carriage to call for her in about two hours,
as she did not wish to miss the railroad train."
"Where did you leave her? Not in that cold, dark parlour, I hope?"
"She sat down on one of the hall chairs, and I left her there."
"A hospitable parsonage reception! Do you wish her to freeze? Go and
ask her into the library, to the fire."
As Hannah left the room, Mrs. Lindsay rose and added two sticks of
oak wood to the mass of coals that glowed between the shining brass
andirons; then carefully removed farther from the flame on the hearth
a silver teapot and covered dish, which contained the pastor's
supper.
"Walk in, madam. I promise you nobody shall interfere with you. Miss
Elise, she says she wishes to see no one but the Doctor."
Hannah ushered the visitor in, and stood at the door, beckoning to
her mistress, who paused irresolute, gazing curiously at the muffled
form and veiled face of the stranger.
"Do not allow me to cause you any inconvenience, madam. My business
is solely with Dr. Hargrove, and I do not fear the cold."
The voice of the visitor was very sweet though tremulous, and she
would have retreated, but Mrs. Lindsay put her hand on the bolt of
the door, partly closing it.
"Pray be seated. This room is at your disposal. Hannah, e, throwing back her veil, and eagerly advancing.
"You are the Rev. Peyton Hargrove?"
"I am. What can I do for you, madam? Pray take this rocking chair."
She motioned it away, and exclaimed:
"Can you too have forgotten me?"
A puzzled expression crossed his countenance as he gazed searchingly
at her, then shook his head.
The glare of the fire, and the mellow glow of the student's lamp fell
full on the pale features, whose exceeding delicacy is rarely found
outside of the carved gems of the Stosch or Albani Cabinets. On camei
and marble dwell the dainty moulding of the oval cheek, the airy
arched tracery of the brows, the straight, slender nose, and clearly
defined cleft of the rounded chin, and nature only now and then
models them as a whole, in flesh. It was the lovely face of a young
girl, fair as one of the Frate's heavenly visions, but blanched by
some flood of sorrow that had robbed the full tender lips of bloom,
and bereft the large soft brown eyes of the gilding glory of hope.
"If I ever knew, I certainly have forgotten you."
"Oh--do not say so! You must recollect me; you are the only person
who can identify me. Four years ago I stood here, in this room. Try
to recall me."
She came close to him, and he heard her quick and laboured breathing,
and saw the convulsive quivering of her compressed lips.
"What peculiar circumstances marked my former acquaintance with you?
Your voice is quite familiar, but----"
He paused, passed his hand across his eyes, and before he could
complete the sentence, she exclaimed:
"Am I then so entirely changed? Did you not one May morning marry in
this room Minnie Merle to Cuthbert Laurance?"
"I remember that occasion very vividly, for in opposition to my
judgment I performed the ceremony; but Minnie Merle was a
low-statured, dark-haired child----" again he paused, and keenly
scanned the tall, slender, elegant figure, and the crimped waves of
shining hair that lay like a tangled mass of gold net on the low,
full, white brow.
"I was Minnie Merle. Your words of benediction made me Minnie
Laurance. God--and the angels know it is my name, my lawful name,--
but man denies it."
Something like a sob impeded her utterance, and the minister took her
hand.
"Where is your husband? Are you widowed so early?"
"Husband--my husband? One to cherish and protect, to watch over, and
love, and defend me;--if such be the duties and the tests of a
husband,--oh! then indeed I have never had one! Widowed did you say?
That means something holy,--sanctified by the shadow of death, and
the yearning sympathy and pity of the world; a widow has the right to
hug a coffin and a grave all the weary days of her lonely life, and
people look tenderly on her sacred weeds. To me, widowhood would be
indeed a blessing, Sir, I thought I had learned composure,
self-control, but the sight of this room,--of your countenance,--even
the strong breath of the violets and heliotrope there on the mantle,
in the same blood-coloured Bohemian vase where they bloomed that
day,--that May day,--all these bring back so overpoweringly the time
that is for ever dead to me,--that I feel as if I should suffocate."
She walked to the nearest window, threw up the sash, and while she
stood with the damp chill wind blowing full upon her the pastor heard
a moan, such as comes from meek, dumb creatures, wrung by the throes
of dissolution.
When she turned once more to the light, he saw an unnatural sparkle
in the dry, lustrous, brown eyes.
"Dr. Hargrove, give me the license that was handed to you by Cuthbert
Laurance."
"What value can it possess now?"
"Just now it is worth more to me than everything else in life,--more
to me than my hopes of heaven."
"Mrs. Laurance, you must remember that I refused to perform the
marriage ceremony, because I believed you were both entirely too
young. Your grandmother who came with you assured me she was your
sole guardian, and desired the marriage, and your husband, who seemed
to me a mere boy, quieted my objections by producing the license,
which he said exonerated me from censure, and relieved me of all
responsibility. With that morning's work I have never felt fully
satisfied, and though I know that any magistrate would probably have
performed the ceremony, I have sometimes thought I acted rashly, and
have carefully kept that license as my defence and apology."
"Thank God, that it has been preserved. Give it to me."
"Pardon me if I say frankly, I prefer to retain it. All licenses are
recorded by the officer who issued them, and by applying to him you
can easily procure a copy."
"Treachery baffles me there. A most opportune fire broke out eighteen
months ago in the room where those records were kept, and although
the court house was saved, the book containing my marriage license
was of course destroyed."
"But the clerk should be able to furnish a certificate of the facts."
"Not when he has been bribed to forget them. Please give me the paper
in your possession."
She wrung her slender fingers, and her whole frame trembled like a
weed on some bleak hillside, where wintry winds sweep unimpeded.
A troubled look crossed the grave, placid countenance of the pastor,
and he clasped his hands firmly behind him, as if girding himself to
deny the eloquent pleading of the lovely dark eyes.
"Sit down, madam, and listen to----"
"I cannot! A restless fever is consuming me, and nothing but the
possession of that license can quiet me. You have no right to
withhold it,--you cannot be so cruel, so wicked,--unless you also
have been corrupted, bought off!"
"Be patient enough to hear me. I have always feared there was
something wrong about that stwells
into waves that bear to our feet fateful countenances, unwelcome as
grave-ghouls,--and the world grows garrulous of incidents that once
more galvanize the shrouded Bygone. For four years the minister had
received no tidings of those whom he had so reluctantly joined in the
bonds of wedlock, and not even a reminiscence of that singular bridal
party had floated into his quiet parsonage study; but within
twenty-four hours he seemed destined to garner a plentiful harvest of
disagreeable data for future speculation. He had not yet reached his
lawyer's office, when, hearing his name pronounced vociferously, Dr.
Hargrove looked around and saw the postmaster standing in his door
and calling on him to enter.
"Pardon me, my dear sir, for shouting after you so unceremoniously;
but I saw you were not coming in, and knew it would promote your
interest to pay me a visit. Fine day at last, after all the rain and
murky weather. This crisp, frosty air sharpens one's wits,--a sort of
atmospheric pumice, don't you see, and tempts me to drive a good
bargain. How much will you give for a letter that has travelled half
around the world, and had as many adventures as Robinson Crusoe, or
Madame Pfeiffer?"
He took from a drawer a dingy and much-defaced envelope, whose
address was rather indistinct from having encountered a oath on its
journey.
"Are you sure that it is for me?" asked the minister, trying to
decipher the uncertain characters.
"Are there two of your name? This is intended for Reverend Peyton
Hargrove of St. ---- Church -- V----, United States of America. It
was enclosed to me by the Postmaster-General, who says that it
arrived last week in the long-lost mail of the steamship _Algol_,
which you doubtless recollect was lost some time ago,--plying
between New York and Havre; It now appears that a Dutch sailing
vessel bound for Tasmania--wherever that may be; somewhere among the
cannibals, I presume--boarded her after she had been deserted by the
crew, and secured the mail bags, intending to put in along the
Spanish coast and land them, but stress of weather drove them so far
out to sea, that they sailed on to some point in Africa, and as the
postmasters in that progressive and enlightened region did not serve
their apprenticeship in the United States Postal Bureau, you perceive
that your document has not had 'despatch.' If salt water is ever a
preservative, your news ought not to be stale."
"Thank you. I hope the contents will prove worthy of the care and
labour of its transmission. I see it is dated Paris--one year ago,
nearly. I am much obliged by your kind courtesy. Good-day."
Dr. Hargrove walked on, and, somewhat disappointed in not receiving
a moiety of information by way of recompense, the postmaster added:
"If you find it is not your letter bring it back, and I will start it
on another voyage of discovery, for it certainly deserves to get
home."
"There is no doubt whatever about it. It was intended for me."
Unfolding the letter, he had glanced at the signature, and now
hurrying homeward, read as follows:
"PARIS, _February 1st_,
"REV. PEYTON HARGROVE,--Hoping that, while entirely ignorant of
the facts and circumstances, you unintentionally inflicted upon
me an incalculable injury, I reluctantly address you with
reference to a subject fraught with inexpressible pain and
humiliation. Through your agency the happiness and welfare of my
only child, and the proud and unblemished name of a noble family,
have been wellnigh wrecked; but my profound reverence for your
holy office, persuades me to believe that you were unconsciously
the dupe of unprincipled and designing parties. When my son
Cuthbert entered ---- University, he was all that my fond heart
desired, all that his sainted mother could have hoped, and no
young gentleman on the wide Continent gave fairer promise of
future usefulness and distinction; but one year of demoralizing
association with dissipated and reckless youths undermined the
fair moral and intellectual structure I had so laboriously
raised, and in an unlucky hour he fell a victim to alluring
vices. Intemperance gradually gained such supremacy that he was
threatened with expulsion, and to crown all other errors he was,
while intoxicated, inveigled into a so-called marriage with a
young but notorious girl, whose only claim was her pretty face,
while her situation was hopelessly degraded. This creature,
Minnie Merle, had an infirm grandmother, who, in order to save
the reputation of the unfortunate girl, appealed so adroitly to
Cuthbert's high sense of honour, that her arguments, emphasized
by the girl's beauty and helplessness, prevailed over reason,
and--I may add--decency and one day when almost mad with brandy
and morphine he consented to call her his wife. Neither was of
age, and my son was not only a minor (lacking two months of being
twenty), but on that occasion was utterly irrational and
irresponsible, as I am prepared to prove. They intended to
conceal the whole shameful affair from me, but the old
grandmother--fearing that some untoward circumstance might mar
the scheme of possessing the ample fortune she well knew my boy
expected to control--wrote me all the disgraceful facts,
imploring my clemency, and urging me to remove Cuthbert from
associates outside of his classmates, who were dragging him to
ruin. If you, my dear sir, are a father (and I hope you are),
paternal sympathy will enable you to realize approximately the
grief, indignation, almost despairing rage into which I was
plunged. Having informed myself through a special agent sent to
the University of the utter unworthiness and disreputable
character of the connection forced upon me, I telegraphed for
Cuthbert, alleging some extraneous cause for requiring his
presence. Three days after his arrival at home, I extorted a full
confession from him, and we were soon upon the Atlantic. For a
time I feared that inebriation had seriously impaired his
intellect, but, thank God! temperate habits and a good
constitution finally prevailed, and when a year after we left
America Cuthbert realized all that he had hazarded during his
temporary insanity, he was so overwhelmed with mortification and
horror that he threatened to destroy himself. Satisfied that he
was more 'sinned against, than sinning,' I yet endeavoured to
deal justly with the unprincipled authors of the stain upon my
family, and employed a discreet agent to negotiate with them, and
to try to effect some compromise. The old woman went out to
California; the young one refused all overtures, and for a time
disappeared, but, as I am reliably informed, is now living in New
York, supported no one knows exactly by whom. Recently she has
made an imperious demand for the recognition of a child, who she
declares shall one day inherit the Laurance estate; but I have
certain facts in my possession which invalidate this claim, and
if necessary can produce a certificate to prove that the birth of
the child occurred only seven months after the date of the
ceremony, which she contends made her Cuthbert's wife. She
rejects the abundant pecuniary provision which has been
repeatedly offered, and in her last impertinent and insanely
abusive communication, threatens a suit to force the
acknowledgment of the marriage, and of the child, stating that
you, sir, hold the certificate or rather the license warranting
the marriage, and that you will espouse and aid in prosecuting
her iniquitous claims. My son is now a reformed and comparatively
happy man, but should this degrading and bitterly repented
episode of his collage life be thrust before the public, and
allowed to blacken the fair escutcheon we are so jealously
anxious to protect, I dread the conought to the convent.
Regina's eager survey showed her only a gentleman, sitting close to
the grating, and an expression of keen disappointment swept over her
countenance, which had been a moment before eloquent with expectation
of meeting her mother.
"Come here, Regina, and speak to Mr. Palma," said the soft, velvet
voice behind the lattice.
The visitor turned around, rose, and watched the slowly advancing
figure.
She was dressed in blue muslin, the front of which was concealed by
her white bib-apron, and her abundant glossy hair was brushed
straight back from her brow, confined at the top of her head by a
blue ribbon, and thence fell in shining waves below her waist. One
hand hung listlessly at her side, the other clasped the drooping lily
and held it against her heart.
The slightly curious expression of the stranger gave place to
astonishment and involuntary admiration as he critically inspected
the face and form; and, fixing her clear, earnest eyes on him, Regina
saw a tall, commanding man of certainly not less than thirty years,
with a noble massive head, calm pale features almost stern when in
repose, and remarkably brilliant piercing black eyes, that were
doubtless somewhat magnified by the delicate steel-rimmed spectacles
he habitually wore. His closely cut hair clustered in short thick
waves about his prominent forehead, which in pallid smoothness
resembled a slab of marble, and where a slight depression usually
marks the temples his swelled boldly out, rounding the entire outline
of the splendidly developed brow. He wore neither moustache nor
beard, and every line of his handsome mouth and finely modelled chin
indicated the unbending tenacity of purpose and imperial pride which
had made him a ruler even in his cradle, and almost a dictator in
later years.
In a certain diminished degree children share the instinct whereby
brutes discern almost infallibly the nature of those who in full
fruition of expanded reason tower above and control them; and, awed
by something which she read in this dominative new face, Regina stood
irresolute in front of him, unwilling to accept the shapely white
hand held out to her.
He advanced a step, and took her fingers into his soft warm palm.
"I hope, Miss Regina, that you are glad to see me."
Her eyes fell from his countenance to the broad seal ring on his
little finger, then, gazing steadily up into his, she said:
"I think I never saw you before, and why should I be glad? Why did
you come and ask for me?"
"Because your mother sent me to look after you."
"Then I suppose, sir, you are very good; but I would rather see my
mother. Is she well?"
"Almost well now, though she has been quite ill. If you promise to be
very good and obedient, I may find a letter for you, somewhere in my
pockets. I have just been telling Mother Aloysius, to whom I brought
a letter, that I have come to remove you from her kind sheltering
care, as your mother wishes you for a while at least to be placed in
a different position, and I have promised to carry out her
instructions. Here is her letter. Shall I read it to you, or are you
sufficiently advanced to be able to spell it out without my
assistance?"
He held up the letter, and she looked at him proudly, with a faint
curl in her dainty lip, and a sudden lifting of her lovely arched
eyebrows, which, without the aid of verbal protest, he fully
comprehended. A smile hovered about his mouth, and disclosed a set of
glittering perfect teeth, but he silently resumed his seat. As Regina
broke the seal, Mother said:
"Wait, dear, and read it later. Mr. Palmer has already been detained
some time, and says he is anxious to catch the train. Run up to the
wardrobe, and Sister Helena will change your dress. She is packing
your clothes."
When the door closed behind her a heavy sigh floated through the
grating, and the sweet seraphic face of the nun clouded.
"I wish we could keep her always; it is a sadly solemn thing to cast
such a child as she is into the world's whirlpool of sin and sorrow.
To-day she is as spotless in soul as one of our consecrated
annunciation lilies; but the dust of vanity and selfishness will
tarnish, and the shock of adversity will bruise, and the heat of the
battle of life that rages so fiercely in the glare of the outside
world will wither and deface the sweet blossom we have nurtured so
carefully."
"In view of the peculiar circumstances that surround her, her removal
impresses me as singularly injudicious, and I have advised against
it, but her mother is inflexible."
"We have never been able to unravel the mystery that seems to hang
about the child, although the Bishop assured us we were quite right
in consenting to assume the charge of her."
From beneath her heavy black hood, Mother's meek shy eyes searched
the non-committal countenance before her, and found it about as
satisfactorily responsive as some stone sphinx half-sepulchred in
Egyptic sand.
"May I ask, sir, if you are at all related to Regina?"
"Not even remotely; am merely her mother's legal counsellor, and the
agent appointed by her to transfer the child to different
guardianship. I repeat, I deem the change inexpedient, but
discretionary powers have not been conferred on me. She seems rather
a mature bit of royalty for ten years of age. Is the intellectual
machinery at all in consonance with the refined perfection of the
external physique?"
"She has a fine active brain, clear and quick, and is very well
advanced in her studies, for she is fond of her books. Better than
all, her heart is noble, and generous, and she is a conscientious
little thing, never told a story in her life; but at times we have
had great difficulty in controlling her will, which certainly is the
most obstinate I have ever encountered."
"She evidently does not suggest wax, save in the texture of her fine
skin, and one rarely finds in a child's face so much of steel as is
ambushed in the creases of the rose leaves that serve her as lips. If
her will matches her mother's, this little one certainly was not
afflicted with a misnomer at her baptism." He rose, looked at his
watch, and walked across the room as if to inspect a _Pieta_ that
hung upon the wall. Unwilling to conclude an interview which had
yielded her no information, Mother Aloysius patiently awaited the
result of the examination, but he finally went to the window, and a
certain unmistakable expression of countenance which can be compared
only to a locking of mouth and eyes, warned her that he was alert and
inflexible. With a smothered sigh she left her seat.
"As you seem impatient, Mr. Palma, I will endeavour to hasten the
preparations for your departure."
"If you please, Mother; I shall feel indebted to your kind
consideration."
Nearly an hour elapsed ere she returned leading Regina, and as the
latter stood between Mother and Sister Angela, with a cluster of
fresh fragrant lilies in her hand, and her tender face blanched and
tearful, it seemed to the lawyer as if indeed the pet ewe lamb were
being led away from peaceful flowery pastures, from the sweet
sanctity of the cloistral fold, out through thorny devious paths
where Temptations prowl wolf-fanged, or into fierce conflicts that
end in the social shambles, those bloodless abattoirs where malice
mangles humanity. How many verdure-veiled, rose-garlanded pitfalls
yawned in that treacherous future now stretching before her like
summer air, here all gold and blue, yonder with purple glory crowning
the dim far away? Intuitively she recognized the fact that she was
confronting the first cross roads in her hitherto monotonous life,
and a vague dread flitted like ill-omened birds before her, darkening
her vision.
In the gladiatorial arena of the court-room, Mr. Palma was regarded
as a large-brained, nimble-witted, marble-hearted man, of vast
ambition and tireless energy in the acquisition of his aims; but his
colleagues and clients would as soon have sought chivalric tenderness
in a bronze statue, or a polished obelisk of porphyry. To-day as he
curiously watched the quivering yet proud little girlish face, her
brave struggles to meet the emergency touched some chord far down in
his reticent stern nature, and he suddenly stooped, and took her
hand, folding it up securely in his.
"Are you not quite willing to trust yourself with me?"
She hesitated a moment, then said with a slight wavering in her low
tone:
"I have been very happy here, and I love the Sisters dearly; but you
are my mother's friend, and whatever she wishes me to do of course
must be right."
Oh beautiful instinctive faith in maternal love and maternal wisdom!
Wot ye the moulding power ye wield, ye mothers of America?
Pressing her fingers gently as if to reassure her, he said:
"I dislike to hurry you away from these kind Sisters, but if your
baggage is ready we have no time to spare."
The nuns wept silently as she embraced them for the last time, kissed
them on both cheeks, then turned and suffered Mr. Palma to lead her
to the carriage, whither her trunk had already been sent.
Leaning out, she watched the receding outlines of the convent until a
bend of the road concealed even the belfry, and then she stooped and
kissed the drooping lilies in her lap.
Her companion expected a burst of tears, but she sat erect and quiet,
and not a word was uttered until they reached the railway station and
entered the cars. Securing a double seat he placed her at the window,
and sat down opposite. It was her introduction to railway travel, and
when the train moved off, and the locomotive sounded its prolonged
shriek of departure, Regina started up, but, as if ashamed of her
timidity, coloured and bit her lip. Observing that she appeared
interested in watching the country through which they sped, Mr. Palma
drew a book from his valise, and soon became so absorbed in the
contents that he forgot tie silent figure on the seat before him.
The afternoon wore away, the sun went down, and when the lamps were
lighted the lawyer suddenly remembered his charge.
"Well, Regina, how do you like travelling on the cars?"
"Not at all; it makes my head ache."
"Take off your hat, and I will try to make you more comfortable."
He untied a shawl secured to the outside of his valise, placed it on
the arm of the seat, and made her lay her head upon it.
Keeping his finger as a mark amid the leaves of his book, he said:
"We shall not reach our journey's end until to-morrow morning, and I
advise you to sleep as much as possible. Whenever you feel hungry you
will find some sandwiches, cake, and fruit in the basket at your
feet."
She looked at him intently, and interpreting the expression he added:
"You wish to ask me something? Am I so very frightful that you dare
not question me?"
"Will you tell me the truth, if I ask you?"
"Most assuredly."
"Mr. Palma, when shall I see my mother?"
His eyes went down helplessly before the girl's steady gaze, and he
hesitated a moment.
"Really, I cannot tell exactly,--but I hope----"
She put up her small hand quickly, with a gesture that silenced him.
"Don't say any more, please. I never want to know half of anything,
and you can't tell me all. Good-night, Mr. Palma."
She shut her eyes.
This man of bronze who could terrify witnesses, torture and overwhelm
the opposition, and thunder so successfully from the legal rostrum,
sat there abashed by the child's tone and manner, and as he watched
her he could not avoid smiling at her imperious mandate. Although
silent, it was one o'clock before she fell into a deep, sound
slumber, and then the lawyer leaned forward and studied the dreamer.
The light from the lamp shone upon her, and the long silky black
lashes lay heavily on her white cheeks. Now and then a sigh passed
her lips, and once a dry sob shook her frame, as if she were again
passing through the painful ordeal of parting; but gradually the
traces of emotion disappeared, and that marvellous peace which we
find only in children's countenances, or on the faces of the
dead,--and which is nowhere more perfect than in old Greek
statuary,--settled like a benediction over her features. Her frail
hands clasped over her breast still held the faded lilies, and to
Erle Palma she seemed too tender and fair for rude contact with the
selfish world, in which he was so indefatigably carving out fame and
fortune. He wondered how long a time would be requisite to transform
this pure, spotless, ingenuous young thing into one of the fine
fashionable miniature women with frizzed hair and huge _paniers_,
whom he often met in the city, with school-books in their hands, and
bold, full-blown coquetry in their eyes?
Certainly he was as devoid of all romantic weakness as the
propositions of Euclid, or the pages of Blackstone, but something in
the beauty and helpless innocence of the sleeper appealed with
unwonted power to his dormant sympathy, and, suspecting that lurking
spectres crouched in her future, he mutely entered into a compact
with his own soul, not to lose sight of, but to befriend her
faithfully, whenever circumstances demanded succour.
"Upon my word, she looks like a piece of Greek sculpture, and be her
father whom he may, there is no better blood than beats there at her
little dimpled wrists. The pencilling of the eyebrows is simply
perfect."
He spoke inaudibly, and just then she stirred and turned. As she
moved, something white fluttered from one of the ruffled pockets of
her apron, and fell to the floor. He picked it up and saw it was the
letter he had given her some hours before. The sheet was folded
loosely, and glancing at it, as it opened in his hand, he saw in
delicate characters: "Oh, my baby,--my darling! Be patient and trust
your mother." An irresistible impulse made him look up, and the
beautiful solemn eyes of the girl were fixed upon him, but instantly
her black lashes covered them.
For the first time in years he felt the flush of shame mount into his
cold haughty face, yet even then he noted the refined delicacy which
made her feign sleep.
"Regina."
She made no movement.
"Child, I know you are awake. Do you suppose I would stoop to read
your letter clandestinely? It dropped from your pocket, and I have
seen only one line."
She put out her slender hand, took the letter, and answered:
"My mother writes me that you are her best friend, and I intend to
believe that all you say is true."
"Do you think I read your letter?"
"I shall think no more about it."
"I will paint her as I see her,
Ten times have the lilies blown
Since she looked upon the sun,
Face and figure of a child,--
Though top calm, you think, and tender,
For the childhood you would lend her."
CHAPTER IV.
"Indeed, Peyton, you distress me. What can be the matter? I heard you
walking the floor of your room long after midnight, and feared you
were ill."
"Not ill, Elise, but sorely perplexed. If I felt at liberty to
communicate all the circumstances to you, doubtless you would readily
comprehend and sympathize with the peculiar difficulties that
surround me; but unfortunately I am bound by a promise which prevents
me from placing all the facts in your possession. Occasionally
ministers involuntarily become the custodians of family secrets that
oppress their hearts and burden them with unwelcome responsibility,
and just now I am suffering from the consequences of a rash promise
which compassion extorted from me years ago. While I heartily regret
it, my conscience will not permit me to fail in its fulfilment."
An expression of pain and wounded pride overshadowed Mrs. Lindsay's
usually bright, happy face.
"Peyton, surely you do not share the unjust opinion so fashionable
nowaday, that women are unworthy of being entrusted with a secret?
What has so suddenly imbued you with distrust of the sister who has
always shared your cares, and endeavoured to divide your sorrows? Do
you believe me capable of betraying your confidence?
"No, dear. In all t you are my mother's best friend, I shall pray for you every
night."
His sternly moulded lips twitched with some strange passing
reminiscence of earlier years, but the emotion vanished, and,
pressing her hands gently, he turned and went down the walk leading
to the gate.
CHAPTER V.
"Please let me come in, and help you."
Regina knocked timidly at the door of the parsonage guest's chamber,
and Mrs. Lindsay answered from within:
"Come in? Of course you may, but what help do you imagine you can
render, you useless piece of prettiness? Shall I set you on the
mantlepiece between the china kittens, and the glass lambs, right
under the sharp nose of my grandmother's portrait, where her great
solemn eyes will keep you in order? Whence do all those delectable
odours come? Are you a walking _sachet?_"
She was kneeling before an open drawer of the bureau, methodically
arranging sundry garments, and, pausing in the task, looked over her
shoulder at the girl who stood near, holding her hands behind her.
"I am sure I could help you, if I were only allowed to try. I am
quite a large girl now, more than a year older than when I came here,
and Hannah has taught me to do ever so many things. She says I will
be a famous cook some day. You didn't know that I made up the Sally
Lunn for tea?"
"What an ambitious bit of majesty you are! You wish to reign in the
kitchen, rule in the poultry yard, and now presume to invade my
province--my special kingdom of making things ready for the Bishop?
Have you been anointing yourself with a whole vial of Lubin's extract
of--Ah!--delicious--what is it?"
"Whatever it may be, will you let me fix it to suit myself on the
Bishop's bureau?"
"No, you impertinent, wily Delilah in short clothes! I never promise
in the dark; show it to me first, and then perhaps I may negotiate
with you. You know as well as I do that the Bishop dearly loves
perfumes, and if I should generously concede you the privilege of
presenting 'sweet-smelling savours' unto him you might some day
depose me--and I wish you distinctly to understand that I intend to
reign over him as long as I live; not an inch of territory shall you
filch."
Regina held up her hands, displaying in one several feathery sprays
of Belgian honeysuckle, with half of its petals pearl, half of the
palest pink; in the other a bunch of double violets of the rarest
shade of delicate lilac, so unusual in the floral kingdom.
"You should be called 'Mab,' and ride about the world on a butterfly,
or a streak of moonshine. How did you coax or conjure that
honeysuckle into blooming before its appointed time?"
"Here are three pieces, two for the Bishop, and one for you. May I
fasten it in your hair?"
"You recite a lesson in history every day, don't you?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Have you come to the Salem-witches yet?"
"Not yet. What has my history to do with this honeysuckle?"
"When you study metaphysics and begin the chase after that
psychological fox--the-law-of-association-of-ideas, you will
understand. Meanwhile, thank your stars, dear, that you did not live
in Massachusetts some years ago, or you would certainly nave gone to
heaven in the shape of smoke. How you stare, you white owl! As if you
thought St. Vitus had rented my tongue for a dancing-saloon. It is
all because the Bishop is coming. My blessed Bishop! Yes, put the
handsomest spray in my hair, and then, if you make me look young and
very pretty, you may do as you like with the others."
Still kneeling, she inclined her head, while Regina twisted the
wreath around the coil of neatly braided hair. Then, kissing the girl
lightly on her cheek, Mrs. Lindsay closed the drawer and rose.
Drawing a silver cup from her pocket, Regina filled it with water,
placed it close to the mirror, and proceeded to arrange the violets
and honeysuckle. Stepping back to inspect the effect, she folded her
hands and smiled.
"Mrs. Lindsay, tell him I gathered them for him, because he was kind
to me when I came here a stranger, and I wish to thank him. When he
is at home it seems always summer-time, don't you think so?"
The mother's eyes filled, and, laying a hand on the girl's head, she
answered:
"Yes, dear, he is my sunshine, and my summer-time."
"How long will he stay with us?"
"He could not say positively when his last letter was written, but I
hope to keep him several months. You know it is possible he may be
forced to go to England, in order to complete some of his studies
before--oh, Regina! could we bear to have two oceans swelling between
our Bishop and us?"
"Why, then, will you let him go?"
"Can I help it?"
"You are his mother, and he would never disobey you."
"But he is a man, and I cannot tie him to my apron strings as I do my
bunch of keys. I must not stand in the way, and prevent him from
doing his duty."
"I suppose I don't yet know everything about such matters, but I
should think it was his duty first to please you. How devoted he is
to 'duty'? It must be horrible to leave all one loves, and go out to
India among the heathens."
"Pray, what do you know about the heathens?" said a manly voice, and
instantly two strong arms gathered the pair in a cordial embrace.
"My son! You stole a march upon me! Oh, Douglass, I never was half so
glad to see you as now!"
"If you do not stop crying, I shall feel tempted to doubt you. Tears
are so unusual in your eyes that I shall be disposed to regard your
welcome as equivocal."
He kissed her on cheek and lips, and added:
"Regina, can't you contrive to say you are a little glad to see me?"
There was no reply, and, turning to look for her, he found she had
vanished.
"Queer little thing, she has gone without a word, though she insisted
on dressing her silver cup with those flowers, which she thought
would suggest to you her gratitude for your numerous little acts of
kindness. Have you seen your uncle?"
"Yes, mother, I stopped a few moments at the church, where he is
engaged with one of the committee. Uncle Peyton is not looking well.
Has he been sick?"
"He has suffered a good deal with his throat since you left us, and
now and then I notice he coughs. He is overworked, and now that you
can fill his pulpit he will have an opportunity to rest. Oh, my son!
in every respect your visit is a blessing."
Leaning her head on his breast, she looked up with proud and almost
adoring tenderness, and, drawing his face down to hers, held it
close, kissing him with that intense clinging fervour which only
mother-love kindles.
"Does my little mother know that she is spoiling her boy by inches;
making a nursery darling, instead of a hardy soldier of him? You are
weaving silken bonds to fasten me more securely here, when you ought
rather to aid me in snapping the fetters of affection, habit, and
association. Come, be so good as to brush the dust out of my hair,
while you tell me everything about everybody, which you have failed
to write during these long months of absence."
For some time they talked of family matters, of occurrences in V----,
of some invidious and unkind remarks, some caustic personal
criticisms upon the pastor's household affairs, which had emanated
from Mrs. Prudence Potter, a widowed member of the congregation, who
had once rashly dreamed of presiding over the clerical hearth as Mrs.
Peyton Hargrove, and having failed to possess her kingdom had become
a merciless spy upon all that happened in the forbidden realm.
"Poor Mrs. Prue! what a warfare exists between her name and her
character. She should petition the legislature to allow her to be
called--Mrs. Echidna! My son, I think modern civilization will remain
incomplete, will not perform its mission, until it relieves society
from the depredations of these scorpions, by colonizing them where
they will expend their poison without dangerous results. If sting
they must, let it be among themselves. If I were lunatic enough to
desire to vote, I should spend my franchise in favour of a 'Gossip
Reservation'--somewhere close to the Great Western Desert, to wore elegant felicitous pose. I should like her
photograph at this moment."
In the grotto scene, Amy was attired in pale sea-green silk, and her
streaming hair braided it with yellow light, as she shrank back from
the haughty visage of the Queen.
Rapidly the end approached, courtiers and maids of honour crowded
upon the stage, and thither Elizabeth dragged the unhappy wife, into
the presence of the earl, crying in thunder tones: "My Lord of
Leicester! knowest thou this woman?"
The craven silence of the husband, the desperate rally of the
suffering wife to shield him from the impending wrath, until at last
she was borne away insensible in Hunsdon's strong arms, all followed
in quick succession, and Amy's ill-starred career approached its
close, in the last interview with her husband.
When Cuthbert Laurance was a grey-haired man, trembling upon the
brink of eternity, there came a vision in the solemn hours of night,
and the form of Amy, wan as some marble statue, breathed again in his
ear the last words she uttered that night.
"Take your ill-fated wife by the hand, lead her to the footstool of
Elizabeth's throne; say that 'in a moment of infatuation moved by
supposed beauty, of which none perhaps can now trace even the
remains, I gave my hand to this poor Amy Robsart.' You will then have
done justice to me, and to your own honour; and should law or power
require you to part from me, I will offer no opposition, since I may
then with honour hide a grieved and broken heart in those shades,
from which your love withdrew me. Then--have but a little
patience--and Amy's life will not long darken your brighter
prospects."
The fatal hour arrived; the gorgeous pomp and ceremonial of the
court-pageant had passed away, and in a dim light the treacherous
balcony at Cumnor Place was visible. In the hush that pervaded the
theatre, the minister heard the ticking of his watch, and Mrs.
Laurance the laboured breathing of her husband.
Upon the profound silence broke the tramp of a horse's hoofs in the
neighbouring courtyard, then Varney's whistle in imitation of the
earl's signal when visiting the countess.
Instantly the door of her chamber swung open, and, standing a moment
upon the threshold, Amy in her fleecy-white drapery wavered like a
drifting cloud, then moved forward upon the balcony; the trapdoor
fell, and the lovely marble face with its lustrous brown eyes sank
into the darkness of death.
CHAPTER VII.
To men and women of intensely emotional nature, it sometimes happens
that a day of keen and torturing suspense, or a night's vigil of
great anguish, mars and darkens a countenance more indelibly than the
lapse of several ordinary monotonous years; and as Madame Orme sat in
her reception-room at one o'clock on the following afternoon,
awaiting the visit of the minister, the blanched face was far sterner
and prouder than when yesterday's sun rippled across it, and bluish
shadows beneath the large eyes that had not closed for twenty-four
hours lent them a deeper and more fateful glow.
The soft creamy folds of her Cashmere robe were relieved at the
throat by a knot of lilac ribbon, and amid its loops were secured
clusters of violets, that matched in hue the long spike of hyacinth
which was fastened in one side of the coiled hair, twined just behind
the ear, and drooped low on the snowy neck. Before her on a gilded
stand was the purple pyramid of flowers she had brought from the
theatre, and beside them lay several perfumed envelopes with
elaborate monograms. These notes contained tributes of praise from
strangers who had been fascinated by her "Amy Robsart," and begged
the honour of an interview, or the favour of a "photograph taken in
the silken cymar which so advantageously displayed the symmetry of
her figure."
Among the latter she had recognized the handwriting of Mr. Laurance,
though the signature was "Jules Duval," and her fingers had shrunk
from the folds of rose paper, as though scorched by flame. Lying
there on the top of the _billets-doux_, the elegant, graceful
chirography of the "Madame Odille Orme" drew her gaze, like the
loathsome fascination of a basilisk, and taking a package of notes
from her pocket, she held them for a moment close to the satin
envelope. Upon one the name of the popular actress; on the others--in
the same peculiar beautiful characters--"Minnie Merle." She put away
the latter, and a flash of scorn momentarily lighted her rigid face.
"Craven as of old! Too cowardly to boldly ask the thing his fickle
fancy favours; he begs under borrowed names. Doubtless his courage
wilts before his swarthy, bold-eyed Xantippe, who allows him scant
latitude for flirtations with pretty actresses. To be thrown
aside--trampled down--for such a creature as Abbie Ames! his
coarse-featured, diamond-dowered bride! Ah! my veins run lava; when I
think of her thick heavy lips, pressing that haughty perfect mouth,
where mine once clung so fondly! Last night the two countenances
seemed like 'as Hyperion to a Satyr!' How completely he sold his
treacherous beauty to the banker's daughter, whom to-day he would
willingly betray for a fairer, fresher face. Craven traitor!"
She passed her handkerchief across her lips, as if to efface some
imaginary stain, and they slowly settled back into their customary
stern curves.
Just then a timid tap upon the door of the reception-room was
followed almost simultaneously by the entrance of Mrs. Waul, who
held a card in her hand.
"The waiter has just brought this up. What answer shall he take
back?"
Mrs. Orme glanced at it, sprang to her feet, and a vivid scarlet
bathed her face and neck.
"Tell him--No! no--no! Madame Orme begs to decline the honour."
Then the crimson tide as suddenly ebbed, she grew ghastly in her
colourlessness, and her bloodless lips writhed, as she called after
the retreating figure:
"Stop! Come back,--let me think."
She walked to the window, and stood for several moments as still as
the bronze Mercury on the mantel. When she turned around, her
features were as fixed as if they belonged to some sculptured slab
from Persepolis.
"Pray don't think me weak and fickle, but indeed, Mrs. Waul, some of
my laurels gash like a crown of thorns. Tell the waiter to show this
visitor up, after five minutes, and then I wish you to come back and
sit with your knitting yonder, at the end of the room. And please
drop the curtain there, the pink silk will make me look a trifle less
ghostly after last night's work. You see I am disappointed, I
expected the American minister on business, and he sends this Paris
beau to make his apologies; that is all."
As the old lady disappeared, Mrs. Orme shuddered, and muttered with
clenched teeth:
"All have a Gethsemane sooner or later, and mine has overtaken me
before I am quite ready. God grant me some strengthening angel!"
She sank back into the arm chair, and drew the oval gilt table before
her as a barrier, while some inexplicable, intuitive impulse prompted
her to draw from her bosom a locket containing Regina's miniature.
Touching a spring, she looked at the childish features so singularly
like those she had seen the previous evening, and when Mrs. Waul
returned and seated herself at the end of the room, the spring
snapped, the locket lay in one hand, the minister's card in the
other.
Mrs. Orme heard the sound on the stairs and along the hall--the
well-remembered step. Amid the tramp of a hundred she could have
singled it out, so often in bygone years had she crouched under the
lilacs that overhung the gate, listening for its rapid approach,
waiting to throw herself into the arms that would clasp her so
fondly; to-day that unaltered step smote her ears like an echo from
the tomb, and for an instant her heart stood still, and she shut her
eyes; but the door swung back, and Mr. Laurance stood upon the
threshold. As he advanced, she rose, and when he stood before her
with outstretched hand, she ignored it, merely rested her palm on the
table between them; and glancing at the card in her fininterrupted in some favourite study to take cognizance of an
unexpected, unwelcome, and altogether unpleasant fact, majestically
refuses to inspect, and dogmatically waves it aside, as if to ignore
were to annihilate.
"Now, Peyton, for a sensible man (to say nothing of the astute
philosopher and the erudite theologian), you certainly do indulge in
the most remarkable spasms of wilful, obstinate, premeditated
blindness. You need not stare so desperately at that page, for I
intend to talk to you, and it is useless to try to snub either me or
my facts. Regina is young, I know, not quite fourteen, but she is
more precocious, more mature, than many girls are at sixteen; and you
seem to forget that, having always associated with grown people, she
has imbibed their ideas and caught their expressions, instead of the
more juvenile forms of thought and speech usual in children who live
among children. She has as far outgrown jumping-ropes as you have
tops and kites, and has no more relish for fairy tales than your
reverence has for base-ball, or my Bishop here for marbles. Suppose
last October I had sprinkled a paper of lettuce-seed in the open
border of the garden, and on the same day you had sown a lot of
lettuce in the hot-beds against the brick wall, where all the
sunshine falls: would you refuse your crisp, tempting, forced salad,
because it had reached perfection so rapidity?"
"Mother, do you intend us to understand that Regina is very tender,
and very verdant?" asked Mr. Lindsay, looking up from a grammar that
lay open before him.
"I intend you, sir, to study your Hindustanee, and your Tamil, while
I experiment upon the value of analogical reasoning in my discussions
with your uncle. Now, Peyton, you see that child's mind has been for
nearly four years in an intellectual hotbed,--sunned in the light of
religion, moistened with the dew of philosophy, cultivated
systematically with the prongs and hoes of regular study, of example,
and precept; and, being a vigorous sprout when she was transplanted,
she has made good use of her opportunities, and, behold! early mental
salad, and very fine! You men theorize, ratiocinate, declaim,
dogmatize about abstract propositions, and finally get your feet
tangled and stumble over facts right under your noses, that women
would never fail to pick up and put aside. The soul of Thales
possesses you all, whereas we who sit at the cradle, and guide the
little tottering feet, study the ground and sweep away the
stumbling-blocks. Day after day you and Douglass discuss all kinds of
scientific theories, and quote pagan authorities and infidel systems
in the presence of Regina, who sits in her low chair over there in
the corner of the fireplace as quiet as a white mouse, listening to
every word, though 'Hans Christian Andersen' lies open on her lap,
and scarcely winking those blue eyes of hers, that are as solemn as
if they belonged to the Judges of Israel. If a child is raised in a
carpenter's shop, with all manner of sharp, dangerous often two-edged
tools scattered around in every direction, who wonders that the
little fingers are prematurely gashed and scarred? You and Douglass
imagine she is dreaming about the number of elves that dance on the
greensward on moonlight nights, or the spangles on their lace wings;
or that she is studying the latitude and longitude of the capital of
the last territory which Congress elevated to the uncertain and
tormenting dignity of nominal self-government, that once (_vide_
'obsolete civil hallucinations') inhered in an American State; or
perhaps you believe the child is longing for a pot of sugar candy?
Then rub your eyes, you ecclesiastical bats, and let me show you the
'outcome' of all this wise and learned chat, with which you edify one
another. You know she beguiled me into giving her lessons on the
organ, as well as the piano, and yesterday when I went over to the
church at instruction hour, I was astonished at a prelude, which she
had evidently improvised. Screened from her view, I listened till she
finished playing. Of course I praised her (for really she has
remarkable talent), and asked her when she began to compose, to
improvise. Now what do you suppose she answered? A brigade of
Philadelphia lawyers could never guess. She looked at me very
steadily, and said as nearly as I can quote her words: 'I really
don't know exactly when I began, but I suppose a long time ago, when
I wore brown feathers, and went to sleep with my head under my wing,
as all nightingales do.' Said I: 'What upon earth do you mean?' She
replied: 'Why of course I mean when I was a nightingale, before I
grew to be a human being. Didn't you hear Mr. Hargrove last week
reading from that curious book, in which so many queer things were
told about transmigration, and how the soul of a musical child came
from the nightingale, the sweetest of singers? And don't you
recollect Mr. Lindsay said that Plato believed it; and that Plotinus
taught that people who lead pure lives and yet love music to excess,
go into the bodies of melodious birds when they die? Just now when I
played, I was wondering how a nightingale felt, swinging in a plum
tree all white with fragrant bloom, and watching the cattle cropping
buttercups and dandelions in the field. Mrs. Lindsay, if my soul is
not perfectly fresh and brand new, I hope it never went into a human
body before mine, because I would much lather it came straight to me
from a sweet innocent bird."
"Surely, Elise, you are as usual, jesting?" exclaimed her brother.
"On the contrary, I assure you I neither magnify nor embellish. I am
merely stating unvarnished facts, that you may thoroughly understand
into what fertile soil your scattered grains of learning fall. I
promise you, with moderate cultivation it will yield an
hundred-fold."
"Mother, what did you say to her, by way of a dose of orthodoxy to
antidote the metempsychosis poison?" asked Mr. Lindsay, who could not
forbear laughing, at the astonished expression of his uncle's
countenance.
"At first I was positively dumb, and stared at the child, very much
as I daresay Mahamaia did, when her boy Arddha-Chiddi stood upon his
feet and spoke five minutes after his entrance into this world of
woe, or when at five months of age he sat unsupported in the air.
Then I shook her, and asked if she had gone to sleep and dreamed she
was a bulbul feeding on rose leaves; whereupon she looked gravely
dignified, and when I proceeded to reason with her concerning the
absurdity of the utterly worn-out doctrine of transmigration, how do
you suppose she met me? With the information that far from being a
worn-out doctrine, learned and scientific men now living were
reviving it as the truth; and that whereas Christianity was only
eighteen hundred years old, that metempsychosis had been believed for
twenty-nine centuries, and at this day numbers more followers, by
millions, than any other religion in the world. I inquired how she
learned all this foolish fustian, and with an indescribable mixture
of pride, pity, and triumph, as if she realized that she was throwing
Mont Blanc at my head, she mentioned you two eminently evangelical
guides, from whose infallible lips she had gleaned her knowledge. As
for you, Douglass, I suggest you abandon Oriental studies, forego the
dim hope of martyrdom in India, and begin your missionary labours at
home. My dear, the Buddhist is at your own door. Now, Peyton, how do
you relish the flavour of your philosophical salad?"
"I am afraid I have been culpably thoughtless in introducing to her
mind various doctrines and theories which I never imagined she could
comprehend, or would even ponder for a moment. Since my sight has
become so impaired and feeble, I have several times called on her to
read some articles which certainly are not healthful pabulum for a
child, and my conversations with Douglass, relative to scientific
theories, have been carried on unreservedly in her presence. I am
very glad you warned me."
"And I am exceedingly sorry, if the effect of my mother's words
svoice, harsh and discordant, and, leaning
slightly forward, Regina saw the old servant from the parsonage
standing immediately beneath the window, fanning herself with her
white apron, and earnestly conversing in subdued tones with a
middle-aged man, whose flushed and rather bloated face still retained
traces of having once been, though in a coarse style, handsome. In
length of limb, and compact muscular development he appeared an
athlete, a very son of Anak; but habitual dissipation had set its
brutalizing stamp upon his countenance, and the expression of the
inflamed eyes and sensuous mouth was sinister and forbidding, as if a
career of vice had left the stain of irremediable ruin on his swarthy
face.
As he concluded his remark and stretched out his hand, Hannah laughed
scornfully.
"Do you take me for a fool? Who else would travel around with a match
and a loaded fuse in the same pocket? I haven't it with me; it is too
valuable to be carried about. The care of that scrap of paper has
tormented me all these years, worse than the tomb devils did the
swine that ran down into the sea to cool off; and if I have changed
its hiding-place once, I have twenty times. If the old General
doesn't pay well for it, I shall gnaw off my fingers, on account of
the sin it has cost me. I was an honest woman and could have faced
the world until that night--so many years ago; and since then I have
carried a load on my soul that makes me--even Hannah Hinton, who
never flinched before man or woman or beast--a coward, a quaking
coward! Sin stabs courage, lets it ooze out, as a knife does blood.
Don't bully me, Peleg! I won't bear it. Jeer me if you dare."
"Never fear, Aunt Hannah. I have no mind to do theatre on a small
scale, and show you Satan reproving sin. After all, what is your bit
of _petit larceny_, your thin slice of theft, in comparison with my
black work? But really I don't in the least begrudge my sins, if only
I might have my revenge,--if I could only get Minnie in my power."
"Bah! don't sicken me with any more of the Minnie dose! I hate the
name as I do small-pox or cholera. A pretty life you have led,
dancing after her, as an outright fool might after the pewter-bells
on a baby's rattle!"
"You women can't understand how a man feels when his love changes to
hate; and yet you ought to know all about it, for when you do turn
upon one another you never let go. Aunt Hannah, I loved her better
than everything else upon the broad earth; I would have kissed the
dust where she walked; I always loved her, and she was fond of me,
until that college dandy came between us, and made a fool of her, a
villain of me. When she forsook me, and followed him off, I swore I
would be revenged. There is tiger blood in me, and when I am
thoroughly stirred up I never cool. It is a long, long time since I
lost her trail--soon after the child was born, and eight years ago I
almost gave up and went to Cuba; but if I can only find the track, I
will follow it till I hunt her down. I never received your letters,
or I would have hurried back. Where is Minnie now?"
"That is more than I know, but I think somewhere in Europe. The
letters are always sent to a lawyer in New York, who directs them to
her. I have tried in every way to find out, but they are all too
smart for me."
"Why don't you pump the child?"
"Haven't I? And gained about as much as if I had put a handle on the
side of a lump of cast iron, and pumped. She is closer than sealing
wax, and shrewder than a serpent. If you pumped her till the stars
fell, you would not get an air-bubble, She can neither be scared nor
coaxed."
"Where is the paper?"
"Safely buried here, among the dead."
"What folly! Don't you know the dampness will destroy it? Pshaw! you
have ruined everything."
"See here, Peleg, all the brains of the family did not lodge in your
skull; and I guess I was wiser at your age than you will be at mine.
The paper was safe and sound when I looked at it a month ago, and it
is wrapped up in oil-silk, then in cotton, and kept in a thick tin
box."
"When can I see it? Suppose you get it now?"
"In daylight? You may depend on my steering clear of detection, no
matter what comes. I would take it up to-night, but there is going to
be an awful storm. Do you hear how the thunder keeps bellowing down
yonder, under that dark line crossing the south? There will be wild
work pretty soon; it has been simmering all day, and when it begins
it won't be child's play. Even the marble slabs on the graves are
hot, and the ground scorched my feet, as if Satan and his fires had
burnt through all but a thin crust. I never was afraid of the devil
until my sin brought me close to him. I want to finish this business,
and before day to-morrow I will come over here and dig up my box.
There will be dim moonlight by three o'clock, and if it should be
cloudy, I can shut my eyes and find the place. I tell you, Peleg, I
am sick and tired of this dirty work; and sometimes I think I am no
better than a hyena prowling among dead men's bones. Come around to
the cowshed in the morning, about seven o'clock, when the family will
be in the library holding prayers; and when I go to milk, I will
bring you the paper. Only to look at, to read over, mind you! It
doesn't leave my hands, until the old General's gold jingles in my
pocket. Then he is welcome to it, and Minnie may suffer the
consequences; and you and I will divide the profits. I want to go
away and rest with my sister Penelope the remainder of my life, and
though the family here beg me to stay, I have already given notice
that I intend to stop work next month."
"Very well, don't fail me; I am as anxious to close up the job as you
possibly can be. I should like to see the child, Minnie's child; but
I might spoil everything if she looks like her mother. Good-bye till
to-morrow."
The two walked away, one passing down the avenue of elms out into the
street. The other sauntered in the direction of the parsonage, but
ere she reached the small gate, Hannah turned aside to a low iron
railing that enclosed two monuments; a marble angel with expanded
wings standing above a child's grave, and a broken column wreathed
with sculptured ivy, placed on a mound covered with grass. Just
behind the former and close to the railing, rose a noble Lombardy
poplar that towered even above the elms, and at its base a mass of
periwinkle and ground ivy ran hither and thither in luxuriant
confusion, clasping a few ambitious tendrils even about the ancient
trunk.
Over the railing leaned Hannah, peering down for several moments, at
the lush green creepers, then she walked on to the parsonage gate,
and disappeared.
Watching her movements, Regina readily surmised that somewhere near
that tree the paper was secreted; and she was painfully puzzled to
unravel the thread that evidently linked her with the mystery.
"I am the child she spoke of, and she has tried again and again to
'pump' me, as she called it. 'Minnie' must mean my mother; but that
is not her name. Odilie Orphia Orme never could be twisted into
'Minnie;' and that coarse, common, low, wicked man never could have
dared to love my own dear beautiful proud mother! There must be some
dreadful mistake. Somebody is wrong; but not mother,--no, no--never
my mother! Once she wrote that she was forced to keep some things
secret, because she had bitter enemies; and this man must be one of
them, for he said he would hunt her down. But he shall not! Was it
Providence that brought them here to talk over their wicked schemes
where I could hear them? Oh if I only knew all! Mother--mother! you
might trust your child! I can't believe that I am ignorant even of my
mother's name. Surely she never was that red-faced man's 'Minnie'!"
Covering her face with her hands, she shuddered at the familiar
mention by profane lips of one so hallowed in her estimation, and
this vague threatening of danger to her mother sufficed for a time to
divert her thoughts from the sorrow that for some days past had
engrossed her mind.
Knowing the affection and confidence with which Hannah had always
been treated by the members of the family, and the great length of
time she had so faithfully served in the parsonage household, Regina
was shocked at the discovery of her complicity in a scheme which she
admitted had made her dishonest. Only two days before she had heard
Mrs. Lindsay lamenting that misfortunes never came single, for as if
Douglass's departure were not disaster enough for one year, Hannah
must even imagine that she felt symptoms of dropsy and desired to go
away somewhere in Iowa or Minnesota, where she could rest, and be
nursed by her relatives.
This announcement heightened the gloom that already impended, and
various attempts had been made by Mr. Hargrove and his sister to
induce Hannah to reconsider her resolution. But she obstinately
maintained that she was "a worn-out old horse, who ought to be turned
out to pasture in peace the rest of her days;" yet, notwithstanding
her persistency, she evinced much distress at her approaching
separation from the family, and never alluded to it without a flood
of tears.
What would the members of the household think when they discovered
how mistaken all had been in her real character? But had she a right
to betray Hannah to her employer? Perhaps the paper had no connection
with the parsonage, and no matter whom else she might have wronged,
Hannah had faithfully served the pastor, and repaid his kindness by
devotion to his domestic interests. Regina's nature was generous as
well as just, and she felt grateful to Hannah for many small favours
bestowed on herself, for a uniform willingness to oblige or assist
her, as only servants have it in their power to do.
Sweetening reminiscences of caramels and crullers, of parenthetic
patty-pancakes not ordered or expected on the parsonage bill of fare,
pleaded pathetically for Hannah, and were ably supported by
recollections of torn dresses deftly darned, of unseasonably and
unreasonably soiled white aprons, which the same skilful hands had
surreptitiously washed and fluted before the regular day for
commencing the laundry work, all of which now made clamorous and
desperate demands on the girl's gratitude and leniency. So complete
had been her trust in Hannah that her reticence concerning her mother
sprang solely from Mr. Hargrove's earnest injunction that she would
permit no one to question her upon the subject; consequently she had
very tenderly intimated to the old woman that she was not at liberty
to discuss that matter with any one.
"She is going away very soon, bearing a good character. Would it be
right for me to disgrace her in her old age, by telling Mr. Hargrove
what I accidentally overheard? If I only knew 'Minnie' meant mother,
I could be sure this paper did not refer to Mr. Hargrove, and then I
should see my way clearly; for they both said 'old General,' and no
one calls Mr. or Dr. Hargrove 'General.' I only want to do what is
right."
As she lifted her face from her hands she was surprised at the sudden
gloom that since she last looked out had settled like a pall over the
sky, darkening the church, rendering even the monuments indistinct.
Hero began to whine and bark, and, starting from her seat, Regina
hurried toward the steps leading down from the organ-loft. Ere she
reached them a fearful sound like the roaring of a vast flood broke
the prophetic silence, then a blinding lurid flash seemed to wrap
everything in flame; there was simultaneously an awful detonating
crash, as if the pillars of the universe had given way, and the
initial note ushered in the thunder-fugue of the tempest, that raged
as if the Destroying Angel rode upon its blast.
In the height of its fury it bowed the ancient elms as if they were
mere reeds, and shook the stone church to its foundations as a giant
shakes a child's toy.
Frightened by the trembling of the building, Regina began to descend
the stairs, guided by the incessant flashes of lightning, but when
about half-way down a terrific peal of thunder so startled her that
she missed a step, grasped at the balustrade but failed to find it,
and rolled helplessly to the floor of the vestibule. Stunned and mute
with terror, she attempted to rise, but her left foot, crushed under
her in the fall, refused to serve her, and with a desperate instinct
of faith she crawled through the inside door and down the aisle,
seeking refuge at the altar of God. Dragging the useless member, she
reached the chancel at last, and as the lightning showed her the
railing, she laid herself down, and clasped the mahogany balusters in
both hands.
In the ghastly electric light she saw the wild eyes of the lion in
the pulpit window glaring at her,--but over all the holy smile of
Christ, as, looking down in benediction, He soared away heavenward;
and above the howling of the hurricane rose her cry to Him who
stilleth tempests, and saith to wind and sea, "Peace, be still!": "O
Jesus! save me, that I may see my mother once more!"
She imagined there was a lull, certainly the shrieking of the gale
seemed to subside, but only for half a moment, and in the doubly
fierce renewal of elemental strife, amid deafening peals if thunder
and the unearthly glare that preceded each reverberation, there came
other sounds more appalling, and as the church rocked and quivered
some portion of the ancient edifice fell, adding its crash to the
diapason of the storm.
Believing that the roof was falling upon her, Regina shut her eyes,
and in after years she recalled vividly two sensations that seemed
her last on earth: one, the warm touch of Hero's tongue on her
clenched fingers; the other, a supernatural wail that came down from
the gallery, and that even then she knew was born in the organ. Was
it the weird fingering of the sacrilegious cyclone that concentrated
its rage upon the venerable sanctuary? After a little while the fury
of the wind spent itself, but the rain began to fall heavily, and the
electricity drama continued with unabated vigour and fierceness.
Although unusually brave for so young a person, Regina had been
completely terrified, and she lay dumb and motionless, still clinging
to the altar railing. At last, when the wind left the war to the
thunder and the rain, Hero, who had been quite until now, began to
bark violently, left her side, and ran to and fro, now and then
uttering a peculiar sound, which with him always indicated delight.
His subtle instinct was stronger than her hope, and as she raised
herself into a sitting posture she saw that he had sprung upon the
top of one of the side aisle pews, and thence into the window, which
had been left open by the sexton. Here he lingered as if irresolute,
and in an agony of dread at the thought of being deserted, she cried
out:
"Here, Hero! Come back! Hero, don't leave me to die alone."
He whined in answer, and barked furiously as if to reassure her; then
the whole church was illumined with a lurid glory that seemed to
scorch the eyeballs with its intolerable radiance, and in it she saw
the white figure of the dog plunge into the blackness beyond.
She knew the worst was over, unless the lightning killed her, for the
wind had ceased, and the walls were still standing; but the
atmosphere was thick with dust, and redolent of lime, and she
conjectured that the plastering in the gallery had fallen, though the
tremendous crash portended something more serious. She tried to stand
up by steadying herself against the balustrade, but the foot refused
to sustain her weight, and she sank back into her former crouching
posture, feeling very desolate, but tearless and quiet as one of the
apostolic figures that looked pityingly upon her whenever the
lightning smote through them.
She turned her head, so that at every flash she could gaze upon the
placid face of the beatified Christ floating above the pulpit; and in
the intense intervening darkness tried to possess her soul in
patience, thinking of the mercy of God and the love of her mother.
She knew not how long Hero had left her, for pain and terror are not
accurate chronometers, but after what appeared a weary season of
waiting, she started when his loud bark sounded under the window,
through which he had effected his exit. She tried to call him, but
her throat was dry and parched, and her foot throbbed and ached so
painfully, that she dreaded making any movement. Then a voice always
pleasant to her ears, but sweeter now than an archangel's, shouted
above the steady roar of the rain:
"Regina! Regina!"
She rose to her knees, and with a desperate exertion of lungs and
throat, answered:
"I am here! Mr. Lindsay, I am here!"
Remembering that words ending in o were more readily distinguished at
a distance, she added:
"Hero! Oh, Hero!"
His frantic barking told her that she had been heard, and then
through the window came once more the music of the loved voice.
"Be patient. I am coming."
She could not understand why he did not come through the door instead
of standing beneath the window, and it seemed stranger still, that
after a little while all grew silent again. But her confidence never
wavered, and in the darkness she knelt there patiently, knowing that
he would not forsake her.
It seemed a very long time before Hero's bark greeted her once more,
and, turning toward the window, a lingering zigzag flash of lightning
showed her Douglass Lindsay's face, as he climbed in, followed by the
dog.
"Regina! where are you?"
"Oh, here I am!"
He stood on one of the seats, swinging a lantern in his hand, and as
she spoke he sprang toward her.
Still clutching the altar railing with one hand, she knelt, with her
white suffering face upturned piteously to him, and stooping he threw
his arms around her and clasped her to his heart.
"My darling, God has been merciful to you and me!"
She stole one arm up about his neck, and clung to him, while for the
first time he kissed her cheek and brow.
"Does my darling know what an awful risk she ran? The steeple has
fallen, and the whole front of the church is blocked up, a mass of
ruins. I could not get in, and feared you were crushed, until I heard
Hero bark from the inside and followed the sound, which brought me to
the window, whence he jumped out to meet me. At last when you
answered my call, I was obliged to go back for a ladder. Here,
darling, at God's altar, let us thank Him for your preservation."
He bowed his face upon her head, and she heard the whispered
thanksgiving that ascended to the throne of grace, but no words
were audible. Rising he attempted to lift her, but she winced and
moaned, involuntarily sinking back.
"What is the matter? After all, were you hurt?"
"When I came down from the gallery it turned so dark I was
frightened, and I stumbled and fell down the steps. I must have
broken something, for when I stand up my ankle gives way, and I can't
walk at all."
"Then how did you get here? The steps are at the front of the
church."
"I thought the altar was the safest place, and I crawled here on my
hands and knees."
He pressed her head against his shoulder, and his deep manly voice
trembled.
"Thank God, for the thought. It was your salvation, for the stairs
and the spot where you must have fallen are a heap of stone, brick,
and mortar. If you had remained there, you would certainly have been
killed."
"Yes, it was just after I got here and caught hold of the railing
that the crash came. Oh! is it not awful!"
"It was an almost miraculous escape, for which you ought to thank and
serve your God all the days of the life He has mercifully spared to
you. Stand up a minute, even if it pains you, and let me find out
what ails your foot. I know something of surgery, for once it was my
intention to study medicine instead of divinity."
He unbuttoned and removed her shoe, and as he firmly pressed the foot
and ankle, she flinched and sighed.
"I think there are no bones broken, but probably you have wrenched
and sprained the ankle, for it is much swollen already. Now, little
girl, I must go back for some assistance. You will have to be taken
out through the window, and I am afraid to attempt carrying you down
the ladder unaided and in the darkness. I might break your neck,
instead of your ankle."
"Oh, please don't leave me here!"
She stretched out her arms pleadingly, and tears sprang to his eyes
as he noted the pallor of her beautiful face and the nervous
fluttering of her white lips.
"I shall leave Hero and the lantern with you, and you may be sure I
shall be gone the shortest possible time. The danger is over now,
even the lightning is comparatively distant, and you who have been so
brave all the while certainly will not prove a coward at the last
moment."
He took her up as easily as if she had been an infant, and laid her
tenderly down on one of the pew cushions; then placed the lantern on
the pulpit desk, and came back.
"Slip your hand under Hero's collar, to prevent him from following me
if he should try to do so, and keep up your courage. Put yourself in
God's hands, and wait here patiently for Douglass. Don't you know
that I would not leave you here an instant, if it could be avoided?
God bless you, my white dove."
He stooped and kissed her forehead, then hurried away, and after a
moment Regina knew that she and her dog were once more alone in the
ancient church, with none nearer than the dead, who slept so soundly,
while the soft summer rain fell ceaselessly above their coffins.
CHAPTER X.
The town clock was striking nine when the renewal of welcome sounds
beneath the window announced to Regina that her weary dark vigil was
ended. Soon after Mr. Lindsay's departure, the lantern above the
altar grew dim, then went out, leaving the church in total darkness,
relieved only by an occasional glimmer from the electric batteries
that had wheeled far away to the north-east. Erect and alert Hero sat
beside his mistress, now and then rubbing his head against her
shoulder, or placing his paw on her arm, as if to encourage her by
mute assurances of faithful guardianship; and even when the voices
outside cheered him into one quick bark of recognition, he made no
effort to leave the prostrate form.
"All in the dark? Where is your lantern?" asked Mr. Lindsay, as he
climbed through the window.
"It went out very soon after you left. Can you find me? or shall I
try to come to you?"
"Keep still, Regina. Come up the ladder, Esau, and hold your torch so
that I can see. It is black as Egypt inside."
In a few moments the ruddy glare streamed in, and showed the anxious
face of the sexton, and the figure of Mr. Lindsay groping from pew to
pew. Before that cheerful red light how swiftly the trooping spectres
and grim phantoms that had peopled the gloom fled away for ever! What
a blessed, comforting atmosphere of love and protection seemed to
encompass her, when, after handing one of the pew cushions to the
sexton, Mr. Lindsay came to the spot where she lay.
"How are your wounds?"
"My foot is very stiff and sore, but if you will let me hold your
arm, I can hop along."
"Can you, my crippled snow-bird? Suppose I have a different use for
my strong arms?"
He lifted her very gently, but apparently without effort, and
carried her to the window.
"Go down, Esau, set the torch in the ground, and hold the
ladder,--press it hard against the wall. I am coming down
backward,--and if I should miss a round, you must be ready to help
me. Come, Hero, jump out first and clear the way. Steady now, Esau."
Placing his charge on the broad sill, Mr. Lindsay stepped out,
established himself securely on the ladder, and, drawing the girl to
the ledge, took her firmly in his arms, balancing himself with some
difficulty as he did so.
"Now say your prayers. Clasp your hands tight around my neck, and
shut your eyes."
His chin rested upon her forehead, as she clung closely about his
neck, and they commenced the perilous descent.
Once he wavered, almost tottered, but recovered himself, and from the
fierce beating of his heart and the laboured sound of his deep
breathing she knew that it cost him great physical exertion; but at
last his close strain relaxed, he reached the ground safely and stood
resting a moment, while a sigh of relief escaped him.
"Esau, put the end of the torch sideways in Hero's mouth,--mind, so
that it will not burn him; and lay the cushion on the plank.
No!--that is wrong. Turn the torch the other way, so that as he
walks, the wind will blow the flame in the opposite direction, away
from his face. Take it, Hero! That's a noble fellow! Now home, Hero."
When the cushion had been adjusted on the broad plank brought for the
purpose, Mr. Lindsay laid Regina upon it, threw a blanket over her,
and, bidding the sexton take one end of the plank, he lifted the
other, and they began the march.
"Not that way, Hero, although it is the nearest. Truly the 'longest
way round is the shortest way' home this time; for we could not twist
about among the graves, and must go down the avenue, though it is
somewhat obstructed by fallen boughs. Come here, Hero, and walk ahead
of us. Now, Regina, you can shut your eyes and imagine you are riding
in a palankeen, as the Hindustanee ladies do when they go out for
fresh air. The motion is exactly the same, as you will find some day
when you come to Rohilcund or Oude, to see Padre Sahib--Lindsay. You
shall then have a new dooley all curtained close with rose-coloured
silk; but I can't promise that the riding will prove any more easy
than this cushioned plank."
What a stab seemed each word, bringing back all the bitter suffering
his departure would cause,--the reviving the grief, from which the
storm had temporarily diverted her thoughts.
"You are not going to-night? You will not try to start, after this
dreadful storm?" she said, in an unsteady voice.
"Yes, I am obliged to go, in order to keep an appointment for
to-morrow night in New York; otherwise, I would wait a day to learn
the extent of the damage, for I am afraid the hurricane has made sad
havoc. Esau tells me the roof and a portion of the market house was
carried away, and it was the most violent gale I have ever known."
They had reached the street and were approaching the gate of the
parsonage, where Hero turned back, dropped the torch at Mr. Lindsay's
feet, and shook his head vigorously, rubbing his nose with his paw.
"Poor fellow! can't you stand it any longer? It must nave scorched
him, as it burnt low. Brave fellow!"
"Oh, Douglass! is that you?" cried an eager voice at some distance.
"Yes, mother."
Mrs. Lindsay ran to meet them.
"Did you find her?"
"Yes, I am bringing her home."
"Bringing her--oh, my God! Is she dead?"
"No, she is safe."
"My son, don't try to deceive me. What is the matter? You are
carrying something on a litter."
"Why do you not speak, Regina, and assure her of your safety?"
Mrs. Lindsay had groped her way to the side of her son, and put her
hand on the figure stretched upon the cushion.
"I only sprained my foot badly, and Mr. Lindsay was so good as to
bring me home this way."
"Have they got her?" shouted Hannah, who accompanied by Mr. Hargrove
had found it impossible to keep pace with Mrs. Lindsay.
"Oh, it is a corpse you are fetching home!" she added, with a genuine
wail, as in the gloom she dimly saw the outline of several persons.
"Nobody is dead, but we need a light. Run back and get a candle."
Thankful that life had been spared, no more questions were asked
until they reached the house, and deposited their burden on the
lounge in the dining-room.
Then Mr. Lindsay briefly explained what had occurred, and
superintended the anointing and binding up of the bruised ankle, now
much swollen.
As Hannah knelt, holding the foot in her broad palm, to enable Mrs.
Lindsay to wrap it in a linen cloth saturated with arnica, the former
bent her grey head and tenderly kissed the wounded member. She had
been absent for a few minutes during the recital of the accident, and
now asked:
"Where were you, that you could not get home before the storm? Heaven
knows that cloud grumbled and gave warning long enough."
"Hannah, she was in the church, and when she tried to get out, it was
too late."
"In the church! Why I was in the yard, trying to get a breath of air,
not twenty minutes before the cloud rolled up like a mountain of ink,
and I saw nobody."
Regina understood her nervous start, and the eager questioning of her
eyes.
"I was in the organ gallery, and, falling down the steps, I hurt
myself."
"Honey, did you see me?"
Her fingers closed so spasmodically over the girl's foot, that she
winced from the pressure.
"I saw you walking about the churchyard, and would have come home
with you, if I had thought the storm was so near. Please, Hannah,
bring me some cool water."
She pitied the old woman's evident confusion and anxiety, and
rejoiced when Mr. Hargrove changed the topic.
"I am very sorry, Douglass, that I cannot accompany you as far as New
York. When I promised this afternoon to do so, of course I did not
anticipate this storm. There may have been lives lost, as well as
steeples blown down, and it is my duty not to leave my people at such
a juncture. If it were not for the sailing of the steamer, I would
insist on your waiting a day or so, in order that I might go with you
and have a personal interview with Dr. Pitcairns. I ought to have
thought of and attended to that matter before this."
"Pray do not feel annoyed, uncle; it can be easily arranged by
letter. Moreover, as my mother goes with me to Boston, it would not
be right to leave Regina here alone in her present helpless
condition."
"Do not think of me a moment, Mr. Hargrove. Go with him and stay with
him as long as you can; I would if I could. Hannah will take care of
me."
"My dear, I think of my duty, and that keeps me at home. Douglass, I
will write a short note to Pitcairns, and you must explain matters to
him. Elise, it is ten o'clock, and you have not much time."
He went into the library, and Mrs. Lindsay hurried upstairs to put on
her bonnet, calling Hannah to follow and receive, some parting
injunctions. Kneeling by the lounge, Mr. Lindsay took one of the
girl's hands.
"Regina, I desired and intended to have a long talk with you this
afternoon, but could not find you; and now I have no time, except to
say good-bye. You will never know how hard it is for me to leave my
dear little friend; I did not realize it myself until to-night."
"Then why will you go away? Can't you stay, and serve God as well by
being a minister in this country? Can't you change your mind?"
She raised herself on her elbow, and tears gushed over her cheeks,
as, twining her fingers around his, she looked all the intense loving
appeal that words could never have expressed.
Just then his stony Teraph--Duty--smiled very benignantly at the
aching heart he laid upon her dreary cold altar.
"Don't tempt me to look back after putting my hand to the plough. I
must do my duty, though at bitter cost. Will you promise never to
forget your friend Douglass?"
"How could I ever forget you? Oh, if I could only go with you!"
His fine eyes sparkled, and, drawing her hand across his cheek, he
said eagerly:
"Do you really wish it? Think of me, write to me, and love me, and
some day, if it please God to let me come home, you may have an
opportunity of going back with me to my work in India. Would you be
willing to leave all, and help me among the heathens?"
"All but mother. You come next to my mother. Oh, it is hard that I
must be separated from the two I love best!"
For a moment she sobbed aloud.
"You are only a young girl now, but some day you will be a woman, and
I hope and believe a very noble woman. Until then we shall be
separated, but when you are grown I shall see you again, if God
spares my life. Peculiar and unfortunate circumstances surround you;
there are trials ahead of you, my darling, and I wish I could shield
you from them, but it seems impossible, and I can only leave you in
God's hands praying continually for you. You say you love me nest to
your mother. All I ask is, that you will allow no one else, no new
friend, to take my place. When I see you again, years hence, I shall
hope to hear you repeat those words, 'next to my mother.' Far away in
the midst of Hindustan my thoughts and hopes will travel back and
centre in my white dove. Oh, child! my heart is bound to you for
ever."
He drew her head to his shoulder, and held her close, and as in the
church when kneeling before the altar she heard whispers which only
God interpreted.
Mrs. Lindsay came back equipped for her journey, and Mr. Hargrove
entered at the same moment, but neither spoke. At length, fully aware
of their presence, the young missionary raised his head, and, placing
his hand under Regina's chin, looked long at the spirituelle
beautiful face, as if he wished to photograph every feature on his
memory. Without removing his eyes, he said:
"Uncle, take care of her always. She is very dear to me. Keep her
just as she is, in soul 'unspotted from the world.'"
Then his lips quivered, and in a tremulous voice he added:
"God bless you, my darling! My pure lovely dove."
He kissed her, rose instantly, and left the room.
Mrs. Lindsay came to the lounge, and while the tears rolled over her
cheeks she said tenderly:
"My dear child, it seems unkind to desert you in your crippled
condition, but I feel assured Peyton and Hannah will nurse you
faithfully; and every moment that I can be with Douglass seems doubly
precious now."
"Do you think I would keep you even if I could from him? Oh! don't
you wish we were going with him to India?"
"Indeed I do, from the depths of my soul. What shall we do without
our Bishop?"
Bending over the girl the mother wept unrestrainedly, but Mr.
Hargrove called from the threshold:
"Come, Elise."
As Mrs. Lindsay turned to leave the room, she beckoned to Hannah.
"Carry her upstairs and undress her; and if she suffers much pain,
don't fail to send for the doctor."
A white image of hopeless misery, Regina lay listening till the sound
of departing steps became inaudible, and when Hannah left the room
the girl groaned aloud in the excess of her grief:
"I did not even say good-bye. I did not once thank him for all he did
for me in the storm! And now I know, I feel I shall never see him
again! Oh, Douglass!"
The glass door leading into the flower-garden stood open, and Mr.
Lindsay who had been watching her from the cover of the clustering
honeysuckle, stepped back into the room.
With a cry of delight, she held out her arms.
"Dear Mr. Lindsay, I shall thank you, and pray for you, and love you
as long as I live!"
He put a small packet in her hand, and whispered:
"Here is something I wish you to keep until you are eighteen. Do not
open it before that time, unless I give you permission, or unless you
know that I am dead."
He drew her tenderly to his heart, and his lips pressed her cheek.
Then he said brokenly:
"O God! be merciful in all things, to my darling!"
A moment after she heard his rapid footsteps on the gravelled walk,
followed by the clang of the gate; then a great loneliness as of
death fell upon her.
There are indeed sorrows "that bruise the heart like hammers," and
age it suddenly, prematurely. In subsequent years Regina looked back
to the incidents of this eventful Sabbath, and marked it with a black
stone in the calendar of memory as the day on which she "put away
childish things," and began to see life and the world through new,
strange disenchanting lenses, that dispelled all the gilding glamour
of childhood, and unexpectedly let in a grey dull light that chilled
and awed her.
With tearless but indescribably mournful eyes, she looked vacantly at
the door through which her friend had vanished, as it then seemed,
for ever, and, finding that her own remarks were entirely unheard,
unheeded, Hannah touched her shoulder.
"Poor thing! Are you ready to let me carry you upstairs?"
"Thank you, but I am not going upstairs to-night. I want to stay
here, because I am too heavy to be carried up and down, and I can get
about better from here. Bring a pillow and some bedclothes. I can
sleep on this lounge."
"I shall be scolded if you don't go to bed."
"Let me alone, Hannah. I intend to stay where I am. Bring the things
I need. Nobody shall scold you if you will only do as I ask."
"Then I shall have to make a pallet on the floor, for Miss Elise gave
positive orders that I should sleep in your room until she came back.
Don't you mean to undress yourself?"
"No. Please unfasten my clothes and then leave them as they are. You
must not sleep on the floor. Roll in the hall sofa, and it will make
a nice bed."
There was no alternative, and when Mr. Hargrove returned at midnight,
he deemed it useless to reprimand or expostulate, as Regina declared
herself very comfortable, and pleaded for permission to remain until
morning.
Looking very sad and careworn, the pastor stood for some minutes
leaning on his gold-headed cane. As he bade her goodnight and turned
from the lounge, she put her hand on the cane.
"Please, sir, lend me this until morning. Hannah sleeps soundly, and
if I am forced to wake her, I can easily do so by tapping on the
floor with your cane."
"Certainly, dear; keep it as long as you choose. But I am afraid none
of us will sleep much to-night. It is a heavy trial to give up
Douglass. He is my younger, better self."
He walked slowly away, and she thought he looked more aged and infirm
than she had ever seen him, his usually erect head drooping, as if
bowed by deep sorrow.
For an hour after his departure his footsteps resounded in the room
overhead, as he paced to and fro, but when the distant indistinct
echo of the town clock told two all grew quiet upstairs.
In the dining-room the shaded lamp burned dimly, and Regina could see
the outline of Hannah's form on the sofa, and knew from the continual
turning first on one side, then on the other, that the old woman was
awake, though no sound escaped her.
Engrossed by a profound yet silent grief that rendered sleep
impossible, Regina lay with her hands folded over the small packet,
wondering what it contained, regretting that the conditions of the
gift prohibited her opening it for so many long years, and striving
to divest herself of a haunting foreboding that she had looked for
the last time on the bright benignant countenance of the donor, who
was indissolubly linked with the happiest memories of her lonely
life.
Imagination magnified the perils of the tedious voyage that included
two oceans, and as if to intensify and blacken the horrors of the
future all the fiendish tragedies of Delhi, Meerut, and Cawnpore were
vividly revived among the missionaries to whom Mr. Lindsay was
hastening. Deeply interested in the condition of a people whose
welfare was so dear to his heart, she had eagerly read all the
mission reports, and thus imbibed a keen aversion to the Sepoys, who
had become synonymous with treachery and ingenious atrocity.
Is there an inherent affinity between brooding shadows of heart and
soul, and that veil of physical darkness that wraps the world during
the silent reign of night? Why do sad thoughts like corporeal
suffering and disease grow more intense, more tormenting, with the
approach of evening's gloom? Who has not realized that trials,
sorrows, bereavements which in daylight we partly conquer and put
aside, rally and triumph, overwhelming us by the aid of night? Why
are the sick always encouraged, and the grief-laden rendered more
cheerful by the coming of dawn? Is there some physical or chemical
foundation for Figuier's wild dream of reviving sun-worship, by
referring all life to the vivifying rays of the King Star? Does the
mind emit gloomy sombre thoughts at night, as plants exhale carbonic
acid? What subtle connection exists between a cheerful spirit, and
the amount of oxygen we inhale in golden daylight? Is hope, radiant
warm sunny hope, only one of those "beings woven of air by light,"
whereof Moleschott wrote?
To Regina the sad vigil seemed interminable, and soon after the clock
struck four she hailed with inexpressible delight the peculiarly
shrill crowing of her favourite white Leghorn cock, which she knew
heralded the advent of day. The China geese responded from their
corner of the fowlyard, and amid the _reveille_ of the poultry Hannah
rose, crept stealthily to the table and extinguished the lamp.
Intently listening to every movement, Regina felt assured she was
dressing rapidly, and in a few moments the tremulous motion of the
floor, and the carefully guarded sound of the bolt turned slowly,
told her that the old woman had started to fulfil her promise.
Having fully determined her own course, the girl lost no time in
reflection, but hastily fastening her clothes took her shoes in one
hand, the cane in the other, and limping to the glass door softly
unlocked it, loosened the outside Venetian blinds, and sat down on
the steps leading to the garden. Taking off the bandage, she slipped
her shoe on the sprained foot, and wrapping a light white shawl
around her, made her way slowly down the walk that wound toward the
church.
Unaccustomed to the cane, she used it with great difficulty, and the
instant her wounded foot touched the ground, sharp twinges renewed
the remonstrance that had been silent until she attempted to walk.
A waning moon hung above the tree tops on the western boundary of the
enclosure, and its wan spectral lustre lit up the churchyard, showing
Regina the tall form of Hannah, who carried a spade or short shovel
on her shoulder, and had just passed through the gate, leaving it
open. Following as rapidly as she dared, in the direction of the iron
railing, the child was only a few yards in the rear, when the old
woman stopped suddenly, then ran forward, and a cry like that of some
baffled wild beast broke the crystal calm of the morning air.
"The curse of God is upon it! The poplar is gone!"
Gliding along, Regina reached the outer edge of the railing, and,
creeping behind the broken granite shaft which shielded her from
observation, she peered cautiously around the corner, and saw that
the noble towering tree had been struck by lightning and fired.
Whether shivered by electricity, or subsequently blown down by the
fury of the gale, none ever knew; but it appeared to have been
twisted off about two feet above the ground, and in its fall smote
and shattered the marble angel, which a few hours before had hovered
with expanded wings over a child's grave. A wreath of blue smoke
curled and floated from the heart of the stump, showing that the
roots were burning, and the ivy and periwinkle so luxuriant on the
previous day were now a mass of ashes and cinders.
On her knees sank Hannah, raking the hot embers into a heap, and at
last she bent her grey head almost to the ground. Lifting something
on the end of the spade, she uttered a low wail of despair:
"Melted--burnt up! I thought it was tin: it must have been lead!
Either the curse of God, or the work of the devil!"
She fell back like one smitten with a stunning blow, and sobs shook
her powerful frame.
Very near the ground the tree had contained a hollow, hidden by the
rank lush creepers, and in this cavity she had deposited a small can,
cylindrical in form, and similar in appearance to those generally
used for hermetically sealed mushrooms. Upon it several spadefuls of
earth had been thrown, to secure it from detection, should prying
eyes discover the existence of the hollow.
All that remained was a shapeless lump of molten metal.
Along the east a broad band of yellow was rapidly mounting into the
sky, and in the blended light of moon and day the churchyard
presented a melancholy scene of devastation.
The spire and belfry had fallen upon and in front of the church, and
the long building stood like a dismasted vessel among the billowy
graves, that swelled as a restless sea around its grey weather-beaten
sides. Here and there ancient headstones had been blown down on the
mounds they guarded; and one venerable willow in the centre of a
cluster of graves had been torn from the earth, and its network of
roots lifted until they rested against a stone cross.
Awed by the solemn influence of the time and place, and painfully
reminded of her own peril on the previous night, Regina stepped down
from the base of the monument, and approached the figure crouching
over the blasted smoking roots. There was no rustle of grass or leaf
as she limped across the dewy turf, but warned by that mysterious
magnetic instinct which so often announces some noiseless, invisible
human presence, Hannah lifted and turned her head. With a scream of
superstitious terror she sprang to her feet.
Very ghostly the girl certainly appeared, in her snowy mull muslin
dress and white shawl, as she leaned forward on the cane, and looked
steadily at the old woman. Her long black hair, loosened and
disordered by tossing about all night, hung over her shoulders and
gave a weird, almost supernatural, aspect to the blanched and
sorrowful young face, which in that strange chill light seemed
wellnigh as rigid and pallid as a corpse.
"Hannah Hinton!"
"God have mercy! Who are you?"
Hannah seized the spade and brandished it, with hands that shook from
terror.
"You wicked woman, do you want to kill me? Put down that spade."
Regina advanced, but the old woman retreated, still waving the spade.
"Hannah, are you afraid of me?"
"Good Lord! Is it you, Regina?"
"Your sin makes you a coward. Did you really think me a ghost?"
"It is true, I am afraid of everything now, even of my own shadow,
and once I was so brave. But what are you doing here? I thought you
were crippled? What are you tracking me for?"
She threw down the spade, ran forward, and seized the girl's
shoulder, while a scowl of mingled fear and rage darkened her
countenance.
"You are watching, trailing me like a bloodhound! Is it any of your
business where I go? Suppose I do choose to come here and say my
prayers among the dead, while other folks are sound asleep in their
beds, who has the right to hinder me?"
"Don't tell stories, Hannah. If you really said your prayers, you
would never have come here to sell your soul to Satan."
Tightening her clutch, the old woman shook her, as if she had been
a slender weed, and an ashen hue settled upon her wrinkled features,
as she cried in an unnaturally shrill quavering tone:
"Aha! you were eavesdropping yesterday in the church. How I wish to
God it had all blown down on you! And you watched me,--you mean to
disgrace me,--to ruin me,--to arrest me! You do! But you shall not! I
will strangle you first!"
"Take your hands off my shoulders, Hannah. Do you think you can scare
me with such wild desperate threats? In the first place, I am not
afraid to die, and in the second you know very well you dare not kill
me. Let go my shoulder, you hurt me."
Very white but fearless, the young face was lifted to hers, and
before those wrathful glittering eyes that flashed like blue steel,
Hannah quailed.
"Will you promise not to betray me?"
"I will promise nothing while you threaten me. Sit down, you are
shaking all over as if you had an ague. When I came here I had no
intention of betraying you; I only wanted to prevent you from
committing a sin. Are you going to have a spasm? Do sit down."
Hannah's teeth were chattering violently, and her trembling limbs
seemed indeed unable to support her. When she sank down on the stone
base of the shaft, Regina stood before her, leaning more heavily upon
the cane.
"I heard all that you said yesterday, yet I was not 'eavesdropping.'
You came and stood under the window where I sat, and if you had
looked up would have seen me. When I learned you were engaged in a
wicked plot, I determined to try to stop you before it was too late.
I followed you here, hoping that you would give that paper to me,
instead of to that bold, bad man; for though you did very wrong, I
can't believe that you have a wicked cruel heart."
She paused, but the only response was a deep groan, and; Hannah
shrouded her face in her arms.
"Hannah, did my mother ever injure you, ever harm you, in any way?"
"Yes, she caused me to steal, and I shall hate her as long as I live.
I was as honest as an angel until she came that freezing night so
many years ago, and showed me by her efforts, her anxiety to get the
paper, how valuable it was. Beside, it was on her account that my
nephew went to destruction; and I was sure all the blame and
suspicion would fall on her: it seemed so clear that she stole the
paper. I knew Mr. Hargrove gave her a copy of it, and I only wanted
to sell the paper itself to the old General in Europe because I was
poor, and had not money enough to stop work. I have not had a happy
day since; my conscience has tormented me. I have carried a mountain
of lead upon my soul, day and night, and at last when Peleg came, and
I was about to get my gold, the Lord interfered and took it out of my
hands. Oh! it is an awful thing to shut your eyes and stop your ears,
and run down a steep place to meet the devil who is waiting at the
bottom for you, and to feel yourself suddenly jerked back by
something which you know Almighty God has sent to stop you! He sent
that lightning to burn up the paper, and I feel that His curse will
follow me to my grave."
"Not if you earnestly repent, and pray for His forgiveness." Hannah
raised her grey head, and gazed incredulously at the pale delicate
face, into the violet eyes that watched her with almost tender
compassion.
"Oh, child! when our hands are tied, and we are so helpless we can't
do any more mischief, who believes in our repentance?"
"I do, Hannah; and how much more merciful is God?"
"You don't mean that you would ever trust me, ever believe in me
again?"
Her hand caught the white muslin dress, and her haggard wrinkled face
was full of eager, breathless supplication.
"Yes, Hannah, I would. I do not believe you will ever steal again.
Suppose the lightning had struck you as well as the tree where you
hid the stolen paper, what do you think would have become of your
poor wicked soul? You intended to sell that paper to a person who
hates my mother, and who would have used it to injure her; but she is
in God's hands, and you ought to be glad that this sin at least was
prevented. In a few days you are going away, far out to the west, you
say, where we shall probably never see or hear from you again, unless
you choose to write us. Until you are gone, I shall keep all this
secret. Mrs. Lindsay never shall know anything about it; but if Mr.
Hargrove believes my mother took that paper, it is my duty to her to
tell him the truth; and this I must do after you leave us. I promise
he shall suspect nothing while you remain here. Can you ask me to do
more than this for you?"
Hannah was crying passionately, and attempted no answer, save by
drawing the girl closer to her, as if she wanted to take the slender
figure in her brawny arms.
"I am sorry for you, Hannah; sorry for my dear mother; sorry for
myself. The storm came and put an end to all the mischief you meant
to do, so let us be thankful. You say my mother has a copy; and it
would have injured her, if the original paper had been sold. Then you
have harmed only yourself. Don't cry, and don't say anything more.
Let it all rest; I shall never speak to you again on the subject.
Hannah, will you please help me back to the house? My foot pains me
dreadfully, and I begin to feel sick and faint."
In the mellow orange light that had climbed the sky, and was flooding
the world with a mild glory, wherein the wan moon waned ghostly, the
old woman led the white figure toward the parsonage. When they
reached the little gate, Regina grasped the supporting arm, and a
deadly pallor overspread her features.
"Where are you, Hannah? I cannot see----"
The blue eyes closed, she tottered, and as Hannah caught and bore her
up, a swift heavy step on the gravel caused her to glance over her
shoulder.
"What is the matter, Aunt Hannah? You look ill and frightened. Is
that Minnie's child?"
"Hush! our game is all up. For God's sake go away until seven
o'clock, then I will explain. Don't make a noise, Peleg. I must get
her in the house without waking any one. If Mr. Hargrove should see
us, we are ruined."
As Hannah strode swiftly toward the glass door, bearing the slight
form in her stout arms, the stranger pressed forward, eagerly
scrutinizing the girl's face; but at this juncture Hero, barking
violently, sprang down the walk, and the intruder hastily retreated
to the churchyard, securing the gate after he passed through.
CHAPTER XI.
The steamer sailed promptly on the Thursday subsequent to Mrs.
Lindsay's departure from the parsonage, but she had been absent ten
days, detained by the illness of a friend in Boston.
Impatiently her return was anticipated by every member of the
household, and when a telegram announced that she might be expected
on the following morning, general rejoicing succeeded the gloom which
had hung chill and lowering over the diminished family circle. Under
Hannah's faithful, cautious treatment Regina had sufficiently
recovered from the effects of the sprain to walk once more without
much pain, though she still limped perceptibly; but a nameless,
formless foreboding of some impending evil--some baleful
influence--some grievous calamity hovering near--rendered her
particularly anxious for Mrs. Lindsay's comforting presence.
The condition of the church, which was undergoing a complete
renovation, as well as repairing of the steeple, prevented the usual
services, and this compulsory rest and leisure seemed singularly
opportune for Mr. Hargrove, who had been quite indisposed and feeble
for some days. The physician ascribed his condition to the lassitude
induced by the excessive heat, and Regina attributed his pale weary
aspect and evident prostration to grief for the loss of his nephew
and adopted son; but Hannah looked deeper, shook her grizzled head,
and "wished Miss Elise would come home."
The pastor's eyes which had long resented the exaggerated taxation
imposed upon them by years of study, had recently rebelled outright,
and he spoke of the necessity of visiting New York to consult an
eminent oculist, who, Mrs. Lindsay wrote, had gone to Canada, but
would return in September, when he hoped to examine and undertake the
treatment of her brother's eyes.
During Thursday morning the minister lay upon his library sofa, while
Regina read aloud for several hours, but in the afternoon, receiving
a summons to attend a sick man belonging to his church, he persisted
in walking to a distant part of the town, to discharge what he
considered a clerical obligation.
In vain Regina protested, assuring him that the heat and fatigue
would completely prostrate him. He only smiled, patted her head, and
said cheerfully as he put on his hat:
"Is the little girl wiser than her guardian? And has she not yet
learned that a pastor's duty knows neither heat nor cold, neither
fatigue nor bodily weaknesses?"
"I am so glad Mrs. Lindsay will come to-morrow. She can keep you at
home, and make you take care of yourself."
Holding his sleeve, she followed him to the front door, and detained
him a moment, to fasten in the button-hole of his coat a tuberose and
sprig of heliotrope, his favourite flowers.
"Thank you, my dear. You have learned all of Elise's pretty petting
tricks, and some day you will be, I hope, just such a noble,
tender-hearted woman. While I am gone, look after the young guineas;
I have not seen them since yesterday. I shall not stay very long."
He walked away, and she went out among the various pets in the
poultry yard.
It was late in August, but the afternoon was unusually close and
warm, and argosies of frail creamy clouds with saffron shadows seemed
becalmed in the still upper air, which was of that peculiar blue that
betokens turbid ether, and hints at showers.
About sunset Regina rolled the large easy chair out on the verandah
distant Atlantic.
Her thoughts wandered toward the future, that _terra incognita_ which
Mr. Lindsay's vague words--"There are trials ahead of you"--had
peopled with dread yet intangible phantoms, whose spectral shadows
solemnly presageful, hovered over even the present. Why was her own
history a sealed volume--her father a mystery--her mother a wanderer
in foreign lands?
From this most unprofitable train of reflection she was gradually
recalled by the restless singular behaviour of her dog. He had been
lying near the table, with his head on his paws, but rose, whined,
came close to his mistress and caught her sleeve between his
teeth--his usual mode of attracting her attention.
"What is it, Hero? Are you hungry?"
He barked, ran to the easy chair, rubbed his nose against the
pastor's hand, came back whining to Regina, and finally returning to
the chair, sat down, bent his head to the pastor's feet and uttered a
prolonged and dismal howl.
An undefinable horror made the girl spring toward the chair.
The sleeper had not moved, and stooping over she put her hand on his
forehead. The cold damp touch terrified her, and with a cry of
"Hannah! Oh, Hannah!" she darted into the library, and seized the
lamp. By its light held close to the quiet figure, she saw that the
eyes were closed as in slumber, and the lips half parted, as though
in dreaming he had smiled; but the features were rigid, the hands
stiff and cold, and she could feel no flutter in the wrists or
temples.
"Oh, my God! he is dead!" screamed Hannah, wringing her hands, and
uttering a succession of shrieks, while like a statue of despair the
girl stood staring almost vacantly at the white placid face of the
dead. At last, shuddering from head to foot, she exclaimed:
"Run for Dr. Melville! Run, Hannah! you can go faster now than I
could."
"What is the use? He is dead! stone dead!"
"Perhaps not--he may revive. Oh, Hannah! why don't you go?"
"Leave you alone in the house--with a corpse?"
"Run--run! Tell the doctor to hurry. He may do something."
As the old servant disappeared, Regina fell on her knees, and seizing
the right hand, carried it to her lips; then began to chafe it
violently between her own trembling palms.
"O Lord, spare him a little while! Spare him till his sister comes?"
She rushed into the library, procured some brandy which was kept in
the medicine chest, and with the aid of a spoon tried to force some
down his throat, but the muscles refused to relax, and, pouring the
brandy on her handkerchief, she rubbed his face and the hand she had
already chafed. In the left he tightly held the jasmine, as when he
spoke to her last, and she shrank from touching those fingers.
Finding no change in the fixed white face she took off his shoes and
rubbed his feet with mustard, but no effect encouraged her, and
finally she sat, praying silently, holding the feet tenderly against
her heart.
How long lasted that lonely vigil with the dead, she never knew. Hope
deserted her, and by degrees she realized the awful truth that the
arrival of the physician so impatiently expected would bring no
succour. How bitterly she upbraided herself for leaving him a moment,
even though in obedience to his wishes. Perhaps he had called and the
organ had drowned his voice.
Had he died while she sang, and was his spirit already with God when
she repeated the words "Far away in the regions of the blest"? When
she came on tiptoe, and asked, "Are you asleep?" was he indeed verily
"Asleep in Jesus"? While she waited, fearful of disturbing his
slumber, was his released and rejoicing soul nearing the pearly
battlements of the City of Rest, lead by God's most pitying and
tender angel, loving yet silent Death?
When will humanity reject and disown the hideous, ruthless monster
its own disordered fancy fashioned, and accept instead the beautiful
Oriental Azrael, the most ancient "Help of God," who is sent in
infinite mercy to guide the weary soul into the blessed realm of
Peace?
"O Land! O Land!
For all the broken-hearted,
The mildest herald by our fate allotted--
Beckons, and with inverted torch doth stand,
To lead us with a gentle hand
Into the Land of the great departed,--
Into the Silent Land."
When the solemn silence that hung like a pall over the parsonage was
broken by the hurried tread of many feet and the confused sound of
strange voices, Regina seemed to be aroused from some horrible
lethargy, and gazed despairingly at the doctor.
"It is too late. You can't do anything for him now," she said,
clinging to his feet, as an attempt was made to lift them from her
lap.
"He must have been dead several hours," answered Dr. Melville.
"None but God and the angels know when he died. I thought he had gone
to sleep; and so indeed he had."
Hannah had spread the alarm, while searching for the doctor, and very
soon Mr. Hargrove's personal friends and some of the members of the
congregation thronged the library, into which the body of the
minister had been removed.
An hour afterward Dr. Melville, having searched for the girl all over
the house, found her crouched on the steps leading down to the flower
garden. She sat with her arm around Hero's neck, and her head bowed
against him. Seating himself beside her, the physician said:
"Poor child, this is an awful ordeal for you, and in Dr. Hargrove's
death you have lost a friend whom the whole world cannot replace. He
was the noblest man, the purest Christian, I ever knew, and if the
church has a hundred pastors in future, none will ever equal him. He
married me, he baptized my children, and when I buried my wife, his
voice brought me the most comfort, the----"
His tone faltered, and a brief silence ensued.
"Regina, I wish you would tell me as nearly as you can how he seemed
to-day, and how it all happened. I could get nothing satisfactory put
of old Hannah."
She described the occurrences of the morning, his debility and entire
lack of appetite, and the long walk in the afternoon, followed by the
attack of vertigo and palpitation, to which he alluded after his
return. When she concluded her recital of the last terrible scene in
the melancholy drama, Dr. Melville sighed, and said:
"It has ended just as I feared, and predicted. His heart has been
affected for some time, and not a month ago I urged him to give up
his pulpit work for a while at least, and try rest and change of air.
But he answered that he considered his work imperative, and when he
died it would be with the harness on. He would not permit me to
allude to the subject in the presence of his family, because he told
me he did not wish to alarm his sister, who is so devoted to him, or
render the parting with his nephew more painful, by adding
apprehensions concerning his health. I fear his grief at the loss of
Douglass has hastened the end."
"When Mrs. Lindsay comes to-morrow it will kill her," groaned Regina,
whose soul seemed to grow sick, as she thought of the devoted fond
sister, and the anguish that awaited her already bruised and aching
heart.
"No, sorrow does not kill people, else the race would become
extinct."
"It has killed Mr. Hargrove."
"Not sorrow, but the disease, which sorrow may have aggravated."
"Mrs. Lindsay would not go to India with her son, because she said
she could not leave her brother whose sight was failing, and who
needed her most. Now she has lost both. Oh, I wish I could run away
to-morrow, somewhere, anywhere, out of sight of her misery!"
"Some one must meet her at the train, and prepare her for the sad
news. My dear child, you would be the best person for that melancholy
task."
"I? Never! I would cut off my tongue before it should stab her heart
with such awful news! Are people ever prepared for trouble like
this?"
"Well, somebody must do it; but, like you, I am not brave enough to
meet her with the tidings. When it is necessary, I can amputate
limbs, and do a great many apparently cruel things, but when by
thoughts of to-morrow's mournful mission, that she failed to notice
the roll of wheels along the street, or the quick rattle of the
gate-latch. The sound of rapid footsteps and the rustle of drapery on
the pebbled walk, finally arrested her attention, and rising she
would have moved aside, but a hand seized her arm.
"What is the matter? How is my brother?"
"Oh, Mrs. Lindsay!"
"Something must have happened. I had such a presentiment of trouble
at home that I could not wait till to-morrow. I came on the night
express. Why is the house all lighted up? Is Peyton ill?"
Trembling from head to foot, she waited an instant, but Regina only
crouched and groaned, and Mrs. Lindsay sprang up the steps. As she
reached the door, the light in the library revealed the shrouded
table,--the rigid figure resting thereon,--and a piercing wail broke
the silence of death.
"Merciful God!--not my Peyton?"
Thrusting her fingers into her ears, Regina fled down the walk out of
the yard, anywhere to escape the sound and sight of that
broken-hearted woman, whose cry was indeed _de profundis_.
"Console if you will, I can bear it; 'Tis a well-meant alms of
breath; But not all the preaching since Adam Has made Death other
than Death."
CHAPTER XII.
A dreary sunless December day had drawn to a close, prematurely
darkened by a slow drizzling rain, that brought the gloom of early
night, where sunset splendours should have lingered, and deepened the
sombre desolation that mantled the parsonage. In anticipation of the
arrival of the new minister, who was expected the ensuing week, the
furniture had been removed and sold, the books carefully packed and
temporarily stored at the warehouse of a friend, and even the trunks
containing the wearing apparel of the occupants had been despatched
to the railway depot, and checked for transmission by the night
express.
The melancholy preparations for departure were completed, friends had
paid their final visits, and only Esau the sexton waited with his
lantern, to lock up the deserted house, and take charge of the keys.
The last mournful tribute had been offered at the grave in the
churchyard, where the beloved pastor slept serenely; and the cold
leaden rain fell upon a mass of beautiful flowers, which quite
covered the mound, that marked his dreamless couch.
Since that farewell visit to her brother's tomb, Mrs. Lindsay seemed
to have lost her wonted fortitude and composure, and was pacing the
empty library, weeping bitterly, giving vent to the long-pent anguish
which daily duties and business details had compelled her to
restrain.
Impotent to comfort, Regina stood by the mantlepiece, gazing vacantly
at the wood fire on the hearth, which supplied only a dim fitful and
uncertain light in the bare chill room, once the most cosy and
attractive in the whole cheerful house.
How utterly desolate everything appeared now, with only the dreary
monotone of the wintry rain on the roof, and the occasional sob that
fell from the black-robed figure walking to and fro.
It had been such a happy, peaceful, blessed home, where piety,
charity, love, taste, refinement, and education all loaned their
charms to the store of witchery, which made it doubly sad to realize
that henceforth other feet would tread its floors, other voices echo
in its garden and verandahs.
To the girl who had really never known any other home (save the quiet
convent courts) this parsonage was the dearest spot she had yet
learned to love; and with profound sorrow she now prepared to bid
adieu for ever to the haven where her happiest years had passed like
a rosy dream.
The dreary deserted aspect of the house recalled to her mind--
"How some they have died, and some they have left me,
And some are taken from me; all are departed"--
of Charles Lamb's quaint tender "Old familiar faces," as full of
melancholy pathos as human eyes brimming with unshed tears; and from
it her thoughts gradually drifted to another poem, which she had
first heard from Mr. Lindsay during the week of his departure, and
later from the sacred lips that were now placidly smiling beneath the
floral cross and crown in the neighbouring churchyard.
To-night the words recurred with the mournful iteration of some
dolorous refrain; and yielding to the spell she leaned her forehead
against the chimney-piece, and repeated them sadly and slowly:
"'We sat and talked until the night
Descending, filled the little room;
Our faces faded from the sight--
Our voices only broke the gloom.
We spake of many a vanished scene,
Of what we once had thought and said,
Of what had been, and might have been,
And who was changed, and who was dead;
And all that fills the hearts of friends,
When first they feel with secret pain,
Their lives thenceforth have separate ends,
And never can be one again.
The very tones in which we spake
Had something strange, I could but mark;
The leaves of memory seemed to make
A mournful rustling in the dark.'"
Attracted by the rhythm, which softly beat upon the air like some
muffled prelude striking only minor chords, Mrs. Lindsay came to the
hearth, and with her arm resting on the girl's shoulder, stood
listening.
"How dearly my Douglass loved those lines."
"And on the night before he died, Mr. Hargrove repeated them, asking
me afterward to select some sweet solemn sacred tune with an organ
accompaniment, and sing them for him. But what music is there that
would suit a poem, which henceforth will seem as holy as a psalm to
me?"
"Perhaps after a while you and I may be able to quiet the pain, and
set it to some sweet old chant. Just now our hearts are too sore."
"After a while? What hope has after a while? It cannot bring back the
lost; and does memory ever die? After a while has not given me my
mother; after a while has not taught me to forget her, or made me
more patient in my waiting. After a while I know death will come to
us all, and then there will be no more heartache; but I can't see
that there is any comfort in after a while, except beyond the grave.
Mrs. Lindsay, I do not wish to be wicked or rebellious, but it seems
very hard that I must leave this dear quiet home, and be separated
from you and Mr. Lindsay whom I dearly love, and go and live in a
city, with that cold, hard, harsh, stern man, of whom I am so much
afraid. He may mean well, but he has such unkind ways of showing it.
You have no idea how dreadful the future looks to me."
She spoke drearily, and in the fitful flashes of the firelight the
young face looked unnaturally stern.
"My dear child, you must not despond; at your age one must try to see
only the bright side. If I expected to remain in America, I would not
give you up without a struggle; would beg your mother's permission to
keep you until she claimed you. But I shall only wait to learn that
Douglass has arranged for my arrival. As you know, my sister and
brother-in-law are in Egypt, and if I were with them in Cairo, I
could hear more regularly and frequently from my dear boy. I wish I
could keep you, for you have grown deep into my heart, but my own
future is too uncertain to allow me to involve any one else in my
plans."
"I understand the circumstances, but if mother only knew everything,
I believe she would not doom me to the care of that man of stone. Oh,
if you could only take me across the ocean, and let me go to Venice
to mother."
Mrs. Lindsay tightened her arm around the erect slender figure, and
gently stroked back the hair from her temples.
"My dear, you paint your future guardian too grimly. Mr. Palma
is very reserved, rather haughty, and probably stern, but
notwithstanding has a noble character, I am told, and certainly
appears much interested in and kindly disposed toward you. Dear
Peyton liked him excee checks, and
he will have the trunks at home almost as soon as we get there.
Michael O'Brien!"
As the ruddy, beaming pleasant countenance of the express man
approached, and he received the checks, Mr. Roscoe sprang into the
carriage, but Regina summoned courage to speak.
"If you please, I want my dog."
"Your dog! Did you leave it in the car? Is it a poodle?"
"Poodle! He is a Newfoundland, and the express agent has him."
"Then O'Brien will bring him with the trunks," said Mr. Roscoe,
preparing to close the door.
"I would not like to leave him behind."
"You certainly do not expect to carry him in the carriage?" answered
the gentleman, staring at her, as if she had been a refugee from some
insane asylum.
"Why not? There seems plenty of room. I am so much afraid something
might happen to him among all these people. But perhaps you would not
like him shut up in the carriage."
For an instant she seemed sorely embarrassed, then leaning forward,
addressed the coachman.
"Would you mind taking my dog up there with you? thank you very much
if you will please be so kind."
Before the wistful pleading of the violet eyes, and the sweet tones
of the hesitating voice, the surly expression vanished from Farley's
countenance, and, touching his hat, he replied cheerfully:
"Aye, miss; if he is not venomous, I will take him along."
"Thank you. Mr. Roscoe, if you will be so good as to go with me to
the express car, I can get my dog."
"That is not necessary. Besides it is snowing hard, and your wraps
are not very heavy. Give me the receipt, and I will bring him out."
There was some delay, but after a little while Mr. Roscoe came back
leading Hero by a chain attached to his collar. The dog looked sulky
and followed reluctantly, but at sight of his mistress, sprang
forward, barking joyfully.
"Poor Hero! poor fellow! Here I am."
When he had been prevailed upon to jump up beside the driver, and the
carriage rolled homeward, Mr. Roscoe said:
"That is a superb creature. The only pure white Newfoundland I ever
saw. Where did you get him?"
"He was bought in Brooklyn several years ago, and sent to me."
"What is his name?"
"Hero."
"How very odd. Bruno, or Nero, or Ponto, or even Fido, would be so
much more suitable."
"Hero suits him, and suits me."
Mr. Roscoe looked curiously into the face beside him, and laughed.
"I presume you are a very romantic young miss, and have been dreaming
about some rustic Leander in round jacket."
"My dog was not called after the priestess at Sestos. It means hero
the common noun, not Hero the proper name. Holding torches to guide
people across the Hellespont was not heroism."
If she had addressed him in Aramaic he would not have been more
surprised; and for a moment he stared.
"I am afraid your Hero will not prove a thoroughly welcome addition
to my cousin's household. He has no fondness whatever for dogs, or
indeed for pets of any kind, and Mrs. Palma, who has a chronic terror
of hydrophobia, will not permit a dog to come near her."
He saw something like a smile flicker across the girl's mouth, but
she did not look up, and merely asked:
"Where is Mr. Palma?"
"He was unexpectedly called to Philadelphia two days ago, on urgent
business. Do you know him?"
"I have not seen him for several years."
She turned away, fixing her attention upon the various objects of
interest that flitted by, as they rolled rapidly along one of the
principal streets. The young gentleman who in no respect resembled
Mr. Palma, found it exceedingly pleasant to study the fair delicate
face beside him, and not a detail of her dress, from the shape of
her hat to the fit of her kid gloves, escaped his critical
inspection.
Almost faultily fastidious in his Broadway trained tastes, he arrived
at the conclusion that she possessed more absolute beauty than any
one in his wide circle of acquaintance; but her travelling suit was
not cut in the approved reigning style, and the bow of ribbon at her
throat did not exactly harmonize with the shade of the feather in her
hat, all of which jarred disagreeably.
As the carriage entered Fifth Avenue, and drew up before one of the
handsome brown-stone front mansions that stretch like palatial walls
for miles along that most regal and magnificent of American streets,
Mr. Roscoe handed his companion out, and rang the bell.
Hero leaped to the sidewalk, and, patting his head, Regina said:
"Driver, I am very much obliged to you for taking care of him for
me."
"You are quite welcome, miss. He is an uncommon fine brute, and I
will attend to him for you if you wish it."
The door opened, and Regina was ushered in, and conducted by Mr.
Roscoe into the sitting-room, where a blazing coal fire lent pleasant
warmth and a ruddy glow to the elegantly furnished apartment.
"Terry, tell the ladies we have come."
The servant disappeared, and, holding his hands over the fire, Mr.
Roscoe said:
"I believe you are a stranger to all but my cousin; yet you are
probably aware that his stepmother and her daughter reside with him."
Before she could reply the door suddenly opened wide, as if moved by
an impatient hand, and a middle-aged lady, dressed in black silk that
rustled proudly at every step, advanced toward Regina. Involuntarily
the girl shivered, as if an icy east wind had blown upon her.
"Mrs. Palma, I have brought this young lady safely, and transfer her
to your care. This is Regina Orme."
"Miss Orme has arrived on a cold day, and looks as if she realized
it."
She put out her hand, barely touched the fingers of the stranger, and
her keen, probing, inquisitorial eyes of palest grey wandered
searchingly over the face and figure; while her haughty tone was
chill--as the damp breath of a vault.
Catching sight of Hero she started back, and exclaimed with
undisguised displeasure:
"What! A dog in my sitting-room! Who brought that animal here?"
Regina laid a protecting hand on the head of her favourite, and said
timidly, in a voice that faltered from embarrassment:
"It is my dog. Please, madam, allow me to keep him; he will disturb
no one; shall give no trouble."
"Impossible! Dogs are my pet aversion. I would not even allow my
daughter to accept a lovely Italian greyhound which Count Fagdalini
sent her on her last birthday. That huge brute there would give me
hysterics before dinner-time."
"Then you shall not see him. I will keep him always out of eight; he
shall never annoy you."
"Very feasible in a Fifth Avenue house! Do you propose to lock him up
always in your own chamber? How absurd!"
She touched the bell, and added:
"It always saves trouble to start exactly as we expect or intend to
continue. I cannot endure dogs--never could, and yours must be
disposed of at once."
Pitying the distress so eloquently printed on the face of the girl,
Mr. Roscoe interposed:
"Strike, but hear me! Don't banish the poor fellow so summarily. He
can't go mad before May or June, if then; and at least let her keep
him a few days. She feels strange and lonely, and it will comfort her
to have him for a while."
"Nonsense, Elliott! Terry, tell Farley I shall want the carriage in
half an hour, and meantime ask him to come here and help you take out
this dog. We have no room for any such pests. Send Hattie to show
this young lady to her own room."
Mr. Roscoe shrugged his shoulder, and closely inspected his seal
ring.
There was an awkward silence. Mrs. Palma stirred the coals with the
poker, and at last asked abruptly:
"Miss Orme, I presume you have breakfasted?"
"I do not wish any, thank you."
Something in her quiet tone attracted attention, and as the lady and
gentleman turned to look at her, both noticed a brilliant flush on
her cheek, a peculiar sparkle dancing in her eyes.
Passing her arm through the handle of her satchel, she put both her
hands upon Hero's silver collar.
"Hattie will show you up to your room, Miss Orme; and if you need
anything call upon her for it. Farley, take that dog away, and do not
let me seeme all! this rock shall fly
From its firm base, as soon as I!'
I daresay it is his terrapin habit that helps Erle Palma to his great
success as a lawyer; when he once takes hold, he never lets go. Now,
mamma, if you do not hoist a white flag as far as that poor girl is
concerned, I shall certainly ask your wary stepson to give her a
sprig of phryxa from Mount Brixaba. Do you understand, Elliott?"
"Of course not I rarely do understand you when you begin your
spiteful challenges. Now, Olga, I always preserve an unarmed
neutrality, so do let me alone."
He made a deprecating gesture, and put on his hat.
"Free schools and universal education is one of my spavined hobbies,
and a brief canter for your improvement in classic lore would be
charitable, so I proceed: Agatho the Samian says that in the Scythian
Brixaba grows the herb phryxa (hating the wicked), which especially
protects step children; and whenever they are in danger from a
stepmother (observe the antiquity of Stepmotherly characteristics!)
the phryxa gives them warning by emitting a bright flame. You see
Erle Palma remembers his classics, and early in life turned his
attention to the cultivation of phryxa, which flourishes----"
"Olga, you vex me beyond endurance. Put on your furs at once; it is
time to go to the Studio. Elliott, will you ride down with us, and
look at the portrait?"
"Thanks! I wish I could, but promised to write out some legal
references before my cousin returns, and must keep my word; for you
very well know he has scant mercy on delinquents."
"I only hope he will bring his usual iron rule to bear upon this new
element in the household, else her impertinent self-assertion will be
unendurable. Will you be at Mrs. Delafield's reception to-night?"
"I promised to attend. Suppose I call for you and Olga about nine?"
"Quite agreeable to all parties. I shall expect you. Good-morning."
When Regina left the sitting-room she followed the housemaid up two
flights of steps, and into a small but beautifully furnished
apartment, where a fire was not really necessary, as the house was
heated by a furnace, still the absence of the cheerful red light she
had left below made this room seem chill and uninviting.
The trunks had been brought up, and after lowering the curtain of
the window that looked down on the beautiful Avenue, Hattie said:
"Will you have tea, coffee, or chocolate?"
"Neither, I thank you."
"Have you had any breakfast?"
"I do not want any."
"It is no trouble, miss, to get what you like."
Regina only shook her head, and proceeded to take off her hat and
wrappings.
"Are you an orphan?" queried Hattie, her heart warming toward a
stranger who avoided giving trouble.
"No; but my mother is in----is too far for me to go to her."
"Then you aren't here on charity?"
"Charity! No, indeed! Mr. Palma is my guardian until I go to my
mother."
"Well, miss, try to be contented. Miss Olga has a kinder heart than
her mother, and though she has a bitter tongue and rough ways she
will befriend you. Don't fret about your dog, we folks belowstairs
will see that he does not suffer. We will help you take care of him."
"Thank you, Hattie. I shall be grateful to all who are kind to him.
Please give him some water and a piece of bread when you go down."
It was a great relief to find herself once more alone, and, sinking
down wearily into a rocking chair, she hid her face in her hands.
Her heart was heavy, her head ached; her soul rose in rebellion
against the cold selfishness and discourtesy that had characterized
her reception by the inmates of her guardian's house.
Everything around her betokened wealth, taste, elegance; the carpets
and various articles of furniture were of the most costly materials,
but at the thought of living here she shuddered. Fine and fashionable
in all its appointments, but chilly, empty, surface gilded, she felt
that she would stifle in this mansion.
By comparison, how dear and sacred seemed the old life at the
parsonage I how desolate and dreary the present! how inexpressibly
lonely and hopeless the future!
From the thought of Mr. Palma's return, she could borrow no pleasant
auguries, rather additional gloom and apprehension; and his absence
had really been the sole redeeming circumstance that marked her
arrival in New York. With an unconquerable dread which arose from
early childish prejudice and which she never attempted to analyze,
she shrank from meeting him.
There came a quick low rap on the door, but she neither heard nor
heeded it, and started when a warm hand removed those that covered
her face.
"Just as I expected, you are having a good cry all to yourself. No,
your eyes are dry and bright as stars. I daresay you have set us all
down as a family of brutes; as more cruel than the Piutes or Modocs;
as stony hearted as Solomon, when he ordered the poor little baby to
be cut in half and distributed among its several mothers. But there
is so little justice left in the world, that I imagine each
individual would do well to contribute a moiety to the awfully
slender public stock. Suppose you pay tithes to the extent of
counting me out of this nest of persecutors? Thank Heaven! I am not a
Palma! My soul does not work like the piston of a steam-engine,--is
not regulated by a gauge-cock and safety-valve to prevent all
explosions, to keep the even, steady, decorous, profitable tenor of
its sternly politic way. I am a Neville. The blood in my veins is not
'blue' like the Palma's, but red,--and hot enough to keep my heart
from freezing, as the Palma's do, and to melt the ice they
manufacture, wherever they breathe. I am no Don Quixote to redress
your grievances, or storm windmills; for verily neither mamma nor
Erle Palma belongs to that class of harmless innocuous bugaboos, as
those will find to their cost who run against them. I am simply Olga
Neville, almost twenty-three, and quite willing to help you if
possible. Shall we enter into an alliance--offensive and defensive?"
She stood by the mantlepiece, slowly buttoning her glove, and looked
quite handsome, and very elegant in her rich wine-coloured silk and
costly furs.
Looking up into her face, Regina wondered how far she might trust
that apparently frank open countenance, and Olga smiled, and added:
"You are a cunning fledgling, not to be caught with chaff. Have they
sent you anything to eat?"
"I declined having anything. My head aches."
"Then do as I tell you, and you will soon feel relieved. There is a
bath-room on this floor. Ring for Hattie, and tell her you want a
good hot bath. When you have taken it, lie down and go to sleep. One
word before I go. Do try not to be hard on mamma. Poor mamma! She
married among these Palmas, and very soon from force of habit and
association she too grew politic, cautious; finally she also froze,
and has never quite thawed again. She is not unkind,--you must not
think so for an instant; she only keeps her blood down to the safe,
wise prudent temperature of sherbet. Poor mamma! She does not like
dogs; once she was dreadfully bitten, almost torn to pieces by one,
and very naturally she has developed no remarkable 'affinity' for
them since that episode. Hattie will get you anything you need. Take
your bath and go to sleep, and dream good-natured things about
mamma."
She nodded, smiled pleasantly, and glided away as noiselessly as she
came, leaving Regina perplexed, and nowise encouraged with reference
to the stern cold character of her guardian.
She had eaten nothing since the previous day, had been unable to
close her eyes after bidding Mrs. Lindsay farewell; and now, quite
overcome with the reaction from the painful excitement of yesterday's
incidents, she threw herself across the foot of the bed, and clasped
her hands over her throbbing temples. No sound disturbed tier, save
the occasional roll of wheels on the street below, and very soon the
long lashes drooped, and she slept the heavy deep sleep of mental and
physical exhaustion.
CHAPTER XIV.
Led by poof any sentiment of gratitude
toward me? If so, will you do me a favour?"
"Certainly, if I can."
"Thank you. I shall always feel exceedingly obliged. Pray do not look
so uneasy, and grow so white; it is a small matter. I gave you the
dog years ago, little dreaming that I was thereby providing future
discord for my own hearthstone. With a degree of flattering delicacy,
which I assure you I appreciate, you decline to sell what was a
friendly gift; and now I simply appeal to your generosity, and ask
you please to give him back to me."
She recoiled a step, and her fingers clutched each other.
"Oh, Mr. Palma! Don't ask me. I cannot give up my Hero. I would give
you anything, everything else that I own."
"Rash little girl! What else have you to give? Yourself?"
He was smiling now, and the unbending of his lips, and glitter of his
remarkably fine teeth, gave a strange charm to his countenance,
generally so grave.
"You would give yourself away, sooner than that unlucky dog?"
"I belong to my mother. But he belongs to me, and I never, never will
part with him!"
"_Jacta est alea!_" muttered the lawyer, still smiling.
"Mr. Palma, I hope you will excuse me. It may seem very selfish and
obstinate in me, and perhaps it really is so, but I can't help it. I
am so lonely now, and Hero is all that I have left to comfort me.
Still I know as well as you or any one else, that it would be very
wrong and unkind to force him into a house where dogs are
particularly disliked; and therefore we will annoy no one here,--we
will go away."
"Will you? Where?"
He rose, and they stood side by side.
Her face wore its old childish look of patient pain, reminding him of
the time when she stood with the cluster of lilies drooping against
her heart. He saw that tears had gathered in her eyes, tendering them
larger, more wistful.
"I do not know yet. Anywhere that you think best, until we can write
and get mother's permission for me to go to her. Will you not please
use your influence with her?"
"To send you from the shelter of my roof? That would be eminently
courteous and hospitable on my part. Besides your mother does not
want you."
Observing how sharply the words wounded her, he added:
"I mean, that at present she prefers to keep you here, because it is
best for your own interests; and in all that she does, I believe your
future welfare is her chief aim. You understand me, do you not?"
"I do not understand why or how it can be best for a poor girl to be
separated from her mother, and thrown about the world, burdening
strangers. Still, whatever my mother does must be right."
"Do you think you burden me?"
"I believe, sir, that you are willing for mother's sake to do all you
can for me, and I thank you very much; but I must not bring trouble
or annoyance into your family. Can't you place me at school? Mrs.
Lindsay has a dear friend--the widow of a minister--living in New
York, and perhaps she would take me to board in her house? I have a
letter to her. Do help me to go away from here."
He turned quickly, muttering something that sounded very like a
half-smothered oath, and took her little trembling hand, folding it
gently between his soft warm palms.
"Little girl, be patient; and in time all things will be conquered.
As long as I have a home, I intend to keep you, or until your mother
sends for you. She trusts me fully, and you must try to do so, even
though sometimes I may appear harsh,--possibly unjust. Of course Hero
cannot remain here at present, but I will take him down to my office,
and have him carefully attended to; and as often as you like you
shall come and see him, and take him to ramble with you through the
parks. As soon as I can arrange matters, you shall have him with you
again."
"Please, Mr. Palma! send me to a boarding school; or take me back to
the convent."
"Never!"
He spoke sternly, and his face suddenly hardened, while his fingers
tightened over hers like a glove of steel.
"I shall never be contented here."
"That remains to be seen."
"Mrs. Palma does not wish me to reside here."
"It is my house, and in future you will find no cause to doubt your
welcome."
She knew that she might as efficaciously appeal to an iron column,
and her features settled into an expression that could never have
been called resignation,--that plainly meant hopeless endurance. She
attempted twice to withdraw her hand, but his clasp tightened.
Bending his haughty head, he asked:
"Will you be reasonable?"
A heavy sigh broke over her compressed mouth, and she answered in a
low, but almost defiant tone:
"It seems I cannot help myself."
"Then yield gracefully to the inevitable, and you will learn that
when struggles end, peace quickly follows."
She chose neither to argue, nor acquiesce, and slowly shook her head.
"Regina."
She merely lifted her eyes.
"I want you to be happy in my house."
"Thank you, sir."
"Don't speak in that sarcastic manner. It does not sound respectable
to one's guardian."
She was growing paler, and all her old aversion to him was legible in
her countenance.
"Let us be friends. Try to be a patient, cheerful girl."
"Patient,--I will try. Cheerful,--no, no, not here! How can I be
happy in this house? Am I a brute, or a stone? Oh! I wish I could
have died with my dear, dear Mr. Hargrove, that calm night when he
went to rest for ever while I sang!"
One by one the tears stole over her long lashes, and rolled swiftly
down her cheeks.
"Will you tell me the circumstances of his death?"
"Please do not ask me now. It would bring back all the sad things
that began when Mr. Lindsay left me. Everything was so bright until
then,--until he went away. Since then nothing but trouble, trouble."
A frown clouded the lawyer's brow; then with a half smile he asked:
"Of the two ministers, who did you love best? Mr. Hargrove, or the
young missionary?"
"I do not know, both were so noble, good, and kind; and both are so
very dear to me. Mr. Palma, please let go my hand; you hurt me."
"Pardon me! I forgot I held it."
He opened his hands, and, looking down at the almost childish
fingers, saw that his seal ring had pressed heavily upon, and
reddened the soft palm.
"I did not intend to bruise you so painfully, but in some respects
you are such a tender little thing, and I am only a harsh, selfish
strong man, and hurt you without knowing it. One word more, before I
send you off to sleep. Olga has the most kindly ways, and really the
most affectionate heart under this roof of mine, and she will do all
she can for your comfort and happiness. Be respectful to Mrs. Palma,
and she shall meet you half way. This is as you say the most
attractive room in the house, this is exclusively and especially
mine; but at all times, whether I am absent, or present, you must
consider yourself thoroughly welcome, and recollect, all it contains
in the book line is at your service. To-morrow I will talk with you
about your studies, and examine you in some of your text-books. _A
propos!_ I take my breakfast alone, before the other members of the
family are up, and unless you choose to rise early and join me at the
seven o'clock table, you need not be surprised if you do not see me
until dinner, which is usually at half-past six. If you require
anything that has not been supplied in your room, do not hesitate to
ring and order it. Try to feel at home."
"Thank you, sir."
She moved a few steps, and he added:
"Do not imagine that Hero is suffering all the torments painted in
Dante's 'Inferno'; but go to sleep like a good child, and accept my
assurance that he is resting quite comfortably. When I came home, I
took a light, went out and examined his kennel; found him liberally
provided with food, water, bed, every accommodation that even your
dog, which all New York can't buy, could possibly wish. Good-night,
little one. Don't dream that I am Blue Beard or Polyphemus."
"Good-night, Mr. Palma."
CHAPTER XV.
"Mrs. Orme, I am afraid you will overtax your strength. Yoease from the man who had
bruised, trampled, broken her heart? She instructed Mrs. Waul to
decline receiving the bouquet when next the messenger came, and to
request him to assure his master that Madame Orme was fully conscious
once more and wished the floral tribute discontinued. During the
tedious days of convalescence she contracted a cold that attacked her
lungs, and foreboded congestion; and though yielding to medical
treatment, it left her as _souvenir_, a. troublesome cough.
Her physician informed her that her whole nervous system had received
a shock so severe that only perfect and prolonged rest of mind and
freedom from all excitement could restore its healthful tone.
Interdicting sternly the thought of dramatic labour for at least a
year, they urged her to seek a quiet retreat in Italy, or Southern
France, as her lungs had already become somewhat involved.
More than once she had been taken in a carnage through the Bois de
Boulogne, but to-day for the first time since her recovery she
ventured on foot, in quest of renewed vigour from outdoor air and
exercise.
Wrapped in a mental cloud of painful speculation concerning her
future career, a cloud unblessed as yet by silver lining, and
unfringed with gold, she wandered aimlessly along the walk, taking no
notice of passers-by until she approached the water, where swans were
performing their daily regatta evolutions for the amusement of those
who generally came provided with crumbs or grain wherewith to feed
them.
The sound of a sob attracted Mrs. Orme's attention, and she paused to
witness a scene that quickly aroused her sympathy.
A child's carriage had been pushed close to the margin of the basin,
to enable the occupant to feast the swans with morsels of cake, and
in leaning over to scatter the food a little hat composed of lace,
silk, and flowers, had fallen into the water. Near the carriage stood
a boy apparently about ten years old, who with a small walking-stick
was maliciously pushing the dainty millinery bubble as far beyond
reach as possible.
In the carriage, and partly covered by a costly and brilliant afghan,
reclined a forlorn and truly pitiable creature, who seemed to have
sunk down helplessly on the cushions. Although her age was seven
years, the girl's face really appeared much older, and in its
shrunken, sallow, pinched aspect indicated lifelong suffering.
The short thin dark hair was dry and harsh, lacking the silken gloss
that belongs to childhood, and the complexion a sickly yellowish
pallor. Her brilliant eyes were black, large and prominent, and
across her upper lip ran a diagonal scar, occasionally seen in those
so afflicted as to require the merciful knife of a skilful surgeon to
aid in shaping the mouth.
The unfortunate victim of physical deformity, increased by a fall
which prevented the possibility of her ever being able to walk,
nature had with unusual malignity stamped her with a feebleness of
intellect that at times bordered almost on imbecility.
Temporarily deserted by her nurse, the poor little creature was
crying bitterly over the fate of her hat. Walking up behind the boy,
who was too much engrossed by his mischievous sport to observe her
approach, Mrs. Orme seized his arms.
"You wicked boy! How can you be so cruel as to torment that afflicted
child?"
Taking his pretty mother-of-pearl-headed cane, she tried to touch the
hat, but it was just beyond her reach, and, resolved to rescue it,
she fastened the cane to the handle of her parasol, using her
handkerchief to bind them together. Thus elongated it sufficed to
draw the hat to the margin, and, raising it, she shook out the water,
and hung the dripping bit of finery upon one of the handles of the
carriage.
"Give me my walking-stick," said the boy, whose pronunciation
proclaimed him thoroughly English.
"No, sir. I intend to punish you for your cruelty. You tyrannized
over that helpless little girl, because you were the strongest. I
think I have more strength than you, and you shall feel how pleasant
such conduct is."
Untying the cane, she raised it in the air, and threw it with all the
force she could command into the middle of the water.
"Now if you want it, wade in with your best boots and Sunday clothes
and get it; and go home and tell your parents, if you have any, that
you are a bad, rude, ugly-behaved boy. When you need your toy, think
of that hat."
The cane had sunk instantly, and with a sullen scowl of rage at her,
and a grimace at the occupant of the carriage, the boy walked sulkily
away.
With her handkerchief, Mrs. Orme wiped off the water that adhered to
the hat, squeezed and shook out the ribbons and laid it upon the
afghan, in reach of the fingers that more nearly resembled claws than
the digits of a human hand.
"Don't cry, dear. It will soon dry now."
The solemn black eyes, still glistening with tears, stared up at her,
and impelled by that peculiar pitying tenderness that hovers in the
hearts of all mothers, Mrs. Orme bent down and gently smoothed the
elfish locks around the sallow forehead.
"Has your nurse run away and left you? Don't be afraid; nothing shall
trouble you. I will stay with you till she comes back."
"Hellene is gone to buy candy," said the dwarf, timidly,
"My dear, what is your name?"
"Maud Ames Laurance."
The stranger had compassionately taken one of the thin hands in her
own, but throwing it from her as if it had been a serpent, she
recoiled, involuntarily pushing the carriage from its resting-place.
It rolled a few steps and stopped, while she stood shuddering.
Her first impulse was to hurry away; the second was more feminine in
its promptings, and conquered. Once more she approached the
unfortunate child, and scrutinized her, with eyes that gradually
kindled into a blaze.
She bore in no respect the faintest resemblance to her father, but
Mrs. Orme fancied she traced the image of the large-featured
bold-eyed mother; and as she contrasted this feeble deformed creature
with the remembered face and figure of her own beautiful darling
girl, a bitter but intensely triumphant laugh broke suddenly on the
air.
"Maud Ames Laurance! A proud name truly--and royally you grace it!
Ah, Nemesis! Christianity would hunt you down as a pagan myth, but
all honour, glory to you, incorruptible pitiless Avenger! Accept my
homage, repay my wrongs, and then demand in sacrificial tribute what
you will, though it were my heart's best blood! Aha! will she lend
lustre to the family name? Shall the splendour of her high-born
aristocratic beauty gild the crime that gave her being? Yes verily,
it seems that after all, even for me the Mills of the Gods do not
forget to grind. '_The time of their visitation will come, and that
inevitably; for, it is always true, that if the fathers have eaten
sour grapes, the children's teeth are set on edge_' Command my
lifelong allegiance, oh Queenly Nemesis!"
Sometimes grovelling in the dust of gross selfishness which clings
more or less to all of us, we bow worshipping before the gods, into
which we elevate the meanest qualities of our own nature,
apotheosizing sinful lusts of hate and vengeance; and while we vow
reckless tribute and measureless libations, lo, we are unexpectedly
called upon for speedy payment!
Looking down with exultant delight on the ugly deformity who stared
back wonderingly at her, Mrs. Orme's wan thin face grew radiant, the
brown eyes dilated, glowed, and the blood leaped to her hollow
cheeks, burning in two scarlet spots; but the invocation seemed
literally answered, when she was suddenly conscious of a strange
bubbling sensation, and over her parted, laughing lips crept the
crimson that fed her heart.
At this moment the child's nurse, a pretty bright-eyed young
coquette, hurried toward the group, accompanied by a companion of the
same class; and as she approached and seized the handles of the
carriage, Mrs. Orme turned away. The hemorrhage was not copious, but
steady, and lowering her thick veil, she endeavoured to stanch its
flow. Her handkerchiefne the counterpart of
"_La Joconde_."
The dress and drapery were of black velvet, utterly bare of ornament,
and out of the canvas looked a face of marvellous, yet mysteriously
mournful beauty. The countenance of a comparatively young woman,
whose radiant brown eyes had dwelt in some penetrale of woe, until
their light was softened, saddened; whose regular features were
statuesque in their solemn repose, and whose gold-tinted hair simply
parted on her white round brow, fell in glinting waves down upon her
polished shoulders. The mystical pale face of one who seemed alike
incapable of hope or of regret, who gazed upon past, present, future,
as proud, as passionless and calm as Destiny; and whose perfect hands
were folded in stern fateful rest.
As Regina looked up at it she stopped, then run to the hearth, and
stood with her eyes riveted to the canvas, her lips parted and
quivering.
Watching her, Mr. Palma came to her side, and asked:
"Whom can it be?"
Evidently she did not hear him. Her whole heart and soul appeared
centred in the picture; but as she gazed, her own eloquent face grew
whiter, she drew her breath quickly, and tears rolled over her
cheeks, as she lifted her arms toward the painting.
"Mother I my beautiful sad-eyed mother!"
Sobs shook her frame, and she pressed toward the mantelpiece till the
skirt of her dress swept dangerously close to the fire. Mr. Palma
drew her back, and said quietly:
"For an uncultivated young rustic, I must say your appreciation of
fine painting is rather surprising. Few city girls would have paid
such a tearful tribute of heartfelt admiration to my pretty 'Mona
Lisa.'"
Without removing her fascinated eyes she asked:
"When did it come?"
"I have had it several days. I presume that you know it is a copy of
Da Vinci's celebrated picture, upon which he worked four years, and
which now hangs in the gallery of the Louvre at Paris?"
She merely shook her head.
"In France it is called '_La Joconde_; but I prefer the softer 'Mona
Lisa' for my treasure."
"Is it not mine? She must have sent it to me?"
"She? Are you dreaming? Mona Lisa has been dead three hundred years!"
"Mr. Palma, it is my mother. No other face ever looked like that, no
other eyes except those in the _Mater Dolorosa_ resemble these
beautiful sad brown eyes, that rained their tears upon my head. Do
you think a child ever mistook another for her own mother? Can the
face I first learned to know and to love, the lovely--oh! how
lovely--face that bent over my cradle ever--ever be forgotten? If I
never saw her again in this world, could I fail to recognise her in
heaven? My own mother!"
"Obstinate, infatuated little ignoramus! Read--and be convinced."
He opened and held before her a volume of engravings of the pictures
and statues in the Louvre, and turning to the Leonardo Da Vinci's,
moved his fingers slowly beneath the title.
Her eyes fell upon "_La Joconde_," then wandered back to the portrait
over the fireplace; and through her tears broke a radiant smile.
"Yes, sir, I perfectly understand. Your engraving is of Da Vinci's
painting, and of course I suppose it is very fine, though the face is
not pretty; but up yonder! that is mother! My mother who kissed and
cried over me, and hugged me so close to her heart. Oh! Your Da Vinci
never even dreamed of, much less painted, anything half so heavenly
as my darling mother's face!"
Closing the book, Mr. Palma threw it on the table, and as he glanced
from the lovely countenance of the girl to that of the woman on the
wall, something like a sigh heaved his broad chest.
Did the wan meek shadow of his own patient much-suffering young
mother lift her melancholy image in the long silent adytum of his
proud heart, over whose chill chambers ambition and selfishness had
passed with ossifying touch?
Years ago, at the initial steps of his professional career, he had
set before him one glittering goal, the Chief-Justiceship. In
preparing for the long race that stretched ahead of him, seeing only
the Judicial crown that sparkled afar off, he had laid aside his
tender sensibilities, his warmest impulses of affection and
generosity as so many subtle fetters, so much unprofitable luggage,
so much useless weight to retard and burden him.
While his physical and mental development had brilliantly attested
the efficacy of the stern regiment he systematically imposed,--his
emotional nature long discarded, had grown so feeble and inane from
desuetude, that its very existence had become problematical. But
to-day, deeply impressed by the intensity of love which Regina could
not restrain at the sight of the portrait, strange softening memories
began to stir in their frozen sleep, and to hint of earlier, warmer,
boyish times, even as magnolia, mahogany, and cocoa trunks stranded
along icy European shores, babble of the far sweet sunny south, and
the torrid seas whose restless blue pulses drove them to hyperborean
realms.
"Is it indeed so striking and unmistakable a likeness? After all, the
instincts of nature are stronger than the canons of art. Your mother
is an exceedingly beautiful woman; but, little girl, let me tell you,
that you are not in the least like her."
"I know that sad fact, and it often grieves me."
"You must certainly resemble your father, for I never saw mother and
child so entirely dissimilar."
He saw the glow of embarrassment, of acute pain tinging her throat
and cheeks, and wondered how much of the past had been committed to
her keeping; how far she shared her mother's confidence. During the
year that she had been an inmate of his house she had never referred
to the mystery of her parentage, and despite his occasional efforts
to become better acquainted had shrunk from his presence, and
remained the same shy reserved stranger she appeared the week of her
arrival.
"Is not the portrait for me? Mother wrote that she intended sending
me something which she hoped I would value more than all the pretty
clothes, and it must be this, her own beautiful precious face."
"Yes, it is yours; but I presume you will be satisfied to allow it to
hang where it is. The light is singularly good."
"No, sir, I want it."
"Well you have it, where you can see it at any time."
"But I wish to keep it, all to myself, in my room, where it will be
the last thing I see at night, the first in the morning--my sunrise."
"How unpardonably selfish you are. Would you deprive me of the
pleasure of admiring a fine work of art, merely to shut it in,
converting yourself into a pagan, and the portrait into an idol?"
"But, Mr. Palma, you never loved any one or anything so very dearly,
that it seemed holy in your eyes; much too sacred for others to look
at."
"Certainly not. I am pleased to say that is a mild stage of lunacy,
with which I have as yet never been threatened. Idolatry is a phase
of human weakness I have been unable to tolerate."
He saw a faint smile lurking about the perfect curves of her rosy
mouth, but her eyes remained fixed on the picture.
"I should be glad to know what you find so amusing in my remark."
She shook her head, but the obstinate dimples reappeared.
"What are you smiling at?"
"At the assertion that you cannot tolerate idolatry."
"Well? Of all the men in New York, probably I am the most thoroughly
an iconoclast."
"Yes, sir, of other people's gods; nevertheless, I think you worship
ardently."
"Indeed! Have you recently joined the 'Microscopical Society'? I
solicit the benefit of your discoveries, and shall be duly grateful
if you will graciously point out the unknown fane wherein I secretly
worship. Is it Beauty? Genius? Riches?"
"It is not done in secret. All the world knows that Mr. Palma
imitates the example of Marcus Marcellus, and dedicates his life to
two divinities."
Standing on either side of the gate, and each pressing a hand upon
the slab of the mantle, the lawyer looked curiously down at the
bright young face.
"You are quite fresh in foraging from historic fields,--and since I
quitted the claed me until this after noon, and as
she could not leave home I came alone."
"I prefer you should not attend strange churches without a companion,
and now I will see you safely home."
She looked up, saw a few persons ascending the broad steps, and her
soul rose in rebellion;
"What possible harm can overtake me in God's house? Don't try to
stand between me and my duty."
"Do you not consider obedience to my wishes part of your duty?"
"Sometimes, sir; but not when it conflicts with my conscience."
"What is conscience?"
"The feeling God put into my soul when He gave it to me, to teach me
right from wrong."
"Is it? And if you were a Calmuck or a Mongol, it would teach you to
reverence Shigemooni as the highest god; and bid you fall down and
worship Dalai-lama, praying him to give you a pill of consecrated
dough."
"You mean that conscience is merely education? Even if it should be
so--which is not true, I think--the Bible says 'the heathen are a law
unto themselves,' and God knows they worship the best they can find
until revelation shows them their error. But I do not live in Lassa,
and my going to church here, is not akin to Lamaism. Nothing will
happen to me, and I assure you, sir, I will come home as soon as the
service is over."
"Is your eternal salvation dependent on church going?"
"I don't know, I rather think not; because if it were impossible for
me to attend service the Lord would know it, and He only requires
what He makes possible. But at least you must admit it cannot harm
me; and I enjoy coming to this church more than any I have seen since
I left our own dear old one at V----."
"It is a small, very plain affair, in no respect comparable to St.
Thomas's Church, where Mrs. Palma takes you every Sunday morning.
Where you not there to-day?"
"Yes, sir; but----"
"But--what? Speak out."
"Perhaps I ought not to say so,--and it may be partly my fault, but
indeed there seems to me more real religion in this plain little
chapel, at least it does me more good to come here."
"For instance, it incites and helps you defy your guardian on the
street!"
Until now she had resolutely kept her face set churchward, but as he
uttered the last words in a severer tone than he often used in
conversation with her, she turned quite around and retraced her
steps.
Walking beside her, he could only see the long soft lashes of her
downcast eyes, and the firm compression of her mouth.
"Little girl, are you very angry?"
She looked up quickly into his brilliant smiling eyes, and her cheek
dimpled.
"Mr. Palma, I wanted so very much to go, and I do feel disappointed;
but not angry."
"Then why do you not ask me to go with you?"
"You go there? Is it possible that you would ever do such a thing?
Really would you go, sir?"
"Try me."
"Please Mr. Palma, go with me."
He raised his hat, bowed, and said:
"I will."
"Oh, thank you!"
They turned and walked back in silence until they reached the door,
and he asked:
"Are the pews free?"
"Yes, sir; but Mrs. Mason and I generally sit yonder by that column."
"Very well, you must pilot me."
She turned into the side aisle next the windows, and they seated
themselves in a pew just beyond the projection of the choir gallery.
The edifice was small, but the altar and pulpit were handsome, and
though the windows were unstained, the light was mellowed by buff
inside blinds. The seats were by no means filled, and the
congregation was composed of people whose appearance denoted that
many belonged to the labouring class, and none to the Brahmin caste
of millionnaires, though all were neatly and genteely apparelled.
As the silver-haired pastor entered the pulpit the organ began to
throb in a low prelude, and four gentlemen bore shallow waiters
through the assemblage, to receive the contribution for the
"Destitute." Mr. Palma saw his companion take something from her
glove, and when the waiter reached them and she put in her small
alms, which he judged amounted to twenty-five cents, he slipped his
fingers in his vest pocket and dropped a bill on the plate.
"Is all that huge sum going to India to the missionaries?" he
gravely whispered.
"It is to feed the poor of this church."
As the organ swelled fuller and louder, Mr. Palma saw Regina start,
and listen intently; then the choir begin to sing, and she turned
very pale and shut her eyes. He could discover nothing remarkable in
the music,--"Oh that I had wings!" but as it progressed the girl's
emotion increased, became almost uncontrollable, and through the
closed lids the tears forced themselves rapidly, while she trembled
visibly, and seemed trying to swallow her sobs.
He moved closer to her, and the blue eyes opened and looked at him
with such pleading deprecating misery in their beautiful depths, that
he was touched, and involuntarily laid his ungloved hand on her
little bare fingers. Instantly they closed around it, twining like
soft tendrils about his, and unconsciously his clasp tightened.
All through the singing her tears fell unchecked, sliding over her
cheeks and upon her white dress, and when the congregation knelt in
prayer, Mr. Palma only leaned his head on the back of the pew in
front, and watched the figure bowed on her knees, close beside him,
crying silently, with her face in her hands.
When the prayer ended and the minister announced the hymn, she seemed
to have recovered her composure, and finding the page, offered her
pretty gilt hymn-book to her guardian. He accepted it mechanically,
and during the reading of the Scriptures that soon followed he slowly
turned over the leaves until he reached the title-page. On the
fly-leaf that fluttered over was written: "Regina Orme. With the love
and prayers of Douglass Lindsay."
Closing the book, he laid it in his lap, leaned back and folded his
arms over his chest.
The preacher read the sixty-third Psalm, and from it selected his
text: "My soul followeth hard after Thee."
Although certainly not a modern Chrysostom, he was an earnest,
faithful, and enlightened man, full of persuasive fervour; and to the
brief but interesting discourse he delivered--a discourse
occasionally sprinkled with felicitous metaphors and rounded with
several eloquent passages--Mr. Palma appeared to listen quite
attentively. Once a half smile moved his mouth, as he wondered what
his associates at the "Century" would think, if they could look in
upon him there; otherwise his deportment was most gravely decorous.
As he heard the monotonous rise and fall of the minister's tone, the
words soon ceased to bear any meaning to ears that gradually caught
other cadences long hushed; the voice of memory calling him from afar
off, back to the dewy days of his early boyhood, when walking by his
mother's side he had gone to church, and held her book as he now held
Regina's. Since then, how many changes time had wrought! How holy
seemed that distant, dim, church-going season!
At long intervals, and upon especially august occasions he had now
and then attended service in the elegant church where his pew-rent
was regularly paid; but not until to-day had he been attacked by the
swarming reminiscences of his childhood, all eagerly babbling of the
long-forgotten things once learned--
"At that best academe, a mother's knee."
From the benignant countenance of the earnest preacher his keen cold
eyes began to wander, and after awhile rested upon the pale tender
face at his side.
Except that the lashes were heavy with moisture that no longer
overflowed in drops, there was no trace of the shower that had
fallen; for hers was one of those rare countenances, no more
disfigured by weeping, than the pictured _Mater Dolorosa_ by the tear
on her cheek.
To-day in the subdued sadness that filled her heart, while she
pondered the depressing news from India, her face seemed
etherealized, singularly sublimated; and as he watched the expression
of child-like innocence, the delicate tracery of nose and brows, the
transparent purity of the complexion, and the ocking tone:
"Can you keep a secret?"
"I think so. I will try."
"Well, then, prepare to envy me. Until yesterday I was poor Olga
Neville, with no heritage but my slender share of good looks, and my
ample dower of sound pink and white, strawberry and cream flesh,
symmetrically spread over a healthy osseous structure. Perhaps you do
not know (yet it would be remarkable if some gossip has not told you)
that poor mamma was sadly cheated in her second marriage; and after
bargaining with Mammon never collected her pay, and was finally cut
off with a limited annuity which ceases at her death. My own poor
father left nothing of this world's goods, consequently I am
unprovided for. We have always been generously and kindly cared for,
well fed, and handsomely clothed by Mr. Erle Palma, who, justice
constrains me to say, in all that pertains to our physical
well-being, has been almost lavish to both of us. But for some years
I have lost favour in his eyes, have lived here as it were on
sufferance, and my bread of late has not been any sweeter than the
ordinary batch of charity loaves. Yesterday I was a pensioner on his
bounty, but the god of this world's riches--_i.e._, Plutus--in
consideration no doubt of my long and faithful worship at his altars,
has suddenly had compassion upon me, and to-day I am prospectively
one of the richest women in New York. Now do you wonder that
Circassia is so jubilant?"
"Do you mean that some one has died, and left you a fortune?"
"Oh no! you idiotic cherub! No such heavenly blessing as that. Plutus
is even shrewder than a Wall Street broker, and has a sharp eye to
his own profits. I mean that at last, after many vexatious and
grievous failures, I am promised a most eligible alliance, the
highest market price. Mr. Silas Congreve has offered me his real
estate, his stocks of various kinds, his villa at Newport, and his
fine yacht. Congratulate me."
"He gives them to you? Adopts and makes you his heiress? How very
good and kind of him, and I am so glad to hear it."
"He offers to many me, you stupid dove!"
"Not that Mr. Congreve who dined here last week, and who is so deaf?"
"That same veritable Midas. You must know he is not deaf from age; oh
no! Scarlet fever when he was teething."
"You do not intend to marry him?"
"Why not? Do you suppose I have gone crazy, and lost the power of
computing rents and dividends? Are people ever so utterly mad as
that? If I were capable of hesitating a moment, I should deserve a
strait-jacket for the remainder of my darkened days. Why, I am
reliably informed that his property is unencumbered, and worth at
least two millions three hundred thousand dollars! I think even dear
mamma, who mother-like overrates my charms, never in her rosiest
visions dreamed I could command such a high price. The slave trade
is looking up once more; threatens to grow brisk, in spite of
Congressional prohibition."
She sat quite erect, with her hands clasped across the back of her
head; a crimson spot burning on each cheek, and an unnatural lustre
in her laughing eyes.
"Olga, do you love him?"
"Now I am sure you are the identical white pigeon that Noah let out
of the ark; for nothing less antediluvian could ask such obsolete,
such utterly dead and buried questions! I love dearly and sincerely
rich laces, old wines, fine glass, heavy silver, blooded horses fast
and fiery, large solitaires, rare camei; and all these comfortable
nice little things I shall truly honour, and tenaciously cling to,
'until death us do part,' and as Mrs. Silas Congreve--hush! Here
comes mamma."
"Olga, why are you not up and dressed? You accepted the invitation to
'lunch' with Mrs. St. Clare, and what excuse can I possibly frame?"
"I have implicit faith in your ingenuity, and give you _carte
blanche_ in the manufacture of an apology."
"And my conscience, Olga?"
"Oh dear! Has it waked up again? I thought you had chloroformed it,
as you did the last spell of toothache a year ago. I hope it is not a
severe attack this time?"
She took her mother's hand, and kissed it lightly.
"My daughter, are you really sick?"
"Very, mamma; such fits of palpitation."
"I never saw you look better. I shall tell no stories for you to Mrs.
St. Clare."
"Cruel mamma! when you know how my tender maidenly sensibilities are
just now lacerated by the signal success of such patient manoeuvring!
Tell Mrs. St. Clare that like the man in the Bible who could not
attend the supper, because he had married a wife, I stayed at home to
ponder my brilliant prospects as Madame Silas----"
"Olga!" exclaimed Mrs. Palma, with a warning gesture toward Regina.
"Do you think I could hide my bliss from her? She knows the honour
proffered me, and has promised to keep the secret."
"Until the gentleman had received a positive and final acceptance, I
should imagine such confidence premature."
Mrs. Palma spoke sternly, and withdrew her fingers from her
daughter's clasp.
"As if there were even a ghost of a doubt as to the final acceptance!
As if I dared play this heavy fish an instant, with such a frail
line? Ah, mamma! don't tease me by such tactics! I am but an
insignificant mouse, and you and Mr. Congreve are such a grim pair of
cats, that I should never venture the faintest squeak. Don't roll me
under your velvet paws, and pat me playfully, trying to arouse false
hopes of escape, when all the while you are resolved to devour me
presently. Don't! I am a wiry mouse, proud and sensitive, and some
mice, it is said, will not permit insult added to injury."
"Regina, are you ready? I shall take you to Mrs. Brompton's, and it
is quite time to start."
Mrs. Palma looked impatiently at Regina, and as the latter rose to
get her hat and wrappings from her own room, she saw the mother lean
over the pillows, saw also that the white arms of the girl were
quickly thrown up around her neck.
Soon after, she heard the front door-bell ring, and when she started
down the steps, Olga called from her room:
"Come in. Mamma has to answer a note before she leaves home. When you
go down, please ask Terry to give a half-bottle of that white wine
with the bronze seal to Octave, and tell him to make and send up to
me as soon as possible a wine-chocolate. Mrs. Tarrant's long-promised
grand affair comes off to-night, and I must build myself up for the
occasion."
"Are you feverish, Olga? Your cheeks are such a brilliant scarlet?"
"Only the fever of delicious excitement, which all young ladies of my
sentimental temperament are expected to indulge, when assured that
the perilous voyage of portionless maidenhood is blissfully ended in
the comfortable harbour of affluent matrimony. Does that feel like
ordinary fever?"
She put out her large well-formed hand, and, clasping it between her
own, Regina exclaimed:
"How very cold! You are ill, or worse still, you are unhappy. Your
heart is not in this marriage."
"My heart? It is only an automatic contrivance for propelling the
blood through my system, and so long as it keeps me in becoming
colour, I have no right to complain. The theory of hearts entering
into connubial contracts, is as effete as Stahl's Phlogiston! One of
the wisest and wittiest of living authors, recognizing the drift of
the age, offers to supply a great public need, by--'A new proposition
and suited to the tendencies of modern civilization, namely, to
establish a universal Matrimonial Agency, as well ordered as the
Bourse of Paris, and the London Stock Exchange. What is more useful
and justifiable than a Bourse for affairs? Is not marriage an affair?
Is anything else considered in it but the proper proportions? Are not
these proportions values capable of rise and fall, of valuation and
tariff? People declaim against marriage brokers. What else, I pray
you, are the good friends, the near relations who take tie field,
except obliging, sometimes official brokers?' Now, Regina, 'M.
Graindorge,' who makes this proposal to the Parisian world, has lived
long in America, and doubtless received his inspiration in thegagements until to-morrow, I wish
to spend the afternoon with Mrs. Mason, who has removed to No.
900, East ---- Street, but Mrs. Palma advised me to ask your
permission. Hoping that you will not object to my making the
visit, without having waited to see you, I am,
"Very respectfully
Your ward,
REGINA ORME."
Leaving it open on the desk, where he could not fail to see it, she
glanced once more at the portrait, and hurried away, fearful of being
intercepted ere she reached the carriage.
"Drive to No. 900, East ---- Street."
The carriage had not turned the neighbouring corner, when Mr. Palma
leisurely approached his office door, with his thoughts intent upon
an important will case, which was creating much interest and
discussion among the members of the Bar, and which in an appeal form
he had that day consented to argue before the Supreme Court. As he
entered the front room, the clerk looked up.
"Stuart, has Elliott brought back the papers?"
"Not yet, sir. There was a young lady here a moment ago. Did you meet
her?"
"No. What was her business?"
"She did not say. Asked for you, and would not wait."
"What name?"
"Did not give any. Think she left a note on your desk. She was the
loveliest creature I ever looked at."
"My desk? Hereafter in my absence allow no one to enter my private
office. I did not consider it necessary to caution you, or inform you
that my desk is not public property, but designed for my exclusive
service. In future when I am out keep that door locked. Step around
to Fitzgerald's and get that volume of Reports he borrowed last
week." The young man coloured, picked up his hat, and disappeared;
and the lawyer walked into his sanctum and approached his desk.
Seating himself in the large revolving chair, his eyes fell instantly
upon the long sheet, with the few lines traced in a delicate feminine
hand.
Over his cold face swept a marvellous change, strangely softening its
outlines and expression. He examined the writing curiously, taking
off his glasses and holding the paper close to his eyes; and he
detected the alteration in the "Dear," which had evidently been
commenced as "My."
Laying it open before him, he took the pen, wrote "my" before the
"dear," and drawing a line through the "Regina Orme," substituted
above it "Lily."
In her haste she had left on the desk one glove, and her small ivory
_porte-monnaie_ which her mother had sent from Rome.
He took up the little pearl-grey kid, redolent of Lubin's "violet,"
and spread out the almost childishly small fingers on his own broad
palm, which suddenly closed over it like a vice; then with a half
smile of strange tenderness, in which all the stony sternness of lips
and chin seemed steeped and melted, he drew the glove softly,
caressingly over his bronzed cheek.
Pressing the spring of the purse, it opened and showed him two small
gold dollars, and a five dollar bill. In another compartment, wrapped
in tissue paper, was a small bunch of pressed violets, tied with a
bit of blue sewing silk. Upon the inside of the paper was written:
"Gathered at Agra. April 8th, 18--."
He knew Mr. Lindsay's handwriting, and his teeth closed firmly as he
refolded the paper, and put the purse and glove in the inside breast
pocket of his coat. Placing the note in an envelope, he addressed it
to "Erle Palma," and locked it up in a private drawer.
Raising his brilliant eyes to the lovely girlish face on the wall, he
said slowly, sternly:
"My Lily, and she shall be broken, and withered, and laid to rest in
Greenwood, before any other man's hand touches hers. My Lily, housed
sacredly in my bosom; blooming only in my heart."
CHAPTER XX.
Dismissing the carriage at the corner of the square, near which she
expected to find Mrs. Mason located in more comfortable lodging,
Regina walked on until she found the building of which she was in
quest, and rang the bell. It was situated in a row of plain,
unpretending but neat tenement houses, kept thoroughly repaired; and
the general appearance of the neighbourhood indicated that the
tenants though doubtless poor were probably genteel, and had formerly
been in more affluent circumstances.
The door was opened by a girl apparently half grown, who stated that
Mrs. Mason had rented the basement rooms, and that her: visitors were
admitted through the lower entrance, as a different set of lodgers
had the next floor. She offered to show Regina the way, and knocking
at the basement door, the girl suddenly remembered that she had seen
Mrs. Mason visiting at the house directly opposite.
"Wait, miss, and I will run across and call her."
While standing at the lower door, and partly screened by the flight
of steps leading to the rooms above, Regina saw a figure advancing
rapidly along the sidewalk, a tall figure whose graceful carriage was
unmistakable; and as the person ran up the steps of the next house in
the row, and impatiently pulled the bell, Regina stepped forward and
looked up.
A gust of wind just then blew aside the thick brown veil that
concealed the countenance, and showed for an instant only the
strongly marked yet handsome profile of Olga Neville.
The door opened; her low inaudible question was answered in the
affirmative, and Olga was entering, when the skirt of her dress was
held by a projecting nail, and in disengaging it, she caught a
glimpse of the astonished countenance beneath the steps. She paused,
leaned over the balustrade, threw up both hands with a warning
gesture, then laid her finger on her lips, and hurried in, closing
the door behind her.
"The lady says Mrs. Mason was there, but left her about a quarter of
an hour ago. What name shall I give when she comes home?"
"Tell her Regina Orme called, and was very sorry she missed seeing
her. Say I will try to come again on Sunday afternoon, if the weather
is good. Who lives in the next house?"
"A family named Eggleston. I hear they sculp and paint for a living.
Good-day, miss. I won't forget to tell the old lady you called."
Walking leisurely homeward, Regina felt sorely perplexed in trying to
reconcile Olga's plea of indisposition and her lingering in bed, with
this sudden appearance in that distant quarter of the city, and her
evident desire to conceal her face, and to secure silence with regard
to the casual meeting. Was Mrs. Palma acquainted with her daughter's
movements, or was the girl's nervous excitement of the morning
indirectly connected with some mystery, of which the mother did not
even dream? That some adroitly hidden sorrow was the secret spring of
Olga's bitterness toward Mr. Palma, and the unfailing source of her
unjust and cynical railings against that society into which she
plunged with such inconsistent recklessness, Regina had long
suspected; and her conjecture was strengthened by the stony
imperturbability with which her guardian received the sarcasms often
aimed at him. Whatever the solution, delicacy forbade all attempts to
lift the veil of concealment, and resolving to banish unfavourable
suspicion concerning a woman to whom she had become sincerely
attached, Regina directed her steps toward one of the numerous small
parks that beautify the great city, and furnish breathing and
gambolling space for the helpless young innocents, who are debarred
all other modes of "airing," save such as are provided by the noble
munificence of New York. The day, though cold, was very bright, the
sky a cloudless grey-blue, the slanting beams of the sun filling the
atmosphere with gold-dust; and in crossing the square to gain the
street beyond Regina was attracted by a group of children romping
along the walk, and laughing gleefully.
One a toddling wee thing, with a scarlet cloak that swept the ground,
and a hood of the same warm tint drawn over her curly yellow hair and
dimpled round face, had fallen on the walk, unheeded by her
boisterous companions, and becoming entangled in the long garment
could not get up again. Pausing to lift the little creature to her
feet, and restore the piece of cake that had escaped from the chubby
hand, Regina stood smiling sympathetically at the sport of the larger
children, and wondering whether all those rosy-cheeked "olive
branches" clustered around one household altar.
At that moment a heavy hand was placed on her shoulder, and turning
she saw at her side a powerful man, thick set in stature, and whose
clothing was worn and soiled. Beneath a battered hat drawn
suspiciously low she discerned a swarthy, flushed, saturnine
countenance, which had perhaps once been attractive, before the seal
of intemperance marred and stained its lineament. Somewhere she
certainly had seen that dark face, and a sensation of vague terror
seized her.
"Regina, it is about time you should meet and recognize me."
The voice explained all; she knew the man whom Hannah bad met in the
churchyard on the evening of the storm.
She made an effort to shake off his hand, but it closed firmly upon
her, and he asked:
"Do you know who I am?"
"Your name is Peleg, and you are a wicked man, an enemy of my
mother."
"The same, I do not deny it. But recollect I am also your father."
She stared almost wildly at him, and her face blanched and quivered
as she uttered a cry of horror.
"It is false! You are not--you never could have been! You--Oh!
never--never!"
So terrible was the thought that she staggered, and sank down on an
iron seat, covering her face with her hands.
"This comes of separating father and child, and rising you above your
proper place in the world. Your mother taught you to hate me, I knew
she would; but I have waited as long as I can bear it, and I intend
to assert my rights. Who do you suppose is your father? Whose child
did she say you were?"
"She never told me, but I know--O God, have mercy upon me! You cannot
be my father! It would kill me to believe it!"
She shuddered violently, and when he attempted to put his hand on
hers, she drew back and cried out, almost fiercely:
"Don't touch me! If you dare, I will scream for a policeman."
"Very well, as soon as you please, and when he comes I will explain
to him that you arc my daughter; and if necessary I will carry you
both to the spot where you were born, and prove the fact. Do you know
where you were born? I guess Minnie did not see fit to tell you that,
either. Well, in was in that charity hospital on ---- Street, and I
can tell you the year, and the day of the month. My child, you might
at least pity, and not insult your poor unhappy father."
Could it be possible after all? Her head swam; her heart seemed
bursting; her very soul sickened, as she tried to realize all that
his assertion implied. What could he expect to accomplish by such a
claim, unless he intended, and felt fully prepared, to establish it
by irrefragable facts?
"My girl, your mother deserted me before you were born, and has never
dared to let you know the truth. She is living in disguise in Europe,
under an assumed name, and only last week I found out her
whereabouts. She calls herself Mrs. Orme now, and has turned actress.
She was born one; she has played a false part all her life. Do you
think your name is Orme? My dear child, it is untrue, and I, Peleg
Peterson, am your father."
"No, no! My mother, my beautiful, refined mother never, never could
have loved you! Oh! it is too horrible! Go away, please go away! or I
shall go mad."
She bound her hands tightly across her eyes, shutting out the
loathsome face, and in the intensity of her agony and dread she
groaned aloud. If it were true, could she hear it, and live? What
would Mr. Lindsay think, if he could see that coarse brutal man
claiming her as his daughter? What would her haughty guardian say, if
he who so sedulously watched over her movements, and fastidiously
chose her associates, could look upon her now?
Born in a. hospital, owning that repulsive countenance there beside
her as parent?
Heavy cold drops oozed out, and glistened on her brow, and she
shivered from head to foot, rocking herself to and fro.
Almost desperate as she thought of the mysterious circumstances that
seemed to entangle her mother as in some inextricable net, the girl
suddenly started up, and exclaimed:
"It is a fraud, a wicked fraud, or you would never have left me so
long in peace. My father was, must have been, a gentleman; I know, I
feel it! You are--you--Save me, O Lord in heaven, from such a curse
as that!"
He grasped her arm and hissed:
"I am poor and obscure, it is true; but Peterson is better than no
name at all, and if you are not my child, then you have no name. That
is all; take your choice."
What a pall settled on earth and sky! The sun shining so brightly in
the west grew black, and a shadow colder and darker than death seized
her soul. Was it the least of alternate horrors to accept this man,
acknowledging his paternal claim, and thereby defend her mother's
name? How the lovely sad face of that young mother rose like a star,
gilding all this fearful blackness; and her holy abiding faith in her
mother proved a strengthening angel in this Gethsemane.
Rallying, she forced herself to look steadily at her companion.
"You say that your name is Peleg Peterson; why did you never come
openly to the parsonage and claim me? I know that my mother was
married in that house, by Mr. Hargrove."
"Because I never could find out where you were hid away, until my
aunt, Hannah Hinton, told me the week before the great storm. Then
she promised me the marriage license, which she had found in a desk
at the parsonage, on condition that I would not disturb you; as she
thought you were happy and well-cared for, and would be highly
educated, and I was too miserably poor to give you any advantages.
You know the license was burned by lightning, else I would show it to
you."
"Proving that you are my mother's legal husband?"
"Certainly, else what use do you suppose I had for it."
"Oh no! You intended to sell it. Hannah told me so."
"No such thing. Minnie does not want to own me now, and I intended to
show the license to the father of the man for whom she deserted both
you and me. She has followed him to Europe, though she knows he is a
married man."
"It is false! How dare you! You shall not slander her dear name. My
mother could never have done that! There is some foul conspiracy to
injure her; not another word against her! No matter what may have
happened, no matter how dark and strange things look, she was not to
blame. She is right, always right; I know, I feel it! I tell you, if
the sun and the stars, and the very archangels in heaven accused her,
I would not listen, I would not believe--no--never! She is my mother,
do you hear me? She is my mother, and God's own angels would go
astray as soon as she!"
She looked as white and rigid as a corpse twelve hours dead, and her
large defiant eyes burned with a supernatural lustre.
He comprehended the nature with which he had to deal, and after a
pause, said sullenly:
"Minnie does not deserve such a child, and it is hard that you, my
own flesh and blood, refuse to recognize me. Regina, I am desperately
poor, or I would take you now, forcibly if necessary; and if Minnie
dared deny my claim, I would publish the facts in a court of justice.
Even your guardian is deceived, and many things would come to light,
utterly disgraceful to you, and to your father and mother. But at
present I cannot take care of you, and I am in need, actual need.
Will my child see her own father want bread and clothing, and refuse
to assist him? Can you not contribute something toward my support,
until I can collect some money due me? If you can help me a little
now, I will try to be patient, and leave you where you are, in luxury
and peace; at least till I can hear from Minnie, to whom I have
written."
"Why do you not go at once to my guardian, and demand me?"
"If you wish it I will, before sunset. Come, I am ready. But when I
do, the facts will be blazoned to the world, and you and Minnie and I
shall all go down together in disgrace and ruin. If you are willing
to drag all the shameful history into the papers, I am ready now."
He rose, but she shrank away, and putting her hand in her pocket,
became aware of the loss of her purse. Had she been robbed, or had
she dropped her _porte-monnaie_ in the carriage?
"I have not a cent with me. I have lost my purse since I left home."
She saw the gloomy scowl that lowered on his brow. "When can you give
me some money? Mind, it must not be known that I am literally
begging. I am as proud, my daughter, as you are, and if people find
out that I am getting alms from you, I shall explain that it is from
my own child I receive aid."
A feeble gleam of hope stole across her soul, and rapidly she
reflected on the best method of escape.
"I have very little money, but to-morrow I will send you through the
post office every cent I possess. How shall I address it?"
He shook his head.
"That would not satisfy me. I want to see you again, to look at your
sweet face. Do you think I do not love my child? Meet me here this
time to-morrow."
Each word smote like pelting hailstones, and he saw all her loathing
printed on her face.
"I have an engagement that may detain me beyond this hour; but if I
live, I will be as punctual as circumstances permit."
"If you tell Palma you have seen me, he must know everything, for
Minnie has hired him to help her deceive you and the world, and all
the while she has kept the truth from him. Shrewd as he is, she has
completely duped him. If he learns you have been with me, I shall
unmask everything; and when he washes his hands of you and your
mother, I will take you where you shall never lay your eyes again on
the two who have taught you to hate me--Minnie and Palma. My child,
do you understand me?"
She shuddered as he leaned toward her, and stepping back, she
answered resolutely:
"That threat will prove very effectual. I will meet you here,
bringing the little money I have, and will keep this awful day a
secret from all but God, who never fails to protect the right."
"You promise that?"
"What else is left me? My guardian shall know nothing from me until I
can hear from my mother, to whom I shall write this night. Do not
detain me. My absence will excite suspicion."
"Good-bye, my daughter."
He held out his hand.
She looked at him, and her lips writhed as she tried to contemplate
for an instant the bare possibility that after all he might be her
parent. She forced herself to hold out her left hand which was
gloved, but he had scarcely grasped her fingers, when she snatched
them back, turned and darted away, while he called after her:
"This time to-morrow. Don't fail."
The glory of the world, and the light of her young life had suddenly
been extinguished, and fearful spectres vague and menacing thronged
the future. Death appeared a mere trifle in comparison with the
lifelong humiliation, perhaps disgrace, that was in store for her;
and bitterly she demanded of fate, why she had been reared so
tenderly, so delicately, in an atmosphere of honour and refinement,
if destined to fall at last into the hands of that coarse vicious
man? The audacity of his claim almost overwhelmed her faint hope that
some infamous imposture was being practised at her expense; and the
severity of the shock, the intensity of her mental suffering,
rendered her utterly oblivious of everything else.
At another time she would doubtless have heard and recognized a
familiar step that followed her from the moment she quitted the
square; but to-day, almost stupefied, she hurried along the pavement,
mechanically turning the corners, looking neither to right nor left.
Fifth Avenue was a long way off, and it was late in the afternoon
when she reached home, and ran up to her own room, anxious to escape
observation.
Hattie was arranging some towels on the washstand, and turning
around, exclaimed:
"Good gracious, miss! You are as white as the coverlid on the bed! I
guess something has happened?"
"I am not well. I am tired, so tired. Have they all come home?"
"Yes, and there will be company to dinner. Two gentlemen, Terry said.
Are you going to wear that dress?"
"I don't want any dinner. If they ask for me, tell Mrs. Palma I feel
very badly, and that I beg she will excuse me. Where is Olga?"
"Busy trimming her overskirt with flowers. You know Mrs. Tarrant
gives her ball to-night, and Miss Olga says she has saved herself,
rested all day, to be fresh for it. Lou-Lou has just come to dress
her hair. What a pity you can't go too, you look quite old enough.
Miss Olga has such a gay, splendid time."
"I do not want to go. I only wish I could lie down and sleep for
ever. Shut the door, and ask them all please to let me alone this
evening."
How the richness of the furniture and the elegance that prevailed
throughout this house mocked the threadbare raiment and
poverty-stricken aspect of the man who threatened to drag her down to
his own lower plane of life and association? Her innate pride, and
her cultivated fondness for all beautiful objects, rebelled at the
picture which her imagination painted in such sombre hues, and with a
bitter cry of shame and dread she bowed her head against the marble
mantlepiece.
For many years she had known that some unfortunate cloud hung over
her own and her mother's history, but faith in the latter, and a
perfect trust in the wisdom and goodness of Mr. Hargrove, had
encouraged her in every previous hour of disquiet and apprehension.
Until to-day the positive and hideous ghoul of disgrace had never
actually confronted her, and with the intuitive hopefulness of youth,
she had waved aside all forebodings, believing that at the proper
time her mother would satisfactorily explain the necessity for the
mystery of her conduct. Was Mr. Lindsay acquainted with some terrible
trouble that threatened her future when in bidding her farewell he
had said he would gladly shield her, were it possible, from trials
that he foresaw would be her portion?
Did he know all, and would he love her less, if that bold bad man
should prove his paternal claim to her? Her father! As she tried to
face the possibility, it was with difficulty that she smothered a
passionate cry, and throwing herself across the foot of the bed,
buried her face in her hands.
If she could only run away and go to India, where Mr. Lindsay would
shield, pity, and love her! How gratefully she thought of him at this
juncture,--how noble, tender, and generous he had always been! what a
haven of safety and rest his presence would be now!
As a very dear brother she had ever regarded him, for her affection,
though intense and profound, was as entirely free from all taint of
sentimentality, as that which she entertained for his mother; and her
pure young heart had never indulged a feeling that could have
coloured her cheek with confusion had the world searched its
recesses.
Were Douglass accessible, she would unhesitatingly have sprung into
his protecting arms, as any suffering young sister might have done,
and, fully unburdening her soul, would have sought brotherly counsel;
but in his absence, to whom was it possible for her to turn?
To her guardian? As she thought of his fastidious overweening pride,
his haughty scorn of everything plebeian, his detestation of all that
appertained to the ranks of the ill-bred, a keen pang of almost
intolerable shame darted through her heart, and a burning tide surged
over her cheeks, painting them fiery scarlet. Would he accord her the
shelter of his roof, were he aware of all that had occurred that day?
She started up, prompted by a sudden impulse to seek him and divulge
everything; to ask how much was true, to demand that he would send
her at once to her mother.
Perhaps he could authoritatively deny that man's statements, and
certainly he was far too prudent to assume guardianship of a girl
whose real parentage was unknown to him.
Implicit confidence in his wisdom and frd soul,
burying for a time the bitter experience of to-day!
Unable to conclude the song, she leaned back in her chair, and gave
way to the tears that rolled swiftly down her cheeks.
So wan and hopeless was her face that Mr. Palma, watching her from
the curtained alcove, came quickly forward.
He was elegantly dressed in full evening toilette, and, throwing his
white gloves on the table, approached his ward.
At sight of him she started up, and hastily wiped away the tears that
obstinately dripped despite her efforts.
"Oh, sir! I hoped you would forget to come home, and would go to Mrs.
Tarrant's. I did not know you were in the house."
"I never forget my duties, and though I am going to Mrs. Tarrant's
after a while, I attend to 'business before pleasure'; it has been my
lifelong habit."
His new suit of black, and the white vest and cravat were singularly
becoming to him. He was aware of the fact; and even in the midst of
her anxiety and depression, Regina thought she had never seen him
look so handsome.
"I wish to ask you a few questions. Was it actual bodily sickness,
physical pain, that kept you in your room during dinner, at which I
particularly desired your attendance?"
"I cannot say that it was."
"You had no fever, no headache, no fainting-spell?"
"No, sir."
"Then why did you absent yourself?"
"I felt unhappy, and shrank from seeing any one: especially strange
guests."
"Unhappy? About what?"
"My heart ached, and I wished to be alone."
"Heart-ache, so early? However, you are in your seventeenth year,
quite old enough, I suppose, for the premonitory symptoms. What gave
you heart-ache?"
She was silent.
"You feared my displeasure, knowing I had cause to feel offended,
when making a pretence of deferring to my wishes, you hurried away
from my office, just as I was returning to it? Why did you not wait?"
"I was afraid you would refuse your permission, and I wanted so very
much to go to Mrs. Mason's."
Above all other virtues he reverenced and admired stern unvarnished
truth, and this strong element of her reticent nature had powerfully
attracted him.
"Little girl, am I such a stony-hearted ogre?" A strangely genial
smile wanned and brightened his usually grave cold face, and
certainly at that moment Erle Palma showed one aspect of his nature
never exhibited before to any human being.
"What a fascinating person this poor old Mrs. Mason must be;
absolutely tempting you to disobedience. Does she not correspond with
the saints in Oude?"
"If you mean Mr. Lindsay and his mother, she certainly hears from
them occasionally."
"Why not phrase it Mrs. Lindsay and her son? Was it the dreadful news
that malarial fever is epidemic at the Missions, or that the Sepoys
are threatening another revolt, that destroyed your appetite,
unfitted you for the social amenities at the dinner-table, and gave
you heart-ache?"
"If there is such bad news, I did not hear it Mrs. Mason was not at
home."
"Indeed! Then whom did you see?"
"When I ascertained she was absent, I had already sent the carriage
away, and I came home, after stopping a few moments in ---- Square."
She grew very white as she spoke, and he saw her lips quiver.
"Regina, what is the matter?"
She did not reply; and bending toward her, he said in a low, winning
voice entirely unlike his usual tone:
"Lily, trust your guardian."
Looking into his brilliant eyes, she felt tempted to tell him all, to
repose implicitly upon his wisdom and guidance, but the image of
Peleg Peterson rose like a hideous warning spectre.
Readily interpreting the varying expression of a countenance which he
had so long and carefully studied, he continued:
"You wish to tell me frankly, yet you shrink from the ordeal. Lily,
what have you done that you blush to confess to me?"
"Nothing, sir."
"Why then do you hesitate?"
"Because other persons are involved. Oh, Mr. Palma! I am very
unhappy."
She clasped her hands, and bowed her chin upon them, a peculiar
position into which sorrow always drove her.
"I inferred as much, from your manner while at the organ. I am very
sorry that my house is not a happy home for my ward. Have you been
subjected to any annoyances from the members of my household?"
"None whatever. All are kind and considerate. But I can never be
satisfied till I see my mother. I shall write tonight, imploring her
permission to join her in Europe, and I beg that you will please use
your influence in favour of my wishes. Oh, sir, do help me to go to
my mother!"
His smile froze, his face hardened; and he led her to a low sofa
capable of seating only two persons, and drawn near the fire.
"Madame Orme does not want her daughter just yet"
"But I want my mother. Oh, I must go!"
He took both her hands as they lay folded in her lap, opened the
clenched fingers, clasping them softly in his own, so white and
shapely, and his black eyes glittered:
"Am I cruel and harsh to my Lily, that she is so anxious to run away
from her guardian?"
"No, sir, oh no! Kind and very good, consulting what you consider my
welfare in all things. But you can't take mother's place in my
heart."
"I assure you, little girl, I do not want your mother's place."
Something peculiar in his tone arrested her notice, and lifting her
large lovely eyes she met his searching gaze.
"That is right, keep your eyes so, fixed steadily on mine, while I
discharge a rather delicate and embarrassing duty, which sometimes
devolves upon the grim guardians of pretty young ladies. In your
mother's absence I am supposed to occupy a _quasi_ parental position
toward you; and am the authorized custodian of your secrets, should
you, like most persons of your age, chance to possess any. Your
mother, you are aware, invested me with this right as her vicegerent,
consequently you must pardon the inquisition into the state of your
affections, which just now I am compelled to make. Although I
consider you entirely too young for such grave propositions, it is
nevertheless proper that I should be the medium of their presentation
when they become inevitable. Upon the tender and very susceptible
heart of Mr. Elliott Roscoe it appears that either with 'malice
prepense,' or else, let us hope, in innocent unconsciousness, you
have been practising certain feminine wiles and sorcery, which have
so far capsized his reason, that he is incapacitated for attending to
his business. When I remonstrated against the lunacy into which he is
drifting, he in very poetic and chivalric style--which it is
unnecessary to repeat here--assured me that you were the element
which had utterly deranged his cerebral equipoise. Elliott Roscoe is
my cousin, is a young gentleman of good character, good mind, good
education, good heart, and good manners, and in due time may command
a good income from his profession; but just now, in pecuniary
matters, he would not be considered a brilliant match. Mr. Roscoe
informs me that he desires an interview with you to-morrow, for the
purpose of offering you his heart and hand; and while protesting on
the ground of your youth, I have promised to communicate his wishes
to you, and should he be favourably received, write to your mother at
once."
Perplexed and confused, she had not fully comprehended his purpose
until he uttered the closing sentence, and painful astonishment kept
her silent, while as if spellbound her gaze met his.
"Now it remains for you to answer one question. Should your mother
give her consent, does Miss Regina Orme intend to become my cousin?"
"Oh, never! You distress me; you ought not to talk to me of such
things. I am so young, you know mother would not approve of it."
She blushed scarlet, and attempted to withdraw her hands, but found
it impossible.
"Quite true, and if crazy young gentlemen could be prevailed upon to
keep silent, rest assured I should never have broached a subject,
which I regard as premature. But while I certainly applaud your good
sense, it is rather problematical whether I should feel gratified at
your summary rejection of an alliance with my cousin. Are you fully
resolved that I shall never be related to you, except as your
guardian?"
"Yes, sir. I do not wish to be your cousin."
Once more the smile shone out suddenly, making sunshine in his face.
"Thank you. At what hour will you see Mr. Roscoe?"
"At none. Please do not let him come here, or speak to me on that
subject; it would be so extremely painful. I should never meet him
afterward without feeling distressed, and things would be intolerably
disagreeable. Please, Mr. Palma, shield me from it."
She involuntarily drew closer to him, as if for protection, and
noting the movement, he smiled, and tightened his clasp of her hands.
"I cannot positively forbid him to address you on this terrible
topic, but if you wish it, I will endeavour to dissuade him. Elliott
has Palma blood in his veins, and that has certain unmistakable
tendencies to obstinacy, though its conduct in love affairs yet
remains to be tested; but it occurs to me that if you are in earnest
in desiring to crush this foolish whim in the bud, you can very
easily accomplish it by empowering me to make to my cousin a simple
statement, which will extinguish the matter beyond all possibility of
resurrection."
"Then tell him whatever your judgment dictates."
"My judgment must be instructed by facts, and the simple statement I
propose might involve grave consequences. Do you authorize me to
close the discussion of this matter at once and for ever, by
informing Mr. Roscoe that you cannot entertain the thought of
granting him an interview because his suit is hopeless from the fact
that your affections are already engaged?"
She was too much embarrassed by his piercing merciless eyes, to
notice that he slipped one finger upon the pulse at her wrist,
keeping her hands firmly in his warm clasp; or that he leaned lower
as he spoke, until his noble massive head very nearly approached
hers.
"I could not ask you to tell him that. It would be untrue."
"Are you sure, Lily?"
"Yes, Mr. Palma."
"Have you forgotten Mr. Lindsay?"
He thought for an instant that the pulse stood still, then beat
regularly calmly on, and he wondered if his own tight pressure had
baffled his object.
"No, I never forget Mr. Lindsay."
She did not shrink or colour, but a sad hopeless look crept into her
splendid eyes at the mention of his name.
"You are certain that the young missionary will not prove the
obstacle to your becoming more closely related to your guardian?
Thus far, I have found you singularly truthful in all things; be
careful that just here you deceive neither yourself nor me. There is
a tradition that in the river Inachus is found a peculiar stone
resembling a beryl, which turns black in the hands of those who
intend to bear false witness; and you can readily understand that
lawyers find such stones invaluable in the court-room. I have placed
you on the witness stand, and my beryl-tinted seal ring presses your
palm at this instant. Be frank; are you not very deeply attached to
Mr. Lindsay?"
Suddenly a burning flush bathed her brow, she struggled to free her
hands in order to hide her face from his glowing probing eyes, but
his hold was unyielding as a band of steel; and hardly conscious
where she found shelter, she turned and pressed her cheek against his
shoulder, striving to avoid that inquisitorial gaze.
She did not see his face grow grey and stony, or that the white teeth
gnawed the lower lip; but when he spoke his voice was stern, and
indescribably icy.
"My ward should study her heart before she empowers her guardian to
consider it unoccupied property. You should at least inform your
mother that it has become a mere missionary station."
With her hot cheeks still hidden against his shoulder, she exclaimed:
"No, no! You do not at all understand me. I feel to him, to Douglass,
exactly as I did when he went away."
"So I infer. Your feeling is sufficiently apparent."
"Not what you imagine. When he left me I promised him I would always
love him as I did then; and I told him what was true: I loved him
next to my mother. But not as you mean, oh no! If God had given me a
brother, I should think of him exactly as I do of dear Douglass. I
miss him very much, more than I can express; and I love him, and want
to see him. But I never had any other thought, except as his adopted
sister, until this moment when you spoke, and it shocked, it almost
humiliated me. Indeed my feeling for him is almost holy, and your
thought, your meaning seems to me sacrilegious. He is my noble true
friend, my dear good brother, and you must not think such things of
him and of me; it hurts me."
For nearly a moment there was silence.
Mr. Palma dropped one of her hands, and his arm passed quickly around
her shoulder, while his open palm pressed her head closer against
him.
"Is my ward sure that if he wished to be more than a brother, she
would never reciprocate, would never cherish a different feeling, a
stronger affection?"
"He could never wish that. He is so much older and wiser and better
than I am; and looks on me only as a little sister."
"Is superiority in years and wisdom the only obstacle you can
imagine?"
"I have never thought of it at all until you spoke, and it is
painful to me. It seems disrespectful to connect such ideas as yours
with the name of one whom I honour as my brother."
He put his hand under her chin, turning her face to view despite her
struggle to prevent it, and bending his head--he did not kiss her! Oh
no! Erle Palma had never kissed any one since his childhood; but for
one instant his dark cheek was laid close to hers, with a tender
caressing touch, that astonished her as completely as if one of the
bronze statuettes on the console above her head had laughed aloud,
and clapped its metallic hands.
"Henceforth the 'disrespectful idea' shall never be associated with
the name of Mr. Douglass Lindsay, and in the future I warn you, there
shall be none but a purely fraternal niche allowed him; moreover, it
is not requisite that you should speak of him as 'dear Douglass' in
order to assure me of your sisterly regard. What I shall do with my
unfortunate young cousin is not quite so transparent; for Elliott
will not receive his rejection by proxy."
He had withdrawn his arm, and released her hand, and rising she
exclaimed impetuously:
"Tell him that Regina Orme will never permit him to broach that
subject; and tell him, too, that I am a waif, a girl over whose
parentage hangs a shadow dark and chill as a pall. Oh! tell him I
want my mother, and an honourable unsullied name, and until I can
find these I have no room in my mind or heart for a lover!"
As the events of the day, temporarily banished from her thoughts by
the unexpected character of the interview, rushed back with renewed
force and bitterness, the transient colour died out of her face,
leaving it strangely wan and worn in aspect; and Mr. Palma saw now
that purple shadows lay beneath the deep eyes, rendering them more
than ever prophetic in their solemn mournful expression.
"What unusual occurrence has stimulated your interest and curiosity
concerning your parentage?"
"It never slumbers. It is the last thought at night, and the first
when the day dawns. It is a burden that is never lifted, that galls
continually; and sometimes, as to-night, I feel that I cannot endure
it much longer."
"You must be patient, for awhile at least----"
"Yes, I have heard that for ten long years, and I have been both
patient and silent: but the time has come when I can bear no more.
Anything positive, definite, susceptible of proof, no matter how
distressing, would be more tolerable than this suspense, this
maddening conjecture. I will see my mother; I must know the truth, be
it what it may!"
The witchery of childhood had vanished for ever. Even the glimmer of
hope seemed paling in the almost supernatural eyes, that had grown
prematurely womanly; viewing life no more through the rainbow lenses
of sanguine girlhood, but hencefoe heard of Dirce and Damiens dragged by wild
beasts? Theirs was a mere afternoon airing in comparison with the
race I am driven by the lash of your guardian, the spur of mamma, and
the frantic wails of my famished heart. I wish I could speak without
bitterness, and mockery, and exaggeration, but it has grown to be a
part of my nature, as features habituated to a mask insensibly assume
to some extent its outlines. I will try to put aside my flippant
hollow attempts at persiflage, which constitute my worldly mannerism,
and tell you in a few simple words. When I was about your age, I
think my nature must have resembled yours, for many of your ideas and
views of duty in this life remind me in a mournfully vague, tender
way of my own early youth; and from that far distant time taunting
reminiscences float down to me, whispers from my old self long, long
dead. When I was seventeen, I went one June to spend some weeks with
my Grandmother Neville, who was an invalid, and resided on the
Hudson, near a very picturesque spot, which artists were in the habit
of frequenting with their sketch-books. Allowed a degree of liberty
which mamma never accorded me at home, I availed myself of the lax
regimen of my grandmother, and roamed at will about the beautiful
country adjacent. In one of these ill-fated excursions I encountered
a young artist, who was spending a few days in the neighbourhood. I
was a simple-hearted schoolgirl, untutored in worldly wisdom, and had
always spent my vacations with grandmother, who was afflicted with no
aristocratic whims and vagaries; who thought it not wholly
unpardonable to be poor, and was so old-fashioned as to judge people
from their merits, not by the amount of their income tax.
"Belmont Eggleston was then about twenty-five, very handsome, very
talented, full of chivalric enthusiasm, and as refined and tender in
sensibility as a woman. We met accidentally at a farmhouse, where a
sudden shower drove us for shelter, and from that hour neither could
forget the other. It was the old, old immemorial story--two fresh
young souls united, two hearts exchanged, two lives for ever
entangled. We walked and rode together, he taught me drawing, came
now and then and spent the long summer afternoons, and grandmother
liked and welcomed him; offered no obstacle to the strong current of
love that ran like a golden stream for those few hallowed weeks, and
afterward found only rapids and whirlpools. How deliriously happy I
was! What a glory seems even now to linger about every tree and rock
that we visited together! He told me he was very poor, and was
encumbered with the care of an infirm mother and sister, and of a
young brother who displayed great plastic skill, and gave promise of
becoming renowned in sculpture, while Belmont was devoted to
painting. He frankly explained his poverty, detailed his plans,
expatiated with beautiful poetic fervour upon the hopes that gilded
his future, and asked my sympathy and affection. While he was obscure
he was unwilling to claim me, his love was too unselfish to
transplant me from a sphere of luxury and affluence to one of
pecuniary want; and he only desired that I would patiently wait until
his genius won recognition. One star-lit night, standing on the bank
of the river, with the perfume of jasmines stealing over us, I put my
hand in his, and pledged my heart, my life for his. Nearly eight
years have passed since then, but no shadow of regret has ever
crossed my mind for the solemn promise I gave; and, despite all I
have suffered, were it in my power to cancel the past I would not!
Bitter waves have broken over me, but the memory of my lover, of his
devotion, is sweeter, oh! sweeter than my hopes of heaven! God
forgive me if it be sinful idolatry. It is the one golden link that
held me back, that saves me now, from selling myself to Satan. In the
midst of that rose-crowned June and July, in the height of my
innocent happiness, mamma fell upon us, as a hawk swoops upon a
dovecote, dividing a cooing pair. Disguising nothing, I freely told
her all, and Belmont nobly pleaded for permission to prove his
worthiness. Grandmother was a powerful ally, and perhaps the result
might have been different, and mamma would have ultimately been won
over, had not Erle Palma's counsel been sought. That cold-blooded
tyrant has been the one curse of my life. But for him, I should be
to-day a happy, loving wife. Do you wonder that I hate him? How I
have longed for the seven Apocalyptic vials of wrath! He and mamma
conferred. An investigation concerning the Egglestons elicited the
fatal fact that some branch of the family had once been accused of
embezzlement, had been prosecuted by Erle Palma, and in defiance of
his efforts to convict him had been acquitted. Mamma and your
guardian possessed then, as now, only one criterion:
'He is .poor, and that's suspicious; he is unknown,
And that's defenceless!'
Then and there they sternly prohibited even my acquaintance with one
to whom I had promised all that woman can give of affection, faith,
and deathless constancy. No more pity or regard was shown to my agony
of heart and mind than the cattle drover manifests in driving
innocent dumb horned creatures from quiet clover meadows where they
browsed in peace, to the reeking public shambles. Even a parting
interview was denied me; but clandestinely I found an opportunity to
renew my vows, to assure Belmont that no power on earth should compel
me to renounce him, and that if necessary I would wait twenty years
for him to claim me. Older and wiser than I, he realized what
stretched before me, and while repeatedly assuring me his love was
inextinguishable, he generously attempted to dissuade me from defying
those who had legal control of me. So we parted, pledged irrevocably
one to the other; and whenever we have met since that summer, it has
been by strategy. My mother, from the day when the doom of my love
was decreed, has been as deaf to my pleadings, and my heart-breaking
cries, as the golden calf was to the indignant denunciations of
Moses. I was hurried prematurely into society, thrown into a
maelstrom of gaiety that whirled me as though I were a dancing
dervish, and left me apparently no leisure for retrospection or
regret, or for the indulgence of the rosy dream that lay like a
lovely morning cloud above and behind me. My clothing was costly and
tasteful; I was exhibited at Saratoga, Long Branch, and Newport,
those popular human expositions, where wealth and fashion flock to
display and compare their textile fabrics and jewellery, as less
'developed' cattle still on four feet are hurried to State fairs, to
ascertain the value of their pearly short horns, thin tails, and
satin-coated skins. No expense or pains were spared, and my mother's
stepson certainly lavished his money as well as advice upon me. At
long intervals I had stolen interviews with Belmont, then he went far
south to study for a tropical landscape, and was absent two years.
When he returned, beaming with hope, the cloud over our lives seemed
silvering at the edges, and he was sanguine that his picture would
compel recognition, and bring him fame, which in art means food.
But Earl Palma had resolved otherwise. It was our misfortune, that in
my haste to see the picture, I neglected my usual precautionary
measures to elude suspicion, and your guardian tracked me to the
attic, where the finishing touches were being put on. Unluckily
Belmont was never a favourite among the artists, and he explained to
me that it was because he was proud, reticent, and held himself aloof
from their club life and social haunts. Taking advantage of his
personal unpopularity, your magnanimous guardian organized a cabal
against him. No sooner was the painting exhibited, than a tirade of
ridicule and abuse was poured upon it, and the journal most
influential in forming and directing artistic taste, contained an
overwhelmingly adverse criticism, which was written by a particular
friend and chum of Erle Palma, who, I am convinced, caused its
preparation. Oh, Regina! it was a cruel, cruel stab, that entered my
darling's noble tender heart, and almost maddened him. In literature,
savage criticism defeats its own unamiable purpose, by promoting the
sale of books it is designed to crush; but unfortunately this law
does not often operate in the department of painting. In a fit of
gloomy despondency, Belmont offered his lovely work for a mere
trifle, but the picture dealers declined to touch it at any price,
and rashly cutting it from the frame, he threw the labour of years
into the flames. Meantime grand-mamma had died, and Belmont's mother
became hopelessly bedridden, while his young brother had made his way
to Europe, where he occupied a menial position in a sculptor's
_atelier_ at Florence. A more rigid surveillance was exerted over me,
and the dancing dervishes crowned me queen of their revels. By day
and by night I was surrounded with influence intended to beguile me
from the past, to narcotize memory, to make me in reality the
heartless, soulless, scoffing creature that I certainly seem. But
Erle Palma has found me stiff tough clay, and despite his efforts, I
have been true to the one love of my life. What I have suffered, none
but the listening watching God above us knows; and sometimes I
despise and loathe myself for the miserable subterfuges I am forced
to practise in order to elude my keepers. Poor mamma loves me, after
a selfish worldly fashion, and there are moments when I really think
she pities me; but from Palma influence and association wealth has
long been her most precious fetich. Poverty, obscurity terrify her,
and for the fleshpots of fashion she would literally sell me, as she
once sold herself to Godwin Palma. Repeatedly I have been urged to
accept offers of marriage that revolted every instinct of my nature,
that seemed insulting to a woman who long ago gave away all that was
best, in her heart's idolatrous love. To-day my Belmont is ten-fold
dearer, than when in the dawning flush of womanhood, I plighted my
lifelong faith to him; and reigns more royally than ever over all
that is good and true in my perverted and cynical nature. I cling to
him, to my faith in his noble, manly, unselfish, undying love for me,
unworthy as I have grown, even as a drowning wretch to some
overhanging bough, which alone saves her from the black destruction
beneath. Unable to conquer the opposition he encountered here,
Belmont went West, and finally strayed into the solitudes of Oregon
and British America. At one time, for a year, I did not know whether
he were living or dead, and what torture I silently endured! Six
months ago he returned, buoyed by the hope of retrieving his past;
and one of his pictures was bought by a wealthy man in Philadelphia,
who had commissioned him to paint two more landscapes. At last we
began to dream of an humble little home somewhere, where at least we
should have the blessing of our mutual love and presence. The thought
was magnetic,--it showed me there was some good left in my poor
scoffing soul; that I possessed capacity for happiness, for
self-sacrificing devotion to my noble Belmont,--that made our future
seem a canticle. Oh! how delicious was the release I imagined!"
She groaned aloud, and rocked herself to and fro, with a hopelessness
that awed and grieved her pale mute listener.
"The Fates are fond of Erle Palma. They will pet him to the end, for
he is a man after their own flinty hearts; pitiless as those grim
three, whom Michael Angelo must have seen during nightmare. When I
think how he will gloat over the overthrow of my darling hope, I feel
that it is scarcely safe for me to remain under his roof; I am so
powerfully tempted to strangle him. Exposure to the rigour of two
winters in the far North-West has seriously undermined Belmont's
health. His physician apprehends consumption, and orders him to
hasten to Southern Europe, or South America."
For some moments Olga was silent, and her mournful eyes were fixed on
the wall, with a half vacant stare, as her thoughts wandered to her
unfortunate lover.
Regina could scarcely realize that this pallid face so full of
anguish was the radiant mocking countenance she had hitherto seen
only in mask, and taking her hand she pressed it gently to recall her
attention.
"Feeling as you do, dear Olga, how can you think of marrying Mr.
Congreve?"
"Marrying him! I do not; I am not yet quite so degraded as that
implies. I would sooner buy a pistol, or an ounce of arsenic, and end
all this misery. While Belmont lives, I belong to him; I love him as
I never have loved any one else; but when he is taken from me, only
Heaven sees what will be my wretched fate. Destiny has made a
football of the most precious hope that ever gladdened a woman's
heart, and when the end comes, I rather think Erle Palma will not
curl his granite lips, and taunt me. My assent to the Congreve
purchase is but a _ruse_; in other words, honest words, a disgraceful
subterfuge, fraud, to gain time. I can bear the life I lead no
longer, and ere many days I shall burst my fetters, and snatch
freedom, no matter what cost I pay hereafter."
"Olga, you cannot mean that you intend----"
"No matter what I intend, I shall not falter when the time comes.
Yesterday I went to see his mother--poor patient sufferer--and to
learn the latest tidings from my darling. You saw me when I entered,
and no doubt puzzled your brains to reconcile the inconsistency of my
conduct. Your delicate reticence entitles you to this explanation.
Now you know all my sorrow, and no matter what happens you must not
betray my movements. From this house, my letters to Belmont have been
intercepted, and our correspondence has long been conducted under
cover to his mother."
"Where is he now?"
"In Philadelphia."
"How is he?"
"No better. His physician says January must find him _en route_ to a
warmer climate."
"When did you see him last?"
"In September. Even then his cough rendered me anxious, but he
laughed at my apprehensions. O God! be merciful to him and to me! I
know I am unworthy; I know I have a bitter wicked tongue, and a world
of hate in my heart; but if God would be pitiful, if He only spares
my darling's life, I will try to be a better woman."
She leaned her head once more on Regina's shoulder, and burst into a
flood of tears, the first her companion had ever seen her shed. After
some minutes the sympathizing listener said:
"Perhaps if you appealed frankly to Mr. Palma, and showed him the
dreadful suffering of your heart, he would relent."
"You do not know him. Does a lion relent with his paw upon his prey?"
"His opposition must arise from an erroneous view of what would best
promote your happiness. He cannot be actuated by merely vindictive
motives, and I am sure he would sympathize with you if he realized
the intensity of your feelings."
"I would as soon expect ancient Cheops to dissolve in tears at the
recital of my woes; or that statue of Washington in Union Place to
dismount and wipe my eyes! An Eggleston once defied and triumphed
over him in the court-room; and defeat Erle Palma never forgets,
never forgives. He proposes to give me ten thousand dollars as a
bridal present, when owning millions, I need it not; and to-day
one-half that amount would make me the happiest woman in all America,
would enable Belmont to travel south and re-establish his health,
would render two wretched souls everlastingly happy and grateful! Ah
how happy!"
"Tell him so! Try him just once more, and I have an abiding faith
that he will generously respond to your appeal."
Olga looked compassionately at her companion for an instant, and the
old bitter laugh jarred upon the girl's ears.
"Poor little dove trying your wings in the upper air, flashing the
silver in the sun; fancying you are free to circle in the heavens so
blue above you! Your wary hawk watches patiently, only waiting for
you to soar a little higher, venture a little farther from the
shelter of the dovecote; then he will strike you down, fasten his
talons in youhorses moved slowly. At
last they reached a point where the line of road turned away from the
direction in which Regina desired to go, and quitting the car, she
walked toward East ---- Street.
After the heated atmosphere she had just left, the sharp biting cold
was refreshing, and against the glistening needles of snow she
pressed rapidly on, until finally the trees in the square gladdened
her eyes.
Near one of the corners, stood a large close carriage whose driver
was enveloped in a cloak, and protected by an umbrella, while the
yellow silk inside curtains were drawn down over the windows.
Agitated by contending emotions of reluctance to meeting the man
whose presence was so painful, and of dread lest he had grown
impatient, and might present himself to her guardian, Regina hastened
into the square, and looked eagerly about the deserted walks.
Pressed against the south side of a leafless tree whose trunk partly
shielded him from the driving snow-laden north-east wind, Peleg
Peterson stood watching her, and as she approached, he came forward.
"Better late than never. How long did you expect me to wait here,
with the cold eating into my vitals?"
"Indeed I am very sorry, but I could not come a moment sooner."
"Who is in that carriage yonder?"
"I do not know. How should I?"
"There is something suspicious about it. Is it waiting for you?"
"Certainly not, No human being knows where I am at this moment. Here
are forty-five dollars, every cent that I possess. You must not
expect me to aid you in future, for I shall not be able; and moreover
I shall be subjected to suspicion if I come here again."
She handed him the money rolled up in a small package, and he
deposited it in his pocket.
"You might at least have made it a hundred."
"I have no more money."
"Do you still doubt that you are my child?"
"When you make your claim in a court of justice, as you yesterday
threatened, the proofs must be established. Until then, I shall not
discuss it with you. I have an abiding faith in the instincts of
nature, and I believe that when I stand before my father, my heart
will unmistakably proclaim it. From you it shrinks with dread and
horror."
"Because Minnie taught you to hate me. I knew she would."
"Mother never mentioned your name to me. Only to Hannah am I indebted
for any knowledge of you. Where is Hannah now?"
"I don't know. We quarrelled not long ago. Regina, I want your
photograph. I want to wear my daughter's picture over my heart."
He moved closer to her, and put out his arm, but she sprang back.
"You must not touch me, at least not now; not until I can hear from
mother. I have no photographs of myself. The only picture taken for
years is a portrait which Mr. Palma had painted, and sent to mother.
In any emergency that may occur, if you should be really ill, or in
actual suffering and want, write to me, and address your letter
according to the directions on this slip of paper. Mrs. Mason will
always see that your note reaches me safely. You look very cold, and
I must hasten back, or my absence might cause questions and censure.
I shall find out everything from mother, for she will not deceive me;
and if--if what you say is true, then I shall know what is my duty,
and you must believe that I shall perform it. I pray to God that you
may not be my father, and I cannot believe that you are; but if after
all you prove your claim, I will do what is right. I will take your
hand then, and face the world's contempt; and we will bear our
disgrace together as best we may. When I know you are my father, I
will pay you all that a child owes a parent. This I promise you."
Her face was wellnigh as white as the snow that covered and fringed
her hood; and out of its pallid beauty, the sad eyes looked
steadfastly into the bloated visage before her.
"I believe you! There spoke my girl! You are true steel, and worth a
hundred of Minnie. Some day, my pretty child, you and I shall know
one another, as father and daughter should."
He once more attempted to touch her, but vigilant and agile she
eluded his hand, and said decisively:
"You have all that I can give you now--the money. Don't put your hand
on me, for as yet I deny your parental claim. When I know I am your
child, you shall find me obedient in all things. Now, sir, good-bye."
Turning, she ran swiftly away, and glanced over her shoulder, fearful
of pursuit, but the figure stood where she had left him; was occupied
in counting the money, and, breathing more freely, Regina shook the
snow from her wrappings, from her umbrella, and walked homeward.
Had she purchased a sufficient reprieve to keep him quiet until she
could hear from her mother, and receive the expected summons to join
her? Or was this but an illusive relief, a mere momentary lull in the
tempest of humiliation that was muttering and darkening around her?
She had walked only a short distance from the square, and was turning
a corner, when she ran against a gentleman hurrying from the opposite
direction.
"Pray pardon me, miss."
She could not suppress the cry that broke from her lips.
"Oh, Mr. Palma!"
He turned as though he had not until now recognized her, but there
was no surprise in his stern fixed face.
"I thought Mrs. Brompton resided on West ---- Street; had not heard
of her change of residence. From the length of your rehearsal you
certainly should be perfect in your performance. It is now half-past
five, and I think you told me you commenced at one? Rather
disagreeable weather for you to be out. Wait here, under this awning,
till I come back."
He was absent not more than five minutes, and returned with a close
carriage; but a glance sufficed to show her it was not the one she
had seen in the neighbourhood of the square.
As he opened the door and beckoned her forward, he took her umbrella,
handed her in, and with one keen cold look into her face, said:
"I trust my ward's dinner toilette will be an improvement upon her
present appearance, as several guests have been invited. The Cantata
must have bored you immensely."
He bowed, closed the door, directed the driven to the number of his
residence on Fifth Avenue, and disappeared.
Sinking down in one corner, Regina shut her eyes, and groaned. Could
his presence have been accidental? She had given no one a clue in her
movements, and how could he have followed her circuitous route after
leaving Mrs. Brompton's? He had evinced no surprise, had asked no
explanation of her conduct, but would he abstain in future? Was his
promise to trust her the cause of his forbearance? Or was it
attributable to the fact that his thoughts were concentrated upon the
lady with whose name people were associating his?
The strain upon her nerves was beginning to relax; her head ached,
her eyes smarted, and she felt sick and faint. Like one in a
perplexing dream, she was whirled along the streets, and at last
reached home.
The house was already brilliantly lighted, for the day had closed
prematurely, with the darkness of the increasing snow, and in the
seclusion of her own room the girl threw herself down in a rocking
chair.
Everything seemed dancing in kaleidoscopic confusion, and amid the
chaos only one grim fact was immovable, she must dress and go down to
dinner. Just now, unwelcome as was the task, she dared not neglect
it, for her absence might stimulate the investigation she so much
dreaded, and wearily she rose and began her toilette.
At half-past seven Hattie entered.
"Aren't you ready, miss? Mrs. Palma says you must hurry down, for the
company are all in the parlour, and Mr. Palma has asked for you. Stop
a minute, miss. Your sash is all crooked. There, all right. Let me
tell you there is more lace and velvet downstairs than you can show,
and jewellery! No end of it! But as for born good looks, you can
outface them all."
"Don't I look very pale and jaded?"
"Very white, miss; you always do, and red cheeks would be as much out
of your style as paint on a corpse. I can tell you what you do look
like, morely guest, and watching them, Regina
recollected the remark concerning their appearance which had been
made by the gentleman in the car.
Was it possible that after all the lawyer's heart had been seriously
interested? Could that satin-cheeked, grey-eyed Circe with pale
yellow hair and lashes, hold him in silken bonds at her feet? The
idea that he could be captivated by any woman seemed utterly
incompatible with all that his ward knew of his life and character,
and it had appeared an established fact that he was incapable of any
tender emotion; but certainly at this instant the expression with
which he was gazing down into Mrs. Carew's lotos face, was earnestly
admiring. While Regina watched the pair, a cold sensation crept over
her as on some mild starlit night, one suddenly and unconsciously
drifts under the lee of some vast, slow-sailing iceberg, and knows
not, dreams not, of danger until smitten with the fatal prophetic
chill.
Suppose the ambitious middle-aged man intended to marry this wealthy,
petted, lovely widow, was it not in all respects a brilliant suitable
match, which _le beau monde_ would cordially applaud? Was there a
possibility that she would decline an alliance with that proud
patrician, whose future seemed dazzling?
In birth, fortune, and beauty could he find her superior?
The flowers in the tall gold _epergne_ in the centre of the table,
and the wreath of scarlet camellias that swung down to meet them from
the green bronze chandelier, began to dance a saraband. Silver,
crystal, china, even the human figures appeared whirling in a misty
circle, across which the orange, emerald, and blue tints of the hock
glasses shot hither and thither like witch-lights on the Brocken; and
indistinct and spectral, yet alluring, gleamed the almond-shaped grey
eyes with their gold fringes.
With a quick unsteady motion Regina grasped and drained a goblet of
iced-water, and after a little while the mist rolled away, and she
heard once more the voices that had never for an instant ceased their
utterances.
The shuttlecock of conversation was well kept up from all sides of
the table, and when Regina's thoughts crept back from their numbing
reverie, Mr. Chesley was eloquently describing some of the most
picturesque localities in Oregon and California.
Across the table floated a liquid response.
"I saw in Philadelphia a large painting of that particular spot, and
though not remarkably well done, it enables one to form an
approximate idea of the grandeur of the scenery."
Mr. Chesley bowed to Mrs. Carew, and answered:
"I met the artist, while upon his sketching tour, and was deeply
interested in his success. At one time, I hoped he would cast
matrimonial anchor in San Francisco, and remain among us; but his
fickle fair one deserted him for a young naval officer, and after her
marriage, California possessed few charms for him. I pitied poor
Eggleston most cordially."
"Then permit me to assure you, that you are needlessly expending your
sympathy, for I bear witness to the fact that his wounds have
cicatrized. A fair Philadelphian has touched them with her fairy
finger, and at present he bows at another shrine."
Shivering with sympathy for Olga, Regina could not refrain from
looking at her, while Mrs. Carew spoke, and marvelled at the calm
deference, the smiling _insouciance_ with which her hazel eyes rested
on the speaker. Then they wandered as if accidentally to the
countenance of Mr. Palma, and a lambent flame seemed to kindle in
their brown depths.
"Mr. Eggleston has talent, and I am surprised that he has not been
more successful," replied the Congressman.
Mr. Palma was pressing Mrs. St. Clare to take more wine, and appeared
deaf to the conversation, but Mrs. Carew's flute-like voice
responded:
"Yes, a certain order of talent for mere landscape painting; but he
should never attempt a higher or different style. He made a wretched
copy of the Crucifixion for a wealthy retired tailor, who boasts of
his investments in 'virtue and bigotry;' and I fear I gave mortal
offence by venturing to say to the owner, that it reminded me of the
criticism of Luis de Vargas on a similar failure: 'Methinks he is
saying, Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do.'"
"_A propos!_ of pictures. Mrs. Carew, I must arrange to have you see
a superb new painting recently hung upon the wall at the 'Century,'
and ask your opinion of its merit----"
Regina did not catch the remainder of her guardian's sentence, which
she felt assured was intended to divert the conversation and shield
Olga, for just then Mr. Chesley asked to fill her glass, and the talk
drifted away to less dangerous topics.
Irresistibly attracted by some subtle charm in his manner she found
herself drawn into a pleasant dialogue with him relative to some
startling incidents which he narrated of the early miners in the far
West. Watching his face, she puzzled her brain with the solution of
the singular familiarity it possessed. She had never met him until
to-day, and yet her heart wanned toward him more and more.
At length she ventured the question: "Did you leave your family in
California?"
"Unfortunately I have no family, and no relatives. My dear young
lady, is it not melancholy to find a confirmed old bachelor, verging
fast upon decrepitude, with no one to look after or care for him?
When I was a good-looking young beau, and should have been hunting me
a bonny blue-eyed bride, I was digging gold from the rocky ribs of
mountains in Western solitudes. When I made my fortune, I discovered
too late that I had given my youth in exchange."
"I should think, sir, that you might still marry, and be very happy."
His low pleasant laugh did not embarrass her, and he answered:
"You are very kind to kindle that beacon of encouragement, but I fear
your charitable sympathy clouds your judgment. Do you imagine any
fair young girl could brave my grey hairs and wrinkles?"
"A young girl would not suit you, sir; but there must be noble
middle-aged ladies whom you could admire, and trust, and love?"
He bent his white head, and whispered:
"Such, for instance, as Mrs. Carew, who converts all places into
Ogygia?"
Without lifting her eyes, she merely shook her head, and he
continued:
"Miss Orme, all men have their roseleaf romance. Mine expanded very
early, but fate crumpled, crushed it into a shapeless ruin, and
leaving the wreck behind me, I went to the wilds of California. Since
then, I have missed the humanising influence of home ties, of
feminine association; but as I look down the hill, when the sun of my
life is casting long shadows, I sometimes feel that it would be a
great blessing had I a sister, cousin, niece, or even an adopted
daughter, whom I could love and lean upon in my lonely old age. Once
I seriously entertained the thought of selecting an orphan from some
Asylum, and adopting her into my heart and home."
"When you do, I sincerely hope she will prove all that you wish, and
faithfully requite your goodness."
She spoke so earnestly that he smiled, and added:
"Can you recommend one to me? I envy Palma his guardianship, and if I
could find a young girl like you, I should not hesitate to
solicit----"
"Pardon me, Mr. Chesley, but Mr. Palma is endeavouring to attract
your notice," said Mrs. Palma.
The host held in his hand an envelope.
"A telegram for you. Shall I direct the bearer to wait?"
"With your permission, I will examine it."
Having glanced at the lines, he turned the sheet of paper over, and
with a pencil wrote a few words; then handed it to Terry, requesting
him to direct the bearer to have the answer promptly telegraphed.
"Nothing unpleasant, I trust?" said Mr. Palma.
"Thank you, no. Only a summons which obliges me to curtail my visit,
and return to Washington by the midnight train."
Interpreting a look from her stepson, Mrs. Palma hastened the slow
course of the dinner by a whisper to the waiter behind her chair; and
as she asked some questions relative to mutual friends residing in
Washingtg, she looked
for the first time at the audience, and saw her guardian's tall
conspicuous figure leaning against a column near the spot where Mrs.
Carew sat.
Very grave, coolly critical, and quite preoccupied he certainly
looked, and none would have dreamed that the slight motion of his
lips meant "My Lily."
Twice she sang alone, and finally in a duo which admirably displayed
the compass and _timbre_ of her very peculiar voice, and the floral
hurricane that assailed her attested her complete triumph.
The unaffected simplicity of her bearing, as contrasted with the
_aplomb_ and artificial manner of the other young ladies who were
performers,--the angelic purity and delicacy of the sweet girlish
face, with a lingering trace of sadness in the superb eyes, which
only deepened their velvet violet,--excited the earnest interest of
all present, and many curious inquiries ran through the audience.
At the close of the Cantata, Mrs. Palma drew Regina away from the
strangers who pressed forward to offer their congratulations, and,
throwing a fur cloak around her, kissed her cheek.
It was the first caress the stately woman had ever bestowed, and as
the girl looked up, gratified and astonished, the former said:
"You sang delightfully, my dear, and we are more than satisfied,
quite proud. Your voice was as even and smooth as a piece of
cream-coloured Persian satin. No, Mrs. Brompton, not to-night.
Pardon me, Professor, but I must hurry her away, for Mrs. Carew and I
have an engagement at Mrs. Quimbey's. I shall be obliged to take our
'Undine' home, and then return for my fair friend, who is as usual
surrounded, and inextricable just now."
While she spoke, Regina's eyes wandered across the mass of heads, and
rested on the commanding form of her guardian, standing among a group
of gentlemen collected around Mrs. Carew, who clad in white _moire
antique_, with a complete overdress of finest black lace, looped with
diamond sprays, seemed more than usually regal and brilliant.
Mrs. Palma hurried Regina through a side entrance, and down to the
carriage, and ere long, having seen her enter the hall at home, bade
her good-night, and drove back for Mrs. Carew and Mr. Palma.
It was only a little after ten o'clock, and Regina went up to the
library, her favourite haunt. She had converted the over-skirt of her
dress into an apron, now filled with bouquets from among the number
showered upon her; and selecting one composed of pelargoniums and
heliotropes, she placed it in the vase beneath her mother's picture,
and laid the remainder in a circle around it.
"Ah, mother! they praised your child; but your voice was missing.
Would you too have been proud of me? Oh! if I could feel your lips on
mine, and hear you whisper once more, as of old, 'My baby! my
precious baby!'"
Gazing at the portrait, she spoke with a passionate fervour very
unusual in her composed reserved nature, and unshed tears gathered
and glorified her eyes.
The house was silent and deserted, save by the servants, by Mrs.
Carew's child and nurse, and throwing off her cloak, Regina remained
standing in front of the portrait, while her thoughts wandered into
grey dreary wastes.
Since the day of Mrs. Carew's arrival she had not exchanged a
syllable with her guardian, nor had she for an instant seen him
alone, for the early breakfasts had been discontinued, and in honour
of his guest and client, Mr. Palma took his with the assembled
family.
There was in his deportment toward his ward nothing harsh, nothing
that could have indicated displeasure; but he seemed to have entirely
forgotten her from the moment when he presented her to Mr. Chesley.
He never even accidentally glanced at her, and patiently watching her
immobile cold face, sparkling only with intelligence, as he
endeavoured to entertain his exacting and imperious guest, Regina
began to realize the vast distance that divided her from him.
His haughty Brahmimc pride seemed to lift him into some lofty plane,
so far beyond the level of Peleg Peterson, that in contrasting them
the girl groaned and grew sick at heart. She felt that she stood upon
a mine already charged, and that at any moment that wretched man who
held the fatal fuse in his brutal hand, might hurl her and all her
hopes into irremediable chaos and ruin. If the fastidious and
aristocratic people who had kindly applauded her singing a little
while ago could have imagined the dense cloud of social humiliation
that threatened to burst upon her, would she have even been tolerated
in that assemblage? Ignorance of her parentage was her sole passport
into really good society, and the prestige of her guardian's noble
name an ermine mantle of protection, which might be rudely torn away.
During the last three days, left to the companionship of her own sad
thoughts, and unable to see Olga alone for even a moment, more than
one painful and unutterably bitter discovery had been made. She felt
that indeed her childhood had flown for ever, that the sacred
mysterious chrism of womanhood had been poured upon her young heart.
Until forced to observe the marked admiration which in his own house
Mr. Palma evinced when conversing with Mrs. Carew, Regina had been
conscious only of a profound respect for him, of a deeply grateful
appreciation of his protecting care; and even when he interrogated
her with reference to her affection for Mr. Lindsay, she had
truthfully averred her conviction that her heart was wholly
disengaged.
But sternly honest in dealing with her own soul, subsequent events
had painfully shocked her into a realization of the feeling that
first manifested itself as she watched Mr. Palma and Mrs. Carew at
the dinner-table.
She knew now that the keen pang she suffered that day could mean
nothing less solemn and distressing than the mortifying fact that she
was beginning to love her guardian. Not merely as a grateful,
respectful ward, the august lawyer who represented her mother's
authority, but as a woman once, and once only in life, loves the man,
whom her pure tender heart humbly acknowledges as her king, her
high-priest, her one divinity in clay.
Although conscience acquitted her of any intentional weakness, her
womanly pride and delicacy bled at every pore, when she arraigned
herself for being guilty of this emotion toward one who regarded her
as a child, who merely pitied her forlorn isolation; and whose eye
would fill with fiery scorn, could he dream of her presumptuous, her
unfeminine folly.
Despite the chronic sneers with which Olga always referred to his
character and habitual conduct, Regina could not withhold a reverence
for his opinion, and an earnest admiration of his grave, dignified,
yet polished deportment in his household.
By degrees her early dread and repulsion had melted away, confidence
and respect usurped their place; and gradually he had grown and
heightened in her estimation, until suddenly opening her eyes wide
she saw that Erle Palma filled all the horizon of her hopes.
During three sleepless nights she had kept her eyes riveted upon this
unexpected and mournful fact, and while deeply humiliated by the
discovery, she proudly resolved to uproot and cast out of her heart
the alien growth, which she felt could prove only the upas of her
future. Allowing herself absolutely no hope, no pardon, no quarter,
she sternly laid the axe of indignant condemnation and destruction to
the daring off-shoot, desperately hewing at her very heart-strings.
Mrs. Carew's manner left little doubt that she was leaning like a
ripe peach within his reach, ready at a touch to fall into his hand;
and though Regina felt that this low-browed, sibyl-eyed woman was
vastly his inferior in all save beauty and wealth, she knew that even
his failure to marry the widow would furnish no justification for the
further indulgence of her own foolish and unsought preference.
The dread lest he might suspect it, and despise her, added intensity
to her desire to leave New York, and find safety in joining her
mother; for the thought of his coleping. Show me your heart."
As if fearful he might read it, she involuntarily closed her
eyes, and her answer was almost a sob.
"It is not my secret, it involves others, and I would rather die
to-morrow, to-night, than have it known. Oh! let me go away at once,
and for ever!"
Accustomed to compel compliance with his wishes, it was difficult for
him to patiently endure defiance and defeat from that fair young
creature, whom he began to perceive he could neither overawe nor
persuade.
For several minutes he seemed lost in thought, still holding her
hands firmly; then he suddenly laughed, and stooped toward her.
"Brave, true little heart! I wonder if some day you will be as
steadfast and faithful in your devotion to your husband, as you have
been in your loving defence of your mother? You need not tell me your
secret, I know everything; and, Lily, I can scarcely forgive you for
venturing within the reach and power of that wretched vagabond."
He felt her start and shiver, and pitying the terrified expression
that drifted into her countenance, he continued:
"Unconsciously, you were giving alms to your own and to your mother's
worst enemy. Peleg Peterson has for years stood between you and your
lawful name."
She reeled, and her fingers closed spasmodically over his, as white
and faint, she gasped:
"Then he is not--my----"
The words died on her quivering lips.
"He is the man who has slandered and traduced your mother, even to
her own husband."
"Oh! then, he is not, he cannot be my--father!"
"No more your father than I am! At last I have succeeded in
obtaining----"
She was beyond the reach even of his voice, and as she drooped he
caught her in his arms.
Since Monday the terrible strain had known no relaxation, and the
sudden release from the horrible incubus of Peleg Peterson was
overpowering.
Mr. Palma held her for some seconds clasped to his heart, and placing
the head on his bosom, turned the white face to his. How hungrily the
haughty man hung over those wan features, and what a wealth of
passionate tenderness thrilled in the low trembling voice that
whispered:
"My Lily. My darling; my own."
He kissed her softly, as if the cold lips were too sacred even for
his loving touch, and gently placed her on the sofa, holding her with
his encircling arm.
Since his boyhood no woman's lips had ever pressed his, and the last
kiss he had bestowed was upon his mother's brow, as she lay in her
coffin.
To-night the freshness of youth came back, and the cold, politic,
non-committal lawyer found himself for the first time an ardent
trembling lover.
He watched the faint quiver of her blue-veined lids, and heard the
shuddering sigh that assured him consciousness was returning. Softly
stroking her hand, he saw the eyes at last unclose.
"You certainly have been down among your uncanny Undine caves; for
you quite resemble a drenched lily. Now sit up."
He lifted her back into the easy chair, as if she had been an infant,
and stood before her.
As her mind cleared, she recalled what had passed, and said almost in
a whisper:
"Did I dream, or did you tell me that horrible man is not my father?"
"I told you so. He is a black-hearted, vindictive miscreant, who
successfully blackmailed you, by practising a vile imposture."
"Oh! are you quite sure?"
"Perfectly sure. I have been hunting him for years, and at last have
obtained in black and white his own confession, which nobly
exonerates your mother from his infamous aspirations."
"Thank God! Thank God!"
Tears were stealing down her cheeks, and he saw from the twitching of
her face that she was fast losing control of her overtaxed nerves.
"You must go to your room and rest, or you will be ill."
"Oh! not if I am sure he will never dare to claim me as his child.
Oh, Mr. Palma! that possibility has almost driven me wild."
"Dismiss it as you would some hideous nightmare. Go to sleep and
dream of your mother, and of----"
He bit his lip to check the rash words, and too much agitated to
observe his changed manner, she asked:
"Where is he now?"
"No matter where. He is so completely in my power, that he can
trouble us no more."
She clasped her hands joyfully, but the tears fell faster, and
looking at her mother's picture, she exclaimed:
"Have mercy upon me, Mr. Palma! Tell me--do you know--whom I am? Do
you really know beyond doubt who was--or is--my father?"
"This much I can tell you, I know your father's name; but just now I
am forbidden by your mother to disclose it, even to you. Come to your
room."
He raised her from the chair, and as she stood before him, it was
pitiable to witness the agonized entreaty in her pallid but beautiful
face.
"Please tell me only one thing, and I can bear all else patiently.
Was he--was my father--a gentleman? Oh! my mother could never have
loved any--but a gentleman."
"His treatment of her and of you would scarcely entitle him to that
honourable epithet; yet in the eyes of the world your father
assuredly is in every respect a gentleman, is considered even an
aristocrat."
She sobbed aloud, and the violence of her emotion, which she seemed
unable to control, alarmed him. Leading her to the library door he
said, retaining her hand.
"Compose yourself, or you will be really sick. Now that your poor
tortured heart is easy, can you not go to sleep?"
"Oh, thank you! Yes, I will try."
"Lily, next time trust me. Trust your guardian in everything.
Good-night. God bless you."
CHAPTER XXV.
"'The dice of the gods are always loaded,' and what appears the
merest chance is as inexorably fixed, predetermined, as the rules of
mathematics, or the laws of crystallization. What madness to flout
fate!"
Mrs. Orme laid down her pen as she spoke, and leaned back in her
chair.
"Did you speak to me?" inquired Mrs. Waul, who had been nodding over
her worsted work, and was aroused by the sound of the voice.
"No, I was merely thinking aloud; a foolish habit I have contracted
since I began to aspire to literary laurels. Go to sleep again, and
finish your dream."
Upon the writing desk lay a _MS_. in morocco cover, and secured by
heavy bronze clasps, into which the owner put a small key attached to
her watch chain, carefully locking and laying it away in a drawer of
the desk.
Approaching a table in the corner of the room, Mrs. Orme filled
a tall narrow Venetian glass with that violet-flavoured,
violet-perfumed Capri wine, whose golden bubbles danced upon the
brim, and, having drained the last amber drop, she rolled her chair
close to the window, looped back the curtains, and sat down.
The lodgings she had occupied since her arrival in Naples were
situated on the _Riviera di Chiaja_, near the _Villa Reale_, and not
far from the divergence into the _Strada Mergellina_. Of the
wonderful beauty of the scene beyond her front windows She had never
wearied, and now in the ravishing afternoon glow, with the blue air
all saturated with golden gleams, she yielded to the Parthenopean
spell, which, once felt, seems never to be forgotten.
Had it the power to chant to rest that sombre past which memory kept
as a funeral theme for ever on its vibrating strings? Was there at
last a file for the serpent, that had so long made its lair in her
distorted and envenomed nature?
At thirty-three time ceases to tread with feathery feet, and the
years grow self-asserting, italicize themselves in passing; and
across the dial of woman's beauty the shadow of decadence falls
aslant. But although Mrs. Orme had offered sacrifice to that
inexorable Terminus, who dwells at the last border line of youth, the
ripeness and glow of her extraordinary loveliness showed as yet no
hint of the coming eclipse.
Health lent to cheek and lip its richest, warmest tints, and though
the silvery splendour of hope shone no longer in the eloquent brown
eyes, the light of an almost accomplished triumph imparted a baleful
brilliance, which even the long lashes could not veil.
Her pale lilac robe showed admirably the transparency of her
complexion, and in her waving gilded hair she wore a cluster of
delicate rose anemones.
Her gaze seemed to have crossed the blue pavement of sea, and rested
on the purpling outlines of Ischia and Capri; but the dimpling smile
that crossed her face sprang from no dreamy reverie of Parthenope
legends, and her voice was low and deep like one rehearsing for some
tragic outbreak.
"So Samson felt in Dagon's temple, amid the jubilee of his
tormentors, when silent and calm, girded only by the sense of his
wrongs, he meekly bowed to rest himself; and all the while his arms
groped stealthily around the pillars destined to avenge him. Ah! how
calm, how holy, all outside of my heart seems! How in contrast with
that charnel-house yonder vision of peaceful loveliness appears as
incongruous as the nightingales which the soul of Sophocles heard
singing in the grove of the Furies? After to-day will the world ever
look quite the same to me? Thirty-three years have brought me swiftly
to the last fatal page; and shall the hand falter that writes
_finis_?"
A strangely solemn expression drifted over her countenance, but at
that moment a tall form darkened the doorway, and she smiled.
"Come in, General Laurance. Punctuality is essentially an American
virtue, rarely displayed in this _dolce far niente_ land; and you
exemplify its nationality. Five was the hour you named, and my little
Swiss tell-tale is even now sounding the last stroke."
She did not rise, seemed on the contrary, to sink farther back in her
velvet-lined chair; and bending down General Laurance touched her
hand.
"When a man's happiness for all time is at stake does he loiter on
his way to receive the verdict? Surely you will----"
He paused and glanced significantly at the figure whose white cap was
bowed low, as its wearer slumbered over the interminable crochet.
"May not this interview at least be sacred from the presence of your
keepers?"
"Poor dear soul, she is happily oblivious, and will take no
stenographic notes. I would as soon declare war against my own shadow
as order her away."
Evidently chagrined, the visitor stood irresolute, and meanwhile the
gaze of his companion wandered back to the beauty of the Bay.
He drew a chair close to that which she occupied, and holding his hat
as a screen, should Mrs. Waul's spectacles chance to turn in that
direction, spoke earnestly.
"Have I been unpardonably presumptuous in interpreting favourably
this permission to see you once more? Have you done me the honour to
ponder the contents of my letter?"
"I certainly have pondered well the contents."
She kept her hands beyond his reach, and looking steadily into his
eager handsome face, she saw it flush deeply.
"Madame, I trust, I believe you are incapable of trifling."
"In which, you do me bare justice only. With me the time for
trifling is past; and just now life has put on all its tragic
vestments. But how long since General Laurance believed me incapable
of--worse than trifling?"
"Ever since my infamous folly was reproved by you as it deserved.
Ever since you taught me that you were even more noble in soul than
lovely in person. Be generous, and do not humiliate me by recalling
that temporary insanity. Having blundered fearfully, in my ignorance
of your real character, does not the offer of yesterday embody all
the reparation, all the atonement of which a man is capable?"
"You desire me to consider the proposal contained in your letter, as
an expiation for past offences, as an _amende honourable_ for what
might have ripened into insult, had it not been nipped in the bud? Do
I translate correctly your gracious diction?"
"No, you cruelly torment me by referring to an audacious and shameful
offence, for which I blush."
"Successful sins are unencumbered by penitential oblations, and only
discovered and defeated crimes arouse conscience, and paint one's
cheeks with mortification. General Laurance merely illustrates a
great social law."
"Do not, dear madame, keep me in this fiery suspense. I have offered
you all that a gentleman can lay at the feet of the woman he loves."
A cold smile lighted her face, as some arctic moonbeams gleams for an
instant across the spires and doomes of an iceberg.
"Once you attempted to offer me your heart, or what remains of its
ossified ruins; which I declined. Now you tender me your hand and
name, and indeed it appears that like many of the high-born class you
so nobly represent, your heart and hand have never hitherto been
conjoined in your _devoir_. It were a melancholy pity they should be
eternally divorced."
Bending over her, he exclaimed:
"As heaven hears me, I swear I love you better than life, than
everything else that the broad earth holds! You cannot possibly doubt
my sincerity, for you hold the proof in your own hands. Be merciful,
Odille, and end my anxiety."
He caught her hand, and as she attempted no resistance, he raised it
to his moustached lip. Her eyes were resting upon the blue expanse of
water, as if far away, across the vast vista of the Mediterranean she
sought some strengthening influence, some sacred inspiration; and
after a moment, turning them full upon his countenance, she said with
grave stony composure:
"You have asked me to become your wife, knowing full well that no
affection would prompt me to entertain the thought; and you must be
thoroughly convinced that only sordid motives of policy could
influence me to accept you. Do men who marry under such circumstances
honour and trust the women, who as a _dernier ressort_ bear their
names? You are not so weak, so egregiously vain, as to delude
yourself for one instant with the supposition that I could ever love
you?"
"Once my wife, I ask nothing more. Upon my own head and life, be the
failure to make you love me. Only give me this hand, and I will take
your heart Can a lover ask less, and hazard more?"
"And if you fail--woefully, as fail you must?"
"I shall not. You cannot awe or discourage me, for I have yet to find
the heart that successfully defies my worship. But if you remained
indifferent--ah, loveliest! you would not! Even then, I should be
blessed by your presence, your society--and that alone were worth all
other women!"
"Even though it cost you the heavy, galling burden of marriage vows,
an exorbitant price, which only necessity extorts? How vividly we of
the nineteenth century exemplify the wisdom of the classic aphorisms?
_Quem Deus vult perdere, prius dementat_. Have you no fear that you
are seizing with bare fingers a glittering thirsty blade, which may
flesh itself in the hand that dares to caress it?"
"I fear nothing but your rejection; and though you should prove
Judith or Jael, I would disarm you thus."
Again he kissed the fair slender hand, and clasped it tenderly
between both his own.
"A man of your years does not lightly forsake the traditions of his
Caste, and the usages of his ancestors; and what can patricians like
General Laurance hope to secure by stooping to the borders of
_proletaire?_"
"The woman whom he loves. To you I will confess, that never until
within the past six or eight months have I really comprehended the
power of genuine love. Early in life I married a high-born, gentle,
true-hearted woman, who made me a good faithful wife; but into that
alliance my heart never entered, and although for many years I have
been free to admire whom fickle fancy chose, and have certainly
petted and caressed some whom the world pronounced very lovely, the
impression made upon me was transient, as the perfume of a blossom
plucked and worn for a few hours only. You have exerted over me a
fascination which I can neither explain nor resist. For you I
entertain feelings never aroused in my nature until now; and I speak
only the simple truth, when I solemnly swear to you, upon the honour
of a Laurance, that you are the only woman I have ever truly and
ardently loved."
"The honour of a Laurance? What more sacred pledge could I possibly
desire?"
The fingers of her fre worthy
of admiration and confidence. He did not impress me as a stranger,
but rather as a dear friend."
"Doubtless I shall find the chances all against me, when you are
requested to decide between us."
A perplexed expression crossed the face she raised toward him.
"I am not as quick as Mrs. Carew in solving enigmas."
"_ A propos!_ what do you think of my charming fair client?"
Her heart quickened its pulsations, but the clear sweet voice was
quiet and steady.
"I think her exceedingly beautiful and graceful."
"When I am as successful in her suit as in the great case I won
to-day, I shall expect you to offer me very sincere congratulations."
He smiled pleasantly, as he looked at her pure face, which bad never
seemed so surpassingly lovely as just then, with white hyacinths
nestling in and perfuming her hair.
"I shall not be here then; but, Mr. Palma, wherever I am, I shall
always congratulate you upon whatever conduces to your happiness."
"Then I may consider that you have already decided in favour of Mr.
Chesley?"
"Mr. Palma, I do not quite understand your jest"
"Pardon me, it threatens to become serious. Mr. Chesley is immensely
wealthy, and having no near relatives desires to adopt some pretty,
well-bred, affectionate-natured girl, who can take care of and cheer
his old age; and to whom he can bequeath his name and fortune. His
covetous eye has fallen upon my ward, and he seriously contemplates
making some grave proposals to your mother, relative to transferring
you to Washington, and thence to San Francisco. As Mr. Chesley's
heiress, your future will be very brilliant, and I presume that in a
voluntary choice of guardians, I am destined to lose my ward."
"Very soon my mother will be my guardian, and Mr. Chesley is
certainly a gentleman of too much good sense and discretion to
entertain such a thought relative to a stranger, of whom he knows
absolutely nothing. A few polite kindly worded phrases bear no such
serious interpretation."
She had bent so persistently over her book, that he closed and
removed it beyond her reach, forcing her to regard him; for after the
toil, contention, and brain-wrestling of the courtroom, it was his
reward just now to look into her deep calm eyes, and watch the
expressions vary in her untutored ingenuous countenance.
"Men, especially confirmed old bachelors, are sometimes very
capricious and foolish; and my friend Mr. Chesley appears to have
fallen hopelessly into the depth of your eyes. In vain I assured him
that Helmholtz has demonstrated that the deepest blue eye is after
all only a turbid medium. In his infatuation he persists that science
is a learned bubble, and that your eyes are wells of truth and
inspiration. Of course you desire that I shall present your
affectionate regards to your future guardian?"
"You can improvise any message you deem advisable, but I send none."
A faint colour was stealing into her cheeks, and the long lashes
drooped before the bright black eyes, that had borne down many a
brave face on the witness stand.
The clock struck, and Mr. Palma compared his watch with its record.
He was loath to quit that charming quiet room, which held the fair
innocent young queen of his love, and hasten away upon the impending
journey; but it was important that he should not miss the railway
train, and he smothered a sigh:
"This morning I neglected to give you a letter which arrived
yesterday, and of course I need expect no pardon when you ascertain
that it is from 'India's coral strand.' If 'Brother Douglass' is as
indefatigable in the discharge of his missionary as his epistolary
labours, he deserves a crown of numerous converts. This letter was
enclosed in one addressed to me, and I prefer that you should
postpone your reply until my return. I intended to mention the matter
this morning, but was absorbed in court proceedings, and now I am too
much hurried."
She put the letter into her pocket, and at the same time drew out a
small envelope containing the amount of money she had borrowed.
Rising, she handed it to him.
"Allow me to cancel my debt."
As he received it, their fingers met, and a hot flush rushed over the
lawyer's weary face. He bit his lip, and recovered himself before she
observed his emotion.
"That alms-giving episode is destined to yield an inestimable harvest
of benefits. But I must hurry away. Pray do not take passage for the
jungles of Oude before I return, for whenever you leave me I should
at least like the ceremony of bidding my ward adieu. Good-bye."
She gave him her hand.
"Good-bye, Mr. Palma. I hope you will have a pleasant trip."
As she stood before him, the rich blue of her soft cashmere dress
rendered her pearly complexion fairer still, and though keen pain
gnawed at her heart, no hint of her suffering marred the perfection
of her face.
"Lily, where did you get those lovely white hyacinths? Yesterday I
ordered a bouquet of them, but could procure none. Would you mind
giving me the two that smell so deliciously in your hair? I want
them--well--no matter why. Will you oblige me?"
"Certainly, sir; but I have a handsomer fresher spike of flowers in
a glass in my room, which I will bring down to you."
She turned, but he detained her.
"No, these are sufficiently pretty for my purpose, and I am hurried.
I trust I may be pardoned this robbery of your floral ornaments,
since you will probably see neither Mr. Roscoe, Mr. Chesley, nor yet
Padre Sahib this evening."
She laid the snowy perfumed bells in his outstretched hand, and said:
"I am exceedingly glad that even in such a trifle I can contribute to
your pleasure, and I assure you that you are perfectly welcome to my
hyacinths."
The sweet downcast face, and slightly wavering voice appealed to all
that was tender and loving in his cold undemonstrative nature, and
he was strongly tempted to take her in his arms, and tell her the
truth, which every day he found it more difficult to conceal.
"Thank you. Some day, Lily, I will tell you their mission and fate.
Should I forget, remind me."
He smiled, bowed, and hurried from the room, leaving her sadly
perplexed.
At dinner Mrs. Palma said:
"I have promised to chaperon the Brace sisters to-night to the opera,
and shall take tea at their house. Were I sure of a seat for you, I
should insist upon taking you, for I dislike to leave you so much
alone; but the box might be full, and then things would be awkward."
"You need have no concern on my account, for I have my books, and am
accustomed to being alone. Moreover, I am not particularly partial to
the music of 'Martha' which will be played to-night."
"Did your guardian tell you he has just won that great 'Migdol' case
that created so much interest?"
"He mentioned it. Mrs. Palma, I thought he looked weary and jaded; as
if he needed a rest, rather than a journey."
"Erle is never weary. His nerves are steel, and he will speedily
forget his court-house cares in Mrs. Carew's charming conversation."
"But she is not in Washington?"
"She told me yesterday she would go there this afternoon, and showed
me the most superb maize-coloured satin just received from Worth,
which she intends wearing to-morrow evening at the French
Ambassador's ball, or reception. You know she is very fascinating,
and though Erle thinks little about women, I really believe she will
succeed in driving law books, for a little while at least, out of his
cool clear head. My dear, I am going to write a short note. Will you
please direct Hattie to bring my opera hat, cloak, and glasses?"
With inexpressible relief, Regina heard the heavy silk rustle across
the hall, when she took her departure, and rejoiced in the assurance
that there was no one to intrude upon her solitude.
How she wished that she could fly to some desert, where undiscovered
she might cry aloud, in the great agony that possessed her heart.
The thought that her guardian had hastened away to accompany that
grey-eyed, golden-haired witch of a woman to Washington was
intolerably bitter; and as she contemplated the possibility, nay the
probability, of his speedy marriage, a wild longing seized her to
make her escape, and avoid the sight of such a spectacle.
When she recalled his proud, handsome, composed face, and tried to
imagine him the husband of Mrs. Carew, bending over, caressing her,
the girl threw her arms on his writing desk, and sunk her face upon
them, as if to shut out the torturing vision.
She knew that he was singularly reserved and undemonstrative; she had
never seen him fondle or caress anything, and the bare thought that
his stern marble lips would some day seek and press that woman's
scarlet mouth made her shiver with a pang that was almost maddening.
How cruelly mocking that he should take her favourite snowy hyacinths
to offer them to Mrs. Carew! Did his keen insight penetrate the folly
she had suffered to grow up in her own heart, and had he coolly
resorted to this method of teaching her its hopelessness?
If she could leave New York before his return, and never see him
again, would it not be best? His eyes were so piercing, he was so
accustomed to reading people's emotions in their countenance, and she
felt that she could not survive his discovery of her secret.
What did his irony relative to India portend? Hitherto she had quite
forgotten the letter from Mr. Lindsay, and now breaking the seal,
sought an explanation.
A few faded flowers fell out as she unfolded it, and ere she
completed the perusal a cry escaped her. Mr. Lindsay wrote that his
health had suffered so severely from the climate of India that he had
been compelled to surrender his missionary work to stronger hands,
and would return to his native land. He believed that rest and
America would restore him, and now he fully declared the nature of
his affection, and the happiness with which he anticipated his
reunion with her; reminding her of her farewell promise that none
should have his place in her heart. More than once she read the
closing words of that long letter.
"I had intended deferring this declaration until you were
eighteen, and restored to your mother's care; but my unexpectedly
early return, and the assurance contained in your letters that
your love has in no degree diminished, determine me to acquaint
you at once with the precious hope that so gladdens the thought
of our approaching reunion. While your decision must of course be
subject to and dependent on your mother's approval, I wish you to
consult only the dictates of your heart, believing that all my
future must be either brightened or clouded by your verdict. Open
the package given to you in our last interview, and if you have
faithfully kept your promise let me see upon your hand the ring
which I shall regard as the pledge of our betrothal. Whether I
live many or few years, God grant that your love may glorify and
sanctify my earthly sojourn. In life or death, my darling Regina,
believe me always,
"Your devoted
"DOUGLASS."
Below the signature, and dated a week later, were several lines in
Mrs. Lindsay's handwriting, informing her that her son had again been
quite ill, but was improving; and that within the ensuing ten days
they expected to sail for Japan, and thence to San Franciso, where
Mrs. Lindsay's only sister resided. In conclusion she earnestly
appealed to Regina, as the daughter of her adoption, not to
extinguish the hope that formed so powerful an element in the
recovery of her son Douglass.
Was it the mercy of God, or the grim decree of fatalism, or the
merest accident that provided this door of escape, when she was
growing desperate?
Numb with heart-ache, and strangely bewildered, Regina could
recognize it only as a providential harbour, into which she could
safely retreat from the storm of suffering that was beginning to roar
around her. Recalling the peaceful happy years spent at the
parsonage, and the noble character of the man who loved her so
devotedly, who had so tenderly cared for her through the season of
her childhood, a gush of grateful emotion pleaded that she owed him
all that he now asked.
When she contrasted the image of the pale student, so affectionate,
so unselfishly considerate in all things, with the commanding figure
and cold, guarded, non-committal face of Mr. Palma, she shivered and
groaned: but the comparison only goaded her to find safety in the
sheltering love, that must at least give her peace.
If she were Douglass Lindsay's wife, would she not find it far easier
to forget her guardian? Would it be sinful to promise her hand to
one, while her heart stubbornly enshrined the other? She loved Mr.
Lindsay very much: he seemed holy, in his supremely unselfish and
deeply religious life; and after awhile perhaps other feelings would
grow up toward him.
In re-reading the letter, she saw that Mr. Lindsay had informed Mr.
Palma of the proposal which it contained; as he deemed it due to her
guardian to acquaint him with the sentiments they entertained for
each other.
Should she reject the priestly hand and loyal heart of the young
missionary, would not Mr. Palma suspect the truth?
She realized that the love in her heart was of that deep exhaustive
nature which comes but once to women, and since she must bury it for
ever, was it not right that she should dedicate her life to promoting
Mr. Lindsay's happiness? Next to her mother, did she not owe him more
than any other human being?
As she sat leaning upon Mr. Palma's desk, she saw his handkerchief
near the inkstand, where he had dropped it early that morning; and
taking it up, she drew it caressingly across her check and lips.
Everything in this room, where since her residence in New York she
had been accustomed to see him, grew sacred from association with
him, and all that he touched was strangely dear.
For two hours she sat there, very quiet, weighing the past,
considering the future; and at last she slowly resolved upon her
course.
She would write that night to her mother, enclose Mr. Lindsay's
letter, and if her mother's permission could be obtained, she would
give her hand to Douglass, and in his love forget the brief madness
that now made her so wretched.
From the date of the postscript she discovered that the letter had
been delayed _en route_, and computing the time from Yokohama to San
Francisco, according to information given by Mr. Chesley, she found
that unless some unusual detention had occurred, the vessel in which
Mr. and Mrs. Lindsay intended to sail should have already reached
California.
Mr. Palma's jest relative to India was explained; and evidently he
had not sufficient interest in her decision even to pause and ask it.
Knowing the contents, he had with cold indifference carried the
letter for two days in his pocket, and handed it to her just as he
was departing.
She imagined him sitting in the car, beside Mrs. Carew, admiring her
beauty, perhaps uttering in her ear tender vows, never breathed by
his lips to any other person; while she--the waif, the fatherless,
nameless, obscure young girl--sat there alone desperately fighting
the battle of destiny.
Bitter as was this suggestion of her aching heart, it brought
strength; and rising, she laid aside the handkerchief, and quitted
the apartment that babbled ceaselessly of its absent master.
Among some precious souvenirs of her mother she kept the package
which had been given to her by Mr. Lindsay with the request that it
should remain unopened until her eighteenth birthday; and how she
unlocked the small ebony box that contained her few treasures.
The parcel was sealed with red wax, and when she removed the
enveloping pasteboard, she found a heavy gold ring, bearing a large
beautifully tinted opal, surrounded with small diamonds. On the
inside was engraved "Douglass and Regina," with the date of the day
on which he had left the parsonage for India.
Kneeling beside her bed, she prayed that God would help her to do
right, would guide her into the proper path, would enable her to do
her duty, first to her mother, then to Mr. Lindsay.
When she rose, the ring shone on her left hand, and though her face
was worn and pallid her mournful eyes were undimmed, and she sat down
to write her mother frankly concerning the feelings of intense
gratitude and perfect confidence which prompted her to accept Mr.
Lindsay's offer, provided Mrs Orme consented to the betrothal.
Ere she had concluded the task, her attention was attracted by a
noise on the stairs that were situated near her door.
It was rather too early for Mrs. Palma's return from the opera, and
the servants were all in a different portion of the building.
Regina laid down her pen, and listened. Slow heavy footsteps were
ascending, and recognizing nothing familiar in the sound, she walked
quickly to the door which stood ajar, and looked out.
A tall woman wrapped in a heavy shawl had reached the landing, and as
the gaslight fell upon her, Regina started forward.
"Olga! we did not expect you until to-morrow, but you are disguised!
Oh! what is the matter?"
Wan and haggard, apparently ten years older than when she ran down
these steps a week previous departing for Albany, Olga stood clinging
to the mahogany rail of the balustrade. Her large straw bonnet had
fallen back, the heavy hair was slipping low on neck and brow, and
her sunken eyes had a dreary stare.
"Are you ill? What has happened? Dear Olga, speak to me."
She threw her arms around the regal figure, and felt that she was
shivering from head to foot.
As she became aware of the close clinging embrace in which Regina
held her, a ghastly smile parted Olga's colourless lips, and she said
said in a husky whisper:
"Is it you? True little heart; the only one left in all the world."
After a few seconds, she added:
"Where is mamma?"
"At the opera."
"To see Beelzebub? All the world is singing and playing that now, and
you may be sure that you and I shall be in at the final chorus.
Regina----"
She swept her hand feebly over her forehead, and seemed to forget
herself.
Then she rallied, and a sudden spark glowed in her dull eyes, as when
a gust stirs an ash heap, and uncovers a dying ember.
"Erle Palma?"
"Has gone to Washington."
"May he never come back! O God! a hundred deaths would not satisfy
me! A hundred graves were not sufficient to hide him from my sight!"
She groaned and clasped her hand across her eyes.
"What dreadful thing has occurred? Tell me, you know that you can
trust me."
"Trust! no, no; not even the archangels that fan the throne of God. I
have done with trust. Take me in your room a little while. Hide me
from mamma until to-morrow; then it will make no difference who sees
me."
Regina led her to the low rocking chair in her own room, and took off
the common shawl and bonnet which she had used as a disguise, then
seized her cold nerveless hand.
"Do tell me your great sorrow."
"Something rare nowaday. I had a heart, a live, warm, loving heart,
and it is broken; dead--utterly dead. Regina, I was so happy
yesterday. Oh! I stood at the very gate of heaven, so close that all
the glory and the sweetness blew upon me, like June breezes over a
rose hedge; and the angels seemed to beckon me in. I went to meet
Belmont, to join him for ever, to turn my back on the world, and as
his wife pass into the Eden of his love and presence.... Now, another
gate yawns, and the fiends call me to come down, and if there really
be a hell, why then----"
For nearly a moment she remained silent.
"Olga, is he ill? Is he dead?"
A cry as of one indeed broken-hearted came from her quivering lips,
and she clasped her arms over her head.
"Oh, if he were indeed dead! If I could have seen him and kissed him
in his coffin! And known that he was still mine, all mine, even in
the grave----"
Her head sank upon her bosom, and after a brief pause she resumed in
an unnaturally calm voice.
"My world so lovely yesterday has gone to pieces; and for me life is
a black crumbling ruin. I hung all my hopes, my prayers, my fondest
dreams on one shining silver thread of trust, and it snapped, and all
fall together. We ask for fish, and are stung by scorpions; we pray
for bread--only bare bread for famishing hearts--and we are stoned.
Ah! it appears only a hideous dream; but I know it is awfully,
horribly true."
"What is true? Don't keep me in suspense."
Olga bent forward, put her large hands on Regina's shoulders as the
latter knelt in front of her, and answered drearily:
"He is married."
"Not Mr. Eggleston?"
"Yes, my Belmont. For so many years he has been entirely mine, and
oh, how I loved him! Now he is that woman's husband. Bought with her
gold. I intended to run away and marry him; go with him to Europe,
where I should never see Erle Palma's cold devilish black eyes again.
Where in some humble little room hid among the mountains, I could be
happy with my darling. I sold my jewellery, even my richest clothing,
that I might have a little money to defray expenses. Then I wrote
Belmont of my plans, told him I had forsaken everything for him, and
appointed a place in this city where we could meet. I hastened down
from Albany, disguised myself, and went to the place of rendezvous.
After waiting a long time, his cousin came; brought me a letter,
showed me the marriage notice. Only two days ago they--Belmont and
that woman--were married, and they sailed for Europe at noon to-day,
in the steamer upon which I had expected to go as a bride. He wrote
that with failing health, penury staring him in the face, and,
despairing at last of being able to win me, he had grown reckless,
and sold himself to that wealthy widow who had long loved him, and
who would provide generously for his helpless mother. He said he
dared not trust himself to see me again. And so, all is over for
ever."
She dropped her head on her clenched hands, and shuddered. "Dear
Olga, he was not worthy of you, or he would never have deserted you.
If he truly loved you, he never could have married another, for----"
She paused, for the shimmer of the diamonds on her hand accused her.
Was she not contemplating similar treachery? Loving one man, how dare
she entertain the thought of listening to another's suit. She was
deeply and sincerely attached to Douglass, she reverenced him more
than any living being; but she knew that it was not the same feeling
her heart had declared for her guardian, and she felt condemned by
her own words.
Olga made an impatient motion, and answered:
"Hush--not a word against him; none shall dishonour him. He was
maddened, desperate. My poor darling! Erle Palma and mamma were too
much for us, but we shall conquer at last. Belmont will not live many
months; he had a hemorrhage from his lungs last week, and in a little
while we shall be united. He will not long wait to join me."
She leaned back and smiled triumphantly, and Regina became uneasy as
she noted the unnatural expression of her eyes.
"What do you mean, Olga? You make me unhappy, and I am afraid you are
ill."
"No, dear; but I am tired. So tired of everything in this hollow,
heartless, shameful world, that I want to lie down and rest. For
eight years nearly I have leaned on one hope for comfort; now it has
crumbled under me, and I have no strength. Will you let me sleep here
with you to-night? I will not keep you awake."
"Let me help you to undress. You know I shall be glad to have you
here."
Regina unbuttoned her shoes, and began to draw them off, while Olga
mechanically took down and twisted her weighty hair. Once she put her
hand on her pocket, and her eyes glittered.
"I want a glass of wine, or anything that will quiet me. Please go
down to the dining-room, and get me something to put me to sleep. My
head feels as if it were on fire."
The tone was so unusually coaxing, that Regina's suspicions were
aroused.
"I don't know where to find the key of the wine closet."
"Then wake Octave, and tell him to give you some wine He keeps port
and madeira for soups and sauces. You must I would do as much for
you. I will go to Octave."
She attempted to rise, but Regina feigned acquiescence, and left the
room, closing the door, but leaving a crevice. Outside, she knelt
down and peeped through the key-hole.
Alarmed by the unnatural expression of the fiery hazel eyes, a
horrible dread overshadowed her, and she trembled from head to foot.
While she watched, Olga rose, turned her head and listened intently;
then drew something from her pocket, and Regina saw that it was a
glass vial.
"I win at last. To-morrow, mamma and her stepson will not exult over
this victory. If I have an immortal soul may God--my Maker and
Judge--have mercy upon me!"
She drew out the cork with her teeth, turned, and as she lifted the
vial to her lips, Regina ran in and seized her arm.
"Olga, you are mad! Would you murder yourself?"
They grappled; Olga was much taller and now desperately strong, but
luckily Regina had her fingers also on the glass, and, dragging down
the hand that clenched it, the vial was inverted, and a portion of
the contents fell upon the carpet.
Feeling the liquid run through her fingers, Olga uttered la cry of
baffled rage of despair, and struck the girl a heavy blow in the face
that made her stagger; but almost frantic with terror Regina improved
the opportunity afforded by the withdrawal of one of the large hands,
to tighten her own grasp, and in the renewed struggle succeeded in
wrenching away the vial. The next instant, she hurled it against the
marble mantlepiece, and saw it splintered into numberless fragments.
As the wretched woman watched the fluid oozing over the hearth, she
cried out and covered her face with her hands.
"Dear Olga, you are delirious, and don't know what you are doing. Go
to bed, and when you lie down, I will get the wine for you. Please,
dear Olga! You wring my heart."
"Oh, you call yourself my friend, and you have been most cruel of
all! You keep me from going to a rest that would have no dreams, and
no waking, and no to-morrow. Do you think I will live and let them
taunt me with my folly, my failure? Let that iron fiend show his
white teeth, and triumph over me? People will know I sold my clothes,
and tried to run away, and was forsaken. Oh! if you had only let me
alone! I should very soon lave been quiet; out of even Erle Palma's
way! Now----"
She gave utterance to a low, distressing wail, and rocked herself,
murmuring some incoherent words.
"Olga, your mother has come, and unless you wish her to hear you, and
come in, do try to compose yourself."
Shuddering at the mention of her mother, she grew silent, moody, and
suffered Regina to undress her. After a long while, during which she
appeared absolutely deaf to all appeals, she rose, smiled strangely,
and threw herself across the bed; but the eyes were beginning to
sparkle, and now and then she laughed almost hysterically.
When an hour had passed, and no sound came from the prostrate figure,
Regina leaned over to look at her, and discovered that she was
whispering rapidly some unintelligible words.
Once she startled up, exclaiming:
"Don't have such a hot fire! My head is scorching."
Regina watched her anxiously, softly stroking one of her hands,
trying to soothe her to sleep; but after two o'clock, when she grew
more restless and incoherent in her muttering, the young nurse felt
assured she was sinking into delirium, and decided to consult Mrs.
Palma.
Concealing the shawl and bonnet, and gathering up the most
conspicuous fragments of glass on the hearth, she put them out of
sight, and hurried to Mrs. Palma's room.
She was astonished to find her still awake, sitting before a table,
and holding a note in her hand.
"What is the matter, Regina?"
"Olga has come home, and I fear she is very ill. Certainly she is
delirious."
"Oh! then she has heard it already! She must have seen the paper. I
knew nothing of it until to-night, when Erle's hasty note from
Philadelphia reached me, after I left the opera. I dreaded the effect
upon my poor, unfortunate child. Where is she?"
"In my room."
CHAPTER XXVII.
During the protracted illness that ensued, Olga temporarily lost the
pressure of the burden she had borne for so many years, and entered
into that Eden which her imagination had painted, ere the sudden
crash and demolition of her _Chateaux en Espagne_. Her delirium was
never violent and raving, but took the subdued form of a beatified
existence. In a low voice, that was almost a whisper, she babbled
ceaselessly of her supreme satisfaction in gaining the goal of all
her hopes--and dwelt upon the beauty of her chalet home--the tinkling
music of the bells on distant heights where cattle browsed--the
leaping of mountain torrents just beyond her window--the cooing of
the pigeons upon the tall peaked roof--the breath of mignonette and
violets stealing through the open door. When pounded ice was laid
upon her head, an avalanche was sliding down, and the snow saluted
her in passing; and when the physician ordered more light admitted
that he might examine the unnaturally glowing eyes, she complained
that the sun was setting upon the glacier and the blaze blinded her.
Now she sat on a mossy knoll beside Belmont, reading aloud Buchanan's
"Pan" and "The Siren," while he sketched the ghyll; and anon she
paused in her recitation of favourite passages to watch the colour
deepen on the canvas.
From the beginning Dr. Suydam had pronounced the case peculiarly
difficult and dangerous, and as the days wore on, bringing no
debatement of cerebral excitement, he expressed the opinion that some
terrible shock had produced the aberration that baffled his skill,
and threatened to permanently disorder her faculties.
Jealously Regina concealed all that had occurred on the evening of
her return, and though Mrs. Palma briefly referred to her daughter's
unfortunate attachment to an unworthy man, whose marriage had
painfully startled her, she remained unaware of the revelations made
by Olga. Although she evinced no recognition of those about her, the
latter shrank from all save Regina whose tender ministrations were
peculiarly soothing; and clinging to the girl's hand, she would
smilingly talk of the peace and happiness reaped at last by her
marriage with Belmont Eggleston, and enjoin upon her the necessity of
preserving from "mamma and Erle Palma" the secret of her secluded
little cottage home.
On the fourth night, Mrs. Palma was so prostrated by grief and
watching, that she succumbed to a violent nervous headache, and was
ordered out of the room by the physician, who requested that Regina
might for a few hours be entrusted with the care of his patient.
"But if anything should happen? And Regina is so inexperienced?"
sobbed the unhappy mother, bending over her child, who was laughing
at the gambols of some young chamois, which delirium painted on the
wall.
"Miss Orme will at least obey my orders. She is watchful and
possesses unusual self-control, which you, my dear madam, utterly
lack in a sick-room. Beside, Olga yields more readily to her than to
any one else, and I prefer that Miss Orme should have the care of
her. Go to bed, madam, and I will send you an anodyne that will
compose you."
"If any change occurs, you will call me instantly?"
"You may rest assured I shall."
Mrs. Palma leaned over her daughter, and as her tears fell on the
burning face of the sufferer, the latter put up her hands, and said:
"Belmont, it is raining and your picture will be ruined, and then
mamma will ridicule your failure. Cover it quick."
"Olga, my darling, kiss mamma good-night."
But she was busy trying to shield the imaginary painting with one of
the pillows, and began in a quavering voice to sing Longfellow's
"Rainy Day." Her mother pressed her lips to the hot cheek, but she
seemed unconscious of the caress, and weeping bitterly Mrs. Palma
left the room. As she passed into the hall a cry escaped her, and
the broken words:
"Oh, Erle, I thought you would never come! My poor child!"
Dr. Suydam closed the door, and drawing Regina to the window,
proceeded to question her closely, and to instruct her concerning the
course of treatment he desired to pursue. Should Olga's pulse sink to
a certain stage, specified doses must be given; and in a possible
condition of the patient he must be instantly notified.
"I am glad to find Mr. Palma has returned. Though he knows no more
than a judge's gavel of what is needful in a sick-room, he will be a
support and comfort to all, and his nerves never flag, never waver.
Keep a written record of Olga's condition at the hours I have
specified, and shut her mother out of the room as much as possible. I
will try to put her to sleep for the next twelve hours, and by that
time we shall know the result. Good-night."
Olga had violently opposed the removal from Regina's room, and in
accordance with her wishes she had remained where her weary whirling
brain first rested on the day of her return. Arranging the medicine
and glasses, and turning down the light, Regina put on her pale blue
dressing-gown girded at the waist by a cord and tassel, and loosely
twisted and fastened her hair in a large coil low on her head and
neck. She had slept none since Olga came home, and anxiety and
fatigue had left unmistakable traces on her pale, sad face. The
letter to her mother had been finished and signed, but still lay in
the drawer of her portable writing desk, awaiting envelope and stamp;
and so oppressed had she been by sympathy with Olga's great
suffering, that for a time her own grief was forgotten, or at least
put aside.
The announcement of Mr. Palma's return vividly recalled all that
beclouded her future, and she began to dread the morrow that would
subject her to his merciless bright eyes, feeling that his presence
was dangerous. Perhaps by careful manoeuvring she might screen
herself in the sick-room for several days, and thus avoid the chance
of an interview, which must result in an inquiry concerning her
answer to Mr. Lindsay's letter. Fearful of her own treacherous heart,
she was unwilling to discuss her decision until assured she had grown
calm and firm, from continued contemplation of her future lot;
moreover, her guardian would probably return from Washington an
accepted lover, and she shrank from the spectacle of his happiness,
as from glowing ploughshares--lying scarlet in her pathway. In this
room she would ensconce herself, and should he send for her, various
excuses might be devised to delay the unwelcome interview.
Olga had grown more quiet, and for nearly an hour after the doctor's
departure she only now and then resumed her rambling, incoherent
monologue. Sitting beside the bed, Regina watched quietly until the
clock struck twelve, and she coaxed the sufferer to take a spoonful
of a sedative from which the physician hoped much benefit. She bathed
the crimson cheeks with a cloth dipped in iced water, and all the
while the hazel eyes watched her suspiciously. Other reflections
began to colour her vision, and the happy phase was merging into one
of terror, lest her lover should die or be torn away from her.
Leaning over her, Regina endeavoured to compose her by assurances
that Belmont was well and safe, but restlessly she tossed from side
to side.
At last she began to cry, softly at first, like a fretful weary
child; and while Regina held her hands, essaying to soothe her, a
shadow glided between the gas globe and the bed, and Mr. Palma stood
beside the two. He looked pale, anxious, and troubled, as his eyes
rested sorrowfully on the fevered face upon the pillow, and he saw
that the luxuriant hair had been closely clipped, to facilitate
applications to relieve the brain. The parched lips were browned and
cracked, and the vacant stare in the eyes told him that consciousness
was still a long way off.
But was there even then a magnetic recognition, dim and vague, of the
person whom she regarded as the inveterate enemy of her happiness?
Cowering among the bedclothes, she trembled and said, in a husky yet
audible whisper:
"Will you hide us a little while? Belmont and I will soon sail, and
if Erle Palma and mamma knew it, they would tear me from my darling,
and chain me to Silas Congreve, and that would kill me. Oh! I only
want my darling; not the Congreve emeralds, only my Belmont, my
darling."
Something that in any other man would have been a groan, came from
the lawyer's granite lips, and Regina, who shivered at his presence,
looked up, and said hastily:
"Please go away, Mr. Palma; the sight of you will make her worse."
He only folded his arms over his chest, sighed, and sat down, keeping
his eyes fixed on Olga. It was one o'clock before she ceased her
passionate pleading for protection from those whom she believed
intent upon sacrificing her, and then turning her face to the wail
she became silent, only occasionally muttering rapid indistinct
sentences.
For some time Mr. Palma sat with his elbow on his knee, and his head
resting on his hand, and even in that hour of deep anxiety and dread,
Regina realized that she was completely forgotten; that he had
neither looked at nor spoken to her.
Nearly a half-hour passed thus, and his gaze had never wandered from
the restless sufferer on the bed, when Regina rose and renewed the
cold cloths on her forehead. She counted the pulse, and while she
still sat on the edge of the bed, Olga half rose, threw herself
forward with her head in Regina's lap, and one arm clasped around
her. Softly the girl motioned to her guardian to place the bowl of
iced water within her reach, and, dipping her left hand in the water,
she stole her fingers lightly across the burning brow. Olga became
quiet, and by degrees the lids drooped over the inflamed eyes.
Patiently Regina continued her gentle cool touches, and at last she
was rewarded by seeing the sufferer sink into the first sleep that
had blessed her during her illness.
Fearing to move even an inch lest she should arouse her, and knowing
the physician's anxiety to secure repose, the slight figure sat like
a statue, supporting the head and shoulders of the sleeper. The clock
ticked on, and no other sound was audible, save a sigh from Mr.
Palma, and the heavy breathing of Olga. The former was leaning back
in his chair, with his arms crossed, and though Regina avoided
looking at him, she knew from the shimmer of his glasses, that his
eyes were turned upon her. Gradually the room grew cold, and she
raised her hand and pointed to a large shawl lying on a chair within
his reach. Very warily the two spread it lightly over the arms and
shoulders, without disturbing the sleeper. One arm was clasped about
Regina's waist, and the flushed face was pressed against her side.
So they watched until three o'clock, and then Mr. Palma saw that the
girl was wearied by the constrained, uncomfortable position. He had
been studying the colourless, mournful features that were as regular
and white as if fashioned in Pentelicus, and noted that the heavy
hair coiled low at the back of the head, gave a singularly graceful
outline to the whole. She kept her eyes bent upon the face in her
lap, and the beautiful lashes and snowy lids drooped over their blue
depth. He knew from the paling of her lips that she was faint and
tired, but he realized that she could be relieved only by the
sacrifice of that sound slumber, upon which Olga's welfare was so
dependent. If she stirred even a muscle the sleeper might awake to
renewed delirium.
The next hour seemed the longest he had ever spent, and several times
he looked at his watch, hoping the clock a laggard. To Regina the
vigil was inexpressibly trying, and sitting there three feet from her
guardian, she dared not lift her gaze to the countenance that was so
dear.
At four o'clock he took a pillow and lounge cushion and placed them
behind her as a support for her wearied frame, but she dared not lean
against them sufficiently to find relief; and stooping he put his arm
around her shoulder, and pressed her head against him. Laying his
cheek on hers, he whispered very cautiously, for his lips touched her
ear:
"I am afraid you feel very faint; you look so. Can you bear it a
little while longer?"
His breath swept warm across her cold cheek, and she hastily inclined
her head. He lowered his arm, but remained close beside her, and at
last she beckoned to him to bend down, and whispered:
"The fire ought to be renewed in the furnace; will you go down, and
attend to it?"
Shod in his velvet slippers, he noiselessly left the room.
How long he was absent, she was unable to determine, for her heart
was beating madly from the pressure of his cheek, and the momentary
touch of his arm; and gazing at the ring on her finger, she fiercely
upbraided herself for this sinful folly. Wearing that opal, was it
not unwomanly and wicked to thrill at the contact with one, who never
could be more than her coolly kind, prudent, sagacious guardian? She
felt numb, sick, giddy, and her heart--ah! how it ached as she tried
to realize fully that some day he would caress Mrs. Carew!
Olga slept heavily, and when Mr. Palma returned, he brought his warm
scarlet-lined dressing-gown and softly laid it around Regina's
shoulders. She looked up to express her thanks, but he was watching
Olga's face, and soon after walked to the mantlepiece and stood
leaning, with his elbow upon it.
At last the slumberer moaned, turned, and after a few restless
movements, threw herself back on the bolster, and fell asleep once
more, with disjointed words dying on her lips. It was five o'clock,
and Mr. Palma beckoned Regina to him.
"She will be better when she wakes. Go to her room, and go to sleep.
I will watch her until her mother comes in."
"I could not sleep, and am unwilling to leave her until the doctor
arrives."
"You look utterly exhausted."
"I am stronger than I seem."
"Mrs. Palma tells me that you have been made acquainted with the
unfortunate infatuation which has overshadowed poor Olga's life for
some years at least. I should be glad to know what you have learned."
"All that was communicated to me on the subject was under the seal of
confidence, and I hope you will excuse me if I decline to betray the
trust reposed in me."
"Do you suppose I am ignorant of what has recently occurred?"
"At least, sir, I shall not recapitulate what passed between Olga and
myself."
"You are aware that she considers me the author of all her
wretchedness."
"She certainly regards you and Mrs. Palma's opposition to her
marriage with Mr. Eggleston as the greatest misfortune of her life."
"He is utterly unworthy of her affection, is an unscrupulous
dissipated man; and it were better she should die to-day, rather than
have wrecked her future by uniting it with his."
"But she loved him so devotedly."
"She was deceived in his character, and refused to listen to a
statement of facts. When she knows him as he really is, she will
despise him."
"I am afraid not"
"I know her better than you do. Olga is a noble high-souled woman,
and she will live to thank me for her salvation from Eggleston. Her
marriage with Mr. Congreve must not be consummated; I will never
permit it in my house."
"She believes you have urged it, have manoeuvred to bring it to
pass, and this has enhanced her bitterness."
"Manoeuvring is beneath me, and I am justly accused of much for
which I am in no degree responsible. Poor Olga has painted me an
inhuman monster, but her good sense will ere long acquit me, when
this madness has left her and she is once more amenable to reason."
He walked softly across the floor, leaned over the bed, and for some
minutes watched the sleeper, then quietly left the room.
Drawing his dressing-gown closely around her, Regina sat down near
the bedside; and as she felt the pleasant warmth of the pearl-grey
merino, and detected the faint odour of cigar smoke in its folds, she
involuntarily pressed her lips to the garment that seemed almost a
part of its owner.
Day broke clear and cold, and when the sun had risen Regina saw that
the flush was no longer visible in Olga's face, and that to delirium
had succeeded stupor.
The physician looked anxious, and changed the medicine, and he found
some difficulty in arousing her sufficiently to administer it. Mrs.
Palma resumed her watch at her daughter's side, and Dr. Suydam
remained several hours, urging the pale young nurse to take some
repose; but aware that the crisis of the disease had arrived, the
latter could not consent to quit the room even for a moment. Twice
during the day, Mr. Palma came up from his office, and into the
darkened apartment where life and death were battling for their
prostrate prey; but he exchanged neither word nor glance with his
ward, and after brief consultation with the doctor glided noiselessly
away.
About seven o'clock Mrs. Palma went down to dinner, leaving Regina
alone with the sufferer, and scarcely five minutes later she heard a
low moan from the figure that had not stirred for many hours.
Brightening the light, she peered cautiously at the face lying upon
the pillow, and was startled to find the eyes wide open. Trembling
with anxiety she said:
"Are you not better? You have slept long and soundly."
Mournfully the hazel eyes looked at her, and the dry brown lips
quivered.
"I have been awake some time."
"Before your mother left?"
"Yes."
"Dear Olga, is your mind quite clear again?"
"Terribly clear. I suppose I have been delirious?"
"Yes, you have known none of us for five days. Here, drink this, the
doctor said you must have it the instant you waked."
"To keep me from dying? Why should I live? I remember everything so
vividly, and while custom made you all try to save me, you are
obliged to know it would have been better, more kind and merciful, to
have let me die at once. Give me some water."
After some seconds, she wearily put her hand to her head, and a
ghostly smile hovered over her mouth.
"All my hair cut off? No matter now, Belmont will never see me again,
and I only cared for my glossy locks because he was so proud of them.
Poor darling."
She groaned, knitted her brows, and shut her eyes; and though she did
not speak again, Regina knew that she lay wrestling with bitter
memories. When her mother came back, she turned her face toward the
wall, and Mrs. Palma eagerly exclaimed:
"My darling, do you know me? Kiss your mother."
Olga only covered her face with her hands and said wearily:
"Don't touch me yet, mamma. You have broken my heart."
At the expiration of the fifth day of convalescence, Olga was wrapped
in warm shawls and placed on the couch, which had been drawn near the
grate where a bright fire burned. Thin and wan, she lay back on the
cushions and pillows, with her wasted hands drooping listlessly
beside her. Moody, and taciturn, she refused all aid from any but
Regina, and mercilessly exacted her continual presence. By day the
latter waited upon and read to her; by night she rested on the same
bed, where the unhappy woman remained for hours awake, and
inconsolable, dwelling persistently upon her luckless fate. At Mrs.
Palma's suggestion her stepson had not visited the sick-room since
the recovery of Olga's consciousness; and being closely confined to
the limits of the apartment, Regina had not seen her guardian for
several days. About three o'clock in the afternoon, when she had
finished brushing the short tangled hair that clung in auburn rings
around the invalid's forehead, Olga said:
"Read me the 'Penelope.'"
Regina sat down on a low stool close to the couch, and while she
opened the book and read, Olga's right arm stole over her shoulder.
At the opposite side of the hearth her mother sat, watching the pair;
and she saw the door open sufficiently to admit Mr. Palma's head.
Quickly she waved him back with a warning gesture; but he shook his
head resolutely, advanced a few steps, and stood in a position which
prevented the girls from discovering his presence. As Regina paused
to turn a leaf, Olga began a broken recitation, grouping passages
On the morning after the painful interview between Olga and Mr.
Palma, the former desired to remove into her own apartment, and the
easy chair in which she sat was wheeled carefully to the hearth in
her room.
"Come close to me, dear child."
Olga held her companion for some seconds in a tight embrace, then
kissed her cheek and forehead.
"Patient, true little friend; you saved me from destruction. How worn
and white you look, and I have robbed you so long of sleep! When I am
stronger, I want to talk to you; but to-day I must be alone, must
spend it among my dead hopes, sealing the sepulchres. Jean Ingelow
tells us of 'a Dead Year' 'cased in cedar, and shut in a sacred
gloom;' but I have seven to shroud and bury; and will the day ever
dawn when I can truly say:
Silent they rest, in solemn salvatory'?
Go out, dear, into the sunshine; you look so weary. Leave me alone in
the cold crypts of memory; you need not be afraid, I have no second
vial of poison."
She seemed so hopeless, and her voice was so indescribably mournful,
that Regina's eyes filled with tears, but Mrs. Palma just then called
her into the hall.
"Erle says you must put on your hat, wrap up closely, and come
downstairs. He is waiting to take you to ride."
She had not seen her guardian since he left Olga's sofa the previous
day, and answered without reflection.
"Ask him to excuse me. I am not very well, and prefer remaining in my
own room."
From the foot of the stairs, Mr. Palma's voice responded:
"Fresh air will benefit you. I insist upon your coming immediately."
She leaned over the railing, and saw him buttoning his overcoat.
"Please, Mr. Palma, excuse me to-day."
"Pardon me, I cannot. The carriage is waiting."
She was tempted to rebel outright, to absolutely refuse obedience to
his authority, which threatened her with the dreaded interview, but a
moment's reflection taught her that resistance to his stubborn will
was useless, and she went reluctantly downstairs, forgetting her
gloves in her trepidation. He handed her into the carriage, took a
seat beside her, and directed Farley to drive to Central Park.
The day though cold was very bright, and he partly lowered the silk
curtains to shut out the glare of the sun. For a half-hour they
rolled along the magnificent Avenue, and only casual observations
upon weather, passing equipages, and similar trivial topics, afforded
Regina time to compose her perturbed thoughts. With his overcoat
buttoned tight across his broad chest, and hat drawn a little low on
his brow, Mr. Palma sat, holding his gloved fingers interlaced; and
his brilliant eyes rested now and then very searching upon the face
at his side, which was almost as white as the snowy fur sack that
enveloped her.
"What is the matter with your cheek?" he said at length.
"Why do you ask?" She instantly shielded it with her hand.
"It has a slightly bluish, bruised appearance."
"It is of no consequence, and will soon disappear."
"Olga must indeed have struck you a heavy blow, to leave a mark that
lingers so long. She told me how desperately you wrestled to stay her
suicidal course, and as a family we owe you much for your firm brave
resistance."
"I am sorry she has betrayed what passed. I hoped you would never
suspect the distressing facts."
"When a girl deliberately defies parental wishes and counsel, and
scorns the advice and expostulation of those whom experience has
taught something of life and the world, her fate sooner or later is
sad as Olga's. A foolish caprice which young ladies invariably
denominate 'love,' but which is generally merely flattered vanity,
not unfrequently wrecks a woman's entire life; and though Olga will
rally after a time, she cannot forget this humiliating episode, which
has blighted the brightest epoch of her existence. Her rash, blind
obstinacy has cost her very dear. Here, let us go out; I want you to
walk awhile."
They had entered the Park, and, ordering the driver to await them at
a specified spot, Mr. Palma turned into the Ramble. For some moments
they walked in silence, and finally he pointed to a rustic seat
somewhat secluded, and beyond the observation of the few persons
strolling through the grounds. Regina sat with her muff in her lap,
and her bare hands nervously toying with her white silk tassel. Her
guardian noticed the tremulousness of her lip, and at that moment the
sun, smiting the ring on her finger, kindled the tiny diamonds into a
circle of fire. Mr. Palma drew off his gloves, put them in his
pocket, and just touched the opal, saying coldly:
"Is that a recent gift from your mother? I never saw you wear it
until the night you bathed poor Olga's forehead."
"No, sir."
Involuntarily she laid her palm over the jewels that was beginning to
grow odious in her own sight.
"May I inquire how long it has been in your possession?"
"Since before I left the parsonage. I had it when I came to New
York."
"Why then have you never worn it?"
"What interest can such a trifle possess for you, sir?"
"Sufficient at least to require an answer."
She sat silent.
"Regina."
"I hear you, Mr. Palma."
"Then show me the courtesy of looking at me when you speak.
Circumstances have debarred me until now from referring to a letter
from India, which I gave you before I went to Washington. I presume
you are aware that the writer in enclosing it to me acquainted me
with its tenor and import. Will you permit me to read it?"
"I sent it to my mother nearly a week ago."
She had raised her eyes, and looked at him almost defiantly, nerving
herself for the storm that already darkened his countenance.
"Mr. Lindsay very properly informed me that his letter contained an
offer of marriage, and though I requested you to defer your answer
until my return, I could not of course doubt that it would prove a
positive rejection, since you so earnestly assured me he could never
be more than a brother to you. At least, let me suggest that you
clothe the refusal in the kindest possible terms."
Her face whitened, and she compressed her lips, but her beautiful
eyes became touchingly mournful in their strained gaze. Mr Palma took
off his glasses, and for the first time in her life she saw the full,
fine bright black eyes, without the medium of lenses. How they looked
down into hers?
She caught her breath, and he smiled:
"My ward must be frank with her guardian."
"I have been frank with my mother, and since nothing has been
concealed from her, no one else has the right to catechise me. To her
it is incumbent upon me to confide even the sacred details to which
you allude, and she knows all; but you can have no real interest in
the matter."
"Pardon me, I have a very deep interest in all that concerns my ward;
especially when the disposal of her hand is involved. What answer
have you given 'Brother Douglass'?"
As he spoke, he laid his hand firmly on both of hers, but she
attempted to rise.
"Oh, Mr. Palma! Ask me no more, spare me this inquisition. You
transcend your authority."
"Sit still. Answer me frankly. You declined Mr. Lindsay's offer?"
"No, sir!"
She felt his hand suddenly clutch hers, and grow cold.
"Lily! Lily!"
The very tone was like a prayer. Presently, he said sternly:
"You must not dare to trifle with me. You cannot intend to accept
him?"
"Mother will determine for me."
Mr. Palma had become very pale, and his glittering teeth gnawed his
lower lip.
"Is your acceptance of that man contingent only on her consent and
approval?"
For a moment she looked away at the blue heavens bending above her,
and wondered if the sky would blacken when she had irretrievably
committed herself to this union. The thought was hourly growing
horrible, and she shivered.
He stooped close to her, and even then she noted how laboured was
his breathing, and that his mouth quivered:
"Answer me; do you mean to marry him?"
"I do, if mother gives me permission."
Bravely she met his eyes, but her words were a mere whisper, and she
felt that the worst was over; for her there could be no retraction.
It was the keenest blow, the most bitter disappointment of Erle
Palma's hitherto successful life, but his face hardened, and he bore
it, as was his habit, without any demonstration, save that
discoverable in his mortal paleness.
During the brief silence that ensued, he still held his hand firmly
on hers, and when he spoke his tone was cold and stern.
"My opinion of your probable course in this matter was founded
entirely upon belief in the truthfulness of your statement that Mr.
Lindsay had no claim on your heart. Only a short time since you
assured me of this fact, and my faith in your candour must plead
pardon for my present profound surprise. Certainly I was credulous
enough to consider you incapable of deceit."
The scorn in his eyes stung her like a lash, and clasping her fingers
spasmodically around his hand, she exclaimed:
"I never intended to deceive you. Oh, do not despise me!"
"I presume you understand the meaning of the words you employ; and
when I asked you if I would be justified in softening your rejection
of my cousin by assuring him that your affections were already
engaged you emphatically negatived that statement, saying it would be
untrue."
"Yes, and I thought so then; but did not know my own heart."
Her shadowy eyes looked appealingly into his, but he smiled
contemptuously.
"You did not know your affections had travelled to India, until the
gentleman formally asked for them? Do you expect me to believe that?"
"Believe anything except that I wilfully deceived you."
The anguish, the hopelessness written in her blanched face, and the
trembling of the childishly small hands that had unconsciously
tightened around his touched him.
He put his right hand under her chin and lifted the face.
"Lily, I want the truth. I intend to have it; and all of it. Now look
me in the eye and answer me solemnly, remembering that the God you
reverence hears your words. Do you really love Mr. Lindsay?"
"Yes; he is so good, how can I help feeling attached to him?"
"You love him next to your mother?"
"I think I do."
The words cost her a great effort, and her eyes wandered from his.
"Look straight at me. You love him so well you wish to be his wife?"
"I want to make him happy if I can."
"No evasions, if you please. Answer yes, or no. Is Mr. Lindsay dearer
to you than all else in the world?"
"Next to mother's his happiness is dearest to me."
"Yes--or no--this time; is there no one you love better?"
Earth and sky, trees and rocks, seemed whirling into chaos, and she
shut her eyes.
"You have no right to question me farther. I will answer no more."
Was the world really coming to an end? She heard her guardian laugh,
and the next moment he had caught her to his heart. What did it
mean? Was she too growing delirious with brain fever? His arm held
her pressed close to his bosom, and his cheek leaned on her head,
while strangely sweet and low were his words:
"Ah, Lily! Lily! Hush. Be still."
She wished that she could die then and there, for the thought of Mr.
Lindsay sickened her soul. But the memory of the ring appalled her,
and she struggled to free herself.
"Let me go! Do let us go home. I am sick."
His arm drew her closer still.
"Be quiet, and let me talk to you, and remember I am your guardian.
Lily, I am afraid you are tempted to stray into dangerous paths, and
your tender little heart is not a safe counsellor. You are sincerely
attached to your old friend, you trust and honour him, you are very
grateful to him for years of kindness during your childhood; and now
when his health has failed, and he appeals to you to repay the
affection he has long given you, gratitude seems to assume the form
of duty, and you are trying to persuade yourself that you ought to
grant his prayer. Lily, love is the only chrism that sanctifies
marriage, and though at present you might consent to become Mr.
Lindsay's wife, suppose that in after years you should chance to meet
some other man, perhaps not so holy, so purely Christian as this
noble young missionary, but a man who seized, possessed your
deep--deathless womanly love, and who you knew loved you in return?
What then?"
"I would still do my duty to my dear Douglass."
"No doubt you would try. But you would do wrong to marry your friend
feeling as you do; and you ought to wait and fully explain to him the
nature of your sentiments. You are almost a child, and scarcely know
you own heart yet, and I, as your guardian, cannot consent to see you
rashly forge fetters that may possibly gall you in future. The letter
to your mother has not yet been forwarded. Hattie, to whom you
entrusted it, did not give it to me until this morning, alleging in
apology, that she put it in her pocket and forgot it. I have reason
to believe that in a very short time you will see your mother: let
this matter rest until you can converse fully with her, and if she
sanctions your decision I, of course, shall have no right to
expostulate. Lily, I want to see you happy, and while I profoundly
respect Mr. Lindsay, who I daresay is a most estimable gentleman, I
should not very cordially give you away to him."
She rose and stood before him, clasping her hands tightly over each
other; tearless, tortured, striving to see the path of duty.
"Mr. Palma, if I can only make him happy! I owe him so much. When I
remember all that he did so tenderly for years, and especially on
that awful night of the storm, I feel that I ought not to refuse what
he asks of me."
"If he knew how you felt, I think I could safely promise for him that
he would not accept your hand. The heart of the woman he loves, is
the boon that a man holds most precious. Lily, you know your inmost
heart does not prompt you to marry Mr. Lindsay."
Did he suspect her secret folly? The blood that had seemed to curdle
around her aching heart surged into her cheeks, painting them a vivid
rose, and she said hastily:
"Indeed he is very dear to me. He is the noblest man I ever knew. How
could I fail to love him?"
He took her left hand and examined the ring.
"You wear this, as a pledge of betrothal? Is it not premature when
your mother is in ignorance of your purpose? Tell me, my ward, tell
me, do you not rather keep it here to stimulate your flagging sense
of duty? To strengthen you to adhere to your rash resolve?"
"He wrote that if I had faithfully kept my farewell promise to him he
wished me to wear it."
"May I know the nature of that promise?"
"That I would always love him next to my mother."
"But I think you admitted that possibly you might some day meet your
ideal who would be dearer even than mother and Douglass. I do not
wish to distress you needlessly, but while you are under my
protection I must unflinchingly do all that honour demands of a
faithful guardian. I can permit no engagement without your mother's
approval; and I honestly confess to you, that I am growing impatient
to place you in her care. Do you still desire your letter forwarded?"
"If you please."
"Sit down. I have sad news for you."
He unbuttoned his coat, took an envelope from his pocket, and she
recognized the telegram which had arrived the previous day. "Regina,
many guardians would doubtless withhold this, but fairness and
perfect candour have been my rule of life, and I prefer frankness to
diplomacy. This telegraphic despatch arrived yesterday, and is
intended for you, though addressed to me."
He put it in her hand, and filled with an undefined terror that
chilled her she read:
"SAN FRANCISCO.
"MR. ERLE PALMA,--Tell your ward that Douglass is too ill to
travel farther. If she wishes to see him alive she must come
immediately. Can't you bring her on at once?
"ELISE LINDSAY."
The despatch fluttered to the ground and the girl moaned and bowed
her face in her hands. He waited some minutes, and with a sob she
said:
"Oh, let me go to him! It might be a comfort to him, and if he should
die? Oh, do let me go!"
"Do you think your mother would consent to your taking so grave a
step?"
"I do not know, but she would not blame me when she learned the
circumstances. If I waited to consult her he might--oh! we are
wasting time! Mr. Palma, pity me! Send me to him--to the friend who
loves me so truly, so devotedly!"
She started up and wrung her hands, as imagination pictured the noble
friend ill, perhaps dying, and longing to see her.
"Regina, compose yourself. That telegram has been delayed by an
unprecedented fall of snow that interrupts the operation of the
wires, and it is dated three days ago. Last night I telegraphed to
learn Mr. Lindsay's condition, but up to the time of our leaving
home, the wires were not working through to San Francisco; and the
trains on the Union Pacific are completely snowbound. The agent told
me this morning that it was uncertain when the cars would run
through, as the track is blocked up. Until we ascertain something
definite let me advise you to withhold your letter, enclosing his;
for I ought to tell you that I am daily expecting a summons to send
you to Europe. Come, walk with me and try to be patient."
He offered her his arm, and they walked for some time in profound
silence. At last she exclaimed passionately:
"Please let me go home. I want to be alone."
They finally reached the carriage, and Mr. Palma gave the coachman
directions to drive to the telegraph office. During the ride Regina
leaned back, with her face pressed against the silken curtain on the
side, and her eyes closed. Her companion could see the regular
chiselled profile, so delicate and yet so firm, and as he studied the
curves of her beautiful mouth, he realized that she had fully
resolved to fulfil her promise; that at any cost of personal
suffering she would grant the prayer of the devoted young minister.
Scientists tell us that "there are in the mineral world certain
crystals, certain forms, for instance of fluor-spar, which have lain
darkly in the earth for ages, but which nevertheless have a potency
of light locked up within them. In their case the potential has never
become actual, the light is, in fact, held back by a molecular
detent. When these crystals are warmed, the detent is lifted, and an
outflow of light immediately begins." How often subtle analogies in
physical nature whisper interpretations of vexing psychological
enigmas?
Was Erle Palma an animated, human fluor-spar? Had the latent
capacity, the potentiality of tenderness in his character been
suddenly actualized, by the touch of that girl's gentle hands, the
violet splendour of her large soft eyes, which lifted for ever the
detent of his cold isolating selfishness?
The long-hidden light had flashed at last, making his heart radiant
with a supreme happiness which even the blaze of his towering and
successful ambition had never kindled; and to-day he found it
difficult indeed to stand aside, with folded arms and sealed lips,
while she reeled upon the brink of an abyss, which was so wide and
deep, that it threatened to bury all his hopes of that sacred home
life--which sooner or later sings its dangerous siren song in every
man's heart.
To his proud worldly nature this dream of pure, deep, unselfish love,
had stolen like the warm, rich spicy breath of June roses--swung
unexpectedly over a glacier, bringing the flush and perfume of early
summer to the glittering blue realms of winter; and he longed
inexpressibly to open all his heart to the sweet sunshine, to gather
it in, garnering it as his own for ever. How his stern soul clung to
that shy, shrinking girl, who seemed in contrast to the gay brilliant
self-asserting women he met in society as some white marble-lidded
Psyche, standing on her pedestal, amid a group of glowing Venetian
Venuses! He had seen riper complexions, and more rounded symmetry;
and had smiled and bowed at graceful polished persiflage, more witty
than aught that ever crossed her quiet, daintily carved lips; but
though he had admired many lovely women of genius and culture, that
pale girl, striving to hide her grieved countenance against his
carriage curtain, was the only one he had ever desired to call his
wife. That any other man dared hope to win or claim her seemed
sacrilegious; and he felt that he would rather see her lying in her
coffin, than know that she was profaned by any touch save his.
Neither spoke, and when the carriage stopped at the telegraph office,
Mr. Palma went in and remained some time. As he returned, she felt
that he held her destiny for all time in his hands, and in after
years he often recalled the despairing, terrified expression of the
face that leaned forward, with parted quivering lips, and eyes that
looked a prayer for pity.
"The wires are not yet working fully, but probably messages will go
through during the day. Regina, try to be patient, and believe that
you shall learn the nature of Mrs. Lindsay's answer as soon as I
receive it. Tell Mrs. Palma I shall not come home to dine, have
pressing business at court, and cannot tell how long I may be
detained at my office. Good-bye. The despatch shall be sent to you
without delay."
He lifted his hat, closed the carriage door, and motioned to Farley
to drive home.
Locked in her own apartment Olga denied admittance to even her
mother, who improved the opportunity to answer a number of neglected
letters, and Regina was left to the seclusion of her room. As the day
wore slowly away, her restlessness increased, and she paced the floor
until her limbs trembled from weariness. Deliberately she recalled
all the incidents of the long residence at the parsonage, and strove
to live again the happy season, during which the young minister had
contributed so largely to her perfect contentment. The white pets
they had tended and caressed together, the books she had read with
him, the favourite passages he had italicized, the songs he loved
best, the flowers he laid upon her breakfast plate, and now and then
twined in her hair; above all, his loving persuasive tone, quiet
gentle words of affectionate counsel, and tender pet name for her,
"my white dove."
How fervent had been his prayer that when he returned, he might find
her "unspotted from the world." Was she? Could she bear to deceive
the brave loyal heart that trusted her so completely?
Once at church she had witnessed a marriage, heard the awfully solemn
vows that the bride registered in the sight of God, and to-day the
words flamed like the sword of the avenging angel, like a menace, a
challenge. Would Douglass take her for his wife, if he knew that Mr.
Palma had become dearer to her than all the world beside? Could she
deny that his voice and the touch of his hand on hers magnetized,
thrilled her, as no one else had power to do? She could think without
pain of Mr. Lindsay selecting some other lady and learning to love
her as his wife, forgetting the child Regina; but when she forced
herself to reflect that her guardian would soon be Mrs. Carew's
husband, the torture seemed unendurable.
Unlocking a drawer, she spread before her all the little souvenirs
Mr. Lindsay had given her. The faded flowers that once glowed under
the fervid sun of India, the seal and pen, the blue and gold
Tennyson, and Whittier, and the pretty copy of Christina Rossetti's
poems, he had sent from Liverpool. One by one she read his letters
ending with the last which Mr. Palma had laid on her lap when he left
the carriage.
Despite her efforts, above the dear meek gentle image of the
consecrated and devout missionary towered the stately proud form of
the brilliant lawyer, with his chilling smile and haughty marble
brow; and she knew that he reigned supreme in her heart. He was not
so generous, so nobly self-sacrificing, so holy and pious as Mr.
Lindsay, nor did she reverence him so entirely; but above all else
she loved him. Conscience, pride, and womanly delicacy all clamoured
in behalf of the absent but faithful lover; and the true heart
answered, "Away with sop
In the magical glow of that cloudless golden afternoon Mrs. Orme saw
the outlines of St. Elmo fade away, Capri vanish like a purple mist,
Ischia and Procida melt insensibly into the blue of the marvellous
bay; and watching the spark which trembled on the distant summit of
Vesuvius like the dying eye of that cruel destiny from which she
fled, the rescued happy woman exulted in the belief that she was at
last sailing through serene seas.
Dreaming of her child, whose pure image hovered in the mirage hope
wove before her--
"She seemed all earthly matters to forget,
Of all tormenting lines her face was clear,
Her wide brown eyes upon the goal were set,
Calm and unmoved as though no foe were near."
CHAPTER XXX.
Since the memorable day of Regina's visit to Central Park many weeks
had elapsed, and one wild stormy evening in March she sat at the
library table writing her translation of a portion of "Egmont."
The storm--now of sleet, now of snow--darkened the air, and the
globes of the chandelier representing Pompeian lamps were lighted
above the oval table, shedding a bright yet mellow glow over the warm
quiet room.
Upon a bronze console stood a terra-cotta jar containing a white
azalea in full bloom, and the fragrance of the flowers breathed like
a benediction on the atmosphere; while in the tall glass beneath Mrs.
Orme's portrait two half-blown snowy camellias nestled amid a fringe
of geranium leaves.
Close to the fire, with her feet upon a Persian patterned cushion,
Olga reclined in the luxurious easy chair that belonged to Mr.
Palma's writing desk, and open on her lap lay a volume entitled "The
Service of the Poor." The former brilliancy of her complexion seemed
to have forsaken her for ever, banished by a settled sallowness; and
she looked thin, feeble, dejected, passing her fingers abstractedly
through the short curling ruddy hair that clustered around her
forehead and upon her neck.
As if weary of the thoughts suggested by her book, she turned and
looked at the figure writing under the chandelier, and by degrees she
realized the change in the countenance, which three months before had
been pure, serene, and bright as a moonbeam.
The keen and prolonged anguish which Regina had endured left its
shadow, faint, vague, but unmistakable; and in the eyes lay gloom,
and around the mouth patient yet melancholy lines, which hinted of a
bitter struggle in which the calm-hearted girl died, and the wiser,
sadder woman was born.
Her grief had been silent but deep for the loss of the dear friend
who symbolized for her all that was noble, heroic, and godly in human
nature; and her suffering was not assuaged by letters from Mrs.
Lindsay, furnishing the sorrowful details of the last illness of the
minister, and the dying words of tender devotion to the young girl
whom he believed his betrothed bride.
Over these harrowing letters she had wept long and bitterly, accusing
herself continually of her unworthiness in allowing another image to
usurp the throne where the missionary should have reigned supreme;
and the only consolation afforded was in the reflection that Douglass
had died believing her faithful, happy in the perfect trust reposed
in her. He had been buried on a sunny slope of the cemetery not far
from the blue waves of the Pacific, and his mother remained in San
Francisco with her sister, in whose house Mr. Lindsay had quietly
breathed his life away, dying as he had lived, full of hope in Christ
and trust in God.
Mrs. Palma and Olga only knew that Regina had lost a dear friend whom
she had not seen for years, and none but her guardian understood the
nature of the sacred tie that bound them.
Day and night she was haunted by memories of the kind face never more
to be seen this side of the City of Peace, and when at length she
received a photograph taken after death, in which, wan and emaciated,
he seemed sleeping soundly, she felt that her life could never again
be quite the same, and that the grey shadowy wings of Regret drooped
low over her future pathway.
Accompanying the photograph was a brief yet loving note written by
Mr. Lindsay the evening before his death; and to it were appended the
lines from "Jacqueline":
"Nor shall I leave thee wholly. I shall be--
An evening thought,--a morning dream to thee,--
A silence in thy life, when through the night,
The bell strikes, or the sun with sinking light,
Smites all the empty windows. As there sprout
Daisies, and dimpling tufts of violets, out
Among the grass where some corpse lies asleep,
So round thy life, where I lie buried deep,
A thousand little tender thoughts shall spring,
A thousand gentle memories wind and cling."
As if the opal were a talisman against the revival of reflections
that seemed an insult to the dead, Regina wore the ring constantly;
and whenever a thrill warned her of the old madness, her right hand
caressed the jewels, seeking from their touch a renewal of strength.
Studiously she manoeuvred to avoid even casual meetings with her
guardian, and except at the table, and in the presence of the family,
she had not seen him for several weeks. Business engagements occupied
him very closely; he was called away to Albany, to Boston, and once
to Philadelphia, but no farewells were exchanged with his ward, and
as if conscious of her sedulous efforts to avoid him, he appeared
almost to ignore her presence.
During these sad days the girl made no attempt to analyze the
estrangement which she felt was hourly increasing between them. She
presumed he disapproved of her resolution to accept Mr. Lindsay,
because he was poor, and offered no brilliant worldly advantages,
such as her guardian had been trained to regard as paramount
inducements in the grave matter of marriage; and secluding herself
as much as possible she fought her battle with grief and remorse as
best she might, unaided by sympathy. If she could only escape from
that house, with her secret undiscovered, she thought that in time
she would crush her folly and reinstate herself in her own respect.
After several interviews with Mr. Palma, the details of which Olga
communicated to no one, she had consented to hold her scheme of the
"Sisterhood" in abeyance for twelve months, and to accompany her
mother to Europe, whither she had formerly been eager to travel; and
Mrs. Palma, in accordance with instructions from her stepson, had
perfected her preparations, so as to be able to leave New York at a
day's notice.
Mrs. Carew had returned to the city, and now and then Mr. Palma
mentioned her name, and delivered messages from her to his
stepmother; but Olga abstained from her old badinage, and Regina
imagined that her forbearance sprang from a knowledge of the
engagement which she supposed must exist between them. She could not
hear her name without a shiver of pain, and longed to get away before
the affair assumed a sufficiently decided form to compel her to
notice and discuss it. To-day, after watching her for some time, Olga
said:
"You are weary, and pale almost to ghastliness. Put away your books,
and come talk to me."
Regina sighed, laid down her pen, and came to the fireplace.
"I thought you promised to go very early to Mrs. St. Clare's and
assist Valeria in arranging her bridal veil?"
"So I did, and it will soon be time for me to dress. How I dislike to
go back into the gay world, where I have frisked so recklessly and so
long. Do you know I long for the hour when I shall end this
masquerade, and exchange silks and lace and jewellery for coarse blue
gown, blue apron, and white cap?"
"Do you imagine the colour of your garments will change the
complexion of your heart and mind? You remind me of Alexander's
comment upon Antipater: 'Outwardly Antipater wears only white
clothes, but within he is all purple.'"
"Ah! but my purple pride has been utterly dethroned, and it seems to
me now that when I find rest in cloistered duties the quiet sacretray the suffering he was
resolved to conceal.
After a moment, he said:
"Thank you. I shall buy the music in order to secure the words.
Lily----"
He paused, bent down, and rested his chin on the large coil of hair
at the back of her head, and though she never knew it his proud lips
touched the glossy silken mass.
"Lily, if I ask a foolish trifle of you, will you grant it, as a
farewell gift to your guardian?"
"I think, sir, you do not doubt that I will."
"It is a trivial thing, and will cost you nothing. The night on which
you sang those songs to Llora is associated with something which I
treasure as peculiarly precious; and I merely wish to request that
you will never sing them again for any one unless I give you
permission."
Swiftly she recalled the fact that on that particular evening he had
escorted Mrs. Carew to a "German" at Mrs. Quimbey's, and she
explained his request by the supposition that her songs to Mrs.
Carew's child commemorated the date of his betrothal to the grey-eyed
mother. Could she bear even to think of them in coming years?
She hastily pushed back the ivory stops, and shaking off his
detaining palms, rose:
"I am sorry that I cannot do something of more importance to oblige
my kind guardian; for this trifle involves not the slightest
sacrifice of feeling, and I would gladly improve a better opportunity
of attesting my gratitude. You may rest assured I shall never sing
those words again under any circumstances. Do not buy the music; I
will leave my copies for Llora, and you and her mother can easily
teach her the words."
"Thanks! You will please place the music on the organ, and when I
come back from Cincinnati it will remind me. I hope your mother will
be pleased with you progress in French German, and music. Your
teachers furnish very flattering reports, and I have enclosed them
with some receipts, bills, and other valuable papers in this large
sealed envelope, which you must give to your mother as soon as you
see her."
He went to his desk, took out the package, and handed it to her.
Seating himself at the table where she generally wrote and studied,
he pointed to a chair on the opposite side, and mechanically she sat
down.
"Perhaps you may recollect that some months ago, Mrs. Orme wrote me
she was particularly desirous you should be trained to read well. It
is a graceful accomplishment, especially for a lady, and I ordered a
professor of elocution to give you instruction twice a week. I hope
you have derived benefit from his tuition, as he has fitted one or
two professional readers for the stage, and I should dislike to have
your mother feel disappointed in any of your attainments. Now that I
am called upon to render an account of my stewardship, I trust you
will pardon me, if I examine you a little. Here is Jean Ingelow,
close at hand, and I must trouble you to allow me an opportunity of
testing your proficiency."
The book which she had been reading that day lay on the table, and
taking it up he leisurely turned over the leaves. A premonitory dread
seized her, and she wrung her hands, which were lying cold in her
lap.
"Ah!--here is your mark; three purple pansies, crushed in the middle
of 'Divided,'--staining the delicate cream-tinted paper with their
dark blood. Probably you are familiar with this poem, consequently
can interpret it for me without any great effort. Commence at the
first, and let me see what value Professor Chrysostom's training
possesses. Not too fast; recollect Pegasus belongs to poets,--never
to readers."
He leaned across the marble table, and placed the open book before
her.
Did he intentionally torture her? With those bright eyes reading her
unwomanly and foolish heart, was he amusing himself, as an
entomologist impales a feeble worm, and from its writhing deduces the
exact character of its nervous and muscular anatomy?
The thought struck her more severely than the stroke of a lash would
have done, and turning the page to the light, she said quickly:
"'Divided' is not at all dramatic, and as an exercise is not
comparable to 'High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire,' or 'Songs of
Seven,' or even that most exquisite of all, 'Afternoon at a
Parsonage.'"
"Try 'Divided.'"
She dared not refuse lest he should despise her utterly, interpreting
correctly her reluctance. For an instant the print danced before her,
but the spirit of defiance was fast mastering her trepidation, and
she sat erect, and obeyed him.
Thrusting one hand inside his vest, where it rested tightly clenched
over his heart, Mr. Palma sat intently watching her, glad of the
privilege afforded him to study the delicate features. Her excessive
paleness reminded him of the words:
"That white, white face, set in a night of hair,"
and though the chastening touch of sorrow and continued
heart-ache--that most nimble of all chisellers--had strangely matured
the countenance which when it entered that house was as free from
lines and shadows as an infant's, it still preserved its almost
child-like purity and repose.
The proud fair face, with its firm yet dainty scarlet lips, baffled
him; and when he reflected that a hundred contingencies might arise
to shut it from his view in future years he suddenly compressed his
mouth to suppress a groan. His vanity demanded an assurance that her
heart was as entirely his as he hoped, yet he knew that he loved her
all the more tenderly, and reverently, because of the true womanly
delicacy that prompted her to shroud her real feelings, with such
desperate tenacity.
She read the poem with skill and pathos, but no undue tremor of the
smooth, deliciously sweet voice betrayed aught save the natural
timidity of a tyro, essaying her first critical trial. Tonight she
wore a white shawl draped in statuesque folds over her shoulders and
bust, and the snowy flowers in her raven hair were scarcely purer
than her full forehead, borne up by the airy arched black bows that
had always attracted the admiration of her fastidious guardian; and
as the soft radiance of the clustered lamps fell upon her, she looked
as sweet and lovely a woman as ever man placed upon the sacred hearth
of his home, a holy priestess to keep it bright, serene, and warm.
On that same day, but a few hours earlier, she had perused these
pages, wondering how the unknown gifted poetess beyond the sea had so
accurately etched the suffering in her own young heart, the
loneliness and misery that seemed coiled in the future like serpents
in a lair. Now, holding that bruised palpitating heart under the
steel-clad heel of pride, she was calmly declaiming that portraiture
of her own wretchedness, as any elocutionist might a grand passage
from the "_Antigone_," or "_Prometheus_." Not a throb of pain was
permitted to ripple the rich voice that uttered:
"But two are walking apart for ever,
And wave their hands in a mute farewell."
Farther on, nearing the close, Mr. Palma observed a change in the
countenance, a quick gleam in the eyes, a triumphant ring in the deep
and almost passionate tone that cried exultingly:
"Only my heart to my heart will show it
As I walk desolate day by day."
He leaned forward and touched the volume:
"Thank you. Give me the book. I should render the concluding verses
very much as I heard them recently from my fair client, Mrs.
Carew--so."
In his remarkably clear, full, musical and carefully modulated voice
he read the two remaining verses, then closed the volume and looked
coolly across the table at the girl.
With what a flash her splendid eyes challenged his, and how proudly
her tender lips curled, as with pitiless scorn she answered:
"Not so--oh, not so. Jean Ingelow would never recognize her own
jewelled handiwork. She meant this, and any earnest woman who prized
a faithful lover could not fail to read it aright."
Her eyes sank till they rested on her ring, and slipping it to and
fro upon her slender finger till the diamonds sparkled, she repeated
with indescribable power and pathos:
derness, a yearning to possess her entirely, but
he checked himself, and, taking one of the hands, led her to the
door. Upon the threshold she rallied, and looked up:
"Good-bye, Mr. Palma."
He drew her close to his side, unconscious that he pressed her
fingers so tight that the small points of the diamonds cut into the
flesh.
"God bless you, Lily. Think of me sometimes."
They looked in each other's eyes an instant, and she walked away. He
turned and closed the door, and she heard the click of the lock
inside. Blind and tearless, like one staggering from a severe blow,
she reached her own room, and fell heavily across the foot of her
bed.
Through the long hours of that night she lay motionless, striving to
hush the moans of her crushed heart, and wondering why such anguish
as hers was not fatal. Staring at the wall, she could not close her
eyes, and the only staff that supported her in the ordeal was the
consciousness that she had fought bravely, had not betrayed her
humiliating secret.
Toward dawn she rose, and opened her window. The sleet had ceased,
and the carriage was standing before the door. An impulse she could
not resist drove her out into the hall, to catch one more glimpse of
the form so precious to her. She heard a door open on the hall
beneath, and recognized her guardian's step. He paused, and she heard
him talking to his stepmother, bidding her adieu. His last words were
deep and gentle in their utterance.
"Be very tender and patient with Olga. Wounds like hers heal slowly.
Take good care of my ward. God bless you all."
Descending the steps she saw him distinctly, enveloped in an overcoat
buttoned so close that it showed the fine proportions of his tall
figure; and as he stopped to light his cigar at a gas globe which a
bronze Atalanta held in a niche half way up the stairs, his nobly
formed head and gleaming forehead impressed itself for ever on her
memory.
Slowly he went down, and leaning over the balustrade to watch the
vanishing figure, the withered azaleas slipped from her hair, and
floated like a snowflake down, down to the lower hall.
Fearful of discovery she shrank back, but not before he had seen the
drifting flowers, and one swift upward glance showed him the blanched
suffering face pale as a summer cloud, retreating from observation.
Stooping, he snatched the bruised wilted petals that seemed a fit
symbol of the drooping flower he was leaving behind him, kissed them
tenderly, and thrust them into his bosom.
The blessed assurance so long desired seemed nestling in their
perfumed corollas making all his future fragrant; and how little she
dreamed of the precious message they breathed from her heart to his!
"What could he do indeed? A weak white girl
Held all his heartstrings in her small white hand;
His hopes, and power, and majesty were hers,
And not his own."
CHAPTER XXXI.
"No, mother; no. Not less, but more beautiful; not so pale as when
you hang over me at the convent, baptizing me with hot, fast dripping
tears. Now a delicate flush like the pink of an apple bloom
overspreads your cheeks; and your eyes, once so sad, eyes which I
remember as shimmering stars, burning always on the brink of clouds,
and magnified and misty through a soft veil of April rain, are
brighter, happier eyes than those I have so fondly dreamed of. Oh,
mother! mother! Draw me close, hold me tight. Earth has no peace so
holy as the blessed rest in a mother's clasping arms. After the long
winter of separation, it is so sweet to bask in your presence,
thawing like a numb dormouse in the sunshine of May. I knew I should
find joy in the reunion, but how deep, how full, anticipation failed
to paint; and only the blessed reality has taught me."
On the carpet at her mother's feet, with her head in her mother's lap
and her arms folded around her waist, Regina had thrown herself,
feasting her eyes with the beauty of the face smiling down upon her.
It was the second day after her arrival in Paris, and hour after hour
she had poured into eagerly listening ears the recital of her life at
the quiet parsonage, at the stately mansion on Fifth Avenue; and yet
the endless stream of talk flowed on, and neither mother nor child
took cognizance of the flight of time.
Of her past the girl withheld only the acknowledgment of her profound
interest in Mr. Palma, and when questioned concerning his opposition
to her engagement with Mr. Lindsay she had briefly announced her
belief that he was hastening the preparations for his marriage with
Mrs. Carew. Of him she spoke only in quiet terms of respect and
gratitude, and her mother never suspected the spasm of pain that the
bare mention of his name aroused.
Thus far no allusion had been hazarded to the long-veiled mystery of
her parentage, and Mrs. Orme wondered at the exceeding delicacy with
which her daughter avoided every reference that might have been
construed into an inquiry. As the soft motherly hand passed
caressingly over the forehead resting so contentedly on her knee,
Regina continued:
"In all the splendid imagery that makes 'Aurora Leigh' deathless,
nothing affected me half so deeply as the portrait of the motherless
child; and often when I could not sleep, I have whispered in the wee
sma' hours:
"I felt a mother want about the world,
And still went seeking, like a bleating lamb
Left out at night, in shutting up the fold,
As restless as a nest-deserted bird,
Grown chill through something being away, though what--
It knows not. So mothers have God's license to be missed."
"My guardians were noble, kind, high-toned, honourable gentlemen, and
I owe them thanks, but ah! a girl should be ward only to those who
gave her being; and, mother, brown-eyed mother, sweet and holy, it
would have been better for your child had she shared her past with
none but you. Do I weary you with my babble? If so, lay your hand
upon my mouth, and I will watch your dear face, and be silent."
In answer, the mother stooped and kissed many times the perfect lips
that smiled at the pressure; but the likeness to a mouth dangerously
sweet, treacherously beautiful, mocked her, and Regina saw her turn
away her eyes, and felt rather than heard the strangled moan.
"Mother-kisses, the sweetest relic of Eden that followed Eve into a
world of pain. All these dreary years I have kept your memory like a
white angel-image, set it up for worship, offered it the best part of
myself; and I know I have grown jealously exacting, where you are
concerned. I studied because I wished you to be proud of me; I
practised simply that my music might be acceptable and pleasant to
you; and when people praised me, said I was pretty, I rejoiced that
one day I might be considered worthy of you. Something wounded me
when at last we met. Let me tell you, my dearest, that you may take
out the thorn, and heal the grieved spot. The day I came,--how long
ago? for I am in a delicious dream, have been eating the luscious
lotos of realized hope,--the day I came, and saw a new, glorious sun
shining from my mother's eyes, you ran to meet me. I hear you again,
'My baby! my baby!' as you rushed across the floor. You opened your
arms, and when you clasped me to your bosom you bent my head back,
and gazed at me--oh! how eagerly, hungrily; and I saw your face turn
ghastly white, and a great agony sweep across it, and the lips that
kissed me were cold and quivering. To me it was all sweet as heaven;
but the cup of delight I drained, had bitter drops for you. Mother,
tell me, were you disappointed in your daughter?"
"No, darling; no. The little blue-eyed child has grown into a woman,
of whom the haughtiest mother in the land might be proud. My darling
is all I wish her."
"Ah, mother! the flattery is inexpressibly sweet, falling like dew on
parched leaves; but the eyes of your idolatrous baby have grown very
keen, and I know that the sight of me brings you a terrible pain you
cannot hide. Last night, when Mrs. Waul maem as curses, learning later that they garner all our earthly
hopes, sometimes our heavenly; and when I look at you now, my soul
yearns over you with a love too deep for utterance. I know that you
were born to avenge your wrongs and mine, to aid by your baby fingers
in lifting the load of injustice and libel that has so long borne me
down. You are the one solitary comfort in all the wide earth, and but
for you I should have given up the struggle long ago."
Softly she stroked the silky hair and tearful cheek, and leaning back
continued:
"While I was still an inmate of the hospital, where I was known as
Minnie Merle, Peleg Peterson found me, and proclaimed himself your
father. He was partly intoxicated at the time, and was forcibly
ejected; but the excitement of that dastardly horrible charge threw
me into a relapse, and I was dangerously ill. Lying beside me on my
cot, I watched your little face, through the slow hours of
convalescence, and your tiny hands seemed to strengthen me for the
labour that beckoned me back to life. For your dear sake I must brave
the future. To one of the noble-hearted gentle Sisters of Charity who
visited the hospital and ministered like an angel of mercy to you and
me, I told enough of my history to explain my presence there, and
through her influence when I was strong enough to work, I was placed
in a position where I was permitted to keep you with me for a year. I
knew that my only safety lay in hiding for a time from my enemy, and
destroying all trace of my departure from the hospital, I assumed the
name of Odille Orphia Orme, which had belonged to a sister of my
grandmother.
"I was not sixteen when you were born, and, having had my head shaved
during my illness, my hair grew out the bright gold you see it now,
instead of the dark brown it had hitherto been. A strange freak of
nature, but a providential aid to the disguise I wished to maintain.
I wrote to Cuthbert, informing him of your birth, praying his speedy
return, but no reply came; and again and again I repeated the
petition. At length I was answered by the return of all my letters,
without a line of comment. Then I began to suspect what was in store
for me, but it threatened to drive me wild; and I shut my eyes and
refused to think, set my teeth, and hoped, hoped still. The two years
had almost expired, and when Cuthbert was of age he would fly to his
wife and child, solacing them for all they had endured. I could not
afford to doubt; that way lay madness!
"When you were fourteen months old, I put you in an Orphan Asylum,
where I could see you often, and took a situation as upper maid and
seamstress in a fashionable family on Fifth Avenue. My duties were
light, my employers were considerate and kind, and the young ladies,
observing my desire to improve myself, gave me the privileges of the
library, which was well selected and extensive. They were very
cultivated, elegant people, and I listened to their conversation,
observed their deportment, and modelled my manners after the example
they furnished. I was so anxious to astonish Cuthbert by my grace and
intelligence, when he presented me to his father, and I exulted in
the thought that even he might one day be proud of his son's wife.
"How I struggled and toiled, sowing by day, reading, studying by
night. Finding Racine, Euripides, and Shakespeare in the library, I
perused them carefully, and accidentally I discovered my talent. The
ladies of the house on one occasion had private theatricals, and the
play was one with which I chanced to be familiar. At the last
rehearsal, on the night of the play, one of the young ladies was
suddenly seized with such violent giddiness, that she was unable to
appear in the character she personated, and in the dilemma I was
summoned. So successful was my performance that I saw the new path
opening before me, and began to fit myself for it. I gave every spare
moment to dramatic studies, and was progressing rapidly when all hope
was crushed.
"Cuthbert's birthday came; days, weeks, months rolled by, and I wrote
one more passionate prayer for recognition; pleading that at least
he would allow me to see him once again, that he would just once look
at the lovely face of his child; then if he disowned both wife and
child we would ask him no more. How I counted the weeks that crawled
away! how fondly I still hoped that now, being of age and free, he
would fulfil his promise!
"You were two years and a half old, and I went one Sunday to visit
you.
"How well I recollect your appearance on that fatal day! Your bare
pearly feet gleaming on the floor over which I guided your uncertain
steps, as you tottered along clinging to my finger, your dimpled neck
and arms displayed by the white muslin slip my hands had fashioned,
your jetty hair curling thick and close over your round head, your
small milk-white teeth sparkling through your open lips, as your
large soft violet eyes laughed up in my face!--so glad you were to
see me! You had never seemed so lovely before, and I knelt down and
hugged you, my darling. I kissed your dainty feet and hands, your
lips and eyes so like Cuthbert's, and I know as I caressed you my
heart swelled with the fond pride that only mothers can understand
and feel, and I whispered, 'Papa's baby! Papa's own darling!
Cuthbert's baby!'
"It was harder than usual to quit you that day; you clung to me,
nestled close to me, stole your little hand into my bosom, and
finally fell asleep. When I laid you softly down in your low
truckle-bed, the tears would come and hang on my lashes, and while
I lingered, passing my hand over your dear pretty feet, I determined
that if Cuthbert did not come, or write very soon, I would take you
and go in search of him. What man could shut his arms and heart
against such a lovely babe who owed him her being?
"It was late when I got home, and the lady with whom I lived sent for
me in great haste. Guests had unexpectedly come from a distance,
dinner must be served, and the butler had been called away
inopportunely to one of his children, who had been terribly scalded.
Could I oblige her by consenting to serve the visitors at table? She
was a good mistress to me, and of course I did not hesitate. One of
the guests was a nephew of the host, and recently returned from
Europe, as I learned from the conversation. When the desert was being
set upon the table, he said: 'No, I rather liked him; none are
perfect, and he has sowed his wild oats, and settled down. Marriage
is a strong social anchor, and his bride is a very heavy-looking
woman, though enormously rich, I hear. It is said that his father
manoeuvred the match, for Cuthbert liked being fancy free.'
"The name startled me, and the master of the house asked, 'Of whom
are you speaking?' 'Cuthbert Laurance and his recent marriage with
Abbie Ames the banker's daughter. My mistress pulled my dress and
directed me to bring a bottle of champagne from the side table. I
stood like a stone, and she repeated the command. As I lifted the
wine and started back, the stranger added: 'Here is an account of the
wedding; quite a brilliant affair, and as I witnessed the nuptials I
can testify the description is not exaggerated. They were married in
Paris, and General Laurance presented the bride with a beautiful set
of diamonds.' The bottle fell with a crash, and in the confusion I
tottered toward the butler's pantry and sank down insensible.
"Oh, the awful, intolerable agony that has been my portion ever
since! Do you wonder that Laurance is a synonym for all that is
cruel, wicked? Is it strange that at times I loath the sight of your
face, which mocks me with the assurance that you are his as well as
mine? Oh, most unfortunate child! cursed with the fatal beauty of him
who wrecked your mother's life, and denies you even his infamous
name!"
She sprang up, broke away from her daughter's arms, and resumed her
walk.
"After that day I was a different woman, hard, bitter, relentless,
desperate. In the room of hope reigned hate, and I dedicated the
future to revris, and when I have talked with Uncle Orme,
whose step I hear, I shall be able to tell you definitely of the hour
when the thunderbolt will be hurled into the camp of our enemies.
Kiss me good-night. God bless my child."
CHAPTER XXXII.
After a sleepless night, Cuthbert Laurance sat in dressing gown and
slippers before the table, on which was arranged his breakfast. In
his right hand he held, partly lifted, the cup of coffee; upon the
left he rested his head, seeming abstracted, oblivious of the dainty
dishes that invited his attention.
The graceful _insouciance_ of the Sybarite had vanished, and though
the thirty-seven years of his life had dealt very gently with his
manly beauty, leaving few lines about his womanishly fair brow, he
seemed to-day gravely preoccupied, anxious, and depressed. Pushing
back his chair, he sat for some time in a profound and evidently
painful reverie, and when his father came in, and closed the door
behind him, the cloud of apprehension deepened.
"Good-morning, Cuthbert, I must compliment you on your early hours.
How is Maud?"
"I have not seen her this morning. Victorine usually takes her out at
this time of the day. I hope after a night's reflection and rest, you
feel disposed to afford me more comfort than you extended last
evening. The fact is, unless you come forward and help me, I shall be
utterly ruined."
General Laurance lighted his cigar, and, standing before his son,
answered coldly:
"I beg you to recollect that my resources are not quite
inexhaustible, and last year when I gave that Chicago property to
you, I explained the necessity of curbing your reckless extravagance.
Were I possessed of Rothschild's income, it would not suffice to keep
upon his feet a man who sells himself to the Devil of the gaming
table, and entertains with the prodigality of a crown prince. I never
dreamed until last night that the real estate at home is encumbered
by mortgages, and it will be an everlasting shame if the homestead
should be sacrificed; but I can do no more for you. This failure of
Ames is a disgraceful affair, and I understand soils his
reputation--past all hope of purification. How long does Abbie expect
to remain in Nice? It does not look well, I can tell you, that she
should go off and leave Maud with her _bonne_."
"Oh! for that matter, Maud is better off here, where she can be seen
regularly by the physician, and Victorine knows much better what to
do for her than her mother. Abbie is perfectly acquainted with the
change in her father's and in my own affairs, and I should suppose
she would have returned immediately after the receipt of the
intelligence, especially as I informed her that we should be
compelled to return to America."
"I shall telegraph her to come back at once, for I hear that she is
leading a very gay life at Nice, and that her conduct is not wholly
compatible with her duties as a wife and mother."
An expression of subdued scorn passed over Cuthbert's face, as he
answered sarcastically:
"Probably your influence may avail to hasten her return. As for her
peculiar views, and way of conducting herself, I imagine it is rather
too late for you to indulge in fastidious carpings, as you selected
and presented her to me as a suitable bride, particularly acceptable
to you for a daughter-in-law.
"When men live as you have done since your marriage, it is scarcely
surprising that wives should emulate their lax example. You have
never disguised your indifference as a husband."
"No, sir. When I made merchandise of my hand, I deemed that sacrifice
sufficient, and have never pretended to include my heart in the
bargain. But why deal in recrimination? Past mistakes are
irremediable, and it behooves me to consider only the future. Were it
not for poor Maud, I really should care very little, but her
helplessness appeals to me now more forcibly than all other
considerations. You say, sir, that you cannot help me--why not? At
this crisis a few shares of stock, and some of those sterling bonds
would enable me to pay off my pressing personal debts; and I could
get away from Paris with less annoying notoriety and scandal, which
above all things I abhor. I only ask the means of retiring from my
associations here without disgrace, and once safely out of France I
shall care little for the future. You certainly cannot consent to see
me stranded here, where my position and _menage_ have been so proud?"
General Laurance puffed vigorously at his cigar for some seconds,
then tossed it down, put his hands in his pockets, and said abruptly:
"When I told you last night that I could not help you, I meant it.
The stocks and bonds you require have already been otherwise
appropriated. I daresay, Cuthbert, you will be astonished at what I
am about to communicate, but whatever your opinion of the step I have
determined to take, I request in advance, that you will refrain from
any disagreeable comments. For thirty-seven years I have devoted
myself to the promotion of your interest and happiness, and you must
admit you have often sorely tried my patience. If you have at last
made shipwreck of your favourable financial prospects, it is no
longer in my power to set you afloat again. Cuthbert, I am on the eve
of assuming new responsibilities that require all the means your
luxurious mode of living has left me. I am going to marry again."
"To marry again! Are you approaching your dotage?"
The son had risen, and his handsome face was full of undisguised
scorn, as his eyes rested on his father's haughty and offended
countenance.
"Whatever your dissatisfaction, you will be wise in repressing it at
least in your remarks to me. I am no longer young, but am very far
from senility; and finding no harmony in your household, no peaceful
fireside where I can spend the residue of my days in quiet, I have
finally consulted the dictates of my own heart, and am prompted by
the hope of great happiness with the woman whom I sincerely love--to
marry her. Under these circumstances you can readily appreciate my
inability to transfer the stocks, which it appears you have relied
upon to float you out of this financial storm."
Cuthbert bowed profoundly, and answered contemptuously:
"They have, I presume, already been transferred in the form of a
marriage contract? Pardon me, sir; but may I inquire whom you design
to fill my mother's place?"
"I expect within a few days to present to you as my wife the
loveliest woman in all Europe, one as noble, refined, modest, and
delicate as she is everywhere conceded to be beautiful,--the
celebrated Madame Odille Orme."
An unconquerable embarrassment caused his eyes to wander from his
son's face as he pronounced the name, else he would have discovered
the start, the pallor with which the intelligence was received.
Cuthbert turned and stood at the window, with his back to his father,
and the convulsive movement of his features attested the profound
pain which the announcement caused.
"Madame Orme is not an ordinary actress, and has always maintained a
reputation quite rare among those of her profession. I have carefully
studied her character, think I have seen it sufficiently tested to
satisfy even my fastidious standard of female propriety and decorum;
and knowing how proudly and jealously I guard my honour and my name,
you may rest assured I have not risked anything in committing both to
the keeping of this woman, to whom I am very deeply and tenderly
attached. She told me she had met you once. How did she impress you?"
It cost him a strong effort to answer composedly.
"She certainly is the most beautiful woman I have seen in Europe."
"Ah! and sweet as she is lovely! My son, do not diminish my happiness
by unkind thoughts and expressions, which would result in our
estrangement. No father could have devoted himself more assiduously
to a child than I have done to you, and in my old age, if this
marriage brings me so much delight and comfort, have I not earned the
right to consider my own happiness? It is quite natural that you
should er half-sister, Regina lightly kissed the
hollow cheek of the invalid.
"Good-bye. I shall ask papa where you got his eyes; for they are my
papa's lovely eyes."
"Has mademoiselle left her card with Jean?" asked Victorine, whose
curiosity was thoroughly aroused.
"I have not one with me."
"Then be pleased to give me your name."
"No matter now. I will come again, and then you and Maud shall learn
my name."
She hastened out of the room, and when she reached her mother's
lodgings, met her uncle pacing the floor of the reception-room.
"Regina, where have you been? You are top total a stranger here to
venture out alone, and I beg that you will not repeat the imprudence.
I have been really uneasy about your mysterious absence."
"Uncle Orme, I wanted to see my father, and I went to his home."
She threw her hat upon the sofa, and sighed heavily.
"My dear child, Minnie will never forgive your premature disclosure!"
"I made none, because he was not at home. Oh, uncle, I saw something
that made my heart turn sick with pity. I saw that poor little
deformed girl, Maud Laurance, and it seems to me her haggard face,
her utter wretchedness and helplessness would melt a heart of steel!
I longed to take the poor forlorn creature in my arms, and cry over
her; and I tell you, Uncle Orme, I will not be a party to her ruin
and disgrace! I will not, I will not! I am strong and healthy, and
God has given me many talents, and raised up dear friends, you uncle,
the dearest of all, after mother; but what has that unfortunate
cripple? Nothing but her father (for she has been deserted by her
mother), and only her father's name. Do you think I could see her
beggared, reduced to poverty that really pinched, in order that I
might usurp her place as the Laurance heiress? Never."
"My dear girl, the usurpation is on their part, not yours. The name
and inheritance is lawfully yours, and the attainment of these rights
for you has sustained poor Minnie through her sad, arduous career."
"Abstract right is not the only thing to be considered at such a
juncture as this. Suppose I could change places with that poor little
deformed creature, would you not think it cruel, nay wicked, to turn
me all helpless and forlorn out of a comfortable home, into the cold
world of want, a nameless waif. Uncle, I know what it is to be
fatherless and nameless! All of that bitterness and humiliation has
been mine for years, but now that my heart is at rest concerning my
parentage, now that _I_ know there is no blemish on mother's past
record, I care little for what the world may think, and much, much
more, what that poor girl would suffer. To-day, when I looked at her
useless feet and shrunken hands and deep hollow eyes, I seemed to
hear a voice from far Judean hills: '_Bear ye one another's
burdens_;' and, Uncle Orme, I am willing to bear Maud's burden to the
end of my life. My shoulders have become accustomed to the load they
have carried for over seventeen years, and I will not shift it to
poor Maud's. I am strong, she is pitiably feeble. I have never known
the blessing of a father's love, have learned to do without it; she
has no other comfort, no other balm, and I will not rob her of the
little God has left her. I understand how mother feels, I cannot
blame her; and while I know that her care and anxiety in this matter
are chiefly on my account, I could never respect, never forgive
myself, if to promote my own importance or interest I selfishly
consented to beggar poor Maud. She cannot live long; death has set a
shadowy mark already upon her weird eyes, and until they close in the
peace of the grave let us leave her the name she seems so proud of.
She pronounced it Maud Ames Laurance, as though it were a royal
title. Let her bear it. I can wait."
As Mr. Chesley watched the pale gem-like face, with its soft holy
eyes full of a resolution which he knew all the world could not
shake, a sudden mist blurred her image, and taking her hand, he
kissed her forehead.
"My noble child, if the golden rule you seek to practise were in
universal acceptation and actualization, injustice, fraud, and crime
would overturn the bulwarks of morality and decency. When men violate
the laws of God and man as Cuthbert Laurance certainly has done, even
religion as well as justice requires that his crime should be
punished; although in nearly all such instances the innocent suffer
for the sins of the guilty. Your mother owes it to you, to me, to
herself, to society, to demand recognition of her legal rights; and
though I do not approve all that she proposes (at least, the manner
of its accomplishment), I cannot censure her; and you, dear child,
for whose sake she has borne so much, should pause before you judge
her harshly."
"God forbid that I should! But oh, uncle! it seems to me something
dreadful, sacrilegious, to act over before a multitude of strangers
those mournful miserable events that ought to be kept sacred. The
thought of being present is very painful to me."
"None but General Laurance and his son will dream that it is more
than a mere romance. None but they can possibly recognize the scenes,
and the audience cannot suspect that Minnie is acting her own
history. When a suit is instituted, it will probably result in a
recognition of the marriage, and thereupon a large alimony will be
granted to your mother, who will at once apply for a divorce. In the
present condition of their financial affairs this cannot fail to
beggar the Laurances, for I had a cable despatch this morning from
Mr. Palma, intimating that the stock panic had grievously crippled
several of General Laurance's best investments. This news will be
delightful to Minnie, but I see it distresses you. Now, Regina,
regnant, listen to me. Have no controversy with your mother; she is
just now in no mood to bear it, and I want no distrust to grow up
between you. Whether you wish it or not, she will establish her
claim, and she is right in doing so. Now I wish to make a contract
with you. Keep quiet, and if we find that the Laurances will really
be reduced to want, I will supply you with the funds necessary to
provide a comfortable home for them, and you shall give it to your
father and little Maud. Minnie must not know of the matter, she would
never forgive us, and neither can I consent that your father should
consider me as his friend. But all that I have, my sweet girl, is
yours, and Laurance may feel indebted to his own repudiated child for
the gift. It is a bargain?"
"Oh, Uncle Orme! how good and generous you are! No wonder my heart
warmed to you the first time I ever saw you! How I love and thank
you, my own noble uncle! You have no idea how earnestly I long for
the time when you and mother and I can settle down together in a
quiet home somewhere, shut out from the world that has used us all so
hardly, and safe in our love, and confidence for and in each other."
She had thrown her arms around his neck, and pressing her head
against his shoulder, looked at him with eyes full of hope and
happiness.
"I am afraid, my dear girl, that as soon as our imaginary Eden is
arranged satisfactorily, the dove that gives it peace and purity will
be enticed away, caged in a more brilliant mansion. You will love
Minnie and me very much I daresay until some lover steals between us
and lures you away."
She hid her countenance against his shoulder, and her words impressed
him as singularly solemn and mournful.
"I shall have no lover. I shall make it the aim and study of all my
future life to love only God, mother, and you. My hope of happiness
centres in the one word Home! We all three have felt the bitter want
of one, and I desire to make ours that serene, holy ideal Home of
which I have so long dreamed: 'We will bear our Penates with us;
their atrium, the heart. Our household gods are the memories of our
childhood, the recollections of the hearth round which we gathered;
of the fostering hands which caressed us, of the scene of all the
joys, anxieties, and hopes, the ineffable yearnings of love, whichness. I shall attempt no defence, beyond requiring my counsel to
state that no communication ever reached me from you; that I believed
you the wife of another; and I shall also insist upon the reading of
the two letters in answer to those I wrote, requesting the President
and Professor to ascertain where you were. I was assured that a
marriage contracted during my minority was invalid, and without due
investigation of the statutes of the State in which it was performed
and which had unfortunately undergone a change, I believed it. Your
right as a wife is clear, indisputable, inalienable, and cannot be
withheld; and the divorce you desire will inevitably be granted. I
cannot censure your resolution, it is due to yourself, doubly due to
your child--our child! My child! Oh! that I had known the truth
seventeen years ago! How different your fate and mine!"
She leaned back, closing her eyes, against the eloquent pleading of
that mesmeric countenance which was slowly robbing her of her stern
purposes; renewing the spell she had never been able to fully resist.
He saw the spasm of pain that wrinkled her brow, blanched her lips;
and gazing into the lovely face so dear to him, he exclaimed:
"Minnie! Minnie! Oh, my wife! My own wife!"
He sank on his knees before her, and his handsome head fell upon the
arm of her chair. She covered her face with her hands, and a
smothered sob broke from her tortured heart.
"I have sinned, but not intentionally against you. God is my witness
had I known all twenty oceans could not have kept me from my wife and
my baby. When you lived it all over again that night, when I saw you
ill, deserted, in a charity hospital, with the child you say is mine
cradled in your arms, oh! then indeed I suffered what all the pangs
of perdition cannot surpass. When you and I married we were but
children, but I loved you; afterward when I was a man, I madly
renewed those vows to one, whom I was urged, persuaded, to wed. I am
not a villain, and I know my duties to the mother of my afflicted
Maud, to the child of my loveless union, and I intend rigidly to
discharge them. But, Minnie, God knows that you are my true, lawful
wife, and I want here upon my knees, before we part for ever, to tell
you that no other woman ever possessed my heart. I have tried to be a
patient, kind, indulgent husband to Abbie, but when I look at you,
and think of her, remembering that my own rash blindness shut me from
the Eden that now seems so deliciously alluring, when I realize what
might have been for you and me, my punishment indeed appears
unendurable. Ah, no language can describe my feelings, as I looked at
that noble, lovely girl. Oh the fond pride of knowing that she is
mine as well as yours! My wife! my wife, let the holy blue eyes and
pure lips of our baby, our daughter, plead her father's
forgiveness----"
His voice faltered. There was a deep silence. Although kneeling so
near, he made no attempt to touch her. For fifteen years she had
struggled against all tender memories, and every softening
recollection had been harshly banished. She had trained herself to
despise and hate the man who had so blackened her life at its dewy
threshold; but the mysterious workings of a woman's heart baffle
experience, analysis, and conjecture.
Listening to the low cadence of the beloved voice that first waked
her from the magic realm of childhood, and unsealed the fountain of
affection, the days of their courtship stole back; the blissful hours
of the brief honeymoon. He was her lover, her noble young husband;
above all, he was the father of her baby; and yielding to the old
irresistible infatuation she suddenly laid her hand upon his head. As
yet she had not uttered a syllable since his entrance, but the
floodgates were lifted, and he heard the despairing cry of her
famished heart:
"Oh, my husband! My husband, my own husband!"
He threw his arms around her as she leaned toward him, and drew the
head to his shoulder. So in silence they rested, and he felt that one
arm tightened around him, as he knelt holding her to his heart.
"Minnie, your true heart forgives your unworthy husband. Tell me so,
and it will enable me to bear all that the future may contain. Say,
Cuthbert, I forgive you."
She struggled up, gazed into his eyes, and exclaimed:
"No; I loved you too well, too insanely ever to forgive, had loved
you less, I might have forgiven more. There is no meekness in my
soul, but an intolerable bitterness that mocks and maddens me. I
ought to despise myself, and I certainly shall, for this unpardonable
weakness. But very precious memories unnerved me just then, and I
clung, not to you, not to Abbie Ames' husband, but to the phantom of
the Cuthbert whom long ago I loved so well, to the vision of the
young bridegroom I worshipped so blindly. Let me go. Our interview is
ended."
She withdrew from his arms, and rose.
"Before I go, let me see our child once more. Let me tell her that
her father is inexpressibly proud of the daughter who will honour his
unworthy name again."
"She declines meeting you again."
"Minnie, don't teach her to hate me."
"I gave her the opportunity, and she made her own choice, saying she
freely forgave the wrongs committed against her, but her mother's she
could never forget. If I had asked of Heaven the keenest punishment
within the range of vengeance, it seems to me none could exceed the
wretchedness of the man who, owning my darling for his child, is yet
debarred from her love, her reverence, her confidence, and the
precious charm of her continual presence. My sweet, tender, perfect
daughter! The one true heart in all the wide world that loves and
clings to me. You forsook and disowned me, repudiated your vows,
offered them elsewhere, making unto yourself strange new gods;
profaning the altar, where other images should have stood. The
banker's daughter, and the Laurance heiress she bore you, are
entitled to what remains of your fickle selfish heart, and I trust
that the two who supplanted my baby and me will suffice for your
happiness in the future as in the past. Into my own and my darling's
life you can enter no more. 'Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he
reap. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?' You deem
me relentless and vindictive? Think of all the grey, sunless, woeful
existence I showed you behind the footlights not many nights since,
and censure me if you can. There is no pious resignation in my proud
soul for indeed 'there are chastisements that do not chasten; there
are trials that do not purify, and sorrows that do not elevate; there
are pains and privations that harden the tender heart, without
softening the stubborn will.' Of such are the sombre wrap and woof of
my ill-starred life. When you reach New York Mr. Erle Palma, who is
my counsel, will acquaint you with the course he deems it best to
pursue."
She looked calm and stately as the Ludovisian Juno, and quite as
lovely, in her pale pride.
"Minnie, do not part from me in anger. Oh, my wife, let me fold you
in my arms once more! And once, just once, I pray you, let me kiss
you! Are you not my own?"
She recoiled a step, her brown eyes lightened, and her words fell
crisp as icicles:
"Since I was a bride, three weeks a wife, since you pressed them
last, no man's lips have touched mine. I hold them too sacred to that
dear buried past to be submitted to a pressure less holy--to be
profaned by those of another woman's husband. Only my daughter kisses
my lips. Yours are soiled with perjury, and belong to the wife and
child of your choice. Go, pay your vows, be true at last to
something. Good-bye."
He came closer, but her pitiless chill face repulsed him. Seizing her
beautiful hand, white and cold as marble, he lifted it, but the flash
of the diamonds smote his heart like a heavy flail.
"The death's head that you gave me as a bridal token! Is there not a
fatality even in symbols? Upon my wedding ring stands the cinerary
urn that soon sepulchred my peace, my hopes. A mockery so exquisite
could not have been accidental, and faithfully that grinning skeleton
has walked with me. The ghastly coat of arms of Laurance."
She had thrown off his clasp, raised her hand, and turned the ring
over, till the jewels glowed, then it fell back nerveless at her
side.
"Minnie."
His voice was broken, but her lustrous eyes betrayed no hint of pity.
"My wife has no pardon for her erring husband. I have merited none,
still I hoped for one kind farewell word from lips that are strangely
dear to me. So be it. Tell my daughter, if her unhappy father dared
to pray, he would invoke Heaven's choicest blessings on her young
innocent head. And, Minnie love, let our baby's eyes and lips
successfully plead pardon for her father's unintentional sins against
the wife he never ceased to love."
He caught the hand once more, kissed the ring he had placed there
eighteen years before, and, feeling his hot trembling lips upon her
icy fingers, she shut her eyes. When she opened them--she was alone.
"We twain have met like ships upon the sea,
Who hold an hour's converse, so short, so sweet;--
One little hour! and then, away they speed,
On lonely paths, through mist, and cloud and foam--
To meet no more!"
CHAPTER XXXV.
From the window of one of those beautiful villas that encrust the
shores of Como, nestling like white birds at the base of the laurel
and vine-clad hills that lave their verdant feet in the blue waters,
Regina watched the sunshine falling across the placid bosom of the
lake. Far away, on the sky-line opposite, and towering above the
intervening mountains, glittered the white fire of the snowy Alps, as
if they longed to quench their dazzling lustre in the peaceful blue
sleeping beneath.
Luxuriant vines clambered along the hillsides, and where the latter
had been cut in terraces, and seemed swinging like the gardens of
Semiramis, orange, lemon, myrtle, and olive trees showed all their
tender green and soft grey tints, and longhaired acacias waved in the
evening air, that was redolent of the faint delicious vesper incense
swung from the pink chalices of climbing roses.
"No tree cumbered with creepers let the sunshine through,
But it was caught in scarlet cups, and poured
From these on amber tufts of bloom, and dropped
Lower on azure stars."
Never weary of studying the wonderful beauty of the surrounding
scenery, Regina surrendered herself to an enjoyment that would have
been unalloyed had not a lurking shadow cast its unwelcome chill on
all. Mr. and Mrs. Waul had returned to America, and for a month Mrs.
Laurance, accompanied by Mr. Chesley and Regina, had been quietly
ensconced in this lovely villa, whose terraces and balconies
projected almost into the water, and commanded some of the finest
views of the lake.
But anxiety had followed, taking up its dreary watch in the midst of
that witchery which might have exorcised the haunting grey ghost of
care; and though shrouded by every imaginable veil and garland of
beauty, its grim presence was as fully felt as that of the
byssus-clad mummy that played its allotted part at ancient Coptic
feasts.
The steamer in which Mr. Laurance embarked with his family for
America had been lost in mid Atlantic; and only one boat filled with
a portion of the passengers and crew had been rescued by a West
Indian ship bound for Liverpool. Among the published names of the few
survivors that of Laurance did not appear.
Had old ocean mercifully opened its crystal bosom and gathered to
coral caves and shrouding purple algae the unfortunate man, who had
quaffed all the rosy foam beading the goblet of life, and for whom it
only remained to drain the bitter lees of public humiliation and
social disgrace?
When Mrs. Laurance received the first intimation that Cuthbert had
probably perished, with his wife and child, she vehemently and
stubbornly refused her credence. It seemed impossible that envious
death could have so utterly snatched from her grasp the triumph upon
which her eager fingers were already closing.
Causing advertisements to be inserted in various journals, and
offering therein a reward for information of the missing passengers,
she forbade the topic broached in her presence, and quitting Paris
retired for a season to Lake Como, vainly seeking that coveted
tranquillity which everywhere her own harrowing thoughts and
ceaseless forebodings effectually murdered.
As time wore on she grew gloomy, taciturn, almost morose, and a
restlessness beyond the remedy of medicine robbed her of the power of
sleep. To-day she clung convulsively to her daughter, unwilling that
she should leave her even for an instant; to-morrow she would lock
herself in, and for hours refuse admittance to any human being. The
rich bloom forsook her cheek, deep shadows underlined her large
melancholy eyes, and her dimpled hands became so diaphanous, so
thin, that the black agate ring with difficulty held its place upon
the wasted fingers.
With patient loving care, Regina anticipated her wishes, indulged
all her varying caprices, devoted herself assiduously to the task of
diverting her mind, and comforting her heart by the tender
ministrations of her own intense filial affection. By day she read,
talked, sang to her. When in the tormenting still hours of night her
mother refused the thorns of a sleepless pillow, the daughter drew
her out upon the terrace against which the wavelets broke in a
silvery monologue, and directed her thoughts to the glowing stars
that clustered in the blue dome above, and shimmered in the azure
beneath; or with an arm around the mother's waist, led her into the
flowery garden, and up the winding walks that climbed the eminence
behind the villa, where oleanders whitened the gloom, and passionate
jasmines broke their rich hearts upon the dewy air; so, pacing to and
fro, until the moon went down behind myrtle groves, and the bald brow
of distant Alps flushed under the first kiss of day.
For Mrs. Laurance, nepenthe was indeed a fable, and while she
abstained from even an indirect allusion to the subject that absorbed
her, the nameless anxiety that seemed consuming her, Regina and her
uncle watched her with increasing apprehension.
This afternoon she had complained of headache, and, throwing herself
on a couch in the recess of the window that overlooked the lake,
desired to be left alone, in the hope of falling asleep.
Stooping to kiss her, Regina said:
"Mother, let me sit by you, and while I fan you gently read the
'Lotos Eaters.' The drowsy rhythm will lull you into that realm of
rest,--
'In which it seemed always afternoon.'
May I?"
"No. To-day your blue eyes would stab my sleep. I will ring when I
want you."
Dropping the filmy lace curtains, in order to lessen the reflection
from the water, Regina softly stole away, and sat down at the window
of the salon, where satin-leaved arums and dainty pearly orchids
embellished the consoles, and fragrant heliotrope and geraniums were
blooming in pots clustered upon the stone balcony outside.
Each day the favourite view of the lake and bending shore line, upon
which she gazed from this spot, developed some new beauty, hidden
hitherto under leafy laurel shadows, or behind the snowy soil of some
fishing-boat, rocking idly upon the azure waves.
Now the burden of her reflections was:
"If we could only spend our lives in this marble haven, away from the
turmoil and feverish confusion of the outside world--forgetting the
past, contented with the society of each other--and shut in with God
and nature, how peaceful the future would be! nay, how happy all
might yet become!"
Sympathy with her mother had forced her to put temporarily aside the
contemplation of her own sorrow, but in secret it preyed upon her
heart; and whenever a letter arrived, she dreaded the announcement of
Mr. Palma's marriage.
His parting allusion to a brief European visit she had by the aid of
her fears interpreted to mean a bridal tour, curtailed by his
businessenger. He shouted the nearest to
take his child, only his child; but the violence of the gale rendered
it impossible to do more than keep the boat from swamping, and with
many others, he was left upon the doomed vessel. There was no
remaining boat; night came swiftly on, the storm increased, and next
day there was no vestige of boat or ship visible. Mrs. Laurance was
in the second boat, the largest and strongest, but it was overladen,
and about twilight it capsized in the fury of the gale, and _all went
down_. The surgeon who heard the wild screams of the women knows that
the wife perished, and says he cannot indulge the faintest hope that
the father and child escaped. Cuthbert was a remarkably skilful
swimmer; he had once contended for a wager off Brighton, with a party
of naval officers, and Laurance won it; but none could live in the
sea that boiled and bellowed around that sinking ship, and encumbered
as he was with the helpless child, it was impossible that he would
have survived. I would rather not tell Minnie now, but Mr. Palma
writes that the sister and nephew of General Laurance will force a
suit to secure the remnants of the property, and he wishes to
anticipate their action. Come with me, dear. Minnie is not asleep. As
I passed her door, I heard her walk across the floor."
"Uncle Orme, can't you wait till to-morrow? I do not know how this
news will affect her, and I dread it."
"My dear child, her suspense is destroying her. After all, delay will
do no good. Poor Minnie! There is her bell. She knows the hour our
mail is due, and she will ask for letters."
Opening the door, both paused at the threshold, and neither could
ever forget the picture she represented.
In a snowy _peignoir_, she sat on the side of the couch, with her
long waving hair falling in disorder to the marble floor, and seemed
indeed like Japhet's "Amarant":
"She in her locks is like the travelling sun,
Setting, all clad in coifing clouds of gold."
The wan Phidian face was turned toward them, and was breathless in
its anxious eagerly questioning expression. Her brown eyes widened,
searching theirs; and reading all, in her daughter's tearful pitying
gaze, what a wild look crossed her face!
Regina pushed her uncle back, closed the door and sprang to the
couch, holding out the letters.
Sitting as still as stone, Mrs. Laurance did not appear to notice
them.
"Darling mother, God knows what is best for us all."
Slowly the strained eyes turned to the appealing face of her
kneeling child, and something there broke up the frozen deeps of her
heart.
"Are you sure? Is there no hope?"
"No hope; except to meet him in heaven."
Throwing her hands above her head, the wretched woman wrung them
despairingly, and the pain of all the bitter past wailed in her
passionate cry:
"Lost for ever! And I would not forgive him! My husband! My own
husband! When he begged for pardon I spurned, and derided, and
taunted him! Oh! I meant sometime to forgive him; after I had
accomplished all I planned. After he was beggared, and humiliated in
the eyes of the world, and that woman occupied the position where
they all sought to keep me, a mother and yet no lawful wife, after I
had enjoyed my triumph a little while, I fully intended to listen to
my heart long enough to tell him that I forgave him because he was
your father! And now, where is my revenge? Where is my triumph? God
has turned His back upon me; has struck from my hands all that I have
toiled for fifteen years to accomplish. They all triumph over me now,
in their quiet graves, resting in peace; and I live, only to regret!
To regret!"
Her eyes were dry, and shone like jewels, and when her arms fell, her
clenched hands rested unintentionally on her daughter's head.
"Mother, he knows now that you forgive him. Remember that for him all
grief is ended; and try to be comforted."
"And for me? What remains for me?"
Her voice was so deep, so sepulchral, so despairing, that Regina
clung closer to her.
"Your child, who loves you so devotedly; and the hope of that blessed
rest in heaven, where marriages are unknown, where at last we shall
all dwell together in peace."
For some time Mrs. Laurance remained motionless; then her lips moved
inaudibly. At length she said:
"Yes, my child, our child is all that is left. When he asked to kiss
me once more, I denied him so harshly, so bitterly! When he tried to
draw me for the last time to his bosom, I hurled away his arms, would
not let him touch me. Now I shall never see him again. My husband!
The one only love of my miserable and accursed life! Oh, my beloved!
do you know at last, that the Minnie of your youth, the bride of your
boyhood has never, never ceased to love her faithless, erring
husband?"
Her voice grew tremulous, husky, and suddenly bending back her
daughter's head, she looked long at the grieved countenance.
"His last words were: 'Minnie love, let our baby's eyes and lips
plead pardon for her father's unintentional sins.' They do; they
always shall. Cuthbert's own wonderful eyes shining in his
daughter's. My husband's own proud beautiful lips that kiss me so
fondly every time I press his child's mouth! At last I can thank God
that our baby is indeed her father's image; and because in death
Cuthbert is my own again, I can cherish the memory, and pray for the
soul of my husband! Kiss me, kiss me--oh, my darling!"
She kissed the girl's eyes and lips, held her off, gazing into her
face through gathering mist, then drew her again to her bosom, and
the long hoarded bitterness and agony found vent in a storm of sobs
and tears.
"I must sit joyless in my place; bereft
As trees that suddenly have dropped their leaves,
And dark as nights that have no moon."
CHAPTER XXXVI.
"Uncle Orme, are you awake?"
"My dear girl, what is the matter? Is Minnie ill?"
"No, sir; but this is mother's birthday, and, if you please, I want
you. There are a few late peaches hanging too high for my arms, and
such grape-clusters! just beyond my finger tips. Will you be so kind
as to gather them for me? I intended to ask you yesterday afternoon,
but mother kept me on the terrace until it was too late. I have not
heard you moving about? Do get up; the morning air is so delicious,
and the lake lies like a huge rose with crimped petals."
"You are a tormentingly early lark, chanting your hymns to sunrise,
when you should be sound asleep. You waked me in the midst of a
lovelier rose-coloured dream than your tiresome, stupid lake, and I
shall not excuse you for disturbing me. Where is that worthless,
black-eyed chattering monkey Giulio? Am I a boy to climb peach trees
this time of the day, for your amusement? Oh, the irreverence of
American youth!"
"Giulio has gone on a different errand, and I never should insult
your venerable years by asking you to climb trees, even in honour of
mother's birthday breakfast. You can easily reach all I want, and
then you may come back and finish your dream, and I will keep
breakfast waiting until you declare yourself ready. Here is the
basket, I am going out to the garden."
Regina ran down into the flower-plot at the rear of the house, and
after a little while she saw her uncle unencumbered by his coat,
bearing the basket on his arm and ascending one of the winding walks
that terraced the hill.
To her lifelong custom of early rising she still adhered, and in the
dewy hours spent alone in watching the sun rise over Como she
indulged precious recollections that found audience and favour at no
other season.
It was her habit to place each morning a fresh bouquet upon her
mother's plate, and also to arrange the flower stand, that since
their residence at the villa had never failed to grace the centre of
the breakfast-table.
It was a parsonage custom, and had always been associated in her mind
with the pastor's solemn benediction at each meal.
To-day, while filling her basket with blossoms, some stray waft of
perfume, or perhaps the rich scarlet lips o the glory of the
sunlight streaming through the open door, she saw her guardian's tall
figure outlined.
Was it a mere blessed vision, born of her recent reverie on the
terrace; or had he died, and his spirit, reading the secret of her
soul, had mercifully flown to comfort her by one farewell appearance?
He opened his arms and his whole face was radiant with passionate and
tender love. She did not move, but her eyes gazed into his, like one
in a happy dream, who fears to awake.
He came swiftly forward, and holding out his arms, exclaimed in a
voice that trembled with the excess of his joy:
"My Lily! My darling!"
But she did not spring to meet him, as he hoped and expected, and
thrilled by the music of his tone she grew paler standing quite
still, with trembling lips and eyes that shone like stars when autumn
mists begin to gather.
"My Lily, come to me, of your own dear will."
"Mr. Palma, I am glad, very glad, to see my guardian once more."
She put out her hand, which shook, despite her efforts to keep it
steady, and her own voice sounded far, far off, like an echo lost
among strange hills.
He came a step nearer, but did not take her hand, and when he leaned
toward her, she suddenly clasped her hands and rested her chin upon
them, in the old childish fashion he remembered so well.
"Does my Lily know why I crossed the Atlantic?"
A spasm of pain quivered over her features, and though he saw how
white her lips turned at that instant, her answer was clear, cold,
and distinct.
"Yes, sir. You came on your bridal tour. Is not your wife at Como?"
"I hope so. I believe so; I certainly expected to see her here."
He was smiling very proudly just then, but beginning to suspect that
he had tortured her cruelly by the tacit imposture to which he had
assented, his eyes dimmed at the thought of her suffering.
She misinterpreted the smile, and quickly rallied.
"Mr. Palma, I hope you brought Llora also with you?"
"No. Why should I? She is much better off at home with her mother."
"But, sir, I thought--I understood----"
She caught her breath, and a perplexed expression came into her
wistful deep eyes, as she met those, fixed laughingly upon her.
"You thought, you understood what? That after living single all these
years, I am at last foolish enough to want a wife? One to kiss, to
hold in my arms, to love even better than I love myself? Well, what
then? I do not deny it."
"And I hope, Mr. Palma, that she will make you very happy."
She spoke with the startling energy of desperation.
"Thank you, so do I. I believe, I know she will; I swear she shall!
Can you tell me my darling's name?"
"Yes, sir, it is no secret. All the world knows it is Mrs. Carew."
She was leaning heavily upon her womanly pride; how long would it
sustain her? Would it snap presently, and let her down for ever into
the dust of humiliation?
Mr. Palma laughed, and putting his hand under her chin, lifted the
face.
"All the world is very wise, and my ward quite readily accepted its
teachings. None but Olga suspected the truth. I would not marry
Brunella Carew, if she were the last woman left living on the wide
earth. I do not want a fashion-moth. I would not have the residue of
what once belonged to another. I want a tender, pure, sweet, fresh
white flower that I know, and have long watched expanding from its
pretty bud. I want my darling, whom no other man has kissed, who
never loved any one but me; who will come like the lily she is, and
shelter herself in my strong arms, and bloom out all her fragrant
loveliness in my heart only. Will she come?"
Once more he opened his arms, and in his brilliant eyes she read his
meaning.
The revelation burst upon her like the unexpected blinding glow of
sunshine smiting one who approaches the mouth of a cavern, in whose
chill gloom, after weary groping, all hope had died. She felt giddy,
faint, and the world seemed dissolving in a rosy mist.
"My Lily, my proud little flower! You will not come? Then Erle Palma
must take his own, and hold it, and wear it for ever!"
He folded his arms around her, strained her to his bosom, and laid
his warm trembling lips on hers. What a long passionate kiss, as
though the hunger of a lifetime could never be satisfied.
After his stern self-control and patient waiting, the proud man who
had never loved any one but the fair young girl in his arms,
abandoned himself to the ecstasy of possession. He kissed the
eyebrows that were so lovely in his sight, the waving hair on her
white temples, and again and again the soft sweet trembling lips that
glowed under his pressure.
"My precious violet eyes, so tender and holy. My silver Lily, mine
for ever. Erle Palma's first and last and only love!"
When, with his cheek resting on hers, he told her why his sense of
honour had sealed his lips while she was a ward beneath his roof,
entrusted by her mother to his guardianship, and dwelt upon the
suffering it had cost him to know that others were suing for her
hand, trying to win away the love, which his regard for duty
prevented him from soliciting, she began to realize the strength
and fervour of the affection that was now shining so deliciously
upon her heart. She learned the fate of the glove he had found on
his desk and locked up; of the two faded white hyacinths he had
begged and worn in his breast pocket because they had rested on her
hair; of the songs he wanted simply for the reason that he had heard
them on the night when she fainted and he had first kissed her cold
unconscious lips.
Would the brilliant New York Bar have recognized their cool,
inflexible, haughty favourite in the man who was pouring such fervid
passionate declarations into the small pearly ear that felt his lips
more than once?
Erle Palma had much to tell to the woman of his love, much to explain
concerning the events of the day when Elliott Roscoe witnessed her
first interview with Peleg Peterson, and subsequently aided in his
arrest, but this morning long audience was denied him.
In the midst of his happy whispers a step which he did not hear came
down the stairs, a form for whom he had no eyes, stood awhile
perplexed, and amazed on the threshold. Then a very stately figure
swept across the marble tiles, and laid a firm hand on Regina's
shoulder.
"My daughter!"
The girl looked up, startled, confused; but the encircling arms would
not release her.
"My dear madam, do not take her away."
Mrs. Laurance did not heed him, her eyes were riveted on her child.
"My little girl, have you too deceived and forsaken your unfortunate
mother?"
She broke away from her lover's clasp, and threw her arms around her
mother's neck.
Pressing her tightly to her heart, Mrs. Laurance turned to Mr. Palma,
and said sternly:
"Is there indeed no such thing as honour left among men? You who knew
so well my loneliness and affliction--you, sir, to whom I trusted my
little lamb--have tried to rob me of the only treasure I thought I
possessed, the only comfort left to gladden my sunless life! You have
tried to steal my child's heart, to win her from me."
"No, mother, he never let me know, and I never dreamed that--that he
cared at all for me until this morning. He did not betray your trust,
even for----"
"Let Mr. Palma plead his own defence, if he can; look you to yours,"
answered her mother, coldly.
"It is much sweeter from her lips, and you, my dear madam, are very
cruel to deny me the pleasure of hearing it. Lily, my darling, go
away a little while, not far, where I can easily find you, and let me
talk to your mother. If I fail to satisfy her fully on all points, I
shall never ask at her hands the precious boon I came here solely to
solicit."
He took her hand, drew her from the arms that reluctantly relaxed,
and when they reached the threshold smiled down into her eyes.
Lifting her fingers, he kissed them lightly, and closed the door.
What ailed the birds that trilled their passionate strains so
joyously as she ran down the garden walk, and into the rose-arbour?
Had clouds and shadows flown for ever from the world, leaving only
heavenly sunshine and Mr. Palma?
"I wonder if there be indeed a quiet spot on earth where I can hide;
a sacred refuge, where neither nightingale nor human lovers will vex
my soul, or again disturb my peace with their eternal madrigals?"
She had not seen her uncle, who was sitting in one corner, clumsily
tying up some roses which he intended for a birthday offering to his
niece.
At the sound of his quiet voice, Regina started up.
"Oh, Uncle Orme! I did not see you. Pray excuse me. I will not
disturb you."
She was hurrying away, but he caught her dress.
"My dear, are you threatened with ophthalmia, that you cannot see a
man three yards distant, who measures six feet two inches? Certainly
I excuse you. A man who is kept awake all night by one set of love
ditties, dragged out of his bed before sunrise, and after taking
exercise and a bath that render him as hungry as a Modoc cut off from
his lava-beds, is expected and forced to hold his famished frame in
peace, while a pair of human lovers exhaust the vocabulary of cooing
that man can patiently excuse much. Sit down, my dear girl. Because
my beard is grey, and crow-feet gather about my eyes, do you suppose
the old man's heart cannot sympathize with the happiness that throbs
in yours, and that renews very sacredly the one sweet love-dream of
his own long-buried youth? I know, dear; you need not try to tell me,
need not blush so painfully. Mr. Palma reached Como last evening; I
knew he was coming, and saw him early this morning. I can guess it
all, and I am very glad. God bless you, dear child. Only be sure you
tell Palma that we allow no lovers in our ideal home."
He put his hand on her drooping head, and drawing it down, she
silently pressed it in her own. So they sat; how long, neither knew.
She dreaming of that golden future that had opened so unexpectedly
before her; he listening to memory's echoes of a beloved tone long
since hushed in the grave.
When approaching voices were heard, he rose to steal away and tears
moistened his mild brown eyes.
"Stay with me, please," she whispered, clinging to his sleeve.
Through the arched doorway of the arbour, she saw two walking slowly.
Mrs. Laurance leaned upon Mr. Palma's arm, and as he bent his
uncovered, head, in earnest conversation, his noble brow was placid
and his haughty mouth relaxed in a half-smile. They reached the
arbour, and paused.
In her morning robe of delicate lilac tint, Mrs. Laurance's sad
tear-stained face seemed in its glory of golden locks, almost as
fair as her child's. But one was just preparing to launch her frail
argosy of loving hopes upon the sunny sea that stretched in liquid
splendour before her dazzled eyes; the other had seen the wreck of
all her heart's most precious freight, in the storm of varied griefs,
that none but Christ could hush with His divine "Be still."
The repressed sorrow in the countenance of the mother was more
touching than any outbreak could have been, and after a strong
effort, she held out her hand, and said:
"My daughter."
Regina sprang up, and hid her face on her mother's neck.
"When I began to hope in a blind dumb way that nothing more could
happen to wring my heart, because I had my daughter safe, owned her
entire undivided love, and we were all in all to each other; just
when I dared to pray that my sky might be blue for a little while,
because my baby's eyes mirrored it, even then the last, the dearest
is stolen away, and by my best friend too! Child of my love, I would
almost as soon see you in your shroud as under a bridal veil, for you
will love your husband best, and oh! I want all of your dear heart
for my own. How can I ever give you away, my one star-eyed angel of
comfort!"
Her white hand caressed the head upon her bosom, and clasping her
mother's waist, the girl said distinctly:
"Let it be as you wish. My mother's happiness is far dearer to me
than my own."
"Oh, my darling! Do you mean it? Would you give up your lover, for
the sake of your poor desolate mother?"
She bent back the fair face and gazed eagerly into the girl's eyes.
"Mother, I should never cease to love him. Life would not be so sweet
as it looked this morning, when I first learned he had given me his
heart; but duty is better than joy, and I owe more to my suffering
mother than to him, or to myself. If it adds to the cup of your many
sorrows to give me even to him, I will try to take the bitter for my
portion, and then sweeten as best I may the life that hitherto you
have devoted to me. Mother, do with your child as seems best to your
dear heart."
She was very white, but her face was firm, and the fidelity of her
purpose was printed in her sad eyes.
"God bless my sweet, faithful, trusting child!"
Mrs. Laurance could not restrain her tears, and Mr. Palma shaded his
eyes with his hand.
"My little girl, make your choice. Decide between us."
She moved a few steps, as if to free herself, but in rain; Regina's
arms tightened around her.
"Between you? Oh no, I cannot. Both are too dear."
"To whom does your heart cling most closely?"
"Mother, ask me no more. There is my hand. If you can consent to give
it to him. I shall be--oh, how happy! If it would grieve you too
much, then, mother, hold it, keep it. I will never murmur or
complain, for now, knowing that he loves me, I can bear almost
anything."
Tears were streaming down the mother's cheeks, and pressing her lips
to the white mournful face of her daughter she beckoned Mr. Palma to
her side. For a moment she hesitated, held up the fair fingers and
kissed them, then as if distrusting herself, quickly laid the little
hand in his.
"Take my darling; and remember that she is the most precious gift a
miserable mother ever yielded up."
After a moment Mrs. Laurance whispered something, and very won the
lovely face flushed a brilliant rose, the soft tender eyes were
lifted timidly to Mr. Palma's face, and as he drew her to aim, she
glided from her mother's arms into his, feeling his lips rest like a
blessing from God on her pure brow.
"Does my Lily love me best?"
Only the white arms answered his whisper, clasping his neck; and Mrs.
Laurance and Mr. Chesley left them, with the dewy roses overhead
swinging like censers in the glorious autumn morning and the sacred
chimes of church bells dying in silvery echoes, among the olive and
myrtle that clothed the distant hills.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
In consenting to bestow Regina's hand on Mr. Palma, Mrs. Laurance had
stipulated that the marriage should be deferred for one year,
alleging that her daughter was yet very young, and having been so
long separated she wished her to remain with her at least for some
months. Mr. Palma reluctantly assented to conditions which compelled
him to return to America without Regina, and in November Mrs.
Laurance removed to Milan, where she desired that her child's fine
voice and musical talent should be trained and developed by the most
superior instruction.
Swiftly the twelve months sped away, and in revisiting the
Mediterranean shores, linked by so many painful reminiscences with
the period of her former sojourn, Mrs. Laurance, despite the efforts
of her faithful and fond companion, seemed to sink into a confirmed
melancholy.
By tacit agreement no reference was ever made to her past life, but a
shadow chill and unlifting brooded over her, and the sleeplessness
that no opiate could conquer--a sleeplessness born of heart-ache
which no spell could narcotize--robbed her cheek of its bloom, and
left weary lines on her patient, hopeless face.
Mr. Chesley had returned with Mr. Palma to the United States, and
late in the following autumn Mrs. Laurance and Regina sailed for New
York.
The associations of the voyage were peculiarly painful to the unhappy
wife, whose lips never unclosed upon the topic that engrossed her
thoughts, and soon after their arrival her physician advised a trip
to Florida or Cuba, until the rigour of the winter ha in
accordance with his advice, returned to New York.
Only the day previous he had arrived, and now came to test the power
of memory over his wife's heart.
"Father, she is sitting alone on the verandah, with such a world of
sadness in her eyes, which have lost the blessed power of weeping. Go
to her. I believe you need no ally to reach my mother's heart."
Mr. Laurance kissed her fair forehead, and walked away; and passing
his arm around Regina, Mr. Palma drew her forward across the lawn
till they reached a branching lilac near the verandah.
Here he paused, took off his glasses, and looked proudly and
tenderly down into the violet eyes that even now met his so shyly.
"My Lily, to-morrow at this hour you will be my wife."
His haughty lips were smiling as they sought hers, and with her
lovely flushed face half hidden on his shoulder, and one small hand
clinging to his, she watched her father's figure approaching the
steps.
Mrs. Laurance sat with her folded hands resting on the rail of the
balustrade, her head slightly drooped upon her bosom; and the
beautiful face was lighted by the dying sunset splendour, that
seemed to kindle a nimbus around the golden head, and rendered her
in her violet drapery like some haloed _Mater Dolorosa_, treading
alone the _Via Crucis_.
Dusky shadows under the melancholy brown eyes made them appear
darker, deeper, almost prophetic, and over her lips drifted a
fragment from "Regret"
"Oh that word Regret!
There have been nights and morns, when we have sighed,
'Let us alone Regret! We are content
To throw thee all our past, so thou wilt sleep
For aye.' But it is patient, and it wakes;
It hath not learned to cry itself to sleep,
But plaineth on the bed that it is bard."...
"Ahyes. In the room of revenge reigns regret. Where is my revenge? It
gleamed like nectar, and when I drained it consuming poison clung to
my lips. To revenge is to regret--for ever! To-day how utterly
widowed; to-morrow--childless. Oh, stranded life! Infelice!
Infelice!"
Upon the stone steps stood the man whom her eyes, turned toward the
distant hill-tops, had not yet seen, but when the passionate pathos
of that voice which had so often charmed and swayed its audiences
died away in a sob, a musical yet very tremulous tone fell on the
evening air:
"Minnie,--my wife! After almost twenty years of neglect, injustice,
and wrong, can the husband of your youth, and the father of your
child, hope for pardon?"
"There is no ruined life beyond the smile of heaven,
And compensating grace for every loss is given,
The Coliseum's shell is loved of flower and vine,
And through its shattered rents the peaceful planets shine."