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Title: Marian Grey
or, The heiress of Redstone Hall
Author: Mary Jane Holmes
Release Date: May 27, 2023 [eBook #70870]
Language: English
Produced by: Richard Tonsing and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from
images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIAN GREY ***
_POPULAR NOVELS_
By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes.
All published uniform with this volume, at $1.50, and sent _free_ by
mail on receipt of price.
* * * * *
I.— DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.
II.— ’LENA RIVERS.
III.— TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE.
IV.— MARIAN GREY.
V.— MEADOW BROOK.
VI.— ENGLISH ORPHANS.
VII.— DORA DEANE.
VIII.— COUSIN MAUDE.
IX.— HOMESTEAD ON THE HILLSIDE.
* * * * *
Mrs. Holmes is a peculiarly pleasant and fascinating writer. Her books
are always entertaining, and she has the rare faculty of enlisting the
sympathy and affections of her readers, and of holding their attention
to her pages with deep and absorbing interest.
CARLETON, Publisher,
New York.
MARIAN GREY;
OR, THE
HEIRESS OF REDSTONE HALL.
BY
MRS. MARY J. HOLMES,
AUTHOR OF “’LENA RIVERS,” “TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE,” ETC., ETC.
[Illustration: logo]
NEW YORK:
_Carleton, Publisher, 413 Broadway_.
M DCCC LXV.
Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1863,
BY DANIEL HOLMES,
In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Northern District of
New York.
TO
N. C. MILLER,
OF NEW YORK,
MY MUCH ESTEEMED FRIEND,
AND
FORMER PUBLISHER,
THIS STORY OF MARIAN GREY
IS RESPECTFULLY
DEDICATED,
BY
THE AUTHOR
MARIAN GREY.
CHAPTER I.
GUARDIAN AND WARD.
The night was dark and the clouds black and heavy which hung over
Redstone Hall, whose massive walls loomed up through the darkness like
some huge sentinel keeping guard over the spacious grounds by which it
was surrounded. Within the house all was still, and without there was no
sound to break the midnight silence save the sighing of the autumnal
wind through the cedar trees, or the roar of the river, which, swollen
by the recent heavy rains, went rushing on to meet its twin sister at a
point well known in Kentucky, where our story opens, as “The Forks of
the Elkhorn.” From one of the lower windows a single light was shining,
and its dim rays fell upon the face of a white-haired man, who moaned
uneasily in his sleep, as if pursued by some tormenting fear. At last,
as the old fashioned clock struck off the hour of twelve, he awoke, and
glancing nervously toward the corner, whence the sound proceeded, he
whispered, “Have you come again, Ralph Lindsey, to tell me of my sin?”
“What is it, Mr. Raymond?” and a young girl glided to the bedside of the
old man, who, taking her hand in his, the better to assure himself of
her presence, said, “Marian, is there nothing in that corner
yonder—nothing with silvery hair?”
“Nothing,” answered Marian, “nothing but the lamplight shining on the
face of the old clock. Did you think there was some one here?”
“Yes—no. Marian, do you believe the dead can come back to us again—when
we have done them a wrong—the dead who are buried in the sea, I mean?”
Marian shuddered involuntarily, and cast a timid look toward the shadowy
corner, then, conquering her weakness, she answered, “No, the dead
cannot come back. But why do you talk so strangely to-night?”
The old man hesitated a moment ere he replied.—“The time has come for me
to speak, so that your father can rest in peace. He has been with me
more than once in this very room, and to-night I fancied he was here
again, asking why I had dealt so falsely with his child.”
“Falsely!” cried Marian, kissing tenderly the hand of the only parent
she had ever known. “Not falsely, I am sure, for you have been most kind
to me.”
“And yet, Marian,” he said, “I have done you a wrong—a wrong which has
eaten into my very soul, and worn my life away. I did not intend to
speak of it to-night, but something prompts me to do so, and you must
listen. On that night when your father died, and when all in the ship,
save ourselves and the watch, were asleep, I laid my hand on his
forehead, and swore to be faithful to my trust. Do you hear,
Marian—faithful to my trust. You don’t know what that meant, but _I_
know, and I’ve broken my oath to the dying—and from that grave in the
ocean he comes to me sometimes, and with the same look upon his face
which it wore that Summer afternoon when we laid him in the sea, he asks
why justice has not been done to you. Wait, Marian, until I have
finished,” he continued, as he saw her about to speak; “I know I have
not long to live, and I would make amends; but, Marian, I would
rather—oh, so much rather, you should not know the truth until I’m dead.
You will forgive me then more readily, won’t you, Marian? Promise me you
will forgive the poor old man who has loved you so much—loved you, if
possible, better than he loved his only son.”
He paused for her reply, and half bewildered, Marian answered, “I don’t
know what you mean—but if, as you say, a wrong has been done, no matter
how great that wrong may be, it is freely forgiven for the sake of what
you’ve been to me.”
The sick man wound his arm lovingly around her, and bringing her nearer
to him, he said, “Bless you, Marian—bless you for that. It makes my
deathbed easier. I will leave it in writing—my confession. I cannot tell
it now, for I could not bear to see upon your face that you despised me.
You wrote to Frederic, and told him to come quickly?”
“Yes,” returned Marian, “I said you were very sick and wished to see him
at once.”
For a moment there was silence in the room; then, removing his arm from
the neck of the young girl, the old man raised himself upon his elbow
and looking her steadily in the face, said, “Marian, could you love my
son Frederic?”
The question was a strange one, but Marian Lindsey was accustomed to
strange modes of speech in her guardian, and with a slightly heightened
color she answered quietly, “I do love him as a brother—”
“Yes, but I would have you love him as something nearer,” returned her
guardian. “Ever since I took you for my child it has been the cherished
object of my life that you should be his wife.”
There was a nervous start and an increase of color in Marian’s face, for
the idea, though not altogether disagreeable, was a new one to her, but
she made no reply, and her guardian continued, “I am selfish in this
wish, though not wholly so. I know you could be happy with him, and in
no other way can my good name be saved from disgrace. Promise me,
Marian, that you will be his wife very soon after I am dead, and before
all Kentucky is talking of my sin. You are not too young. You will be
sixteen in a few months, and many marry as early as that.”
“Does _he_ wish it?” asked Marian, timidly; and her guardian replied,
“He has known you but little of late, but when he sees you here at home,
and learns how gentle and good you are, he cannot help loving you as you
deserve.”
“Yes he can,” answered Marian with childish simplicity. “No man as
handsome as Frederic ever loved a girl with an ugly face, and I heard
him tell Will Gordon, when he spent a vacation here, that I was a nice
little girl, but altogether too freckled, too red-headed, and scrawny,
ever to make a handsome woman,” and Marian’s voice trembled slightly as
she recalled a speech which had wrung from her many tears.
To this remark Col. Raymond made no reply—for he too, had cause to doubt
Frederic’s willingness to marry a girl who boasted so few personal
charms as did Marian Lindsey then. Rumors, too, he had heard, of a
peerlessly beautiful creature, with raven hair and eyes of deepest
black, who at the north kept his son a captive to her will. But this
could not be; Frederick must marry Marian, for in no other way could the
name of Raymond be saved from a disgrace, or the vast possessions he
called his be kept in the family, and he was about to speak again when a
heavy tread in the hall announced the approach of some one, and a moment
after, Aunt Dinah, the housekeeper, appeared. “She had come to sit up
with her marster,” she said, “and let Miss Marian go to bed, where
children like her ought to be.”
At first Marian objected, for though scarcely conscious of it herself,
she was well enough pleased to sit where she was and hear her guardian
talk of Frederic and of what she had no hope would ever be; but when
Aunt Dinah suggested to her that sitting up so much would make her look
yellow and old, she yielded, for Frederic was a passionate admirer of
beauty, and she well knew that she had none to lose. Kissing her
guardian good night, she hurried to her chamber, but not to sleep, for
the tumult of thought which her recent conversation had awakened kept
her restless and wakeful. Under ordinary circumstances she would have
wondered what the wrong could be at which Col. Raymond had hinted, but
now she scarcely remembered it, or if it occurred to her at all, she
instantly dismissed it from her mind as some trivial thing which the
weak state of her guardian’s mind magnified into a serious matter.
Thirteen years before our story opens, Marian had embarked with her
father on board a ship which sailed from Liverpool to New York. Of that
father she remembered little save that he was very poor, and that he
talked of his poverty as if it were something of which he was proud.
Pleasant memories, though, she had of an American gentleman who used
often to take her on his lap, and tell her of the land to which she was
going; and when one day her father laid him down in his berth, with the
fever as they said, she remembered how the kind man had cared for him,
holding his aching head and watching by him till he died;—then, when it
was all over, he had taken her upon his knee and told her she was to be
his little girl now, and he bade her call him father—telling her how her
own dead parent had asked him to care for her, who in all the wide world
had no near relative. Something, too, she remembered about an old coarse
bag, which had troubled her new father very much, and which he had
finally put in the bottom of his trunk, throwing overboard a few
articles of clothing to make room for it. The voyage was long and
stormy, but they reached New York at last, and he took her to his
home—not Redstone Hall, but an humble farm-house on the Hudson, where he
had always lived. Frederic was a boy then—a dark-haired handsome boy of
eleven, and even now she shuddered as she remembered how he used to
tease and worry her. Still he liked her, she was sure—and the first real
grief which she remembered was on that rainy day when, with an extra
pull at her long curls, he bade her good-by and went off to a distant
boarding school.
Col. Raymond, her guardian, was growing rich, and people said he must
have entered into some fortunate speculation while abroad, for, since
his return, prosperity had attended every movement; and when, six months
after Frederic’s departure, he went to Kentucky and purchased Redstone
Hall, then rather a dilapidated building, Mrs. Burt, his housekeeper,
had wondered where all his money came from, when he used to be so poor.
They had moved to Kentucky when Marian was five and a half years old—and
now, after ten years’ improvement, there was not in the whole county so
beautiful a spot as Redstone Hall, with its terraced grounds, its
graveled walks, its plats of grass, its grand old trees, its creeping
vines, its flowering shrubs and handsome park in the rear. And this was
Marian’s home;—here she had lived a rather secluded life, for only when
Frederic was with them did they see much company, and all the knowledge
she had of the world was what she gleaned from books or learned from the
negress Dinah, who, “having lived with the very first families,”
frequently entertained her young mistress with stories of “the quality,”
and the dinner parties at which her presence was once so indispensable.
And Marian, listening to these glowing descriptions of satin dresses,
diamonds and feathers, sometimes wished that she were rich, and could
have a taste of fashion. To be sure, her guardian bought her always more
than she needed—but it was not hers, and without any particular reason
why she should do so, she felt that she was a dependent and something of
an inferior, especially when Frederic came home with his aristocratic
manners, his graceful mustache, and the soft scent of perfumery he
usually carried with him. He was always polite and kind to Marian, but
she felt that there was a gulf between them. He was handsome; she was
plain—he was rich; she was poor—he was educated, and she—alas, for
Marian’s education—she read a great deal, but never yet had she given
herself up to a systematic course of study. Governesses she had in
plenty, but she usually coaxed them off into the woods, or down by the
river, where she left them to do what they pleased, while she learned
many a lesson from the great book of nature spread out so beautifully
before her. All this had tended to make and keep her a very child, and
it was not until her fourteenth year that any thing occurred to develop
the genuine womanly qualities which she possessed.
By the death of a distant relative, a little unfortunate blind girl was
left to Colonel Raymond’s care, and was immediately taken to Redstone
Hall, where she became the pet of Marian, who loved nothing in the whole
world as dearly as the poor blind Alice. And well was that love repaid;
for to Alice Marian Lindsey was the embodiment of everything beautiful,
pure and good. Frederic, on the contrary, was a kind of terror to the
little Alice. “He was so precise and stuck up,” she said; “and when he
was at home Marian was not a bit like herself.” To Marian, however, his
occasional visits to Redstone Hall were sources of great pleasure. To
look at his handsome figure, to listen to his voice, to anticipate his
slightest wish and minister to his wants so quietly that he scarcely
knew from whom the attention came, was happiness for her, and when he
smiled upon her, as he often did, calling her “a good little girl,” she
felt repaid for all she had done. Occasionally, since her guardian’s
illness, she had thought of the future when some fine lady might come to
Redstone Hall as its mistress, but the subject was an unpleasant one,
and she always dismissed it from her mind. In her estimation, there were
few worthy to be the wife of Frederic—certainly not herself—and when the
idea was suggested to her by his father, she regarded it as an utter
impossibility. Still it kept her wakeful, and once she said softly to
herself, “I could love him so much if he would let me, and I should be
so proud of him, too.” Then, as she remembered the remark she had heard
him make to his college friend, she covered her face with her hands and
whispered, sadly, “Oh, I wish I wasn’t ugly.” Anon, however, there came
stealing over her the thought that in the estimation of others she was
not as plain as in that of Frederic Raymond. Every body seemed to like
her, and if she were hideous looking they could not. Alice, whose
darkened eyes had never looked upon the light of day, and who judged by
the touch alone, declared that she was beautiful, while old Dinah said
that age would improve her as it did wine, and that in time she would be
the handsomest woman in all Kentucky.
Never before had Marian thought so much of her personal appearance—and
now, feeling anxious to know exactly what her defects were, she arose,
and lighting the lamp, placed it upon her dressing bureau—then throwing
a shawl around her shoulders, she sat down and minutely inspected the
face which Frederic Raymond called so homely. The features were regular
enough, but the face was very thin—“scrawny,” Frederic had said, and the
cheek bones were plainly perceptible. This might be the result of eating
slate-stones; Dinah, who knew everything, said it was, and mentally
resolving thereafter to abjure everything of the kind, Marian continued
her investigations. It did not occur to her that her complexion was
surpassingly fair, nor yet that her eyes were of a most beautiful blue,
so intent was she upon the freckles which dotted her nose and a portion
of her face. Slate-stones surely had nothing to do with these, and she
knew of no way of remedying this evil—unless, indeed, _poulticing_
should do it.—She would consult Dinah on the subject, and feeling a good
deal of confidence in the negress’ judgment, she passed on to what she
considered her crowning point of ugliness—her _hair!_ It was soft,
luxuriant and curly, but alas, it bore the color which, though accounted
beautiful in Mary Stuart’s time, has long since been proscribed by
fashion as horrid and unbecoming. Turn which way she would, or hold the
lamp in any position she chose, it was still red—a dark, decided red—and
the tears came to Marian’s eyes as she recalled the many times when, as
a boy, Frederic taunted her with being a “red-head” or a “brick-top,”
just as the humor suited him. Suddenly she remembered that among her
treasures was a lock of her mother’s hair, and opening a rosewood box
she took from it a shining tress which she laid upon the marble top of
her bureau, and then bent down to admire its color, a beautiful auburn,
such as is rarely seen—and which, when seen, is sure to be admired.
“And this was my mother’s,” she whispered, smoothing caressingly the
silken hair. “I must resemble her more than my father, who my guardian
says was dark. I wish I was like her in everything, for I believe she
was beautiful,” and into the mind of the orphan girl there crept an
image of a bright-haired, sweet-faced woman, whose eyes of lustrous blue
looked lovingly into her own—and this was her mother. She had seen her
thus in fancy many a time, but never so vividly as to-night, and
unconsciously she breathed the petition, “Let me look like her some day,
and I shall be content.”
The gray morning light was by this time stealing through the window, and
overcome with weariness and watching, Marian fell asleep, and when, two
hours later, old Dinah came in to wake her, she found her sitting before
the glass, with the lamp still burning at her side, and her head resting
on her arms, which lay upon the low bureau.
“For the dear Lord’s sake, what are you doing?” was Dinah’s exclamation,
which at once roused Marian, who unhesitatingly answered,
“I got up to look in the glass, and see if I was so very homely.”
“Humbly! Nonsense, child,” returned old Dinah. “You look like a picter
lyin’ thar with the sun a shinin’ on yer har, and makin’ it look like a
piece of crimson satin.”
The compliment was a doubtful one, but Marian knew it was well meant,
and, without a word in reply, commenced her morning toilet. That day,
somewhat to her disappointment, her guardian did not resume the
conversation of the previous night. He was convinced that Marian could
be easily won, but he did not think it wise to encourage her until he
had talked with his son, whose return he looked for anxiously. But day
after day went by, and it was in vain that Alice listened, and Marian
watched, for the daily stage. It never stopped at the gate; and each
time that the old man heard them say it had gone by, he groaned afresh,
fearing Frederic would not come until it was too late.
“I can at least tell him the truth on paper,” he said to himself at
last, “and it may be he will pay more heed to words, which a dead father
wrote, than to words which a living father spoke.”
Marian was accordingly bidden to bring him his little writing desk, and
then to leave the room, for he would be alone when he wrote that letter
of confession. It cost him many a fierce struggle—the telling to his son
a secret which none save himself and God had ever known—aye, which none
had ever need to know if he would have it so—but he would not. The
secret had worn his life away, and he must make reparation now. So, with
the perspiration dropping from every pore, he wrote; and, as he wrote,
in his disordered imagination, there stood beside his pillow the
white-haired Englishman, watching carefully to see that justice was done
at last to Marian. Recently several letters had passed between the
father and his son concerning the marriage of the latter with Marian—a
marriage every way distasteful to the young man, who, in his answer, had
said far harsher things of Marian than he really meant, hoping thus to
put an end to his father’s plan. She was “rough, uncouth, uneducated and
ugly,” he said, “and if his father did not give up that foolish fancy,
he should positively hate the red-headed fright.”
All this the old man touched upon—quoting the very words his son had
used, and whispering to himself, “Poor—poor Marian, it would break her
heart to know that he said that, but she never will—she never will;” and
then, with the energy of despair, he wrote the reason why she must be
the wife of his son, pleading with him as only a dying man can plead,
that he would not disregard the wishes of his father, and begging him to
forget the dark-haired Isabel, who, though perhaps more beautiful, was
not—could not—be as pure, as gentle and as good as Marian.
The letter was finished, and ’mid burning tears of remorse and shame the
old man read it through.
“Yes, that will do,” he said. “Frederic will heed what’s written here.
He’ll marry her or else make restitution;” and laying it away, he
commenced the last and hardest part of all—the confessing to Marian how
he had sinned against her.
Although there was no tie of blood between them, the gentle young orphan
had crept down into his inmost heart, where once he treasured a little
golden-haired girl, who, before Frederic was born, died on his lap, and
went to the heaven made for such as she. In the first moments of his
bereavement, he had thought his loss could never be repaired, but when,
with her soft arms around his neck, Marian Lindsey had murmured in his
ear how much she loved the only father she had ever known, he felt that
the angel he had lost was restored to him tenfold in the little English
girl. He knew that she believed that there was in him no evil, and his
heart throbbed with agony as he nerved himself to tell her how for years
he had acted a villain’s part, but it was done at last, and with a
passionate appeal for her forgiveness, and a request that she would not
forget him wholly, but come some time to visit his lonely grave, he
finished the letter, and folding it up, wrote upon its back, “_For
Marian_;” then, taking the one intended for Frederic, he attempted to
write, “_For my Son_,” but the ink was gone from his pen, there was a
blur before his eyes, and though he traced the words he left no impress,
and the letter bore no superscription to tell to whom it belonged.
Stepping upon the floor, he dragged his feeble limbs to the adjoining
room, his library, and placing both letters in his private drawer,
retired to his bed, where, utterly exhausted, he fell asleep.
When at last he awoke, Marian was sitting by his side, and to her he
communicated what he had done, telling her where the letters were, and
that if he died ere Frederic’s return, she must give the one bearing the
words “For my Son” to him.
“You will not read it, of course,” he said, “or ever seek to know what
its contents are.”
Had Marian Lindsey been like many girls, the caution would have insured
the reading of the letter at once, but she fortunately shrank from
anything dishonorable, and was blessed with but a limited share of
woman’s curiosity; consequently, the letter was safe in her care, even
though no one ever came to claim it. All that afternoon she sat by her
guardian, and when as usual the stage thundered down the turnpike,
leaving no Frederic at the door, she soothed him with the hope that he
would be there to-morrow. But the morrow came and went as did other
to-morrows, until Col. Raymond grew so ill that a telegram was
despatched to the truant boy, bidding him hasten if he would see his
father again alive.
“That will bring him,” the old man said, while the big tears rolled down
his wrinkled face. “He’ll be here in a few days,” and he asked that his
bed might be moved near the window, where, propped upon pillows, he
watched with childish impatience for the coming of his boy.
CHAPTER II.
FATHER AND SON.
A telegram from Frederic, who was coming home at last! He would be there
that very day, and the inmates of Redstone Hall were thrown into a state
of unusual excitement. Old Dinah in jaunty turban and clean white apron,
bustled from the kitchen to the dining room, and from the dining room
back to the kitchen, jingling her huge bunch of keys with an air of
great importance, and kicking from under her feet any luckless black
baby which chanced to be in her way, making always an exception in favor
of “Victoria Eugenia,” who bore a striking resemblance to herself, and
would one day call her “gran’mam.” Dinah was in her element, for nothing
pleased her better than the getting up a “tip-top dinner,” and fully
believing that Frederic had been half starved in a land where they
didn’t have hoe-cake and bacon three times a day, she determined to give
him one full meal, such as would make his stomach ache for three full
hours at least!
Mr. Raymond, too, was better than usual to-day, and at his post by the
window watched eagerly the distant turn in the road where the stage
would first appear. In her chamber, Marian was busy with her toilet,
trying the effect of dress after dress, and at Alice’s suggestion
deciding at last upon a pale blue, which harmonized well with her fair
complexion.
“Frederic likes blue, I know,” she thought, as she remembered having
heard him admire a dress of that color worn by a young lady who had once
visited at Redstone Hall.
Dinah, when consulted as to the best method of making red hair dark, had
strongly recommended “possum ile and sulphur, scented with some kind of
essence;” but to this dye Marian did not take kindly. She preferred that
her hair should retain its natural color, and falling as it did in soft
curls around her face and neck, it was certainly not unbecoming. Her
toilet was completed at last—Alice’s little hands had decided that it
was perfect—the image reflected by the mirror was far from being
ordinary looking, and secretly wondering if Frederic would not think her
tolerably pretty, Marian sat down to await his coming. She had not been
seated long when Alice’s quick ear caught the sound of the distant
stage, and in a few moments Marian from behind the half-closed shutter,
was watching the young man as he came slowly up the avenue, which led
from the highway to the house. His step was usually bounding and rapid,
but now he lingered as if unwilling to reach the door.
“’Tis because of his father,” thought Marian. “He fears he may be dead.”
But not of his father alone was Frederic thinking. It was not pleasant
coming home; for aside from the fear that his father might really die,
was a dread of what that father might ask him to do. For Marian as a
sister, he had no dislike, for he knew she possessed many gentle,
womanly virtues, but from the thoughts of making her his wife he
instinctively shrank. Only one had the shadow of a claim to bear that
relation to him, and of her he was thinking that September afternoon as
he came up the walk. She was poor, he knew, and the daughter of his
landlady, who claimed a distant relationship with his father; but she
was beautiful, and a queen might covet her stately bearing, and
polished, graceful manner. Into her heart he had never looked, for
satisfied with the fair exterior, he failed to see the treachery lurking
in her large black eyes, or yet to detect the fierce, stormy passions,
which had a home within her breast.
Isabella Huntington, or “Cousin Bell,” as he called her, was beautiful,
accomplished, and artful, and during the year that Frederic Raymond had
been an inmate of her mother’s family, she had succeeded in so
completely infatuating the young man that now there was to him but one
face in the world, and that in fancy shone upon him even when it was far
away. He had never said to her that he loved her, for though often
tempted so to do, something had always interposed between them, bidding
him wait until he knew her better. Consequently he was not bound to her
by words, but he thought it very probable that she would one day be his
wife, and as he drew near to Redstone Hall, he could not forbear feeling
a glow of pride, fancying how she would grace that elegant mansion as
its rightful mistress. Of Marian, too, he thought—harsh, bitter
thoughts, mingled with softer emotions as he reflected that she possibly
knew nothing of his father’s plan. He pitied her, he said, for if his
father died, she would be alone in the world. After what had passed, it
would hardly be pleasant for him to have her there where he could see
her every day;—she might not be agreeable to Isabel either, and he
should probably provide for her handsomely and have her live somewhere
else—at a fashionable boarding school, perhaps!
Magnanimous Frederic! He was growing very generous, and by the time he
reached the long piazza, Marian Lindsey was comfortably disposed of in
the third story of some seminary far away from Redstone Hall!
The meeting between the father and son was an affecting one—the former
sobbing like a child, and asking of the latter why he had tarried so
long. The answer to this question was that Frederic had been absent from
New Haven for three weeks, and that Isabel, who took charge of his
letters, neglected to forward the one written by Marian. At the mention
of Isabel, the old man’s cheek flushed, and he said, impatiently, “the
neglect was an unpardonable one, for it bore on its face ‘In haste.’
Perhaps, though, she did it purposely, hoping thus to keep you from me.”
Instantly Frederic warmed up in Isabel’s defence, saying she was
incapable of a mean act. He doubted whether she had observed the words
“In haste” at all, and if she did she only withheld it for the sake of
saving him from anxiety as long as possible.
At this moment there was the sound of little uncertain feet near the
door, and Alice groped her way into the room. She was a fair,
sweet-faced little child, and taking her upon his knee, Frederic kissed
her affectionately, and asked her many questions as to what she had done
since he was home six months before. Seldom before had he paid her so
much attention, and feeling anxious that Marian should be similarly
treated, the little girl, after answering his questions, said to him,
coaxingly,
“Won’t you kiss Marian, too, when she comes down? She’s been ever so
long dressing herself and trying to look pretty.”
Instantly the eyes of the father and son met—those of the former
expressive of entreaty, while those of the latter flashed with defiance.
“Go for Marian, child, and tell her to come here,” said Mr. Raymond.
Alice obeyed, and as she left the room, Frederic said bitterly, “I see
she is leagued with you. I had thought better of her than that.”
“No, she isn’t,” cried the father, fearing that his favorite project was
in danger. “I merely suggested it to her once—only once.”
Frederic was about to reply, when the rustling of female garments
announced the approach of Marian. To Colonel Raymond she was handsome
then, as with a heightened bloom upon her cheek and a bashful light in
her deep blue eyes, she entered timidly and offered her hand to
Frederic. But to the jealous young man she was merely a plain, ordinary
country girl, bearing no comparison to the peerless Isabel. Still he
greeted her kindly, addressed to her a few trivial remarks, and then
resumed his conversation with little Alice, who, feeling that matters
were going wrong, rolled her eyes often and anxiously toward the spot
where she knew Marian was sitting—and when at last the latter left the
room, she said to Frederic, “Isn’t Marian pretty in her blue dress, with
all those curls? There are twenty of them, for I heard her count them.
Say she _is_ pretty, so I can tell her and make her feel good.”
Frederic would not then have admitted that Marian was pretty, even had
he thought so, and biting his lip with vexation, he replied, “I do not
particularly admire blue, and I detest cork-screw curls.”
Marian was still in the lower hall, and heard both the question and the
answer. Darting up the stairs, she flew to her chamber, and throwing
herself upon the bed, burst into a passionate flood of tears. All in
vain had she dressed herself for Frederic Raymond’s eye—curling her hair
in twenty curls, even as Alice had said. He hated blue—he hated
curls—cork-screw curls particularly. What could he mean? She never heard
the term thus applied before. It must have some reference to their
color, and clutching at her luxuriant tresses she would have torn them
from her head, had not a little childish hand been laid upon hers, and
Alice’s soothing voice murmured in her ear, “Don’t cry, Marian; I
wouldn’t care for him. He’s just as mean as he can be, and if I owned
Redstone Hall, I wouldn’t let him live here, would you?”
“Yes—no—I don’t know,” sobbed Marian. “I don’t own Redstone Hall. I
don’t own anything, and I most wish I was dead.”
Alice was unaccustomed to such a burst of passion, and was trying to
frame some reply, when the dinner bell rang, and lifting up her head,
Marian said, “Go down, Alice, and tell Dinah I can’t come, and if she
insists, tell her I _won’t_!”
Alice knew she was in earnest, and going below she delivered the message
to Dinah in the presence of Frederic, who silently took his seat at the
table.
“For the dear Lord’s sake, what’s happened her now?” said Dinah, casting
a rueful glance at Marian’s empty chair.
“She’s crying,” returned Alice, “and she dislikes somebody in this room
awfully; ’taint you, Dinah, nor ’taint me,” and the blind eyes flashed
indignantly at Frederic, who smiled quietly as he replied, “Thank you,
Miss Alice.”
Alice made no reply, and the dinner proceeded in silence. After it was
over, Frederic returned to his father, who had been nerving himself for
the task he had to perform, and which he determined should be done at
once.
“Lock the door, Frederic,” he said, “and then sit by me while I say to
you what I have so long wished to say.”
With a lowering brow Frederic complied, and seating himself near to his
father, he folded his arms and said, “Go on, I am ready now to hear—but
if it is of Marian you would speak, I will spare you that trouble,
father,” and Frederic’s voice was milder in its tone. “I have always
liked Marian very much as a sister, and if it so chances that you are
taken from us, I will be the best of brothers to her. I will care for
her and see that she does not want. Let this satisfy you, father, for I
cannot marry her. I do not love her, for I love another; one compared to
whom Marian is as the night to the day. Let me tell you of Isabel,
father,” and Frederic’s voice was still softer in its tone.
The old man shook his head and answered mournfully, “No, Frederic, were
she as fair as the morning I could not wish her to be your wife. I have
never told you before, but I once received an anonymous letter
concerning this same Isabel, saying she was treacherous and deceitful,
and would lead you on to ruin.”
“The villain! It was Rudolph’s doings,” muttered Frederic; then in a
louder tone he said, “I can explain that, I think. When Isabel was quite
young, she was engaged conditionally to Rudolph McVicar, a worthless
fellow whom she has since discarded. He is a jealous, malignant
creature, and has sworn to be revenged. He wrote that letter, I am sure.
It is like him.”
“It may be,” returned the father, “but I distrust this Isabel. Her
mother, as you are aware, is a distant relative of mine. I know her
well, and though I never saw the daughter, I am sure she is selfish,
ambitious, deceitful and proud, while Marian is so good.”
“Marian is a mere child,” interrupted Frederic.
“Almost sixteen,” rejoined the father, “and before you marry her she
will be older still.”
“Yes, yes, much older,” thought Frederic, continuing aloud, “Listen to
reason, father. I certainly do not love Marian, neither do I suppose
that she loves me. Now if you have our mutual good at heart, you cannot
desire a marriage which would surely result in wretchedness to both.”
“I have thought of all that,” returned the father. “A few kind words
from you would win Marian’s love at once, and when once won she would be
to you a faithful, loving wife, whom you would ere long learn to prize.
You cannot treat any woman badly, Frederic, much less Marian. I know you
would be happy with her, and should desire the marriage even though it
could not save me from dishonor in the eyes of the world.”
“Father,” said Frederic, turning slightly pale, “what do you mean? You
have in your letters hinted of a wrong done to somebody. Was it to
Marian? If so, do not seek to sacrifice my happiness, but make amends in
some other way. Will money repair the wrong? If so, give it to her, even
to half your fortune, and leave me alone.”
He had touched a tender point, and raising himself in bed, the old man
gasped, “Yes, yes, boy—but you have no money to give her. Redstone Hall
is not mine, not yours, but hers. Those houses in Louisville are
hers—not mine, not yours. Everything you see around you is hers—all
hers; and if you refuse her, Frederic—hear me—if you refuse Marian
Lindsey, strict restitution must be made, and you will be a beggar as it
were. Marry her, and as her husband you will keep it all and save me
from disgrace.—Choose, Frederic, choose.”
Mr. Raymond was terribly excited, and the great drops of perspiration
stood thickly upon his forehead, and trickled from beneath his hoary
hair.
“Is he going mad!” thought Frederic, his own heart throbbing with a
nervous fear of coming evil, but ere he could speak his father
continued, “Hear my story, and you will know how I came by these
ill-gotten gains,” and he glanced around the richly furnished room. “You
know I was sent to England, or I could not have gone, for I had no means
with which to meet the necessary expenses. In the streets of Liverpool I
first saw Marian’s father, and I mistook him for a beggar. Again I met
him on board ship, and making his acquaintance, found him to be a man of
no ordinary intellect. There was something about him which pleased me,
and when he became ill, I cared for him as for a friend. The night he
died we were alone, and he confided to me his history. He was an only
child, and, orphaned at an early age, became an inmate of one of those
dens of cruelty—those schools on the Dotheboys plan. From this bondage
he escaped at last, and then for more than thirty years employed his
time in making and saving money. He was a miser in every sense of the
word, and though counting his money by thousands—yes, by tens of
thousands, he starved himself almost to death. No one suspected his
wealth—not even his young wife, Mary Grey, whom he married three years
before I met him, and who died when Marian was born. She, too, had been
an only child and an orphan; and as in England there was none to care
for him or his, he conceived the idea of emigrating to America, and
there lavishing his stores of gold on Marian. She should be a lady, he
said, and live in a palace fit for a queen. But death overtook him, and
to me he entrusted his child with all his money—some in gold, and some
in bank notes. And when he was dying, Frederic, and the perspiration was
cold on his brow, he made me lay my hand there and swear to be faithful
to my trust as guardian of his child. For her, and for her alone, the
money must be used. But, Frederic, I broke that oath. The Raymonds are
noted for their love of gain, and when the Englishman was buried in the
sea, the tempter whispered that the avenue to wealth, which I so long
had coveted, was open now—that no one knew or would ever know of the
miser’s fortune; and I yielded. I guarded the bag where the treasure was
hidden with more than a miser’s vigilance, and I chuckled with delight
when I found it far more than he had said.”
“Oh, my father, my father!” groaned Frederic, covering his white face
with his hands, for he knew now that he was penniless.
“Don’t curse me, boy,” hoarsely whispered the old man; “Marian will not.
She’ll forgive me—for Marian is an angel; but I must hasten. You
remember how I grew gradually rich, and people talked of my good luck.
Very cautiously I used the money at first so as not to excite suspicion,
but when I came to Kentucky, where I was not known, I was less fearful,
and launched into speculations, until now they say I am the wealthiest
man in Franklin county. But it’s hers—it’s Marian’s—every cent of it is
hers. Your education was paid for with her money; all you have and are
you owe to Marian Lindsey, who, by every law of the land, is the heiress
of Redstone Hall.”
He paused a moment, and trembling with emotion, Frederic said, “Is there
nothing ours, father? Our old home on the Hudson? That, surely, is not
hers?”
“You are right,” returned the father; “the old shell was mine, but when
I brought Marian home, it was not worth a thousand dollars, and it was
all I had in the world. Her money has made it what it is. I always
intended to tell her when she was old enough to understand, but as time
went by I shrank from it, particularly when I saw how much you prized
the luxuries which money alone can buy, and how that money kept you in
the proud position you occupy.—But it has killed me, Frederic, before my
time—and now at the last do you wonder that I wish restitution to be
made? I would save you from poverty, and my name from disgrace, by
marrying you to Marian. She must know the truth, of course, for in no
other way can my conscience be satisfied—but the world would still be
kept in ignorance.”
“And if I do not marry her, oh, father, must it come—poverty, disgrace,
everything?”
The young man’s voice was almost heart-broken in its tone, but the old
man wavered not as he answered—“Yes, Frederic, it must come. If you
refuse, I must deed it all to her. The lawyer, of course, must know the
cause of so strange a proceeding, and I have no faith that he would keep
the secret, even if Marian should. I left it in writing in case you did
not come, and I gave you my dying curse if you failed of restoring to
Marian her fortune. But you are here—you have heard my story, and it
remains for you to choose. You have never taken care of yourself—have
never been taught to think it necessary—and how can you struggle with
poverty. Would that Isabel join her destiny with one who had not where
to lay his head?”
“Stop, father! in mercy stop, ere you drive me mad!” and starting to his
feet Frederic paced the floor wildly, distractedly.
A dark cloud had fallen upon him, and turn which way he would it
enveloped him in its dark folds. He knew his father would keep his word,
and he desired that he should do so. It was right, and he shrank from
any further injustice to the orphan, Marian, with whom he had suddenly
changed places. He was the dependent now, and hers the hand that fed
him.—Frederic Raymond was proud, and the remembrance of his father’s
words, “Her money paid for your education; all you have and are, you owe
to Marian Lindsey,” stung him to his inmost soul. Still he could not
make her his wife. It would be a greater wrong than ever his father had
done to her. And yet if he had never seen Isabel, never mingled in the
society of beautiful and accomplished women, he might, perhaps, have
learned to love the gentle little girl, whose presence, he knew, made
the life and light of Redstone Hall. But he could not do it now, and
going up to his father, he said hesitatingly, as if it cost a bitter,
agonized struggle to give up all his wealth, “I cannot do it, father;
neither would Marian wish it if she knew. Send for her now,” he
continued, as a new idea flashed upon him, “tell her all, here in my
presence, and let her choose for me; but stay,” he added, quickly,
coloring crimson at the unmanly selfishness which had prompted the
sending for Marian, a selfishness which whispered that the generous girl
would share her fortune with him; “stay, we will not send for her. I can
decide the matter alone.”
“Not now,” returned the father. “Wait until to-morrow at nine o’clock,
if you do not come to me then, I shall send for Lawyer Gibson, and the
writings will be drawn. I give you until that time to decide; and now
leave me, for I would rest.”
He motioned toward the door, and glad to escape from an atmosphere which
seemed laden with grief, Frederic went out into the open air, and Col.
Raymond was again alone. His first thought was of the letter—the one
intended for his son. He could destroy that now—for he would not that
Marian should ever know what it contained. She might not be Frederic’s
wife, but he would save her from unnecessary pain; and exerting all his
strength, he tottered to his private drawer, and took the letter in his
hand. It was growing very dark within the room, and holding it up to the
fading light, the dim-eyed old man read, or thought he read, “For my
Son.”
“Yes, this is the one,” he whispered—“the other reads ‘For Marian,’” and
hastening back to his bedroom he threw upon the fire burning in the
grate, the letter, but, alas, the wrong one—for in the drawer still lay
the fatal missive which would one day break poor Marian’s heart, and
drive her forth a wanderer from the home she loved so well.
That night Frederic did not come down to supper. He was weary with his
rapid journey, he said, and would rather rest. So Marian, who had dried
her tears and half forgotten their cause, sat down to her solitary tea,
little dreaming of the stormy scene which the walls of Frederic’s
chamber looked upon that night. All through the dreary hours he walked
the floor, and when the morning light came struggling through the
windows, it found him pale, haggard, and older by many years than he had
been the day before. Still he was undecided. “Love in a cottage” with
Isabel, looked fair enough in the distance, but where could he get the
“cottage?” To be sure, he was going through the form of studying law,
but he had never looked upon the profession as a means of procuring his
livelihood, neither did he see any way by which he could pursue his
studies, unless, indeed, he worked to defray the expense. He might,
perhaps, saw wood. Ben Gardiner did in college—Ben with the threadbare
coat, cowhide boots, smiling face and best lessons in the class. Ben
liked it well enough, and so, perhaps, would he! He held his hands up to
the light; they were soft and white as a girl’s. They would blister with
the first cut. He couldn’t saw wood—he couldn’t do anything. And would
Isabel love him still when she knew how poor he was. It seemed unjust to
doubt her, but he did, and he remembered sundry rumors he had heard
touching her ambitious, selfish nature. Anon, too, there crept into his
heart pleasant memories of a little, quiet girl, who had always sought
to do him good, and ministered to his comfort in a thousand unobtrusive
ways. And this was Marian, the one his father would have him marry; and
why didn’t he? When the marrying her would insure him all the elegances
of life to which he had been accustomed, and which he prized so highly.
She was a child yet; he could mold her to his will and make her what he
pleased. She might be handsome some time. There was certainly room for
improvement. But no, she would never be aught save the plain, unpolished
Marian, wholly unlike the beautiful picture he had formed of Redstone
Hall’s proud mistress. He could not marry her, he would not marry her,
and then he went back to the question, “What shall I do, if I don’t?”
As his father had said, the Raymonds were lovers of wealth, and this
weakness Frederic possessed to a great degree. Indeed, it was the
foundation of all his other faults, making him selfish and sometimes
overbearing. As yet he was not worthy to be the husband of one as gentle
and good as Marian, but he was passing through the fire, and the flames
which burned so fiercely would purify and make him better. He heard the
clock strike eight, and a moment after breakfast was announced.
“I am not ready yet; tell Marian not to wait,” was the message he gave
the servant; and so another hour passed by, and heard the clock strike
nine.
His hour was up, but he could not yet decide. He walked to the window
and looked down on his home, which never seemed so beautiful before as
on that September morning. He could stay there if he chose, for he felt
sure he could win Marian’s love if he tried. And then he wondered if his
life would not be made happier with the knowledge that he had obeyed his
father’s request, and saved his name from dishonor. There was the sound
of horses’ feet upon the graveled road. It was the negro Jake, and he
was going for Lawyer Gibson.
Rapidly another hour went by, and then he heard the sound of horses’
hoofs again, but this time there were two who rode, Jake and the lawyer.
In a moment the latter was at the door, and the sound of his feet, as he
strode through the lower hall, went to the heart of the listening young
man like bolts of ice. He heard a servant call Marian and say that his
father wanted her; some new idea had entered the sick man’s head. He had
probably decided to tell her all before he died, but it was not too late
to prevent it, the young man thought; he could not be a beggar, and with
a face as white as ashes, and limbs which trembled in every joint, he
hurried down the stairs, meeting in the hall both Marian and the lawyer.
“Go back,” he whispered to the former, laying his hand upon her
shoulder; “I would see my father first alone.”
Wonderingly Marian looked into his pale, worn face and bloodshot eyes;
then motioning the lawyer into another room, she, too, followed him
thither, while Frederic sought his father’s bedside, and bending low
whispered in the ear of the bewildered and half-crazed man that he would
marry the Heiress of Redstone Hall!
CHAPTER III.
DEATH AT REDSTONE HALL.
For two days after the morning of which we have written, Colonel Raymond
lay in a kind of stupor from which he would rouse at intervals, and
pressing the hand of his son who watched beside him, he would whisper
faintly, “God bless you for making your old father so happy. God bless
you, my darling boy.”
And Frederic, as often as he heard these words, would lay his aching
head upon the pillow and try to force back the thoughts which
continually whispered to him that a bad promise was better broken than
kept, and that at the last he would tell Marian all, and throw himself
upon her generosity. Since the morning when he made the fatal promise he
had said but little to her, though she had been often in the room,
ministering to his father’s comfort—and once in the evening when he
looked more than usually pale and weary, she had insisted upon taking
his place, or sharing at least in his vigils. But he had declined her
offer, and two hours later a slender little figure had glided
noiselessly into the room and placed upon the table behind him a waiter,
filled with delicacies which her own hand had prepared, and which she
knew from experience would be needed ere the long night was over. He did
not turn his head when she came in, but he knew whose step it was; and
in his heart he thanked her for her thoughtfulness, and compelled
himself to eat what she had brought because he knew how disappointed she
would be if in the morning she found it all untouched.
And still he was as far from loving her now as he had ever been; and on
the second night, as he sat by his sleeping father, he resolved, come
what might, he would retract the promise made under such excitement.
“When father wakes, I’ll tell him I cannot,” he said, and anxiously he
watched the clock, which pointed at last to midnight. The twelve long
strokes rang through the silent room, and with a short, quick gasp his
father woke.
“Frederic,” he said, and in his voice there was a tone never heard there
before. “Frederic, has the light gone out, or why is it so dark? Where
are you, my son? I cannot see.”
“Here, father—here I am,” and Frederic took in his the shriveled hand
which was cold with approaching death.
“Frederic, it has come at last, and I am going from you; but before I
go, lay your hand upon my brow, where the death sweat is standing, and
say again what you said two days ago. Say you will make Marian your
wife, and that until she is your wife she shall not know what I have
done, for that might influence her decision. The letter I have left for
her is in my private drawer, but you can keep the key.—Promise,
Frederic—promise both, for I am going very fast.”
Twice Frederic essayed to speak, but the words “I cannot” died on his
lips, and again the faint voice—fainter than when it spoke before, said,
“Promise, my boy, and save the name of Raymond from dishonor!”
It was in vain he struggled to resist his destiny.—The pleading tones of
his dying father prevailed. Isabel Huntington—Marian Lindsey—Redstone
Hall—everything seemed as nought compared with that father’s wishes and
falling on his knees the young man said, “Heaven helping me, father, I
will do both.”
“And as you have made me happy, so may you be happy and prospered all
the days of your life,” returned the father, laying his clammy hand upon
the brown hair of his son. “Tell Marian that dying I blessed her with
more than a father’s blessing, for she is very dear to me. And the
little helpless Alice—she has money of her own, but she must still live
with you and Marian. Be kind to the servants, Frederic. Don’t part with
a single one—and—and—can you hear me, boy? Keep your promise as you hope
for heaven hereafter.”
They were the last words the old man ever spoke—and when at last
Frederic raised his head he knew by the white face lying motionless upon
the pillow, that he was with the dead. The household was aroused, and
crowding round the door the negroes came, their noisy outcries grating
harshly on the ear of the young man, who felt unequal to the task of
stopping them. But when Marian came, a few low spoken words from her
quieted the tumult, and those whose services were not needed dispersed
to the kitchen, where, forgetful of their recent demonstrations of
grief, they speculated upon the probable result of their “old marster’s
death,” and wondered if with the new one they should lead as easy a life
as they had done heretofore.
The next morning the news spread rapidly, not only that Colonel Raymond
was dead, but also that he had died without a will—this last piece of
information being given by Lawyer Gibson, who, a little disappointed in
the result of his late visit to Redstone Hall, had several times in
public expressed his opinion that it was all the work of Frederic, who
wanted everything himself, and feared his father would leave something
to Marian Lindsey. This seemed very probable; and in the same breath,
with which they deplored the loss of Colonel Raymond, the neighbors
denounced his son as selfish and avaricious. Still he was now the
richest man in the county, and it would not be politic to treat him with
disrespect—so they came about him with words of sympathy and offers of
assistance, all of which he listened to abstractedly, and when they
asked for some directions as to the arrangements for the burial, he
answered, “I do not know—I am not myself to-day—but go to Marian. I will
abide by her decision.”
So to Marian they went; and hushing her own great grief—for she mourned
for the departed as for a well loved father—Marian told them what she
thought her guardian would wish that they should do. It is not customary
in Kentucky to keep the dead as long as at the North, and ere the sun of
the first day was low in the west a grave was made within an enclosure
near the river side, where the cedar and the fir were growing, and when
the sun was setting, a long procession wound slowly down the terraced
walk, bearing with them one who when they returned came not with them,
but was resting quietly where the light from the windows of his former
home could fall upon his peaceful grave.
CHAPTER IV.
KEEPING THE PROMISE.
Four weeks had passed away since Colonel Raymond was laid to rest. The
negroes, having finished their mourning at the grave and at church on
the Sabbath succeeding the funeral, had gone back to their old
lighthearted way of living, and outwardly there were no particular signs
of grief at Redstone Hall. But two there were who suffered keenly, and
suffered all the more that neither could speak to the other a word of
sympathy. With Alice Marian wept bitterly, feeling that she was indeed
homeless and friendless in the wide world. From Dinah she had heard the
story of the Will, and remembering the events of that morning when
Lawyer Gibson, as she supposed, had come to draw it, she thought it very
probable. Still this did not trouble her one half so much as the studied
reserve which Frederic manifested toward her. At the funeral he had
offered her his arm, walking with her to the grave and back; but since
that night he had kept aloof, seeing her only at the table, or when he
wished to ask some question which she alone could answer.
In the first days of her sorrow she had forgotten the letter which her
guardian had left for her, and when she did remember it and go to the
private drawer where he said it was, she found the drawer
locked.—Frederic had the key, of course, and thinking that if a wrong
had indeed been done to her, he knew it, too, she waited in hopes that
he would speak of it, and perhaps bring her the letter. But Frederic
Raymond had sworn to keep that letter from her yet awhile, and he dared
not break his vow. On the night after the burial he, too, had gone to
the private drawer, and, taking the undirected missive in his hand, had
felt strongly tempted to break its seal and read. But he had no right to
do that, he said; all that was required of him was to keep it from
Marian until such time as he was at liberty to let her read it. So, with
a benumbed sensation at his heart, he locked the drawer and left the
room, feeling that his own destiny was fixed, and that it was worse than
useless to struggle against it. He could not write to Isabel yet, but he
wrote to her mother, telling her of his father’s death, and saying he
did not know how long it would be ere they saw him again at New Haven.
This done, he sat down in a kind of torpor, and waited for circumstances
to shape themselves.—Marian would seek for her letter, he thought, and
missing the key, would come to him, and then—oh, how he hoped it would
be weeks and months before she came, for when she did he knew he must
tell her why it was withheld.
Meantime, Marian waited day after day vainly wishing that he would speak
to her upon the subject; but he did not, and at last, four weeks after
her guardian’s death, she sought the library again, but found the drawer
locked as usual.
“It is unjust to treat me so,” she said. “The letter is mine, and I have
a right to read it.”
Then, as she recalled the conversation which had passed between herself
and Colonel Raymond on that night when he first hinted of a wrong, she
wondered if he had said aught to Frederic of her. Most earnestly she
hoped not—and yet she was almost certain that he had, and this was why
Frederic treated her so strangely. “He hates me,” she said bitterly,
“because he thinks I want him—but he needn’t, for I wouldn’t have him
now, even if he knelt at my feet, and begged of me to be his wife; I’ll
tell him so, too, the first chance I get,” and sinking into the large
arm chair Marian laid her head upon the writing desk and wept.
The day had been rainy and dark, and as she sat there in the gathering
night and listened to the low moan of the October wind, she thought with
gloomy forebodings of the future, and what it would bring to her.
“Oh, it is dreadful to be so homeless—so friendless, so poor,” she
cried, and in that cry there was a note of desolation which touched a
chord of pity in the heart of him who stood on the threshold of the
door, silently watching the young girl as she battled with her stormy
grief.
He did not know why he had come to that room, and he surely would not
have come had he expected to find her there. But it could not now be
helped; he was there with her; he had witnessed her sorrow, and
involuntarily advancing toward her he laid his hand lightly upon her
shoulder and said, “Poor child, don’t cry so hard.”
She seemed to him a little girl, and as such he had addressed her; but
to the startled Marian it mattered not what he said—there was kindness
in his voice, and lifting up her face, which even in the darkness looked
white and worn, she sobbed, “Oh, Frederic, you don’t hate me, then?”
“Hate you, Marian,” he answered, “of course not. What put that idea into
your head?”
“Because—because you act so cold and strange, and don’t come near me
when my heart is aching so hard for him—your father.”
Frederic made no reply, and resolving to make a clean breast of it,
Marian continued, “There’s nobody to care for me now, and I wish you to
be my brother, just as you used to be, and if your father said any thing
else of me to you he didn’t mean it, I am sure; I don’t at any rate, and
I want you to forget it and not hate me for it. I’ll go away from
Redstone Hall if you say so, but you mustn’t hate me for what I could
not help. Will you, Frederic?” and Marian’s voice was again choked with
tears.
She had stumbled upon the very subject uppermost in Frederic’s mind, and
drawing a chair near to her, he said, “I will not profess to be ignorant
of what you mean, Marian. My father had some strange fancies at the
last, but for these you are not to blame. Did he say nothing to you of a
letter?”
“Yes, yes,” answered Marian quickly, “and I’ve been for it so many
times. Will you give it to me now, Frederic? It’s mine, you know,” and
Marian looked at him wistfully.
Frederic hesitated a moment, and misapprehending the motive of his
hesitancy, Marian continued,
“Do not fear what I may think. He said a wrong had been done to me, but
if it has not affected me heretofore, it surely will not now—and I loved
him well enough to forgive anything. Let me have the letter, won’t you?”
“Marian,” and Frederic trembled with strong emotion, “the night my
father died, I laid my hand upon his head and promised that you should
not see that letter until you were a bride.”
“A bride!” Marian exclaimed passionately, “I shall never be a
bride—never—certainly not yours!” and the little hands worked nervously
together, while she continued. “I asked you to forget that whim of your
father’s. He did not mean it—he would not have it so, and neither would
I,” and Frederic Raymond could almost see the angry flash of the blue
eyes turned so defiantly toward him.
Man-like he began to feel some interest now that there was opposition,
and to her exclamation “neither would I,” he replied softly, “Not if I
wish it, Marian?”
The tone rather than the words affected the young girl, thrilling her
with a new-born delight; and laying her hand again upon the desk, she
sobbed afresh, not impetuously, this time, but steadily, as if the
crying did her good. Greatly she longed for him to speak again, but he
did not. He was waiting for her, and drying her tears, she lifted up her
face, and in a voice which seemed to demand the truth, she said:
“Frederic, do you wish it? Here, almost in the room where your father
died, can you say to me truly that you wish me to be your wife?”
It was a perplexing question, and Frederic Raymond felt that he was
dealing falsely with her, but he made to her the only answer he
could—“Men seldom ask a woman to marry them unless they wish it.”
“I know,” returned Marian, “but—do—would you have thought of it if your
father had not first suggested it?”
“Marian,” said Frederic, “I am much older than yourself, and I might
never have thought of marrying you. He, however, gave me good reasons
why I should wish to have it so—in all sincerity I ask you to be my
wife. Will you, Marian? It seems soon to talk of these things, but he so
desired it.”
In her bewilderment Marian fancied he had said, “I do wish to have it
so,” but she would know another thing, and not daring to put the
question to him direct, she said, “Do men ever wish to marry one whom
they do not love?”
Frederic understood her at once, and for a moment felt strongly tempted
to tell her the truth, for in that case he was sure she would refuse to
listen to his suit and he would then be free, but his father’s presence
seemed over and around him, while Redstone Hall was too fair to be
exchanged for poverty; and so he answered, “I have always loved you as a
sister, and in time I will love you as you deserve. I will be kind to
you, Marian, and I think I can make you happy.”
He spoke with earnestness, for he knew he was deceiving the young girl,
and in his inmost soul he determined to repair the wrong by learning to
love her, as she said:
“And suppose I refuse you, what then?”
Marian spoke decidedly, and something in her manner startled Frederic,
who now that he had gone thus far, did not care to be thwarted.
“You will not refuse me, I am sure,” he said.—“We cannot live together
here just as we have done, for people would talk.”
“I can go away,” said Marian, mournfully, while Frederic replied,
“No, Marian, if you will not be my wife, _I_ must go away; Redstone Hall
cannot be the home of us both, and if you refuse I shall go—soon, very
soon.”
“Won’t you ever come back?” asked Marian, with childish simplicity; but
ere Frederic could answer, the door suddenly opened and old Dinah
appeared, exclaiming as her eye fell upon them, “For the dear Lord’s
sake, if you two ain’t settin’ together in the dark, when I’ve done
hunted everywhar for you,” and Dinah’s face wore a very knowing look, as
setting down the candle she departed, muttering, something about “when
me and Philip was young.”
The spell was broken for Marian, and starting up, she said, “I cannot
talk any more to-night. I’ll answer you some other time,” and she
hurried into the hall, where she stumbled upon Dinah, who greeted her
with “Ain’t you two kinder hankerin’ arter each other, ’case if you be,
it’s the sensiblest thing you ever done. Marster Frederic is the
likeliest, trimmest chap in Kentuck, and you’ve got an uncommon heap of
sense.”
Marian made no reply but darted up the stairs to her room, where she
could be alone to think. It seemed to her a dream, and yet she knew it
was a reality. Frederic had asked her to be his wife, and though she had
said to herself that she would not marry him even if he knelt at her
feet, she felt vastly like revoking that decision! If she were only sure
he loved her, or would love her; and then she recalled every word he had
said, wishing she could have looked into his face and seen what its
expression was. She did not think of the letter in her excitement.—She
only thought of Frederic’s question, and she longed for some one in whom
she could confide. Alice, who always retired early, was already asleep,
and as her soft breathing fell on Marian’s ear, she said, “Alice is much
wiser than children usually are at six and a half. I mean to tell her,”
and, stealing to the bedside, she whispered, “Alice, Alice, wake up a
moment, will you?”
Alice turned on her pillow, and when sure she was awake, Marian said
impetuously, “If you were me, would you marry Frederic Raymond?”
The blind eyes opened wide, as if they doubted the sanity of the
speaker; then quietly replying, “No, indeed, I wouldn’t,” Alice turned a
second time upon her pillow and slept again, while Marian, a good deal
piqued at the answer, tormented herself with wondering what the child
could mean, and why she disliked Frederic so much. The next morning it
was Alice who awoke Marian and said, “Was it a dream, or did you say
something to me last night about marrying Frederic?”
For a moment Marian forgot that the sightless eyes turned so inquiringly
toward her could not see, and she covered her face with her hands to
hide the blushes she knew were burning there.
“Say,” persisted Alice, “what was it?” and half willingly, half
reluctantly, Marian told of the strange request which Frederic had made,
saying nothing, however, of the letter, for if Colonel Raymond had done
her a wrong, she felt it a duty she owed his memory to keep it to
herself.
The darkened world in which Alice lived, had matured her other faculties
far beyond her age, and though not yet seven years old, she was in many
things scarcely less a child than Marian, whose story puzzled her, for
she could hardly understand how one who had seemed so much her companion
could think of being a married woman. Marian soon convinced her,
however, that there was a vast difference between almost seven and
almost sixteen, and still she was not reconciled.
“Frederic is well enough,” she said, “and I once heard Agnes Gibson say
he was the best match in the county, but somehow he don’t seem to like
you. Ain’t he stuck up, and don’t he know a heap more than you?”
“Yes, but I can learn,” answered Marian, sadly, thinking with regret of
the many hours she had played in the woods when she might have been
practising upon the piano, or reading the books which Frederic liked
best. “I can in time make a lady perhaps—and then you know if I don’t
have him, one of us must go away, for he said so.”
“Oh,” exclaimed Alice, catching her breath and drawing nearer to Marian,
“wouldn’t it be nice for you and me to live here all alone with Dinah,
and do just as we’re a mind to. Tell him you won’t, and let him go back
where he came from.”
“No,” returned Marian, “if either goes away, it will be me, for I’ve no
right here, and Frederic has.”
“You go away,” repeated Alice. “What could you do without Dinah?”
“I don’t know,” returned Marian mournfully, a dim foreboding as it were
of her dark future rising up before her. “I can’t sew—I don’t know
enough to teach, and I couldn’t do anything but die!”
This settled the point with Alice. She would rather Marian should marry
Frederic than go away and die, and so she said, “I’d have him, I
reckon,” adding quickly, “You’ll carry the keys, then, won’t you, and
give me all the preserves and cake I want?”
Thus was the affair amicably adjusted between the two, and when at the
breakfast table she met with Frederic, she was ready to answer his
question; but she chose to let him broach the subject, and this he did
do that evening when he found her alone in his father’s room. He had
decided that it was useless to struggle with his fate, and he resolved
to make the best of it. How far Redstone Hall, bank notes, stock and
real estate influenced this decision we cannot say, but he was sincere
in his intention of treating Marian well, and when he found her by
accident in his father’s room, he said to her kindly, “Can you answer me
now?”
Marian was not yet enough accustomed to the world to conceal whatever
she felt, and with the light of a new happiness shining on her childish
face, she went up to him, and laying her hand confidingly upon his, she
said, “I will marry you, Frederic, if you wish me to.”
A strange enigma is human nature. When the previous night she had
hesitated to answer, Frederic was conscious of a vague fear that she
might say no—and now that she had said yes, he felt less pleasure than
pain, for the die he knew was cast. A more observing eye than Marian’s
would have seen the dark shadow which flitted over his face, and the
sudden paling of his lips, but she did not; she only saw how he shook
off her hand without even so much as touching it, and all the novels she
had ever read would surely have sanctioned so modest a proceeding as
that! But novels, she reflected, were not true, and as she was an actor
in real life, she must accept whatever that life might bring. Still she
was not quite satisfied, and when Frederic, fancying he should feel
better if the matter were well over, said to her, “There is no reason
why we should delay—my father would wish the marriage to take place
immediately, and I will speak to Dinah at once,” she felt that with him
it was a mere form, and bursting into tears she said passionately, “You
are not obliged to marry me. I certainly did not ask you to.”
For a moment Frederic stood irresolute, and then he replied, “Don’t be
foolish, Marian, but take a common sense view of the matter. I am not
accustomed to love-making, and the character would not suit me now when
my heart is so full of sorrow for my father. Many a one would gladly
take your place, but”—here he paused, uncertain how to proceed and still
keep truth upon his side—then, as a bright thought struck him, he added,
“but I prefer you to all the girls in Kentucky. Be satisfied with this,
and wait patiently for the time when I can show you that I love you.”
His manner both frightened and fascinated Marian, and she answered
through her tears, “I will be satisfied, and wait.”
Frederic knew well that Marian was too much of a child to manage the
affair, and after his interview with her, he sought out Dinah, to whom
he announced his intentions.
“There is no need of delay,” he said, “and two weeks from to-day is the
time appointed. There will be no show—no parade—simply a quiet wedding
in the presence of a few friends, who will dine with us, of course. The
dinner, you must see to, and I will attend to the rest.”
Amid ejaculations of surprise and delight, old Dinah heard what he had
to say—and then, boiling over with the news, hastened to the kitchen,
where she was soon surrounded by an astonished and listening audience,
the various members of which were affected differently, just according
to their different ideas of what “marster Frederic’s” wife ought to be.
Among the negroes at Redstone Hall were two distinct parties, one of
which having belonged to Mr. Higgins, the former owner of the place,
looked rather contemptuously upon the other clique, who had been
purchased of Mr. Smithers, a neighboring planter, and were not supposed
to have as high blood in their veins as was claimed by their darker
rivals. Hence between the democratic Smitherses and the aristocratic
Higginses was waged many a fierce battle, which was usually decided by
old Dinah, who, having belonged to another family still, “thanked the
Lord that she was neither a Higginses nor a Smitherses, but was a peg or
so above such low-lived truck as them.”
On this occasion the announcement of Master Frederic’s expected marriage
was received by the Smitherses with loud shouts of joy and hurrahs for
Miss Marian. The Higginses, on the contrary, though friendly to Marian,
declared she was not high bred enough to keep up the glory of the house,
and Aunt Hetty, who led the clan and was a kind of rival to old Dinah,
launched forth into a wonderful stream of eloquence.
“Miss Marian would do in her place,” she said, “but ’twas a burnin’
shame to set such an onery thing over them as had been oncet used to the
quality. ’Twas different with the Smitherses, whose old Miss was bed rid
with a spine in her back, and hadn’t but one store carpet in the house.
But the Higginses, she’d let ’em know, had been ’customed to sunthin’
better. Oh,” said she, “you or’to seen Miss Beatrice the fust day
Marster brought her home. She looked jest like a queen, with that great
long switchin’ tail to her dress, a wipin’ up the walk so clean that I,
who was a gal then, didn’t have to sweep it for mor’n a week—and them
_ars_ she put on when she curchied inter the room and walkin’ backards
sot down on the rim of the cheer—so”—and holding out her short
linsey-woolsey to its widest extent, the old negress proceeded to
illustrate.
But alas for Aunt Hetty—her intention was anticipated by stuttering
Josh, the most mischievous spirit of all the Smithers clan. Quick as
thought the active boy removed the chair where she expected to land,
pushing into its place an overflowing slop-pail, and into this the
discomfited old lady plunged amid the execrations of her partisans and
the jeers of her opponents.
“You Josh—you villain—the Lord spare me long enough to break yer sassy
neck!” she screamed, as with difficulty she extricated herself from her
position and wrung her dripping garments.
“Sarved you right,” said Dinah, shaking her fat sides with delight.
“Sarved you right, and the fust one that raises thar voice agin Miss
Marian ’ll catch sunthin’ a heap wus than dirty dishwater.”
But Dinah’s threat was unnecessary, for with Hetty’s downfall the star
of the Higginses set, leaving that of the Smitherses still in the
ascendant!
Meantime Marian was confiding to Alice the story of her engagement, and
wondering if Frederic intended taking a bridal tour. She hoped he did,
for she so much wished to see a little of the world, particularly New
York, of which she had heard such glowing accounts. But nothing could be
less in accordance with Frederic’s feelings than a bridal tour—and when
once Marian ventured to broach the subject, he said that under the
circumstances it would hardly be right to go off and enjoy themselves,
so they had better stay quietly at home. And this settled the point, for
Marian never thought of questioning his decision. If they made no
journey, she would not need any additions to her wardrobe, and she was
thus saved from the trouble which usually falls to the lot of
brides.—Still it was not at all in accordance with her ideas—this
marrying without a single article of finery, and once she resolved to
indulge in a new dress at least. She had ample means of her own, for her
guardian had been lavish of his money, always giving her far more than
she could use, and during the last year she had been saving a fund for
the purpose of surprising Alice and the blacks with handsome Christmas
presents.—The former was to have a little gold watch, which she had long
desired, because she liked to hear it tick—but the watch and the dress
could not both be bought, and when she considered this, Marian
generously gave up the latter for the sake of pleasing the blind girl.
Among her dresses was a neat, white muslin given her by Colonel Raymond
only the Summer previous, and this she decided should be the wedding
robe, for black was gloomy, she said, and would almost seem ominous of
evil.
And so the childish bride elect made her simple arrangements, unassisted
by any one save Dinah and the little Alice, the latter of whom was
really of the most service, for old Dinah spent the greater portion of
her time in grumbling because “Marster Frederic didn’t act more
lover-like to his wife that was to be.”
Marian, too, felt this keenly, but she would not admit it, and she said
to Dinah, “You can’t expect him to be like himself when he’s mourning
for his father.”
“Mournin’ for his father,” returned Dinah,—“and what if he is? Can’t a
fellow kiss a gal and mourn a plenty too? Taint no way to do to mope
from mornin’ till night like you was gwine to the gallus. Me and Phil
didn’t act that way when he was settin’ to me—but I ’spect they’ve done
got some new fangled way of courtin’ jest as they hev for everything
else—but I’m satisfied with the old fashion, and I wish them fetch-ed
Yankees would mind their own business and let well ’nough alone.”
Dinah felt considerably relieved after this long speech, particularly as
she had that very morning made it in substance to Frederic—and when that
evening she saw the young couple seated upon the same sofa, and
tolerably near to each other, she was sure she had done some good by
“ginnen ’em a piece of her mind.”
Among the neighbors there was a great deal of talk, and occasionally a
few of them called at Redstone Hall, but these only came to go away
again, and comment on Frederic’s strange taste in marrying one so young,
and so wholly unlike himself. It could not be, they said, that he had
really cared about the Will, else why had he so soon taken Marian to
share his fortune with him? But Frederic kept his own counsel, and once
when questioned on the subject of his marriage and asked if it were not
a sudden thing, he answered haughtily, “Of course not—it was decided
years ago, when Marian first came to live with us.”
And so amid the speculations of friends, the gossip of Dinah, the joyous
anticipations of Marian, and the harrowing doubts of Frederic, the two
weeks passed away, bringing at last the eventful day when Redstone Hall
was to have once more a mistress.
CHAPTER V.
THE BRIDAL DAY.
“It was the veriest farce in all the world, the marriage of Frederic
Raymond with a child of fifteen;” at least so said Agnes Gibson of
twenty-five, and so said sundry other guests who at the appointed hour
assembled in the parlor of Redstone Hall, to witness the sacrifice—not
of Frederic as they vainly imagined, but of the unsuspecting Marian.
He knew what he did, and why he did it, while she, blindfolded as it
were, was about to leap into the uncertain future. No such gloomy
thoughts as these, however, intruded themselves upon her mind as she
stood before her mirror and with trembling fingers made her simple
bridal toilet. When first the idea of marrying Frederic was suggested to
her nearly as much pride as love had mingled in her thoughts, for Marian
was not without her ambition, and the honor of being the mistress of
Redstone Hall had influenced her decision. But during the two weeks
since her engagement, her heart had gone out toward him with a deep
absorbing love, and had he now been the poorest man in all the world and
she a royal princess, she would have spurned the wealth that kept her
from him, or gladly have laid it at his feet for the sake of staying
with him and knowing that he wished it. And this was the girl whom
Frederic Raymond was about to wrong by making her his wife when he knew
he did not love her. But she should never know it, he said—should never
suspect that nothing but his hand and name went with the words he was so
soon to utter, and he determined to be true to her and faithful to his
marriage vow.
Some doubt he had as to the effect his father’s letter might have upon
her, and once he resolved that she should never see it; but this was an
idle thought, not to be harbored for a moment. He had told her when she
asked him for it the last time that she should have it on her bridal
day; for so his father willed it, and he would keep his word. He had
written to Isabel at the very last, for though he was not bound to her
by a promise he knew an explanation of his conduct was due to her, and
he forced himself to write it. Not a word did he say against Marian, but
he gave her to understand that but for his father the match would never
have been made—that circumstances over which he had no control compelled
him to do what he was doing. He should never forget the pleasant hours
spent in her society, he said, and he closed by asking her to visit the
future Mrs. Raymond at Redstone Hall. It cost him a bitter struggle to
write thus indifferently to one he loved so well, but it was right, he
said, and when the letter was finished he felt that the last tie which
bound him to Isabel was sundered, and there was nothing for him now but
to make the best of Marian. So when on their bridal morning she came to
him and asked his wishes concerning her dress, he answered her very
kindly, “As you are in mourning you had better make no change, besides I
think black very becoming to your fair complexion.”
This was the first compliment he had ever paid her, and her heart
thrilled with delight, but when, as she was leaving the room he called
her back and said, still gently, kindly, “Would you as soon wear your
hair plain? I do not quite fancy ringlets,” her eyes filled with tears,
for she remembered the cork-screw curls, and glancing in the mirror at
her wavy hair, she wished it were possible to remedy the defect.
“I will do the best I can,” she said, and returning to her room, she
commenced her operations, but it was a long, tedious process, the
combing out of those curls, for her hair was tenacious of its rights,
and even when she thought it subdued and let go of the end, it rolled up
about her forehead in tight round rings, as if spurning alike both water
and brush.
“I’d like to see the man what could make me yank out my wool like that,”
muttered Dinah, who was watching the straightening process with a
lowering brow, inasmuch as it reflected dishonor upon her own crisped
locks. “If the Lord made yer har to curl, war it so, and not mind every
freak of his’n. Fust you know, he’ll be a-wantin’ you to war yer face on
t’other side of yer head, but ’taint no way to do. You must begin as you
can hold out. In a few hours you’ll have as much right here as he has,
and I’d show it, too, by pitchin’ inter us niggers and jawin’ to kill. I
shall know you don’t mean nothin’ and shan’t keer. Come to think on’t,
though, I reckon you’d better let me and the Smitherses be and begin
with them Higginses. I’d give it to old Hetty good—she ’sarves to be
took down a button hole lower, if ever a nigger did, for she said a heap
o’ stuff about you.”
Marian smiled a kind of quiet happy smile and went on with her task,
which was finished at last, and her luxuriant hair was bound at the back
of her head in a large flat knot. The effect was not becoming and she
knew it, but if Frederic liked it she was satisfied, even if Dinah did
demur, telling her she looked like “a cat whose ears had been boxed.”
Frederic did not like it, but after the pains she had taken he would not
tell her so, and when she said to him, “I am ready,” he offered her his
arm and went silently down the stairs to the parlor, where guests and
clergymen were waiting.
The day was bright and beautiful, for the light of the glorious Indian
Summer sun was resting on the Kentucky hills, and through the open
window the murmuring ripple of the Elkhorn came, while the balmy breath
of the south wind swept over the white face of the bride, and lifted
from her neck the few stray locks which, escaping from their
confinement, curled naturally in their accustomed place. But to the
assembled guests there seemed in all a note of sadness, a warning voice
which said the time for this bridal was not yet; and years after, when
the beautiful mistress of Redstone Hall rode by in her handsome
carriage, Agnes Gibson told to her little sister how on that November
day the cheeks of both bride and bridegroom paled as if with mortal fear
when the words were spoken which made them one.
Whether it were the newness of her position, or a presentiment of coming
evil Marian could not tell, but into her heart there crept a chill as
she glanced timidly at the man who stood so silently beside her, and
thought, “He is my husband.” It was, indeed, a sombre wedding—“more like
a funeral,” the guests declared, as immediately after dinner they took
their leave and commented upon the affair as people always will. Oh, how
Frederic longed yet dreaded to have them go. He could not endure their
congratulations, which to him were meaningless, and he had no wish to be
alone. He was recovering from his apathy, and could yesterday have been
his again, he believed he would have broken his promise. But yesterday
had gone and to-morrow had come—it was to-day, now, with him, and Marian
was his wife. Turn which way he would, the reality was the same, and
with an intense loathing of himself and a deep pity for her, he feigned
some trivial excuse and went away to his room, where, with the gathering
darkness and his own wretched thoughts, he would be alone.
With strange unrest Marian wandered from room to room, wondering if
Frederic had so soon grown weary of her presence, and sometimes half
wishing that she were Marian Lindsey again, and that the new name by
which they called her belonged to some one else. At last, when it was
really dark—when the lamps were lighted in the parlor and Alice had wept
a bitter, passionate good night in her arms and gone to sleep, she
bethought her of the letter. She could read it now. She had complied
with all the stipulations, and there was no longer a reason why it
should be withheld. She went to Frederic’s door; but he was not there,
and a servant passing in the hall said he had returned to the parlor
while she was busy with Alice. So to the parlor Marian went, finding him
sitting unemployed and wrapped in gloomy thought. He heard her step upon
the carpet, but standing in the shadow as she did, she could not see the
look of pain which flitted over his face at her approach.
“Frederic,” she said, “I may read the letter now—will you give me the
key?”
Mechanically he did as she desired, and then with a slightly uneasy
feeling as to the effect the letter might have upon her, he went back to
his reflections, while she started to leave the room. When she reached
the door she paused a moment and looked back. In giving her the key he
had changed his position, and she could see the suffering expression of
his white face. Quickly returning to his side, she said anxiously, “Are
you sick?”
“Nothing but a headache. You know I am accustomed to that,” he replied.
Marian hesitated a moment—then parting the damp brown hair from off his
forehead she kissed him timidly and left the room. Involuntarily
Frederic raised his hand to wipe the spot away, but something stayed the
act and whispered to him that a wife’s first kiss was a holy thing and
could never be repeated!
Through the hall the nimble feet of Marian sped until she stood within
her late guardian’s room, and there she stopped, for the atmosphere
seemed oppressive and laden with terror.
“’Tis because it’s so dark,” she said, and going out into the hall, she
took a lamp from the table and then returned.
But the olden feeling was with her still—a feeling as if she were
treading some fearful gulf, and she was half tempted to turn back even
now, and ask Frederic to come with her while she read the letter.
“I will not be so foolish, though,” she said, and opening the library
door she walked boldly in; but the same Marian who entered there never
came out again!
CHAPTER VI.
READING THE LETTER.
Oh, how still it was in that room, and the click of the key as it turned
the slender bolt echoed through the silent apartment, causing Marian to
start as if a living presence had been near. The drawer was opened, and
she held the letter in her hand, while unseen voices seemed whispering
to her, “Oh, Marian, Marian—leave the letter still untouched. Do not
seek to know the secret it contains, but go back to the man who is your
husband, and by those gentle acts which seldom fail in their effect, win
his love. It will be far more precious to you than all the wealth of
which you are the unsuspecting heiress.”
But Marian did not understand—nor know why it was she trembled so. She
only knew she had the letter in her hand—her letter—the one left by her
guardian. It bore no superscription, but it was for her, of course, and
fixing herself in a comfortable position, she broke the seal and read:
“_My Dear Child_:”
There was nothing in those three words suggestive of a mistake—and
Marian read on till, with a quick, nervous start, she glanced forward,
then backward—and then read on and on, until at last not even the fear
of death itself could have stopped her from that reading. That letter
was never intended for her eye—she knew that now, but had the cold hand
of her guardian been interposed to wrest it from her, she would have
held it fast until she learned the whole. Like coals of living fire, the
words burned into her soul, scorching, blistering as they burned—and
when the letter was finished she fell upon her face with a cry so full
of agony and horror that Frederic in the parlor heard the wail of human
anguish, and started to his feet, wondering whence it came.
With the setting of the sun the November wind had risen, and as the
young man listened it swept moaning past the window, seeming not unlike
the sound he had first heard. “It was the wind,” he said, and he resumed
his seat, while, in that little room, not very far away, poor Marian
came back to consciousness, and crouching on the floor, prayed that she
might die. She understood it now—how she had been deceived, betrayed,
and cruelly wronged. She knew, too, that she was the heiress of untold
wealth, and for a single moment her heart beat with a gratified pride,
but the surprise was too great to be realized at once, and the feeling
was soon absorbed in the reason why Frederic Raymond had made her his
wife. It was not herself he had married, but her fortune—her
money—Redstone Hall. She was merely a necessary incumbrance, which he
would rather should have been omitted in the bargain. The thought was
maddening, and, stretching out her arms, she asked again that she might
die.
“Oh, why didn’t he come to me?” she cried, “and tell me? I would gladly
have given him half my fortune—yes, all—all—rather than be the wretched
thing I am, and he would have been free to love and marry this—”
She could not at first speak the name of her rival—but she said it at
last, and the sound of it wrung her heart with a new and torturing pain.
She had never heard of Isabel Huntington before, and as she thought how
beautiful and grand she was, she whispered to herself, “Why didn’t he go
back to her, and leave me, the red-headed fright, alone? Yes, that was
what he wrote to his father. Let me look at it again,” and the tone of
her voice was bitter and the expression of her face hard and stony, as
taking up the letter she read for the second time that “she was uncouth,
uneducated and ugly,” and if his father did not give up that foolish
fancy, Frederic would positively “hate the red-headed fright.” Her
guardian had not given up the foolish fancy, consequently there was but
one inference to be drawn.
In her excitement she did not consider that Frederic had probably
written of her harsher things than he really meant. She only thought,
“He loathes me—he despises me—he wishes I was dead—and I dared to kiss
him too,” she added. “How he hated me for that, but ’twas the first, and
it shall be the last, for I will go away forever and leave him Redstone
Hall, the bride he married a few hours ago,” and laying her face upon
the chair Marian thought long and earnestly of the future. She had come
into that room a happy, simple-hearted, confiding child, but she had
lived years since, and she sat there now a crushed but self-reliant
woman, ready to go out and contend with the world alone. Gradually her
thoughts and purposes took a definite form. She was ignorant of the
knotty points of law, and she did not know but Frederic could get her a
divorce, but from this publicity she shrank. She could not be pointed at
as a discarded wife. She would rather go away where Frederic would never
see nor hear of her again, and she fancied that by so doing he would
after a time at least be free to marry Isabel. She had not wept before,
for her tears seemed scorched with pain, but at the thought of another
coming there to take the place she had hoped to fill, they rained in
torrents over her white face, and clasping her little hands convulsively
together, she cried—“How can I give him up when I love him so much—so
much?”
Gradually there stole over her the noble, unselfish thought, that
because she loved him so much, she would willingly sacrifice herself and
all she had for the sake of making him happy—and then she grew calm
again and began to decide where she would go. Instinctively her mind
turned toward New York city as the great hiding place from the world.
Mrs. Burt, the woman who had lived with them in Yonkers, and who had
always been so kind to her, was in New York she knew, for she had
written to Colonel Raymond not long before his death, asking if there
was anything in Kentucky for her son Ben to do. This letter her guardian
had answered and then destroyed with many others, which he said were of
no consequence, and only lumbered up his drawer. Consequently there was
no possibility that this letter would suggest Mrs. Burt to Frederic, who
had never seen her, she having come and gone while he was away at
school, and thus far the project was a safe one. But her name—she might
some time be recognized by that, and remembering that her mother’s
maiden name was _Mary Grey_, and that Frederic, even if he had ever
known it, which was doubtful, had probably forgotten it, she resolved
upon being henceforth MARIAN GREY, and she repeated it aloud, feeling
the while that the change was well—for she was no longer the same girl
she used to know as Marian Lindsey. Once she said softly to herself,
“Marian Raymond,” but the sound grated harshly, for she felt that she
had no right to bear that name.
This settled, she turned her thoughts upon the means by which New York
was to be reached, and she was glad that she had not bought the dress,
for now she had ample funds with which to meet the expense, and she
would go that very night, before her resolution failed her. Redstone
Hall was only two miles from the station, and as the evening train
passed at half-past nine, there would be time to reach it, and write a
farewell letter, too, to Frederic, for she must tell him how, though it
broke her heart to do it, she willingly gave him everything, and hoped
he would be happy when she was gone forever. Marian was beautiful then
in her desolation, and so Frederic Raymond would have said, could he
have seen her with the light of her noble sacrifice of self shining in
her eyes, and the new-born, womanly expression on her face. The first
fearful burst was over, and calmly she sat down to her task—but the
storm rose high again as she essayed to write that good-by, which would
seem to him who read it a cry of despair wrung from a fainting heart.
“Frederic—_dear Frederic_,” she began, “can I—may I say _my husband_
once—just once—and I’ll never insult you with that name again?
“I am going away forever, Frederic, and when you are reading this I
shall not be at Redstone Hall, nor anywhere around it. Do not try to
find me. It is better you should not. Your father’s letter, which was
intended for you, and by mistake has come to me, will tell you why I go.
I forgive your father, Frederic—fully, freely forgive him—but _you_—oh,
Frederic, if I loved you less I should blame you for deceiving me so
cruelly. If you had told me all I would gladly have shared my fortune
with you. I would have given you more than half, and when you brought
that beautiful Isabel home I would have loved her as a sister.
“Why didn’t you, Frederic? What made you treat me so? What made you
break my heart when you could have helped it? It aches so hard now as I
write, and the hardest pain of all is the loss of faith in you. I
thought you so noble, so good, and I may confess to you here on paper, I
loved you so much—how much you will never know, for I shall never come
back to tell you.
“And I kissed you, too. Forgive me for that, Frederic. I didn’t know
then how you hated me.—Wash the stain from your forehead, can’t you?—and
don’t lay it up against me. If I thought I could make you love me, I
would stay. I would endure torture for years if I knew the light was
shining beyond, but it cannot be. The sight of me would make you hate me
more. So I give everything I have to you and Isabel. You’ll marry her at
a suitable time, and when you see how well she becomes your home, you
will be glad I went away. If you must tell her of me, and I suppose you
must, speak kindly of me, won’t you?—You needn’t talk of me often, but
sometimes, when you are all alone, and you are sure she will not know,
think of poor little Marian, who gave her life away, that one she loved
the best in all the world might have wealth and happiness.
“Farewell, Frederic, farewell. Death itself cannot be harder than
bidding you good-by, and knowing it is for ever.”
And well might Marian say this, for it seemed to her that she dipped her
pen in her very heart’s blood, when she wrote that last adieu. She
folded up the letter and directed it to Frederic—then taking another
sheet she wrote to the blind girl:
“DEAREST ALICE—Precious little Alice. If my heart was not already
broken, it would break at leaving you. Don’t mourn for me much, darling.
Tell Dinah and Hetty, and the other blacks, not to cry—and if I’ve ever
been cross to them, they must forget it now that I am gone. God bless
you all. Good by—good by.”
The letters finished, she left them upon the desk, where they could not
help being seen by the first one who should enter—then stealing up the
stairs to the closet at the extremity of the hall, she put on her
bonnet, vail and shawl, and started for her purse, which was in the
chamber where Alice slept. Careful, very careful were her footsteps now,
lest she should waken the child, who, having cried herself to sleep, was
resting quietly. The purse was obtained, as was also a daguerreotype of
her guardian which lay in the same drawer—and then for a moment she
stood gazing at the little blind girl, and longing to give her one more
kiss; but she dared not, and glancing hurriedly around the room which
had been hers so long, she hastened down the stairs and out upon the
piazza. She could see the light from the parlor window streaming out
into the darkness, and drawing near she looked through blinding tears
upon the solitary man, who, sitting there alone, little dreamed of the
whispered blessings breathed for him but a few yards away. It seemed to
Marian in that moment of agony that her very life was going out, and she
leaned against a pillar to keep herself from falling.
“Oh, can I leave him?” she thought. “Can I go away forever, and never
see his face again or listen to his voice?” and looking up into the sky
she prayed that if in heaven they should meet again, he might know and
love her there for what she suffered here.
On the withered grass and leaves near by there was a rustling sound as
if some one was coming, and Marian drew back for fear of being seen, but
it was only Bruno, the large watch dog. He had just been released from
his kennel, and he came tearing up the walk, and with a low savage growl
sprang toward the spot where Marian was hiding.
“Bruno, good Bruno,” she whispered, and in an instant the fierce mastiff
crouched at her feet and licked her hand with a whining sound, as if he
suspected something wrong.
One more yearning glance at Frederic—one more tearful look at her old
home, and Marian walked rapidly down the avenue, followed by Bruno, who
could neither be coaxed nor driven back. It was all in vain that Marian
stamped her little foot, wound her arms round his shaggy neck, bidding
him return; he only answered with a faint whine quite as expressive of
obstinacy as words could have been. He knew Marian had no business to be
abroad at that hour of the night, and, with the faithfulness of his
race, was determined to follow. At length, as she was beginning to
despair of getting rid of him, she remembered how pertinaciously he
would guard any article which he knew belonged to the family—and on the
bridge which crossed the Elkhorn, she purposely dropped her glove and
handkerchief, the latter of which bore her name in full. The ruse was
successful, for after vainly attempting to make her know that she had
lost something, the dog turned back, and, with a loud, mournful howl,
which Marian accepted as his farewell, he laid himself down by the
handkerchief and glove, turning his head occasionally in the direction
Marian had gone, and uttering low plaintive howls when he saw she did
not return.
Meantime Marian kept on her way, striking out into the fields so as not
to be observed—and at last, just as the cars sounded in the distance,
she came up to a clump of trees growing a little to the left, and on the
opposite side of the road from that on which the depot stood. By getting
in here no one would see her at the station, and when the train stopped
she came out from her concealment, and bounding lightly upon the
platform of the rear car, entered unobserved. As the passengers were
sitting with their backs toward her, but one or two noticed her when she
came in, and these scarce gave her a thought, as she sank into the seat
nearest to the door, and drawing her vail over her face trembled
violently lest she should be recognized, or at least noted and
remembered. But her fears were vain, for no one there had ever seen or
heard of her—and in a moment more the train was moving on, and she,
heart-broken and alone, was taking her bridal tour!
CHAPTER VII.
THE ALARM.
In her solitary bed little Alice slumbered on, moaning occasionally in
her sleep, and at last when the clock struck nine, starting up and
calling “Marian, Marian, where are you?” Then, remembering that Marian
could not come to her that night, she puzzled her little brain with the
great mystery, and wept herself to sleep for the second time.
In the kitchen old Dinah was busy with various household matters. With
Frederic she had heard in the distance the bitter moan which Marian made
when first she learned how she had been deceived, and like him she had
wondered what the sound could be—then as a baby’s cry came from a cabin
near by, she had said to herself, “some of them Higgins brats, I’ll
warrant. They’re allus a squallin’,” and, satisfied with this
conclusion, she had resumed her work. Once or twice after that she was
in the house, feeling a good deal disturbed at seeing Frederic sitting
alone without his bride, who, she rightly supposed, “was somewhar. But
’taint no way,” she muttered; “Phil and me didn’t do like that;” then
reflecting that “white folks wasn’t like niggers,” she returned to the
kitchen just as Bruno set up his first loud howl. With Dinah the howl of
a dog was a sure sign of death, and dropping her tallow candle in her
fright, she exclaimed—“for the Lord’s sake who’s gwine to die now? I
hope to goodness ’taint me, nor Phil, nor Lid, nor Victory Eugeny,” and
turning to Aunt Hetty, who was troubled with vertigo, she asked if
“she’d felt any signs of an afterplax fit lately?”
“The Lord,” exclaimed old Hetty, “I hain’t had a drap o’ blood in me
this six month, and if Bruno’s howlin’ for me, he may as well save his
breath;” but in spite of this self-assurance, the old negress, when no
one saw her, dipped her head in a bucket of water by way of warding off
the danger.
Thus the evening wore away until at last Dinah, standing in the doorway,
heard the whistle of the train as it passed the Big Spring station.
“Who s’posed ’twas half-past nine,” she exclaimed. “I’ll go this minit
and see if Miss Marian wants me.”
Just then another loud piercing howl from Bruno, who was growing
impatient, fell upon her ear and arrested her movements.
“What can ail the critter,” she said—“and he’s down on the bridge, too,
I believe.”
The other negroes also heard the cry, which was succeeded by another and
another, and became at last one prolonged yell, which echoed down the
river and over the hills, starting Frederic from his deep reverie and
bringing him to the piazza, where the blacks had assembled in a body.
“’Spects mebbe Bruno’s done cotched somethin’ or somebody down thar,”
suggested Philip, the most courageous of the group.
“Suppose you go and see,” said Frederic, and lighting his old lantern
Philip sallied out, followed ere long by all his comrades, who, by
accusing each other of being “skeered to death,” managed to keep up
their own courage.
The bridge was reached, and in a tremor of delight Bruno bounded upon
Phil, upsetting the old man and extinguishing the light, so that they
were in total darkness. The white handkerchief, however, caught Dinah’s
eye, and in picking it up she also felt the glove, which was lying near
it. But this did not explain the mystery—and after searching in vain for
man, beast or hobgoblin, the party returned to the house, where their
master awaited them.
“Thar warn’t nothin’ thar ’cept this yer rag and glove,” said Dinah,
passing the articles to him.
He took them, and going to the light saw the name upon the handkerchief,
“Marian Lindsey.” The glove too, he recognised as belonging to her, and
with a vague fear of impending evil, he asked where they found them.
“On the bridge,” answered Dinah; “somebody must have drapped ’em. That
handkercher looks mighty like Miss Marian’s hem-stitched one.”
“It is hers,” returned Frederic—“do you know where she is?”
“You is the one who orto know that, I reckon,” answered Dinah, adding
that she “hadn’t seen her sense jest after dark, when she went up stars
with Alice.”
Frederic was interested now. In his abstraction he had not heeded the
lapse of time, though he wondered where Marian was, and once feeling
anxious to know what she would say to the letter, he was tempted to go
in quest of her. But he did not—and now, with a presentiment that all
was not right, he went to Alice’s chamber, but found no Marian there.
Neither was she in any of the chambers, nor in the hall, nor in the
dining room, nor in his father’s room, and he stood at last in the
library door. The writing desk was open, and on it lay three letters—one
for Alice, one for him, the other undirected. With a beating heart he
took the one intended for himself, and tearing it open, read it through.
When Marian wrote that “she gave her life away,” she had no thought of
deceiving him, for her giving _him_ up was giving her very life. But he
did not so understand it, and sinking into a chair he gasped, “Marian is
dead!” while his face grew livid and his heart sick with the horrid
fear.
“Dead, Marster Frederic,” shrieked old Dinah—“who dars tell me my chile
is dead!” and bounding forward like a tiger, she grasped the arm of the
wretched man, exclaiming, “whar is she the dead? and what is she dead
for? and what’s that she’s writ that makes yer face as white as a piece
of paper?—Read, and let us hear.”
“I can’t, I can’t,” moaned the stricken man. “Oh, has it come to this?
Marian, Marian—won’t somebody bring her back?”
“If marster’ll tell me whar to look, I’ll find her, so help me, Lord,”
said uncle Phil, the tears rolling down his dusky cheeks.
“You found her handkerchief upon the bridge,” returned Frederic, “and
Bruno has been howling there—don’t you see? She’s in the river!—She’s
drowned! Oh, Marian—poor Marian, I’ve killed her—but God knows I did not
mean to;” and in the very spot where not long before poor Marian had
fallen on her face, the desolate man how lay on his, and suffered in
part what she had suffered there.
It was a striking group assembled there. The bowed man, convulsed with
strong emotion, and clutching with one hand the letter which had done
the fearful work. The blacks gathered round, some weeping bitterly and
all petrified with terror, while into their midst when the storm was at
its hight the little Alice groped her way—her soft hair falling over her
white night dress, her blind eyes rolling round the room, and her quick
ear turned to catch any sound which might explain the strange
proceedings. She had been roused from sleep by the confusion, and
hearing the uproar in the hall and library, had felt her way to the
latter spot, where in the doorway she stood asking for Marian.
“Bless you, honey, Miss Marian’s dead—drownded,” said Dinah, and Alice’s
shriek mingled with the general din.
“Where’s Frederic?” asked the little girl, feeling intuitively that he
was the one who needed the most sympathy.
At the sound of his name Frederic lifted up his head, and taking the
child in his arms, kissed her tenderly, as if he would thus make amends
for his coldness to the lost Marian.
“‘Tain’t no way to stay here like rocks,” said Uncle Phil at last. “If
Miss Marian’s in the river, we’d better be a fishin’ her out,” and the
practical negro proceeded to make the necessary arrangements.
Before he left the room, however, he would know if he were working for a
certainty, and turning to his master, said, “Have you jest cause for
thinkin’ she’s done drownded herself—’case if you hain’t, ’taint no use
huntin’ this dark night, and it’s gwine to rain, too. The clouds is
gettin’ black as pitch.”
Thus appealed to, Frederic answered, “She says in the letter that she’s
going away forever, that she shall not come back again, and she spoke of
giving her life away. You found her handkerchief and glove upon the
bridge, with Bruno watching near, and she is gone. Do you need more
proof?”
Uncle Phil did not, though “he’d jest like to know,” he said, “why a gal
should up and dround herself on the very fust night arter she’d married
the richest and han’somest chap in the county—but thar was no tellin’
what gals would do. Gener’ly, though, you could calkerlate on thar doin’
jest con-tra-ry to what you’d ’spect they would, and if Miss Marian
preferred the river to that twenty-five pound feather-bed that Dinah
spent mor’n an hour in makin’ up, ’twas her nater, and ’twan’t for him
to say agin it. All he’d got to do was to work!”
And the old man did work, assisted by the other negroes and those of the
neighbors who lived near to Redstone Hall. Frederic, too, joined, or
rather led the search. Bareheaded, and utterly regardless of the rain
which, as Uncle Phil had prophesied, began to fall in torrents, he gave
the necessary directions, and when the morning broke, few would have
recognized the elegant bridegroom of the previous day in the
white-faced, weary man, who, with soiled garments and dripping hair,
stood upon the narrow bridge, and in the grey November morning looked
mournfully down the river as it went rushing on, telling no secret, if
secret, indeed, there were to tell, of the wild despair which must have
filled poor Marian’s heart and maddened her brain ere she sought that
watery grave.
Before coming out he had hurriedly read his father’s letter, and he
could well understand how its contents broke the heart of the wretched
girl, and drove her to the desperate act which he believed she had
committed.
“Poor Marian,” he whispered to himself, “I alone am the cause of your
sad death;” and most gladly would he then have become a beggar and
earned his bread by the sweat of his brow, could she have come back
again, full of life, of health and hope, just as she was the day before.
But this could not be, for she was dead, he said, dead beyond a doubt;
and all that remained for him to do was to find her body and lay it
beside his father. So during that day the search went on, and crowds of
people were gathered on each side of the river, but no trace of the lost
one could be found, and when a second time the night fell dark and heavy
round Redstone Hall, it found a mournful group assembled there.
To Alice Frederic had read the letter left for her, and treasuring up
each word the child groped her way into the kitchen, where, holding the
note before her sightless eyes as if she could really see, she repeated
it to the assembled blacks,
“Lor’ bless the child,” sobbed Dinah from behind her woolen apron, “I
knowed she would remember me.”
“And me,” joined in Hetty. “Don’t you mind how I is spoke of, too? She
was a lady, every inch of her, Miss Marian was, an’ if I said any
badness of her, I want you to forgive me, Dinah. Here’s my hand,” and
these two old ladies took each other’s hand in token that they were
joined together now in one common sorrow.
Indeed, for once, the Higginses and Smitherses forgot their ancient feud
and united in extolling the virtues of the lost one. After reading the
letter as many as three times—for when their grief had somewhat
subsided, the blacks would ask to hear it again, so as to have fresh
cause for tears—Alice returned to the parlor, where she knew Frederic
was sitting. Her own heart was throbbing with anguish, but she felt that
his was a sorrow different from her own, and feeling her way to where he
sat she wound her little arms around his neck, and whispered tenderly:
“We must love each other more now that Marian is gone.”
He made no answer except to take her on his lap and lay her head upon
his bosom; but Alice was satisfied with this, and after a moment she
said, “Frederic, do you know why Marian killed herself?”
“Oh, Alice, Alice,” he groaned. “Don’t say those dreadful words. I
cannot endure the thought.”
“But,” persisted the child, “she couldn’t have known what she was doing,
and God forgave her.—Don’t you think He did? She asked him to, I am
sure, when she was sinking in the deep water.”
The child’s mind had gone further after the lost one than Frederic’s
had, and her question inflicted a keener pang than any he had felt
before. He had ruined Marian, body and soul, and Alice felt his hot
tears dropping on her face as he made her no reply. Her faith was
stronger than his, and putting up her waxen hand, she wiped his tears
away, saying to him, “We shall meet Marian again, I know, and then if
you did anything naughty which made her go away, you can tell her you
are sorry, and she’ll forgive you, for she loved you very much.”
Alice’s words were like arrows to the heart of the young man, and still
he felt in the first hours of his desolation that she was his comforting
angel, and he could not live without her. More than once she asked him
if he knew why Marian went away, and at last he made her answer, “Yes,
Alice, I do know, but I cannot tell you now. You would not understand
it.”
“I think I should,” persisted the child, “and I should feel so much
better if I knew there was a reason.”
Thus importuned, Frederic replied, “I can only tell you that she thought
I did not love her.”
“And did you, Frederic. Did you love her as Marian ought to be loved?”
The large brown blind eyes looked earnestly into his face, and with that
gaze upon him Frederic Raymond could not tell a lie, so he was silent,
and Alice, feeling that she was answered, continued, “But you would love
her now if she’d come back.”
He couldn’t say yes to that, either, for he knew he did not love her
even then, though he thought of her as a noble, generous hearted
creature, worthy of a far different fate than had befallen her—and had
she come back to him, he would have striven hard to make the love which
alone could atone for what she had endured. But she did not come—and day
after day went by, during which the search was continued at intervals,
and always with the same result—until when a week was gone and there was
still no trace of her found, people began to suggest that she was not in
the river at all, but had gone off in another direction.—Frederic,
however, was incredulous—she had no money that he or any one else knew
of, or at least but very little. She had never been away from home
alone, and if she had done so now, somebody would have seen her ere
this, and suspected who it was—for the papers far and near teemed with
the strange event, each editor commenting upon its cause according to
his own ideas, and all uniting in censuring the husband, who at last was
described as a cruel, unfeeling wretch, capable of driving any woman
from his house, particularly one as beautiful and accomplished as the
unfortunate bride! It was in vain that Frederic winced under the
annoyance—he could not help it—and the story went the rounds, improving
with each repetition, until at last an Oregon weekly outdid all the rest
by publishing the tale under the heading of “Supposed Horrible Murder.”
So much for newspaper paragraphs.
Meantime Frederic, too, inserted in the papers advertisements for the
lost one, without any expectation, however, that they would bring her
back. To him she was dead, even though her body could not be found.
There might be deep, unfathomable sink-holes in the river, he said, and
into one of these she had fallen—and so, with a crushing weight upon his
spirits, and an intense loathing of himself and the wealth which was his
now beyond a question, he gave her up as lost and waited for what would
come to him next.
Occasionally he found himself thinking of Isabel, and wondering what she
would say to his letter.—When he last saw her, she was talking of
visiting her mother’s half-brother, who lived at Dayton, Ohio, and he
had said to her at parting, “If you come as far as that, you must surely
visit Redstone Hall.”
But he had little faith in her coming—and now he earnestly hoped she
would not, for if he wronged the living he would be faithful to the
dead; and so day after day he sat there in his desolate home, brooding
over the past, trying to forget the present, and shrinking from the
future, which looked so hopeless now. Thoughts of Marian haunted him
continually, and in his dreams he often heard again the wailing sound,
which he knew must have been her cry when she learned how she had been
deceived. Gradually, too, he began to miss her presence—to listen for
her girlish voice, her bounding step and merry laugh, which he had once
thought rude. Her careful forethought for his comfort, too, he
missed—confessing in his secret heart at least that Redstone Hall was
nothing without Marian.
And now, with these influences at work to make him what he ought to be,
we leave him awhile in his sorrow, and follow the fugitive bride.
CHAPTER VIII.
MARIAN.
Onward and onward—faster and faster flew the night Express, and the
wishes of nearly all the passengers kept pace with the speed. One there
was, however, a pale faced, blue-eyed girl, who dreaded the time when
the cars would reach their destination, and she be in New York! How she
had come thus far safely she scarce could tell. She only knew that every
body had been kind to her, and asked her where she wished to go; until
now the last dreadful change was made—the blue Hudson was crossed—Albany
was far behind, and she was fast nearing New York. Night and day she had
traveled, always with the same dull, dreary sense of pain—the same idea
that to her the world would never be pleasant, the sunshine bright, or
the flowers sweet again. Nervously she shrank from observation—and once,
when a lady behind her, who saw that she was weeping, touched her
shoulder and said, “What is the matter, little girl?” she started with
fear, but did not answer until the question was repeated—then she
replied, “Oh, I’m so tired and sick, and the cars make such a noise!”
“Have you come far?” the lady asked, and Marian answered, “Yes, very,
very far,” adding, as she remembered with a shudder the din and
confusion of the larger cities, “Is New York a heap noisier than Albany
or Buffalo?”
“Why, yes,” returned the lady, smiling at the strange question. “Have
you never been there?”
“Once, when a child,” said Marian, and the lady continued, “You seem a
mere child now. Have you friends in the city?”
“Yes, all I have in the world, and that is only one,” sobbed Marian, her
tears falling fast at words of sympathy.
The lady was greatly interested in the child, as she thought her, and
had she been going to New York would have still befriended her, but she
left at Newburgh, and Marian was again alone. She had heard much of New
York, but she had no conception of it—and when at last she was there,
and followed a group through the depot up to Broadway, her head grew
dizzy and her brain whirled with the deafening roar. Cincinnati,
Louisville, Buffalo and Albany combined were nothing to this, and in her
confusion she would have fallen upon the pavement had not the crowd
forced her along. Once, as a richly dressed young lady brushed past her,
she raised her eyes meekly and asked where “Mrs. Daniel Burt lived?”
The question was too preposterous to be heeded, even if it were heard,
and the lady moved on, leaving Marian as ignorant as ever of Mrs. Burt’s
whereabouts. To two or three other ladies the same question was put, but
Mrs. Daniel Burt was evidently not generally known in New York, for no
one paid the slightest attention—except indeed to hold tighter their
purse-strings, as if there were danger to be apprehended from the
slender little figure which extended its ungloved hand so imploringly.
After a time, a woman from the country, who had not yet been through the
hardening process, listened to the question—and finding that Mrs. Daniel
Burt was no way connected with the Burts of Yates county, nor the
Blodgetts of Monroe, replied that she was a stranger in the city, and
knew no such person—but pretty likely Marian would find it in the
Directory—and as a regiment of soldiers just then attracted her
attention, she turned aside, while Marian, discouraged and sick at
heart, kept on her weary way, knowing nothing where she was going, and,
if possible, caring less. When she came opposite to Trinity Church, she
sank down upon the step, and drawing her vail over her face, half wished
that she might die and be buried there in the enclosure where she saw
the November sunshine falling on the graves. And then she wondered if
the roar of the great city didn’t even penetrate to the ears of the
sleeping dead, and, shudderingly, she said, “Oh, I would so much rather
be buried by the river at home in dear old Kentucky. It’s all so still
and quiet there.”
Gradually, as her weariness began to abate, she grew interested in
watching the passers-by, wondering what every body was going down that
street for, and why they came back so quick! Then she tried to count the
omnibuses, thinking to herself, “Somebody’s dead up town, and this is
the procession.” The deceased must have been a person of distinction,
she fancied, for the funeral train seemed likely never to end. And, what
was stranger than all, another was moving up while this was coming down!
Poor Marian! she knew but little of the great Babylon to which she had
so recently come, and she thought it made up of carts, hacks, omnibuses
and people—all hurrying in every direction as fast as they could go. It
made her feel dizzy and cross-eyed to look at them, and leaning back
against the iron railing, she fell into a kind of conscious sleep, in
which she never forgot for an instant the roar which troubled her so
much, or lost the gnawing pain at her heart. In this way she sat for a
long time, while hundreds and hundreds of people went by, some glancing
sideways at her, and thinking she did not look like an ordinary beggar,
while others did not notice her at all.
At last, as the confusion increased, she roused up, staring about her
with a wild, startled gaze. People were going home, and she watched them
as they struggled fiercely and ineffectually to stop some loaded
omnibus, and then rushed higher up to a more favorable locality.
“The funeral was over,” she said. The omnibuses were most all returning,
and though she had no idea of the lapse of time, she fancied that it
might be coming night, and the dreadful thought stole over her—“What
shall I do then? Maybe I’ll go in the church, though,” she added.
“Nobody, I am sure, will hurt me there,” and she glanced confidingly at
the massive walls which were to shield her from danger and darkness.
And while she sat there thus, the night shadows began to fall—the people
walked faster and faster—the omnibus drivers swore louder and longer—the
crowd became greater and greater—and over Marian there stole a horrid
dread of the hour when the uproar would cease—when Wall street would be
empty, the folks all gone, and she be there alone with the blear-eyed
old woman who had seated herself near by, and seemed to be watching her.
“I will ask once more,” she thought. “Maybe some of these people know
where she lives.” And, throwing back her vail, she half rose to her
feet, when a tall, disagreeable looking fellow bent over her and
said—“What can I do for you, my pretty lass?”
For an instant Marian’s heart stood still, for there was something in
the rowdy’s appearance exceedingly repulsive, but when he repeated his
question, she answered timidly, “I want to find Mrs. Daniel Burt.”
“Oh, yes, Mrs Daniel Burt. I know the old lady well—lives just round the
corner. Come with me and I’ll show you the way,” and the great red,
rough hand was about to touch the little slender white one resting on
Marian’s lap, when a blow from a brawny fist sent the rascal reeling
upon the pavement, while a round, good-humored face looked into
Marian’s, and a kindly voice said, “Did the villain insult you, little
girl?”
“Yes—I reckon not—I don’t know,” answered Marian, trembling with fright,
while her companion continued, “’Tis the first time he ever spoke civil
to a woman then. I know the scamp well—but what are you sittin’ here
alone for, when everybody else is goin’ hum?”
Marian felt intuitively that _he_ could be trusted, and she sobbed
aloud, “I havn’t any home, nor friends, nor anything.”
“Great Moses!” said the young man, scanning her closely, “you ain’t a
beggar—that’s as sure as my name is Ben Burt—and what be you sittin’
here for, any way?”
Marian did not heed his question, so eagerly did she catch at the name
Ben Burt.
“Oh, sir,” she exclaimed, grasping his arm, “are you any way related to
Mrs. Daniel Burt, who once lived with Colonel Raymond at Yonkers?”
“Wall, ra-ally now,” returned the honest-hearted Yankee, “if this don’t
beat all. I wouldn’t wonder if I was some connected to Mrs. Daniel Burt,
bein’ she brung me up from a little shaver, and has licked me mor’n a
hundred times. She’s my mother, and if it’s her you’re looking for we
may as well be travelin’, for she lives all of three miles from here.”
“Three miles!” repeated Marian, “that other man said just around the
corner. What made him tell such a lie?”
“You tell,” answered Ben, with a knowing wink, which however failed to
enlighten Marian, who was too glad with having found a protector to ask
many questions, and unhesitatingly taking Ben’s offered arm she went
with him up the street, until she found the car he wished to take.
When they were comfortably seated and she had leisure to examine him
more closely, she found him to be a tall, athletic, good-natured looking
young man, betraying but little refinement either in personal appearance
or manner, but manifesting in all he did a kind, noble heart, which won
her good opinion at once. Greatly he wondered who she was and whence she
came, but he refrained asking her any questions, thinking he should know
the whole if he waited. It seemed to Marian a long, long ride, and she
was beginning to wonder if it would never end, when Ben touched her arm
and signified that they were to alight.
“Come right down this street a rod or so and we’re there,” said he, and
following whither he led, Marian was soon climbing a long, narrow
stairway to the third story of what seemed to her a not very pleasant
block of buildings.
But if it were dreary without, the sight of a cheerful blazing fire,
which was disclosed to view as Ben opened a narrow door, raised her
spirits at once, and taking in at a glance the rag carpet, the stuffed
rocking chairs, the chintz-covered lounge, the neat-looking supper table
spread for two, and the neater looking woman who was making the toast,
she felt the pain at her heart give way a little, just a little, and
bounding toward the woman, she cried, “You don’t know me, I suppose. I
am Marian Lindsey, Colonel Raymond’s ward.”
Mrs. Burt, for it was she, came near dropping her plate of buttered
toast in her surprise, and setting it down upon the hearth, she
exclaimed, “The last person upon earth I expected to see. Where did you
come from, and how happened you to run afoul of Ben?”
“I ran afoul of her,” answered Ben. “I found her a cryin’ on the
pavement in front of Old Trinity, with that rascal of a Joe Black,
makin’ b’lieve he was well acquainted with you, and that you lived jest
round the corner.”
“Mercy me,” ejaculated Mrs. Burt, “but do tell a body what you’re here
for—not but I’m glad to see you, but it seems so queer. How is the old
Colonel, and that son I never see—Ferdinand, ain’t it—no Frederic,
that’s what they call him?”
At the mention of Frederic, Marian gave a choking sob and replied:
“Colonel Raymond is dead, and Frederic—oh, Mrs. Burt, please don’t ask
me about him now, or I shall surely die.”
“There’s some bedivilment of some kind, I’ll warrant,” muttered Ben, who
was a champion of all woman kind. “There’s been the old Harry to pay, or
she wouldn’t be runnin’ off here, the villain,” and in fancy he dealt
the unknown Frederic a far heavier blow than he had given the scapegrace
Joe.
“Well, never mind now,” said Mrs. Burt, soothingly. “Take off your
things and have some supper; you must be hungry, I’m sure. How long is
it since you ate?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” answered Marian, a deathlike paleness overspreading
her face; “not since yesterday, I reckon. Where am I? Everything is so
confused!” and overcome with hunger, exhaustion and her late fright,
Marian fainted in her chair.
Taking her in his arms as if she had been an infant, Ben carried her to
the spare room, which, in accordance with her New England habits, Mrs.
Burt always kept for company, and there on the softest of all soft beds
he laid her down; then, while his mother removed her bonnet and shawl,
he ran for water and camphor, chafing with his own rough fingers her
little clammy hands, and bathing her forehead until Marian came back to
consciousness.
“There, swaller some cracker and tea, and you’ll feel better directly,”
said Mrs. Burt; and, like a very child, Marian obeyed, feeling that
there was something delicious in being thus cared for after the dreadful
days she had passed. “You needn’t talk to us to-night. There will be
time enough to-morrow,” continued Mrs. Burt, as she saw her about to
speak; and fixing her comfortably in bed, she went back to Ben, to whom
she told all that she knew concerning Marian and the family with whom
she had lived.
“There’s something that ain’t just right, depend on’t,” said Ben,
sitting down at the table. “That Frederic has served her some mean
caper, and so she’s run away. But she hit the nail on the head when she
came here.”
By the time supper was over, Marian’s soft, regular breathing told that
she was asleep, and taking the lamp in his hand, the curious Ben stole
to see her. Her face was white as marble, and even in her sleep the
tears dropped from her long eye-lashes, affecting Ben so strangely that
his coat sleeve was more than once called in requisition to perform the
office of a handkerchief.
“Poor little baby! You’ve been misused the wust kind,” he whispered, as
with his great hand he brushed her tears away, and then went noiselessly
out, leaving her to her slumbers.
It was a deep, dreamless sleep which came to Marian that night, for her
strength was utterly exhausted, and in the atmosphere of kindness
surrounding her, there was something soothing to her irritated nerves.
But when the morning broke and the roar of the waking city fell again
upon her ear, she started up, and gazing about the room, thought, “where
am I, and what is it that makes my heart ache so?”
Full soon she remembered what it was, and burying her face in the
pillows, she wept again bitterly, wondering what they were doing far
away at Redstone Hall, and if anybody but Alice was sorry she had gone.
A moment after Mrs. Burt’s kind voice was heard asking how she was, and
bidding her be still and rest. But this it was impossible for Marian to
do. She could not lie there in that little room and listen to the din
which began to produce upon her the same dizzy, bewildering effect it
had done the previous day, when she sat on the pavement and saw the
omnibuses go by. She must be up and tell the kind people her story, and
then, if they said so, she would go away—go back to those graves she had
seen yesterday, and lying down in some hollow, where that horrid man and
blear-eyed woman could not find her she would die, and Frederic would
surely never know what had become of her. She knew she could trust both
Mrs. Burt and Ben, and when breakfast was over, she unhesitatingly told
them everything, interrupted occasionally by Ben’s characteristic
exclamations of surprise and his mother’s ejaculations of wonder.
Mrs. Burt’s first impulse was, that if she were Marian she would claim
her property, though of course she would not live with Frederic. But Ben
said _No_—“he’d work his fingernails off before she should go back.” His
mother wanted some one with her when he was gone, and Marian was sent to
them by Providence. “Any way,” said he, “she shall live with us a while,
and we’ll see what turns up. Maybe this Fred’ll begin to like her now
she’s gone. It’s nater to do so, and some day he’ll walk in here and
claim her.”
This picture was not a displeasing one to Marian, who through her tears
smiled gratefully upon Ben, mentally resolving that should she ever be
mistress of Redstone Hall she should remember him. And thus it was
arranged that _Marian Grey_, as she chose to be called, should remain
where she was, for a time at least, and if no husband came for her, she
should stay there always as the daughter of Mrs. Burt, whose motherly
heart already yearned toward the unfortunate orphan. Both Mrs. Burt and
Ben were noble types of diamonds in the rough. Neither of them could
boast of much education or refinement, but in all the great city there
were few with warmer hearts or kindlier feelings than the widow and her
son. Particularly was this true of Ben, who in his treatment of Marian
only acted out the impulse of nature; if she had been aggrieved, he was
the one to defend her, and if she bade him keep her secret, it was as
safe with him as if it had never been breathed into his ear. Nearly all
of Ben’s life had been passed in factories, and though now home on a
visit, he was still connected with one in Ware, Mass. Very carefully he
saved his weekly earnings, and once in three months carried or sent them
to his mother, who, having spent many years in New York city, preferred
it to the country. Here she lived very comfortably on her own earnings
and those of Ben, whose occasional visits made the variety of her rather
monotonous life. The other occupants of the block were not people with
whom she cared to associate, and she passed many lonely hours. But with
Marian for company it would be different, and she welcomed her as warmly
as Ben himself had done.
“You shall be my little girl,” she said, laying her hand caressingly on
the head of Marian, who began to think the world was not as cheerless as
she had thought it was. Still the old dreary pain was in her heart—a
desolate, homesick feeling, which kept her thoughts ever in one place
and on one single object—the place, Redstone Hall, and the object,
Frederic Raymond. And as the days went by, the feeling grew into an
intense, longing desire to see her old home once more—to look into
Frederic’s face—to listen to his voice, and know if he were sorry that
she was gone. This feeling Mrs. Burt did not seek to discourage, for
though she was learning fast to love the friendless girl, she knew it
would be better for her to be reconciled to Mr. Raymond, and when one
day, nearly four weeks after Marian’s arrival, the latter said to her,
“I mean to write to Frederic and ask him to take me back,” she did not
oppose the plan, for she saw how the great grief was wearing the young
girl’s life away, making her haggard and pale, and writing lines of care
upon her childish face.
That night there came to Marian a paper from Ben, who, having far
outstayed his time, had returned the week before to Ware. Listlessly she
tore open the wrapper, and glancing at the first page, was about
throwing it aside, when a marked paragraph arrested her attention, and,
with burning cheeks and fast-beating heart, she read that “Frederic
Raymond would gladly receive any information of a young girl who had
disappeared mysteriously from Redstone Hall.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed, springing to her feet, “I am going home—back to
Frederic. He’s sent for me—see!” and she pointed out to Mrs. Burt the
advertisement. “_Can_ I go to-night?” she continued. “_Is_ there a
train? Oh, I am so glad.”
Mrs. Burt, however, was more moderate in her feelings. Mr. Raymond could
scarcely do less than advertise, she thought, and to her this did not
mean that he wished the fugitive to return for any love he bore her.
Still, she would not dash Marian’s hopes at once, though she would save
her from the cold reception she felt sure she would meet, should she
return to Redstone Hall, unannounced. So, when the first excitement of
Marian’s joy had abated, she said: “I should write to Mr. Raymond, just
as I first thought of doing. Then he’ll know where you are, and he will
come for you, if he wants you, of course.”
That “if he wants you” grated harshly on Marian’s ear; but, after her
past experience, she did not care to thrust herself upon him, unless
sure that he wished it, and concluded to follow Mrs. Burt’s advice. So
she sat down and wrote to him a second letter, telling him where she
was, and how she came there, and asking him in her childlike way, to let
her come back again.
“Oh, I want to come home so much,” she wrote; “if you’ll only let me,
you needn’t ever call me your wife, nor make believe I am—at least, not
until you love me, and I get to be a lady. I’ll try so hard to learn.
I’ll go away to school, and maybe, after a good many years are gone, you
won’t be ashamed of me, though I shall never be as beautiful as Isabel.
If you don’t want me back, Frederic, you must tell me so. I can’t feel
any worse than I did that day when I sat here in the street and wished I
could die. I didn’t die then, maybe I shouldn’t now, and if you _do_
hate me, I’ll stay away and never write again—never let you know whether
I am alive, or not; and after seven years, Ben Burt says, you will be
free to marry Isabel. She’ll wait for you, I know. She won’t be too old
then, will she? I shall be almost twenty-three, but that is young, and
the years will seem so long to me if you do not let me return. May I,
Frederic? Write, and tell me Yes; but direct to Mrs. Daniel Burt, as I
shall then be more sure to get it. I dare not hope you’ll come for me,
but if you only would, and quick, too, for my heart aches so, and my
head is tired and sick with the dreadful noise. Do say I may come home.
God will bless you if you do, I am sure; and if you don’t, I’ll ask Him
to bless you just the same.”
The letter closed with another assurance that she gave to him cheerfully
all her fortune—that she neither blamed his father, nor himself, nor
Isabel, nor anybody. All she asked was to come back!
Poor little Marian! The pain in her heart was not so intense, and the
noise in the street easier to bear after sending that letter, for hope
softened them both, and whispered to her, “he’ll let me come,” and in a
thousand different ways she pictured the meeting between herself and
Frederic. Occasionally the thought intruded itself upon her, “what if he
bids me keep away,” and then she said, “I’ll do it if he does, and
before seven years are gone, maybe I’ll be dead. I hope I shall, for I
do not want to think of Isabel’s living there with him!”
She had great faith in the seven years, for _Ben_ had said so, and Ben,
who was very susceptible to female charms, believed it, too, and the
thought of it was like a ray of sunshine in the dingy, noisome room
where all day he worked, sometimes reckoning up how many _months_ there
were in seven years—then how many _weeks_—then how many _days_, and
finally calling himself a _fool_ for caring a thing about it. When the
newspaper article came under his eye, the sunshine left the dirty room,
and after he had sent the paper to Marian he cared but little how many
months or weeks or days there were in seven years, and he felt angry at
himself for having _sweat_ so hard in making the computation!
And so, while Marian in the city waits and watches for the message which
will, perhaps, bid her come back, and Ben, in the noisy factory, waits
also for a message which shall say she has gone, and his mother is again
alone, the letter travels on, and one pleasant afternoon, when the clerk
at Cincinnati makes up the mail for Frankfort, he puts that important
missive with the rest and sends it on its way.
CHAPTER IX.
ISABEL HUNTINGTON.
All day and all night it rained with a steady, unrelenting pour, and
when the steamboat which plies between Cincinnati and Frankfort stopped
at the latter place, two ladies from the lower deck looked drearily over
the city, one frowning impatiently at the mud and the rain, while the
other wished in her heart that she was safely back in her old home, and
had never consented to this foolish trip. This wish, however, she dared
not express to her companion, who, though calling her mother, was in
reality the mistress—the one whose word was law, and to whose wishes
everything else must bend.
“This _is_ delightful,” the younger lady exclaimed, as holding up her
fashionable traveling dress, and glancing ruefully at her thin kid
gaiters, she prepared to walk the plank. “This is charming. I wonder if
they always have such weather in Kentucky.”
“No, Miss, very seldom, ’cept on strordinary ’casions,” said the polite
African, who was holding an umbrella over her head, and who felt bound
to defend his native State.
The lady tossed her little bonnet proudly, and turning to her mother,
continued: “Have you any idea how we are to get to Redstone Hall?”
At this question an old gray-haired negro, who, with several other
idlers, was standing near, came forward and said, “If it’s Redstone Hall
whar Miss wants to go, I’s here with Marster Frederic’s carriage. I come
to fotch a man who’s been out thar tryin’ to buy a house of marster in
Louisville.”
At this announcement the face of both ladies brightened perceptibly, and
pointing out their baggage to the negro, who was none other than our old
friend Uncle Phil, they went to a public house to wait until the
carriage came round for them.
“What do you suppose Frederic will think when he sees us?” the mother
asked; and the daughter replied, “He won’t think anything, of course. It
is perfectly proper that we should visit our relations, particularly
when we are as near to them as Dayton, and they are in affliction, too.
He would have been displeased if we had returned without giving him a
call.”
From these remarks the reader will readily imagine that the ladies in
question were Mrs. Huntington and her daughter Isabella. They had
decided at last to visit Dayton, and had started for that city a few
days after the receipt of Frederic’s letter announcing his father’s
death: consequently they knew nothing of the marriage, and the fact that
Colonel Raymond was dead only increased Isabel’s desire to visit
Redstone Hall, for she rightly guessed that Frederic was now so absorbed
in business that it would be long ere he came to New Haven again; so she
insisted upon coming, and as she found her Ohio aunt not altogether
agreeable, she had shortened her visit there, and now with her mother
sat waiting at the Mansion House for the appearance of Phil and the
carriage. That Isabel was beautiful was conceded by every one, and that
she was as treacherous as beautiful was conceded by those who knew her
best. Early in life she had been engaged to Rudolph McVicar, a man of
strong passions, an iron will and indomitable perseverance. But when
young Raymond came, and she fancied she could win him, she
unhesitatingly broke her engagement with Rudolph, who, stung to madness
by her cold, unfeeling conduct, swore to be revenged. This threat,
however, was little heeded by the proud beauty. If she secured Frederic
Raymond, she would be above all danger, and she bent every energy to the
accomplishment of her plan. She knew that the Kentuckians were
proverbial for their hospitality, and feeling sure that no one would
think it at all improper for her mother and herself to visit their
cousin, as she called Frederic, she determined, if possible, to prolong
that visit until asked to stay with him always. He had never directly
talked to her of love, consequently she felt less delicacy in going to
his house and claiming relationship with him; so when Phil came around
with the carriage, she said to him, quite as a matter of course, “How is
Cousin Frederic since his father’s death?”
“Jest tolable, thankee,” returned the negro, at the same time saying,
“Be you marster’s kin?”
“Certainly,” answered Isabel, while the negro bowed low, for any one
related to his master was a person of distinction to him.
Isabel had heard Frederic speak of Marian, and when they were half way
home, she put her head from the window and said to Phil, “Where is the
young girl who used to live with Colonel Raymond—Marian was her name, I
think?”
“Bless you,” returned the negro, cracking his whip nervously, “haint you
hearn how she done got married to marster mighty nigh three weeks ago?”
“Married! Frederic Raymond married!” screamed Isabel; “it is _not_ true.
How dare you tell me such a falsehood?”
“Strue as preachin’, and a heap truer than some on’t, for I seen ’em
joined with these very eyes,” said Phil, and, glancing backward at the
white face leaning from the window, he muttered, “’spects mebby she
calkerlated on catchin’ him herself. Ki, wouldn’t she and Dinah pull har
though. Thar’s a heap of Ole Sam in them black eyes of hern,” and,
chirruping to his horses, Philip drove rapidly on, thinking he wouldn’t
tell her that the bride had ran away—he would let Frederic do that.
Meantime, Isabel, inside, was choking—gasping—crying—wringing her hands
and insisting that her mother should ask the negro again if what he had
told them were so.
“Man—sir”—said Mrs. Huntington, putting her bonnet out into the rain,
“is Mr. Frederic Raymond really married to that girl Marian?”
“Yes, as true as I am sittin’ here. Thursday’ll be three weeks since the
weddin’,” was the reply, and with another hysterical sob, Isabel laid
her head in her mother’s lap.
Nothing could exceed her rage, mortification and disappointment, except,
indeed, her pride, and this was stronger than all her other emotions and
that which finally roused her to action. She would not turn back now,
she said. She would brave the villain and show him that she did not
care. She would put herself by the side of his wife and let him see the
contrast. She had surely heard from him that Marian was plain, and in
fancy, she saw how she would overshadow her rival and make Frederic feel
keenly the difference between them, and then she thought of the
discarded Rudolph. If everything else should fail, she could win him
back—he had some money, and she would rather be his wife than nobody’s!
By this time they had left the highway, for Redstone Hall was more than
a mile from the turnpike, and Isabel found ample opportunity for venting
her ill-nature. Such a road as that she never saw before, and she’d like
to know if folks in Kentucky lived out in the lots. “No wonder they were
such heathen! you nigger,” she exclaimed, as Phil drove through a brook;
“are you going to tip us over, or what?”
“Wonder if she ’spects a body is gwine round the brook,” muttered Phil,
and as the carriage wheels were now safe from the water, he stopped and
said to the indignant lady, “mebby Miss would rather walk the rest of
the way. Thar’s a heap wus places in the cornfield, whar we’ll be pretty
likely to get oversot.”
“Go on,” snapped Isabel, who knew she could not walk quite as well as
the mischievous driver.
Accordingly they went on, and ere long came in sight of the house which
even in that drenching rain looked beautiful to Isabel, and all the more
beautiful because she felt that she had lost it. On the piazza little
Alice stood, her fair hair blowing over her face, and her ear turned to
catch the first sound which should tell her if what she hoped were true.
Old Dinah, who saw the carriage in the distance, had said there was some
one in it, and instantly Alice thought of Marian, and going out upon the
piazza, she waited impatiently until Phil drove up to the door.
“There are four feet,” she said, as the strangers came up the steps;
“four feet, but none are Marian’s,” and she was turning sadly away, when
she accidentally trod upon the long skirt of Isabel, who, snatching it
away, said angrily, “child, what are you doing—stepping on my dress?”
“I didn’t mean to; I’m blind,” answered Alice, her lip quivering and her
eyes filling with tears.
“Never you mind that she dragon,” whispered Uncle Phil, thrusting into
the child’s hand a paper of candy, which had the effect of consoling her
somewhat, both for her disappointment and her late reproof.
“Who is that ar?” asked Dinah, appearing upon the piazza just as Isabel
passed into the hall. “Some of marster’s kin!” she repeated after Uncle
Phil. “For the Lord’s sake, what fotched ’em here this rainy day, when
we’s gwine to have an ornery dinner—no briled hen, nor turkey, nor
nothin’. Be they quality, think?”
“’Spects the young one wants to be, if she ain’t,” returned Phil, with a
very expressive wink, which had the effect of enlightening Dinah with
regard to his opinion.
“Some low flung truck, I’ll warrant,” said she, as she followed them
into the parlor, where Isabel’s stately bearing and glittering black
eyes awed her into a low courtesy, as she said: “You’re very welcome to
Redstone Hall, I’m sure. Who shall I tell marster wants to see him?”
“Two ladies, simply,” was Isabel’s haughty answer, and old Dinah
departed, whispering to herself, “Two ladies simple! She must think I
know nothin’ ’bout grarmar to talk in that kind of way, but she’s
mistakened. I hain’t lived in the fust families for nothin’,” and
knocking at Frederic’s door, she told him that “two simple ladies was
down in the parlor and wanted him.”
“Who?” he asked, in some surprise, and Dinah replied:
“Any way, that’s what she said—the tall one, with great black eyes jest
like coals of fire. Phil picked ’em up in Frankford, whar they got off
the boat. They’s some o’ yer kin they say.”
Frederic did not wish to hear any more, for he suspected who they were.
It was about this time they had talked of visiting Dayton, and motioning
Dinah from the room, he pressed his hands to his forehead, and thought,
“Must I suffer this, too? Oh, why did she come to look at me in my
misery?” Then, forcing an unnatural calmness, he started for the parlor,
where, as he had feared, he stood face to face with Isabel Huntington.
She was very pale, and in her black eyes there was a hard, dangerous
expression, from which he gladly turned away, addressing first her
mother, who, rising to meet him, said:
“We have accepted your invitation, you see.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied, and he was trying to stammer out a welcome,
when Isabel, who all the time had been aching to pounce upon him,
chimed,
“Where is Mrs. Raymond? I am dying to see my new cousin” and in the eyes
of black there was a reddish gleam, as if they might ere long emit
sparks of living fire.
“Mrs. Raymond!” repeated Frederic, the name dropping slowly from his
lips. “Mrs. Raymond! Oh! Isabel, don’t you know? Havn’t you heard?”
“Certainly I have,” returned the young lady, watching him as a fierce
cat watches his helpless prey. “Of course I have heard of your marriage,
and have come to congratulate you. Is your wife well?”
Frederic raised his hand to stop the flippant speech, and when it
finished he rejoined: “But havn’t you heard the rest—the saddest part of
all? Marian is dead!—drowned—at least we think she must be, for she went
away on our wedding night, and no trace of her can be found.”
The fiery gleam was gone from the black eyes—the color came back to the
cheeks—the finger nails ceased their painful pressure upon the tender
flesh—the shadow of a smile dimpled the corner of the mouth, and Isabel
was herself again.
“Dead! Drowned!” she exclaimed. “How did it happen? What was the reason?
Dreadful, isn’t it?” and going over to where Mr. Raymond stood, she
looked him in the face, with an expression she meant should say, “I am
sorry for you,” but which really did say something quite the contrary.
“I cannot tell you why she went away,” Frederic answered, “but there was
a reason for it, and it has cast a shadow over my whole life.”
“Marian was a mere child, I had always supposed,” suggested Isabel,
anxious to get at the reason why he had so soon forgotten herself.
“Did you get my last letter—the one written to you?” asked Frederic, and
upon Isabel’s replying that she did not, he briefly stated a few facts
concerning his marriage, saying it was his father’s dying request, and
he could not well avoid doing as he had done, even if he disliked
Marian. “But I didn’t dislike her,” he continued, and the hot blood
rushed into his face. “She was a gentle, generous hearted girl, and had
she lived, I would have made her happy.”
If by this speech Frederic Raymond thought to deceive Isabel Huntington,
he was mistaken, for, looking into his eyes she read a portion of the
truth and knew there was something back of all—a something between
himself and his father which had driven him to the marriage. What it was
she did not care then to know. She was satisfied that the bride was
gone—and when Frederic narrated more minutely the particulars of her
going, the artful girl said to herself, “She is dead beyond a doubt, and
when I leave Redstone Hall, I shall know it, and mother, too!”
It was strange how rapidly Isabel changed from a hard, defiant woman, to
a soft, sparkling, beautiful creature, and when, in her plaid silk dress
of crimson and brown, with her magnificent hair bound in heavy braids
about her head, she came down to dinner, Aunt Dinah involuntarily
dropped another courtesy, and whispered under her teeth, “The Lord, if
she ain’t quality after all.” Old Hetty, too, who from a side door
looked curiously in at their guests, received a like impression,
pronouncing her more like Miss Beatrice than any body she had ever seen.
To Alice, Isabel was all gentleness, for she readily saw that the child
was a pet; so she called her darling and dearest, smoothing her fair
hair and kissing her once when Frederic was looking on. All this,
however, did not deceive the little blind girl, or erase from her mind
the angry words which had been spoken to her, and that evening, when she
went to Frederic to bid him good night, she climbed into his lap and
said: “Is that Miss Isabel going to stay here always?”
“Why, no,” he answered. “Did you think she was?”
“I did not know,” returned Alice, “but I hoped not, for I don’t like her
at all. She’s very grand and beautiful, Dinah says, but I think she must
look like a snake, and I want her to go away, don’t you?”
Frederic would not say yes to this question, and he remained silent. Had
he been consulted, he would rather that she had never come to Redstone
Hall, but now that she was there, he did not wish her away. It would be
inhospitable, he said, and when next morning she came down to breakfast,
bright, fresh and elegant in her tasteful wrapper, he felt a pang, as he
thought, “had I done right, she might have been the mistress of Redstone
Hall,” but it could not be now, he said, even if Marian were dead, and
all that day he struggled manfully between his duty and his inclination,
while Isabel dealt out her highest card, ingrafting herself into the
good graces of the Smitherses by speaking to them pleasant, familiar
words, exalting herself in the estimation of the Higginses by her lofty,
graceful bearing, and winning Dinah’s friendship by praising Victoria
Eugenia, and asking if that fine looking man who drove the carriage was
her husband. Then, in the evening, when the lamps were lighted in the
parlor, she opened the piano and filled the house with the rich melody
of her cultivated voice, singing a sad, plaintive strain, which reminded
Alice of poor, lost Marian, and carried Frederic back to other days,
when, with a feeling of pride, he had watched her snowy fingers as they
gracefully swept the keys. He could not look at them now—he dared not
look at her, in her ripe glowing beauty, and he left the room, going out
upon the piazza, where he wiped great drops of sweat from his face, and
almost cursed the fate which had made it a sin for him to love the
dark-haired Isabel. She knew that he was gone, and rightly divining the
cause, she dashed off into a stirring dancing tune, which brought the
negroes to the door, where they stood admiring her playing and praising
her queenly form.
“That’s somethin’ like it,” whispered Hetty, beating time to the lively
strain. “That sounds like Miss Beatrice did when she done played the
pianner. I ’clare for’t, I eenamost wish Marster Frederic had done chose
her. ’Case you know t’other one done drowned herself the fust night,”
she added quickly, as she met Dinah’s rebuking glance.
Dinah admired Isabel, but she could not forget Marian; though like her
sex, whether black or brown, she speculated upon the future, when
“Marster Frederic would be done mournin’,” and she wondered if “old
miss,” meaning Mrs. Huntington, would think it necessary to stay there,
too. Thus several days went by, and so pleasant was it to Frederic to
have some one in the house who could divert him from his gloomy
thoughts, that he began to dread the time when he would be alone again.
But could he have looked into the heart of the fair lady, he would have
seen no immediate cause of alarm. Isabel did not intend to leave her
present quarters immediately, and to this end her plans were laid. From
what she had heard she believed Marian Lindsey was dead, and if so, she
would not again trust Frederic away from her influence. Redstone Hall
needed a head—a housekeeper—and as her mother was an old lady, and also
a relative of Frederic, she was just the one to fill that post. Their
house in New Haven was only rented until March, and by writing to some
friends they could easily dispose of their furniture until such time as
they might want it. Alice needed a governess, for she heard Frederic say
so; and though the little pest (this was what she called her, to
herself) did not seem to like her, she could teach her as well as any
one. It would be just as proper for her to be Alice’s governess as for
any one else, and a little more so, for her mother would be with her.
And this arrangement she brought about with the most consummate skill,
first asking Frederic if he knew of any situation in Kentucky which she
could procure as a teacher. That was one object of her visit, she said.
She must do something for a living, and as she would rather teach either
in a school, or in a private family, she would be greatly obliged to him
if he would assist her a little. Hardly knowing what he was doing,
Frederic said something about Alice’s having needed a governess for a
long time; and quickly catching at it, Isabel rejoined, “Oh! but you
know I couldn’t possibly remain here, unless mother staid with me. Now,
if you’ll keep her as a kind of overseer-in-general of the house, I’ll
gladly undertake the charge of dear little Alice’s education. She does
not fancy me, I think, but I’m sure I can win her love. I can that of
almost any one—children I mean, of course;” and the beautiful,
fascinating eyes looked out of the window quite indifferently, as if
their owner were utterly oblivious of the fierce struggle in Frederic’s
bosom.
He wished her to stay with him—oh, so much! But was it right? and would
he not get to loving her? No, he would not, he said. He would only think
of her as his cousin—his sister, whose presence would cheer his solitary
home. So he bade her stay, and she bade her mother stay, urging so many
reasons why she should, and must, that the latter consented at last, and
a letter was dispatched to New Haven, with directions for having their
furniture packed away, and their house given up to its owner. This
arrangement at first caused some gossip among the neighbors, who began
to predict what the end would be, and, also, to assert more loudly than
ever their belief that Marian was not dead. Still, there was no reason
why Isabel should not be Alice’s governess, particularly as her mother
was with her; and when Agnes Gibson pronounced her beautiful,
accomplished, and just the thing, the rest followed in the train, and
the health of the “northern beauty” was drunk by more than one fast
young man.
In the kitchen at Redstone Hall there was also a discussion, in which
the Higginses rather had the preference, inasmuch as the lady in
question was after their manner of thinking. Old Dinah wisely kept
silent, saying to herself, “a new broom sweeps clean, and I’ll wait to
see what ’tis when it gets a little wore. One thing is sartin, though,
if she goes to put on ars, and sasses us colored folks, I’ll gin her a
piece of my mind. I’ll ask her whar she come from, and how many niggers
she owned afore she come from thar.”
It was several days before Alice was told of the arrangement, and then
she rebelled at once. Bursting into tears, she hid her face in Dinah’s
lap, and sobbed, “I can’t learn of her. I don’t like her. What shall I
do?”
“I wish to goodness I had larning,” answered Dinah, “and I’d hear you
say that foolishness ’bout the world’s turnin’ round and makin’ us stan’
on our heads half the time, but I hain’t, and if I’s you I’d make the
best on’t. I’ll keep my eye on her, and if she makes you do the fust
thing you don’t want to, I’ll gin her a piece of my mind. I ain’t afraid
on her. Why, Gibson’s niggers say how they hearn Miss Agnes say she used
to make her own bed whar she came from, and wash dishes, too! Think o’
that!”
Thus comforted, Alice dried her tears, and hunting up the books from
which she had once recited to Marian, she declared herself ready for her
lessons at any time.
“Let it be to-morrow, then,” said Isabel, who knew that Frederic was
going to Lexington, and that she could not see him even if she were not
occupied with Alice.
So, the next morning, after Frederic was gone, Alice went to the
school-room, and drawing her little chair to Isabel’s side, laid her
books upon the lady’s lap, and waited for her to begin.
“You must read to me,” she said, “until I know what ’tis, and then I’ll
recite it to you.”
But Isabel was never intended for a teacher, and she found it very
tedious reading the same thing over and over, particularly as Alice
seemed inattentive and not at all inclined to remember. At last she
said, impatiently, “For the pity’s sake how many more times must I read
it. Can’t you learn anything?”
“Don’t—don’t speak so,” sobbed Alice. “I’m thinking of Marian, and how
she used to be with me. It’s just six weeks to-day since she went away.
Oh, I wish she’d come back. Do you believe she’s dead?”
Isabel was interested in anything concerning Marian, and closing the
book, she began to question the child, asking her among other things,
“if Marian did not leave a letter for Mr. Raymond, and if she knew what
was in it.”
“No one knows,” returned the child; “he never told—but here’s mine,” and
drawing from her bosom the soiled note, she passed it to Isabel, who
scrutinized it closely, particularly the handwriting.
“Of course she’s dead, or she would have been heard from ere this,” said
she, passing the note back to Alice, who, not feeling particularly
comforted, made but little progress in her studies that morning, and
both teacher and pupil were glad when the lessons of the day were over.
Before starting for Lexington, Frederic had sent Josh on some errand to
Frankfort, and just after dinner the negro returned. Isabel was still
alone upon the piazza when he came up, and as she was expecting news
from New Haven, she asked if he stopped at the post-office.
“Ye-e-us’m,” began the stuttering negro, “an’ I d-d-d-one got a h-h-eap
on ’em, too,” and Josh gave her six letters—one for herself and five for
Frederic.
Hastily breaking the seal of her own letter, she read that their matters
at home were satisfactorily arranged—a tenant had already been found for
their house, and their furniture would be safely stowed away. Hearing
her mother in the hall, she handed the letter to her and then went to
the library to dispose of Frederic’s. As she was laying them down she
glanced at the superscriptions, carelessly, indifferently, until she
came to the last, the one bearing the New York post-mark; then, with a
nervous start she caught it up again and examined it more closely, while
a sickening, horrid fear crept through her flesh—her heart gave one
fearful throb and then lay like some heavy, pulseless weight within her
bosom. Could it be that she had seen that handwriting before? Had the
dead wife returned to life, and was she coming back to Redstone Hall?
The thought was overwhelming, and for a moment Isabel Huntington was
tempted to break that seal and read. But she dared not, for her
suspicion might be false; she would see Alice’s note again, and seeking
out the child she asked permission to take the letter which Marian had
written. Alice complied with her request, and darting away to the
library Isabel compared the two. They were the same. There could be no
mistake, and in the intensity of her excitement, she felt her black hair
loosening at its roots.
“It is from her, but he shall never see it, never!” she exclaimed aloud,
and her voice was so unnatural that she started at the sound, and
turning saw Alice standing in the door with an inquiring look upon her
face, as if asking the meaning of what she had heard.
Isabel quailed beneath the glance of that sightless child, and then sat
perfectly still, while Alice said, “Miss Huntington, are you here? Was
it you who spoke?”
Isabel made no answer, but trembling in every limb, shrank farther and
farther back in her chair as the little, groping, outstretched arms came
nearer and nearer to her. Presently, when she saw no escape, she forced
a loud laugh, and said, “Fie, Alice. I tried to frighten you by feigning
a strange voice. You want your letter, don’t you? Here it is. I only
wished to see if in reading it a second time I could get any clue to the
mystery,” and she gave the bit of paper back to Alice, who, somewhat
puzzled to understand what it all meant, left the room, and Isabel was
again alone. Three times she caught up the letter with the intention of
breaking its seal, and as often threw it down, for, unprincipled as she
was, she shrank from that act, and still, if she did not know the truth,
she should go mad, she said, and pressing her hands to her forehead, she
thought what the result to herself would be were Marian really alive.
“But she isn’t,” she exclaimed. “I won’t have it so. She’s dead—she’s
buried in the river.” But who was there in New York that wrote so much
like her? She wished she knew, and she might know, too, by opening the
letter. If it was from a stranger, she could destroy it, and he,
thinking it had been lost, would write again. She should die if she
didn’t know, and maybe she should die if she did.
At all events, reality was more endurable than suspense, and glancing
furtively around to make sure that no blind eyes were near, she snatched
the letter from the table and broke the seal! Even then she dared not
read it, until she reflected that she could not give it to Frederic in
this condition—she might as well see what it contained; and wiping the
cold moisture from her face she opened it and read, while her flesh
seemed turning to stone, and she could feel the horror creeping through
her veins, freezing her blood and petrifying her very brain. _Marian
Lindsey lived!_ She was coming back again—back to her husband, and back
to the home which was hers. There was enough in the letter for her to
guess the truth, and she knew why another had been preferred to herself.
For a moment even her lip curled with scorn at what she felt was an
unmanly act, but this feeling was soon lost in the terrible thought that
Marian might return.
“Can it be? Must it be?” she whispered, as her hard, black eyes fastened
themselves again upon the page, blotted with Marian’s tears. “Seven
years—seven years,” she continued, “I’ve heard of that before,” and into
the wild tumult of her thoughts there stole a ray of hope. If she
withheld the letter from Frederic, and she must withhold it now, he
would never know what she knew. Possibly, too, Marian might die, and
though she would have repelled the accusation, Isabel Huntington was
guilty of murder in her heart, as she sat there alone and planned what
she would do. She was almost on the borders of insanity, for the
disappointment to her now would be greater and more humiliating than
before. She had no home to go to—her arrangements for remaining in
Kentucky were all made, and Redstone Hall seemed so fair that she would
willingly wait twice seven years, if, at the expiration of that time,
she were sure of being its mistress. It was worth trying for, and though
she had but little hope of success, the beautiful demon bent her queenly
head and tried to devise some means of effectually silencing Marian, so
that if there really were anything in the seven years the benefit would
accrue to her.
“She’s a little,” she said, “and this Mrs. Daniel Burt she talked about
is just as silly as herself. They’ll both believe what is told to them.
I may never marry Frederic, it is true, but I’ll be revenged on Marian.
What business had she to cross my path, the little red-headed jade!”
Isabel was growing excited, and as she dared do anything when angry, she
resolved to send the letter back.
“I can imitate his handwriting,” she thought; “I can do anything as I
feel now,” and going to her room, she found the letter he had written to
her mother.
This she studied and imitated for half an hour, and at the end of that
time wrote on the blank page of Marian’s letter, “Isabel Huntington is
now the mistress of Redstone Hall.”
“That will keep her still, I reckon,” she said, and taking a fresh
envelope, she directed it to “Mrs. Daniel Burt,” as Marian had bidden
Frederic do. “’Twas a fortunate circumstance, her telling him that, for
‘Marian Lindsey’ would have been observed at once,” she thought; and
then, lest her resolution should fail her, she found Josh and bade him
take the letter to the post-office at the Forks of Elkhorn not very far
away.
Nothing could suit Josh better than to ride, and stuttering out
something which nobody could understand, he mounted his rather
sorry-looking horse and was soon galloping out of sight. In the kitchen
Mrs. Huntington heard of Josh’s destination, and when next she met her
daughter, she asked to whom she had been writing.
“To some one, of course,” answered Isabel, at the same time intimating
that she hoped she could have a correspondent without her mother
troubling herself.
The rudeness of this speech was forgotten by Mrs. Huntington in her
alarm at Isabel’s pale face, and she asked anxiously what was the
matter?
“Nothing but a wretched headache—teaching don’t agree with me,” was
Isabel’s reply, and turning away, she ran up the stairs to her room,
where, throwing herself upon the bed, she tried to fancy it all a dream.
But it was not a dream, and Marian’s anguish was scarcely greater than
her own at that moment, when she began to realize that Frederic and
Redstone Hall were lost to her forever. There might be something in the
seven years, but it was a long, dreary time to wait, with the
ever-haunting fear that Marian might return, and she half wished she had
not opened the letter. But her regrets were unavailing now, and
resolving to guard her secret carefully and deny what she had done, if
ever accused of it, she began to consider how she should hereafter
demean herself toward Frederic. It would be terrible to have him making
love to her, she thought, for she would be compelled to tell him no, and
if another should become her rival, she could not stand quietly by and
witness the unlawful deed.
“Oh, if I or Marian had never been born, this hour would not have come
to me,” she cried, burying her face in the pillows to shut out the fast
increasing darkness which was so hateful to her.
Already was she reaping the fruit of the transgression, and when an hour
later she heard the voice of Frederic in the hall, she stopped her ears,
and, burying her face still closer in the pillows, wished again that
either Marian or herself had never seen the light of day.
CHAPTER X.
FREDERIC AND ALICE.
All the day long Frederic had thought of Marian—thought of the little
blue-eyed girl, who just six weeks before went away from him to die. To
die. Many, many times he said that to himself, and as often as he said
it, he thought, “perhaps she is not dead,” until the belief grew strong
in him that somewhere he should find her, that very day it might be. He
wished he could, and take her back to Redstone Hall, where she would be
a barrier between himself and the beautiful temptation which it was so
hard for him to resist. Manfully had he struggled against it, going
always from its presence when the eyes of lustrous black looked softly
into his own, and when he heard, as he often did, the full rich-toned
voice singing merry songs, he stopped his ears lest the sweet music
should touch a chord which he said was hushed forever.
“It might have been,” he thought sometimes to himself, but the time was
past, and even if Marian were dead, he must not take another to share
the wealth so generously given up. And Marian was dead, he had always
believed until to-day, when she seemed to be so near, that on his return
at night to Redstone Hall he had a half presentiment that he might find
her there, or at least some tidings of her.
All about the house was dark, but on the piazza a little figure was
standing, and as its dim outline was revealed to him, he said,
involuntarily: “That may be Marian, and I am glad, or at least I will be
glad,” and he was hurrying on, when a light from the hall streamed out
upon the figure, and he saw that it was Alice waiting for him. Still the
impression was so strong that after kissing her, he asked if no one had
been at the Hall that day.
“No one,” she answered, and with a vague feeling of disappointment, he
led her into the house.
Alice’s heart was full that night, for accidentally she had heard old
Hetty and Lyd discussing the probable result of Isabel’s sojourn among
them, and the very idea shocked her, as if they had trampled on Marian’s
grave.
“I’ll tell Frederic,” said she to herself, “and ask him is he going to
marry her,” and when after his supper he went into the library to read
the letters which Mrs. Huntington told him were there, she followed him
thither.
It was not Frederic’s nature to pet or notice children much, but in his
sorrow he had learned to love the little helpless girl dearly, and when
he saw her standing beside him with a wistful look upon her face, he
smoothed her soft brown hair and said: “What does my blind bird want?”
“Take me in your lap,” said Alice, “so I can feel your heart beat and
know if you tell me true.”
He complied with her request, and laying her head against his bosom, she
began, “be we much related?”
“Second cousins, that’s all.”
“But you love me, don’t you?”
“Yes, very much.”
“And I love you a heap,” returned the little girl. “I didn’t use to,
though—till Marian went away. Frederic, Marian isn’t dead!” and, lifting
up her head, Alice looked at him with a truthful, earnest look, which
seemed to say that she believed what she asserted.
Frederic gasped a short, quick breath, and Alice continued, “wouldn’t it
be very wicked for you to love anybody else. I don’t mean me—because I’m
a little blind girl—but to love somebody and marry them with Marian
alive?”
“Certainly it would be wicked,” he replied; and Alice continued, “Aunt
Hetty said you were going to marry Isabel, and it almost broke my heart.
I never thought before that Marian wasn’t dead, but I knew it then. I
felt her right there with us, and I’ve felt her ever since. Dinah, too,
said it seemed to her just like Marian was alive, and that she hoped you
wouldn’t make—perhaps I ought not to tell you, but you don’t care for
Dinah—she hoped you wouldn’t make a fool of yourself. Frederic, do you
love Isabel Huntington?”
“Yes,” dropped involuntarily from the young man’s lips, for there was
something about that old little child which wrung the truth from him.
“Did you love her before you married Marian?”
“Yes,” he said again, for he could not help himself. There was silence a
moment, and then Alice, who had been thinking of what he told her once
before, said, interrogatively, “Marian found it out, and that was why
she thought you didn’t love her and went away?”
“That was one reason, but not the principal one.”
“Do you think Isabel as good as Marian?”
“No, not as good—not as good,” and Frederic was glad that he could pay
this tribute to the lost one.
After a moment Alice spoke again:
“Frederic, do you believe Marian is dead?”
“I have always thought so,” he answered, and Alice replied: “But you
don’t know for certain; and I want you to promise that until you do you
won’t make love to Isabel, nor marry her, nor anybody else, will you,
Frederic?” and putting both her little hands upon his forehead, she
pushed back his hair and waited for an answer.
Many times the young man had made that resolution, but the idea of thus
promising to another was unpleasant, and he hesitated for a time; then
he said:
“Suppose we never can know for certain—would you have me live all my
life alone?”
“No,” said Alice, “and you needn’t, either; but I’d wait ever so long,
ten years, anyway, and before that time she’ll come, I’m sure. Dinah
says maybe she will, and that perhaps we shan’t know her, she’ll be so
changed—so handsome,” and as if the power of prophecy were on her, Alice
pictured a beautiful woman who might come to them sometime as their lost
Marian, and Frederic, listening to her, felt more willing to promise
than he had been before.
A glow of hope was kindled within his own bosom, and when she finished
he said to her:
“I will wait, Alice—wait ten years for Marian.”
Blessed Alice! When the mother, whose grave was grass-grown now and
sunken, first knew her only child was blind, she murmured against the
dealings of Providence, and in the bitterness of her heart asked:
“Why was my baby born? and what good can it ever do?”
She who had questioned thus was dead, while the good the little girl was
to do was becoming, each day, more and more apparent. Helpless and blind
though she was, she would keep the strong man from falling, and when his
heart grew faint with hope deferred, her gentle, earnest words would
cheer him on to wait a little longer. Marian was not dead to her, and so
sure of it did she seem that when the interview was ended, and Frederic
was left alone, he bowed his head reverently and said:
“If Marian be, indeed, alive, will the good Father send me some tidings
of her, and so keep me from sin?”
Oh! could the writing desk before him have told how only that afternoon
there had lain upon its velvet cover a message from the lost one—a
sweet, childlike petition for him to take her back, even though he could
not love her—he would have gone for her then, and, bringing her to the
home which was not his, but hers, he would have placed her between
himself and the temptation, yielding to her all honor and respect until
his heart should say it loved her. But the time was not yet, and he must
suffer longer—must pass through deeper waters; while Marian, too, must
be molded and changed into a bride who, far better than the queenly
Isabel, could do the honors of Redstone Hall.
CHAPTER XI.
THE LETTER RECEIVED.
It was baking-day at Mrs. Burt’s, and the good lady bustled in and
out—her cap strings pinned over her head, her sleeves tucked up above
her shoulders, and her face, hands and apron covered with flour.
Occasionally as she rolled out the short pie crust, or sliced the juicy
apple, she glanced at the rain-drops pattering against the window, and
said encouragingly, “I don’t care for the rain, for I’ve get a big
umbrella and the best kind of overshoes;” and as often as she related
the cheering words, they brought a smile to the thin, white face of the
young girl who sat in the large, stuffed easy chair, and did not offer
to share the labors of her aunt, as she called her.
Marian was sick. Strong excitement had worn her strength away, and since
she had sent the letter to Frederic, her restless anxiety for the answer
had made her so weak that she kept her bed nearly all the time, counting
the days which must elapse ere she could possibly hope to hear, and
then, when the full time was out, bidding Mrs. Burt wait one more day
before she went to the office, so as to be sure and get it. She had made
due allowance for delays, and now she was certain that it had come. She
would sit up that day, she said, for she felt almost well; and if
Frederic told her to come home, she should start to-morrow and get there
Saturday night, and she fancied how people would stare at her, and be
glad to see her, too, on Sunday, when she first went into church, for
she “should go, any way.” Alice, too, would be delighted, and kiss her
so many times; and then she wondered if Frederic wouldn’t kiss her,
too—she thought he might just once, she’d been so long away, and she
said to herself that “she would draw back a little, and let him know she
wasn’t so very anxious.”
Poor Marian, how little was she prepared for the cruel blow awaiting
her! The pies were made at last, as was the gingerbread and crispy
snaps; the apple dumplings, Marian’s favorite dessert, were steaming on
the stove; the litter was cleared away, the carpet swept, the oil-cloth
washed, the chairs set back; and then exchanging her work dress for a
more respectable delaine, Mrs. Burt put over the kettle to boil, “for
after her wet walk, she should want a cup of tea,” she said, and,
leaving Marian to watch the pie baking in the oven, she started on her
errand.
“I mean to have the table ready when she gets back,” said Marian—“for if
I don’t make her think I’m well, she won’t let me start so soon;” and,
exerting all strength, she set the table for dinner in the neatest
possible manner, even venturing upon the extravagance of bringing out
the best white dishes, which Mrs. Burt only used on great occasions.
“When I get some, I’ll send her a new set with gilt bands,” the little
girl said, as she arranged the cups, and then stepped back to witness
the effect. “Oh! I wish she’d come,” she continued, glancing at the
clock; but it was not time yet, and, resuming her rocking-chair, she
tried to wait patiently.
But it seemed very long and very tiresome, sitting there alone,
listening to the rain and the ticking of the clock. It is strange how
the most trivial circumstance will sometimes stamp itself indelibly upon
the memory. The steam from the dumplings, which Marian thought she
should enjoy so much, filled the room with a sweet, sickly odor, and for
many, many years she remembered how faint it made her feel. But ’twas a
pleasant faintness now; everything was pleasant, for wasn’t she going
home, back to Redstone Hall—back to Frederic, who, if he didn’t love her
now, would learn to love her, for Mrs. Burt said so; Mrs. Burt, who knew
almost as much as Dinah, and who, even while she thought of her, was
coming up the narrow stairs. Marian heard her put her dripping umbrella
beside the door, but for her life she could not move. If she should be
disappointed after all, she said, and she tried to see how many she
could count before she knew for certain.
“A letter—oh, have you a letter for me?” she attempted to say, when Mrs.
Burt came in, but she could not articulate a word, and the good lady,
wishing to tease her a little, leisurely took off her overshoes, hung up
her shawl, wiped her damp bonnet with a handkerchief, and looked at the
dumplings and then said, as indifferently as if the happiness of a young
life was not to be crushed by what she had in her pocket, “it rains
awfully down street!”
“I know—but the letter—was there a letter?” and Marian’s blue eyes
looked dark with excitement. “Yes, child, there was, but where it was
mailed I don’t know. ’Tis directed to me, and is from Kentucky, but I
can’t make out the post-mark mor’n the dead. It’s some kind of Forks,
but the postmaster will never set the Hudson on fire with his writing.”
“Forks of Elkhorn,” cried Marian, snatching at the letter. “It’s
Frederic’s superscription, too, and dated ever so many days ago. Dear
Frederic, he didn’t wait a minute before he wrote,” and she pressed to
her lips the handwriting of Isabel Huntington!
The envelope was torn open—the enclosed sheet was withdrawn, but about
it there was a strangely familiar look. Was there a film before Marian’s
eyes? Was she growing blind, or did she recognize her own letter—the one
she had sent to Redstone Hall? It was the same—for it said “Dear
Frederic” at the top, and “Marian” at the bottom! And he had returned it
to her unanswered—not a word—not a line—nothing but silence, as cold, as
hard and as terrible as the feeling settling down on Marian’s heart. But
yes—there was one line—only one, and it read—oh, horror, could it be
that he would mock her thus—that he would tear out her bleeding heart
and trample it beneath his feet, by offering her this cruel insult.
“_Isabel Huntington is now the mistress of Redstone Hall._”
This was the drop in the brimming bucket, and if she had suffered death
when the great sorrow came upon her once before, she suffered more now a
hundred fold. In her ignorance she fancied they were married, for how
else could Isabel be mistress there, and she comprehended at once the
shame—the disgrace such a proceeding would bring to Frederic, and the
wrong, the dishonor, the insult it brought to her. There was a look of
anguish in her eye and a painful contraction of the muscles about her
mouth. There were purple spots upon her flesh, which seemed wasting away
while she sat there, and a note of agony, rarely heard by human ear, was
in her voice, as she cried, “No, no, no—it is too soon—too soon—anything
but that,” and the little Marian who, half an hour before, had heard the
ticking of the clock and listened to the rain, lay in the arms of Mrs.
Burt, a white, motionless thing, unconscious of pain, unconscious of
everything. She had suffered all she could suffer, and henceforth no
sorrow which could come to her would eat into her heart’s core as this
last one had done.
Mrs. Burt thought she was dead, as did those who came at her loud call,
but the old physician said there was life, adding, as he looked at the
blue pinched lips and shrunken face: “The more’s the pity, for she has
had some awful blow, and if she lives she’ll probably be a raving
maniac.”
Poor Marian! As time passed on the physician’s words seemed likely to be
verified. For days she lay in the same deathlike stupor, and when at
last she roused from it, ’twas only to tear her hair and rave in wild
delirium. At first, Mrs. Burt, who had examined the letter, thought of
writing to Frederic and telling him the result of his cruel message, the
truth of which she did not believe; but she seldom acted without advice,
so she wrote first to Ben, who came quickly, crying like a very child,
and wringing his great rough hands when he saw the swaying, tossing form
upon the bed and knew that it was Marian.
“No, mother,” he said, “we won’t write. It’s a lie the villain told her,
but we will let him be till she’s dead. God will find him fast enough,
the rascal!” and Ben struck his fist upon the bureau as if he would like
to take the management of Frederic into his own hands.
It was a long and terrible sickness which came to Marian, and when the
delirium was on, the very elements of her nature seemed changed. For her
hair she conceived an intense loathing; and clutching at her long
tresses, she would tear them from her head and shake them from her
fingers, whispering scornfully:
“Go, you vile red things! He hates you, and so do I.”
“Better shave the hull concern and not let her yank it out like that,”
said Ben; and when she became more and more ungovernable, he passed his
arms around her and held fast her little hands, while her head was shorn
of the locks once so displeasing to Frederic Raymond.
Ben’s taste, however, was different, and putting them reverently
together, he dropped great tears upon them, and then laid them carefully
away, thinking: “’Twill be something to look at when she’s gone. Poor
little picked bird,” he would say as he watched by her side and listened
to her moaning cries for home, “you’ll be out of your misery afore long,
and go to a’nough sight better hum than Red stun Hall; but I hev my
doubts ’bout meetin’ him there. Poor little girl if you hadn’t been born
a lady and I hadn’t been born a fool, and we’d been brung up together,
mabby you wouldn’t be a lyin’ here a biting your tongue and wringin’
your hands, with your head shaved slick and clean,” and the sweat
dropped from Ben’s face, as he thought of what under widely different
circumstances might have been. “But it can’t be now,” he said, “for even
if she wan’t jined to this villain she loves so much, she’s as far above
Ben Burt as the stars in Heaven.”
This, however, did not lessen Ben’s attentions in the least, or stay his
tears when he thought that she would die. “She should be buried in
Greenwood,” he said; “he’d got more’n two hundred dollars in the bank at
Ware, all arnt honest, with hard work; and if there was such a thing as
a stun forty feet high she should have it, and he’d get som o’ them that
scribbled for a living to write a piece; there should be a big funeral,
too—he could hire carriages as well as the best of ’em—and he’d have a
procession so long that folks would stop and stare, and Frederic Raymond
wouldn’t be ashamed on’t either, the _scalliwag_—he hoped when he and
Isabel came to die they’d be pitched into the _canal_ where the water
was considerable kind o’ dirty, too!”
This long speech relieved Ben somewhat, and fully determined to carry
out his promise, he staid patiently by Marian, nor experienced one
feeling of regret when he heard that, owing to his prolonged absence,
his place in Ware had been given to another.
“Nobody cares,” he said, “I can find something to do if it’s nothin’ but
sawin’ wood.”
So he remained at home through all the winter days, and watched by the
sick girl, who talked piteously of her home, of Alice, and _that man_
who hated her so. She never spoke his name, but she sometimes begged of
him to come and take her away where it didn’t thunder all the time. The
roar of the city disturbed her, and she frequently besought Ben to go
and stop it so that she could sleep and be better in the morning; and
Ben, had it been in his power, would have stayed the busy life around
them, and let the weary, worn-out sufferer sleep. But this could not be,
and so, day after day the heavy, incessant roar came through the
curtained window into the darkened room, where Marian lay moaning in her
pain. Once in her unconsciousness she folded meekly her thin hands and
prayed, “Will God stop that noise and let me sleep just once?” then with
an expression of childish trust upon her face, she said to those around
her, “He _will_ stop it to-morrow, I reckon.”
And when the winter snows all were fallen, and the early March sun shone
upon the kitchen walls, the _to-morrow_ so much longed for came, and
Marian woke at last to consciousness. She was out of danger, the
physician said, though it might be long ere her health was fully
restored. To Marian, this announcement brought but little joy. “She had
hoped to die,” she said, “and thus be out of the way,” and then she
spoke of Redstone Hall, asking if any tidings had come from there since
the dreadful message she had received. There was none, for Isabel
Huntington guarded her secret well, and Frederic Raymond knew nothing of
the white, emaciated wreck which prayed each day that he might be happy
with the companion he had chosen.
“If he had only waited,” she said to Mrs. Burt and Ben, one day when she
was able to be bolstered up in bed, “if he had waited and not taken her
so soon, I shouldn’t care so much, but it’s awful to think of his living
with her after I wrote that letter.”
“Marian,” said Ben, a little impatiently, “I’m naturally a fool, so
every body says, but I’ve sense enough to know that Mr. Raymond never
went and married that woman so quick after you came away; ’taint
reasonable at all. Why, they’d mob him—tar and feather him—for you ain’t
dead, and he’s no business with two wives.”
Marian’s, face was whiter than ever when Ben finished speaking, and a
bright red spot burned on her cheek as she gasped, “You didn’t,—you
can’t believe she’s there and not his wife. That would be worse than
everything else.”
“Of course I don’t,” returned Ben. “My ’pinion is that she ain’t there
at all, and he only writ that to make a clean finish of you, or ’tany
rate, so’t you wouldn’t be coming back to bother him. He calkerlates to
have her bimeby. I presume—say in seven years.”
“Oh, I wish I knew,” said Marian, and Ben replied, “Would you rest any
easier nights if you did?”
“Yes, a heap,” was the answer, and the great, blue eyes looked wistfully
at Ben, as if anxious that he should clear up the mystery.
“You might write,” suggested Mrs. Burt; but Marian shook her head,
saying, “I wrote once, and you know my success.”
“You certainly wouldn’t go back,” continued Mrs. Burt; and Marian
answered indignantly, “Never! I am sure he hates me now, and I shall not
trouble him again. Perhaps he thinks me mean because I read the letter
intended for him, and so found it all out. But I thought it was mine
until I read a ways, and then I _could not_ stop. My eyes wouldn’t leave
the paper. Was it wrong in me, do you think?”
“It is what anybody would have done,” answered Mrs. Burt, and, changing
the subject entirely, Marian rejoined, “Oh, I do wish I knew about this
Isabel.”
For a time Ben sat thinking; then striking his hands together, he
exclaimed, “I’ve got it, and it’s jest the thing, too. I don’t want no
better fun than that. I’ve lost my place to Ware, and though I might get
another, I’ve a notion to turn _peddler_. I allus thought I should like
travellin’ and seein’ the world. I’ll buy up a lot of jimcracks and take
a bee line for Redstun Hall, and learn just how the matter stands. I can
put on a little more of the Down East Yankee, if you think I hain’t got
enough, and I’ll pull the wool over their eyes. What do you say, wee
one?”
“Oh, I wish you would,” said Marian, adding in the same breath, “what
will you do, if you find him the husband of Isabel?”
“Do!” he repeated. “String ’em both up by the neck on one string. What
do you ’spect I’d do? Honest, though,” he continued, as he saw her look
of alarm; “if she _is_ his wife, which ain’t at all likely, ’tis because
he s’posed you’re dead, but he knows better now, and I shall tell the
neighbors that you’re alive and breathin’, and they can do with him what
they choose—and if they ain’t married, nor ain’t nothin’, I’ll just do
what you say.”
“Come back, and don’t tell Frederic you ever saw or heard of me,” said
Marian. “I shall not live a great while, and even if I do, I’d rather
not trouble him. It would only make him hate me worse, and that I
couldn’t bear. He knows now where I am, and if he ever wants me, he will
come. Don’t tell him, nor any one, a word of me, Ben, but do go, for I
long to hear from home.”
To Mrs. Burt this project seemed a wild and foolish one, but she rarely
opposed her son, and when she saw that he was determined, she said
nothing, but helped him all she could.
“You’ll be wantin’ to send some jimcrack to that, blind gal, I guess,”
he said to Marian one day, and she replied, “I wish I could, but I
havn’t anything, and besides you mustn’t tell her of me.”
“Don’t you worry,” answered Ben. “I’ve passed my word, and I never broke
it yet. I can manage to give her somethin’ and make it seem natural.
What do you say to makin’ her a bracelet out o’ them curls of yourn that
we shaved off?”
“That red hair! Frederic would know it at once,” and Marian shook her
head ruefully, but Ben persisted. “’Twould look real pretty, just like
gingerbread when ’twas braided tight,” and bringing out the curls, he
selected the longest one, and hurried off.
The result proved his words correct, for when a few days after he
brought home the little bracelet, which was fastened with a neat golden
clasp, Marian exclaimed with delight at the soft beauty of her hair:
“Darling Alice,” she cried, kissing the tiny ornament, “I wish she could
know that my lips have touched it—that it once grew on my head—but it
wouldn’t be best. She couldn’t keep the secret, and you mustn’t tell.”
“Don’t worry, I say,” returned Ben. “I’ve got an idee in my brains for a
wonder, and I’m jest as ’fraid of tellin’ as you be. So cheer up a bit
and grow fat, while I’m gone, for I want you to be well when I come
back, so as to go to school and get to be a great scholar, that Mr.
Raymond won’t be ashamed on when the right time comes,” and Ben spoke as
cheerfully as if within his heart there was no grave where during the
weary nights when he watched with Marian he buried his love for her, and
vowed to think of her only as a cherished sister.
Marian smiled pleasantly upon him, watching him with interest as he made
up his pack, consisting of laces, ribbons, muslin, handkerchiefs, combs
and jewelry, a little real, and a good deal brass, “for the niggers,” he
said. Many were the charges she gave him concerning the blacks, telling
him which ones to notice particularly, so as to report to her.
“Jehoshaphat!” he exclaimed at last, “how many is there? I shall never
remember in the world,” and taking out a piece of paper, he wrote upon
it, “Dinah, Hetty, Lid, Victory, Uncle Phil, Josh, and the big dog.
There!” said he, reading over the list, “if I don’t bring you news of
every one, my name ain’t Ben Burt. I’ll wiggle myself inter their good
feelin’s and get ’em to talkin’ of you, see if I don’t.”
Marian had the utmost confidence in Ben’s success, and though she knew
she should be lonely when he was gone, she was glad when, at last, the
morning came for him to leave them. Ben, too, was equally delighted, for
the novelty lent a double charm to the project; and, bidding his mother
and Marian good-by, he gathered up his large boxes, and whistling a
lively tune, by way of keeping up his spirits, started for Kentucky.
CHAPTER XII.
THE YANKEE PEDDLER.
The warm, balmy April day was drawing to a close, and the rays of the
setting sun shone like burnished gold on the western windows of Redstone
Hall. It was very pleasant there now, for the early spring flowers were
all in blossom, the grass was growing fresh and green upon the lawn, and
the creeping vines were clinging lovingly to the time-worn pillars, or
climbing up the massive walls of dark red stone, which gave the place
its name. The old negroes had returned from their labors, and were
lounging about their cabins, while the younger portion looked wistfully
in at the kitchen door, where Dinah and Hetty were busy in preparing
supper. On the back piazza several dogs were lying, and as their quick
ears caught the sound of a gate in the distance, the whole pack started
up and went tearing down the avenue, followed by the furious yell of
Bruno, who tried in vain to escape from his confinement.
“Thar’s somebody comin’,” said Dinah, shading her eyes with her hand,
and looking toward the highway; “somebody with somethin’ on his back.
You, Josh, go after them dogs, afore they skeer him to death.”
Stuttering out some unintelligible speech, Josh started in the direction
the dogs had gone, and soon came up to a tall six-footer, who, with
short pantaloons, a swallow-tailed coat, stove-pipe hat, sharp-pointed
collar, red necktie, and two huge boxes on his back, presented a rather
ludicrous appearance to the boy, and a rather displeasing one to the
dogs, who growled angrily, as if they would pounce upon him at once. The
club, however, with which he had armed himself kept them at bay, until
Josh succeeded in quieting them down.
“Ra-ally, now,” began our friend Ben, who vainly imagined it necessary
to _put on_ a little, by way of proving himself a genuine
Yankee—“ra-ally, now boot-black, what’s the use of keepin’ sich a
’tarnal lot o’ dogs to worry a decent chap like me.”
It was Josh’s misfortune to stammer much more when at all excited, and
to this interrogatory he began, “Caw-caw-caw-cause ma-ma-mars
wa-wa-want——”
“Great Heaven!” interrupted the Yankee, setting down his pack and eyeing
the stuttering negro as if he had been the last curiosity from
Barnum’s—“_will_ you tell a fellow what kind of language you speak.”
“Spe-pe-pe-pects sa-sa-same ye-e-e you do,” returned the negro, failing
wholly to enlighten Ben, who rejoined indignantly, “You go to grass with
your lingo;” and, gathering up his boxes, he started for the house,
accompanied by Josh and the dogs, the first of which made several
ineffectual attempts at conversation.
“Some nateral born fool,” muttered Ben, thinking to himself that he
would like to examine the boy’s mouth and see what ailed it.
After a few minutes they entered the yard, and came up to the other
blacks, who were curiously watching the new comer. Seating himself upon
the steps and crossing one leg over the other, Ben swung his cowhide
boot forward and back, and greeted them with, “wall, uncles, and _ants_,
and cousins, how do you dew, and how do you find yourselves this
afternoon?”
“Jest tolerable, thanky,” answered uncle Phil, and Ben continued, “wall,
health is a great blessing to them that hain’t got it. Do you calkerlate
that I could stay here to-night? I’ve got lots o’ gewgaws,” pointing to
his boxes—“hankerchers, pins, ear-rings and a red and yeller gownd
that’ll jest suit you, old gall,” nodding to Dinah, who muttered
gruffly, “if he calls me _old_ what’ll he say to Hetty?”
Ben saw he had made a mistake, for black women no more care to be old
than their fairer sisters, and he tried to make amends by complimenting
the indignant lady until she was somewhat mollified, when he asked again
if he could stay all night?
“You, Josh,” said Uncle Phil, “go and tell yer master to come here.”
“Whew-ew,” whistled Ben, “if you’re goin’ to send that stutterin’
critter, I may as well be joggin’, for no human can make out his
rigmarole.”
But Ben was mistaken. Josh’s dialect was well understood by Frederic,
who came as requested, and, standing in the door, gazed inquisitively at
the singular looking object seated upon his steps, and apparently
oblivious to everything save the _sliver_ he was trying to extract from
his thumb with a large pin, ejaculating occasionally, “gaul darn the
pesky thing.”
Nothing, however, escaped the keen grey eyes which from time to time
peered out from beneath the stove-pipe hat. Already Ben had seen that
Redstone Hall was a most beautiful spot, and he did not blame Frederic
for disliking to give it up. He had selected Dinah and Phil from the
other blacks, and had said that the baby, who, with a small white dog,
was disputing its right to a piece of fat bacon and a chicken bone, was
Victoria Eugenia. _Josh_ he identified by his name, and he was wondering
at Marian’s taste in caring to hear from _him_, when Frederic appeared,
and all else was forgotten in his eagerness to inspect the man “who
could make a gal bite her tongue in two and yank her hair out by the
roots, all for the love of him.”
Frederic seemed in no hurry to commence a conversation, and during the
minute that he stood there without speaking, Ben had ample time to take
him in from his brown hair and graceful mustache down to his polished
boots.
“Got up in considerable kind of good style,” was Ben’s mental comment,
as he watched the young man carelessly scraping his finger nail with a
pen-knife.
“Did you wish to see me?” Frederic said at last, and with another thrust
at the sliver, Ben stuck his pin upon his coat sleeve, and reversing the
position of his legs, replied, “wall, if you’re the boss, I guess I dew;
I’m Ben Butterworth from down East, and I’ve got belated, and bein’
there ain’t no taverns near I want to stay all night, and pay in money
or notions. Got a lot on ’em, besides some tip-top muslin collars for
your wife, Mrs., what do you call her?” and the gray eyes glistened
themselves upon the face, which for a single instant was white as
marble—then the hot blood came rushing back, and Frederic replied,
“there is no wife here, sir, but you can stay all night if you please.
Will you walk in?” and he led the way to the sitting-room, followed by
Ben, who had obtained what to him was the most important information of
all.
The night was chilly, and in the grate a cheerful coal fire was burning,
casting its ruddy light upon the face of a little girl, who, seated upon
a stool, with her hair combed back from her sweet face, her waxen hands
folded together and her strange brown eyes fixed upon the coals as if
she were looking at something far beyond them, seemed to Ben what he had
fancied angels in heaven to be. It was not needful for Mr. Raymond to
say, “Alice, here is a peddler come to stay all night,” for Ben knew it
was the blind girl, and his heart gave a great throb when he saw her
sitting there so beautiful, so helpless, and so lonely, too, for he
almost knew that she was thinking of Marian, and he longed to take her
in his arms and tell her of the lost one.
Motioning him to a chair, Frederic went out, leaving them together. For
some minutes there was perfect silence, while Ben sat looking at her and
trying hard to keep from crying. It seemed terrible to him that one so
young should be blind, and he wanted to tell her so, but he dared not,
and he sat so still that Alice began to think she was alone, and,
resuming her former thoughts, whispered softly to herself, “oh, I wish
she would come back.”
“Blessed baby,” Ben had almost ejaculated, but he checked himself in
time, and said instead, “little gal.”
Alice started, and turning her ear, seemed waiting for him to speak
again, which he did soon.
“Little gal, will you come and sit in my lap?”
His voice was gentle and kind, but Alice did not care to be thus free
with a stranger, so she replied, “I reckon I won’t do that, but I’ll sit
nearer to you,” and she moved her stool so close by him that her head
almost rested on his lap.
“You must ’scuse me,” she said, “if I don’t act like other children
do—I’m blind.”
Very tenderly he smoothed her silken hair, and as he did so, she felt
something drop upon her forehead. It was a tear, and wiping it away, she
said:
“Man, be you hungry and tired, or what makes you cry?”
“I’m cryin’ for you, poor, unfortunate lamb;” and the tender-hearted Ben
sobbed out aloud.
“Oh, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t,” said the distressed child—“I’m used to it.
I don’t mind it now.”
The ice was fairly broken, and a bond of sympathy established between
the two.
“He must be a good man,” Alice thought; and when he began to question
her of her home and friends, she replied to him readily.
“You haven’t no mother, nor sister, nor a’nt, nor nothin’, but Mr.
Raymond and Dinah,” said Ben, after they had talked awhile. “Ain’t there
no white women in the house but you?”
“Yes, Mrs. Huntington and Isabel. She’s my governess,” answered Alice;
and, conscious of a pang, Ben continued:
“Mr. Raymond sent for ’em, I s’pose?”
“No,” returned Alice. “They came without sending for—came to visit, and
he hired them to stay. Mrs. Huntington keeps house.”
At this point in the conversation there was a rustling of garments in
the hall, and a splendid, queenly creature swept into the room, bringing
with her such an air of superiority that Ben involuntarily hitched
nearer to the wall, as if to get out of sight.
“Je-ru-sa-lem! ain’t she a dasher?” was his mental exclamation; and, in
spite of himself, he followed her movements with an admiring glance.
Taking a chair, she drew it to the fire, and, without deigning to notice
the stranger, she said, rather reprovingly,
“Alice, come here.”
The child obeyed, and Ben, determined not to be ignored entirely, said:
“Pretty well this evenin’, miss?”
“How, sir?” and the black eyes flashed haughtily upon him.
Nothing abashed, he continued: “As’t you if you’re pretty well, but no
matter, I know you to be by your looks. I’ve got a lot of finery that I
know you want.” And on opening his boxes, he spread out upon the carpet
the collars and under-sleeves, which had been bought with a view to this
very night. Very disdainfully Isabel turned away, saying she never
traded with peddlers.
“I wonder if you don’t,” returned Ben, with imperturbable gravity.
“Wall, now, seein’ it’s me, buy somethin’, dew. Here’s a bracelet that
can’t be beat,” and he held up to view Marian’s soft hair, which, in the
bright firelight, looked singularly beautiful.
Isabel did unbend a little now. There was no sham about that, she knew,
and, taking it in her hand, she tried to clasp it on her round, white
arm; but it would not come together. It was not made for her!
“It isn’t large enough,” said she; “it must have been intended for some
child.”
“Shouldn’t wonder if you’d hit the nail right on the head,” returned
Ben, and taking the bracelet he continued, “Mebby ’twas meant for this
wee one—who knows?” and he fastened it on Alice’s slender wrist. “Fits
to a T,” said he, “and you have it, too. Them clasps is little hearts,
do you see?”
Frederic now entered the room, and holding up her arm, Alice said,
“Look, is it pretty?”
“Yes, very,” he replied, bending down to examine it, while Ben watched
him narrowly, wondering how he would feel if he knew from whose tresses
that braid was made.
“Harnsome color, ain’t it, Square?” he said, holding Alice’s hand a
little more to the light, and continuing, “Now there’s them that don’t
like red hair, but I swan I’ve seen some that wan’t so bad. Now when it
curls kinder—wall, like a gimblet, you know. I’ve got a gal to hum I
call my sister, and her hair’s as nigh this color as two peas, or it was
afore ’twas shaved. She’s been awful sick with the heart disorder, and
fever, and I tell you, Square, if you’d o’ seen her pitchin’ and divin’,
and rollin’ from one end of the bed to t’other, bitin’ her tongue and
yankin’ out her hair by han’fuls, I rather guess you’d felt kinder
streaked. It made a calf of me, though I didn’t feel so bad then as when
she got weaker, and lay so still that we held a feather to her lips to
see if she breathed.”
“Oh, did she die?” asked Alice, who had been an attentive listener.
“No,” answered Ben, “she didn’t, and the thankfullest prayer I ever
prayed was the one I made in the buttery, behind the door, when the
doctor said she would get well.”
Supper was announced, and putting up his muslins, Ben followed his host
to the dining room. Alice, too, was at the table, the bracelet still
upon her wrist, for she liked the feeling of it. “And she did so wish it
was hers.”
“I shall have to buy it for you, I reckon,” said Frederic, and he
inquired its price.
“Wall, now,” returned Ben, “if ’twas any body but the little gal, I
should say five dollars, but bein’ it’s hers, I’d kinder like to give it
to her.”
This, however, Frederic would not suffer. Alice would not keep it, he
said, unless he paid for it, and he put a half eagle into the hand of
the child, who offered it to Ben. For a moment, the latter hesitated,
then thinking to himself, “Darnt it all, what’s the use. If Marian goes
to school, as I mean she shall, she’ll need a lot of money, and what I
get out o’ him is clear gain,” he pocketed the piece, and the bracelet
belonged to Alice.
After supper, Ben sat down by the fire in the dining room, hoping the
family would leave him with Alice, and this they did ere long, Isabel
going to the piano, and Frederic to the library to answer letters, while
Mrs. Huntington gave some directions for breakfast. These directions
were merely nominal, however, for Dinah, to all intents and purposes,
was mistress of the household, and she came in to see to the supper
dishes, which were soon cleared away, and Ben, as he wished, was alone
with Alice. The bracelet seemed to be a connecting link between them,
for Alice was not in the least shy of him now, and when he asked her
again to sit in his lap, she did so readily.
“That Miss Isabel is a dreadful han’some gal,” he began; “I should
s’pose Mr. Raymond would fall in love with her.”
No answer from Alice, whose sightless eyes looked steadily into the
fire.
“Mebby he _is_ in love with her.”
No answer yet, and mentally chiding himself for his stupidity in not
striking the right vein, Ben continued:
“I wonder he hain’t married afore this. He must be as much as
twenty-five or six years old, and so han’ some too!”
“He _has_ been married,” and the little face of the speaker did not move
a muscle.
“Now you don’t say it,” returned Ben. “A widower, hey? How long sence he
was married?”
“A few months,” and the long eye-lashes quivered in the firelight just a
little.
“I want to know—died so soon—poor critter. Tell me about her, dew. You
didn’t know her long, so I s’pose you couldn’t love her a great sight?”
The brown eyes flashed up into Ben’s face, and the blood rushed to
Alice’s cheek, as she replied “Me not love Marian! Oh, I loved her so
much!”
The right chord was touched at last, and in her own way Alice told the
sad story—how Marian had left them on her bridal night, and though they
searched for her everywhere, both in the river and through the country,
no trace of her could be found, and the conviction was forced upon them
that she was dead.
“Je-ru-sa-lem! I never thought of that!” was Ben’s involuntary
exclamation; but it conveyed no meaning to Alice, and when he asked if
they still believed her dead, she answered:
“I don’t quite believe Frederic does. I don’t, any way. I used to,
though, but now it seems just like she would come back,” and turning her
face more fully toward him, Alice told how she had loved the lost one,
and how each day she prayed that she might come home to them again.
“I don’t know as she was pretty,” she said, “but she was so sweet, so
good, and I’m so lonesome without her,” and down Alice’s cheeks the big
tears rolled, while Ben’s kept company with them and fell upon her
hands.
“Man, don’t you cry a heap?” she asked, shaking the round drops off and
wondering why a perfect stranger should care so much for Marian.
“I’m so plaguy tender-hearted that I can’t help it,” was Ben’s apology,
as he blew his nose vigorously upon his blue cotton handkerchief.
For a time longer he talked with her, treasuring up blessed words of
comfort for the distant Marian, and learning also that Alice was sure
Frederic would never marry again until certain of Marian’s death. He
might like Isabel, she admitted, but he would not dare make her his wife
till he knew for true what had become of Marian.
“And he does know it, the scented up puppy,” thought Ben. “He jest writ
her that last insultin’ thing to kill her out and out; but he didn’t
come it, and till he knows he did, he dassent do nothin’.”
This reasoning was very satisfactory to Ben, who, having learned from
Alice all that he could, began to think it was time to cultivate the
negroes, and putting the child from his knee, he said “he guessed he’d
go out and see the slaves—mebby they’d like to trade a little, and he
must be off in the mornin’.”
Accordingly he started for the kitchen, where his character had been
pretty thoroughly dissected. A negro from a neighboring plantation had
dropped in on a gossiping visit, and as was very natural, the
conversation had turned upon the peddler, whose peculiar appearance had
attracted much attention at the different places where he had stopped.
Particularly was this the case at the house the black man Henry lived.
“He done ask a heap of questions about us colored folks,” said Henry;
“how many was there of us, how old was we, and what was we worth, and
when marster axed him did he want to buy,” he said “no, but way off whar
he lived he allus spoke in meetin’, and them folks was mighty tickled to
hear suffin’ ’bout niggers.’ Ole Miss say how’t she done b’lieve he’s an
abolution come to run some on us off, case he look like one o’ them
chaps down in the penitentiary.”
“Oh, Lord,” ejaculated Dinah, involuntarily hitching her chair nearer to
Victoria Eugenia, who lay in her cradle.
Old Hetty, too, took alarm at once, and glancing nervously at her own
grandchild Dudley, a little boy two years of age, who was stretched upon
the floor, “she hoped to goodness he wouldn’t carry off Dud.”
“Jest the ones he’ll pick for. He could hide a dozen on ’em in them big
boxes,” said Henry, and feeling pleased at the interest he had awakened
in the two old ladies he proceeded to relate the stories he had heard
“’bout them fetch-ed Yankees meddlin’ with what didn’t consarn ’em,” and
he advised Dinah and Hetty both not to let the peddler get sight of the
children for fear of what might happen.
At this point Ben came out of the house with his huge boxes. He was
first discovered by Josh, who, delighted with the fun, pointed
mysteriously toward him and stuttered, “Da-da-da ’e co-co-comes.”
“The Lord help us,” said Dinah and quick as thought she seized the
sleeping Victoria Eugenia and thrust her into the churn as the nearest
place of concealment.
The awakened baby gave a screech but Dinah stopped its mouth with a
piece of the licorice she always carried in her pocket with her tobacco
box and pipe. Meantime Hetty, determined not to be outdone, caught up
Dud, and, opening the meal chest, tumbled him in, telling him in fierce
whispers “not to stir nor wink, for thar was a man comin’ to cotch him.”
Snatching a newspaper which lay on the floor, she rolled it together and
placed it under the lid, so as to allow the youngster a breathing place.
This done, she resumed her seat just as Ben appeared, who, throwing down
his pack, accosted her with—
“Wall, a’nt, got your chores done? ’Cause if you have I want to trade a
little. I won’t be hard on you,” he continued, as he saw the forbidding
expression of her face. “I’ll dicker cheap and take most any kind o’ dud
for pay.”
Dicker and chores were Greek to old Hetty, but she fully comprehended
the word Dud. He meant her DUD—the one in the meal chest—and she grasped
the handle of the frying pan, so as to be ready for what might follow
next.
“Let me show you some breastpins,” said Ben, looking round for a chair.
They were all occupied, and as the mischievous Josh pointed to the
chest, Ben crossed over, and ere Hetty was aware of his intention,
seated himself quite as a matter of course. But not long, for Hetty’s
dusky fist flourished in the air, and, more than all, the smothered cry
of “Granny, granny, he done sot on me,” which came from beneath him,
landed him on the other side of the room, where he struck against the
churn; whereupon, Victoria Eugenia set up another yell, which sent him
back to the spot where Josh’s cowhides were performing various
evolutions by way of showing his delight.
“Thunder!” ejaculated Ben, looking first at the skirts of his
swallow-tail, then at the chest, from which Dud was emerging, covered
with meal, and then at the churn, over the top of which a pair of little
black hands and a piece of licorice were visible, “what’s the meaning of
all this?”
No explanation whatever was vouchsafed, and, to this day, Ben does not
know the reason why those negroes were stowed away in such novel hiding
places.
When the excitement had somewhat subsided, Ben returned to his first
intention, behaving so civilly that the fears of the negroes gave way,
and Dinah was so well pleased with purchasing a brass pin at half price
that Ben ventured, at last to say:
“That little gal, Alice, has been tellin’ me about Mr. Raymond’s
marriage. Unlucky, wasn’t he? Shouldn’t wonder though, if he had a kind
of hankerin’ after that black-eyed miss. She’s han’some as a picter.”
Dinah needed but this to loosen her tongue. She had long before made up
her mind that “Isabel was no kind o’ ’count;” and once the two had come
to open hostilities, Isabel accusing Dinah of being a “lazy, gossiping
nigger,” while Dinah, in return, had told her “she warn’t no better ’n
she should be stickin’ ’round after Mars. Frederic, when nobody knew
whether Miss Marian was dead, or not.”
This indignity was reported to Frederic, who reproved old Dinah,
sharply; whereupon, she turned toward him, and, to use her favorite
expression, “gin him a piece of her mind.”
After this it was generally understood that between Dinah and Isabel
here existed no very amicable state of feeling, and when Ben spoke of
the latter, the former exploded at once.
“’Twas a burnin’ shame,” she said, “and it mortified her een-a-most to
death to see the trollop a tryin’ to set to marster, when nobody know’d
for sartin if his fust wife was dead.”
“Marster’s jest as fast as she,” interposed Hetty, who seldom agreed
with Dinah.
A contemptuous sneer curled Dinah’s lip as she said to Ben, in a
whisper:
“Don’t b’lieve none o’ her trash. Them Higginses allus would lie. I
hain’t never seen Marster Frederic do a single thing out o’ the way,
’cept to look at her, jest as Phil used to look at me when he was
sparkin’. I don’t think that was very ’spectable in him, to be sure, but
looks don’t signify. He dassen’t marry her till he knows for sartin
t’other one is dead. He done told Alice so, and she told me;” and then
Dinah launched out into praises of the lost Marian, exalting her so
highly that Ben tossed into her lap a pair of ear-rings which she had
greatly admired.
“Take them,” said he, “for standin’ up for that poor runaway. I like to
hear one woman stick to another.”
Dinah cast an exulting glance at Hetty, who, nothing daunted, came
forward and said:
“Miss Marian was as likely a gal as thar was in Kentuck, and she, for
one, should be as glad to see her back as some o’ them that made sich a
fuss about it.”
“Playin’ ’possum,” whispered Dinah. “Them Higginses is up to that.”
Ben probably thought so too, for he paid no attention to Hetty, who,
highly indignant started for Isabel, and told her “how Dinah and that
fetch-ed peddler done spilt her character entirely.”
“Leave the room,” was Isabel’s haughty answer. “I am above what a poor
negro and an ignorant Yankee can say.”
“For the dear Lord’s sake,” muttered the discomfited Hetty; “wonder if
she ain’t a Yankee her own self. ’Spects how she done forgot whar she
was raised,” and Hetty returned to the kitchen a warmer adherent of
Marian than Dinah had ever been.
She, too, was very talkative now, and before nine o’clock Ben had
learned all that he expected to learn, and much more. He had ascertained
that no one had the slightest suspicion of the reason why Marian went
away; that both Frederic and Isabel seemed unhappy; that Dinah and
Hetty, too, believed “thar was somethin’ warin’ on thar minds;” that
Frederic was discontented, and talked seriously of leaving Redstone Hall
in care of an overseer, and moving, in the Autumn to his residence on
the Hudson; that Hetty hoped he would, and Dinah hoped he wouldn’t,
“’case if he did, it would be next to impossible to get a stroke o’ work
out o’ them lazy Higginses.”
“I’ve got all I come for, I b’lieve,” was Ben’s mental comment, as he
left the kitchen and returned to the dining room, where he found
Frederic alone. “I’ll poke his ribs a little,” he thought, and helping
himself to a chair, he began:
“Wall, Square, I’ve been out seein’ your niggers. Got a fine lot on ’em,
and I shouldn’t wonder if you was wo’th considerable. Willed to you by
your dad, or was it a kind of a dowry come by your wife? You’re a
widower, they say;” and the gray eyes looked out at their corners, as
Ben thought, “That’ll make him squirm, I guess.”
Frederic turned very white, but his voice was natural as he replied:
“My father was called the richest man in the county, and I was his only
child.”
“Ah, yes, come to you that way,” answered Ben, continuing after a
moment. “There’s a big house up on the Hudson—to Yonkers—that’s been
shet up and rented at odd spells for a good while, and somebody told me
it belonged to a Colonel Raymond, who lived South. Mabby that’s yourn?”
“It is,” returned Frederic, “and I expect now to go there in the Fall.”
“I want to know. I shouldn’t s’pose you could be hired to leave this
place.”
“I couldn’t be hired to stay. There are too many sad memories connected
with it,” was Frederic’s answer, and he paced the floor hurriedly, while
Ben continued: “Mabby you’ll be takin’ a new wife there?”
Frederic’s cheek flushed as he replied:
“If I ever marry again, it will not be in years. Would you like to go to
bed, sir?”
Ben took the hint and replying, “I don’t care if I dew,” followed the
negro, who came at Frederic’s call, up to his room, a pleasant,
comfortable chamber, overlooking the river and the surrounding country.
“Golly, this is grand!” said Ben, examining the different articles of
furniture, as if he had never seen anything like it before.
The negro, who was Lyd’s husband, made no reply, but, hurrying down
stairs to his mother-in-law, he told her, “Thar was somethin’ mighty
queer about that man, and if they all found themselves alive in the
mornin,’ he should be thankful.”
Unmindful of breast-pin and ear-rings, Dinah became again alarmed, and,
bidding Joe see that Victoria Eugenia was safe, she gathered up the
forks and spoons, and rolling them in a towel, tucked them inside her
straw tick, saying: “I reckon it’ll make him sweat some to hist me and
Phil on to the floor;” which was quite probable, considering that the
united weight of the worthy couple was somewhat over three hundred!
The morning dawned at last, and, with her fears abated, Dinah washed the
silver, made the coffee, broiled the steak and fried the corn meal
batter-cakes, which last were at first respectfully declined by Ben, who
admitted that they “might be fust-rate, but he didn’t b’lieve they’d set
well on his stomach.”
Hetty, who was waiting upon the table, quickly divined the reason, and
whispered to him: “Lord bless you, take some; I done sifted the meal!”
This argument was conclusive, and helping himself to the light, steaming
cakes, Ben thought, “I may as well eat ’em, for ’taint no wus, nor as
bad as them Irish gals does to hum, only I happened to see it!”
Breakfast being over, he offered to settle his bill, which he found was
nothing.
“Now, ra-ally, Square,” he said, as Frederic refused to take pay, “I
allus hearn that Kentuckians was mighty free-hearted, but I didn’t
’spect you to give me my livin’. I’m much obleeged to you, though, and I
shall have more left to eddicate that little sister I was tellin’ you
’bout. I mean to give her tip-top larnin’, and mebby sometime she’ll
come here to teach this wee one,” and he laid his hand on Alice’s hair.
The little girl smiled up in his face, and said, “Come again and peddle
here, won’t you?”
“Wouldn’t wonder if I turned up amongst you some day,” was his answer;
and bidding the family goodbye, he went out into Bruno’s kennel, for
until this minute he had forgotten that the dog was to be remembered.
“Keep away from dar,” called out Uncle Phil, while Bruno growled
savagely and bounded against the bars as if anxious to pounce upon the
intruder.
“I’ve seen enough of him,” thought Ben, and shaking hands with Uncle
Phil, he walked rapidly down the avenue and out into the highway.
Marian, he knew, was anxious to hear of his success, and not willing to
keep her waiting longer than was necessary, he determined to return at
once. Accordingly, while the unsuspecting inmates of Redstone Hall were
discussing his late visit and singular appearance, he was on his way to
the depot, where he took the first train for Frankfort, and was soon
sailing down the Kentucky toward home.
CHAPTER XIII.
PLANS.
Marian was sitting by the window of her little room, looking out into
the busy street below, and thinking how differently New York seemed to
her now from what it did that dreary day when she wandered down
Broadway, and wished that she could die. She was getting accustomed to
the city roar, and the sounds which annoyed her so much at first did not
trouble her as they once had done. Still there was the same old pain at
her heart—a restless, longing desire to hear from home, and know if what
she feared were true. She had counted the days of Ben’s absence, and she
knew it was almost time for his return. She did not expect him to-day,
however, and she paid no attention to the heavy footstep upon the
stairs, neither did she hear the creaking of the door; but when Mrs.
Burt exclaimed, “Benjamin Franklin! where did you come from?” she
started, and in an instant held both his hands in hers.
Wistfully, eagerly she looked up into his face, longing, yet dreading,
to ask the important question.
“Have you been there?” she managed to say at last; and Ben replied,
“Yes, chicken, I have, I’ve been to Redstun Hall, and seen the hull
tribe on ’em. That Josh is a case. Couldn’t understand him no more than
if he spoke a furrin tongue.”
“But Frederic—did you see him, and is he—oh, Ben, do tell me—what you
know I want to hear?” and Marian trembled with excitement.
“Wall, I will,” answered Ben, dropping into a chair, and coming to the
point at once. “Frederic ain’t married to Isabel, nor ain’t a goin’ to
be, either.”
“What made him write me that lie?” was Marian’s next question, asked so
mournfully that Ben replied:
“A body’d s’pose you was sorry it warn’t the truth he writ.”
“I am glad it is not true,” returned Marian, “but it hurts me so to lose
confidence in one I love. How does Frederic look?”
“White as a sheet and poor as a crow,” said Ben. “It’s a wearin’ on him,
depend on’t. But she—I tell you she’s a dasher, with the blackest eyes
and hair I ever seen.”
“Who?” fairly screamed Marian. “Who? Not Isabel? Oh, Ben, is Isabel
there?” And Marian grew as white as Ben had described Frederic to be.
“Yes she is,” returned Ben. “She’s pretendin’ to teach that blind gal,
but Frederic ain’t makin’ love to her—no such thing. So don’t go to
faintin’ away, and I’ll begin at the beginning and tell you the hull
story.”
Thus re-assured, Marian composed herself and listened, while Ben
narrated every particular of his recent visit to Redstone Hall.
“I stopped at some of the houses in the neighborhood,” said he, “but I
never as’t a question about the Raymonds, for fear of bein’ mistrusted.
Come to think on’t, though, I did inquire the road, and they sent me
through corn fields, and hemp fields, and mercy knows what; such a way
as they have livin’ in the lots? But I kinder like it. Seems like a
story, them big houses way off among the trees, with the whitewashed
cabins round ’em lookin’ for all the world like a camp-meetin’ in the
woods——”
“Yes, yes,” interrupted Marian; “but Frederic—won’t you ever reach him?”
“Not till I tell you about the dogs, and that jaw breakin’ chap they
call Josh, with his cow hides, big as a scow-boat, I’ll bet,” was Ben’s
answer; and finding it useless to hurry him, Marian summoned all her
patience and waited while he waded through his introduction to the
blacks, his attempt to be more of a Yankee than he really was, his
sliver in his thumb, and, finally his addressing Frederic as Square and
inquiring for his wife!
Marian was all attention now, and held her breath, lest she should lose
a single word. When he came to Isabel, and described her glowing,
sparkling beauty, she trembled in every joint, and felt as if she were
turning to stone; but when he spoke of Alice, and the sweet, loving
words she had said of the lost one, the cold, hard feeling passed away,
and, covering her face with her hands, she wept aloud. Everything which
Ben had seen or heard he told, omitting not a single point, but
lengthening out his story with surmises and suspicions of his own.
“Alice and Dinah both,” said he, “told me Frederic wouldn’t marry till
they knew for certain you was dead, and as he does know for certain, you
can calkerlate on that Isabel’s bein’ an old maid for all of him.”
“I never supposed they’d think me drowned when I dropped my glove and
handkerchief,” said Marian. “Did they inquire at the depot.”
“Yes—so Alice said,” returned Ben, “and nobody knew’ nothin’ of you; so
it was nateral they should think you drownded: but, no matter, it makes
it more like a novel, and now I’ll tell you jest what ’tis, wee one, I
don’t mean no offense, and you must take it all in good part. You are a
great deal better than Isabel, I know; but, as fur as looks and manners
is concerned, you can’t hold a candle to her, and a body knowin’ nothing
about either would naterally say she was most befittin’ Redstun Hall;
but, tell ’em to wait a spell. You hain’t got your growth yet, and you
are gettin’ better-lookin’ every day. That sickness made a wonderful
change in you, and shavin’ your hair was jest the thing. It’s comin’ out
darker, as it always does, and in less than a year I’ll bet my hat on
its bein’ a beautiful auburn. You must chirk up and grow fat, for I’m
goin’ to send you to school, and have you take lessons on the pianner,
and learn French and everything, so that by the time you’re twenty
you’ll be the best educated and han’somest gal in the city, and then
when the right time comes, if Providence don’t contrive to fetch you two
together, Ben Burt will. I shall keep my eye on him, and if he’s gettin’
too thick with Isabel, I’ll drop a sly hint in his ear. They’re goin’ to
move up on to the Hudson to the old place—did I tell you?—and mebby
you’ll run afoul of him in the street some day.”
“Oh, I hope not—at least, not yet—not till the time you speak of,” said
Marian, who had listened eagerly to Ben’s suggestion, and already felt
that there was hope for her in the future. She would study so hard, she
thought, and learn so fast, and if she only could be thought handsome,
or even decent-looking, she would be satisfied, but that was impossible,
she feared.
She did not know that, as Ben had said, the severe illness through which
she had passed had laid the foundation for a softer, more refined style
of beauty than she would otherwise have reached. Her entire constitution
seemed to have undergone a change, and now, with hope to buoy her up,
she grew stronger, healthier, and, as a natural consequence, handsomer
each day. She could not erase from her memory the insult Frederic had
offered her, by writing what she believed he did, but her affection for
him was strong enough to overlook even that, and she was willing to wait
and labor years if at the end of that time she could hope to win his
love.
Whatever Ben undertook he was sure to accomplish in the shortest
possible time, and before starting upon another peddling excursion, the
name of “MARIAN GREY” was enrolled, among the list of pupils who
attended Madam Harcourt’s school. At first she was subject to many
annoyances, for, as was quite natural, her companions inquired
concerning her standing, and when they learned that her aunt was a
sewing woman, and that the queer, awkward fellow who came with her the
first day was her cousin and a peddler, they treated her slightingly,
and laughed at her plain dress. But Marian did not care. One thought—one
feeling alone actuated her; to make herself something of which Frederic
Raymond should not be ashamed was her aim, and for this she studied
early and late, winning golden laurels in the opinion of her teachers,
and coming ere long to be respected and loved by her companions, who
little suspected that she was the heiress of untold wealth.
Thus the Summer and a part of the Autumn passed away, and when the
semi-annual examination came, Marian Grey stood first in all her
classes, acquitting herself so creditably and receiving so much praise,
that Ben, who chanced to be present, was perfectly overjoyed, and
evinced his pleasure by shedding tears, his usual way of expressing
feeling.
From this time forward Marian’s progress was rapid, until even she
herself wondered how it were possible for her to learn so fast when she
had formerly cared so little for books. Hope, and a joyful anticipation
of what would possibly be hers in the future, kept her up and helped her
to endure the mental labors which might otherwise have overtaxed her
strength. Gradually, too, the old soreness at her heart wore away, and
she recovered in a measure her former light-heartedness, until at last
her merry laugh was often heard ringing out loud and clear just as it
used to do at home in days gone by. Very anxiously Ben watched her, and
when on his return from his excursions he found her, as he always did,
improved in looks and spirits, he rubbed his hands together and
whispered to himself, “She’ll set up for a beauty, yet, and no mistake.
That hair of hern is growin’ a splendid color.”
He did not always express these thoughts to Marian, but the little
mirror which hung on the wall in her room sometimes whispered to her
that the face reflected there was not the same which had looked at her
so mournfully on that memorable night when she had left her pillow to
see what her points of ugliness were! The one which she had thought the
crowning defect of all had certainly disappeared. Her red curls were
gone, and in their places was growing a mass of soft wavy hair, which
reminded her of the auburn tress she had so much admired and prized,
because it was her mother’s. She had no means of knowing how nearly they
were alike, for the ringlet was far away, but by comparing her present
short curls with those which had been shorn from her head, she saw there
was a difference, and she felt a pardonable pride in brushing and
cultivating her young hair, which well repaid her labor, growing very
rapidly and curling about her forehead in small, round rings, which were
far from unbecoming.
Toward the last of November, Ben, who found his peddling profitable,
took a trip through Western New York, and did not return until February,
when, somewhat to his mother’s annoyance, he brought a sick stranger
with him. He had taken the cars at Albany, where he met with the
stranger, who offered him a part of his seat and made himself so
generally agreeable that Ben’s susceptible heart warmed toward him at
once, and when at last, as they drew near New York, the man showed signs
of being seriously ill, Ben’s sympathy was roused, and learning that he
had no friends in the city, he urged him so strongly to accompany him
home for the night, at least, that his invitation was accepted, and the
more readily, perhaps, as the stranger’s pocket had been picked in
Albany, and he had nothing left except his ticket to New York. This
reason was not very satisfactory to Mrs. Burt, who from the first had
disliked their visitor’s appearance. He was a powerfully built young
man, with black bushy hair, and restless, rolling eyes, which seemed
ever on the alert to discover something not intended for them to see.
His face wore a hard, dissipated look; and when Mrs. Burt saw how soon
after seating himself before the warm fire, he fell asleep, she rightly
conjectured that a fit of drunkenness had been the cause of his illness.
Still, he was their guest, and she would not treat him uncivilly, so she
bade her son to take him to his room, where he lay in the same deep,
stupid sleep, breathing so loudly that he could be plainly heard in the
adjoining room, where Marian and Ben were talking of the house at
Yonkers which was not finished yet, and would not be ready for the
family until sometime in May.
Suddenly the loud breathing in the bedroom ceased—the stranger was
waking up; but Ben and Marian paid no heed, and talked on as freely as
if there were no greedy ears drinking in each word they said—no
wild-eyed man leaning on his elbow and putting together, link by link,
the chain of mystery until it was as clear to him as noonday. The first
sentence which he heard distinctly sobered him at once. It was Marian
who spoke, and the words she said were, “I wonder if Isabel Huntington
will come with Frederic to Yonkers.”
“Isabel!” the stranger gasped. “What do they know of her?” and sitting
up in bed, he listened until he learned what they knew of her, and
learned, too, that the young girl whom Ben Burt called his cousin was
the runaway bride from Redstone Hall.
Fiercely the black eyes flashed through the darkness, and the fists
smote angrily together as the stranger hoarsely whispered:
“The time I’ve waited for has come at last, and the proud lady shall be
humbled in the very dust!”
It was Rudolph McVicar who thus threatened evil to Isabel Huntington. He
had loved her once, but her scornful refusal of him, even after she was
his promised wife, had turned his love to hate, and he had sworn to
avenge the wrong should a good chance ever occur. He knew that she was
in Kentucky—a teacher at Redstone Hall—and for a time he had expected to
hear of her marriage with the heir, but this intelligence did not come,
and weary of New Haven, he at last made a trip to New Orleans,
determining on his way back to stop for a time in the neighborhood of
Redstone Hall, and if possible learn the reason why Isabel had not yet
succeeded in securing Frederic Raymond. On the boat in which he took
passage on his return were three or four young people from Franklin
county, and among them Agnes Gibson and her brother. They were a very
merry party, and at once attracted the attention of Rudolph, who,
learning that they were from the vicinity of Frankfort, hovered around
them, hoping that by some chance he might hear them speak of Isabel. Nor
was he disappointed; for one afternoon when they were assembled upon the
upper deck, one of their number who lived in Lexington, and who had been
absent in California for nearly two years, inquired after Frederic
Raymond, whom he had formerly known at school.
“Why,” returned the loquacious Agnes, “did no one write that news to
you?” and oblivious entirely of Rudolph McVicar, who at a little
distance was listening attentively, she told the story of Frederic’s
strange marriage and its sad denouement. Isabel, too, was freely
discussed, Miss Agnes saying that Mr. Raymond would undoubtedly marry
her, could he know that Marian was dead, but as there were some who
entertained doubts upon that point he would hardly dare take any
decisive step until uncertainty was made sure.
“When Miss Huntington first came to Redstone Hall,” continued Agnes,
“she took no pains whatever to conceal her preference for Mr. Raymond;
but latterly a change has come over her, and she hardly appears like the
same girl. There seems to be something on her mind, though what it is I
have never been able to learn, which is a little strange, considering
that she tells me everything.”
Not a word of all this story was lost by McVicar. There was no reason
now for his leaving the boat at Louisville. He knew why Isabel was not a
bride, and secretly exulting as he thought of her weary restlessness, he
kept on his way till he reached Albany, where a debauch of a few days
was succeeded by the sickness which had awakened the sympathy of the
tender-hearted Ben, and induced the latter to offer him shelter for the
night. He was glad of it, now—glad that he had met with Ben, for by that
means he had discovered the hiding place of Frederic Raymond’s wife. He
did not know of her fortune, but he knew that she was Marian Lindsey;
that accidentally, as he supposed, she had stumbled upon Mrs. Burt and
Ben, who were keeping her secret from the world, and that was enough for
him. That Isabel had something to do with her he was sure, and long
after the conversation in the next room had ceased, he lay awake
thinking what use he should make of his knowledge, and still not betray
those who had befriended him.
Rudolph McVicar was an adept in cunning, and before the morning dawned
he had formed a plan by which he hoped to crush the haughty Isabel.
Assuming an air of indifference to everything around him, he sauntered
out to breakfast, and pretended to eat, while his eyes rested almost
constantly on Marian. She was very young, he thought, and far prettier
than Agnes Gibson had represented her to be. She was changing in her
looks, he said, and two or three years would ripen her into a beautiful
woman of whom Frederic Raymond would be proud. Much he wished he knew
why she had left Redstone Hall, but as this knowledge was beyond his
reach, he contented himself with knowing who she was, and after
breakfast was over, he thanked his new acquaintances for their
hospitality, and went out into the city, going first to a pawnbroker’s,
where he left his watch, receiving in exchange money enough to defray
his expenses in the city for several days.
That night, in a private room at the St. Nicholas, he sat alone, bending
over a letter, which, when finished, bore a very fair resemblance to an
uneducated woman’s handwriting, and which read as follows:
M. RAYMOND—I now take my pen in hand to inform you that A young Woman,
calling herself Marian lindsey has ben staying with me awhile And she
said you was her Husband what she came of and left you for I don’t know
and I spose its none of my Biznes all I have to do is to tell you that
she died wun week ago come Sunday with the canker-rash and she made me
Promise to rite and tell you she was ded and that she forgives you all
your Sins and hope you wouldn’t wate long before you marred agen it
would of done your Hart good to hear her taulk like a Sante as she did.
I should of writ soonner only her sicknes hindered me about gettin reddy
for a journey ime goin to take my only Brother lives in Scotland and ime
goin out to live with him i was most reddy when Marian took sick if she
had lived she was coming back to you I bleave and now that shes ded ime
going rite of in the —— which sales tomorrough nite else ide ask you to
come down and see where she died and all about it. i made her as
comfitable as I could and hopin you wouldn’t take it to hard for Deth is
the Lot of all i am your most Humble Servant
SARAH GREEN.
“There,” soliloquized Rudolph, reading over the letter. “That covers the
whole ground, and still gives him no clue in case he should come to New
York. The —— does sail the very day I have named, and though ‘Sarah
Green’ may not be among her passengers, it answers my purpose quite as
well. I believe I’ve steered clear of all doubtful points which might
lead him to suspect it a forgery. He knows Marian would not attempt to
deceive him thus, and he will, undoubtedly, think old Mrs. Green some
good soul, who dosed the patient with saffron tea, and then saw her
decently interred! He’ll have a nice time hunting up her grave if he
should undertake that. But he won’t—he’ll be pleased enough to know that
he is free, for by all accounts he didn’t love her much, and in less
than six weeks he’ll be engaged to Isabel. But I’ll be on their track.
I’ll watch them narrowly, and when the day is set, and the guests are
there, one will go unbidden to the marriage feast, and the story that
uninvited guest can tell will humble the proud beauty to the dust. He
will tell her that this letter was a forgery, and Sarah Green a myth:
that Marian Lindsey lives, and Frederic Raymond, if he takes another
wife, can be indicted for bigamy; and when he sees her eyes flash fire,
and her cheek grow pale with rage and disappointment, Rudolph McVicar
will be avenged.”
This, then, was the plan which Rudolph had formed, and, without wavering
for an instant in his purpose, he sealed the letter, and directing it to
Frederic, sent it on its way, going himself the next morning to New
Haven, where he had some money deposited in the bank. This he withdrew,
and after a few days started for Lexington, where he intended to remain
and watch the proceedings at Redstone Hall, until the denouement of his
plot.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE EFFECT.
Not quite one year has passed away since the warm Spring night when Ben
Burt first strolled leisurely up the long avenue leading to Redstone
Hall. It was April, then, and the early flowers were in bloom, but now
the chill March winds are blowing, and the brown stocks of the tall
rose-tree brush against the window, from which a single light streams
out into the darkness. It is the window of the little library where we
have seen Frederic before, and where we meet him once again. He has
changed somewhat since we saw him last, and there is upon his face a
sad, thoughtful expression, as if far down in his heart there were a
haunting memory which would follow him through all time, and embitter
every hour.
Little by little, step by step, he had come to hate the wealth which had
tempted him to sin—to loathe the beautiful home he once loved so
well—and this had prompted him to leave it and go back to the old house
on the river, where his early boyhood was passed. There were not so many
mournful memories clustering around that spot, he thought, and if he
once were there, he might perhaps forget the past, and be happy again.
He would open an office in the city, and if possible earn his own
living, so as not to spend more of Marian’s fortune than was necessary.
He could not tell why he wished to save it. He only knew that he could
not bear to use it, and he roused himself at last, determining to do
something for himself. This plan of moving to the Hudson was opposed by
Isabel, who liked the easy, luxurious life she led at Redstone Hall;
but, for once, Frederic would not listen to her, and he had made his
arrangements to leave Kentucky in May, at which time his house would be
in readiness to receive him. Isabel would go with him, of course—she was
necessary to him now, though, faithful to the promise made to little
Alice, he had never talked to her of love. And she was glad that he had
not; for, with the knowledge she possessed, she would not have dared to
listen to his suit, and she often questioned herself as to what the end
would be.
One year or more of the dreary seven was gone, but the future looked
almost hopeless to her, and she was sometimes tempted to go away and
leave the dangerous game at which she was so hazardously playing. Still,
when she seriously contemplated such a proceeding, she shrunk from
it—for, even though she were never Frederic’s wife, she would rather
remain where she was, and see that no other came to dispute the little
claim she had. All her assurance was gone, and in her dread lest
Frederic should say the words she must not hear, she assumed toward him
a half distant, half bashful manner, far more attractive than a bolder
course of conduct would have been, and Frederic, while watching her in
this new phase of character, struggled manfully against the feeling
which sometimes prompted him to break his promise to the blind girl. She
was faulty, he knew—far more so than he had once imagined—but she was
brilliant, beautiful, accomplished, and he thought that he loved her.
But not of her was he thinking that chill March night when he sat alone
in the library watching the flickering of the lamp, and listening to the
evening wind, as it shook the bushes beneath his window. It was Marian’s
seventeenth birthday, and he was thinking of her, wondering what she
would have been had she lived to see this day. She was surely dead, he
thought, or some tidings of her would have come to him ere this, and
when he remembered how gentle, how pure and self-denying her short life
had been, he said involuntarily, “Poor Marian—she deserved a better
fate, and should she come back to me again I would prove to her that I
am not all unworthy of her love.”
There was a shuffling tread in the hall, and Josh appeared bringing
several letters. One bore the Louisville post-mark—one was from New
Orleans—one from Lexington, and one from Sarah Green!
“Who writes to me from New York?” was Frederic’s mental query, and
tearing open the wrapper he drew nearer to him the lamp and read, while
there crept over him a nameless terror as if even while he was thinking
of the lost, the grave had opened at his feet and shown him where she
lay; not in the moaning river—not in the deep, dark woods, nor on the
western prairies, as he had sometimes feared, but far away in the great
city, where there was no one to pity—no eye to weep for her save that of
the rude woman who had written him the letter.
There Marian had suffered and died for him. His Marian—his young
girl-wife! He could call her so now, and he did, saying it softly,
reverently, as we speak always of the departed, while the tears he was
not ashamed to weep, dropped upon the soiled sheet. He did not think of
doubting it. There was no reason why he should, and his heart went out
after the dead as it had never gone after the living. It seemed to him
so terrible that she should die among strangers, so far from home; and
he wondered much how she ever chanced to get there. She had remembered
him to the last, “forgiving all his sins,” the woman said, and knowing
how much those few words meant, he said again, “Poor Marian,” just as
the door opened and Alice came slowly in.
There was a grand party that night at the house of Lawyer Gibson, and at
Isabel’s request Alice had come to ask how long before the carriage
would be ready. Dinah had told her that Frederic was in the library but
he sat so still she thought he was not there, and she said inquiringly,
“Frederic?”
“Yes, darling,” was his answer in a tone which startled the sensitive
child, for she detected in it a sound of tears, and hurrying to his side
she passed her hand over his face to assure herself that she heard
aright.
“Has something dreadful happened?” she asked, as she felt the moisture
on his eye-lids.
Taking her on his lap, and laying his burning cheek against her cool
forehead, Frederic said to her very tenderly and low:
“Alice, poor Marian is dead! Here is the letter which came to tell us,”
and he placed it in her hand. There was a sudden upward flashing of the
brown eyes, and then their soft light was quenched in tears, as, burying
her face in the young man’s bosom, the blind girl sobbed, “Oh, no, no,
Frederic, no.”
For several minutes she wept passionately, while her little frame shook
with strong emotion. Then lifting up her head and reaching toward the
spot where she knew the letter lay, she said:
“Read it to me, Frederic,” and he did read, pausing occasionally as he
was interrupted by her low moaning cry.
“Is that all?” she asked, when he had finished. “Didn’t you leave out a
word?”
“Not one,” was his reply, and with quivering lips the heart-broken child
continued, “Marian sent no message for poor blind Alice to remember—she
never thought of me who loved her so much. Why didn’t she, Frederic?”
and the sightless eyes looked beseechingly at him as if he could explain
the mystery.
Poor child! Rudolph McVicar did not know how strong was the affection
between those two young girls, or he would surely have sent a message to
one who seemed almost a part of Marian herself, and it was this very
omission which finally led the close reasoning child to doubt the truth
of the letter. But she did not doubt it now. Marian was really dead to
her, and for a longtime she sat with Frederic, saying nothing, but by
her silence manifesting to him how great was her grief at this sudden
bereavement.
At last remembering her errand, she told him why she had come, and asked
what she should say to Isabel.
“Tell her I shall not go,” he said, “but she need not remain at home for
that. The carriage can be ready at any time, and Alice will tell her the
rest? You’ll do it better than I.”
Alice would rather that some one else should carry to Isabel tidings
which she felt intuitively would be received with more pleasure than
pain, but if Frederic requested it of her she would do it, and she
started to return. To her the night and the day were the same, and
ordinarily it mattered not whether there were lamps in the hall or not,
but now, as she passed from the library into the adjoining room, there
came over her a feeling of such utter loneliness and desolation that she
turned back and said to Frederic:
“Will you go with me up the stairs, for now that Marian is dead, the
night is darker than it ever was before.”
He appreciated her feelings, and taking her by the hand, led her to the
door of Isabel’s room. Very impatiently Isabel had waited for her,
wishing to know what hour Frederic intended starting, and if there would
be time for Luce, her waiting maid, to curl her long, black hair.
Accidentally she had overheard a gentleman say that if she wore curls
she would be the most beautiful woman in Kentucky, and as he was to be
present at the party she determined to prove his assertion.
“I hope that young one stays well,” she said, angrily, as the moments
went by, and at last, as Alice did not come, she bade Luce put the iron
in the fire, and commence her operations.
The negress accordingly obeyed the orders, and six long curls were
streaming down the lady’s back, while a seventh was wound around the
hissing iron in close proximity to her ear, when Alice came in, and
hurrying up to her side, began:
“Oh, Miss Huntington, poor, dear Marian wasn’t dead all the time they
thought she was. She was in New York, with Mrs. ——”
She did not finish the sentence; for, feeling certain that her treachery
was about to be disclosed, the guilty Isabel jumped so suddenly as to
bring the hot iron directly across her ear and a portion of her
forehead. Maddened with the pain, and a dread of impending disgrace, she
struck the innocent girl a blow which sent her reeling across the floor.
“Oh, Lordy!” exclaimed Luce, untwisting the hair so rapidly that a
portion of it was torn from the head—“oh, Lordy! Miss Isabel, Alice
never tached you;” and, throwing the iron upon the hearth, she hurried
to the prostrate child, who had thrown herself upon the lounge and was
sobbing so loud and hysterically that Isabel herself was alarmed, and
while bathing her blistered ear, tried to stammer out some apology for
what she had done.
“I supposed you carelessly ran against me,” she said; “and it hurt me so
I didn’t know what I was doing. Pray, don’t cry that way. You’ll raise
the house;” and she took hold of Alice’s shoulder.
“I wish she would,” muttered Luce; and, stooping down, she whispered:
“Screech louder, so as to fotch Marster Frederic, and tell him jest how
she done sarved you!”
But nothing could be further from Alice’s mind than crying for effect.
It was not so much the indignity she had suffered, nor yet the pain of
the blow which made her weep so bitterly. It was rather the utter sense
of desolation, the feeling that her last hope had drifted away with the
certainty of Marian’s death, and for a time she wept on passionately;
while Isabel, with a hurricane in her bosom, walked the floor, wondering
if her perfidy would ever be discovered, and feeling that she cared but
little now whether it were, or not. Suspense was terrible, and when the
violence of Alice’s sobs had subsided, she said to her:
“Where is Marian, and when is she coming home?”
“Oh, never, never!” answered the child. “She can’t come back, for she’s
dead now, Marian is;” and Alice covered her face again with her hands.
“Dead!” exclaimed Isabel, in a far different voice from that in which
she had spoken before. “What do you mean?” and passing her arm very
caressingly around the little figure lying on the lounge, she continued:
“I am sorry I struck you, Alice. I didn’t know what I was doing, and you
must forgive me, will you, darling? There, dry your eyes, and tell me
all about poor Marian. When did she die, and where?”
As well as she could for her tears, Alice told what she knew, and
satisfied that she was in no way implicated, Isabel became still more
amiable, even speaking pleasantly to Luce and telling her she might do
what she pleased the remainder of the evening.
“Of course I shouldn’t think of attending the party now, even if I were
not so dreadfully burned. Poor Frederic! how badly he must feel!”
“He does,” said Alice, “and he cried, too.”
Isabel curled her proud lip contemptuously, and dipping her handkerchief
again in the water, she applied it to her blistered ear, thinking to
herself that he would probably be easily consoled. It would be proper,
too, for her to commence the consoling process at once, by expressing
her sympathy; and leaving Alice alone she went to the library where
Frederic still was sitting, so absorbed in his own sad reflections that
he did not observe her approach until she said, “Alice tells me you have
heard from Marian,” then he started suddenly, and turning toward her,
answered, “Yes, you can read what is written here if you like,” and he
passed her McVicar’s letter.
It did seem to Isabel that there was something familiar about the
writing, particularly in the formation of the capitals, but she
suspected no fraud, and accepted the whole as coming from Sarah Green.
“This is some new acquaintance Marian picked up,” she thought. “The
woman speaks of having known her but a short time. Probably she left
Mrs. Daniel Burt and stumbled upon Sarah Green,” and with an exultant
smile upon her beautiful face, she put the letter down, and laying her
hand very lightly on Frederic’s shoulder, said, “I am sorry for you,
Frederic, though it is better, of course, to know just what did become
of the poor girl.”
Frederic could not tell why it was that Isabel’s words of sympathy
grated harshly on his ear. He only knew that they did, and he was glad
when she left him alone, telling him she should not, of course, attend
the party, and saying in reply to his question as to what ailed her ear,
that Luce, who was curling her hair, carelessly burned it.
“By the way,” she continued, “when I felt the hot iron, I jumped and
throwing out my hand accidentally hit Alice on her head, and, if you’ll
believe me, the sensitive child thinks I intended it, and has almost
cried herself sick.”
This falsehood she deemed necessary, in case the truth of the matter
should ever reach Frederic through another channel, and feeling
confident that she was safe in every respect, and that the prize she so
much coveted was nearly won, she left him and sought her mother’s
chamber.
In the kitchen, the news of Marian’s certain death was received with
noisy demonstrations—old Dinah and Hetty trying hard to outdo each
other, and see which should shed the most and the biggest tears. The
woollen aprons of both were brought into constant requisition, while
Hetty rang so many changes upon the virtues of the departed that Uncle
Phil became disgusted, and said “for his part he’d hearn enough ’bout
dead folks. He liked Miss Marian as well as anybody, but he did up his
mournin’ them times that he wet hisself to the skin a tryin’ to fish her
out of the river. He thought his heart would bust then, though he knew
all the time she wasn’t thar, and he told ’em so, too. He knew she’d run
away to New York, and he allus s’posed they’d hear she died summers at
the South. He wan’t disappointed. He could tell by his feelin’s when
anything was gwine to happen, and for more’n a week back he’d had it on
his mind that Miss Marian was dead—they couldn’t fool him!” and
satisfied that he had impressed his audience with a sense of his
foreknowledge, Uncle Phil pulled off his boots and started for bed,
leaving Dinah and Hetty to discuss the matter at their leisure and
speculate upon the probable result.
“I can tell you,” said Dinah, “it won’t be no time at all afore
Marster’ll be settin’ to that Isabel, and if he does, I ‘clar for’t I’ll
run away, or hire out, see if I don’t. I ain’t a goin’ to be sassed by
none of yer low flung truck and hev ’em carryin’ the keys. She may jest
go back whar she come from, and I’ll tell her so, too. I’ll gin her a
piece of my mind.”
“She is gwine back,” suggested Hetty, who, faithful to the memory of
Miss Beatrice, admired Isabel on account of a fancied resemblance
between the two. “Don’t you mind how Marster is a gwine to move up to
somewhar?”
“That’s nothin’,” returned Dinah. “They’ll come back in the Fall, but I
shan’t be here. I’ll hire myself out, and you kin be the head a spell.”
This prospect was not an unpleasant one to Hetty, who looked with a
jealous eye upon Dinah’s rather superior position, and as a sure means
of attaining the object of her ambition and becoming in turn the
favorite, she warmly espoused the cause of Isabel, and waged many a
battle of words with Dinah, who took no pains to conceal her dislike.
Thus two or three weeks went by, and as nothing occurred to cause Dinah
immediate alarm, her fears gradually subsided, until at last she forgot
them altogether, while even Marian ceased to be a daily subject of
conversation.
To Frederic reality was more endurable than suspense, for he could look
the future in the face and think what he would do. He was free to marry
Isabel, he believed; but, as was quite natural, he cared less about it
now than when there was an obstacle in his way. There was no danger of
losing her, he was sure, and he could wait as long as he pleased! Once
he thought of going to New York to make some inquiries, and if possible
find Marian’s grave, but when he reflected that Sarah Green was on the
ocean, even before her letter reached Kentucky, he decided to defer the
matter until their removal to Yonkers, which was to take place about the
middle of May. Isabel, too, had her own views upon the subject. There no
longer existed a reason why Frederic should not address her, and in her
estimation nothing could be more proper than to christen the new home
with a bride. So she bent all her energies to the task, smiling her
sweetest smile, saying her softest words, and playing the amiable lady
to perfection. But it availed her nothing, and she determined at last
upon a bolder movement.
Finding Frederic alone in the parlor, one day, she said:
“I suppose it will not affect you materially if mother and I leave when
you remove to Yonkers. Agnes Gibson, you know, is soon to be married,
and she has invited me to go with her to Florida, where, she says, I can
procure a good situation as music-teacher, and mother wishes to go back
to New Haven.”
The announcement, and the coolness with which it was made, startled
Frederic, and he replied, rather anxiously:
“I have never contemplated a separation. I shall need your mother there
more than I do here, for I shall not have Dinah.”
“Perhaps you can persuade her to stay, but I think it best for me to
go,” returned Isabel, delighted with her success.
Frederic Raymond did not wish Isabel to leave him, and, after a moment,
he said:
“Why must you go, Isabel? Do you wish for a larger salary? Are you tired
of us—of me?” And the last words were spoken hesitatingly, as if he
doubted the propriety of his saying them.
“Oh, Frederic!” and in the soft, black eyes raised for an instant to his
face, and then modestly withdrawn, there was certainly a tear! “Oh,
Frederic!” was all she said, and Frederic felt constrained to answer:
“What is it, Isabel? Why do you wish to go?”
“I don’t—I don’t,” she answered, passionately; “but respect for myself
demands it. People are already talking about my living here with you;
and now poor Marian is dead and you are a widower, it will be tenfold
worse. I wish they would let us alone, for I have been so happy here and
am so much attached to Alice. It will almost break my heart to leave
her!”
Isabel Huntington was wondrously beautiful then, and Frederic Raymond
was sorely tempted to bid her stay, not as Alice’s governess, nor yet as
the daughter of his housekeeper, but as his wife and mistress of his
house. Several times he tried to speak, and at last, crossing over to
where she sat, he began—“Isabel, I have never heard that people were
talking of you; there is no reason why they should, but if they are I
can devise a method of stopping it and still keeping you with us. I have
never spoken to you of—” love, he was going to say, and the graceful
head was already bent to catch the sound, when a little voice chimed in,
“Please, Frederic, I am here,” and looking up they saw before them
Alice.
She had entered unobserved and was standing just within the door, where
she heard what Frederic said. Intuitively she felt what would follow
next, and scarcely knowing what she did, she had apprised them of her
presence.
“The brat!” was Isabel’s mental comment, while Frederic was sensible of
a feeling of relief, as if he had suddenly wakened from a spell, or been
saved from some great peril. For several moments Isabel sat, hoping
Alice would leave the room, but she did not, and in no very amiable mood
the lady was herself constrained to go, by a call from her mother, who
wished to see her on some trivial matter.
When she was gone, Alice groped her way to the sofa, and climbing upon
it said to Frederic, “Won’t you read me that letter again which Mrs.
Green wrote to you?”
He complied with her request, and when he had finished, the child
continued, “If Marian had really died, wouldn’t she have sent some
message to me, and wouldn’t that woman have told us how she happened to
be way off there, and all about it?”
“_If Marian really died!_” repeated Frederic. “Do you doubt it?”
“Yes,” returned the child, “Marian loved me most as well as she did you,
and she surely would have talked of me and sent me some word; then, too,
if there much difference between scarlet fever and canker-rash? Don’t
some folks call it by both names?”
“I believe they do,” said Frederic, wondering to what all this was
tending.
“Marian had the scarlet fever, and I, too, just after I came here,” was
Alice’s next remark. “You were at college, but I remember it, and so
does Dinah, for I asked her a little while ago. Can folks have it
twice?” and the blind eyes looked up at Frederic, as if sure that this
last argument at least were proof conclusive of Marian’s existence.
“Sometimes, but not often,” answered Frederic, the shadow of a doubt
creeping into his own mind.
“And if they do,” persisted Alice, who had been consulting with
Dinah—“if they do, they seldom have it hard enough to die, so Dinah
says; and I don’t believe that was a good, true letter. Somebody wrote
it, to be wicked. Marian is alive, I almost know.”
“Must you see her dead body, to be convinced?” asked Frederic, a little
impatiently; and Alice rejoined:
“No, no; but somehow it don’t seem right for you to—to—oh, Frederic!”
and, bursting into tears, she came at once to the root of the whole
matter.
She had thought a great deal about the letter, wondering why Marian had
failed to speak of her, and at last rejecting it as an impossibility.
Suddenly, too, she remembered that once, when she and Marian were sick,
she heard some of the neighbors speak of their disease as scarlet fever,
while others called it the canker-rash; and all united in saying they
could have it but once. This had led to inquiries of Dinah, and had
finally resulted in her conviction that Marian might possibly be living.
Full of this new idea, she had hastened to Frederic, and accidentally
overheard what he was saying to Isabel. She comprehended it, too, and
knew that but for her unexpected presence he would, perhaps, have asked
the lady to be his wife, and she felt again as if Marian were there
urging her to stand once more between Frederic and temptation. All this
she told to him, and the proud, haughty man, who would have spurned a
like interference from any other source, listened patiently to the
pleadings of the childish voice, which said to him so earnestly:
“Don’t let Isabel be your wife!”
“What objection have you to her?” he asked; and when she replied, “She
isn’t good,” he questioned her further as to the cause of her
dislike—“was there really a reason, or was it mere prejudice?”
“I try to like her,” said Alice, “and sometimes I do real well, but she
don’t act alone with me like she does when you are round. She’ll be just
as cross as fury, and if you come in, she’ll smooth my hair and call me
‘little pet.’”
“Does she ever strike you?” asked Frederic, feeling a desire to hear
Alice’s version of that story.
Instantly tears came in Alice’s eyes, and she replied, “Only once—and
she said she didn’t mean that—but, Frederic, she did,” and in her own
way Alice told the story, which sounded to Mr. Raymond more like the
truth than the one he had heard from Isabel. Gradually the conviction
was forcing itself upon him that Isabel was not exactly what she seemed.
Still he could not suddenly shake off the chain which bound him, and
when Alice said to him in her odd, straightforward way, “Don’t finish
what you were saying to Isabel until you’ve been to New York and found
if the letter is true,” he answered, “Fie, Alice, you are unreasonable
to ask such a thing of me. Marian is dead. I have no doubt of it, and I
am free from the promise made to you more than a year since.”
“May be she isn’t,” was Alice’s reply, “and if she is, we shall both
feel better, if you go and see. Go, Frederic, do. It won’t take long,
and if you find she is really dead, I’ll never speak another naughty
word of Isabel, but try to love her just as I want to love your wife.
Will you go, Frederic? I heard you say you ought to see the house before
we moved, and Yonkers is close to New York, isn’t it?”
This last argument was more convincing than any which Alice had offered,
for Frederic had left the entire management of repairs to one whom he
knew understood such matters better than himself, consequently he had
not been there at all, and he had several times spoken of going up to
see that all was right. Particularly would he wish to do this if he took
thither a bride in May, and to Alice’s suggestion he replied, “I might,
perhaps, do that for the sake of gratifying you.”
“Oh, if you only would!” answered Alice. “You’ll find her somewhere—I
know you will—and then you’ll be so glad you went.”
Frederic was not quite so sure of that, but it was safe to go, and while
Isabel had been communicating to her mother what he had been saying to
her, and asking if it were not almost a proposal, he was deciding to
start for New York immediately. Alice’s reasons for doubting the
authenticity of the letter seemed more and more plausible the longer he
thought of them, and at supper that night he astonished both Mrs.
Huntington and daughter by saying that he was going North in a few days,
and he wished the former to see that his wardrobe was in a proper
condition for traveling. Isabel’s face grew dark as night, and the
wrathful expression of her eyes was noticeable even to him. “There is a
good deal of temper there,” was his mental comment, while Isabel feigned
some trivial excuse and left the room to hide the anger she knew was
visible upon her face. He had commenced proposing to her, she was sure,
and he should not leave Redstone Hall until he explained himself more
fully. Still it would not be proper for her to broach the subject—her
mother must do that. It was a parent’s duty to see that her daughter’s
feelings were not trifled with, and by dint of cajolery, entreaties and
threats, she induced the old lady to have a talk with Frederic, and ask
him what his intentions were.
Mrs. Huntington was not very lucid in her remarks, and without exactly
knowing what she meant, Frederic replied at random that he was in
earnest in all he had said to Isabel about her remaining there, that he
did not wish her to go away for she seemed one of the family, and that
he would speak with her further upon the subject when he came back. This
was not very definite, but Mrs. Huntington brushed it up a little ere
repeating it to Isabel, who readily accepted it as an intimation that
after his return, he intended asking her directly to be his wife.
Accordingly she told Agnes Gibson confidentially what her expectations
were, and Agnes told it confidentially to several others, who had each a
confidential friend, and so in course of a few days it was generally
understood that Redstone Hall was to have another mistress. Agnes in
particular was very busy disseminating news, hoping by this means to
turn the public gossip from herself and the white-haired man, or rather
the plantation in Florida, which she was soon to marry. In spite of her
protestations to the contrary people would say that _money_ and not
_love_ actuated her choice, and she was glad of anything which would
give her a little rest. So she repeated Isabel’s story again and again,
charging each and every one never to mention it and consulting
between-times with her bosom friend as to what her arrangements were,
and suggesting that they be married on the same day and so make the same
tour. On the subject of bridal presents Agnes had a kind of mania, and
knowing this, some of her friends, who lived at a distance and could not
be present at the ceremony, sent theirs in advance—several of them as a
matter of course deciding upon the same thing, so that in Agnes’ private
drawer there were now deposited _three fish knives and forks_, all of
which were the young lady’s particular aversion. She would dispose of
one of them at all hazards, she thought, and receive more than an
equivalent in return, so she began to pave the way for a costly bridal
present from the future Mrs. Frederic Raymond, by hinting of an elegant
_fish knife and fork_, which in its satin-lined box would look
handsomely upon the table, and Isabel, though detesting the article and
thinking she should prefer almost anything else, said she was delighted,
and when her friend came home from the south, she should invite her to
dinner certainly once a week.
This arrangement was generally understood, as were many others of a
similar nature, until at last even the bridal dress was selected, and
people said it was making in Lexington, where Frederic was well known,
and where the story of his supposed engagement circulated rapidly,
reaching to the second-rate hotel where Rudolph McVicar was a boarder.
Exultingly his wild eyes flashed, and when he heard, as he did, that the
wedding was fixed for the 20th of May, which he knew was Isabel’s
birthday, he counted the hours which must elapse ere the moment of his
triumph came. And while he waited thus, and rumor, with her lying
tongue, told each day some fresh falsehood of “that marriage in high
life,” Frederic Raymond went on his way, and with each milestone passed,
drew nearer and nearer to the lost one—the Marian who would stand
between him and Isabel.
CHAPTER XV.
THE HOUSE ON THE RIVER.
“Marian,” said Ben, one pleasant April morning, “Frederic’s house is
finished in tip-top style, and if you say so, we’ll go out and take a
look. It will do you good to see the old place once more and know just
how things are fixed.”
“Oh, I’d like it so much,” returned Marian, “but what if I should fall
upon Frederic?”
“No danger,” answered Ben; “the man who has charge of everything told me
he wasn’t comin’ till May, and the old woman who is tendin’ to things
knows I have seen Mr. Raymond, for I told her so, and she won’t think
nothin’; so clap on your clothes in a jiff, for we’ve barely time to
reach the cars.”
Marian did not hesitate long ere deciding to go, and in a few moments
they were in the street. As they were passing the —— Hotel, Ben suddenly
left her, and running up the steps spoke to one of the servants with
whom he was acquainted. Returning ere long, he said, by way of apology,
“I was in there last night to see Jim, and he told me there was a man
took sick with a ravin’ fever, pretty much like you had when you bit
your tongue most in two.”
Marian shuddered involuntarily, and without knowing why, felt a deep
interest in the stranger, thinking how terrible it was to be sick and
alone in a crowded, noisy hotel.
“Is he better?” she asked, and Ben replied, “No, ten times wus—he’ll die
most likely. But hurry up—here’s the omnibus we want,” and in the
excitement of securing a seat, they both forgot the sick man.
The trip to Yonkers was a pleasant one, for to Marian it seemed like
going home, and when, after reaching the station, they entered the
lumbering stage and wound slowly up the long, steep hill, she recognized
many familiar way marks, and drawing her vail over her face, wept
silently as she remembered all she had passed through since the night
when Col. Raymond first took her up that same long hill, and told her by
the way, of his boy Frederic, who would be delighted with a sister. The
fond old man was dead now, and she, the little girl he had loved so
much, was a sad lonely woman, going back to visit the spot which had
been so handsomely fitted up without a thought of her.
The house itself was greatly changed, but the view it commanded of the
river and the scenery beyond was the same, and leaning against a pillar
Marian tried to fancy that she was a child again and listening for the
bold footsteps of the handsome, teasing boy, once her terror and her
pride. But all in vain she listened: the well-remembered foot-fall did
not come: the handsome boy was not there, and even had he been, she
would scarcely have recognized him in the haughty, elegant young man,
her husband. Yes, he was her husband, and she repeated the name to
herself, and when at last Ben touched her on the shoulder, saying, “I
have told Miss Russell my sister was here, and she says you can go over
the house,” she started as if waking from a dream.
“Let us go through the garden first,” she said, as she led the way to
the maple tree where summers before he had built her little play-house,
and where on the bark, just as high as his head then came, the name of
Frederic was cut.
Far below it, and at a point which her red curls had reached, there was
another name—her own—and Frederic’s jack-knife had made that, too, while
she stood by and said to him, “I wish I was Marian Raymond, instead of
Marian Lindsey.”
How distinctly she remembered the characteristic reply:
“If you should happen to be my wife, you would be Marian Raymond; but
pshaw, I shall marry a great deal prettier woman than you will ever be,
and you may live with us if you want to, and take care of the children.
I mean to have a lot!”
She had not thought of this speech in years, but it come back to her
vividly now, as did many other things which had occurred there long ago.
Within the house everything was changed, but they had no trouble in
identifying the different rooms, and she lingered long in the one she
felt sure was intended for Frederic himself, sitting in the chair where
she knew he would often sit, and wondering if, while sitting there, he
would ever think of her. Perhaps he might be afraid of meeting her
accidentally in New York, and so he would seldom come there; or, if he
did, it would be after dark, or when she was not in the street, and thus
she should possibly never see him, as she hoped to do. The thought was a
sad one, and never before had the gulf between herself and Frederic
seemed so utterly impassible as on that April morning when, in his room
and his arm-chair, the girl-wife sat and questioned the dark future of
what it had in store for her.
Once she was half tempted to leave some momento—something which would
tell him she had been there. She spurned the idea as soon as formed. She
would not intrude herself upon him a second time, and rising at last,
she arranged the furniture more to her taste, changed the position of a
picture, moved the mirror into a perfect angle, set Frederic’s chair
before the window looking out, upon the river, and then, standing in the
door, fancied that she saw him, with his handsome face turned to the
light, and his rich brown hair shading his white brow. At his feet, and
not far away was a little stool, and if she could only sit there once,
resting her head upon his knee and hear him speaking to her kindly,
affectionately, she felt that she would gladly die, and leave to another
the caresses she could never hope to receive.
Isabel’s chamber was visited next, and Marian’s would have been less
than a woman’s nature could she have looked, without a pang, upon the
costly furniture and rare ornaments which had been gathered there. In
the disposal of the furniture there was a lack of taste—a decidedly Mrs.
Russell air; but Marian had no wish to interfere. There was something
sickening in the very atmosphere of her rival’s apartment, and with a
long, deep sigh, she turned away. Opening the door of an adjoining
chamber, she stood for a moment motionless, while her lips moved
nervously, for she knew that this was Alice’s room. It was smaller than
the others, and with its neat white furniture, seemed well adapted to
the pure, sinless child who was to occupy it. Here too, she tarried
long, gazing, through blinded tears, upon the little rocking-chair just
fitted to Alice’s form, looping up the soft lace curtains, brushing the
dust from the marble mantle, and patting lovingly the snowy pillows, for
the sake of the fair head which would rest there some night.
“There are no flowers here,” said she, glancing at the tiny vases on the
stand. “Alice is fond of flowers, and though they will be withered ere
she comes, she will be sure to find them, and who knows but their faint
perfume may remind her of me,” and going out into the garden she
gathered some hyacinths and violets which she made into bouquets and
placed them in the vases, and bidding the old woman change the water
every day, until they began to fade, and then leave them to dry until
the blind girl came. “Ben told me of her; he once staid at Redstone Hall
all night,” she said, in answer to the woman’s inquiring look. “He says
she is a sweet young creature, and I thought flowers might please her.”
“Fresh ones would,” returned Mrs. Russell “but them that’s withered
ain’t no use. S’pose I fling ’em away when they get old and put in some
new the day she comes?”
“No, no, not for the world, leave them as they are,” and Marian spoke so
earnestly that the old lady promised compliance with her request.
“Be you that Yankee peddler’s sister,” she asked, as she followed Marian
down the stairs. “If you be, nater cut up a curis caper with one or
t’other of you, for you ain’t no more alike than nothin’.”
“I believe I do not resemble him much,” was Marian’s evasive answer, as
with a farewell glance at the old place, she bade Mrs. Russell good-by
and went with Ben to the gate where the stage was waiting to take them
back to the depot.
It was dark when they reached New York, and as they passed the —— Hotel
a second time, Marian spoke of the sick man, and wondered how he was.
“I might go in and see,” said Ben, “but it’s so late I guess I won’t,
particularly as he’s nothin’ to us.”
“But he’s something to somebody,” returned Marian, and as she followed
on after Ben, her thoughts turned continually upon him, wondering if he
had a mother—a sister—or a wife, and if they knew how sick he was.
While thus reflecting they reached home, where they found Mrs. Burt
entertaining a visitor—a Martha Gibbs, who for some time had been at the
—— Hotel, in the capacity of chamber-maid, but who was to leave there
the next day. Martha’s parents lived in the same New England village
where Mrs. Burt had formerly resided, and the two thus became
acquainted, Martha making Mrs. Burt the depository of all her little
secrets and receiving in return much motherly advice. She was to be
married soon, and though her destination was a log house in the West,
and her bridal _trousseau_ consisted merely of three dresses—a silk, a
delaine and a calico—it was an affair of great consequence to her, and
she had come as usual to talk it over with Mrs. Burt, feeling glad at
the absence of Ben and Marian, the latter of whom she supposed was an
orphan niece of her friend’s husband. The return of the young people
operated as a restraint upon her, and changing the conversation, she
spoke at last of a sick man who was up in the third story in one of the
rooms of which she had the charge.
“He had the typhoid fever,” she said, “and was raving distracted with
his head. They wanted some good experienced person to take care of him,
and had asked her to stay, she seemed so handy, but she couldn’t. John
wouldn’t put their wedding off, she knew, and she must go, though she
did pity the poor young man—he raved and took on so, asking them if
anybody had seen _Marian_, or knew where she was buried!”
Up to this point Marian had listened, because she knew it was the same
man of whom Ben had told her in the morning; but now the pulsations of
her heart stopped, her head grew dizzy, her brain whirled, and she was
conscious of nothing except that Ben made a hurried movement and then
passed his arm around her, while he held a cup of water to her lips,
sprinkling some upon her face, and saying, in a natural voice, “Don’t
you want a drink? My walk made me awful dry.”
It was dark in the room, for the lamp was not yet lighted, and thus
Martha did not see the side-play going on. She only knew that Ben was
offering Marian some water; but Mrs. Burt understood it, and, when sure
that Marian would not faint, she said:
“Where did the young man come from, and what is his name? Do you know?”
“He registered himself as _F. Raymond, Franklin County, Kentucky_,”
returned the girl; “and that’s the bother of it. Nobody knows where to
direct a letter to his friends. But how I have staid. I must go this
minute,” and greatly to the relief of the family, Martha took her leave.
Scarcely had the door closed after her, when Marian was on her knees,
and, with her head in Mrs. Burt’s lap, was begging of her to offer her
services as nurse to Frederic Raymond!
“He must not die there alone,” she cried. “Say you will go, or my heart
will burst. They know Martha for a trusty girl, and they will take you
on her recommendation. Help me, Ben, to persuade her,” she continued,
appealing to the young man, who had not yet spoken upon the subject.
He had been thinking of it, however, and as he could see no particular
objection, he said, at last:
“May as well go, I guess. It won’t do no hurt, any how, and mebby it’ll
be the means of savin’ his life. You can tell Martha how’t you s’pose
he’ll pay a good price for nussin’, and she’ll think it’s the money you
are after.”
This suggestion was so warmly seconded by Marian, that Mrs. Burt finally
consented to seeing Martha, and asking her what she thought of the plan.
Accordingly, early the next morning, she sought an interview with the
young woman, inquiring, first, how the stranger was, and then,
continuing—
“What do you think of my turning nurse awhile and taking care of him? I
am used to such folks, and I presume the gentleman is plenty able to
pay.”
She had dragged this last in rather bunglingly, but it answered every
purpose, for Martha, who knew her thrifty habits, understood at once
that money was the inducement, and she replied, “Of course he is. His
watch is worth two hundred dollars, to say nothing of a diamond pin. I
for one shall be glad to have you come, for I am going away some time
to-day, and there’ll be nobody in particular to take care of him. I’ll
speak about it right away.”
The result of this speaking was that Mrs. Burt’s offered services were
readily accepted, for Martha was known to be an honest, faithful girl,
and any one whom she recommended must, of course, be respectable and
trusty. By some chance, however, there was a misunderstanding about the
name, which was first construed into Burton and then into Merton, and as
Martha, who alone could rectify the error, left that afternoon, the few
who knew of the sick man and his nurse, spoke of the latter as a “Mrs.
Merton, from the country, probably.” So when at night Mrs. Burt appeared
and announce herself as ready to assume her duties, she was surprised at
hearing herself addressed by her new name, and she was about to correct
it when she thought, “It doesn’t matter what I’m called, and perhaps on
the whole, I’d rather not be known by my real name. I don’t believe much
in goin’ out nussin’ any way, and I guess I’ll let ’em call me what they
want to.”
She accordingly made no explanation, but followed the servant girl up
three long flights of stairs, and turning down a narrow hall, stood ere
long at the door of the sick room.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE FEVER.
Night and day Frederic Raymond had traveled, never allowing himself a
minute’s rest, nor even stopping at Yonkers, so intent was he upon
reaching New York and finding, if possible, some clue to Marian. It was
a hopeless task, for he had no starting point—nothing which could guide
him in the least, save the name of Sarah Green, and even that was not in
the Directory, while to inquire for her former place of residence, was
as preposterous as Marian’s inquiry for Mrs. Daniel Burt! Still,
whatever he could do he did, traversing street after street, threading
alley after alley, asking again and again of the squalid heads thrust
from the dingy windows, if Sarah Green had ever lived in that locality,
and receiving always the same impudent stare and short answer, “No.”
Once, in another and worse part of the city, he fancied he had found
her, and that she had not sailed for Scotland as she had written, for
they had told him that “Sal Green lived, up in the fourth story,” and
climbing the crazy stairs, he knocked at the low, dark door, shuddering
involuntarily and experiencing a feeling of mortified pride as he
thought it possible that Marian—his wife—had toiled up that weary way to
die. The door was opened by a blear-eyed, hard-faced woman, who started
at sight of the elegant stranger, and to his civil questions replied
rather gruffly, “Yes, I’m Sal Green, I s’pose, or Sarah, jest which you
choose to call me, but the likes of Marian Lindsey never came near me,”
and glancing around the dirty, wretched room, Frederic was glad that it
was so. He would rather not find her, or hear tidings of her, than to
know that she had lived and died in such a place as this, and with a
sickening sensation he was turning away, when the woman, who was blessed
with a remarkable memory and never forgot anything to which her
attention was particularly directed, said to him, “You say it’s a year
last Fall sence she left home.”
“Yes, yes,” he replied eagerly, and she continued, “You say she dressed
in black, and wore a great long vail?”
“The same, the same,” he cried, advancing into the room and thrusting a
bill into the long hand, “oh, my good woman, have you seen her, and
where is she now?”
“The Lord knows, mebby, but I don’t,” answered the woman, who was
identical with the one who had so frightened Marian by watching her on
that day when she sat in front of Trinity and wished that she could die,
“I don’t know as I ever seen her at all,” she continued, “but a year ago
last November such a girl as you described, with long curls that looked
red in the sunshine, sat on the steps way down by Trinity and cried so
hard that I noticed her, and knew she warn’t a beggar by her dress. It
was gettin’ dark, and I was goin’ to speak to her when Joe Black came up
and asked her what ailed her, or somethin’. He ain’t none of the
likeliest,” and a grim smile flitted over the visage of the wrinkled
hag.
“Oh, Heaven,” cried Frederic, pressing his hands to his head, as if to
crush the horrid fear. “God save her from that fate. Is this all you
know? Can’t you tell me any more? I’ll give you half my fortune if
you’ll bring back my poor, lost Marian, just as she was when she left
me.”
The offer was a generous one, and Sal was tempted for a moment to tell
him some big lie, and thus receive a companion to the bill she clutched
so greedily, but the agonizing expression of his white face kindled a
spark of pity within her bosom, and she replied, “I did not finish
tellin’ you that while Joe was talking and had seemingly persuaded her
to go with him, a tall chap that I never seen before knocked him flat,
and took the girl with him, and that’s why I remember it so well.”
“Who was he, this tall man? Where did he go?” and Frederic wiped from
his forehead the great drops of sweat forced out by terrible fear.
“I told you I never seen him before,” was Sally’s answer, “but he had a
good face—a milk and water face—as if he never plotted no mischief in
his life. She’s safe with him, I’m sure. I’d trust my daughter with him,
if I had one, and know he wouldn’t harm her. He spoke to her
tender-like, and she looked glad, I thought.”
Frederic felt that this information was better than none, for it was
certain it was Marian whom the woman had seen, and, in a measure
comforted by her assurance of Ben Burt’s honesty, he bade her good
morning, and walked away.
At last, worn out and discouraged, he returned to his hotel, where he
lay now burning with fever, and, in his delirium, calling sometimes for
Isabel, sometimes for Alice, and again for faithful Dinah, but never
asking why Marian did not come. She was dead, and he only begged of
those around him to take her away from Joe Black, or show him where her
grave was made, so he could go home and tell the blind girl he had seen
it. Every ray of light which it was possible to shut out had been
excluded from the room, for he had complained much of his eyes, and when
Mrs. Burt entered, she could discover only the outline of a ghastly face
resting upon the pillows, scarcely whiter than itself. It was a serious
case, the attending physician said, and so she thought when she looked
into his wild, bright eyes, and felt his rapid pulse. To her he put the
same question he had asked nearly of every one:
“Do you know where Marian is?”
“Marian!” she repeated, feeling a little uncertain how to answer.
“Humor him! say you do!” whispered the physician, who was just taking
his leave. And very truthfully Mrs. Burt replied:
“Yes, I know where she is! She will come to you to-morrow.”
“No!” he answered mournfully. “The dead never come back, and it must not
be, either. Isabel is coming then, and the two can’t meet together here,
for—. Come nearer, woman, while I tell you I loved Isabel the best, and
that’s what made the trouble. She is beautiful, but Marian was good—and
do you know Marian was the Heiress of Redstone Hall; but I’m not going
to use her money.”
“Yes, I know,” returned Mrs. Burt, trying to quiet him, but in vain.
He would talk—sometimes of Marian, and sometimes of Sarah Green, and the
dreary room where he had been.
“It made Marian tired,” he said, “to climb those broken stairs—tired,
just as he was now. But she was resting so quietly in Heaven, and the
April sun was shining on her grave. It was a little grave—a child’s
grave, as it were—for Marian was not so tall nor so old as Isabel.”
In this way he rambled on, and it was not until the morning dawned that
he fell into a heavy sleep, and Mrs. Burt had leisure to reflect upon
the novel position in which she found herself.
“It was foolish in me to give up to them children,” she said, “but now
that I am here, I’ll make the best of it, and do as well as I can.
Marian shan’t come, though! It would kill her dead to hear him going
on.”
Mrs. Burt was a little rash in making this assertion, for even while she
spoke, Marian was in the reception-room below, inquiring for the woman
who took care of Mr. Raymond. Not once during the long night had her
eye-lids closed in sleep, and with the early morning she had started for
the hotel, leaving Ben to get his breakfast as he could.
“Say Marian Grey wishes to see her,” she said, in answer to the inquiry
as to what name the servant was to take to No. ——.
“My goodness!” exclaimed Mrs. Burt; “why didn’t Ben keep her at home?”
and, gliding down the stairs, she tried to persuade Marian to return.
But when she saw the firm, determined expression in the young girl’s
eye, she knew it was useless to reason with her, and saying, rather
pettishly, “You must expect to hear some cuttin’ things,” she bade her
follow up the stairs. Frederic still lay sleeping, his face turned
partly to one side, and his hand resting beneath his head. His rich
brown hair, now damp with heavy moisture, was pushed back from his white
forehead, which, gleaming through the dusky darkness, first showed to
Marian where he lay. The gas-light hurt his eyes, and the lamp, which
was kept continually burning, was so placed that its dim light did not
fall on him, and a near approach was necessary to tell her just how he
looked. He was fearfully changed, and, with a bitter moan, she laid her
head beside him on the pillow, so that her short curls mingled with his
darker locks, and she felt his hot breath on her cheek.
“Frederic—dear Frederic!” she said, and at the sound of her voice he
moved uneasily, as if about to waken.
“Come away, come away,” whispered Mrs. Burt. “He may know you, and a
sudden start would kill him.”
But Marian was deaf to all else save the whispered words dropping from
the sick man’s lips. They were of home, of Alice, of the library, and
oh, joy! could it be she heard aright—did he speak of her? Was it
_Marian_ he said? Yes, _it was Marian_, and with a cry of delight, which
started Mrs. Burt to her feet, and penetrated even to the ear of the
unconscious Frederic, she pressed her lips upon the very spot which they
had touched before on that night when she gave him her first kiss.
Slowly his eyes unclosed, but the wildness was still there, and Mrs.
Burt, who stood anxiously watching him, felt glad that it was so. Slowly
they wandered about the room, resting first upon the door, then on the
chandelier, then on the ceiling above, and dropping finally lower, until
at last they met and were riveted upon Marian, who, with clasped hands,
stood breathlessly awaiting the result.
“Will he know her? Does he know her?” was the mental query of Mrs. Burt;
while Marian’s fast-breathing heart asked the same question eagerly.
There was a wavering, a fierce struggle between delirium and reason, and
then, with a faint smile, he said:
“Did you kiss me just now?” and he pointed to the spot upon his
forehead.
Marian nodded, for she could not speak, and he continued:
“Marian kissed me there, too! Little Marian, who went away, and it has
burned and burned into my veins until it set my brain on fire. Nobody
has kissed me since, but Alice. Did you know Alice, girl?”
“Yes,” answered Marian, keen disappointment swelling within her bosom
and forcing the great tears from her eyes.
She had almost believed he would recognize her, but he did not; and
sinking down by his side, she buried her face in the bed-clothes, and
sobbed aloud.
“Don’t cry, little girl,” he said, evidently disturbed at the sight of
her tears. “I cried when I thought Marian was dead, but that seems so
long ago.”
“Oh Frederic—” and forgetful of everything, Marian sprang to her feet.
“Oh, Frederic, is it true? Did you cry for me?”
At the sound of his own name the sick man looked bewildered, while
reason seemed struggling again to assert its rights, and penetrate the
misty fog by which it was enveloped. Very earnestly he looked at the
young girl, who returned his gaze with one in which was concentrated all
the yearning love and tenderness, she had cherished for him so long.
“Are you Marian?” he asked, and in an instant the excited girl wound her
arms around his neck, and laying her cheek against his own, replied:
“Yes, Frederic yes. Don’t you know me, your poor lost Marian?”
Very caressingly he passed his hand over her short silken curls—pushed
them back from her forehead—examined them more closely, and then
whispered mournfully,
“No, you are not Marian. This is not her hair. But I like you,” he
continued, as he felt her tears drop on his face; “and I wish you to
stay with me, and when the pain comes back charm it away with your soft
hands. They are little hands,” and he took them between his own, “but
not so small as Marian’s were when I held one in my hand and promised I
would love her. It seemed like some tiny rose leaf, and I could have
crushed it easily, but I did not; I only crushed her heart, and she fled
from me forever, for ’twas a lie I told her,” and his voice sunk to a
lower tone. “I didn’t love her then—I don’t know as I love her now, for
Isabel is so beautiful. Did you ever see Isabel, girl?”
“Oh, Frederic,” groaned Marian, and wresting her hands from his grasp,
she tottered to a chair, while he looked after her wistfully.
“Will she go away?” he said to Mrs. Burt. “Will she leave me alone, when
she knows Alice is not here nor Isabel? I wish Isabel would come, don’t
you?”
There was another moan of anguish, and, rolling his bright eyes in the
direction of the arm-chair, the poor man whispered:
“Hark! that’s the sound I heard the night Marian went away! I thought
then ’twas the wind, but I knew afterwards that it was she, when her
soul parted with her body, and it’s followed me ever since. There is not
a spot at Redstone Hall that is not haunted with that cry. I’ve heard it
at midnight, at noonday—in the storm and in the rushing river—where we
thought she was buried. All but Alice—she knew she wasn’t, and she sent
me here to look. She don’t like Isabel, and is afraid I’ll marry her.
Maybe I shall, sometime! Who knows?”
And he laughed in delirious glee.
“Heaven keep me, too, from going mad?” cried Marian. “Oh! why did I come
here?”
“I told you not to all the time,” was Mrs. Burt’s consolatory remark;
which, however was lost on Marian, who, seizing her bonnet and shawl,
rushed from the room, unmindful of the outstretched arms which seemed
imploring her to stay.
The fresh morning air revived her fainting strength, but did not cool
the feverish agony at her heart, and she sped onward, until she reached
her home, where she surprised Ben at his solitary breakfast, which he
had prepared himself.
“Oh! Ben, Ben!” she cried, coming so suddenly upon him that he upset the
coffee-pot into which he was pouring some hot water. “Would it be wicked
for you to kill me dead, or for me to kill myself?”
“What’s to pay now?” asked Ben, using the skirt of his coat for a holder
in picking up the steaming coffee-pot.
Very hastily Marian related her adventures in the sick room, telling how
Frederic had talked of marrying Isabel before her very face.
“Crazy as a loon,” returned Ben. “I shouldn’t think nothin’ of that. You
say he talked as though he thought you was dead, and of course he don’t
know what he’s sayin’. Have they writ to his folks?”
“Yes,” returned Marian, who had made a similar inquiry of Mrs. Burt.
“They directed a letter to ‘Frederic Raymond’s friends, Franklin County,
Kentucky,’ but that may not reach them in a long time.”
“Wouldn’t it be a Christian act,” returned Ben “for us, who know jest
who he is, to telegraph to that critter, and have her come? By all
accounts he wants to see her, and it may do him good.”
Marian felt that it would be right, and, though it cost her a pang, she
said, at last:
“Yes, Ben, you may telegraph; but what name will you append?”
“Benjamin Butterworth, of course,” he replied. “They’ll remember the
peddler, and think it nateral I should feel an interest.” And leaving
Marian to take charge of the breakfast table, he started for the office.
Meantime the sick room was the scene of much excitement—Frederic raving
furiously, and asking for “the girl with the soft hands and silken
hair.” Sometimes he called her Marian, and begged of them to bring her
back, promising not to make her cry again.
“There is a mystery connected with this Marian he talks so much about,”
said the physician, who was present, “and he seems to fancy a
resemblance between her and the girl who left here this morning. What
may I call her name?”
“Marian, my daughter,” came involuntarily from Mrs. Burt, whose mental
rejoinder was, “God forgive me for that lie, if it was one. Names and
things is gettin’ so twisted up that it takes more than me to straighten
’em!”
“Well, then,” continued the physician, “suppose you send for her. It
will never do for him to get so excited. He is wearing out too fast.”
“I will go for her myself,” said Mrs. Burt, who fancied some persuasion
might be necessary ere Marian could be induced to return.
But she was mistaken, for when told that Frederic’s life depended upon
his being kept quiet, and his being kept quiet depended upon her
presence, Marian consented, and nerved herself to hear him talk, as she
knew he would, of her rival.
“If he lives, I will be satisfied,” she thought, “even though he never
did or can love me,” and with a strong, brave heart, she went back again
to the sick man, who welcomed her joyfully, and folding his feeble arms
around her neck, stroked again her hair, as he said, “You will not leave
me, Marian, till Isabel is here. Then you may go—back to the grave I
cannot find, and we will go home together.”
Marian could not answer him, neither was it necessary that she should.
He was satisfied to have her there, and with her sitting at his side,
and holding his hand in hers, he became as gentle as a child.
Occasionally he called her “little girl,” but oftener “Marian,” and when
he said that name, he always smoothed her hair, as if he pitied her, and
knew he had done her a wrong. And Marian felt each day more and more
that the wound she hoped had partly healed was bleeding afresh with a
new pain, for while he talked of Marian as a mother talks of an
unfortunate child, he spoke of Isabel with all a lover’s pride, and each
word was a dagger to the heart of the patient watcher, who sat beside
him day and night, until her eyes were heavy, and her cheeks were pale
with her unbroken vigils.
“Do you then love this Isabel so much?” she said to him one day, and
sinking his voice to a whisper he replied, “Yes, and I love you, too,
though not like her, because I loved her first.”
“And Marian?” questioned the young girl, “Don’t you love her?”
Oh, how eagerly she waited for the answer, which when it came almost
broke her heart.
“Not as I ought to—not as I have prayed that I might, and not as I
should, perhaps, if she hadn’t been to me what she is. Poor child,” he
continued, brushing away the tears which rolled like rain down Marian’s
cheeks, “poor child, are you crying for Marian?”
“Yes—yes, for Marian—for poor heart-broken me;” and the wretched girl
buried her face in the pillow beside him, for he held her firmly by the
wrist, and she could not get away.
In this manner several days went by, and over the intellect so obscured
there shone no ray or reason, while the girlish face grew whiter and
whiter each morning light, and at last the physician said that she must
rest, or her strength would be exhausted.
“Let me stay a little longer,” she pleaded—“stay at least until Miss
Huntington arrives.”
“Miss who?” asked the doctor. “Do you then know his family?”
“A friend of mine knows them,” answered Marian, a deep flush stealing
over her cheek.
“I hope, then, they will reward you well,” continued the physician. “The
young man would have died but for you. It is remarkable what control you
have over him.”
But Marian wished for no reward. It was sufficient for her to know that
she had been instrumental in saving his life, even though she had saved
it for Isabel. The physician said that Frederic was better, and that
afternoon, seated in the large arm-chair, she fell into a refreshing
sleep, from which she was finally aroused by Mrs. Burt, who bending over
her, whispered in her ear:
“Wake up. She’s come—she’s here—Miss Huntington!”
There was magic in that name, and it roused the sleeping girl at once,
sending a quiver of pain through her heart, for her post she knew was to
be given to another. Not both of them could watch by Frederic, and she,
who in all the world had the best right to stay, must go; but not until
she had looked upon her rival and had seen once the face which Frederic
called so beautiful. This done, she would go away and die, if it were
possible, and stand no longer between Frederic and the bride he so much
desired. She did not understand why he had so often spoken of herself as
being dead, when he knew that she was not. It was a vagary of his brain,
she said—he had had many since she came there, and she hoped he would
sometimes talk of her to Isabel, just as he had talked of Isabel to her.
There was a hurried consultation between herself and Mrs. Burt, with
regard to their future proceedings, and it was finally decided that the
latter should remain a few days longer, and so report the progress of
affairs to Marian, who, of course, must go away. This arrangement being
made they sat down and rather impatiently waited for the coming of
Isabel, who was in her room resting after her tiresome journey.
“Oh how can she wait so long?” thought Marian, glancing at Frederic, who
was sleeping now more quietly than he had done before for a long time.
She did not know Isabel Huntington, and she could not begin to guess how
thoroughly selfish she was, nor how that selfishness was manifest in
every movement. The letter, which at last had gone to Frankfort, was
received the same day with the telegram, and as a natural consequence,
threw the inmates of Redstone Hall into great excitement. Particularly
was this the case with Isabel, who unmindful of everything, wrang her
hands despairingly, crying out, “Oh! what shall I do if he dies?”
“Do!” repeated Dinah, forgetting her own grief in her disgust. “For the
Lord’s sake, can’t you do what you allus did? Go back whar you come
from, you and your mother, in course.”
Isabel deigned no reply to this remark, but hurried to her chamber,
where she commenced the packing of her trunk.
“Wouldn’t it look better for me to go?” suggested Mrs. Huntington, and
Isabel answered:
“Certainly not, the telegram was directed to me. No one knows me in New
York, and I don’t care what folks say here. If he lives I shall be his
wife, of course, else why should he send for me. It’s perfectly natural
that I should go.” And thinking to herself that she would rather
Frederic should die than to live for another, she completed her hasty
preparations, and was on her way to the depot before the household had
time to realize what they were doing.
In passing the house of Lawyer Gibson she could not forbear stopping a
moment to communicate the sad news to her particular friend, who, while
condoling with her, thought to herself, “He does care more for her than
I supposed, or he would not have not sent for her.”
“When will you come back?” she asked, and Isabel replied, “Not until he
is better or worse. Oh, Agnes; what if he should die. Imagine Mr. Rivers
at the point of death and you will know just how I feel.”
“Certainly, very, indeed,” was the meaningless answer of Agnes, who, as
the day of her bridal drew near, began to fancy that she might be easily
consoled in case anything should come between herself and the white
haired Floridan. “Perhaps you will be married before you return,” she
suggested, and Isabel, who had thought of the same possibility, replied,
“Don’t, pray, speak of such a thing—it seems terrible when Frederic is
so sick.”
“You won’t cotch the cars if you ain’t keerful,” chimed in Uncle Phil,
and kissing each other a most affectionate good-by, the young ladies
parted, Agnes thinking to herself, “I reckon I wouldn’t go off to New
York after a man who hadn’t really proposed—but then it’s just like
her,” while Isabel’s mental comment was, “It’s time Agnes was married,
for she’s really beginning to look old; I wouldn’t have my grandfather
though!”
So much for girlish friendships!
Distressed and anxious as Isabel seemed, it was no part of her intention
to travel nights, for that would give her a sallow, jaded look; so she
made the journey leisurely, and even after her arrival, took time to
rest and beautify ere presenting herself to Frederic. She had
ascertained that he was better, and had the best of care, so she
remained quietly in her chamber an hour or so, and it was not until
after dark that she bade the servant show her the way to the sick room.
“I will tell them you are coming,” suggested the polite attendant, and,
going on before her, he said to Mrs. Burt that “Miss Huntington would
like to come in.”
In the farthest corner in the room, where the shadows were the deepest,
and where she would be the least observed, sat Marian, her hands clasped
tightly together, her head bent forward, and her eyes fixed intently
upon the door through which her rival would enter. Frederic was awake,
and, missing her from her post, was about asking for her, when Isabel
appeared, looking so fresh, so glowing, so beautiful, that for an
instant Marian forgot everything in her admiration of the queenly
creature, who, bowing civilly to Mrs. Burt, glided to the bedside, and
sank upon her knees, gracefully—very gracefully—just as she had done at
a private rehearsal in her own room! Tighter the little hands were
clasped together, and the head which had dropped before was erect now,
as Marian watched eagerly for what would follow next.
“Dear Frederic,” said Isabel, and over the white face in the arm-chair
the hot blood rushed in torrents for it seemed almost an insult to hear
him thus addressed—“Dear Frederic, do you know me? I am Isabel;” and,
unmindful of Mrs. Burt, or yet of the motionless figure sitting near,
she kissed his burning forehead, and said again; “Do you know me?”
The nails were marking dark rings now in the tender flesh, while the
blue eyes flashed until they grew almost as black as Isabel’s, and still
Marian did not move. She could not, until she heard what answer would be
given. As the physician had predicted, Frederic was better since his
refreshing sleep, and through the misty vail enshrouding his reason a
glimmer of light was shining. The voice was a familiar one, and though
it partly bewildered him, he know who it was that bent so fondly over
him. It was somebody from home, and with a thrill of pleasure akin to
what one feels when meeting a fellow countryman far away on a foreign
shore, he twined his arms around her neck, and said to her joyfully:
“You are Isabel, and you’ve come to make me well.”
Isabel was about to speak again, when a low sob startled her, and,
turning in the direction from whence it came, she met a fierce, burning
gaze which riveted her as by some magnetism to the spot, and for a
moment the two looked intently into each other’s eyes. Isabel and
Marian, the one stamping indelibly upon her memory the lineaments of a
face which had stolen and kept a heart which should have been her own,
while the other wondered much at the strange white face which even
through the darkness seemed quivering with pain.
Purposely Mrs. Burt stepped between them, and thus the spell was broken,
Isabel turning again to Frederic, while Marian, unlocking her stiff
fingers, grasped her bonnet and glided from the room so silently that
Isabel knew not she was gone until she turned her head and found the
chair empty.
“Who was that?” she said to Mrs. Burt—“that young girl who just went
out?”
“My daughter,” answered Mrs. Burt, again mentally asking forgiveness for
the falsehood told, and thinking to herself, “Mercy knows it ain’t my
nater to lie, but when a body gets mixed up in such a scrape as this,
I’d like to see ’em help it!”
After the first lucid interval, Frederic relapsed again into his former
delirious mood, but did not ask for Marian. He seemed satisfied that
Isabel was there, and he fell asleep again, resting so quietly that when
it was eleven Isabel arose and said, “He is doing so well I believe I
will retire. I never sat up with a sick person in my life, and should be
very little assistance to you. That daughter of yours is somewhere
around, I suppose, and will come if you need help.”
Mrs. Burt nodded, thinking how different was this conduct from that of
the unselfish Marian, who had watched night after night without giving
herself the rest she absolutely needed. Isabel, on the contrary, had no
idea of impairing her beauty, or bringing discomfort to herself by
spending many hours at a time in that close, unwholesome atmosphere, and
while Marian in her humble apartment was weeping bitterly, she was
dreaming of returning to Kentucky as a bride. Frederic could scarcely do
less than reward her kindness by marrying her as soon as he was able.
She could take care of him so much better, she thought, and ere she fell
asleep she had arranged it all in her own mind, and had fancied her
mother’s surprise at receiving a letter signed by her new name, “Isabel
H. Raymond.” She would retain the “H,” she said. She always liked to see
it, and she hoped Agnes Gibson, if she persisted in that foolish fancy
of the fish knife, would have it marked in this way!
It was long after daylight ere she awoke, and when she did her first
thought was of her pleasant dream and her second of the girl she had
seen the night before. “How white she was,” she said, as she made her
elaborate toilet, “and how those eyes of hers glared at me, as if I had
no business here. Maybe she has fallen in love while taking care of
him;” and Isabel laughed aloud at the very idea of a nursing woman’s
daughter being in love with the fastidious Frederic! Once she thought of
Mrs. Daniel Burt, wondering where she lived, and half wishing she could
find her, and, herself unknown, could question her of Marian.
“Maybe this Mrs. Merton knows something of her,” she said, and thinking
she would ask her if a good opportunity should occur, she gave an extra
brush to her glossy hair, looked in a small hand mirror to see that the
braids at the back of her head were right, threw open her wrapper a
little more to show her flounced cambric skirt, and then went to the
breakfast room, where three attendants, attracted by her style and the
prospect of a fee, bowed obsequiously and asked what she would have.
This occupied nearly another hour, and it was almost ten ere she
presented herself to Mrs. Burt, who was growing very faint and weary.
At the physician’s request more light had been admitted into the room,
and Frederic, who was much better this morning, recognized Isabel at
once. He had a faint remembrance of having seen her the previous night,
but it needed Mrs. Burt’s assertion to confirm his conjecture, and he
greeted her now as if meeting her for the first time. Many questions he
asked of the people at home, and how they had learned of his illness.
“We received a letter and a telegram both,” said Isabel, continuing,
“You remember that booby peddler who sold Alice the bracelet and
frightened the negroes so? Well, he must have telegraphed, for his name
was signed to the dispatch, ‘Benjamin Butterworth.’”
Mrs. Burt was very much occupied with something near the table, and
Frederic did not notice her confusion as he replied, “He was a
kind-hearted man, I thought, but I wonder how he heard of my illness,
and where he is now. Mrs. Merton, has a certain Ben Butterworth inquired
for me since I was sick?”
“I know nobody by that name,” returned Mrs. Burt, and without stopping
to think that her question might lead to some inquiries from Frederic,
Isabel rejoined, “Well, do you know a Mrs. Daniel Burt?”
“Mrs. Daniel Burt!” repeated Frederic, as if trying to recall something
far back in the past, while the lady in question started so suddenly as
to drop the cup of hot water she held in her hand.
Stooping down to pick up the cup, she said something about its having
burned her, and added, “I ain’t much acquainted in the city, and never
know my next door neighbors.”
“Mrs. Daniel Burt,” Frederic said again, “I have surely heard that name
before. Who is she, Isabel?”
It was Isabel’s turn now to answer evasively; but being more accustomed
to dissimulate than her companion, she replied, quite as a matter of
course, “You may have heard mother speak of her in New Haven. I used to
know her when I was a little girl, and I believe she lives in New York.
She was a very good, but common kind of woman, and one with whom I
should not care to associate, though mother, I dare say, would be glad
to hear from her.”
“The impudent trollop,” muttered Mrs. Burt, marvelling at the
conversation, and wondering which was trying to deceive the other,
Frederic or Isabel. “The former couldn’t hoodwink her,” she said, “even
if he did Isabel. She understood it all, and he knew who Mrs. Daniel
Burt was just as well as she did, for even if he had forgotten that she
once lived with his father, Marian’s letter had refreshed his memory,
and he was only ‘putting on’ for the sake of misleading Isabel. But
where in the world did that jade know her!” that was a puzzle, and
settling it in her own mind that there were two of the same name, she
left the room and went down to her breakfast.
During the day not a word was said of Marian. Isabel was evidently too
much pleased with Frederic’s delight at seeing her to think of anything
else, while Mrs. Burt did not consider it necessary to speak of her.
Frederic, too, for a time had forgotten her, but as the day drew near
its close, he relapsed into a thoughtful mood, replying to Isabel’s
frequent remarks either in monosyllables or not at all. As the darkness
increased he seemed to be listening intently, and when a step was heard
upon the stairs or in the hall without, his face would light up with
eager expectation and then be as suddenly overcast as the footstep
passed his door. Gradually there was creeping into his mind a vague
remembrance of something or somebody, which for many days had been there
with him, gliding so noiselessly about the room that he had almost
fancied it trod upon the air, and he could scarcely tell whether it were
a spirit or a human being like himself. Little by little the outline so
dimly discerned assumed a form, and the form was that of a young girl—a
very fair young girl, with sweet blue eyes, and soft, baby hands, which
had held his aching head and smoothed his tangled hair, oh, so many
times. Her voice too, was low and gentle, and reminding him of some sad
strain of music heard long, long ago. It seemed to him, too, that she
called him Frederic, dropping hot tears upon his face. But where was she
now? Why didn’t she come again, and who was she—that little blue-eyed
girl? For a time the vision faded and all was confused again, but the
reality came back ere long, and listening eagerly for something which
never came, he thought and thought until great drops of sweat stood
thickly upon his brow; and Isabel, wiping them away, became alarmed at
the wildness of his eye and the rapid beating of his pulse. A powerful
anodyne was administered, and he slept at last a fitful feverish sleep,
which however, did him good, and in the morning he was better than he
had been before.
Mrs. Burt, who had watched him carefully, knew that the danger was past,
and that afternoon she left him with Isabel, while she went home, where
she found Marian seriously ill, with Ben taking care of her in his kind
but awkward manner.
“Did Frederic remember me? Does he know I have been there?” were
Marian’s first questions, and when Mrs. Burt replied in the negative,
she turned away whispering, mournfully, “It is just as well.”
“He is doing well,” said Mrs. Burt, “and as you need me more than he
does now, I shall come home and let that Isabel take care of him. It
won’t hurt her any, the jade. She can telegraph for her mother if she
chooses.”
Accordingly, she returned to the sick room, where she found Frederic
asleep and Isabel reading a novel.
To her announcement of leaving, the latter made no objection. She was
rather pleased than otherwise, for, as Frederic grew stronger, the
presence of a third person, and a stranger, too, might be disagreeable.
She would telegraph for her mother, of course, as she did not think it
quite proper to stay there alone. But her mother was under her control;
she could dispose of her at any time, so she merely stopped her reading
long enough to say, “Very well, you can go if you like. How much is your
charge?”
Mrs. Burt did not hesitate to tell her; and Isabel, who had taken care
of Frederic’s purse, paid her, and then resumed her book, while Mrs.
Burt, with a farewell glance at her patient, went from the room, without
a word of explanation as to where she could be found in case they wished
to find her.
It was dark when Frederic awoke, and it was so still around him that he
believed himself alone.
“They have all left me,” he said; “Mrs. Merton, Isabel, and that other
one, that being of mystery—who was she—who could she have been?” and
shutting his eyes, he tried to bring her before him just as he had often
seen her bending o’er his pillow.
He knew now that it was not a phantom of his brain, but a reality. There
had been a young girl there, and when the world without was darkest, and
he was drifting far down the river of death, her voice had called him
back, and her hands had held him up so that he did not sink in the deep,
angry waters. There were tears many times upon her face, he remembered,
and once he had wiped them away, asking why she cried. It was a pretty
face, he said, a very pretty face, and the sunny eyes of blue seemed
shining on him even now, while the memory of her gentle acts was very,
very sweet, thrilling him with an undefined emotion, and awakening
within his bosom a germ of the undying love he was yet to feel for the
mysterious stranger. She had called him Frederic, too, while he had
called her Marian. She had answered to that name, she asked him of
Isabel, and—“oh, Heaven!” he cried, starting quickly and clasping both
hands upon his head. Like a thunderbolt it burst upon him, and for an
instant his brain seemed all on fire. “It was Marian!—it was Marian!” he
essayed to say, but his lips refused to move, and when Isabel, startled
by his sudden movement, struck a light and came to his bedside, she saw
that he had fainted!
In great alarm she summoned help, begging of those who came to go at
once for Mrs. Merton. But no one knew of the woman’s place of residence,
and as she had failed to inquire, it was a hopeless matter. Slowly
Frederic came back to consciousness, and when he was again alone with
Isabel he said to her, “Where is that woman who took care of me?”
“She is gone,” said Isabel. “Gone to her home.”
“Gone,” he repeated. “When did she go, and why?”
Isabel told him the particulars of Mrs. Burt’s going, and he continued:
“Was there no one else here when you came? No young girl with soft blue
eyes?” and he looked eagerly at her.
“Yes,” she replied. “There was a queer acting thing sitting in the
arm-chair the night I first came in—”
“Who was she, and where is she now?” he asked and Isabel answered, “I am
sure I don’t know where she is, for she vanished like a ghost.”
“Yes, yes; but who was she? Did she have no name?” and Frederic clutched
Isabel’s arm nervously.
“Mrs. Merton told me it was her daughter—that is all I know,” said
Isabel; and in a tone of disappointment he continued:
“Will you tell me just how she looked, and how she acted when you first
saw her?”
“One would suppose you deeply interested in your nurse’s daughter;” and
the glittering black eyes flashed scornfully upon Frederic, who replied:
“I am interested, for she saved my life. Tell me, won’t you, how she
looked?”
“Well, then,” returned Isabel pettishly, “she was about fifteen, I
think—certainly not older than that. Her face was very white, with big,
blue eyes, which glared at me like a wild beast’s; and what is queerer
than all, she actually sobbed when I, or rather, you kissed me; perhaps
you have forgotten that you did?”
He had forgotten it, for the best of reasons, but he did not contradict
her, so intent was he upon listening to her story.
“I had not observed her particularly before; but when I heard that sound
I turned to look at her, while she stared at me as impudently as if I
had no business here. That woman stepped between us purposely I know,
for she seemed excited; and when I saw the arm-chair again the girl was
gone.”
Thus far everything, except the probable age, had confirmed his
suspicions; but there was one question more—an all-important one—and
with trembling eagerness he asked:
“What of her hair? Did you notice that?”
“It was brown, I think,” said Isabel—“short in her neck and curly round
her forehead. I should say her hair was rather handsome.”
With a sigh of disappointment Frederic turned upon his pillow, saying to
her:
“That will do—I’ve heard enough.”
Isabel’s last words had brought back to his mind something which he had
forgotten until now—the girl’s hair was short, and he remembered
distinctly twining the soft rings around his fingers. They were not
long, red curls, like those described by Sally Green. It wasn’t Marian’s
hair—it wasn’t Marian at all; and in his weakness his tears dropped
silently upon the pillow, for the disappointment was terrible. All that
night and the following day he was haunted with thoughts of the young
girl, and at last, determining to see her again and know if she were
like Marian, he said to Isabel:
“Send for Mrs. Merton. I wish to talk with her.”
“It is an impossibility,” returned Isabel: “for, when she left us, I
carelessly neglected to ask where she lived——”
“Inquire below, then,” persisted Frederic. “Somebody will certainly
know, and I must find her.”
Isabel complied with his request, and soon returned with the information
that no one knew aught of Mrs. Merton’s whereabouts, though it was
generally believed that she came from the country, and at the time of
coming to the hotel was visiting friends in the city.
“Find her friends, then,” continued Frederic, growing more and more
excited and impatient.
This, too, was impossible, for everything pertaining to Mrs. Merton was
mere conjecture. No one could tell where she lived, or whither she had
gone; and the sick man lamented the circumstance so often that Isabel
more than once lost her temper entirely, wondering why he should be so
very anxious about a woman who had been well paid for her services—“yes,
more than paid, for her price was a most exorbitant one.”
Meantime, Mrs. Huntington, who, on the receipt of Isabel’s telegram, had
started immediately, arrived, laden with trunks, bandboxes, and bags,
for the old lady was rather dressy, and fancied a large hotel a good
place to show her new clothes. On learning that Frederic was very much
better, and that she had been sent for merely on the score of propriety,
she seemed somewhat out of humor—“Not that she wanted Frederic to die,”
she said, “and she was glad of course that he was getting well, but she
didn’t like to be scared the way she was; a telegram always made her
stomach tremble so that she didn’t get over it in a week; she had
traveled day and night to get there, and didn’t know what she could have
done if she hadn’t met Rudolph McVicar in Cincinnati.”
“Rudolph!” exclaimed Isabel. “Pray, where is he now?”
“Here in this very hotel,” returned her mother. “He came with me all the
way, and seemed greatly interested in you, asking a thousand questions
about when you expected to be married. Said he supposed Frederic’s
illness would postpone it awhile, and when I told him you wan’t even
engaged as I knew of, he looked disappointed. I believe Rudolph has
reformed!”
“The wretch!” muttered Isabel, who rightly guessed that Rudolph’s
interest was only feigned.
He had heard of her sudden departure for New York, and had heard also
(Agnes Gibson being the source whence the information came) that she
might, perhaps, be married as soon as Frederic was able to sit up.
Accordingly, he had himself started northward, stumbling upon Mrs.
Huntington in Cincinnati, and coming with her to New York, where he
stopped at the same hotel, intending to remain there and wait for the
result. He did not care to meet Isabel face to face, while she was quite
as anxious to avoid an interview with him; and after a few days she
ceased to be troubled about him at all. Frederic absorbed all her
thoughts, he appeared so differently from what he used to do—talking but
little either to herself or her mother, and lying nearly all the day
with his eyes shut, though she knew he was not asleep; and she tried in
vain to fathom the subject of his reflections. But he guarded that
secret well, and day after day he thought on, living over again the
first weeks of his sickness in that chamber, until at last the
conviction was fixed upon his mind that, spite of the short hair, spite
of the probable age, spite of the story about Mrs. Merton’s daughter, or
yet the letter from Sarah Green, that young girl who had watched with
him so long and then disappeared so mysteriously, was none other than
Marian—his wife. He did not shudder now when he repeated that last word
to himself. It sounded pleasantly, for he knew it was connected with the
sweet, womanly love which had saved him from death. The brown hair which
Isabel had mentioned he rejected as an impossibility. It had undoubtedly
looked dark to her, but it was red still, though worn short in her neck,
for he remembered that distinctly. Sarah Green’s letter was a
forgery—Alice’s prediction was true, and Marian still lived.
But where was she now? Why had she left him so abruptly? and would he
ever find her? Yes, he would, he said. He would spare no time, no pains,
no money in the search; and when he found her he would love and cherish
her as she deserved. He was beginning to love her now, and he wondered
at his infatuation for Isabel, whose real character was becoming more
and more apparent to him. His changed demeanor made her cross and
fretful; while Alice Gibson’s letter, asking when she was to be married,
and saying people there expected her to return a bride, only increased
her ill-humor, which manifested itself several times toward her mother,
in Frederic’s presence.
At last, in a fit of desperation, she wrote to Agnes Gibson that she
never expected to be married—certainly not to Frederic Raymond—and if
every young lady matrimonially inclined should nurse her intended
husband through a course of fever, she guessed they would become
disgusted with mankind generally, and that man in particular! This done,
Isabel felt better—so much better indeed that she resolved upon another
trial to bring about her desired object, and one day, about two weeks
after her mother’s arrival, she said to Frederic:
“Now that you are nearly well, I believe I shall go to New Haven, and,
after a little, mother will come, too. I shall remain there, I think,
though mother, I suppose, will keep house for you this year, as she has
engaged to do.”
To this suggestion Frederic did not reply just as she thought he would.
“It was a good idea,” he said, “for her to visit her old home, and he
presumed she would enjoy it.” Then he added, very faintly: “Alice will
need a teacher here quite as much as in Kentucky, and you can retain
your situation if you choose.”
Isabel bit her lip, and her black eyes flashed angrily as she replied:
“I am tired of teaching only one pupil, for there is nothing to interest
me, and I am all worn out, too.”
She did look pale, and, touched with pity, Frederic said to her, very
kindly:
“You do seem weary, Isabel. You have been confined with me too long, and
I think you had better go at once. I will run down to see you, if
possible, before I return to Kentucky.”
This gave her hope, and, drying her eyes, which were filled with tears,
Isabel chatted pleasantly with him about his future plans, which had
been somewhat disarranged by his unexpected illness. He could not now
hope to be settled at Riverside, as he called his new home, until some
time in June—perhaps not so soon—but he would let her know, he said, in
time to meet him there.
A day or two after this conversation, Isabel started for New Haven,
whither in the course of a week she was followed by both her mother and
Rudolph, the latter of whom was determined not to lose sight of her
until sure that the engagement, which he somewhat doubted, did not in
reality exist.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE SEARCH.
When the carriage containing Mrs. Huntington rolled away from the hotel,
Frederic, who was standing upon the steps, experienced a feeling of
relief in knowing that, as far as personal acquaintances were concerned,
he was now alone and free to commence his search for Marian. Each day
the conviction had been strengthened that she was alive—that she had
been with him a few weeks before—and now every energy should be devoted
to finding her. Once he thought of advertising, but she might not see
the paper, and as he rather shrank from making his affairs thus public,
he abandoned the project, determining, however, to leave no other means
untried; he would hunt the city over, inquire at every house, and then
scour the surrounding country. It might be months, or it might be years,
ere this were accomplished; but accomplish it he would, and with a
brave, hopeful heart, he started out, taking first a list of all the
Mertons in the Directory, then searching out and making of them the most
minute inquiries, except, indeed, in cases where he knew, by the nature
of their surroundings, that none of their household had officiated in
the capacity of nurse. The woman who had taken care of him was poor and
uneducated, and he confined himself mostly to that class of people.
But all in vain. No familiar face ever came at his call. Nobody knew her
whom he sought—no one had heard of Marian Lindsey, and at last he
thought of Sally Green, determining to visit her again, and, if
possible, learn something more of the girl she had described. Perhaps
she could direct him to Joe Black, who might know the tall man last seen
with Marian. The place was easily found, and the dangerous stairs
creaked again to his eager tread. Sal knew him at once, and tucking her
grizzly hair beneath her dirty cap, waited to hear his errand, which was
soon told. Could she give him any further information of that young
girl, had she ever heard of her since his last visit there, and would
she tell him where to find Joe Black?—he might know who the man was, and
thus throw some light on the mystery.
“Bless your heart,” answered the woman, “Joe died three weeks ago with
the delirium tremens, so what you git out of him won’t help you much. I
told you all I knew before; or no, come to think on’t, I seen ’em go
into a Third avenue car, and that makes me think the feller lived up
town. But law, you may as well hunt for a needle in a haystack as to
hunt for a lost gal in New York. You may git out all the police you’ve a
mind to, and then you ain’t no better off. Ten to one they are wus than
them that’s hidin’ her, if they do wear brass buttons and feel so big,”
and Sal shook her brawny arm threateningly at some imaginary officers of
justice.
With a feeling of disgust, Frederic turned away, and, retracing his
steps, came at last to the Park, where he entered a Third avenue car,
though why he did so he scarcely knew. He did not expect to find her
there, but he felt a satisfaction in thinking she had once been over
that route—perhaps in that very car—and he looked curiously in the faces
of his fellow-passengers as they entered and left. Wistfully, too, he
glanced out at the houses they were passing, saying to himself: “Is it
there Marian lives, or there?” and once when they stopped for some one
to alight, his eye wandered down the opposite street, resting at last
upon a window high up in a huge block of buildings. There was nothing
peculiar about that window—nothing to attract attention, unless it were
the neat white fringed curtain which shaded it, or the rose geranium
which in its little earthen pot seemed to indicate that the inmates of
that tenement retained a love for flowers and country fashions, even
amid the smoke and the dust of the city. Frederic saw the white curtain,
and it reminded him of the one which years ago hung in his bedroom at
the old place on the river. He saw the geranium, too, and the figure
which bent over it to pluck the withered leaf. Then the car moved on,
and to the weary man sitting in the corner there came no voice to tell
how near he had been to the lost one, for that window was Mrs. Burt’s,
and the bending figure—Marian.
He had seen her—he had passed within a few rods of her and she could
have heard him had he shouted aloud, but for all the good that this did
him she might have been miles and miles away, for he never dreamed of
the truth, and day after day he continued his search, while the
excitement, the fatigue, and the constant disappointment, told fearfully
upon his constitution. Still he would not give it up, and every morning
he went forth with hope renewed, only to return at night weary,
discouraged, and sometimes almost despairing of success.
Once, at the close of a rainy afternoon, he entered again a Third avenue
car, which would leave him not very far from his hotel. It had been a
day of unusual fatigue with him, and utterly exhausted, he sank into the
corner seat, while passenger after passenger crowded in, their damp
overcoats and dripping umbrellas filling the vehicle with a sickly
steam, which affected him unpleasantly, causing him to lean his aching
head upon his hand, and so shut out what was going on around him. They
were full at last—every seat, every standing point was taken, and still
the conductor said there was room for another, as he passed in a
delicate young girl, who modestly drew her vail over her face to avoid
the gaze of the men, some of whom stared rather rudely at her. Just
after she came in, Frederic looked up, but the thick folds of the vail
told no tales of the sudden paling of the lip, the flushing of her
cheek, and the quiver of the eye-lids. Neither did the violent trembling
of her body, nor the quick pressure of her hand upon her side convey to
him other impression than that she was tired—faint, he thought—and
touching his next neighbor with his elbow, he compelled him to move
along a few inches, while he did the same, and so made room for the girl
between himself and the door.
“Sit here, Miss,” he said, and he turned partly toward her, as if to
shield her from the crowd, for he felt intuitively that she was not like
them.
Her hands, which chanced to be ungloved and grasped the handle of her
basket, were small, very small, and about the joints were little
laughing dimples, looking very tempting to Frederic Raymond, who was a
passionate admirer of pretty hands, and who now felt a strong desire to
clasp the tiny snowflakes just within his reach.
Involuntarily he thought of those which had so lately held his feverish
head; they must have been much like the little ones holding so fast the
basket, and he wished that chance had brought Marian there instead of
the young girl sitting so still beside him. A strange sensation thrilled
him at the very idea of meeting her thus, while his heart beat fast, but
never said to him that it was Marian herself! Why didn’t it? He asked
himself that question a thousand times in after years, saying he should
know her again, but he had no suspicion of it now, though when they
stopped at the same street down which he once had looked at the open
window, and when the seat beside him was empty, he did experience a
sense of loneliness—a feeling as if a part of himself had gone with the
young girl. Suddenly remembering that in his abstraction he had come
higher up than he wished to do, he also alighted, and standing upon the
muddy pavement, looked after the tripping figure moving so rapidly
toward the window where the geranium was blossoming, and where a light
was shining now. It disappeared at last, and mentally chiding him for
stopping in the rain to watch a perfect stranger, Frederic turned back
in the direction of his hotel, while the girl, who had so awakened his
interest, rushed up the narrow stairs, and bounded into the room where
Mrs. Burt was sitting, exclaimed:
“I’ve seen him! I’ve sat beside him in the same car!”
“Why didn’t you fetch him home, then?” asked Ben, who had returned that
afternoon from a short excursion in the country.
Marian’s face crimsoned at this question, and in a hard, unnatural voice
she replied:
“He didn’t wish to come. He didn’t even pretend to recognize me, though
he gave me a seat, and I knew him so quick.”
“Had that brown dud over your face, I s’pose,” returned Ben, casting a
rueful glance at the vail. “Nobody can tell who a woman is, now-a-days.
Why didn’t you pull it off and claim him for your husband, and make him
pay your fare?”
“Oh, Ben,” said Marian, “you certainly wouldn’t have me degrade myself
like that! Frederic knew who I was, I am sure, for I saw him so
plain—but he does not wish to find me. He never asked for me since I
left his sick room. All he cared for was Isabel, and I wish it were
possible for him to marry her.”
“You don’t wish any such thing,” answered Ben, and in the same cold,
hard tone Marian continued:
“I do. I thought so to-night when I sat beside him and looked into his
face. I loved him once as much as one can love another, and because I
loved him thus I came away, thinking in my ignorance that he might be
happy with Isabel; and when I saw that advertisement, I wrote, asking if
I might go back again. The result of the letter you know. He insulted me
cruelly. He told me a falsehood, and still I was not cured. When I
thought him dying in the hotel, I went and staid with him till the other
came: but, after I was gone, he never spoke of me, and he even professed
not to know Mrs. Daniel Burt, asking who she was, when he knew as well
as I, for I told him who she was, and he directed my letter to her. I
never used to think he was deceitful, but I know it now, and I almost
hate him for it.”
“Tut, tut. No you don’t,” chimed in Ben; and Marian growing still more
excited, continued, “Well, if I don’t, I will. I have run after him all
I ever shall, and now if we are reconciled he must make the first
concessions!”
“Whew-ew,” whistled Ben, thinking to himself, “Ain’t the little critter
spunky, though!” and feeling rather amused than otherwise, he watched
Marian as she paced the floor, her blue eyes flashing angrily and her
whole face indicative of strong excitement.
She fully believed that Frederic knew her, simply because she recognized
him, and his failing to acknowledge the recognition filled her with
indignation and determination to forget him if it were possible. Ah,
little did she dream then of the lonely man, who, in the same room where
she so recently had been, sat with bowed head, and thought of her until
the distant bells tolled the hour of midnight.
It was now three weeks since he commenced his search, and he was
beginning to despair of success. His presence he knew was needed in
Kentucky, where Alice had been left alone with the negroes, and where
his arrangements for moving were not yet completed. His house on the
river was waiting for him, the people wondering why he didn’t come, and
as he sat thinking it all over, he resolved at last to go home and bring
Alice to Riverside—to send for Mrs. Huntington as had previously been
arranged, and then begin the search again. Of Isabel too, he thought,
remembering his hasty promise of going to New Haven, but this he could
not do. So he penned her a few lines, telling her how it was impossible
for him to come, and saying that on his return to Riverside with Alice,
he should expect to find her mother and herself waiting to receive him.
“I cannot do less than this,” he said. “Isabel has been with me a long
time, and though I do not feel toward her as I did, I pity her; for I am
afraid she likes me better than she should. I have given her
encouragement, too; but when I come back, I will talk with her candidly.
I will tell her how it is, and offer her a home with me as long as she
shall choose to stay. I will be to her a brother; and when Marian is
found, the two shall be like sisters, until some man who has not a wife
already takes Isabel from my hands.”
Thus deciding, Frederic wrote to Alice, telling her when he should
probably be home, and saying he should stop for a day or so at Yonkers.
This done, he retired to rest, dreaming strange dreams of Marian and the
girl who sat beside him. They were one and the same, he thought; and he
was raising the brown vail to see, when he awoke to consciousness, and
experienced a feeling of disappointment in finding his dream untrue.
That morning a vague, uneasy feeling prompted him to stroll slowly down
the street whither the young girl had gone the previous night. The
window in the third story was open again, and the geranium was standing
there still, its broad leaves growing fresher and greener in the
sunshine which shone warm upon the window sill, where a beautiful kitten
lay, apparently asleep. Frederic saw it all, and for an instant felt a
thrill of fear lest the cat should fall and be killed on the pavement
below. But a second glance assured him of its safety—for, half buried in
its long, silk fur, was a small white hand, a hand like Marian’s and
that of the girl with the thick brown vail. “Its owner was the mistress
of the kitten,” he said; and the top of her head was just visible, for
she sat reading upon a little stool, and utterly unconscious of the
stranger who, on the opposite side in the street, cast many and wistful
glances in that direction, not because he fancied that she was there,
nor yet for any explainable reason, except that the fringed curtain
reminded him of his boyhood; and he knew the occupant of that room had
once lived in the country, and bleached her linen on the sweet, clean
grass, which grew by the running brook.
“Marian,” said Mrs. Burt, “who is that tall man going down the street?
He’s been looking this way ever so much. Isn’t it——”
She did not need to repeat the name, for Marian saw who it was, and her
fingers buried themselves so deeply in the fat sides of the kitten that
the little animal fancied the play rather too rude for comfort, and,
spitting at her mistress pertly bounded upon the floor.
“It’s Frederic!” cried Marian. “Maybe he’s coming here, for he has
crossed the street below, and is coming up this side.” And in her joy
Marian forgot the harsh things she had said of him only the night
before.
But in vain Marian waited for the step upon the stairs—the loud knock
upon the door—neither of them came, and leaning from the window she
watched him through her tears until he passed from sight.
That afternoon, as Frederic was sauntering leisurely down the street in
the direction of the depot—for he intended going to Yonkers that
night—he stumbled upon Ben, whose characteristic exclamation was, “Wall,
Square, glad to see you out agin, but I didn’t b’lieve I ever should
when I sent word to that gal. She come, I s’pose?”
“Yes,” returned Frederic, “and I am grateful to you for your kindness in
telegraphing to my friends. How did you know I was sick?”
“Oh, I’m allus ’round,” said Ben. “Know one of them boys at the hotel,
and he told me. I s’posed you’d die, and I should of come to see you
mabby, only I had to go off peddlin’. Bizness afore pleasure, you know.”
This remark seemed to imply that Frederic’s dying would have been a
source of pleasure to the Yankee, but the young man knew that he did
intend it, and the two walked on together—Ben plying his companion with
questions, an learning that both Isabel and Mrs. Huntington were now in
New Haven, but would probably go to Riverside when Frederic returned
from Kentucky.
“That’s a grand place,” said Ben; “fixed up in tip-top style, too. I
took my sister out to see it, and she thought ’twas pretty slick.
Wouldn’t wonder if you’re goin’ to marry that black haired gal, by the
looks of things?” and Ben’s gray eyes peered sideways at Frederic, who
replied, “I certainly have no such intentions.”
“You don’t say it,” returned Ben. “I shouldn’t of took the trouble to
send for her if I hadn’t s’posed you was kinder courtin’. My sister
thought you was, and she or’to know, bein’ she’s been through the mill!”
Frederic winced under Ben’s pointed remarks, and as a means of changing
the conversation, said, “If I am not mistaken, you spoke of your sister
when in Kentucky, and Alice became quite interested. I’ve heard her
mention the girl several times. What is her name?”
“Do look at that hoss—flat on the pavement. He’s a goner,” Ben
exclaimed, by way of gaining a little time.
Frederic’s attention was immediately diverted from Ben, who thought to
himself, “I’ll try him with half the truth, and if he’s any ways bright
he’ll guess the rest.”
So when, to use Ben’s words, the noble quadruped was “safely landed on
t’other side of Jordan where there wan’t no omnibus drivers, no cars, no
canal boats, no cartmen, no gals to pound their backs into pummice, no
wimmen, nor ministers to yank their mouths, nor nothin’ but a lot as big
as the United States with the Missippi runnin’ through it, and nothin’
to do but kick up their heels and eat clover,” Ben came back to
Frederic’s question, and said, “You as’t my sister’s name. They tried
hard to call her _Mary Ann_, I s’pose. My way of thinkin’ ’taint neither
one nor t’other, though mabby you’ll like it—MARIAN; ’taint a common
name. Did you ever hear it afore?”
“Marian!” gasped Frederic, turning instantly pale, while a strange,
undefinable feeling swept over him—a feeling that he had never been so
near finding her as now.
“Excuse me, Square,” said Ben, whose keen eyes lost not a single change
in the expression of Frederic’s face. “I’m such a blunderin’ critter!
That little blind gal told me your fust wife was Marian, and I or’to
known better than harrer your feelings with the name.”
“Never mind,” returned Frederic, faintly, “but tell me of your
sister—and now I think of it, you said once you were from down east,
which I supposed referred to one of the New England states, Vermont
perhaps?”
“Did use to live in Massachusetts,” replied Ben. “But can’t a feller
move?”
Frederic admitted that he could, and Ben continued, “I or’to told you, I
s’pose, that Marian ain’t my own flesh and blood—she’s adopted, that’s
all. But I love her jest the same. Her name is Marian Grey,” and Ben
looked earnestly at Frederic, thinking to himself, “Won’t he take the
hint when he knows, or had or’to know that her mother was a Grey.”
But hints were lost on Frederic. He had no suspicion of the truth, and
Ben proceeded, “All her kin is dead, and as mother hadn’t no daughter
she took this orphan, and I’m workin’ hard to give her a good schoolin’.
She can play the pianner like fury, and talks the French grammar most as
well as I do the English!”
This brought a smile to Frederic’s face, and he did not for a moment
think of doubting Ben’s word.
“You seem very proud of your sister,” he said, at last, “and as I owe
you something for caring for me and telegraphing to my friends, let me
show my gratitude by giving you something for this Marian Grey. What
shall it be? Is she fond of jewelry? Most young girls are.”
Ben stuck his hands in his trousers pocket and seemed to be thinking;
then, removing his hands he replied, “Mabby you’ll think it sassy, but
there is somethin’ that would please us both. I told her about you when
I came from Kentucky, and she cried like a baby over that blind gal.
Then, when you was sick, she felt worried agin, beg your pardon, Square,
but I told her you was han’some. Jest give us your picter, if it ain’t
bigger than my thumb, and would it be asking too much for you when you
git home to send me the blind gal’s. She’s an angel, and I should feel
so good to have her face in my pocket. You can direct to Ben
Butterworth—but law, you won’t, I know you won’t.”
“Why not?” asked Frederic, laughing at the novel request. “Mine you
shall surely have, and Alice’s also, if she consents. Come with me now,
for we are opposite a daguerrean gallery.”
The result of this was that in a short time Ben held in his hand a
correct likeness of Frederic, which was of priceless value to him,
because he knew how highly it would be prized by her for whom alone he
had requested it.
As they passed out into the street again, Frederic said to him rather
abruptly, “Do you know Sarah Green?”
“No,” answered Ben, and Frederic continued,
“Do you know Mrs. Merton?”
Ben started a little, and then repeating the name replied, “Ain’t
acquainted with that name neither. Who is she?”
“She took care of me,” returned Frederic, “and I would like to find her,
and thank her for her kindness.”
“I shouldn’t s’pose she could of took care of you alone, sick as you
was,” said Ben, waiting eagerly for the answer, which, had it been what
he desired, might lead to the unfolding of the mystery.
But Frederic shrank from making Ben his confidant.
“It was hard for her till Miss Huntington came.”
“Blast Miss Huntington,” thought Ben, now thoroughly satisfied that his
companion did not care to discover Marian, or he would certainly say
something about her.
Both she and his mother were sure that he knew she had been with him in
his sickness, and if he really wished to find her he would speak of her
as well as of Mrs. Merton.
“But he don’t,” thought Ben. “He don’t care a straw for her, and she’s
right when she says she won’t run after him any more. He don’t like
Isabel none too well, and I ra-ally b’lieve the man is crazy.”
This settled the matter satisfactorily with Ben, who accompanied
Frederic to the depot, waiting there until the departure of the train.
“Give my regrets to that Josh, and the rest of the niggers, and don’t on
no account forget the picter,” were his last words, as he quitted the
car, and then hurried home impatient to show Marian his surprise.
He found her sitting by the open window—a listless, dreamy look in her
blue eyes, and a sad expression upon her face, which said that her
thoughts were far away in the South-land, where Nature had decked her
beautiful home with all the glories of the merry month of May and the
first bright days of June. Roses were blooming there now, she knew, and
she thought of the bush she had planted beneath the library window,
wondering if that were in bloom, and if its fragrance ever reminded the
dear ones of her. Did Alice twine the buds amid her soft hair, just as
she used to do, and call them Marian’s buds, saying they were sweeter
than all the rest?
“Darling Alice,” she murmured, “I shall never see her again;” and her
tears were dropping upon her lap just as Ben came in, and began:
“Wall, wee one, I’ve seen the Square, and talked with him of you.”
“Oh, Ben, Ben!”—and Marian’s face was spotted with her excitement—“what
made you? What did he say? and where is he?”
“Gone home,” answered Ben; “but he had this took on purpose for you;”
and he tossed the picture into her lap.
“It is—it is Frederic. Oh, Mrs. Burt, it is,” and Marian’s lip touched
the glass, from which the face of Frederic Raymond looked kindly out
upon her.
It was thinner than when she used to know it, but fuller,
stronger-looking than when it lay among the tumbled pillows. The eyes,
too, were hollow, and not so bright, while it seemed to her that the
rich brown hair was not so thrifty as of old. But it was Frederic still,
her Frederic, and she pressed it again to her lips, while her heart
thrilled with the joyful thought that he remembered her, and had sent
her this priceless token. But why had he gone home without her—why had
he left her there alone if he really cared for finding her? Slowly, as a
cloud obscures a summer sky, a shadow crept over her face—a shadow of
doubt—of distrust. There was something she had not heard, and with
quivering lip she said to Ben, “What does it mean? You have not told me
why he sent it.”
It was cruel to deceive her as he had done, and so Ben thought when he
saw the heaving of her chest, the pressure of her hands, and more than
all, the whiteness of her face, as he told her why Frederic sent to her
that picture; that it was not taken for Marian Lindsey, but rather for
Marian Grey, adopted sister of Benjamin Butterworth.
“He does not wish to find me,” said Marian when Ben had finished
speaking. “We shall never be reconciled, and it is just as well,
perhaps.”
“I think so, too,” rejoined Ben, “or at any rate I’d let him rest a
spell, and learn everything there is in books for woman kind to learn.
You shall go to college, if you say so, and bimeby, when the old Nick
himself wouldn’t know you, I’ll get you a chance to teach that blind
gal, and he’ll fall in love with his own wife; see if he don’t,” and Ben
stroked the curls within his reach very caressingly, thinking to
himself, “I won’t tell her now ’bout Alice’s picter, ’cause it may not
come, but I’ll cheer her up the best way that I can. She grows handsome
every day of her life,” and as this, in Ben’s estimation, was the one
thing of all others to be desired by Marian, he could not forbear
complimenting her aloud upon her rapid improvement in looks.
“Thank you,” she answered, smiling very faintly, for to her, beauty or
accomplishments were of little avail if in the end Frederic’s love were
not secured.
Anon, however, hope whispered to her that it might be, and again she
opened the daguerreotype, catching a glow of encouragement from the eyes
which looked so kindly at her, as if they fain would tell her of the
weary days the original of that picture had spent in searching for her,
or how, even now, amid the noise and dust of the crowded cars, he sat,
wholly unmindful of what was passing around, never looking at the
beautiful blue river without, or yet at the motley passengers within,
but with his hat drawn over his eyes and his shawl across his lap, he
thought of her alone, except indeed occasionally when there would
intrude itself upon him the remembrance of the girl with the brown vail,
or a thought of Marian Grey!
CHAPTER XVIII.
HOME AGAIN.
Frederic was coming home again—“Marster Frederic,” who, as Dinah said,
“had been so near to kingdom come that he could hear the _himes_ they
sung on Sundays.”
Joyfully the blacks told to each other the glad news, which was an
incentive for them all to bestir themselves as they had not done before
during the whole period of their master’s absence. Old Dinah, whose mind
turned naturally upon eatables, busied herself in conjuring up some new
and harmless relish for the invalid, while Uncle Phil spent all the
whole day in rubbing down the horses and rubbing up the carriage with
which he intended meeting his master at Frankfort. Josh, too, caught the
general spirit, and remembering how much his master was wont to chide
him for his slovenly appearance, he cast rueful glances at his sorry
coat and red cowhides, wishing to goodness he had some “clothes to honor
the ’casion with.”
“I m-m-might sh-sh-shine these up a little,” he said, examining his
boots, and, purloining a tallow candle from Hetty’s cupboard, he set
himself to the task, succeeding so well that he was almost certain of
commendation.
A coat of uncle Phil’s was borrowed next, and though it hung like a tent
cloth about Josh’s lank proportions, the effect was entirely
satisfactory to the boy, who had a consciousness of having done all that
could reasonably be expected of him.
In the house Alice was not idle. From the earliest dawn she had been up,
for there was something on her mind which kept her wakeful and restless.
Frederic’s letters, which were read to her by the wife of the overseer,
who lived near by, had told her of the blue-eyed girl who had been with
him in his sickness, and in one letter, written ere he had given up the
search, he had said, while referring to the girl: “Darling Alice, I am
so glad you sent me here, for I hope to bring you a great and joyful
surprise.”
Not the least mention did he make of Marian, but Alice understood at
once that he meant her. Marian and the blue-eyed girl were the same, and
he would bring her back to them again. She was certain of it, and though
in his last letter, dated at Riverside, and apprising them of his
intended return, he had not alluded to the subject, it made no
difference with her. He wished really to surprise her, she thought, and
seeking out Dinah, she said to her, rather cautiously, for she would let
no one into her secret:
“Supposing Frederic had never been married to Marian, but had gone now
after a bride—I don’t mean Isabel,” she said, as she felt the defiant
expression of Dinah’s face—“but somebody else—somebody real nice.
Supposing, I say, he was going to bring her home, which room do you
think he would wish her to have?”
“The best chamber, in course,” answered Dinah—“the one whar the ’hogany
bedstead and silk quilt is. You wouldn’t go to puttin’ Marster
Frederic’s wife off with poor truck, I hope. But what made you ask that
question? What have you hearn?”
“Nothing in particular,” answered Alice, “only it would be nice if he
should bring somebody with him, and I want to fix the room just as
though I knew he would. May Lid sweep and dust it for me?”
For a moment Dinah looked at her as if she thought her crazy. Then
thinking to herself, “it’ll ’muse her a spell any way, and I may as well
humor her whim,” she replied. “Sakes alive, yes, and I’ll ar the bed.
Thar haint nobody slep’ in’t sence Marian run away, ’cept Miss Agnes one
night and that trollop, Isabel, who consulted me by sayin’ how’t they
done clarmbered onto a table afore they could get inter bed, ’twas so
high. Ain’t used to feathers whar she was raised, I reckon, and if
you’ll b’lieve it, she said how’t she allus slep’ on har afore she come
here! Pretty stuff that must be to lie on; but Lord, them Yankees is
mostly as poor as poverty, and don’t know no differ.”
Having relieved herself of this speech, which involved both her opinion
of Yankees in general and Isabel in particular, the old lady proceeded
to business, first _arin’_ the bed, as she said, and then making it
higher, if possible, than it was made on the night when Isabel so
injured her feelings by laughing at its hight. Lid’s services were next
brought into requisition; and when the chamber was swept and dusted, the
arrangement of the furniture was left entirely to Alice, who felt that
what she did was right, and wished so much that she could see just how
Marian’s favorite chair looked standing by the window, from which the
gorgeous sunsets Marian so much admired could be plainly seen. Just
opposite, and on the other side of the window, Frederic’s easy chair was
placed—the one in which he always sat when tired, and where Alice
fancied he would now delight to sit with Marian, so near that he could
look into her eyes and tell her that he was glad to have her there. He
was beginning to love her Alice knew by the tone of his letters; and her
heart thrilled with joy as she thought of the happiness in store for
them all. She would not be lonely now in her own pleasant chamber, for
it was so near to Marian’s. She could leave the doors open between, and
that would be so much nicer than having black Ellen sleeping on the
floor.
Dear little Alice! She built bright castles in the air that summer day,
and they were as real to her as if Frederic had written, “Marian is
found, and coming home with me.”
“She loved a great many flowers around her,” she said, and groping her
way down the stairs and out into the yard, she gathered from the tree
beneath the library window a profusion of buds and half opened roses,
which she arranged into bouquets, and placed in vases for Marian, just
as Marian had gathered flowers for her from the garden far away on the
river.
It was done at last; and very inviting that pleasant, airy apartment
looked with its handsome furniture, its bright carpet and muslin
curtains of snowy white, to say nothing of the towering bed. There were
flowers on the mantle, flowers on the table, flowers in the window,
flowers everywhere, and their sweet perfume filled the air with a
delicious fragrance which Dinah declared was “a heap sight better than
that scent Miss Isabel used to put on her handkercher and fan. Ugh, that
fan!” and Dinah’s nose was elevated at the very thought of Isabel’s
sandal-wood fan which had been her special abhorrence.
“Isn’t it most time for Uncle Phil to start?” asked Alice, when Dinah
had finished fixing the room.
“Yes, high time,” answered Dinah, “but Phil is so slow. I’ll jest hurry
him up,” and followed by Alice she descended the stairs, meeting in the
lower hall with Lyd, who held in her hand a brown envelope, which she
passed to Alice, saying “One dem letters what come like lightnin’ on the
telegraph. A boy done brung it.”
“A telegram,” cried Alice, feeling at first alarmed. “Go for Mrs. Warren
to read it.”
But the overseer’s wife was absent, as was also her husband, and neither
the blacks nor Alice knew what to do.
“There isn’t more than a line and a half,” said Alice, passing her
finger over the paper and feeling the thick sand which had been sifted
upon it. “I presume something has detained Frederic, and he has sent
word that he will not be here to-day.”
“Let me see dat ar,” said Phil, who liked to impress his companions with
a sense of his superior wisdom, and, adjusting his iron-bowed specs, he
took the letter, which in reality was Greek to him.
After an immense amount of wry faces and loud whispering he said:
“Yes, honey, you’re correct, though Marster Frederic has sich an onery
hand-write that it takes me a a heap of time to make it out. It reads,
‘Somethin’ has detained Frederic, and he has sent word that he’ll be
here to-morry.’” And, with the utmost gravity, Phil took off his specs,
and was walking away with the air of one who has done something his
companions could never hope to do, when Hetty called out:
“Wonder if he ’spects us to swaller dat ar, and think he kin read, when
he jest done said over what Miss Alice say. Can’t fool dis chile.”
This insinuation Uncle Phil felt constrained to answer, and with an
injured air he replied:
“Kin read, too, for don’t you mind how’t Miss Alice say. ‘Won’t be here
to-day,’ and it’s writ on the paper, ‘Comin’ to-morry.’” And, fully
satisfied that he had convinced his audience, Uncle Phil hastened off,
ere Hetty had time for further argument. So certain was Phil that
Alice’s surmises were correct and the telegram interpreted aright, and
so anxious withal to prove himself sure, that he would not go to
Frankfort, as he proposed doing.
“There was no use on’t,” he said. “Marster wouldn’t be thar till
to-morry,” and he whiled away the afternoon at leisure.
But alas for Uncle Phil. Mrs. Warren had made a mistake in Frederic’s
last letter, the young man writing he should be home on the 15th,
whereas she had read it the 17th; afterward, Frederic had decided to
leave Riverside one day earlier, and he telegraphed from Cincinnati for
Phil to meet him. Finding neither carriage nor servant in waiting, he
hired a conveyance, and about four o’clock P. M. from every cabin door
there came the joyful cry—
“Marster Frederic has come.”
“Told you so,” said Hetty, with an exultant glance at Uncle Phil, who
wisely made no reply, but hastened with the rest to tell his master,
“How d’ye?”
“How is it that some one did not meet me?” Frederic asked, after the
first noisy outbreak had somewhat subsided. “Didn’t you get the
dispatch?”
The negroes looked at Phil, who stammered out—
“Yes, we done got it, but dem ole iron specs of mine is mighty nigh wore
out—can’t see in ’em at all, and I read ‘to-morry’ instead of ‘to-day.’”
The loud shout which followed this excuse enlightened Frederic as to the
true state of the case, and he, too, joined in the laugh, telling the
crest-fallen Phil that “he should surely have a new pair of silver specs
which would read ‘to-day’ instead of ‘to-morry.’”
“But where is Alice?” he continued. “Why don’t she come to greet me?”
“Sure ’nough,” returned Dinah. “Whar can she be, when she was so fierce
to have you come? Reckon she’s up in the best charmber she’s been fixin’
up for somethin’, she wouldn’t tell what.”
“I’ll go and see,” said Frederic, starting in quest of the little girl,
who, as Dinah had conjectured, was in the front chamber—the one prepared
with so much care for Marian.
She had been sitting by the window when she heard the sound of wheels
coming up the avenue.—Then the joyful cry of “Marster’s comin’,” came to
her quick ear, and, starting up, she bent her head to listen for another
voice—a voice she had not heard for many a weary month. But she listened
in vain, for Marian was not there. Gradually she became convinced of the
fact, and, laying her face on the window sill, she was weeping bitterly
when Frederic came in. Pausing for a moment in the door, he glanced
around first at the well-remembered chair, then at the books upon the
table, then at the flowers, and then he knew why all this had been done.
“I would that it might have been so,” he thought, and going to the
weeping Alice he lifted up her head and pushing her hair from her
forehead, whispered to her softly, “Darling, was it for Marian you
gathered all these flowers?”
“Yes, Frederic, for Marian,” and Alice sobbed aloud.
Taking her in his lap, Frederic replied, “Did you think I would bring
her home?”
“Yes, I thought you had found her, and I was so glad. What made you
write me that?”
“Alice I did find her,” returned Frederic; “I have seen her, I have
talked with her. Marian is alive.”
At these words, so decidedly spoken, the blind eyes flashed up into
Frederic’s face eagerly, wistfully, as if they fain would burst their
vail of darkness and see if he told her truly.
“Is it true? Oh, Frederic, you are not deceiving me? I can’t bear any
more disappointment,” and Alice’s face and lips were as white as ashes,
as she proceeded further to question Frederic, who told her of the
blue-eyed girl who, just as he was treading the brink of the river of
death, had come to him and called him back to life by her kind acts and
words of love.
“She had a sweet, childish face,” said he, “fairer, sweeter than
Marian’s when she went away—but Marian must have changed; for I knew
that this was she.”
Then he told her of her sudden disappearance when Isabel came—of his
fruitless efforts to find her, and how while searching for her, he had
met another girl, whose hands reminded him of those which he had felt so
many times upon his brow.
“Wasn’t that Marian?” said Alice, who had forgotten her grief in
listening.
There was a mournful pathos in the tone of his voice, and it emboldened
Alice to ask another question.
“Frederic,” she began, and her little hand played with his hair, as it
always did when she was uncertain as to how her remarks would be
received, “Frederic, ain’t you loving Marian a heap more than you did
when she went away?”
Frederic did not hesitate a moment ere replying, “Yes, darling, I am,
for that young girl crept away down into my heart where Marian ought to
have been, before I asked her to be my wife; and I shall find her too. I
only stopped long enough to come home for you. The house is ready at
Riverside, and your room is charming.”
“Will Isabel be there?” was Alice’s next inquiry, and Frederic answered
by telling her all he knew of the matter.
He did not say he was beginning to understand her and consequently to
like her less, but Alice inferred as much, and with this fear removed
from her mind, she could endure patiently to become again a pupil of
Miss Huntington. For a long time they talked together, wondering who
wrote the letter purporting to have come from Sarah Green, and why it
had been written. Then Frederic told her of the peddler Ben, and of his
sister, _Marian Grey_, who, at that moment, had his daguerreotype in her
keeping. Of Marian Grey Alice did not say to him “She is our Marian,”
for she had not such a thought, but she seemed interested both in her
and in Ben, and when told that the latter had asked for her picture she
consented at once, saying he should have it as soon as they were settled
at Riverside.
“I would not tell any one that Marian was with me,” said Frederic, as
their conversation drew to a close; “I had rather the subject should not
be discussed until I really find her and bring her home; then we will
set apart a day of general thanksgiving.”
To this suggestion Alice readily assented, and as the supper bell just
then rang, and the two went together to the delicious repast, which
Dinah had prepared with unusual care, insisting the while that “thar was
nothin’ fit for nobody to eat.”
Frederic, however, whose appetite was increasing each day, convinced her
to the contrary, and while watching him as he did justice to her viands,
the old negress thought to herself, “’Clar for’t, how he does eat. I
should know he come from Yankee land. You can allus tell ’em, the way
they crams, when they get whar thar is somethin’.”
The news of Frederic’s return spread rapidly, and that night he received
calls from several of his neighbors, together with an invitation to
Agnes Gibson’s wedding, which was to take place in a few days. In the
invitation Alice was included, and though Dinah demurred, saying that
“trundle-bed truck or to stay at home,” Alice ventured to differ from
her, and at the appointed time went with Frederic to the party, which
was splendid in all its parts, having been got up with a direct
reference to the newspaper articles which were sure to be published
concerning it. Agnes, of course, was charming in white satin, point
lace, orange flowers, flowing vail, and all other _et ceteras_ which
complete the dress of a fashionable bride. And the bridegroom—poor old
man—looked very well in his new suit of broadcloth, even if his knees
did shake—not from fear, however, but as one of the guests remarked,
“Because it was a way they’d had for several years!” The top of his head
was bald, it is true, and his hair as white as snow, but for every
silver thread Agnes knew there was a golden eagle in his purse, and this
consoled her somewhat, though it did not prevent her from watching
jealously to see if any one was talking of the palsied man, her husband.
Her expected present from Isabel had never come, and the three _fish
knives_, ranged in a row, looked as if two of them, at least, were
rather more ornamental than useful, as did also the four card baskets,
and three gold thimbles, which occupied a conspicuous place. To
Frederic, Agnes was especially gracious, asking him numberless questions
concerning her “dear friend,” and saying “she hoped to meet her in her
travels, as they were going North and were intending to spend the Summer
at Saratoga, Newport, and Nahant. I thought once you would be taking
your bridal tour about this time,” she said to him, when several were
standing near.
“I assure you I had no such idea,” was Frederic’s reply, and Agnes
continued, “Indeed I supposed you were engaged, of course.”
“Then you supposed wrong,” he answered, glad of this public opportunity
to contradict a story he knew had gained a wide circulation. “I esteem
Miss Huntington as a friend and distant relative, but I certainly have
no intention whatever of making her my wife.”
Frequently, during the evening, he was asked if he had found any clue to
Sarah Green or her letter; and as he could in all sincerity reply in the
negative, no one guessed that instead of Sarah Green he had found his
wife—only, however to lose her again.
“But he would find her,” he said to himself, and as he looked at the
ill-matched bride and groom, he could not forebear wishing that it were
himself and Marian. He would stay by her now, he thought, and when it
grew dark in the parlor instead of suffering her to go away alone and
read the fatal letter, he would draw her to his side, and telling her of
its contents, would sue for her forgiveness, and offer to her love in
return for the fraud imposed upon her.
It was a pleasant picture Frederic drew that night of what his bridal
might have been, and so absorbed was he in it that when, as they were
going home, Alice with a yawn said to him, “Wasn’t it so tiresome
hearing those young folks say such foolish things to each other, and
hearing the old ones talk about their servants?” he replied, “why no,
child, I spent a most delightful evening.”
“I—don’t—see—how you could,” was the drowsy answer, and in a moment more
Alice lay upon the carriage cushions fast asleep!
It was nearly three weeks after this party ere Frederic’s arrangements
for leaving Kentucky were entirely completed, and it was not until the
latter part of July that he finally started for his now home. The
lamentations of the negroes were noisy in the extreme, though far more
moderate than they would have been if their master had not said that it
was very probable he should return in the Autumn, and merely make
Riverside a Summer residence. If he found Marian he should come back, of
course, he thought, but he did not deem it best to raise hopes which
might never be realized, so he said nothing of her to the blacks who
supposed of course she was dead.
The parting between Dinah and Alice was a bitter one, the former hugging
the little girl to her bosom and wondering how Marster Frederic ‘spected
a child what had never waited on itself even to fotch a drop of water,
could get along way off dar whar thar warn’t nary nigger nor nothin’ but
a pack o’ low flung Irish. “Order ’em ’round,” she said to Alice, wiping
her eyes with her checked apron, “order ’em round jist like they warn’t
white. Make ’em think you be somebody. Say your pra’rs evey night—war
your white cambric wrappers in the mornin’, and don’t on no count catch
any poor folksy’s marners ’mong them Yankees for I shouldn’t get my
nateral sleep o’ nights, till you got shet of ’em, and—” lowering her
voice, “if so be that you tell any of the quality ’bout us blacks,
s’posin you kinder set me ’bove Hetty and them Higginses, bein’ that I
the same as nussed you.”
To nearly all these requirements Alice promised compliance, and then, as
the carriage was waiting, she followed Frederic down to the gate, and
soon both were lost to the sight of the tearful group which from the
piazza of Redstone Hall, gazed wistfully after them.
It was at the close of a sultry Summer day when the travelers reached
Riverside, where they found Mrs. Huntington waiting to receive them.
Frederic had written, apprising her of the time when he should probably
arrive, and asking her to be there if possible. Something, too, he had
said of Isabel, but that young lady was not in the most amiable mood,
and as she was comfortably domesticated with another distant relative,
she declined going to Frederic until he came to some understanding, or
at least manifested a greater desire to have her with him than his
recent letters indicated. Accordingly her mother went alone, and
Frederic was not sorry, while Alice was delighted. Everything seemed so
bright and airy, she said, just as though a load were taken from them,
and like a bird she flitted about the house, for she needed to pass
through a room but once ere she was familiar with its location, and
could find it easily. With her own cozy chamber she was especially
pleased, and in less than half an hour her little hands had examined
every article of furniture, even to the vases which held the withered
blossoms gathered so long ago.
“Somebody must have put these here for me,” she said, and then her mind
went back to the morning when she, too, had gathered flowers for her
expected friend, and she wondered much who had done a similar service
for her.
“It’s me,” returned Mrs. Russell, who was still staying at Riverside.
“How I wonder if you found them dried-up things so soon,” she continued,
advancing into room. “I should of hove them out, only that the girl who
fixed ’em made me promise to leave ’em till you came. ’Pears like she
b’lieved you’d think more on ’em for knowin’ that she picked ’em.”
“Girl! Mrs. Russell. What girl?” and Alice’s eyes lighted up, for she
thought at once of Marian, who would know of course about the house, and
as she would naturally wish to see it, she had come some day and left
these flowers, which would be so dear to her if she found her suspicions
correct. “Who was the girl?” she asked again, and Mrs. Russell replied:
“I don’t remember her name, but she went all over the house, fixing
things in Mr. Raymond’s room, which I didn’t think was very marnerly,
bein’ that ’twa’n’t none o’ hern. Then she come in here and set ever so
long before she picked these posys, which she told me not to throw
away.”
“Yes, it was Marian,” came involuntarily from Alice’s lips, while the
woman, catching at the name rejoined:
“That sounds like what he called her—that tall spooky chap, her
brother—Ben something. She said he had seen you at the South.”
“Oh, Ben Butterworth. It was his adopted sister;” and Alice turned away,
feeling greatly disappointed that _Marian Grey_, and not Marian Lindsey,
had arranged those flowers for her.
This allusion to Ben reminded Alice of his request for her picture, and
one morning, when Frederic was going to New York, she asked to go with
him and sit for her daguerreotype. There was no reason why she should
not, and in an hour or two, she was listening, half stunned, to the
noise and uproar of the city.
“Oh, Frederic,” she cried, holding fast to his hand, as they made their
way up town—“oh, Frederic, I wonder Marian didn’t get crazy and die. I’m
sure I should. I’m almost distracted now. Where are all those people and
carts going that I hear running by us so fast, and what makes them keep
pushing me so hard. Oh, dear, I wish I hadn’t come!” and as some one
just then jostled her more rudely than usual, Alice began to cry.
“Never mind,” said Frederic soothingly, “we are almost there, and we
will take a carriage back. Folks can’t push you then;” and in stooping
down to comfort the little girl, he failed to see the graceful figure
passing so near him that the hem of her dress fluttered against his
boot.
They had come upon each other so suddenly that there was not time for
the brown vail to be dropped, neither was it needful, for so absorbed
was Frederic with his charge that he neither knew nor dreamed how near
to _Marian Lindsey_ he had been.
Alice’s tears being dried, they kept on their way, and when the picture
was taken, Frederic did it up and directing it to Ben Butterworth, sent
it to the office, then calling a carriage, he took Alice, as he had
promised, all over the great city. And Alice enjoyed it very much,
laying back on the soft cushions, and knowing that no one could touch
her of all the noisy throng she heard so distinctly, but could not see.
It was a day long talked of by the blind girl, and she asked Mrs.
Huntington to write a description of it to the negroes, who she knew
fancied that Louisville was the largest city in the world.
Not long after this, something which Mrs. Huntington said about her
daughter determined Frederic to visit her and make the explanation which
he felt it his duty to make, for he knew he had given her some reason to
think he intended asking her to be his wife. He accordingly feigned some
excuse for going to New Haven, and one morning found himself at the door
where Isabel was stopping.
“Give her this,” he said, handing his card to the servant who carried it
at once to the delighted young lady.
“Frederic Raymond,” read Isabel. “Oh, yes. Tell him I’ll be down in a
moment,” and she proceeded to arrange her hair a little more becomingly,
and made several changes in her dress, so that the one minute was nearly
fifteen ere she started for the parlor, where Frederic was rather
dreading her coming, for he scarcely knew what he wished to say.
Half timidly she greeted him as a bashful maiden is supposed to meet her
lover, and seating herself at a respectful distance from him, she asked
numberless questions concerning his health, her numberless friends in
Kentucky, her mother, and dear little Alice, who, she presumed, did not
miss her much.
“Your mother’s presence reminds us of you very often, of course,”
returned Frederic, “but you know we can get accustomed to almost
anything, and Alice seems very happy.”
“Yes,” sighed Isabel. “You will all forget me, I suppose, even to
mother—but for me I have not been quite contented since I left Kentucky.
I thought it tiresome to teach, and perhaps was sometimes impatient and
unreasonable, but I have often wished myself back again. I don’t seem to
be living for anything now,” and Isabel’s black eyes studied the pattern
of the carpet quite industriously.
This long speech called for a reply, and Frederic said, “You would not
care to come back again, would you?”
“Why, yes,” returned Isabel; “I would rather do that than nothing.”
For a time there was silence, while Frederic fidgeted in his chair and
Isabel fidgeted in hers, until at last the former said:
“I owe you an explanation, Isabel, and I have come to make it. Do you
remember our conversation in the parlor, and to what it was apparently
tending, when we were interrupted by Alice?”
“Yes,” replied Isabel, “and I have thought of it so often, wondering if
you were in earnest, or if you were merely trifling with my feelings.”
“I certainly had no intention of trifling with you,” returned Frederic:
“neither do I know as I was really in earnest. At all events it is
fortunate for us both that Alice came in as she did;” and having said so
much, Frederic could now look calmly upon a face which changed from a
serene Summer sky to a dark, lightning-laden thunder-cloud as he told
her the story he had came to tell.
In her terrible disappointment, Isabel so far forgot herself as to lose
her temper entirely, and Frederic, while listening to her as she railed
at him for what she called his perfidy, wondered how he ever could have
thought her womanly or good.
“It was false that Marian was living, and had taken care of him when
sick,” she said. “He could not impose that story upon her, and he only
wished to do it because he fancied that he was in some way pledged to
her and wished for an excuse, but he might have saved himself the
trouble, for even had Alice not appeared she should have told him No.
She liked him once, she would admit, but there was nothing like living
beneath the same roof to make one person tire of another, and even if
she were not disgusted with him before, she should have become so while
taking care of him in New York, and so she wrote to Agnes Gibson, who,
she heard, had spread the news that she was engaged, though she had no
authority for doing so, but it was just like the tattling
mischief-maker!”
“Are you through?” Frederic coolly asked, when she had finished
speaking. “If you are I will consider our interview at an end.”
Isabel did not reply and he arose to go, saying to her as he reached the
door, “I did not come here to quarrel with you, Bell, I wish still to be
your friend, and if you are ever in trouble come to me as to a brother.
Marian will, I trust, be with me then; but she will be kind to you, for
’tis her nature.”
“Plague on that Marian,” was Isabel’s unlady-like thought as the door
closed after Frederic. “I wonder how many times she’s coming to life!
How I wanted to charge him with his meanness in marrying her fortune,
but as that is a secret between the two, he would have suspected me of
treachery. The villain! I believe I hate him—and only to think how those
folks in Kentucky will laugh. But it’s all Agnes’ doings. She inveigled
more out of me than there was to tell, and then repeated it to suit
herself. The jade! I hope she’s happy with that old man”—and at this
point Isabel broke down in a flood of tears, in the midst of which the
door bell rang again, and hurrying up the stairs she listened to the
names, which this time were “Mr. and Mrs. Rivers,” (Agnes and her
husband) and they asked for her.
Drying her tears, and bathing her eyes until the redness was gone,
Isabel went down to meet the “tattling mischief-maker,” embracing her
very affectionately, and telling her how delighted she was to see her
again, and how well she was looking.
“Then why do you not embark on the sea of matrimony yourself, if you
think it such a beautifier,” said Agnes.
“Me?” returned Isabel, with a toss of her head; “I thought I wrote you
that I had given up that foolish fancy.”
“Indeed, so you did,” said Agnes, “but I had forgotten it, and when I
saw Mr. Raymond at the Tontine, where we are stopping, I supposed of
course he had come to see you, and I said to Mr. Rivers it really was
too bad, for from what he said at our wedding I fancied there was
nothing in it, and had made up my mind to take you with us to Florida,
as I once talked of doing. Husband’s sister wants a teacher for her
children, don’t she, dear?”
Mr. Rivers was about to answer in the affirmative, but ere he could
speak Isabel chimed in, “Oh, you kind, thoughtful soul. Let me go with
you now; do. Nothing could please me more. I have missed your society so
much, and am so unhappy here!” and in the black eyes there was certainly
a tear, which instantly touched the heart of the sympathetic old man who
anticipated his wife’s reply, by saying, “Certainly you shall go, if you
like. You’ll be company for Mrs. Rivers, and if I am in my dotage, as
some say, I’ve sense enough to know that she can’t be contented all the
time with her grandfather. Eh, Aggie?” and chucked his bride under the
chin.
“Disgusting!” thought Isabel.
“Old fool!” thought Agnes, who was really rather pleased with the idea
of having Isabel go with her to her new home, for though she did not
love her dear friend, she rather enjoyed her company, and she felt that
anybody was acceptable who would stand as a third person between herself
and the grandfather she had chosen.
The more she thought of the plan the better she was pleased with it, and
before parting the whole was amicably adjusted. Early in October, Isabel
was to join her friend in Kentucky, and go with her from thence to
Florida, where she was either to remain with Mrs. Rivers, or to teach in
the family of Mrs. McGregor, Mr. Rivers’ sister. The former was what
Isabel intended to do, for she thoroughly disliked teaching, and if she
could live without it, she would. Still she did not so express herself
to her visitors, and she appeared so gracious and so grateful withal,
that, the heart of the bridegroom was wholly won, and after his return
to their hotel, he extolled her so highly that Agnes began to pout, a
circumstance which pleased her fatherly spouse, inasmuch as it augured
more affection for himself than he had supposed her to possess.
The story of Isabel’s intended trip to Florida was not long in reaching
Rudolph McVicar, who had been wondering why something didn’t occur, and
if he were really to be disappointed after all.
“I wasted that paper and ink for nothing,” was his mental comment when
he heard from her own lips that Isabel was going; for, presuming upon
his former acquaintance, he finally ventured to call upon her, demeaning
himself so well that, like her mother, Isabel began to think he had
reformed.
Still there was an expression in his eye which she did not like, and
when at last he left her, she experienced a feeling of relief, as if a
spell had been removed. After her recent interview with Frederic she
would not go to his house, so her mother went to New Haven, staying with
her daughter a week and then returning to Riverside, while Isabel
started for Kentucky, where, as she had expected, she met with Mr. and
Mrs. Rivers, and was soon on her way to Florida.
When sure that Isabel was gone, and that Sarah Green’s letter had indeed
been written in vain, Rudolph, who cared nothing now whether Marian were
ever discovered to her husband or not, went to New York and embarked on
a whaling voyage, as he had long thought of doing, fancying that the
roving life of a seaman would suit his restless nature.
And now, with Rudolph on the sea, with Isabel in Florida, with Marian at
school, and Frederic at Riverside, we draw a vail over the different
characters of our story, nor lift it again until three years have passed
away, bringing changes to all, but to none a greater change than to the
so-called Marian Grey.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE GOVERNESS.
It was a bright September afternoon, and the dense foliage of the trees
looked as fresh and green as when watered by the Summer showers, save
here and there a faded leaf came rustling to the ground, whispering to
those at whose feet it fell of the Winter which was hastening on, and
whose breath even now was on the northern seas. Softly the Autumnal
sunlight fell upon the earth, and the birds sang as gayly in the trees
as if there were no hearts bereaved—no small, low rooms where all was
darkness and gloom—no humble procession winding slowly through the
crowded streets and out into the country, where, in a new-made grave, a
mother’s love was buried, while the mourners, two in number, a young man
and a girl, held each other’s hand in token that they were bound
together by a common sorrow. Not a word was said by either; and when the
solemn burial rite was over, they returned as silently to the carriage,
then were driven back to their desolate home—the tenement where Frederic
Raymond had watched the curtained window and the geranium growing there.
For many days that window had been darkened, just as it was when Marian
Grey lay there with the fever in her veins; but it was open now, and the
west wind came stealing in, purifying the room from the faint sickening
smell of coffins and of death, for the Destroyer had been there. And
when the mourners came back from the grave in the country, one threw
himself upon the lounge, and burying his face in the cushions, sobbed
aloud:
“Oh, Marian, it’s terrible to be an orphan and have no mother.”
“Yes, Ben, ’tis terrible,” and Marian’s tears dropped on the hair of the
honest-hearted Ben.
Up to this hour he had restrained his grief, but now that he was alone
with Marian, he wept on until the sun went down and the night shadows
were creeping into the room. Then lifting up his head, he said, “It is
so dark—so dismal now—and the hardest of all is the givin’ up our dear
old home where mother lived so long, and the thinkin’ maybe you’ll
forget me when you live with that grand lady.”
“Forget you! Oh, Ben, I never can forget how much you have done for me,
denying yourself everything for my sake,” said Marian, while Ben
continued, “Nor won’t you be ashamed of me neither, if I should come
sometimes to see you? I should die if I could not once in a while look
into your eyes; and you’ll let me come, won’t you, Marian?”
“Of course I will,” she replied, continuing after a moment, “It is not
certain yet that I go to Mrs. Sheldon’s. I have not answered her last
letter because—You know what we talked about before your mother died!”
“Yes, yes, I know,” returned Ben, “but I had forgot it—my heart was so
full other things. I’ll go out there to-morrow. I’d rather you should
teach at Riverside, even if you’d never heard of Frederic, than go to
that grand lady, who might think, because you was a governess, that you
wan’t fit to live in the same house.”
“I have no fears of that,” said Marian. “Mrs. Harcourt says she is an
estimable woman; but still, I too, would rather go to Riverside, if I
were sure Frederic would not know me. Do you think there is any danger?”
“No,” was Ben’s decided answer, and in this opinion Marian herself
concurred, for she knew that she had changed so much that none who saw
her when first she came to Mrs. Burt’s would recognize her now.
About three months before the night of which we are writing, she had
been graduated at Mrs. Harcourt’s school with every possible honor, both
as a musician and a scholar. There had never been her equal there
before, Mrs. Harcourt said, and when her friend, Mrs. Sheldon, who lived
in Springfield, Mass., applied to her for a family pupil, she warmly
recommended her favorite pupil, Marian Grey, frankly stating, however,
that she was of humble origin—that her adopted mother or aunt was a poor
sewing woman, and her adopted brother a peddler. This, however, made no
difference with Mrs. Sheldon, and several letters had passed between
herself and Marian, who would have accepted the liberal offer at once,
but for a lingering hope that Ben would carry out his favorite plan, and
procure her a situation as teacher at Riverside. She had forgotten what
she once said about learning to hate Frederic, and the possibility of
living again beneath the same roof with him made her heart beat faster
than its wont. She had occasionally met him in the street, and once she
was sure his eye had rested upon her in passing, but she knew by its
expression that she was not recognized, and when Ben suggested offering
her services as Alice’s governess she readily consented.
During these years Ben had not lost sight of Frederic’s movements,
though it so chanced that they had met but twice, once just after the
receipt of Alice’s picture, which had been greeted by Marian with a
shower of kisses and tears, and once the previous Autumn, when Frederic
was about returning to Kentucky, for, with his changed feelings toward
Marian, Mr. Raymond felt less delicacy in using her money—less aversion
to Redstone Hall, where his presence was really needed, for a portion of
the year at least, and which he intended making his Winter residence.
But he was at Riverside now, and Ben was about going there to see what
arrangements could be made, when his mother’s sudden death caused both
himself and Marian to forget the subject until the night after the
burial, when, without a moment forgetting the dead or the dreary blank
her absence made, they talked together of the future, and decided that
on the morrow Ben should go to Riverside and see if there were room in
Frederic’s house for Marian Grey. The morning came, and at an early hour
Ben started, bidding Marian keep up her spirits as he was sure of
bringing her good tidings.
Frederic was sitting in his arm-chair, which stood near the window, just
where Marian had placed it three years and a half ago. Not that it had
never been moved since that April morning, for, freed from old Dinah’s
surveillance, Mrs. Huntington, who was still at Riverside, proved
herself a pattern housekeeper, and the chair had probably been moved a
thousand times to make room for the broom and brush, but it was in its
old place now, and Frederic was sitting in it, thinking of Marian and
his hitherto fruitless efforts at finding her. He was beginning to get
discouraged, and still each time he went to the city he thought “perhaps
I may meet her to-day,” and each night, as the hour for his return drew
near, Alice waited upon the piazza when the weather was fine, and by the
window when it was cold, listening intently for another step than
Frederic’s—a step which never came, and then Alice grew less hopeful,
while Marian seemed farther and farther away as month after month went
by bringing no tidings of her. Frederic knew that she must necessarily
have changed somewhat from the Marian of old, for she was a woman now,
but he should readily recognise her, he said. He should know her by her
peculiar _hair_, if by no other token. So when his eye once rested on a
face of surpassing sweetness, shaded by curls of soft chesnut hair,
which in the sunlight wore a rich red tinge, he felt a glow like that
which one experiences in gazing for a single instant on some picture of
rare loveliness; then the picture faded, the graceful figure glided by,
and there was nothing left to tell how, by stretching forth his hand, he
might have grasped his long lost Marian. Moments there were when she
seemed near to him, almost within his reach, and such a moment was the
one when Mrs. Huntington announced _Ben Butterworth_, whom he had not
seen for a long time.
Involuntarily he started up, half expecting his visitor had come to tell
him something of her. But when he saw the crape upon Ben’s hat, and the
sorrow on his face, he forgot Marian in his anxiety to know what had
happened.
“My mother’s dead,” said Ben, and the strong man, six feet high, sobbed
like a little child, bringing back to Frederic’s mind the noiseless
room, the oddly shaped box, the still, white face, and tolling bell,
which were all he could distinctly remember of the day when he, too,
said to a boy like himself, “My mother’s dead.”
These three words. Alas, how full of anguish is their utterance, and how
their repetition will call up an answering throb in the heart of every
one who has ever said in bitterness of grief, “My mother’s dead.”
Frederic felt it instantly, and it prompted him to take again the rough
hand, which he pressed warmly in token of his sympathy.
“He _is_ a good man,” thought Ben, wiping his tears away; and after a
few choking coughs and brief explanations as to how and when, he came at
once to the object of his visit.
“He should peddle now just as he used to do, of course, but wimmen wan’t
so lucky, and all Marian could do was to teach. He had given her a
tip-top larnin’, though she had earnt some on’t herself by sewin’. She
had got a paper thing, too, with a blue ribin, from Miss Harcourt, who
praised her up to the skies. In short, if Mr. Raymond had not any
teacher for Alice, wouldn’t he take Marian Grey?” and Ben twirled his
hat nervously, while he waited for the answer.
“I wish you had applied to me sooner,” said Frederic, “for in that case
I would have taken her, but a Mrs. Jones, from Boston, came on only a
week ago, so you see I am supplied. I am very sorry, for I feel an
interest in Miss Grey, and will use my influence to procure her a
situation.”
“Thank you; there’s a place she can have, but I wanted her to come
here,” returned Ben, who was greatly disappointed and began to cry
again.
Frederic was somewhat amused, besides being considerably disturbed, and
after looking at the child-man for a moment, he continued:
“Mrs. Jones is engaged for one year only, and if at the end of that time
Miss Grey still wishes to come, I pledge you my word that she shall do
so.”
This brought comfort at once. One year was not very long to wait, and by
that time Marian would certainly be past recognition, and as all Ben’s
wishes and plans centered upon one thing, to wit: Mr. Raymond’s falling
in love with his unknown wife, he was readily consoled, and wiping his
eyes, he said apologetically, as it were, “I’m dreadful tender-hearted,
and since I’ve been an orphan it’s ten times wus. So you must excuse my
actin’ like a baby. Where’s Alice?”
Frederic called the little girl, who, childlike, waited to put on her
bracelet, “so as to show the man that she still wore it and liked it
very much.” She seemed greatly pleased at meeting Ben again, asking him
why he had not been there before, and if he had received her picture.
“Yes, wee one,” said he, taking her round white arm in his hand and
touching the bracelet. “I should have writ, only that ain’t in my line
much, and I don’t always spell jest right, but we got the picter, and
Marian was so pleased she cried.”
“What made her?” said Alice, wonderingly. “She don’t know me.”
“But she knows you’re blind, for I told her,” was Ben’s quick reply,
which was quite satisfactory to Alice, who by this time had detected a
note of sadness in his voice, and she asked what was the matter.
To her also Ben replied, “My mother’s dead,” and the mature little girl
understood at once the dreary loneliness that a mother’s death must
bring even to the heart of a big man like Ben. Immediately, too, she
thought of Marian Grey, and asked “What she would do?”
“I come out to see if your pa—no, beg your pardon—to see if the Square
didn’t want her to hear you say your lessons,” was Ben’s answer, and
Alice exclaimed, “Oh, Frederic. Let her come. I know I shall like her
better than Mrs. Jones, for she’s young and pretty, I am sure. May she
come?”
“Alice,” said Frederic, “Mrs. Jones has an aged mother and two little
children dependent upon her earnings, and, should I send her away, the
disappointment would be very great. Next year, if we all live, Miss Grey
shall come, and with this you must be satisfied.”
Alice saw at once that he was right, and she gave up the point, merely
remarking that “a year was a heap of a while.”
“No, ’taint,” said Ben, who each moment was becoming more and more
reconciled to the arrangement.
One year’s daily intercourse with fashionable people, he thought, would
be of invaluable service to Marian, and as he wished her to be perfect
both in looks and manners when he presented her to Frederic Raymond, he
was well satisfied to wait, and he returned to New York with a light,
hopeful heart. Marian, on the contrary, was slightly disappointed, for
like Alice, a year seemed to her a long, long time. Still there was no
alternative, and she wrote to Mrs. Sheldon that she would come as early
as the first day of October. It was hard to break up their old home, but
it was necessary, they knew, and with sad hearts they disposed of the
furniture, gave up the rooms, and then, when the appointed time came,
Marian started for her new home, accompanied by Ben, who went rather
unwillingly.
“We ain’t no more alike than ile and water,” he said, when she first
suggested his going, “and they won’t think as much of you for seein’
me.”
But Marian insisted, and Ben went with her, mentally resolving to say
but little, as by this means he fancied “he would be less likely to show
how big a dolt he was!”
CHAPTER XX.
WILL GORDON.
Mrs. Sheldon’s residence was a most delightful spot, reminding Marian a
little of Redstone Hall, and as she passed up its nicely graveled walk
and stepped upon its broad piazza, she felt that she could be very happy
there, provided she met with sympathizing friends. Any doubts she might
have had upon this subject were speedily dispelled by the appearance of
Mrs. Sheldon, in whose face there was something very familiar; and it
was not long ere Marian identified her as the lady who had spoken so
kindly to her in the car between Albany and New York, asking her what
was the matter, and if she had friends in the city. This put Marian at
once at her ease, and her admiration for her employer increased each
moment, particularly when she saw how gracious she was to Ben, who true
to his resolution, scarcely spoke except to answer Mrs. Sheldon’s
questions and to decline her invitation to dinner.
“I should never get through that in the world without some blunder,” he
thought, and as the dinner bell was ringing, he took his leave, crying
like a child when he parted with Marian, who was scarcely less affected
than himself.
Going to the depot, he sauntered into the ladies’ room, where he found a
group of young girls, who were waiting the arrival of a friend, and who,
meantime, were ready for any fun which might come up. Ben instantly
attracted their attention, and one who seemed to be the leader of the
party, began to quiz him, asking “where he lived, and if he had ever
been so far from home before?”
Ben understood the drift of her remarks at once, and with imperturbable
gravity, replied:
“I come from down East, where they raise sich as me, and this is the
fust time I was ever out of Tanton, which allus was my native town!”
Then, taking his tobacco box from his pocket, he passed it to an
elegant-looking man, whom he readily divined to be the brother of the
girl, saying to him:
“Have a chaw, captain? I’d just as lief you would as not.”
As he heard the loud laugh which this speech called forth, he continued,
without the shadow of a smile:
“I had—’strue’s I live, for I ain’t none o’ your tight critters. Nobody
ever said that of Ben Bur—Ben Butterwith,” he added, hastily, for until
Marian was discovered to Frederic, he thought it best to retain the
latter name.
“Ben Butterworth,” repeated the young girl in an aside to her
brother—“Why, Will, didn’t sister Mary tell us that was the adopted
brother or cousin of her new governess? You know Miss Grey mentioned his
name in one of her letters.”
“Yes, sir,” said Ben, ere Will had time to reply. “If by Mary you mean
Miss Sheldon, I’m the chap. Brought my sister there to-day, to be her
schoolma’am, and I don’t want you to run over her neither, ’cause you’ll
be sorry bimeby. That was all gammon I told you about never being away
from home before, for I’ve seen considerable of the world.”
The cars from Boston were by this time rolling in at the depot, and
without replying to Ben’s remark, the young lady went out to look for
her friend.
That night, just after dark, Mrs. Sheldon’s door bell rang, and her
brother and sister came in, the latter dressed in the extreme of
fashion, and bearing about her an air which seemed to indicate that she
had long been accustomed to receive the homage of those around her.
Seating herself on the sofa, she began, “Well, Mary, Will and I have
come over to see this wonderful prodigy. Mother was here, you know, this
afternoon, and she came home half wild on the subject of Miss Grey,
insisting that I should call directly, and so like a dutiful daughter I
have obeyed, though I must confess that the sight of Ben Butterworth,
whom we met at the depot, did not greatly prepossess me in her favor.”
“They are not at all alike,” said Mrs. Sheldon, “neither are they in any
way related. Miss Grey is highly educated, and has the sweetest face I
ever saw. She has some secret trouble, too, I’m sure, and she reminds me
of a beautiful picture over which a vail is thrown, softening, and at
the same time heightening its beauty.”
“Really,” said Will, rousing up, “some romance connected with her. Do
bring her out at once.”
Mrs. Sheldon left the room, and going up to Marian’s chamber, knocked at
the door. A low voice bade her come in, and she entered just in time to
see Marian hide away the daguerreotype of Frederic, at which she had
been looking.
“My brother and sister are in the parlor and have asked for you,” she
said.
“I will come down in a moment,” returned Marian, who wished a little
time to dry her tears, for she had been weeping over the pictures of
Frederic and Alice, both of which she had in her possession.
Accordingly, when Mrs. Sheldon was gone, she bathed her face until the
stains had disappeared; then smoothing her collar and brushing her wavy
hair, she descended to the parlor, where Ellen Gordon sat prepared to
criticise, and William Gordon sat prepared for almost anything, though
not for the vision which greeted his view when Marian Grey appeared
before him. The dazzling purity of her complexion contrasted well with
her black dress, and the natural bloom upon her cheek was increased by
her embarrassment, while her eyes dropped modestly beneath the
long-fringed lashes, which Ellen noticed at once, because they were the
one coveted beauty which had been denied to herself.
“Jupiter!” was Will’s mental comment. “Mary didn’t exaggerate in the
least, and Nell will have to yield the palm at once.”
Something like this passed through Ellen’s mind, but though on the whole
a frank, right-minded girl, she was resolved upon finding fault with the
stranger, simply because her mother and sister had said so much in her
praise.
“She is vulgar, I know,” she thought, and she watched narrowly for
something which should betray her low birth, but she waited in vain.
Marian was perfectly lady-like in her manners; her language was well
chosen; her voice soft and low; and ere she had been with her half an
hour, Ellen secretly acknowledged her superiority to most of the young
ladies of her acquaintance, and she regretted that she, too, had not
been educated at Mrs. Harcourt’s school, if such manners as Miss Grey’s
were common there.
At Mrs. Sheldon’s request, Marian took her seat at the piano, and then
Ellen hoped to criticise; but here again she was at fault, for Marian
was a brilliant performer, keeping perfect time, and playing with the
most exquisite taste.
As she was turning over the leaves of the music book after the close of
the first piece, Will said to his sister:
“By the way, Nell, I had a letter from Fred to-day and he says he will
be delighted to get you that music the first time he goes to the city.”
Marian started just as she had done that afternoon when Mrs. Sheldon
called her youngest boy Fred. Still there was no reason why she should
do so. Frederic was a common name, and she kept on turning the leaves,
while Ellen replied, “What else did he write, and when is he going
south?”
Marian’s hand was stayed now, and she listened eagerly for the answer,
which was “Sometime in November, and he has invited me to go with him,
but I hardly think I shall. He’s lonesome, he says, and can find no
trace of his run away wife. So, there’s a shadow of a chance for you
Nell.”
The hand which held the leaf suspended, came down with a crash upon the
keys of the piano, but Ellen thought it was an accident, if she thought
of it at all; and she replied, “Fie, just as though I would have a man
before I knew for certain that his wife was dead. I admire Mr. Raymond
very much, and if he had not been so foolish as to marry that child, I
can’t say that he would not have made an impression, for he is the
finest looking and most agreeable gentleman I ever met. Isn’t it strange
where that girl went, and what she went for? Hasn’t he ever told you
anything that would explain it?”
Up to this point Marian had sat immovable, listening eagerly and
wondering where these people had known Frederic Raymond. Then, as
something far back in the past flashed upon her mind, she turned, and
looking in the young man’s face, knew who he was and that they had met
before. His name had seemed familiar from the first, and she knew that
he was the Will Gordon who had been Frederic’s chum in college, and had
once spent a vacation at Redstone Hall. He had predicted that she would
be a handsome woman, and Frederic had said she could not with such hair.
She remembered it all distinctly, but any effect it might then have had
upon her was lost in her anxiety to hear the answer to Ellen’s question.
“Fred generally keeps his matters to himself, but I know as much as
this: He didn’t love that Miss Lindsey any too well when he married her,
but he has admitted to me since that his feelings toward her had
undergone a change, and he would give almost anything to find her. He is
certain that she was with him when he was sick in New York, and since
that time he has sought for her everywhere.”
William Gordon had no idea of the effect his words produced upon the
figure which, on the music stool, sat as motionless as if it had been a
block of marble. During all the long, dreary years of exile from home
there had not come to her so cheering a ray of hope as this, and the
bright bloom deepened on her cheek, while the joy which danced in her
deep blue eyes made them look almost black beneath the heavy lashes.
Frederic was beginning to love her—he had acknowledged as much to Mr.
Gordon, and her heart bounded forward to the time when she should see
him face to face, and hear him tell her so with his own lips. Little now
she heeded Ellen’s next remark, “I presume it would be just the same
even if he were to find her. He is a great admirer of beauty, and she, I
believe, was very ordinary looking.”
“Not remarkably so,” returned Will. “She was thin-faced and had red
hair, but I remember thinking she might make a handsome woman—”
“With red hair! Oh, Will!” and the black-tressed Ellen laughed at the
very idea.
A sudden movement on Marian’s part made Will recollect her, and he
hastened to apologise for his apparent forgetfulness of her presence.
“You will please excuse us,” he said, “for discussing an affair in which
you, of course, can have no interest.”
“Certainly,” she replied, while around the corners of her mouth were
little laughing dimples, which told no tales to the young man, who
continued: “Will you give us some more music? I admire your style of
playing.”
Marian was in a mood for anything, and turning to the piano she dashed
off into a merry, spirited thing, to which Will’s feet kept time, while
Ellen looked on amazed at the white fingers which flew like lightning
over the keys, seemingly never resting for an instant upon any one of
them, but lighting here and there with a rapidity she never before seen
equalled. It was the outpouring of Marian’s heart, and the tune she
played was a song of jubilee for the glad tidings she had heard. Ere she
had half finished, Will Gordon was at her side, gazing wonderingly into
her face, which sparkled and glowed with her excitement.
“She is strangely beautiful,” he thought, and so he said to Ellen when
they were walking home together.
“She looks very well,” returned Ellen, “but I trust you will not feel it
your duty to fall in love with her on that account. Wouldn’t it be
ridiculous though, for you, who profess never to have felt the least
affection for any woman, to yield at once to Mary’s governess?”
“Mary’s governess is no ordinary person,” answered Will. “How like the
mischief she made those fingers go in that last piece. I never saw
anything like it;” and he tried in vain to whistle a few bars of the
lively strain.
That night three men dreamed of Marian—Will Gordon in his bachelor
apartments, which he had said should never be invaded with a female’s
wardrobe—Ben Burt in his room at the Lovejoy Hotel—and Frederic Raymond
in his cheerful home upon the Hudson. But to Marian, sleeping so quietly
in her chamber there came a thought of only one, and that one Frederic
Raymond, whose picture lay beneath her pillow. She had never placed it
there until to-night, for she had felt that she had no right to do so.
But Mr. Gordon’s words had effected a change. He said that Frederic was
beginning to love her at last—that he had sought for her without
success—that he would give almost anything to find her. It is true she
could not reconcile all this with her preconceived opinion: but she had
no wish to doubt it, and she accepted it as truth, thinking it was
probably a very recent thing with him, this searching after and loving
her.
Very rapidly and pleasantly to Marian did the first few weeks of her
sojourn with Mrs. Sheldon pass away. She was interested in her pupils,
two bright-faced little girls, and doubly interested in their brother,
the brown-eyed _Fred_, whose real name she learned was Frederic Raymond,
he having been called, Mrs. Sheldon said, after Williams particular
friend, who spent his winters in Kentucky, and his Summers at Riverside,
a delightful place on the Hudson. Frederic Raymond was a frequent
subject of conversation in Mrs. Sheldon’s family, and once, after Marian
had been there four or five months, and Will, as usual, was spending an
evening there, the matter was discussed at length, while Marian, sitting
partly in the shade, so that the working of her features could not be
seen, dropped stitch after stitch in the cloud she was crocheting, and
finally stopped altogether as the conversation proceeded.
“I am positive,” said Mrs. Sheldon, “that I saw Mrs. Raymond in the
cars, between Albany and Newburg. It was four years ago, last Autumn,
and about that time she came away. There was a very young girl sitting
before me, dressed in black, with long red curls, and she looked as if
she had wept all her tears away, though they fell like rain when I spoke
to her and asked her what was the matter. I remember her particularly
from her question, ‘Is New York a heap noisier than Albany or Buffalo?’”
“That ‘heap’ is purely Southern,” interrupted Will, while his sister
continued:
“She said she had but one friend in the world, and that one was in New
York. I remember, too, that one of her hands was ungloved. It was so
white and small, and she used it so often to brush her tears away.”
Here Will glanced involuntarily at the beautiful little hands busy with
the cloud. It might have been fancy, but he thought they trembled, and
so he closed the register and opened a door, thinking the heat of the
room might have made Miss Grey nervous—and he was growing very careful
of her comfort!
Poor Will!
Returning to his seat, he replied to his sister’s remark, “That was
undoubtedly Marian Lindsey. Did you speak of it to Frederic?”
“No,” said Mrs. Sheldon, “I have always thought he disliked talking of
her to me, and that makes me think there is something wrong—that he did
her an injury.”
“Every man who marries without love injures the woman he makes his
wife,” said Will, “and Frederic does not profess to have loved her then.
His father drew him into this match, and for some inexplicable reason
Fred consented, when all the time he loved that Isabel Huntington. But
he has recovered from that infatuation, and I am glad of it, for I never
liked her, and had the thing been possible, I should say she poisoned
him against this Marian. Why, Miss Grey, you are actually shivering,” he
added, as he saw the violent trembling of Marian’s body, and this time
he opened the register and shut the door, offering to go for a shawl,
and asking where she had taken such a cold.
“It’s only a slight chill—it will soon pass off,” she said, and as Mrs.
Sheldon was just then called from the room, Will drew his chair a little
nearer to Marian and continued:
“This Raymond affair must be irksome to you, who know nothing about it.”
“Oh, no,” said Marian faintly. “I am greatly interested, particularly in
the girl-wife. Can’t he find her? Seems as though he might. Perhaps
though, he don’t really care.”
“Yes, he does,” interrupted Will. “He disliked her once, but I believe
he feels differently toward her now. His hobby in college was a handsome
wife, but he has learned that beauty alone is worthless, and he would
gladly take Marian back.”
“Red hair and all?” asked Marian, mischievously, and Will replied, “Yes,
I believe he’s even made up his mind to the red hair. I didn’t object to
it myself, and I once saw this girl.”
“Redstone Hall is a beautiful spot, I believe,” said Marian, briefly
stating that Ben had once been there in his travels, and had since met
Mr. Raymond in New York.
“Then you know the family,” said Will, in some surprise.
“I know _of_ them,” returned Marian, “for Ben was so much interested in
the blind girl that after his return he talked of little else.”
“You have never seen them youself, of course,” and taking this fact for
granted, Will proceeded to give her a most minute description of
Redstone Hall, of its master, and of herself as she was when he visited
Kentucky.
Frederic’s marriage was then touched upon. Will telling how angry his
chum used to be when he received a letter on the subject from his
father.
“We were studying law together,” he said, “and, as we were room-mates in
college, it was quite natural that we should confide in each other; so
he used to tell me of his father’s project, and almost _swear_ he
wouldn’t do it. I never was more astonished than when I heard he was to
be married in a few days. ‘It’s all over with me,’ he wrote, ‘I can’t
help it!’ and he signed himself ‘Your wretched Fred!’ But what are you
crying for, Miss Grey? You certainly are. What is the matter?”
“I am crying for her—for poor Marian Lindsey!” was the answer; and
Marian’s tears flowed faster.
Will Gordon was distressed at the sight of woman’s tears, but
particularly at the sight of Marian Grey’s, and he tried to console her
by saying he was sure Mr. Raymond would sometime find his wife, and they
all would be the happier for what they both had suffered. Involuntarily
he had touched the right chord, for, in listening to his predictions of
future good, which should come to Frederic Raymond’s wife, Marian Grey
ceased to weep, and when, ere his departure, Will asked her for some
music, she gave him one of those stirring pieces she always played when
her heart was running over with happy anticipations!
Will Gordon was older than Frederic Raymond, and an examination of the
family Bible would have shown him to be thirty. Quite a bachelor, his
sister Ellen said, and she marveled that he had lived thus long without
taking to himself a wife. But Will was very fastidious in his ideas of
females, and though he had traveled much, both in Europe and his own
country, he had never seen a face which could hold his fancy for a
moment, until the sunny blue eyes of Marian Grey shone upon him and
thawed the ice which had laid about his heart so many years. Even then
he did not quite understand the feeling, or know how it was that night
after night he found himself locked out at home, while morning after
morning his sister Ellen scolded him for staying out so late, wondering
what attraction he could find at Mary’s, when he knew as well as she
that he would never disgrace the Gordon family by marrying a
_governess_, and a peddler’s adopted sister, too! Will hardly thought he
should either. He didn’t quite know what ailed him, and in a letter
written to Frederic, who was now in Kentucky, he gave an analysis of his
feelings, after having first told him that Marian Grey was the adopted
sister of a Yankee peddler, who had once visited Redstone Hall, and who,
he was sure, Frederic would remember for his oddities.
“I wish you could see this girl,” he wrote, “I’d like to have your
opinion, for I know you are a _connoisseur_ in everything pertaining to
female charms, but I am sure you never in all your life saw anything
like Marian Grey. I never did, and I have seen the proudest court
beauties in Europe—but nobody like her. And yet it is not so much the
exceeding fairness of her complexion, or the perfect regularity of her
features, as it is the indescribably fascinating something which demands
your pity as well as your admiration. There is that about her mouth, and
in her smile, which seems to say that she has suffered as few have ever
done, and that from this suffering she has risen purified, beautified,
and if I may be allowed a term which my good mother would call wicked in
the extreme, _glorified_ as it were!
“Just picture to yourself a graceful, airy figure, five feet four inches
high—then clothe it in black, and adapt every article of dress exactly
to her form and style, then imagine a rose-bud face, which I cannot
describe, with the deepest, saddest, brightest, merriest, sunniest,
laughing blue eyes you ever saw. You see there is a slight contradiction
of words, but every one by turns will apply to her eyes of blue. Then
her hair—oh, Fred, words fail me here. It’s a mixture of
everything—brown, black, yellow, and red. Yes, red—I mean it, for it has
decidedly a reddish hue in the sunshine. By gas-light it is brown, and
by daylight a most beautiful chesnut or auburn—rippling all over her
head in glossy waves, and curling about her forehead and neck.
“Beautiful—beautiful Marian! Yes, I will call her Marian here on paper,
with no one to see it but you. ’Tis a sweet, feminine name, Fred;—the
name, too, of your lost wife. I told her that story the other night, and
she cried great tears, which looked like pearls upon her cheek.
“Do write soon, and give me your advice—though what I want of it is more
than I can tell. I only know that I feel strangely about the region of
my waistbands, and every time I see Miss Grey, I feel a heap worse, as
you folks say. She is of low origin, I know, and this would make a
difference with a man as proud as you, but I don’t care. Marian Grey has
bewitched me, I verily believe, until I am—I don’t know what.
“Do write, Fred, and tell me what I am, and what to do. But pray don’t
preface your letter with long-winded remarks about marrying my
equal—looking higher than a peddler’s sister, and all that nonsense, for
it will be lost on me. I never can get higher than Marian’s blue eyes
unless indeed I reached her hair, at which point I should certainly
yield, and go over to the enemy at once.”
This letter reached Frederic one rainy afternoon, when he had nothing to
do but to read it, laugh over it, reflect upon and answer it. Will
Gordon’s description of Marian Grey thrilled him with a strange feeling
of pleasure, imperceptibly sending his thoughts after another Marian,
and involuntarily he said, aloud, “If she had been like this picture
Will has drawn, I should not be here so lonely and desolate.”
Frederic Raymond was prouder far than Will Gordon, and his feelings at
first rebelled against his friend’s taking for a bride the sister of
unpolished, uneducated Ben. “But it is his own matter,” he said; “I see
plainly that he is in love, so I will write at once and tell him what is
the ‘trouble.’”
Accordingly he commenced a letter, in which after expressing his
happiness that his college friend had not persisted in shutting his eyes
to all female charms, he wrote:
“I should prefer your wife to be somewhat nearer your equal in point of
family, it is true, but your description of Marian Grey won my heart
entirely, and you have my consent to offer yourself at once. By so
doing, you will probably deprive Alice of her governess and me of a
pleasant companion, for I had made an arrangement with Ben to have Miss
Grey with us next year. But no matter for that. Woo and win her just the
same, and Heaven grant you a happier future than my past has been.
“‘Beautiful! beautiful Marian!’ you said, and without knowing why, my
heart responded to it. She is beautiful, I am sure, and your description
of her is just what I would like to apply to my own wife—my lost Marian!
You see I have withdrawn my allegiance from black haired dark eyed
maidens, and gone over to laughing blue eyes and auburn tresses.
“By the way, speaking of the dark eyed maidens reminds me that Agnes
Gibson’s husband is dead, and she is sole heiress of all his fortune,
except a legacy which he left to Miss Huntington, who lived in his
family at the time of his death. Poor old man! Rumor says he led a sorry
life with both of them, but at the last his young wife cajoled him into
making his will, and was really kind to him. She is at her father’s now,
and Miss Huntington is there also. I called upon them yesterday, and
have hardly recovered yet from the chilling reception I met with from
the latter.
“But pardon me, Will, for this digression, when I was to write of
nothing save Marian Grey. The name reminded me of my own wife, and that,
as a matter of course, suggested Isabel. Give my compliments to Miss
Grey, and tell her that, under the circumstances, I release her from her
engagement with myself, and that, if she is a sensible girl, as I
suppose she is, she will not keep you on your knees longer than
necessary. Let me hear of your success or failure, and, on no account,
forget to invite me to the wedding. It is possible I may be obliged to
come North on business, in the course of a few weeks, and, if so, I
shall certainly call on you for the sake of seeing this wonderful Marian
Grey.
“Yours truly,
“F. Raymond.”
CHAPTER XXI.
WILL’S WOOING.
The silver tea-set and damask cloth had been removed from Mrs. Gordon’s
supper-table. The heavy curtains of brocatelle were dropped before the
windows; a cheerful fire was burning in the grate, for Mrs. Gordon
eschewed both furnaces and stoves; the gas burned brightly in the
chandelier, casting a softened light throughout the room, and rendering
more distinct the gay flowers on the carpet. The lady-mother, a fair
type of a thrifty New England woman, had donned her spectacles, and from
a huge pile of socks was selecting those which needed a near
acquaintance with the needle, and lamenting over her son’s propensity at
wearing out his toes!
The son, meantime, half lay, half sat upon the sofa, listlessly drumming
with his fingers, and feeling glad that Ellen was not there, and
wondering how he should begin to tell his mother what he so much wished
her to know.
“I should suppose she might see it,” he thought—“might know how much I
am in love with Marian, for I used to be always talking about her, and
now I never mention her, it makes my heart thump so if I try to speak
her name. Nell will make a fuss, perhaps, for she thinks so much of
family: but Marian is family enough for me. Mary likes her, and I guess
mother does. I mean to ask her.”
“Mother?”
“What, William?” and the good lady ran her hand into a sock with a
shockingly large rent in the heel.
No woman can be very gracious with such an open prospect, and, as Will
saw the scowl on his mother’s face, he regretted that he had spoken at
this inauspicious moment.
“I’ll wait till she finds one not quite as dilapidated as that,” he
thought, and when the question was repeated, “What, William?” he
replied, “Is Nell coming home to-night?”
“I believe so. I wish she was here now to help me, for I shall never get
these mended. What makes you wear out your socks so fast?”
“I don’t know, I’m sure, unless it’s beating time to Miss Grey’s lively
music. Don’t she play like the mischief, though?”
Mrs. Gordon did not answer, and Will continued, “Let me help you mend. I
used to in college and in Europe, too, and if I never marry,”—here
Will’s voice trembled a little—“I shall need to know how. Thread me a
darning needle, won’t you?”
Mrs. Gordon laughingly compiled with his request, and the fashionable
Will Gordon was soon deep in the mysteries of sock-darning, an
accomplishment in which he had before had some experience. Very rapidly
his mother’s amiability increased, until at last he ventured to say,
“Let me see, how old am I?”
“Thirty, last August, just twenty years younger than I am.”
“Then, when you were at my age you had a boy ten years old. I wonder how
I should feel in a like predicament.”
“I’m afraid you’ll never know,” and Mrs. Gordon commenced on a fresh
sock.
“Mother, how would you to have me marry and settle down?” Will
continued, after a moment’s silence, and his mother replied, “Well
enough, provided I liked your wife.”
“You don’t suppose I’d marry one you didn’t like, I hope. Just look, can
you beat that?” and he held up what he fancied to be a neatly darned
sock, which, spite of its bungling appearance, received so much praise,
that he felt emboldened to proceed.
Taking Frederic’s letter from his pocket he passed it to his mother,
asking her to read it, and give him her opinion.
“You know I never can make out Mr. Raymond’s writing,” said Mrs. Gordon,
“so pray read it yourself.”
But this Will could not do, and he insisted until his mother took the
letter and began to read, while he forgot to darn, so intent was he upon
watching the expression of her face. At first it turned very red, then
white, and then the great drops of perspiration stood upon her forehead,
for she felt as every mother does, when they first learn that their only
boy is about yielding to another the love they have claimed so long.
“Have you spoken to Marian?” she asked, giving him back the letter, but
not resuming her work.
“No,” was his answer: and she continued, “Then I wouldn’t.”
“Why not?” he asked, in some alarm; and with a tremor in her voice, his
mother replied, “I’ve nothing against Marian, but we are so happy
together, and it would kill me to have you go away.”
“Is that all?” and in his delight Will ran the darning-needle under his
thumb nail; “I needn’t go away. I can bring her home, and you won’t have
to mend my socks any more. Those back chambers are seldom used, and—”
“Back chambers!” exclaimed Mrs. Gordon. “I guess if you bring a wife
here, you’ll occupy the parlor chamber and bedroom. I was going to
re-paper them in the Spring, and I think on the whole I’ll refurnish it
entirely, for you might sometimes have calls up there.”
“You charming woman,” cried Will, kissing his mother, whose consent he
understood to be fully won.
He knew she had always admired Miss Grey, but he expected more
opposition than this, and in his delight he would have gone to see
Marian at once, were it not that he had heard she was absent that
evening. For an hour or more he talked with his mother of his plans, and
when at last Ellen came in, she, too, was let into the secret. Of
course, she rebelled at first, for her family pride was very strong, and
the peddler Ben, was a serious objection. But when she saw how earnest
her brother was, and that her mother, too, had espoused his cause, she
condescended to say:
“I suppose you might do worse, though folks will wonder at your taste in
marrying Mary’s governess.”
“Let them wonder, then,” said Will. “They dare not slight my wife, you
know,” and then he drew a pleasing picture of the next Summer, when,
with his mother, Marian and Ellen, he would visit the White Mountains
and Montreal.
“Why not go to Europe?” suggested Ellen. “Mr. Sheldon talks of going in
August, and if you must marry this girl, you may as well go, too.”
“Well spoken for yourself, little puss,” returned Will; “but it’s a
grand idea, and I’ll make arrangements with Tom as soon as I have seen
Marian. Maybe she’ll refuse me,” and Will turned pale at the very idea.
“No danger,” was Ellen’s comment, while her mother thought the same, for
in her estimation no one in their right mind could refuse her noble boy.
It was a long night to Will, and the next day longer still, for joyful
hope and harrowing fears tormented his mind, and when at last it was
dark, and he had turned his face toward Mr. Sheldon’s, he half
determined to go back. But he didn’t, and with his usual easy, off-hand
manner, he entered his sister’s sitting-room. Though bound to secrecy,
Ellen had told the news to Mrs. Sheldon, who, of course, had told her
husband; and soon after Will’s arrival, the two found some excuse for
leaving him alone with Marian Grey.
Marian liked William Gordon very much—partly because he was Frederic’s
friend, and partly because she knew him to be a most affectionate
brother and dutiful son—two rare qualities in a traveled and fashionable
man. She was always pleased to see him, and she welcomed him now as
usual, without observing his evident embarrassment when at last they
were alone. There were no stockings to be darned, and he did not know
how to commence, until he remembered Frederic’s letter. It had helped
him with his mother—it might aid him now—and after fidgeting awhile in
his chair, he said:
“I heard from Mr. Raymond yesterday.”
“Indeed!” and Marian’s voice betrayed more interest than the word would
indicate.
“He wrote that you were engaged to him—”
“I engaged to Frederic Raymond!” and Marian started so suddenly that she
pulled her needle out from the worsted garment she was knitting.
“Engaged to teach, I mean,” returned Will. “I’ll show you what he wrote
when you pick up those stitches. What do you call that queer-shaped
thing?”
“A Sontag, or Hug-me-tight,” said Marian, while Will involuntarily
exclaimed, “Oh, I wish I could—see Fred, he’s such a good fellow,” he
hastened to add, as he saw Marian’s wondering glance.
But the beginning and end of the sentence were too far apart to belong
to each other, and there was a moment’s awkward silence, which was
broken at last by Marian, who, resolving to take no notice of the
strange speech, said:
“What did Mr. Raymond write of me?”
“I’ll show you just a little,” and Will pointed out the sentence
commencing with “Give my respects to Miss Grey,” etc.
The sight of the well-remembered handwriting affected Marian sensibly;
but when she came to the last part, and began to understand to what it
all was tending, her head grew dizzy and her brain whirled for a moment.
Then an intense pity for Will Gordon filled her soul, for looking upward
she met the glance of his eyes, and saw therein how much she was
beloved.
“No, no, Mr. Gordon!” she cried, putting her hands to her ears as he
began to say: “Dear Marian.” “You must not call me so; it is wicked for
you to do it—wicked for me to listen. I am not what I seem.”
And she burst into tears, weeping so bitterly that in his efforts to
soothe her, Will well nigh carried out the wish which had been finished
up with “seeing Frederic Raymond.”
Her not being what she seemed, he fancied might refer to something
connected with her birth, and he hastened to assure her that no
circumstance whatever could change his feelings, or prevent him from
wishing her to be his wife.
“Won’t you, Marian?” he said, holding her in his arm so she could not
escape. “I have never loved before. I always said I could not, until I
saw you; and then everything was changed. I have told my mother,
darling, and Ellen, too. They are ready to receive you, if you will go.
Look at me, and say you will come to my home, which will never again be
so bright to me without you. Won’t my darling answer me?” he continued,
while she sobbed so violently as to render speaking impossible. “I am
sorry if my words distressed you so,” he added, resting her head upon
his bosom, and fondly smoothing her hair.
“I am distressed for you,” Marian at last found voice to say. “Oh, Mr.
Gordon, I should be most wretched if I thought I had encouraged you in
this! But I have not, I am sure. I like you very, very much, but I
_cannot be your wife_!”
“Marian, are you in earnest?” And on Will Gordon’s manly face was a look
never seen there before.
He did not know until now how much he loved the beautiful young girl he
held so closely to his side. All the affections of his heart had
centered themselves, as it were, upon her, and he could not give her up.
She had been so kind to him—had welcomed him ever with her sweetest
smile—had seemed sorry at his departure—and was not this encouragement?
He had taken it as such, and ere she could reply to the question: “Are
you in earnest?” he added:
“I have thought, from your manner, that I was not indifferent to you,
else I had never told you of my love. Oh, Marian, if you desert me now,
I shall wish that I could die!”
Marian struggled until she released herself from his embrace, and,
standing before him, she replied:
“I never dreamed that you thought of me, save as a friend, and if I have
encouraged you, it was because—you reminded me of another. Oh, Mr.
Gordon, must I tell you that long before I came here, I had learned to
love some other man—hopelessly, it is true, for he does not care for me;
but that can make no difference. Had I never seen him—never known of
him—I might—I _would_ have been your wife, for I know that you are noble
and good; but ’tis too late—too late!”
He did not need to ask her now if she were in earnest; for, looking up
into her truthful, clear blue eyes, he knew there was no hope for him,
and bowing his head upon the arm of the sofa, he groaned aloud, while
the heaving of his chest showed how much he suffered, and how manfully
he strove to keep his feelings down. Mournfully Marian gazed upon him,
wishing she had never come there, if by coming she had brought this hour
of anguish to him. Half timidly she laid her hand upon his head, for she
wished to comfort him; and, as he felt the touch of her fingers, he
started, while an expression of joy lighted up his face, only to pass
away again as he saw the same unloving look in her eye.
“If I could comfort you,” she said, “I would gladly do it; but I cannot.
You will forget me in time, Mr. Gordon, and be as happy as you were
before you knew me.”
He shook his head despairingly. “No one could forget you; and the man
who stands between us must be a monster not to requite your love. Who is
he, Marian? or is it not for me to know?”
“I would rather you should not—it can do no good,” was Marian’s reply;
and then Will Gordon pleaded with her to think again ere she told him so
decidedly no. She might outlive that other love. She ought to,
certainly, if ’twere a hopeless one; and if she only gave him half a
heart, he would be content until he won the whole. They would go to
Europe in Autumn; and beneath the sunny skies of Italy she would learn
to love him, he knew. “Won’t you, Marian?” and in the tone of his voice
there was a word of eager, fearful, yearning love.
“I can’t—I can’t; it is utterly impossible!” was the decided answer;
and, without another word, Will Gordon rose and passed, with a breaking
heart, from the room he had entered so full of hope and pleasing
anticipations.
The fire burned just as brightly in the grate at home as it had done the
night before; the gas-light fell as softly on the roses in the carpet,
and on his mother’s face there was a placid, expectant look, as he came
in. But it quickly vanished when she saw how he pale he was, and how he
crouched down into his easy chair, as if he fain would hide from every
one the pain gnawing at his heart. There had never been a secret between
Mrs. Gordon and her son, for in some respects the man of thirty was as
much a child as ever; and when his mother, coming to his side, parted
the damp hair from his forehead, and looked into his eyes, saying:
“What is it, William? Has Marian Grey refused my boy?” he told her all.
How Marian Grey had given her love to another, and that henceforth the
world to him would be a dreary blank.
It was, indeed, a terrible disappointment, and as the days wore on, it
told fearfully upon William’s health, until at last the mother sought an
interview with Marian Grey, beseeching her to think again.
“You can be happy with William,” she said, “and I had prepared myself to
love you as a daughter. Do, I beseech of you, give me some hope to carry
back to my poor boy?”
“I cannot—I cannot!”
And, laying her head in the motherly lap of Mrs. Gordon, Marian wept
bitterly—half tempted, more than once, to tell her the whole truth.
But this she did not do, and she wept on, while Mrs. Gordon’s tears kept
company with her own.
“Don’t you like my William?” she asked, unconsciously playing with the
bright hair resting on her lap.
“Yes—very, very much; but I loved another first.” And this was all the
satisfaction Marian could give.
Mrs. Sheldon next tried her powers of persuasion, pleading for herself
quite as much as for her brother, for she loved the young girl dearly,
and would gladly have called her sister. But naught which she could say
had the least effect, and _Ellen_ determined to see what she could do.
She had been very indignant at first, to think a poor teacher should
refuse her brother, and something of this spirit manifested itself
during her interview with Marian.
“I am astonished at you,” she said; “for, though we have ever treated
you as our equal, you must know that in point of family you are not, and
my brother has done what few young men in his standing would have done.
Why, there never was a gentleman in Springfield whom the girls accounted
a better match than William, unless it were Mr. Raymond from Kentucky,
and they only gave him the preference because he lives South, and
possibly has a wife somewhere. So they could not get him, if they wished
to. Now, if you were in love with _him_, and he were not already
married, I should not think so strangely of your conduct, for he may be
Will’s superior in some respects; but I cannot conceive of your refusing
him for any common man such as would be likely to address you.”
Marian did not think it necessary to reply in substance to this long
speech, neither did she, by word or look, resent Ellen’s overbearing
manner; but she answered, as she always did:
“I would marry your brother, if I could; but I cannot.”
“Then I trust you will have a pleasant time teaching all your days,”
said Ellen, as she slammed the door behind her, and went to report her
success.
All this trouble and excitement wore upon Marian, and after a time she
became too ill to leave her room, where she kept her bed, sometimes
fancying it all a dream—sometimes resolving to tell the people who she
was, and always weeping over the grief she had brought to William
Gordon, who, during her illness, showed how noble and good he was by
caring for her as tenderly as if she had indeed been his promised bride.
He did not see her, but he made his presence felt in a thousand
different ways, and when they told him how her tears would drop upon the
fresh bouquets he sent her from the green-house every morning, he would
turn away to keep his own from falling.
One night, toward the last of March, as he sat with his mother in the
same room where he first told her of his love for Marian Grey, the door
bell rang, and a moment after, to his great surprise, Frederic Raymond
walked into the room. William had forgotten what his friend had said
about the possibility of his coming north earlier than usual, and he was
so much astonished that for some moments he did not appear like himself.
“You know I wrote that business might bring me to Albany,” said
Frederic, “and that if I came so far I should visit you.”
“Oh, yes, I remember now,” returned William, the color mounting to his
forehead as he recalled the nature of the last letter written to
Frederic, who, from his manner, guessed that something was wrong, and
forbore questioning him until they retired to their room for the night.
“Fred,” said William, after they had talked awhile on indifferent
subjects, “Fred,” and Will’s feet went up into a chair, for even a man
who has been refused feels better, and can tell it better, with his
heels a little elevated, “Fred, it’s all over with me, and it makes no
difference now whether the sun rises in the east or in the west.”
“I suspected as much,” returned Frederic, “from your failing to write
and from the length of your face. What is the matter? You didn’t coax
hard enough, I reckon, and I shall have to undertake it for you. How
would you like that? I dare say I should be more successful,” and
Frederic’s smile was much like the Frederic of other days, when he and
Will were college friends together.
“I said everything a man could say, but the chief difficulty is that she
_don’t_ love _me_ and _does_ love another,” returned Will, at the same
time repeating to his companion as much of his experience as he thought
proper.
“A discouraging beginning, I confess,” said Frederic; “but perhaps she
will relent.”
“No she won’t,” returned Will; “she is just as decided now as she was
that night. I have exhausted all my persuasion; mother has coaxed, so
has Mary, so has Nell, and all to no purpose. Marian Grey can never be
my wife. If it were not for this other love, though, I would not give it
up.”
“Who is the favored one?” Frederic asked, and his friend replied, “Some
rascal, I dare say, for she says it is a hopeless attachment on her
part, and that makes it all the worse. Now if I knew the man was worthy
of her, I should not feel so badly. If it were _you_, for instance, or
somebody like you, I’d try to be satisfied, knowing she was quite as
well off as she would be with me,” and Will’s feet went up to the top of
the chair as he thought how magnanimous he would be were it Frederic
Raymond who was beloved by Marian Grey.
“I am sorry for you,” said Frederic—“sorry that you, too, must walk
under a cloud, as I am doing. We little thought, when we were boys, that
we should both be called to bear a heavy burden; but thus has it proved.
Mine came sooner than yours, and it seems to me ’tis the hardest of the
two to bear.”
“Fred, you don’t know what you are saying. Your grief cannot be as great
as mine, for I _love_ Marian Grey as man never loved before, and when
she told me ‘No,’ and I knew she meant it, I felt as if she were tearing
out my very heartstrings. _You_ acknowledge that you never loved your
wife; but you married her for—I don’t know _what_ you married for——
“_For_ MONEY!” And the word dropped slowly from Frederic’s lips.
“_For money?_” repeated Will. “She had no money—this Marian Lindsey. She
was a poor orphan, I always thought. Will you tell me what you mean?”
“I have never told a living being why I made that girl my wife,” said
Frederic; “but I can trust you, I know, and I have sometimes thought I
might feel better if some one shared my secret. Still, I would rather
not explain to you _how_ Marian was the heiress of Redstone Hall, for
that concerns the dead; but heiress she was, not only of all that, but
of all the lands and houses said to belong to the Raymond estate in
Kentucky; not a cent of it was mine; and, rather than give it up, I
married her without one particle of love—married her, too, when she did
not know of her fortune, but supposed herself dependent upon me.”
“Oh, Frederic, did you thus wrong that girl? I never thought you capable
of such an act. I knew you did not love her, but the rest——. It hurts me
to think you did it, and that you still live on her money.”
“Hush, Will!” And Frederic bowed his head for very shame. “I deserve
your censure, I know, but if my sin was great—great has been my
punishment. Look at me, Will. I am not the lighthearted man you parted
with six years ago upon the college green; for, since that dreadful
night when I first knew poor Marian had fled, and thought she was in the
river, I have not had a single moment of perfect peace or freedom from
remorse. I have not spent more of her money either than I could help.
Bad as I am, I shrink from that. Redstone Hall grew hateful to me—it was
haunted with so many bitter memories of her, and was, besides, the place
where I sinned against her a second time by daring to think of
another—of Isabel. You remember her?”
“Fred Raymond!” and in his indignation, Will’s feet came down from the
top of the chair, “you did not aggravate your guilt by talking of love
to _her_?”
“No, no,” groaned Frederic, “I did not, though Heaven only knows the
fierce struggle it cost me to see her there every day, and know I must
not say one word to her of love. I left Redstone Hall at last, as you
know. Left it because it was Marian’s and Riverside was my father’s,
before Marian came to us; so it did not seem quite so much like spending
her money, for I did try to be a man and earn my own living. They did
not get on well without me in Kentucky. They needed me there a part of
the time, at least; and when, at last, I began to feel differently
toward Marian, I felt less delicacy about her fortune, and I have spent
my winters at Redstone Hall, where the negroes and the neighbors around
all suppose Marian dead, for I have never told them that she was with me
in New York. Isabel knows it, but for some reason she has kept it to
herself; and I am glad, for I would rather people should not talk of it
until she is really found. I have sought for her so long and
unsuccessfully that I’m growing discouraged now.”
“If you knew that she was dead, would you marry Isabel?” asked Will; and
Frederic replied,
“Never!”
Then, in a reverent tone, as if speaking of one above him in purity and
innocence, he told how the little blind girl had stood between him and
temptation, holding up his hands when they were weakest, and keeping his
feet from falling. “But that desire is over. I can look Isabel
Huntington calm in the face and experience no sensation, save that of
relief, to think I have escaped her. With the legacy left her by Mr.
Rivers, and the little means her mother had, she has bought a small
house near Riverside; so I shall have them for neighbors every Summer.
But I do not care. I have no love now for Isabel. It all died out when I
was sick, and centered itself upon that little sweet-faced girl, who, I
know, was Marian, though I cannot find her. If I could, Will, I’d
willingly part with every cent of money I call mine, and work for my
daily bread. Labor would not seem a hardship, if I knew that when my
toil was done, there was a darling wife waiting for me at home—a wife
like what I hope my Marian is, and like what your Marian Grey may be.”
“Not mine, Frederic. There is in all the world no Marian for me,” said
Will.
“Nor for me, perhaps,” was the sad response, and in the dim firelight,
the two mournful faces looked wistfully at each other, as if asking the
sympathy neither had to give.
And there they sat until the clock in the room below, struck the hour of
midnight. Two weary heart-broken men, in the pride of their early
manhood, sat talking each to the other, one of “_My_ Marian,” and one of
“Mine;” but never, never dreaming that the beautiful Marian Grey, so
much beloved by William Gordon, was the lost Marian so greatly mourned
by Frederic Raymond.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE BIRTHDAY.
Mrs. Gordon’s breakfast bell rang several times next morning ere the
young men made their appearance, for, as a natural consequence, the late
hours of the previous night had been followed by protracted slumbers. As
they were making their hasty toilet, Frederic said to Will:
“This is Marian’s twentieth birthday.”
“Is it possible?” returned Will. “It seems but yesterday since I saw
her, a little girl in pantalets, with long curls streaming down her
back. I liked her very much, she seemed so kind, so considerate of every
one’s comfort; and I remember telling you once that she would be a
handsome woman, while you said—‘Never, with that hair!’”
“Neither can she,” rejoined Frederic. “She may be rather pretty. Yes, I
am sure she is pretty, for the face which bent over my pillow was not an
ugly one; but I still insist that a woman with red hair cannot be
handsome.”
“Tastes differ,” returned Will. “Now, I’ll venture to say Miss Grey’s
hair was red when she was a child. It is not very far from it now, in
the sunlight; and everybody speaks of her hair as her crowning beauty.”
“I wish I could see her,” said Frederic; “for, as she will not be your
wife, I suppose she will be Alice’s governess. And it is quite proper
that I should have an interview with her, and talk the matter over. Will
you call with me this evening?”
“Certainly,” returned Will; “for, though it will afford me more pain
than pleasure to meet her, I will not be so foolish as to avoid her.”
Breakfast being over, the young men started for a walk down town, going
by Mrs. Sheldon’s house, of course, although it was entirely out of
their way. But neither thought of this, and they passed it on the
opposite side of the street; so that Will could, unobserved, point out
Marian’s room to Frederic.
“That’s it,” he said—“the one with the blinds thrown open. There she has
often sat, I suppose, thinking of the villain who stands between me and
happiness. The rascal! I tell you, Fred, I wish I had him as near to me
as you are!” and Will Gordon fancied how, in such a case, he would treat
a man who did not love Marian Grey!
Frederic made no answer, for his eyes were fixed intently upon the
window, hoping to catch a glimpse of one who was fast becoming an object
of interest even to him. But he looked in vain, for Marian had not yet
risen. Pale, weary and weak, she reclined among her pillows, her fair
hair falling about her face in beautiful disorder, and her eyes turned
also toward the window, not because she knew that Frederic was looking
in that direction, but because the morning sun was shining there, and
she was watching it as it danced upon the curtain of bright crimson.
“I have seen the suns of twenty years,” she thought, “and I am growing
old so fast. I wonder if Frederic would know me now.”
At this moment, Mrs. Sheldon came in, and advancing toward the window,
looked down into the street. Catching a view of her brother and his
friend, she exclaimed:
“Frederic Raymond! I wonder when he came?”
“What? Where? Who is it?” Marian asked, quickly, at the same time
raising herself upon her elbow, and looking wistfully in the direction
Frederic had gone.
“Mr. Raymond, Will’s friend, from Kentucky,” returned Mrs. Sheldon. “He
must have come last night?” and as little Fred just then called to her
from without, she left the room.
When she was alone, Marian buried her face in the bed-clothes, and
murmured:
“Oh, if I could only see him! I long so to test his powers of
recognition, and see if he would know me.”
She almost hoped he would, and claim her for his wife, as this, she
fancied, might cure Will Gordon sooner than aught else which could be
done. She was sure they would talk of her, for Frederic had bidden Will
propose, and he would naturally ask the result of that proposal. Will
would say she had refused him because she loved another, and would not
something whisper to her husband that “the other” was himself—that
Marian Grey was his Marian—the Marian of Redstone Hall—and he would come
to her that very day, perhaps, and all the morning she waited anxiously
for a step she was certain she would know, though it might not be as
elastic and bounding as of old, ere she had trammeled it with a heavy
weight. She listened nervously for its full, rich tones, asking for her,
in the parlor below. But she listened in vain and the restless
excitement brought on a severe headache, which rendered it impossible
for her to leave the room, even if he came. This Mrs. Sheldon greatly
lamented, for she had invited the young men to tea, and while accepting
her invitation, Will had asked if Miss Grey would not be able to spend a
part of the evening with them.
“She is to be Fred’s governess, you know,” he said, “and he naturally
wishes to make her acquaintance.”
This request Mrs. Sheldon made known to Marian, who asked, eagerly, if
“to-morrow would not do as well?”
“It might,” returned Mrs. Sheldon, “were it not that he leaves on the
early train.”
Marian sighed deeply, and turning upon her pillow tried to sleep, hoping
thus to lose the throbbing pain in her head—but it would not be lost;
and when, as it was growing dark, she heard the sound of feet upon the
gravelled walk, and knew whose feet they were, it ached as it had not
done before during the entire day. She heard them as they entered the
lower hall, and fancied she saw Frederic place his hat and shawl upon
the stand, and pass his fingers through his hair ere he entered the
parlor, which was directly beneath her room. She knew when he was there,
for she heard his well-remembered voice speaking to the children, and
covering her face with her hands she wept aloud to think she should not
see him.
Meantime, in the parlor below, little Fred had climbed into his uncle’s
lap and commenced a rather embarrassing conversation. Somehow Will
reminded him of Marian, for the two were associated together in his
mind; and he said, rather as a piece of news: “Miss Day is sick—up
stairs she is; and when I told her you was comin’ she _vomucked_ and
cried so hard!”
Frederic could not help laughing, and, emboldened by this proof of
appreciation, the child continued: “What made her cry, Uncle Will? I
asked her didn’t she want you to come, and she say yes. Don’t she like
you?”
“I guess not,” said Will, trying himself to laugh, while Frederic,
pitying his embarrassment, strove to divert the little fellow’s mind by
asking about the sled he saw upon the steps as he came in.
This had the desired effect, for a sled was of more consequence to Fred
than Miss Grey’s tears, and he prattled on about it until his nurse came
to take him from the room. After he was gone Mr. Raymond spoke of Miss
Grey, asking if he should not have the pleasure of seeing her.
“She is suffering from a nervous headache,” returned Mrs. Sheldon, “and
cannot come down, for which I am very sorry, as I wish you to hear her
play.”
“I do not care so much for that,” returned Frederic, “as for seeing her,
so as to carry back a good account to Alice. Do tell me, Mrs. Sheldon,
is she really as beautiful, and fascinating, and accomplished as report
would make her out to be?”
“I should say she would fully warrant any praise you may have heard of
her,” returned Mrs. Sheldon, “although her beauty is not of the
brilliant style. She is very modest and gentle in her appearance, and
there is in her eyes and in her smile something so very sad and
plaintive, that I often feel like crying when I look at her, for I know
she must have suffered some great trouble, young as she is.”
Involuntarily Frederic and William glanced at each other, for they knew
what that trouble was, and the latter felt as if he would like to take
vengeance on the man who could be indifferent to love like that of
Marian Grey!
After a moment, Mrs. Sheldon continued:
“There has been something said, I believe, about her going to you next
September, but I warn you now that I shall use every possible effort to
keep her. We sail for Europe in August, you know, and she will be of
invaluable service to me then, as she speaks French and German so
readily. The tour, too, will do her good, and you must not be surprised
to hear that she cannot come to Riverside.”
Mr. Raymond was too polite to oppose Mrs. Sheldon openly, but he had
become too deeply interested in Marian Grey to give her up without a
struggle, and when alone again with Will, in the chamber of the latter,
he broached the subject, asking his companion if he thought there was
any probability of Miss Grey’s disappointing him.
“I mean to write her a note,” he said, and sitting down by Will’s
writing desk he took up a sheet of gilt edged paper and commenced, “My
dear Marian.”
“Pshaw!” he exclaimed, “what am I thinking about?” and tearing up the
sheet he threw it into the grate and commenced again, addressing her
this time as “Miss Grey.”
He considered her services engaged to himself, he said, and should
expect her at Riverside early in September. She could come sooner if she
liked, for Mrs. Jones was to leave the first of August.
“That European trip may tempt her,” he thought, and he added, “I am glad
to learn from Mrs. Sheldon that you are such a proficient in German and
French, for I have serious thoughts of visiting the Old World myself ere
long, and as Alice, of course, will go with me, we shall prize your
company all the more on account of these accomplishments.”
This note he gave to Will, who said, “Perhaps I shall try again, and if
I succeed, I suppose you will give her up to me.”
“Yes,” answered Frederic, “I’ll give way for Will Gordon’s wife, but for
no one else,” and there the conversation ceased concerning Marian Grey;
nor was it resumed again, for early the next morning he started for New
York, as he intended stopping at Riverside ere he returned to Kentucky.
True to his trust, Will gave the note to Marian the first time that he
met her, after she was well enough to come down stairs as usual.
“It is from Mr. Raymond,” he said, and Marian’s face was scarlet as she
took it and looked into his eye with an eager, searching glance, to see
if he knew her secret.
But he did not, and with spirits which began to ebb, she broke the seal
and read the few brief lines, half smiling as she thought how very
formal and businesslike they were. But it was Frederic’s handwriting,
and when sure Will did not see her she pressed it to her lips.
“What you do that for?” asked little Fred whose sharp eyes saw
everything not intended for them to see.
“Sh—sh,” said Marian; but the child persisted. “Say, what you _tiss_
that letter for?”
Will Gordon was standing with his back to her, but, at this strange
question, he turned quickly and fastened his eyes on Marian’s face, as
if he would fathom her inmost soul.
“There’s something there,” she said, passing the note again over her
lips as if she would brush the “something” away.
This explanation was wholly satisfactory to Fred, who, with childish
simplicity, asked, “Did you get it?”
But Will was not quite certain, and for several days he puzzled his
brain with wondering whether “Marian Grey really did kiss Frederic
Raymond’s note or not.” If so, why did she? She could not be in love
with a man she had never seen. She was not weak enough for that, and at
last rejecting it as an impossibility and accepting the troublesome
“something” as a reality, his mind became at rest upon that subject.
CHAPTER XXIII.
MARIAN RAYMOND.
Very rapidly the Spring passed away, enlivened once by a short visit
from Ben, who, having purchased an entire new suit of clothes for the
occasion, looked and appeared unusually well, talking but little until
he was alone with Marian, when his tongue was loosed, and he told her
all he had come to tell.
He had been to Riverside, he said, and Mrs. Russell, who was still there
and was to be the future housekeeper, was very gracious to him, on
account of his being the adopted brother of their next governess, Miss
Grey.
“She showed me your chamber,” said he, “and it’s the very one they fixed
up so nice for Isabel. Nobody has ever used it, for Miss Jones slep’ in
a little room at the end of the hall. Frederic has had a door cut from
Alice’s chamber into yourn, ’cause he said how’t you and she would want
to be near to each other, he knew. And I’ll tell you what, when you git
there, it seems to me you’ll be as nigh Heaven as you’ll ever git in
this world. Mrs. Huntington has bought a little cottage close by
Frederic’s,” he continued, “and she’s livin’ there with Isabel, who has
got to be an heir——”
“An heiress!” repeated Marian. “Whose, pray?”
“Don’t know,” returned Ben, “only that old man she went to Florida with
is dead, and he willed her some. I don’t know how much, but law she’ll
spend it in no time. Mrs. Russell said her lace curtains cost an awful
sight, though she b’lieved they was bought second-hand, in New York. I
walked by there afoot to see ’em, and between you and me they are
yallerer than saffern. My advice to her is that she bile ’em up in ashes
and water, jest as mother used to bile up my shirts that I wore in the
factory. It’ll whiten ’em quickest of anything, and if I’s you I’d
kinder tell her so—friendly like, you know—’cause it don’t look well for
decent folks to have such dirty things a hangin’ to their winders!”
Marian smiled at Ben’s simplicity, telling him that “the chief value of
the curtains consisted probably in their soiled, yellow appearance.”
“Whew,” whistled Ben, “I wish mother’d had a little more larnin’, for if
she’d known it was genteel to be dirty, mabby she wouldn’t have broke
her back a scrubbin’, when there warn’t no use on’t.”
Isabel’s curtains having been discussed at length, and herself described
as Ben saw her “struttin’ through the streets,” he arose to go, telling
Marian he should not probably see her again until he visited her in the
Autumn at Riverside.
“I guess I wouldn’t let it all out at once,” said he, “but wait and let
Frederic sweat. It’ll do him good, and he isn’t paid yet for all he’s
made you suffer. I ain’t no Universaler, but I do like to see folks
catch it as they go ’long.”
Once Marian thought to tell him of William Gordon’s unfortunate
attachment, particularly as he was loud in his praises of the young man;
but upon second reflections she decided to keep that matter to herself,
hoping that the subject would never be mentioned to her again. And in
this her wishes seemed to be realized, for as the weeks after Ben’s
departure went by, William began to be more like himself than he had
been before since her refusal of him. He came often to Mrs. Sheldon’s,
sang with her sometimes as of old, and she fancied he was losing his
love for her. But she was mistaken, for it was strengthening with each
hour’s interview. The very hopelessness of his passion rendered it more
intense, it would seem, until at last, unable longer to remain where she
was, and know she could never be his, he went from home, nor returned
again until near the middle of August, when he found Mrs. Sheldon’s
house in a state of great confusion. Furniture was being covered or
packed away, rooms shut up, and windows fastened down, while his sister
was in that state of feminine bliss when every chair is filled with new
dresses, save two, and those two are occupied by the makers of said
dresses.
Mr. and Mrs. Sheldon were going to Europe. They would sail in about two
weeks, and as Marian had positively declined to accompany them, they had
engaged another governess, who was to meet them in New York. It was
decided that Marian should remain a few days with Mrs. Gordon, and then
go to Riverside, where her coming was anxiously expected both by
Frederic and Alice. This arrangement was highly satisfactory to Will,
who anticipated much happiness in having her wholly to himself for a
week. There would be no sister Ellen, with curious, prying eyes, for she
was going with Mrs. Sheldon as far as New York—no little girls always in
the way—no funny Fred, to see and tell of everything—nobody, in short,
but his good mother, who he knew would often leave him alone with
Marian.
During his absence from home he had thought much upon the subject, and
had resolved to make one more trial at least. She might be eventually
won, and if so, he should care but little for the efforts made to win
her. With this upon his mind, he felt rather relieved than otherwise
when the family at last were gone, and Marian was an inmate of his
mother’s house. Both Mr. and Mrs. Sheldon had urged him to accompany
them, and he had made arrangements to do so in case he found Marian
still firm in her refusal. They were intending to stop for a few days in
New York, and he could easily join them the day on which the ship was
advertised to sail. He should know his fate before that time, he
thought, and he strove in various ways to obtain an interview with
Marian, who, divining his intention, was unusually reserved in her
demeanor toward him, and if by chance she found herself with him alone,
she invariably formed some excuse to leave the room, so that Will began
at last to lose all hope, and to think seriously of joining his sister
as the surest means of forgetting Marian Grey.
“She does not care for me,” he said to his mother, one night after
Marian had retired. “I believe she rather dislikes me than otherwise. I
think on the whole I shall go, and if so, I must start in the morning,
for the vessel sails to-morrow night.”
To this his mother made no objection, for though she would be very
lonely without him, she was accustomed to rely upon herself, so she
rather encouraged him than otherwise, thinking it would do him good.
Accordingly, next morning, when Marian came down to breakfast, she was
surprised to hear of Will’s intended departure.
“Oh, I am sorry,” she said, involuntarily, for Will Gordon had a strong
place in her affections, and knew not what danger might befall him on
the deep.
Breakfast being over, there remained to Will but half an hour, and as a
part of this was necessarily spent with the servants, and in
preparations for his journey, he had at the last but a few moments in
which to say his farewell words to Marian. She was in the back parlor,
his mother said, and there he found her weeping, for she felt that her
friends were leaving her one by one, and though in a few days she was
going back to her husband and her home, she knew not what the result
would be. Will’s sudden determination to visit Europe affected her
unpleasantly, for she felt that she was in some way connected with it,
and she was conscious of a feeling of loneliness, such as she had not
experienced before since she first came to Mrs. Sheldon’s.
“Are you weeping?” said Will, when he saw her with her head bowed down
upon the arm of the sofa.
Marian did not answer, and with newly awakened hope Will drew nearer and
seated himself beside her. “It might be that he was mistaken, after
all,” he thought. “Her tears would seem to indicate as much. Girls were
strange beings, everybody said,” and passing his arm around the weeping
Marian, he whispered: “Do you like me, then?”
“Yes, very, very much,” she answered, “and now that you are going away,
and I may never see you again, I am so sorry I ever caused you a
moment’s pain.”
“I needn’t go, Marian,” William said, drawing her close to him. “I will
stay, oh, so gladly, if you bid me do so. But it must be for _you_.
Shall I, Marian? May I stay?” and again Will Gordon poured into her ear
deep burning words of love—entreating her to be his wife—to forget that
other love so unworthy of her, and to give herself to him, who would
cherish her so tenderly. Then he told her how the thought that she did
not love him had made him go away, when he would so much rather remain
where she was, if he could know she wished it. “Answer me, Marian,” he
said, “for time hastens, and if you tell me no again, I must be gone.
Never man loved and, worshipped his wife as I will love and worship you.
Speak and tell me yes.”
Will paused for her reply, and looking into her face, which she had
turned towards him, he thought he read a confirmation of his hopes, but
the first words she uttered wrung his heart with cruel disappointment.
“I cannot be your wife,” she said. “I mean it, Mr. Gordon, I cannot, and
oh, it would be wicked not to tell you. Can I trust you? Will you keep
my secret safe, as I have kept it almost six long years?”
There was some insufferable barrier between them, and William Gordon
felt it, as trembling in every limb, he answered, “Whatever you intrust
to me shall not be betrayed.”
“Then, listen,” she said, “and say if you will bid me marry you. I told
you I was not what I seemed, and I am not. People, perhaps, call me
young, but to myself I seem old, I have suffered so much and all my
womanhood has been wasted, as it were, in tears. I told you once that
before coming here I had given to another the love for which you sued,
and I told you truly; but Mr. Gordon, there was more to tell; that other
one, who loves me not, or who, if he does, has never manifested it to me
by word or deed, is _my own husband_!”
“Oh, Marian, Marian, this indeed is death itself!” groaned Will, for
though he had said there was no hope, it seemed to him now that he had
never believed or realized it, as when he heard the dreadful words, “my
own husband.”
“Do not despise me for deceiving you,” Marian continued. “If I had
thought you could have seen aught to desire in me, a poor, humble girl,
I might, perhaps, have warned you in time, though how could I tell you,
a stranger, that I was an unloved wife?”
“Where is he—that man?” Will asked, for he could not say “your husband,”
and his lip quivered with something akin to the pain one feels when he
hears the cold earth rattling into the grave where he has buried his
fondest pride.
Marian’s confession was a death-blow to all Will had dared to hope, and
he asked for the husband more as a matter of form than because he really
cared to know.
“Mr. Gordon,” said Marian, rising to her feet, and standing with her
face turned fully toward him, “_Must_ I tell you more? I thought I
needed only to speak of a _husband_ and you would guess the rest. Don’t
you know me? Have we never met before?”
Wistfully, anxiously William gazed at her, scanning her features one by
one, while a dim vision of something back in the past floated before
him, but assumed no tangible form, and shaking his head, he answered:
“Never, to my knowledge.”
“Look again. Is not my face a familiar one? Did you never see it before?
Not here—not in New England—but far away, where the Summer comes earlier
and the Winter is not so long. Is there not something about me—something
in my person, or my voice, which carries you back to an old house on the
river where you once met a little curly-haired girl?”
She did not need to say more. Little by little it had come to him, and,
starting to his feet, he caught her hand, exclaiming, “Great Heaven!
_The lost wife of Frederic Raymond!_”
“Yes,” she answered, “the lost Marian of Redstone Hall,” and leaning her
head upon his arm, she burst into tears, for he seemed to her like a
brother now, while she to him—
He could not think of her as a sister yet—he loved her too well for
that; but still his feelings toward her had changed in the great shock
with which he recognized her. She could never be his Marian, he knew,
neither did he desire it. And for a moment he stood speechless, wholly
overwhelmed with astonishment and wonder. Then he said, “Marian Raymond,
why are you here?”
“Why?” she repeated bitterly. “You may well ask why. Hated by him who
should care for me, what could I do but go away into the unknown world,
and throw myself upon its charities, which in my case have not been cold
or selfish. God bless the noble-hearted Ben, and the sainted woman, his
mother, who did not cast me off when I went to them, homeless,
friendless, and heart-broken.”
In her excitement, Marian clasped her hands together, and the blue of
her eye grew deeper, darker, as she paid this tribute of gratitude to
those who had been her friends indeed. Involuntarily, Will Gordon, too,
responded to the words, “God bless the noble-hearted Ben,” for, looking
at the beautiful girl before him, he felt that what she was she owed to
the self-denying, unwearied efforts of the uncultivated but generous
Ben.
“Marian,” he said again, “you must go home. Go to your husband. He is
waiting for you. He has sought for you long; he has expiated his sin.
Go, Marian, go——”
“I am going,” she answered, “and if I only knew he wanted me—wanted his
wife——”
“He does want you,” interrupted Will. “He has told me so many a time.”
Marian was about to reply, when Mrs. Gordon appeared, warning her son
that the carriage was at the door; and with a hurried farewell to Marian
and his mother, Will hastened off, whispering to the former, “I shall
write to you when on the sea—”
“And keep my secret safe. I would rather divulge it myself,” she added.
He nodded in the affirmative, and was soon on his way to the depot, so
bewildered with what he had heard, that he scarcely knew whether it were
reality or a dream. Gradually, however, it became clear to him, and he
remembered many things which confirmed the strange story he had heard.
Greatly he wished to write to Frederic, and tell him that Marian Grey
was his wife, but he would not break his promise, and he was wondering
how he could hasten the discovery, when, as the cars left the depot at
Hartford, a broad hand was laid upon his shoulder, and a voice which
sounded familiar, said, “Wall, captain, bein’ we’re so full, I guess
you’ll have to make room for me, or else I’ll have to set with that gal
whose hoops take up the hull concern.”
“Ben Butterworth,” Will exclaimed, turning his face toward the speaker,
who recognized him at once.
“Wall,” he began, as he took the seat Will readily shared with him, “I
didn’t ’spose ’twas you. How do you do, and how’s Marian? Has she gone
to Riverside yet?”
“No,” returned Will, and looking Ben directly in the face, he continued,
“How much of Miss Grey’s history do you know?”
“Mor’n I shall tell, I’ll bet. How much do you know?” and Ben set his
hat a little more on one side of his head.
“More than you suppose, perhaps,” returned Will. “And if you, too, are
posted, I’d like to talk the matter over, but if not, I shall betray no
secrets.”
“I swan, I b’lieve you do know,” said Ben. “Did she tell you?”
Will nodded, and Ben continued, “She wrote to me that you knew Mr.
Raymond, and liked him, too; I guess he ain’t a very bad chap after all,
is he?”
The ice was fairly broken now, and both Will and Ben settled themselves
for a long conversation. Will did not think it betrayed Marian’s
confidence to talk of her with one who understood her affairs so much
better than himself, and ere they reached New York, he had heard the
whole story—heard how Ben had stumbled upon her in New York, and taken
her to his home without knowing aught of her, except that she was
friendless and alone—how the mother, now resting in her grave, had cared
for the orphan girl, and how Ben, too, had done for her what he could.
“’Twan’t much anyway,” he said, “and I never minded it an atom, for
’twas a pleasure to arn money for her schoolin’.”
And Ben spoke truly, for it never occurred to him that he had denied
himself as few men would have done—toiling early and late, through
sunshine and storm, wearing the old coat long after it was threadbare,
and sometimes, when peddling, eating but two meals a day, by way of
saving for Marian. Of all this he did not speak to his companion. He did
not even think of it, or, if he did, he felt that he was more than paid
in seeing Marian what she was. Accidentally, he said that his name was
really Ben Burt, and that he should be glad when the time came for him
to be called thus again.
“When will that be?” asked Will, and Ben replied by unfolding to him his
long cherished plan of having Frederic make love to his own wife.
“You might write to him, I s’pose,” he said, “but that would spile all
my fun, and I’d rather let the thing work itself out. He’s bound to fall
in love with her. He can’t help it, and I don’t see how _you_ could.
Mabby you did.” And Ben’s grey eyes looked quizzically at his companion,
who colored deeply as he replied merely to the first part of Ben’s
remark. “I certainly will not interfere in the matter, though before
meeting you I was wondering how I could do so, and not betray Marian’s
confidence. I am sure now it will all come right at last, and you ought
to be permitted to bring it round in your own way, for you have been a
true friend to her, and I dare say she loves you as a brother.”
This was touching Ben on a tender point, for his old affection for
Marian was not quite dead yet, and Will’s last words brought back to him
memories of those dreary winter nights, when in his way he had battled
with the love he knew he must not cherish for Marian Grey. He fidgeted
in his seat, got up and looked under him, sat down again and looked out
of the window, and repeated to himself a part of the multiplication
table, by way of keeping from crying.
“Bless her, she’s an angel,” he managed at last to say, adding, as he,
met the inquiring glance of Will: “It’s my misfortin’ to be oncommon
tender-hearted, and when I git to thinkin’ of somethin’ that concerns
nobody but me, I can’t keep from cryin’ no way you can fix it,” and two
undeniable tears rolled down his cheeks and dropped from the end of his
nose.
“He, too,” sighed Will Gordon, and as he thought how much more the
uncouth man beside him had done for Marian Grey than either Frederic or
himself, and that he really had the greatest claim to her gratitude and
love, his heart warmed toward Yankee Ben as to a long tried friend, and
he resolved to leave for him a substantial token of his regard.
“Why don’t you settle down, as a grocer, in some small country town?” he
asked, as they came near the city.
“I have thought of that,” said Ben, “for I’m gettin’ kinder tired of
travelin’ now that there ain’t no home for me to go to once in so often.
I think I should like to be a grocery man first rate, and weigh out
saleratus and bar soap to the old wimmen. Wouldn’t they flock in,
though, to see me, I’m so odd! But ’taint no use to think on’t for I
hain’t the money now, though, mabby I shall have it bimeby. My expenses
ain’t as great as they was.”
By this time they had reached the depot, and Will, who knew they must
part there, said to him, “How long do you stay in New York?”
“Not long,” returned Ben, “I’ve only come to recruit my stock a little.”
“Go to the Post-Office before you leave,” was Will’s reply, as he
stepped from the platform and was lost in the crowd.
“What did he mean?” thought Ben. “Nobody writes to me but Marian, and I
ain’t expectin’ nothin’ from her, but I guess I may as well go.”
Accordingly, the next night, when Will Gordon, with little Fred in his
arms, was looking out upon the sea, Ben wended his way to the office,
inquiring first for Ben Butterworth and then for Ben Burt. There was a
letter for the latter, and it contained a draft for three hundred
dollars, together with the following lines:
“You and I have suffered alike, and in each of our hearts there is a
hidden grave. I saw it in the tears you shed when talking to me of
Marian Grey. Heaven bless you, Ben Burt, for all you have been to her.
She is one of the fairest, best, of God’s creation, but she was not
meant for you nor me; and we must learn to go our way without her. You
have done for her more, perhaps, than either Mr. Raymond or myself would
have done in the same circumstances, and thus far you are more worthy of
her esteem. You will please accept the inclosed as a token that I
appreciate your self-denying labors for Marian Grey. Use it for that
grocery we talked about, if you choose, or for any purpose you like. If
you have any delicacy just consider it a loan to be paid when you are a
richer man than I am. You cannot return it, of course, for when you
receive it I shall be gone.
“Yours, in haste, WILLIAM GORDON.”
This letter was a mystery to Ben, who read it again and again, dwelling
long upon the words, “You and I suffered alike, and in each of our
hearts there is a hidden grave.”
“That hits me exactly,” he said, “though I never thought of callin’ that
hole in my heart a grave—but ’taint nothin’ else, for I buried somethin’
in it, and the tender brotherly feelin’ I’ve felt for Marian ever since
was the grave stun I set up in memory of what had been. But what does he
know about it, though why shouldn’t he, for no mortal man can look in
Marian’s face and not feel kinder cold and hystericky-like at the pit of
his stomach! Yes, he’s in love with her, and that’s the way she came to
tell who she was. Poor Bill! poor Bill! I know how to pity him to a
dot,” and Ben heaved a deep sigh as he finished this long soliloquy.
The money next diverted his attention, but no puzzling on his part could
explain to him satisfactorily why it had been sent.
“S’posin’ he was grateful,” he said, “he needn’t give me three hundred
dollars for nothin’, but bein’ he has, I may as well use it to start in
business, though I shall pay it back, of course,” and when alone in his
room at the Hotel where he stopped, he wrote upon a bit of paper.
“NEW YORK, August 30 18—
“For vally rec. I promise to pay Bill Gordon, or bearer, the sum of
three hundred dollars with use from date.
“BENJAMIN BURT.”
This note he put carefully away in his old leathern wallet, where it was
as safe and as sure of being paid as if it had been in William Gordon’s
hands instead of his.
Meantime Marian at Mrs. Gordon’s was half regretting that she had told
her secret to William, and greatly lamenting that they had been
interrupted ere she knew just how much Frederic wished to find her. That
his feelings toward her had changed, she was sure, but she would know by
word and deed that he loved her ere she revealed herself to him, and the
dark mystery of that cruel letter must be explained before she could
respect him as she had once done. And now but a few days remained ere
she should see him face to face, for she was going to Riverside very
soon. Some acquaintance of hers were going west by way of New York, and
she decided to accompany them, though by so doing she would reach
Riverside one day earlier than she was expected.
“It would make no difference of course,” she said, and she waited
impatiently for the appointed morning.
It came at last and long before the hour for starting she was ready, the
dancing joy in her eyes, and her apparent eagerness to go being sadly at
variance with the expression of Mrs. Gordon’s face, for the good lady
loved the gentle girl and grieved to part with her.
“I am sorry to leave you,” Marian said, when the last moment came, “but
I am so glad I am going, too, sometime, perhaps, you may know why and
then you will not blame me.”
She could not shed a tear although she had become greatly attached to
her Springfield home, and her excitement continued unabated until she
reached New York, where they stopped for the night. There were several
hours of daylight left, and stealing away from her friends she took a
Third Avenue car and went up to their old house where strangers were
living now. She did not care to go in, for the dingy, uncurtained
windows looked far from inviting, and she passed slowly down the other
side of the street, musing upon all that had passed since the night when
she first climbed those narrow stairs, and asked a mother’s care from
Mrs. Burt. She did not think then that she would ever be as happy as she
was to-day with the uncertainty of meeting Frederic to-morrow. It seemed
a great while to wait, and as Ben had once numbered the weeks in seven
years, so she now counted the hours, which must elapse ere she felt the
pressure of Frederic’s hand—for he would shake hands with her of course,
and he would look into her face, for he had heard much of her both from
Will Gordon and Ben. Would he be disappointed? Would he think her
pretty? Would he know her? And Alice—what would she say? Marian dreaded
this test more than all the rest, for she felt that there was danger in
the instinct of the blind girl. Slowly she retraced her steps and
returning to the Astor, sought her own room, informing her friends that
she was weary and would rest.
“Five hours more,” was her first thought when she awoke next morning
from a sounder sleep than she had supposed it possible to enjoy when
under such excitement. Ere long it was four hours more, then three, then
two, then one, and then the cars stopped at the depot at Yonkers. Two
trunks marked “M. G.” stood upon the platform, and near them a figure in
black, bowing to her friends, who leaned from the car window, and
holding in her hands a satchel, a silk umbrella, two checks, her purse,
and a book, for Marian possessed the weakness of her sex, and in
traveling always carried the usual amount of baggage.
“To Riverside,” she said, when asked where she wished to go, and she
looked around as if half expecting a familiar face.
But she looked in vain, and in a few moments she was comfortably seated
in the lumbering stage, which once before had carried her up that long
hill. Eagerly she strained her eyes to catch the first view of the
house; and when at last it came in sight, she was too intent upon it to
observe the showily-dressed young lady tripping along upon the walk, and
holding her skirts with her thumb and finger so as to show her dainty
slipper.
But if Marian did not see Isabel, Isabel saw her. It was not usual for
the stage to come up at that hour of the day, and as it passed her by,
Isabel turned to see where it was going.
“To Riverside,” she exclaimed, as she saw it draw up to the gate. “It
must be the new governess,” and as there was no house very near, she
stopped to inspect the stranger as well as she could at that distance.
“Black,” she said, as Marian stepped upon the ground; “But I might have
known it, for regular built teachers always wear black, I believe. She
is rather tall, too. An umbrella, of course. I wonder she hasn’t her
blanket shawl and overshoes this hot day. Her bonnet is pretty, and that
hem in her veil very wide. On the whole, she’s quite genteel for a
governess,” and Isabel walked on while Marian went up the graveled walk,
expecting at each step to meet with either Frederic or Alice.
She would rather it should be the latter, for in case of recognition,
she knew she could bind the blind girl to secrecy for a time, but no one
appeared, and about the house there was no sign of life, save a parrot,
which, in its cage beneath a maple tree, screamed out wholly
unintelligible words. The door was shut, and even after the driver had
placed her trunks upon the piazza and gone, Marian stood there ringing
the bell. The window to her right was open, and she knew it was the
window of Frederic’s room, but he was not sitting near it, and after a
little she ventured to approach it and look in. It did not seem to have
been occupied at all that day, for everything was arranged in perfect
order as if broom and duster had recently done service there. Its prim,
neat appearance affected Marian unpleasantly, as if it were the
forerunner of some disappointment, and going back to the door she
resolutely pulled the silver knob. The loud, sharp ring made her heart
beat violently, and when she heard a heavy tread, not unlike a man’s
coming up the basement stairs, she thought, “What if it is Frederic
himself? What shall I say?”
“It is Frederic,” she continued, as the step came nearer, and she was
wishing she could run away and hide, when the door was opened by Mrs.
Russell, her feet encased in a pair of Mr. Raymond’s cast-off shoes,
which accounted for her heavy tread, and herself looking a little
crest-fallen at the sight of her visitor, whom she recognized at once.
“Miss Grey, I b’lieve?” she said, dropping a low curtsy. “We wan’t
expectin’ you till to-morrow; but walk in, and make yourself at home.
You’ll want to go to your room, I ’spose. Traveled all night, didn’t
you? You look pale, and I wouldn’t wonder if you wanted to sleep most of
the day. I never thought of such a thing as your comin’ this mornin’.
Dear me, what shall I do?”
This was said in an under-tone, but it caught the ear of Marian, who,
now that she had a chance to speak, asked for Mr. Raymond, timidly, as
if fearful that with his name her secret might slip out.
“Bless you!” returned Mrs. Russell, “both of ’em went to New York early
this morning, and won’t be home till dark, maybe, and that’s why I feel
so. I don’t know how to entertain you as they do, and Miss Alice has
been reckoning on giving you a good impression. I’m so sorry
you’ve—they’ve gone, I mean. I wan’t expecting to get any dinner to-day,
and was having such a nice time, sewin’ on my new dress;” and, with the
last, the whole cause of the old lady’s uneasiness was divulged.
In the absence of Frederic and Alice, she had counted upon a day of
leisure, which Marian’s arrival had seriously interrupted.
“I beg you not to trouble yourself for me,” said Marian, who readily
understood the matter. “I never care for a regular dinner: indeed, I may
not be hungry at all.”
The old lady’s face brightened perceptibly, and she replied:
“Oh, I don’t mind a cup of tea, and the like o’ that; but to brile or
stew this hot day ain’t so pleasant, when a person is fleshy, as I am.
I’ll get you something, though; and now you go up stairs to your room,
the one at the right hand, with the white furniture, and the silver
jigger, that lets the water into that marble dish. We live in style, I
tell you; and Mr. Raymond is a gentleman, if there ever was one—only he
wants meat three times a day, just as he has in Kentucky. Thinks, I
’spose, it don’t hurt me any more to sweat over the fire, than it does
that Dinah, Alice talks so much about. Yes, that’s the door—right
there;” and Mrs. Russell went back to the making of her dress, while
Marian sought her chamber, feeling rather disappointed at the absence of
both Frederic and Alice, whose object in visiting New York, that day,
will be explained in the succeeding chapter, and will necessarily take
us backward for a little in our story.
CHAPTER XXIV.
FREDERIC AND ALICE VISIT MARIAN’S OLD HOME.
“Frederic,” said Alice, about six weeks before Marian’s arrival at
Riverside, “who hired that Mrs. Merton to take care of you when you were
sick at the hotel?”
“The proprietor, I suppose,” returned Frederic.
Alice continued:
“But who told him of her?”
“I don’t know,” said Frederic. “She was from the country, I believe.”
“Yes, yes,” returned Alice; “but some person must have recommended her,
and if you can ascertain who that person was, you may find Mrs. Merton,
and learn something of Marian.”
“I wonder I never thought of that before,” said Frederic, adding, “that
if Alice had her sight he believed she would have discovered Marian ere
this.”
“I know I should,” was her answer; and after a little further
conversation, it was decided that Frederic should go to New York, and
learn, if possible, who first suggested Mrs. Merton as a nurse.
This was not so easy a matter as he had imagined it to be, for though
Frederic himself was well remembered at the hotel, where he was now a
frequent guest, scarcely any one could recall Mrs. Merton distinctly,
and no one seemed to know how she came there, until a servant, who had
been in the house a long time, spoke of Martha Gibbs, and then the
proprietor suddenly remembered that she had recommended Mrs. Merton as
being a friend of hers.
“But who is Martha Gibbs, and where is she now?” Frederic asked; and the
servant replied that
“Her home used to be in Woodstock, Conn.;” and with this item of
information Frederic wrote to her friends, inquiring where she was.
To this letter there came ere long an answer, saying that Mrs. John
Jennings lived in ——, a small town in the interior of Iowa. Accordingly
the next mail westward from Yonkers carried a letter to said Mrs.
Jennings, asking where the woman lived who had nursed Mr. Raymond
through that dangerous fever. This being done, Frederic and Alice waited
impatiently for a reply, which was long in coming, for Mr. Jennings’ log
tenement was several miles from the post-office, where he seldom called,
and it was more than a week ere the letter reached him. Even then it
found him so engrossed in the arrival of his first-born son and heir,
that for two or three days longer it lay unopened in the clock-case, ere
he thought to look at it.
“I don’t know what it means, I’m sure,” he said, taking it to his wife,
who, having never heard of the death of her old friend, replied, “Why,
he wants to know where Mrs. Burt lives. Just write on a piece of paper:
‘East —— street, No. —, third story; turn to your right; door at the
head of the stairs.’ I wonder if he’s never been there yet?”
John was not an elaborate correspondent, and he simply wrote down his
better half’s direction, saying nothing whatever of Mrs. Burt herself,
and thus conveying to Frederic no idea that Merton was not the real
name.
“A letter from Iowa,” said Frederic to Alice, as he came in from the
office, on the very night when Marian was walking slowly past what was
once her home. “I have the street and number, and to-morrow I am going
there.”
“And I am going, too,” cried Alice. “Won’t Marian be surprised to see us
both. I hope she’ll come to the door herself; and Frederic, if she does,
you’ll kiss her, won’t you, and act like you was glad, for if you don’t,
maybe she won’t come back with us.”
“I will do right,” answered Frederic, adding in a low tone, “Perhaps she
will not be there.”
“Yes, she will,” was Alice’s positive reply, “or if she’s not, somebody
can tell us where she is. Only to think, we shall see her to-morrow. I
do wish it would hurry, and I’m glad Miss Grey is not coming until the
day after. It will be so nice to have them both here. Do you suppose
they’ll like each other, Marian and Miss Grey?”
“I dare say they will,” returned Frederic, smiling at the little girl’s
enthusiasm, and hoping she might not be disappointed.
Anon, a shadow clouded Alice’s face, and observing it, Frederic passed
his hand over her hair, saying, “What is it, birdie?”
“Frederic,” said Alice, creeping closely to the side of the young man,
“Isn’t Miss Grey very beautiful?”
“Mr. Gordon and Ben say so,” returned Frederic, and Alice continued:
“Don’t be angry with me, but you loved Isabel the best because she was
the handsomest, and now you won’t love Miss Grey better than Marian,
will you, and you’ll be Marian’s husband right off, won’t you?”
“When Marian comes here, it will be as my wife,” said Frederic, and with
this answer Alice was satisfied.
“I wish it would grow dark faster,” she said, for she could tell when it
was night; and Frederic, while listening to the many different ways she
conjured up for them to meet Marian, became almost as impatient as
herself for the morrow, when his renewed hopes might, perhaps, be
realized.
The breakfast next morning was hurried through, for neither Alice nor
Frederic could eat, and Mrs. Russell, when she saw how much was left
untouched, congratulated herself upon its answering for the hired man’s
dinner, and thus giving her a nice long time for sewing.
“It isn’t a bit likely Miss Grey will come to-day,” said Alice, as she
followed Frederic to the carriage; and, confident of this, they gave
Miss Grey no further thought, but went on their way in search of Marian.
When they reached New York, Frederic, who had some business to transact,
left Alice in the parlor at the Astor, where she sat with her face to
the window, just as though she could see the passers-by; and, as she sat
there, a party who were leaving glanced hastily in, all seeing the
little figure by the window, and _one_ thinking to herself, “She wears
her hair combed back, as Alice used to do!”
Then the group passed on, while over the face of the blind girl there
flitted for an instant a wondering, bewildering expression, for her
quick ear had caught the sound of a voice which, it seemed to her, she
had heard before—not there—not in New York—but far away, at Redstone
Hall. What was it? Who was it? She bent her head to listen, hoping to
hear it again, but it came no more, for Marian Grey had left the house,
and was passing up Broadway. It was not long ere Frederic returned, and,
taking Alice’s hand, he led her into the street, and entered a Third
avenue car.
“We are on the right track, I think,” he said; “for it was this way she
went with the man described by Sarah Green.”
Alice gave a sigh of relief, and, leaning against Frederic, rather
enjoyed the pleasant motion of the car, although she wished it would go
faster.
“Won’t we ever get there?” she asked, as they plodded slowly on,
stopping often to take in a passenger, or set one down.
“Yes, by and by,” said Frederic, encouragingly. “I am not quite certain
of the street, myself, but I shall know it when I see the name, of
course;” and he looked anxiously out as they passed along. “Here it is!”
he cried, at last; and, seizing Alice’s arm, he rather dragged than led
her from the car, and out upon the crossing. “Why,” he exclaimed, gazing
eagerly around him, “I have been here before—down this very street;” and
his eye wandered involuntarily in the direction of the window where once
the white fringed curtain hung.
It was gone now, as was the rose geranium. The kitten, too, was gone,
and the small hand resting on it; while in their place appeared the
heads of two or three dirty children, looking across the way, and making
wry faces at similar dirty children in the window opposite. Frederic saw
all this, and it affected him unpleasantly, causing him to feel as if he
had parted from some old friend. But no; where was that? It must be in
this locality; and he wondered how one accustomed to the luxuries of
Redstone Hall could live in this place so long.
“I’ve found it!” he said, as his eye caught the number; and now, that he
believed himself near to what he had sought so long, he was more
impatient than Alice herself.
He could not wait for her uncertain footsteps, and pale with excitement,
he caught her in his arms and hurried up the narrow stairs, which many a
time had creaked to Marian’s tread. The third story was reached at last,
and he stood panting by the door, where Mr. Jennings had said that he
must stop. It was open, and the greasy, uncarpeted floor, of which he
caught a glimpse, looked cheerless and uninviting, but it did not keep
him back a moment, and he advanced into the room, which, by the three
heads at the window, he knew was the same where the white curtain once
had hung, and where now the glaring August sunlight came pouring in,
unbroken and unsubdued.
At the sight of a stranger one of the heads turned toward him and a
little voice said:
“Ma’s out washin’, she is, and won’t be home till night.”
There was a cold, heavy feeling of disappointment settling round
Frederic’s heart, for nothing there seemed at all like what he
remembered of the neat, tidy Mrs. Merton, but he nerved himself to ask:
“What is your mother’s name?”
“Bunce, and my pa is in the Tombs,” was the reply.
“How long have you lived here?” was the next question, asked with a
colder, heavier heart.
“Next Christmas a year,” said the little girl, and catching Frederic’s
arm, Alice whispered,
“Do let’s go out into the open air.”
But Frederic did not move—there was a spell upon him, and for several
moments it kept him there in the very room where Marian had wept so many
tears for him, and where, in her desolation, she had asked that she
might die when the greatest sorrow she had ever known came upon her—the
sorrow brought by Isabel’s cruel letter. There close to where he stood
was the door of the little room where for weeks and months she had lain,
tossing in her feverish pain, while over her Ben Burt kept his tireless
watch, nor asked for greater reward than to know that she would live.
And was there nothing to tell him of all this—nothing to whisper that
the one he sought had been there once, but was waiting for him now in
his own home! No, there was nothing but dark, cheerless poverty staring
him in the face, and with a sigh he turned away, and knocking at other
doors, asked for the former occupants of those front rooms. Nearly all
the present tenants had moved there since Mrs. Burt’s death, and none
knew aught of her save one rather decent-looking woman, who said “she
remembered the folks well, though they held their heads above the likes
of her. She’d seen them comin’ in and out and had peeked into their
room, so she knew they was well to do.”
“Was their name Merton? and did a young girl live with, them?” asked
Frederic; and the woman replied:
“Merton sounds some like it, though I’d sooner say ’twas _Burton_, or
something like that. I never even so much as passed the time of day with
’em, for I tell you they felt above me; but the girl was a jewel—so trim
and genteel like.”
“That was Marian,” whispered Alice; and Frederic continued:
“Where are they now?”
“Bless you,” returned the woman. “One on ’em is in Heaven, and the Lord
only knows where t’other one went to.”
Alice’s hand, which lay in Frederic’s, was clutched with a painful
grasp; and the perspiration gathered about the young man’s white lips as
he stammered out:
“Which one is dead? Not the girl? You dare not tell me that?”
“I dare if it was so,” returned the woman; “but ’twant; ’twas the old
one—the one I took to be the mother; though I have heard a story about
the girl’s comin’ here long time ago, before I moved here. I was away
when the woman died, and when I got back the rooms was empty, and the
boy and girl was gone; nobody knows where; and I haint seen ’em since.”
Frederic was too much interested in Marian to hear anything else, and he
paid no attention to her mention of a boy. Marian was all he wished to
find, but it was in vain that he questioned and cross-questioned the
woman. She had given all the information she could; and with an
increased feeling of disappointment he left her, glancing once more into
the room where he was sure Marian had lived. Alice, too, was willing to
stop there now; and when Frederic told her of the geranium and the
kitten he had once seen in the window, a smile mingled with her tears,
and she wished she had them now, especially the kitten! She did not know
that the matronly-looking cat, which, behind the broken stove, was
purring sleepily, was the same Maltese kitten Marian had fondled so
often. At the time of leaving she had given it to an acquaintance near
by, but pussy preferred her old haunts, and returning to them, persisted
in remaining there until the arrival of the new comers, who took her in,
and she now daily shared the meagre fare of the three children by the
window. Intuitively, as it were, she felt that Alice was a lover of her
race, and she came towards her, purring loudly, and rubbing against her
side.
“Lands sake,” exclaimed the woman. “Here’s the very cat the young girl
used to tend so much. I know it by the white spot between its eyes. I
found it mewing and making an awful noise by the door when I came back;
and though I ain’t none of your cat women, I flung it a bone or two till
them folks came, and the children kept it to torment, I ’spect, just as
young ones will. I see one of ’em with a string round its neck t’other
day a chokin’ it most to death.”
“Oh, Frederic,” and Alice’s face expressed what she wished to say, while
she caught up the animal in her arms.
Frederic understood her, and speaking to the oldest of the children, he
said, “Will you give me your cat?”
“No, no,” the three set up at once, and Alice whispered, “Buy her,
Frederic, won’t you?”
“Will you let me have her for fifty cents?” he asked, showing the silver
coin.
“No, no,” and the youngest began to cry.
“Give more,” said Alice, and Frederic continued, “Fifty cents a piece,
then. You can buy a great many cakes and crackers with it”—
“And candy,” suggested Alice.
The youngest began to show signs of relenting, as did the second, but
the third persisted in saying “No.” “Offer her more,” was whispered in a
low voice, and glancing around the poorly furnished room, Frederic took
out his purse and said, “You shall have a dollar a piece, but part of it
must be saved for your mother,—besides that, this little girl is blind,”
and he laid his hand on Alice’s head.
This last argument would have been sufficient without the dollar, for it
touched a chord of pity in the heart of that child of poverty, and
coming closer to Alice she looked at her curiously, saying, “Can’t you
see a bit more’n I can with my eyes shut?” and she closed her own by way
of experimenting.
“Not a bit,” returned Alice, “but I love kitty just the same, because
she used to belong to a dear friend of mine. May I have her?”
“Ye-es,” came half reluctantly from the lips of the child, as she
extended her hand for the money.
“Oh, I’m so glad,” said Alice when they were at a safe distance from the
house. “I was afraid they’d take it back,” and she held fast to the
kitten, which made no effort to escape, but lay in her arms, singing
occasionally as if well pleased with the exchange.
This, however, Frederic knew would not continue until they reached home,
and stepping into a shop which they were passing, he bought a covered
basket, in which the cat was placed and the lid secured, a proceeding
not altogether satisfactory to the prisoner. Alice, too, was equally
distressed, and when she learned that Frederic could not go home until
night, she insisted upon his getting her a room at the Astor, where she
could let her treasure out without fear of its escaping. Frederic
complied with her request, and in her delight with her new pet, she half
forgot how disappointed she had been in the result of their visit. But
not so with Frederic. He felt it keenly, for never had his hopes of
finding Marian been raised to a higher pitch than that morning, and even
now he could not give it up. Leaving Alice at the hotel he went back
again to the street and made the most minute inquiries, but all to no
purpose. He could not obtain the least clue to her, and he retraced his
steps with a feeling that she was as really lost to him as if Sarah
Green’s letter had been true and Marian resting in her grave.
“Why had that letter been written?” he asked himself again and again.
Somebody knew of Marian, and there was a mystery connected with it—a
mystery of wrong it might be. Perhaps she could not come back, even
though she wanted to, and his pulses quickened with painful rapidity as
he thought of all the imaginary terrors which might surround the lost
one. It was indeed a sad reflection, and his spirits were unusually
depressed, when just before sunset he took Alice by one hand, the basket
in the other, and started for home.
“I didn’t think we should come back alone,” said Alice, when at last
they reached the depot at Yonkers, and she was lifted into the carriage
waiting for them. “It’s dreadful we couldn’t find her, but I am so glad
we’ve got the cat;” and she guarded the basket carefully, as if it had
contained the diamonds of India.
Frederic did not care to talk, and folding his arms, he leaned moodily
back in his carriage, evincing no interest in anything until as they
drew near home, the driver said to Alice:
“Guess who’s come?”
“Oh, I don’t know—Dinah, may be,” was Alice’s reply, and then Frederic
smiled at the preposterous idea.
“No; guess again,” said the driver. “Somebody as handsome as a doll.”
“Miss Grey!” cried Alice, almost upsetting her basket in her delight.
Eagerly she questioned John, and then replied, “I’m so glad, though I
was going to fix her room so nice to-morrow—but no matter, it’s always
pleasant up there. How lonesome she must have been all day with nothing
but the garden, the books, and the piano.”
“She has been homesick, I guess,” said John, “for I seen her cryin’, I
thought, out under a tree in the garden.”
“Poor thing!” sighed Alice. “She won’t be homesick any more when we get
there; will she, Frederic? I wonder if she likes cats!” And as by this
time they had stopped at their own gate, the little girl went running up
the walk, shaking the basket prodigiously, and inciting its contents to
such violent struggles that in the hall the lid came off, and bounding
from its confinement, the cat ran into the parlor, where, trembling with
fright, it crouched as for protection, at the feet of Marian Grey.
CHAPTER XXV.
THE MEETING.
Notwithstanding Alice’s fears the day had not been a long one to Marian,
who had been so occupied in unpacking her trunks and in going over the
house and grounds, as scarcely to heed the lapse of time, and she was
surprised when, about sunset, she saw John drive from the yard, and knew
he was going for his master. Not till then did she fully realize her
position, and she sought her chamber to compose herself, for the dreaded
trial, which each moment came nearer and nearer.
“Will Frederic know me?” she asked herself a dozen times, and as often
answered no—but Alice, ah, Alice, there was danger to be apprehended
from her, and Marian felt that she would far rather meet the
scrutinizing gaze of Frederic Raymond’s eyes than submit herself to the
touch of the blind girl’s fingers, or trust her voice to the blind
girl’s ear.
That might not have changed. She could not tell if it had, though she
thought it very probable, for six years was a long, long time, and it
was nearly that since she left Redstone Hall. She could not sustain a
feigned voice, she knew, and there was no alternative save to wait the
trial and abide the result of a recognition. She felt a pardonable pride
in wishing to make a good impression upon Frederic, for he could see,
and she spent a much longer time at her toilet than usual. Black was
very becoming to her dazzling complexion, and the thin tissue she wore
fitted her admirably, showing just enough of her neck, while the wide,
loose sleeves displayed the whole of her well-shaped arm, which, from
contrast, looked white and smooth as ivory. Hitherto she had curled her
entire hair, but she did not dare to do so now, and she confined a part
of it with a comb, while the remainder of it was suffered to curl as
usual about her face and behind her ears. This changed her looks
somewhat, but was still becoming, and as she saw in the mirror the
reflection of her sweet young face and deep blue eyes there came a
brighter glow to her cheek, for she knew that the cherished wish of her
early girlhood had been fulfilled, and that Ben Burt was right when he
called her beautiful.
The gas was lighted when she entered the parlor below, and turning it
down a little, she took a book and seated herself somewhat in the shade.
But the volume might as well have been wrong side up for any idea its
contents conveyed to her, so absorbed was she in what was fast
approaching, for she had heard the carriage stop at the gate, and felt
the cold moisture starting out beneath her hair and on her hands.
“I will be calm,” she said, and with one tremendous effort of the will
she quieted the violent throbbings of her heart, and leaning on her
elbow, pretended to be reading, though not a sound escaped her ear. She
heard the little feet come running up the walk, and the heavy, manly
tread following in the rear.
She heard the struggle in the hall between Alice and the cat, and when
the latter bounded into the room and crouched down at her feet, she
thought there was something familiar in that spot between the eyes. But
it could not be, she said, though Alice’s exclamation of “Do, Frederic,
shut the door, so she cannot get away,” seemed to intimate that pussy
was a stranger there. Stooping down, she passed her hand caressingly
over the animal’s back, whispering, in a low tone, “Spotty, darling, is
it you?”
Won by her voice, the cat sprang up on Marian’s lap just as Frederic
glanced hastily in.
“Your pet is safe,” he said to Alice, whom he followed to the sitting
room, waiting there a moment, and then starting to meet Miss Grey.
She knew he was coming, counting every step, and without raising her
eyes from the book she pretended to be reading, knew just when he
crossed the threshold of the door. Removing her hand from her head,
where it had been resting, she gently pushed the cat from her lap, and
half rising to her feet, waited for the first words of greeting.
“Miss Grey, I believe;” and bowing low, Frederic Raymond advanced
towards Marian, who now stood up, so that the blaze of the chandelier
fell full upon her, revealing at once her face and form.
Had her very life depended upon it she could not have spoken then, for
the stormy emotions the name “Miss Grey” called up, mastered her speech
entirely. She knew he would thus address her, but it grated harshly on
her ear to hear him call her so, and her heart yearned for the familiar
name of Marian, though she had no reason to expect it from him.
“You are welcome to Riverside,” he continued; “and I regret that your
first day here should have been so lonely.”
This gave her a little time, and conquering her weakness she extended
her hand to take the one he offered. Hers was cold and clammy, and
trembled like an imprisoned bird, as it lay in his broad, warm palm. For
an instant he held it there, and gazed down into her sweet, childish
face, which did not look wholly unfamiliar to him, while she herself
seemed more like a friend than a total stranger. The tie between them,
which naught but death could sever, and which was bound so closely
around Marian’s heart, brought to his own an answering throb, and when
at last she spoke, assuring him that she had not been lonely in the
least, he started, for there was something in the tone which moved him
as a stranger oft is moved, when hearing in the calm, still night the
air of “Home, Sweet Home.” It carried him back to Redstone Hall, years
and years ago, when in the moonlight he had played with his dusky
companions upon the river brink. But Marian Lindsey had no portion of
his thoughts at that first interview with Marian Grey, who ventured at
last to look into his face just as he was looking into hers. Oh, how
much like the Frederic of old he was, save that in his mature manhood he
was finer, nobler looking, while the proud fire of his eye had given
place to a milder, softer expression, and she felt intuitively that he
was far more worthy of her love than when she knew him before.
Motioning her to a chair, he, too, sat down at a little distance and
conversed with her pleasantly, as friend converses with friend, asking
about her journey, making inquiries after Mrs. Sheldon’s family, and
experiencing a most unaccountable sensation when he saw how she blushed
at the mention of William Gordon! Ben was next talked about, and Marian
was growing eloquent in his praise, when suddenly a sight met her view
which petrified her powers of speech and sent the hot blood ebbing
backward from her cheek and lip. In the hall without and where Frederic
could not see her, the blind girl stood, her hands clasped and slightly
raised, her lips apart, her eyes rolling, her head bent forward, and her
ear turned toward the door, whence came the sound which had arrested her
footsteps and chained her to the spot. She had started for the parlor
and come thus far, when she, too, caught the tone which had affected
even Frederic, and her head grew dizzy with the bewildering sound, for
to her it brought memories of Marian. Had she come? Was she there with
Frederic and Miss Grey? Eagerly she waited to hear the sound repeated,
wondering why Miss Grey, too, did not join in the conversation. It came
again, the old familiar strain, though tuned to a sadder note, for
Marian had suffered much since last she talked with Alice, and it was
perceptible even in her voice. Tighter and tighter the small hands
pressed together—lower and lower bent the head, while a shade of
disappointment flitted over the face of the listening child, for this
time it did not seem quite so natural as at first, and she knew, too,
that ’twas Miss Grey who spoke, for her subject was Ben Butterworth.
“What is it?” asked Frederic, observing that Miss Grey stopped suddenly
in the midst of a remark.
Marian pointed toward the spot where Alice stood, but ere Frederic had
time to step forward, the loud ring of the bell started Alice from an
attitude which, had Frederic Raymond seen it, would surely have led to a
discovery.
“The little girl, she acts so singular,” said Marian, thinking she must
make some explanation.
“She’s blind, you know,” was answered in a low tone, and going toward
the hall, Frederic met with Alice just as a servant opened the outer
door, and a stranger entered, asking for Mr. Raymond.
“In a moment,” said Frederic, and leading Alice up to Marian, he
continued, “Your teacher,” and then left the two together.
For an instant there was perfect silence, and Marian knew the blind girl
could hear the beating of her heart, while she in turn watched the
wonder and perplexity written on the speaking face turned upward toward
her own, the brown eyes riveted upon her, as if for once they had broken
from their prison walls and could discern what was before them.
Oh! how Marian longed to take the little, helpless creature in her arms;
to hug her, to kiss her, to cry over her, and tell her of the love which
had never known one moment’s abatement during the long years of their
separation. But she dared not; and she sat gazing at her to see if she
had changed since the night when she left her sleeping so quietly in
their dear old room at home. She was now nearly thirteen, but her figure
was so slight, and her features so childlike, that few would have
guessed her more than nine, unless they judged by her mature, womanly
mind. To Marian she seemed the same; and when, unable longer to restrain
herself, she drew the child to her, and, kissing her forehead, said to
her kindly,
“You are Alice, my pupil, I am sure. Alice what?”
“Alice Raymond,” and the sightless eyes never moved for an instant from
the questioner’s face.
“Are you very nearly related to Mr. Raymond?” asked Marian; and Alice
replied:
“Second cousin, that’s all. But he has been more than a brother to me
since—since—”
The perplexed, mystified look increased on Alice’s face, and her gaze
grew more intense as she continued: “Since Marian went away.”
There was a moment’s stillness, and then the hand which hitherto had
rested on Marian’s lap was raised until it reached the head, where it
lay lightly, very lightly, though to Marian it seemed like the weight of
a thousand pounds, and she felt every hair prickle at its root when the
blind girl said to her:
“AIN’T YOU MARIAN?”
“Yes, Marian Grey. Didn’t you know my first name?” was the answer,
spoken so deliberately that Marian was astonished at herself.
There was a wavering then in the brown eyes, a quivering of the lids,
and the great tears rolled down Alice’s cheeks, for with this calm
reply, uttered so naturally, the hope she had scarcely dared to cherish
passed away, and she murmured sadly:
“It cannot be her.”
“What makes you cry, darling?” asked Marian, choking back her own tears,
which were just ready to flow, and which did gush forth in torrents,
when Alice answered:
“Oh, I wish I wasn’t blind to-night!”
This surely was a good cause for weeping and pressing the little one to
her bosom, Marian wept over her passionately for a few moments; then,
drying her eyes, she said:
“Why to-night more than any other time?”
“Because I want so much to know how you look,” returned Alice; adding
immediately: “May I feel of your face? It’s the only way I have of
seeing.”
“Certainly,” answered Marian; and the fingers wandered slowly,
cautiously, over every feature, involuntarily caressing the fair, round
cheek, but lingering longest on the hair—the beautiful hair—whose glossy
waves were perceptible even to the touch.
“What color is it?” she asked, winding one of the curls around her
finger.
“Some call it auburn, some chesnut, and some a mixture of both,” was the
reply, and Alice continued her investigations by mentally comparing its
length with a standard she had in her own mind.
The two did not agree, for the curls she remembered were longer and far
more wiry than the silken tresses of Miss Grey.
“How tall are you?” she suddenly asked, and Marian tried to laugh,
although every nerve was thrilling with fear, for she knew she was
passing through a dangerous test.
“Rather tall,” she replied, standing up, “Yes, very tall, some would
say. Put up your hand and see.”
Alice did as she requested, and her tears came faster as she whispered
mournfully. “You’re the tallest.”
“Did you think we had met before?” asked Marian, and then the sobs of
the child burst forth unrestrained.
Burying her face in Marian’s lap, she cried, “Yes—no—I don’t know what I
thought, only you don’t seem to me like I supposed you would. You make
me tremble so, and I keep thinking of somebody we lost long ago. At
first your voice sounded so natural, that I knew most she was here, but
you ain’t even like her. You’re taller and fatter, and handsomer, I
reckon, and yet there is something about you that makes my heart beat so
fast. Oh, I wish I could see what it is. What made God make me blind?”
Never before had Marian heard a murmur from the lips of the unfortunate
child, and it seemed to her cruel not to whisper words of comfort in her
ear. But she could not do it yet, and so she kissed her tenderly,
saying, “Did you love this other one so very much?”
“Yes, very, very much,” was Alice’s reply, “and it hurts me so to think
we cannot find her. I thought we surely should to-day, for we went
there, Frederic and I—went where she used to live, and she wasn’t there.
’Twas a dreary place, and Frederic groaned out loud to think she ever
lived there.”
“Perhaps it didn’t look so then,” suggested Marian, who felt constrained
to say a word in favor of her former home.
“Oh, I know it didn’t,” returned Alice, “for Frederic has been by there,
though he didn’t know it then, and he says it looked real nice, with the
white curtain and the kitten asleep on the window sill. It’s a cat now,
and we brought it home.”
“Her cat?” and Marian started eagerly.
“Yes,” said Alice, “Frederic gave three dollars for it,” and forgetting
her late grief in this new interest, she told how they knew it was
Marian’s, and then as Miss Grey expressed a wish to see it, she started
in quest of it, just as Frederic appeared, telling them tea was ready.
“I am afraid you will think we keep Lent here all the year round,” he
said, apologetically. “I was surprised to find that Mrs. Russell
compelled you to fast until our return.”
“It didn’t matter,” Marian replied; though she had wondered a little at
the non-appearance of supper, for Mrs. Russell, intent upon her dress,
had no idea of “makin’ two fusses,” and she kept her visitor waiting
until the return of Frederic, saying, “the supper would taste all the
better when it did come.”
Very willingly Marian followed Frederic to the dining room, where
everything was indicative of elegance and wealth.
“Mrs. Jones used to sit here; and I now give the place to you,” said
Frederic, motioning to the seat by the tea-tray, and himself sitting
down opposite, with Alice upon his right.
Marian became her new position well, and so Frederic thought, as he saw
how gracefully her snowy fingers handled the silver urn, and how much at
home she seemed. There was a strange fascination about her as she sat
there at the head of his table, with the bright bloom on her cheek, and
the dewy lustre in her beautiful blue eyes, which occasionally wandered
toward the figure opposite, but as often fell beneath the curious gaze
which they encountered. Frederic could not forbear looking at her, even
though he saw that it embarrassed her—she was so fresh, so fair, so
modest—while there was about her an indescribable something which he
could not define, for though a stranger, as he supposed, she seemed near
to him—so near that he almost felt he had a right to pass his arm around
her, and kiss the girlish lips which Will Gordon had likened to a
rose-bud.
“Poor Will,” sighed, “he did lose a prize when he lost Marian Grey.”
Involuntarily his mind went back to Redstone Hall, and to the time when
another Marian sat opposite, and did for him the office this one was
doing. The contrast between the two was great, but, with a nobleness
worthy of the man, he thought “Marian Grey is far more beautiful, ’tis
true, but Marian Lindsey was my wife.”
Then he remembered the day when Isabel first sat at his board, and he
had felt it a sin to look at her in all her queenly beauty. He had grown
hard since then, for he could not think it wicked to look at Marian
Grey, or deem it a wrong to the other one, and he feasted his eyes upon
her until she arose from the table, and went, at Alice’s request, to see
the cat, which was safely confined in a candle box, “by way of taming
her,” Alice said.
“I think there’s no need of that,” returned Marian, stroking her soft
coat. “I am sure she will not run away. What do you propose calling
her?”
“Marian, I reckon, only you might not want her named after _you_, and it
wouldn’t be, for it’s the other one.”
“I haven’t the least objection,” said Miss Grey, laughing, “only Marian
will sound oddly. Suppose you call it ‘Spottie,’ there’s a cunning white
spot between its eyes.”
“Yes, Alice, let that be the name,” said a voice behind them, and
turning, Marian saw Frederic, who had all the time been standing near
and watching them as like two children they knelt together by the candle
box and gave the cat its milk—Marian and Alice, side by side, just as
they used to be of old—just as Frederic had seen them many a time.
The tableau was a familiar one, and so he felt it to be, though he could
not divine the reason. The tall, beautiful girl before him bore no
resemblance to the Marian of Redstone Hall, and still nothing she did
seemed strange or new to him.
“I certainly have dreamed of her,” he said, when lifting up her head she
shook back from her face the clustering curls, and smiled on Alice as
she used to do. “I have dreamed of her just as I sometimes dream of
places, and see them afterward in waking.”
This conclusion was entirely satisfactory, and she returned with the
girls to the parlor, while “Spottie” followed after, hovering near to
Marian, whose low spoken words and gentle caresses had reawakened the
affection which had perhaps been dormant during the last year.
“Will you play for us, Miss Grey?” said Frederic, and without a word of
apology, Marian seated herself at the piano, whose rich, mellow tones
roused her enthusiasm at once, and she played more than usually well,
while Alice stood by listening eagerly, and Frederic looked on, scarce
heeding the stirring notes, so intent was he upon the dimpled hands
which swept the keys so skillfully.
On the third finger there was a little cornelian ring, the first gift of
Ben, and as he looked, he felt certain he had seen that ring and those
hands before. But where? He tried to recall the time and the place.
Stepping forward, he looked into her face, but that gave him no clue,
only the ring and the hands were familiar. Suddenly he started, for he
remembered the when and the where—remembered, too, that Alice, when told
of the girl with the brown vail, had said to him, “Wan’t that our
Marian?”
He had accepted the suggestion as a possible one then, but he doubted it
now, for if that maiden were Marian Grey, it certainly could not have
been Marian Lindsey. The exquisite music ceased, and ere Alice had time
for a word of comment, he asked abruptly: “Miss Grey, did you ever ride
in the cars with me in New York?”
The question was a startling one, but Marian’s face was turned from him,
and he could not see the effort she made to answer him calmly.
“I think it very probable. I have been in the cars a great many times,
and with a great many different people.”
“Yes, but one rainy night, more than four years ago, did I not offer you
a seat between myself and the door? You wore a brown vail, and carried a
willow basket, if it were you. Something about your appearance has
puzzled me all the evening, and I think I must have met you there. It
was on the Third Avenue cars.”
Marian trembled violently, but by constantly turning the leaves of her
music book, she managed to conceal her agitation, and when Frederic
ceased speaking, she answered in her natural tone, “Now that you recall
the circumstances, I believe I do remember something about it, though
you do not look as that man did. I imagined he had been sick, or was in
trouble,” and Marian’s blue eyes turned sideways to witness, if
possible, the effect of her words. But she was disappointed, for she
could not see how white Frederic was for a single instant, but she felt
it in his voice, as he replied:
“You are right. I had been sick, and was in great trouble.”
“Wasn’t that when you were looking for Marian?” Alice asked, and again
the blue eyes sought Frederic’s face, turning this time so that they
could see it.
“Yes, I was hunting for Marian,” was the answer; and the deep sigh which
accompanied the words brought a thrill of joy to the Marian hunted for,
and she knew now, and from his own lips, too, that he had sought for
her, nay, that he was looking for her even then, when in her anger she
censured him for not recognizing her.
Little by little she was learning the truth just as it was; and when at
a late hour she bade Frederic good night, and went to her own chamber,
her heart was almost too full for utterance, for she felt that the long,
dark night was over, and the dawn she had waited for so long was
breaking at last around her. Intuitively, Alice, who had been permitted
to sit up so long as she did, caught something of the same spirit. “It
was almost as nice as if Marian really were there,” she said; and she
came twice to kiss her governess, while on her face was a most satisfied
expression, as she nestled among her pillows and listened to the
footsteps in the adjoining chamber where Marian made her nightly toilet.
“Oh, I wish she’d let me sleep with her,” she thought. “It would be a
heap more like having Marian back.” And, when all was still, she stepped
upon the floor and glided to the bedside of Marian, who was not aware of
her approach until a voice whispered in her ear:
“May I stay here with you? I’ve been making believe that you was
Marian—our Marian, I mean—and I want to sleep with you so much just as I
used to do with her—may I?”
“Yes, darling,” was the answer, as Marian folded her arms lovingly
around the neck of the blind girl, whose soft, warm cheek was pressed
against her own.
And there, just as they were used to do in the old Kentucky home, ere
sorrow had come to either, they lay side by side, Marian and Alice, the
one dreaming sweet dreams of the Marian come back to her again; and the
other, that to her the gates of Paradise were opened, and she saw the
glory shining through, just as in Frederic Raymond’s eyes she had seen
the glimmer of the love-light which was yet to overshadow her and
brighten her future pathway.
CHAPTER XXVI.
LIFE AT RIVERSIDE.
It was a joyful waking which came to Marian next morning, and when fresh
and glowing from her invigorating bath she descended to the piazza she
was surprised at finding Frederic there before her, looking haggard and
pale, as if the boon of sleep had been denied to him. After Marian and
Alice had bidden him good night, he, too, had retired to his room, which
was directly under theirs; and sitting in his arm-chair, he had listened
to the footsteps above, readily distinguishing one from the other, and
experiencing unconsciously a vague, delicious feeling of comfort in
knowing that the long talked of Marian Grey had come to him at last, and
that she was even more beautiful than he had imagined her to be from
Will Gordon’s glowing description. He would keep her with him, too, he
said, until the other one was found, if that should ever be: and then,
as the footsteps and the murmur of voices in the chamber above him
ceased, and all about the house was still, his heart went out after the
other one, demanding of the solitude around to show him where she was—to
lead him to her so that he could bring her back to the home where each
day he was wanting her more and more. And the solitude thus questioned
invariably carried his thoughts to _Marian Grey_, whose delicate,
girlish beauty had made so strong an impression upon his mind. “How
would the two compare?” he asked. “Would not the governess far outshine
the wife? Would not the contrast be a painful one?”
“No, no!” he said; “for, though Marian Lindsey were not as beautiful as
Marian Grey, she was gentle, pure and good.” And then, as he sought his
pillow, he went back again in fancy to that feverish sick room, and the
tender love which alone had saved him from death; while mingled with
this remembrance were confused thoughts of the vailed maiden in the
corner of the car—of the geranium growing in the window, and of Marian
Grey, who seemed a part of every thing—for, turn which way he would, her
blue eyes were sure to shine upon him; and once, when, for a few
moments, he fell into a troubled sleep, she said to him, “I am the
Marian you seek.”
Then this vision faded, and he saw a little grave, on whose humble stone
was written, “The Heiress of Redstone Hall,” and with a nervous start he
woke, only to doze and dream again, until at last he was glad when the
dawn came stealing across the misty river, and looked in at his window.
The sun was not yet up when he arose, and going out upon the broad
piazza, tried by walking to gain the rest the night had failed to bring.
As he walked Spottie came purring to his side, rubbing against his feet
and looking into his face as if she fain would tell him, if she could,
that the lost one had returned, and was safe beneath his roof.
Frederic Raymond could not be said to care particularly for cats, but
there was a charm connected with this one gambolling at his feet, and he
did not deem it an unmanly act to stoop down and caress it for the sake
of her who had often had it in her arms.
“Can you tell me nothing of your mistress,” he said, aloud, for he
thought himself alone.
Instantly the cat, whose ear had caught a sound he did not hear, bounded
toward the door where Marian Grey was standing. Advancing toward her,
Frederic said, “You must excuse me, Miss Grey. I am not often guilty of
petting cats, but this one has a peculiar attraction for me, inasmuch as
it once belonged to—to—to Mrs. Raymond,” and Frederic felt vastly
relieved to think he had actually spoken of his wife to Marian Grey, and
called her Mrs. Raymond, too! He knew Will Gordon had told her the
story, and when he saw how the color came and went upon her cheek, he
fancied that it arose from the delicacy she would naturally feel in
talking with him of his runaway wife. He was glad he had introduced the
subject, and she should continue it or not, as she choose. Marian hardly
knew how to reply, for though she longed to hear what he had to say of
Mrs. Raymond, she scarcely dared trust herself to question him.
At last, however, she ventured to say, “Yes, Alice told me that it was
once your wife’s. She is dead, isn’t she?”
Frederic started, and walking off a few paces, replied, “Marian dead!
not that I know of! Did you ever hear that she was?” and he came back to
Marian, looking at her so earnestly that she colored deeply, as she
replied:
“Mr. Gordon told me something of her; and I had the impression that——”
She did not know how to finish the sentence, and she was glad to hear a
little, uncertain step upon the stairs, as that was an excuse for her to
break off abruptly, and go to Alice, who had come down in quest of her,
expressing much surprise that she should rise so early and dress so
quietly.
“Mrs. Jones used to make such a noise coughing and sneezing,” she said,
“that she always woke me, while Isabel never got up till breakfast was
ready, and sometimes not then, when we were in Kentucky. Negroes were
made to wait on her, she said. She’ll be coming over here to call and
see how you look. I heard her asking Mrs. Russell last week if you were
pretty, and she said——”
“Never mind what she said,” suggested Marian, adding laughingly, “I have
heard of Miss Huntington before. Will Gordon told me of her, and Ben,
too. He saw her in Kentucky, you know; so you see, I am tolerably well
posted in your affairs;” and she turned towards Frederic, who was about
to answer, when Alice, who had climbed into a chair, and was standing
with her arm around the young man’s neck, chimed in:
“If Mr. Gordon told you that Frederic liked her, it isn’t so, for he
don’t; do you, Frederic?”
“I like all the ladies,” was his reply; and the breakfast bell just then
rang, the conversation ceased, and they entered the house together,
Alice holding fast to Marian’s hand, and dancing along like a joyous
bird.
“You seem very happy this morning,” said Frederic, smiling down upon the
happy child.
“I am,” she replied. “I’m most as happy as I should be if we had found
Marian yesterday. Wouldn’t it be splendid if this were really Marian,
and wouldn’t you be glad?”
Frederic Raymond did not say yes—he did not say anything; but as he
looked at the figure in white presiding a second time so gracefully at
his table, he fancied that it would not be a hard matter for any man to
be glad if Marian Grey were his wife. Breakfast being over, Alice
assumed the responsibility of showing her teacher the place.
“You were here once, I know,” she said, “and left me those flowers, but
you hadn’t time then to see half. There’s a tree down in the garden,
where Frederic’s name is cut in the bark, and Marian Lindsey’s, too. You
must see that;” and she led her off to the spot where John had seen her
crying the day before. “I ain’t going to study a bit for ever so long.
Frederic says I needn’t,” said Alice. “I’m going to have a right nice
time with you.” And Marian was not sorry, for nothing could please her
better than rambling with Alice over what was once her home.
Very rapidly the first few days passed away, and ere a week had gone by,
Marian understood tolerably well the place which Marian Lindsey occupied
in her husband’s affections, and she needed not the letter received from
William Gordon to tell her that the Frederic Raymond of to-day was not
the same from whose presence she had once fled with a breaking heart. He
was greatly changed, and if she had loved him in the early days of her
girlhood, her heart clung to him now with an affection tenfold stronger
than she had ever known before. From Alice, who was very communicative,
she learned many things of which she little dreamed, when in New York
she was hiding from her husband, and believing that he hated her. Alice
liked nothing better than to talk of Marian, and one afternoon, when
Frederic was in New York, and the two girls were sitting together in
their pleasant chamber, she told her sad story in her own childish way,
accepting her companion’s tears, which fell like rain as tokens of
sympathy for the lost one.
“Frederic cried just like he was a woman,” she said, “when he came up
from the river, cold, and wet, and sick, and told us they could not find
her. I remember, too, how he groaned when I asked him what made her kill
herself; she didn’t, though,” she added quickly, as she heard Marian’s
exclamation of horror at the very idea; “she wasn’t even dead, but we
thought she was, and we mourned for her so much. The house was like a
funeral all the time till Isabel came.”
“And how was it then?” Marian asked.
Alice did not reply immediately, and as Marian saw the shadow which
flitted over her face, she pressed her hands together nervously, for she
fancied that she knew what Redstone Hall was like when Isabel, her
rival, came.
“You were telling me about the house after Miss Huntington’s arrival,”
she rejoined, as Alice showed no signs of continuing the conversation,
but sat with her eyes fixed upon the floor as if she were thinking of
something far back in the past.
At Marian’s remark she started, and with the same dreamy, perplexed look
upon her face, replied:
“Perhaps I ought not to tell; but you seem so near to me that I don’t
believe Frederic would care. He’s got over it, too, but he loved
Isabel,” and Alice’s voice sank to a whisper, as if afraid the walls
would hear. “He loved her a heap better than he did poor dear Marian,
who somehow found it out that night, and rather than be his wife when he
didn’t want her, she ran away, you know.”
“Yes, yes, I know,” gasped Marian, while Alice, little dreaming how well
she knew, continued, “And so when Isabel came, he couldn’t help loving
her some, I suppose, though Dinah thought he could, and she used to
scold mightily when she heard her singing and playing, as she did all
the time, so as to get Frederic in there,” and Alice’s tone and manner
were so much like old Dinah and so highly expressive of her meaning,
that Marian could not forbear smiling. “I talked to Frederic one night,”
said Alice, “and told him I didn’t believe Marian was dead, and I reckon
I made him think so, too, for he promised he would wait for her ten
years.”
“Will he marry then, if he does not find her?” Marian asked by way of
calling out the little girl, who replied:
“I suppose he won’t live all his life alone; at any rate, he said he
wouldn’t. Oh, Miss Grey!” and Alice started so quickly that Marian
started, too; “I’d a heap rather Marian would be his wife than anybody,
because he married her first; but if she don’t come back, can’t you
guess what I wish would be?” and Alice wound her arms around the neck of
Marian, who did guess, but could not embody her guessing in words.
“Did Mr. Raymond never hear from her?” she asked, and resuming her seat,
Alice replied:
“Yes, and that’s the mystery. One cold March night when Isabel was
dressing for a party, and was just as cross as she could be, there came
to him a letter from Sarah Green, saying she was dead and buried with
canker rash.”
“Dead!” exclaimed Marian, starting quickly. “When? Where?”
“In New York,” answered Alice; and Marian listened breathlessly to the
story of her supposed decease, wondering, as Frederic had often done,
whence the letter came, and why it had been sent.
“It must have been a plan of Ben’s to see what he would do,” she
thought; and she listened again, with burning cheeks and beating heart,
while Alice told of Frederic’s grief when he read that she was dead.
“I know he cried,” said Alice, “for there were tears on his face, and he
sat so still, and held me so close to him that I could hear his heart
thump so hard,” and she illustrated by striking her tiny fist upon the
table.
Then she told how sometime after she had interrupted Frederic in the
parlor, just as he was asking Isabel to be his wife, and had almost
convinced him again of Marian’s existence.
“Blessed Alice,” said Marian, involuntarily. “You have been Miss
Lindsey’s good angel, and kept her husband from falling.”
“I couldn’t help it,” answered Alice. “I most knew she was alive; and I
was so glad when he started for New York. I was sure he’d find her; and
he did. She took care of him a few days and his voice sounded so low and
sad when he told me of her, and how she left him when Isabel came. Your
brother Ben—the nice man who gave me the bracelet—telegraphed for her to
go; and you would suppose she was crazy—she flew around so, ordering the
negroes, and knocking Dud down flat, because he couldn’t run fast enough
to get out of her way. That made Aunt Hetty, his grandmother, mad, and
she yellowed Isabel’s collar that she was ironing. If I hadn’t been
blind I should have cried myself so those dreadful days when we expected
to hear Frederic was dead, for next to Marian I love him the best. He’s
real good to me now; and when I asked him once what made him pet me so
much more than he used to, he said, ‘Because our dear, lost Marian loved
you, and you loved her.’”
“Did he say that? Did he call her his ‘dear, lost Marian?’” and the eyes
of the speaker sparkled with delight, while across her mind there
flitted the half-formed resolution that before the sun had set Frederic
Raymond should know the whole.
Ere Alice could answer this question, there was a loud ring at the door,
and a servant brought to Miss Grey Isabel Huntington’s card.
“I knew she’d call,” said Alice. “She wants to see how you look; but I
don’t care, for Frederic says you’re a heap the handsomest; I asked him
last night after you quit playing, and had left the room.”
The knowledge that Frederic Raymond preferred her face to that of
Isabel, rendered Marian far more self-possessed than she would otherwise
have been, as she went down to meet her visitor, whose call was prompted
from mere curiosity, and not from any friendliness she felt towards
Marian Grey. Isabel had heard much of Marian’s beauty from those who met
her since her arrival at Riverside, and she had come to see if rumor
were correct. During the last three years she had not improved
materially, for her disappointment in failing to win Frederic Raymond
had soured a disposition never particularly amiable, and she was now a
censorious, fault-finding woman of twenty-five, on the lookout for a
husband, and trembling lest the dreaded age of thirty should find her
still unmarried. For Frederic Raymond she affected a feeling of
contempt; insinuating that he was mean—that his property was not gained
honestly; that she knew something which she could tell but shouldn’t—all
of which had but little effect in a place where he was so much better
known than herself. And still, had Frederic Raymond evinced the
slightest interest in her, she would gladly have met him more than half
the way, for the love she really felt for him once had never died away.
And even now she watched him often through blinding tears as he passed
her cottage door. The story of Marian’s existence she had repudiated at
first and in the excitement of going south, and the incidents connected
with her sojourn there, she had failed to speak of it even to Mrs.
Rivers, choosing rather to make her friends believe that she had
deliberately refused the owner of Redstone Hall. Recently, however, and
since her arrival at Riverside, she had indirectly circulated the story,
and Frederic had more than once been questioned as to its authenticity.
Greatly to Isabel’s chagrin he took no pains to conceal the fact, but
frankly spoke of Mrs. Raymond, as a person who had been, and who he
hoped was still a living reality. Very narrowly Isabel watched the
proceedings at Riverside, and when she heard that Alice’s new governess
was in some way connected with the “gawky peddler,” whom she remembered
well, she sneered at her as a person of no refinement, marvelling
greatly at the praises bestowed upon her. At last, curious to see for
herself, she donned her richest robes, and now in the parlor at
Riverside, sat awaiting the appearance of Miss Grey.
“Let her be what she will, Frederic can’t marry her, and that’s some
consolation,” she thought, just as a tripping footstep announced the
approach of Marian, and, assuming her haughtiest manner, she arose, and
bowed to Frederic Raymond’s wife.
They had met before, but there was no token of recognition between them
now, and as strangers they greeted each other, Marian’s hand trembling
slightly as she offered it to Isabel—for she knew that this was not
their first meeting. Coldly, inquisitively and almost impudently, the
haughty Isabel scrutinized the graceful creature, mentally acknowledging
that she was beautiful, and hating her for it. With great effort Marian
concealed her agitation, and answered carelessly the first few
common-place remarks addressed to her, as to how she liked Riverside,
and if this were her first visit there.
“No,” she answered to this last question—“I came here once with Ben,
who, you remember, was once at Redstone Hall.”
“I could not well forget him. His odd Yankee ways furnished gossip for
many a day among the negroes.” And Isabel tossed her head scornfully, as
if Ben Burt were a creature far beneath her notice.
After a little, she spoke of Mr. Raymond, asking Marian, finally, what
she thought of him, and saying she supposed she knew he was a married
man.
“I know he has been married, but is there any certainty that his wife is
still living?” asked Marian, for the sake of hearing her visitor’s
remarks.
“Any certainty! Of course there is,” said Isabel, experiencing at once a
pang of jealousy lest the humble Marian Grey had dared to think of
Frederic as a widower, and hence a marriageable man. “Of course she’s
living, though, I must say, he takes no great pains to find her. He did
look for her a little, I believe, after he was sick in New York; but he
did it more to divert his mind from a very mortifying disappointment
than from any affection he felt for her, and it was this which prompted
him to go to New York at all.”
“What disappointment?” Marian asked, faintly, and, affecting to be
embarrassed, Isabel replied:
“It would be unbecoming in _me_ to say what the nature of it was, and I
referred to it thoughtlessly. Pray, forget it, Miss Grey;” and she
turned the leaves of a handsomely bound volume lying on the table with
well feigned modesty.
Marian understood her at once, and was glad that Isabel was too intent
upon an engraving to observe her agitation. Notwithstanding what Alice
said, Frederic _had_ offered himself to Isabel, and her refusal had sent
him to New York, where he hoped to forget his mortification, and where
sickness had overtaken him. In the kindness of her heart, Isabel had
come to him, and the words of affection which she had heard her speak to
Frederic were prompted by pity, rather than love, as she then supposed.
And after Isabel had left him, he had looked for her merely by way of
excitement, and not because he cared to find her. Such were the thoughts
which flashed upon Marian’s mind and destroyed at once her half-formed
resolution of telling Frederic that night. She did not know Isabel, and
she could not understand why she should be guilty of a falsehood to
her—a perfect stranger.
“He is not learning to love me, after all,” was the sad cry of her
heart; and, when she spoke again, there was a plaintive tone in her
voice, and Isabel wondered she had not observed before how mournful it
was. And, as they sat talking, there came along the graveled walk a step
familiar to them both, and the color deepened on their cheeks; while in
the kindling light which shone in the eyes of blue, and flashed from the
eyes of black, there was a spark of jealousy, as if each were reading
the secret thoughts of the other.
Frederic had returned from the city earlier than was his custom, for he
usually spent the entire day; but there was something now to draw him
home besides the blind girl, and he was conscious of quickening his
footsteps as he drew near his house, and of watching eagerly for the
flutter of a mourning robe, or the sight of a sunny face, which, he
knew, would smile a welcome. He heard her voice in the parlor, and ere
he was aware of it, he stood in the presence of Isabel. Narrowly Marian
watched him, marvelling somewhat at his perfect self-possession; for
Isabel was to him an object of such indifference that he experienced far
less emotion in meeting her than in speaking to Marian Grey, and asking
if she had been lonely.
“You men are so vain,” said Isabel, with a toss of her head, “and think
we miss you so much. Now I’ll venture to say Miss Grey has not thought
of you in a day. Why should she?”
“Why shouldn’t she?” asked Frederic, giving to Marian a smile which sent
the hot blood tingling to her finger tips.
“‘Why shouldn’t she!’” returned Isabel—“just as though we, girls, ever
think of married men. By the way, have you heard anything definite from
Mrs. Raymond, since she left you so suddenly in New York, or have you
given up the search?”
Marian pitied Frederic then, he turned so white; and she almost hated
Isabel, as she saw the malicious triumph in her eye. Breathlessly, too,
she awaited the answer, which was:
“I shall never abandon the search until I find her, or know certainly
that she is dead. I went to the place where she used to live, not long
ago.”
“Indeed! What did you learn?” and a part of Isabel’s assurance left her,
for she felt that his searching for his wife was a reality with him;
while Marian’s heart grew hopeful and warm again, as she listened to
Frederic Raymond telling Isabel Huntington of that dear old room which
had been her home so long.
“I can’t conceive what made her run away,” said Isabel, fixing her
large, glittering eyes upon Frederic, who coolly replied, “_I can_,” and
then turning to Marian he abruptly commenced a conversation upon an
entirely different subject.
Biting her lip with vexation, Isabel arose to go, saying she should
expect to see Miss Grey at her own house, and that she hoped she would
sometimes bring Mr. Raymond with her.
“You need not be afraid to come,” she continued, addressing herself to
him, “for everybody knows you have a wife, consequently your coming will
create no scandal concerning yourself and _mother_!” and with a hateful
laugh she swept haughtily down the walk.
From this time forth Isabel was a frequent visitor at Riverside, where
she always managed to say something which seriously affected Marian’s
peace of mind and led her to distrust the man who was beginning to feel
far more interest in the Marian found than in the Marian lost. This the
quick-sighted Isabel saw and while her bosom rankled with envy towards
her rival, she exulted in the thought that love her as he might he dared
not tell her of his love, for a barrier the living wife had built
between the two. Though professing the utmost regard for Miss Grey she
did not hesitate to speak against her when an opportunity occurred, but
her shafts fell harmlessly, for where Marian was known she was esteemed
and the wily woman gave up the contest at last and waited anxiously to
see the end.
Towards the last of October, Ben, who was now a petty grocer in a New
England village, came to Riverside for the first time since Marian’s
residence there. Never before had he appeared so happy, and his honest
face was all aglow with his delight at seeing Marian at last where she
belonged.
“You fit in like an odd scissor,” he said to her when they were alone.
“Ain’t it most time to tell?”
“Not yet,” returned Marian. “I would rather wait until I am back at
Redstone Hall. We are going there next month, and then, too, I wish I
knew how much of Isabel’s insinuations to believe.”
“Isabel be hanged,” said Ben. “She lied I know, and mebby that letter
was some of her devilment. Has she washed them curtains yit?”
Marian replied by telling him of the letter from Sarah Green and asking
if he could explain it. But it was all a mystery to him, and he puzzled
his brain with it for a long time, deciding at last that it might have
come from some of her Kentucky acquaintance who chanced to be in New
York, and sent it just for mischief.
“But they overshot the mark,” said he. “You ain’t dead by a great sight,
and I b’lieve I’d let the cat out pretty soon. That makes me think you
wrote that Spottie was here. Where is the critter? ’Twould be good for
sore eyes to see her again.”
Marian went in quest of her, and on her return found Alice with Ben,
who, in her presence, dared not manifest all that he felt at sight of
his old friend. Taking the animal on his lap he looked at it for a
moment with quivering chin; then stroking its soft fur, he said, with a
prolongation of each syllable, which rendered the sound ludicrous,
“_Gri-mal-kin_——poor _gri-mal-kin_,” and a tear dropped on its back.
“What!” exclaimed Alice, coming to his side, “what did you call the
kitty?”
“_Gri-mal-kin_,” answered Ben, adding, by way of explanation, “that, I
b’lieve, is the _Latin_ for cat.”
Marian could not forbear laughing aloud, and as Ben joined with her, it
served to keep him from crying outright, as he otherwise might have
done.
“What are you going to do with it when you go South?” he asked, and upon
Alice’s replying that they should leave it with Mrs. Russell, he
proposed taking it instead and keeping it until Spring, when he could
return it.
This suggestion was warmly seconded by Marian, and as Alice finally
yielded the point, Ben carried Spottie off the next morning, promising
the little girl that it should be well cared for in her absence. Alice
shed a few tears at parting with her pet, but they were like April
showers, and soon passed away in her joyful anticipations of a speedy
removal to Kentucky, for Frederic was going earlier this season than
usual, and the 10th of November was appointed for them to start. If they
met with no delays they would reach Redstone Hall on the anniversary of
Marian’s bridal, and to her it seemed meet that on this day of all
others she should return again to her old home, and she wondered if
Frederic, too, would think of it or send one feeling of regret after his
missing bride. He did remember it, for the November days were always
fraught with memories of the past. This year, however, there was a
difference, for though he thought much of Marian Lindsey, it was not as
he had thought of her before, and he was conscious of a most
unaccountable sensation of satisfaction in knowing that even if she
could not go with him to Kentucky, her place would be tolerably well
filled by Marian Grey!
CHAPTER XXVII.
REDSTONE HALL.
News had been received at Redstone Hall, that the family would be there
on the 13th; but Frederic’s coming home was a common occurrence now, and
did not create as great a sensation among his servants as it once had
done. Still it was an event of considerable importance, particularly as
he was to bring with him a new governess, who, judging from his apparent
anxiety to have everything in order, was a person of more distinction
than the prosy Mrs. Jones, or even the brilliant Isabel. Old Dinah
accordingly worked herself up to her usual pitch of excitement, and
then, long before it was time, started off her spouse, who was to meet
his master at Big Spring Station, and who waited there impatiently at
least an hour ere the whistle and smoke in the distance announced the
arrival of the train.
“We are here at last,” said Frederic, when they stopped before the
depot; and he touched the arm of Marian, who sat leaning against a
window, her head bent down, and her thoughts in such a wild tumult that
she scarcely comprehended what she was doing or where she was.
During the entire journey she had labored under the highest excitement,
which manifested itself sometimes in snatches of merry songs, sometimes
in laughter almost hysterical, and again when no one saw her, in floods
of tears, which failed to cool her feverish impatience. It seemed to her
she could not wait, and she counted every milestone, while her breath
came faster and faster as she knew they were almost there. With a
shudder she glanced at the clump of trees under whose shadow she had
hidden six years before, and those who noticed her face as she passed
out marvelled at its deathly pallor.
“Jest gone with consumption,” was Phil’s mental comment; and he wondered
at the eager, curious glance which she gave to him. “’Spects she never
seen a nigger before,” he muttered; and as by this time the travelers
were comfortably seated in the wide capacious carriage, he chirrupped to
his horses, and they moved rapidly on toward Redstone Hall.
Marian did not try longer to conceal her delight, and Frederic watched
her wonderingly, as with glowing cheeks and beaming eyes she looked
first from one window and then from the other, the color deepening on
her face and the pallor increasing about her mouth, as way-mark after
way-mark was passed and recognized.
“You seem very much excited,” he said to her at last; and, assuming as
calm a manner as possible, she replied:
“For years back the one cherished object of my life was to visit
Kentucky; and now that I am really here, I am so glad! oh, so glad!” and
Frederic could see the gladness shining in her eyes, and making her so
wondrously beautiful to look upon that he was sorry when the twilight
shadows began to fall, and partially obscured his vision.
“There is the house,” he said, pointing to the chimneys, just
discernible above the trees.
But Marian had seen them first, and when as they turned a corner, the
entire building came in view, she sank back upon the cushion, dizzy and
sick with the thoughts which came crowding so fast upon her. The day had
been soft and balmy, and mingled with the gathering darkness was the
yellow, hazy light the sun of the Indian summer often leaves upon the
hills. The early mist lay white upon the river, while here and there a
shower of leaves came rustling down from the tall trees, which grew in
such profusion around the old stone house. And Marian saw
everything—heard everything—and when the horses’ hoofs struck upon the
bridge, where once they fancied she had stood and plunged into eternity,
an icy chill ran through her frame, depriving her of the power to speak
or move. Through the dim twilight she saw the dusky forms gathered
expectantly around the cabin doors—saw the full, rounded figure of Dinah
on the piazza—saw the vine-wreathed pillar where six years ago that very
night, she had leaned with a breaking heart, and wept her passionate
adieu to the man, who, sitting opposite to her now, little dreamed of
what was passing in her mind. In a distant hempfield she heard the song
some negroes sang returning from their labor, and as she listened to the
plaintive music, her tears began to flow, it seemed so natural—so much
like the olden time.
Suddenly as they drew nearer and the song of the negroes ceased the
stillness was broken by the deafening yell which Bruno, from his cage,
sent up. His voice had been the last to bid the runaway good bye, and it
was the first to welcome her back again. With a stifled sob of joy too
deep for utterance, she drew her veil still closer over her face, and
when at last they stopped and the light from the hall shone out upon
her, she sat in the corner of the carriage motionless and still.
“Come, Miss Grey,” said Frederic, when Alice had been safely deposited
and was folded to Dinah’s bosom, “Come, Miss Grey, are you sleeping?”
and he touched the hand which lay cold and lifeless upon her lap. “She
has fainted,” he cried. “The journey and excitement have overtaxed her
strength,” and, taking her in his arms as if she had been a little
child, he bore her into the house and up to her own chamber, for he
rightly guessed that she would rather be there when she returned to
consciousness.
Laying her upon the lounge, he removed her bonnet and veil, and then
kneeling beside her, looked wistfully into her face, which in its
helplessness seemed more beautiful than ever.
“Has she come to, yet?” asked the puffing Dinah, appearing at the door.
“It’s narves what ailed her, I reckon, and I told Lyd to put some
delirian to the steep. That’ll quiet her soonest of anything.”
Frederic knew that his services were no longer needed, and after
glancing about the room to see that everything was right, he went down
stairs leaving Marian to the care of Dinah, who, as her patient began to
show signs of returning consciousness, undressed her as soon as possible
and placed her in the bed, herself sitting by and bathing her face and
hands in camphor and cologne. The fainting fit had passed away, but it
was succeeded by a feeling of such delicious languor that for a long
time Marian lay perfectly still, thinking how nice it was to be again in
her old room with Dinah sitting by, and once as the hard, black hand
rested on her forehead, she took it between her own, murmuring
involuntarily, “Dear Aunt Dinah, I thank you so much.”
“Blessed lamb,” whispered the old lady, “they told her my name, I
’spect. ’Pears like she’s nigher to me than strangers mostly is,” and
she smoothed lovingly the bright hair floating over the pillow.
Twice that evening there came up the stairs a cautious step which
stopped always at the door, and Dinah as often as she answered the
gentle knock, came back to Marian and said, “It’s marster axin’ is you
any wus.”
“Tell him I am only tired, not sick,” Marian would say, and turning on
her pillow, she wept great tears of joy to think that Frederic should
thus care for her.
At last, having drank the “delirian tea,” more to please old Dinah than
from any faith she had in its virtues, she fell into a quiet sleep,
which was disturbed but twice, once when at nine o’clock Bruno was
loosed from his confinement, and with a loud howl went rushing past the
window, and once when Alice crept carefully to her side, holding her
breath lest she should arouse her, and whispering low her nightly
prayer. Then, indeed, Marian moved as if about to waken, and the blind
girl thought she heard her say, “Darling Alice,” but she was not sure,
and she nestled down beside her, sleeping ere long the dreamless sleep
which always came to her after a day of unusual fatigue.
The rosy dawn was just stealing into the room, next morning, when Marian
awoke with a vague, uncertain feeling as to where she was, or what had
happened. Ere long, however, she remembered it all; and, stepping upon
the floor, she glided to the window, to feast her eyes once more upon
her home. Before her lay the garden, and though the November frosts had
marred its Summer glory, it was still beautiful to her; and, hastily
dressing herself, she went forth to visit her olden haunts, strolling
leisurely on until she reached a little Summer-house which had been
built since she was there. Over the door were some pencil marks, in
Frederic’s hand writing; and though the rains had partly washed the
letters away, there were still enough remaining for her to know that
“Marian Lindsey” had been written there.
“He has sometimes thought of me,” she said; and she was about entering
the arbor, when there rose upon the air a terrific yell, which, had she
been an intruder, would have sent her flying from the spot. But she did
not even tremble, and she awaited fearlessly the approach of the huge
creature, which, bristling with rage, came tearing down the graveled
walk, his eyeballs glowing like coals of fire, and his head lowered as
if ready for attack.
Bruno was still on guard, and when, in the distance, he caught a sight
of Marian, he started with a lion like bound, which soon brought him
near to the brave girl, who calmly watched his coming, and, when he was
close upon her, said to him:
“Good old Bruno! Don’t you know me, Bruno?”
At the first sound of her voice, the fire left the mastiff’s eye, for
he, too, caught the tone which had once so startled Alice, and which
puzzled Frederic every day; still, he was not quite assured, and he came
rushing on, while she continued speaking gently to him. With a bound,
half playful, half ferocious, he sprang upon her, and, catching him
around the neck, she passed her hand caressingly over his shaggy mane,
saying to him, softly,
“I am Marian, Bruno! Don’t you know me?”
Then, indeed, he answered her—not with a human tongue, it is true; but
she understood his language well, and by the low, peculiar cry of joy he
gave as he crouched upon the ground, she knew that she was recognised.
Of all who had loved her at Redstone Hall, none remembered her save the
noble dog, who licked her face, her hair, her hands, her dress, her
feet; while all the time his body quivered with the intense delight he
could not speak.
At last as she knelt down beside him, and laid her cheek against his
neck, he bent his head, and gave forth a deep, prolonged howl, which was
answered at a little distance by a cry of horror, and turning quickly
Marian saw Frederic hastening toward the spot, his face pale as ashes,
and his whole appearance indicative of alarm. He had been roused from
sleep by the yell which Bruno gave when he first caught sight of Marian,
and ere he had time to think what it could be, Alice knocked at his
door, exclaiming:
“Oh, Frederic, Miss Grey, I am sure, has gone into the garden, and Bruno
is not yet secured. I heard him bark just like he did last year when he
mangled black Andy so. What if he should tear Miss Grey?”
Frederic waited for no more, but dressing himself quickly he hastened
out, sickening with fear, as he came upon the fresh tracks the dog had
made when going down the walk. He saw Marian’s dress, and through the
lattice he caught a sight of Bruno.
“He has her down! He is drinking her life-blood!” he thought; and for an
instant the pulsations of his heart stood still, nor did they resume
their wonted beat even after he saw the attitude of Marian Grey, and his
terrible watch dog, Bruno.
“Marian!” he began, for he could not be formal then. “Marian! leave him,
I entreat you. He is cruelly savage with strangers.”
“But I have tamed him, you see,” she answered, winding her arms still
closer around his neck, while he licked again her face and hair.
Wonderingly Frederic looked on, and all the while there came to him no
thought that the two had met before—that the hand patting so fondly
Bruno’s head had fed him many a time—and that amid all the changes which
six years had made, the sagacious, animal had recognized his mistress
and playmate, Marian Lindsey.
“It must be that you can win all hearts,” he said, watching her
admiringly, and marvelling at her secret power.
Shaking back her sunny curls, and glancing upward into his face Marian
answered involuntarily:
“No, not all. There is one I would have given worlds to win, but it cast
me off, just when I needed comfort the most.”
She spoke impulsively, and as she spoke there arose within her the wish
that he, like Bruno, might know her then and there. But he did not. He
only remembered what Will Gordon had said of her hopeless attachment and
her apparent confession of the same to him, smote heavily upon his
heart, though why he, a married man, should care he could not tell. He
didn’t really care, he thought; he only pitied her, and by way of
encouragement he said, “Even that may yet be won;” and while he said it,
there came over him a sensation of dreariness, as if the winning of that
heart would necessarily take from him something which was becoming more
and more essential to his happiness.
Their conversation was here interrupted by Josh, who was Bruno’s keeper,
and had come to chain him for the day. Marian knew him at once, though
he had changed from the short, thick lad of twelve to the taller youth
of seventeen; and when, as he saw her position with Bruno, he exclaimed,
“Goo-goo-good Lord!” she turned her beaming face toward him and answered
laughingly, “I have a secret for charming dogs.”
Involuntarily Josh’s old cloth cap came off, while over his countenance
there flitted an expression as if that voice were not entirely strange
to him. Touching his master’s arm, and pointing to the kneeling maiden,
he stammered out:
“Ha-ha-hain’t I s-s-seen her afore?”
“I think not,” answered Frederic, and with a doubtful shake of the head,
Josh attempted to lead Bruno away.
But Bruno would not move, and he clung so obstinately to Marian that she
arose, and patting his side, said playfully:
“I shall be obliged to go with him, I guess. Lead the way, boy.”
With eyes protruding like saucers, Josh turned back, followed by Marian
and Bruno, the latter of whom offered no resistance when his mistress
bade him enter his kennel, though he made wondrous efforts to escape
when he saw that she was leaving him.
“In the name of the Lord,” exclaimed Hetty, shading her eyes with her
hand, to be sure she was right, “if thar ain’t the young lady shettin’
up the dog. I never knowed the like o’ that.”
Then as Marian came towards the kitchen, she continued, “’Pears like
I’ve seen her somewhar.”
“Ye-ye-yes,” chimed in Josh, who had walked faster than Marian.
“Who-o-oo is she, Hetty?”
Marian by this time had reached the door, where she stood smiling
pleasantly upon the blacks, but not daring to call them by name until
she saw Dinah, who courtesied low, and coming forward asked, “Is you
better this mornin’?”
“Yes, quite well, thank you. Are these your companions?” said Marian,
anxious for an opportunity to talk with her old friends.
“Yes, honey,” answered Dinah. “This is Hetty, and this is Lyd, and
this——”
She didn’t finish the sentence, for Hetty, who had been earnestly
scanning Marian’s features, grasped her dress, saying, “Whar was you
born?”
“Jest like them Higginses,” muttered Dinah. “In course, Miss Grey don’t
want to be twitted with bein’ a Yankee the fust thing.”
But Hetty had no intentions of casting reflections upon the place of
Marian’s birth. Like Josh she had detected something familiar in the
young girl’s face, and twice she had swept her hand across her eyes to
clear away the mist and see if possible what it was which puzzled her so
much.
“I was born a great many miles from here,” said Marian, and ere Hetty
could reply, Josh, whose gaze had all the time been riveted upon her,
stuttered out, “Sh-sh-she is-s-s-s like M-m-m-Miss Marian.”
Yes, this was the likeness they had seen, but Marian would rather the
first recognition should come from another source, and she hastened to
reply, “Oh, Mrs. Raymond, you mean. Alice noticed it when I first went
to Riverside. You suppose your young mistress dead, do you not?”
Instantly Dinah’s woolen apron was called into use, while she said,
“Yes, poor dear lamb; if thar’s any truth in them Scripter sayin’s,
she’s a burnin’ and a shining light in de kingdom come.” And the old
negress launched forth into a long eulogy, in the midst of which
Frederic appeared in quest of Marian.
“I am listening to praises of your wife,” she said, and there was a
mischievous triumph in her eye as she saw how his forehead flushed, for
he was beginning to be slightly annoyed when she, as she often did,
alluded to his wife.
Why need she thrust that memory continually upon him? Was it not enough
for him to know that somewhere in the world there _was_ a wife, and that
he would rather hear any one else speak of her than the bright-haired
Marian Grey.
“Dinah can be very eloquent at times,” he said, “but come with me to
Alice. She has been sadly frightened on your account,” and he led the
way to the piazza, where the blind girl was waiting for them.
Breakfast being over, Marian and Alice sought the parlor, where, instead
of the old fashioned instrument which the former remembered as standing
there, she found a new and beautifully carved piano.
“Frederic ordered this on purpose to please you,” whispered Alice. “He
said it was a shame for you to play on the other rattling thing.”
This was sufficient to call out Marian’s wildest strains, and as a
matter of course the entire band of servants gathered about the door to
listen just as they once had done when the performer was Isabel. As was
quite natural, they yielded their preference to the last comer, old
Hetty acknowledging that even “Miss Beatrice couldn’t beat that.”
It would seem that Marian Grey was destined to take all hearts by storm,
for ere the day was done her virtues had been discussed in the kitchen
and by the cabin fire, while even the gallant Josh, at his work in the
hempfield, attempted a song, which he meant to be laudatory of her
charms, but as he was somewhat lacking in poetical talent, his music ran
finally into the well known ballad of “Mary Ann,” which suited his
purpose quite as well.
Meantime, Marian, stealing away from Alice, quietly explored every nook
and corner of the house, opening first the little box where she once had
kept her mother’s hair. It was just as she had left it, and kissing it
reverently she placed it by the side of her silken locks, to see how
they compared. It might be that the tress of the dead had faded
somewhat, for there was certainly a richer, darker tinge to her own wavy
hair, and bowing her head upon the bureau she dropped tears of
thankfulness that her childhood’s prayer had been more than answered.
The library was visited next, and she seated herself again in the chair
where she had sat when penning her last farewell to Frederic. Where was
that letter now? She wished that she could see it, though she did not
care to read it, and without any expectation of finding it she pressed
what she knew was the secret spring to a private drawer. It yielded to
her touch—the drawer came open, and there before her lay the letter—her
letter—she knew it by its superscription, and by its tear-stained,
soiled appearance. She had wept over it herself, but she knew full well
her tears alone had never blurred and blotted it like this. Frederic’s
had mingled with them, and her heart was trembling with joy when another
object caught her eye and quickened her rapid pulsations. Her glove! the
little black kid glove she had dropped upon the bridge was there,
wrapped in a sheet of paper, and with it the handkerchief!
“Frederic has saved them all,” she whispered, shuddering involuntarily,
for it seemed almost like looking into the grave, where he had buried
these sad remembrances of her. He had preserved them carefully, she
thought, and she continued her investigation, coming at last upon a
daguerreotype of herself, taken when she was just fifteen.
“Oh, horror!” she cried, and sinking back in her chair, she laughed
until the tears ran at the forlorn little face which looked upon her so
demurely from the casing. “Frederic must enjoy looking at you vastly,
and thinking you are his wife,” she said, and she felt a thrill of pride
in knowing that Marian Grey bore scarcely the slightest resemblance to
that daguerreotype.
There was a similarity in the features and in the way the hair grew
around the forehead, while the eyes were really alike. But the likeness
extended no further, and she did not wonder that none, save Bruno, had
recognized her. Returning the picture to its place, she was about to
leave the room, when Frederic came in, appearing somewhat surprised to
find her there, sitting in his chair as if she had a perfect right so to
do. At first she was too much confused to apologize, but she managed at
last to say:
“This cozy room attracted me, and I took the liberty to enter. You have
a very fine library, I think; some of the books must have been your
father’s.”
It was the books, of course, which she came to see, and sitting down
opposite to her Frederic talked with her about them until she chanced to
spy a portrait, put away behind the ponderous sofa, with its face turned
to the wall.
“Whose is it?” she asked, directing Frederic’s attention to it. “Whose
is it, and why is it hidden there?”
Instantly the young man’s face grew dark, and Marian trembled beneath
the glance he bent upon her. Then the cold, hard look passed away, and
he replied:
“It is an unfinished portrait of Mrs. Raymond, taken from a
daguerreotype of her when she was only fifteen. But the artist did not
understand his business, and it looks even worse than the original.”
This last was spoken bitterly, and Marian felt the hot blood rising to
her cheeks.
“I never even told Alice of it,” he continued, “but put it away in here,
where I hide all my secrets.”
He glanced at the private drawer—so did Marian; but she was too intent
upon seeing a portrait which could look worse than the daguerreotype to
heed aught else, and she said, entreatingly, “Oh, Mr. Raymond, please
let me see it, won’t you? I lived in New York a long time, you know, and
perhaps I may have met her, or even known her under some other name? May
I see it?” and she was advancing toward the sofa, when Frederic seized
both her hands, and holding them in his, said, half hesitatingly, half
mournfully:
“Miss Grey, you must excuse me for refusing your request. Poor Marian
was far from being handsome, nay, I sometimes thought her positively
ugly. She is certainly so in the portrait, and a creature as highly
gifted with beauty as you, might laugh at her plain features, but if you
did—” He paused a moment, and Marian’s eye-lashes fell beneath his
steady gaze—“And if you did,” he continued, “I never could like you
again, for she was my wife, and as such must be respected.”
Marian could not tell why it was, but Frederic’s words and manner
affected her painfully. She half feared she had offended him by her
eagerness to see the portrait, while mingled with this was a strange
feeling of pity for poor, plain Marian Lindsey, as she probably looked
upon the canvas, and a deep respect for Frederic, who would, if
possible, protect her from even the semblance of insult. Her heart was
already full, and, releasing her hands from Frederic’s, she resumed her
seat, and leaning her head upon the writing desk, burst into tears,
while Frederic paced the room, wondering what, under the circumstances,
he was expected to do. He knew just how to soothe Alice, but Marian Grey
was a different individual. He could not take her in his lap and kiss
away her tears, but he could at least speak to her; and he did at last,
laying his hand as near the little white one grasping the table edge as
he dared, and saying, very gently:
“If I spoke harshly to you, Miss Grey, I am sorry—very sorry; I really
did not intend to make you cry. I only felt that I could not bear to
hear you, of all others, laugh at my poor Marian, and so refused your
request. Will you forgive me?”
And by some chance, as he looked another way, his hand did touch hers,
and held it, too! He did not think that an insult to the portrait at
all, nor yet of the supposed original; for there was something in the
way the snowy fingers twined themselves round his, which drove all other
ideas from his mind, and for one brief instant he was supremely happy.
From the first he had thought of Marian Grey as a sweet, beautiful young
creature, whom some man would one day delight to call his own; but the
possibility of loving her himself had never occurred to him until now,
when, like a flash of lightning, the conviction burst upon him that,
spite of Marian Lindsey—spite of his marriage vow—spite of the humble
origin which would once have shocked his pride—and spite of everything,
Marian Grey had won a place in his heart from which he must dislodge
her. But, how? He could not send her away, for she seemed a part of
himself, and he could not live without her; but he would stifle his
new-born love, he said, and as the best means of doing so, he would talk
to her often of his wife as a person who certainly had an existence, and
would some day come back to him; so, when Marian replied:
“I feared you were angry with me, Mr. Raymond; I would not have asked to
see the portrait had I supposed you really cared,” he drew his chair at
a respectful distance and said: “I cannot explain the matter to you, but
if you knew the whole sad story of my marriage, and the circumstances
which led to it, you would not wonder that I am somewhat sensitive upon
the subject. I used to think beauty the principal thing I should require
in a wife, but poor Marian had none of that, and were you to see the
wretched likeness, you would receive altogether too unfavorable an
impression of her; for, notwithstanding her plain face, she was far too
good for me.”
“Do you really think so?” was Marian’s eager exclamation, while close
behind it was the secret struggling hard to escape, but she forced it
back, until such time as she should be convinced that Frederic loved her
as Marian Grey, and would hail with delight the news that she was indeed
his wife.
He seemed surprised at her question, but he answered, unhesitatingly:
“Yes; far too good for me.”
“And do you really wish to find her?” was Marian’s next question, which
brought a flush to Frederic’s face, and caused him to hesitate a little
ere he replied.
Yesterday he would have said Yes, at once, but since coming into that
library he had discovered that the finding of his wife would be less
desirable than before. But it should not be so. He would crush every
thought or feeling which detracted in the least from his late interest
in Marian Lindsey, and with a great effort he said:
“I really wish to find her;” adding, as he saw a peculiar expression
flit over Marian’s face; “Wouldn’t you, too, be better pleased if
Redstone Hall had a mistress?”
“Yes, provided that mistress were your wife, Marian Lindsey,” was the
ready answer; and, looking into her face, Frederic was conscious of an
uneasy sensation, for Miss Grey’s words would indicate that the presence
of his wife would give her real pleasure.
Of course, then, she did not care for him, as he cared for her; and why
should she? He asked himself this question many a time after the chair
opposite him was vacant, and she had left him there alone. Why should
she, when she came to him with the knowledge that he was already bound
to another. She might not have liked him perhaps had he been free,
though, in that case, he could have won her love, and compelled her to
forget the man who did not care for her. Taking the high-backed chair
she had just vacated, he rested his elbow upon the table, and tried to
fancy that Marian Lindsey had never crossed his path, and Marian Grey
had never loved another. It was a pleasant picture he drew of himself
were Marian Grey his wife, and his heart fairly bounded as he thought of
her stealing to his side, and placing upon his arm those little soft
white hands of hers, while her blue eyes looked into his own, and her
rose-bud lips called him “Husband!” and, as he thought, it seemed to him
more and more that it must one day be so. She would be his at last, and
the sun of his domestic bliss would shine upon him all the brighter for
the dreary darkness which had overshadowed him so long. From this dream
of happiness there came ere long a waking, and burying his face in his
hands he moaned aloud, “It cannot be, and the hardest part of all to
bear is the wretched thought that but for my dastardly, unmanly act, it
might, perhaps, have been—but now, never! never! Oh, Marian Grey! Marian
Grey! I would that we had never met!”
“Frederic, didn’t you hear me coming? I made a heap of noise,” said a
voice close to his side, and Alice’s arm was thrown across his neck.
She had heard all he was saying, but she did not comprehend it until he
muttered the name of Marian Grey, and then the truth flashed upon her.
“Poor Frederic,” she said, soothingly, “I pity you so much, for though
it is wicked, I am sure you cannot help it.”
“Help what?” he asked, rather impatiently, for this one secret he hoped
to bury from the whole world, but the blind girl had discovered it, and
she answered unhesitatingly:
“Can’t help loving Marian Grey. I’ve been fearful you would,” she
continued, as he made no reply. “I did not see how you could well help
it, either, she is so beautiful and good, and every night I pray that if
our own Marian is really dead God will let us know.”
This was an entire change in Alice. Hitherto she had pleaded a living
Marian—now she suggested one deceased, but Frederic repelled the thought
at once.
“Marian was not dead,” he said, “and though he admired Miss Grey, he had
no right to love her. He didn’t intend to, either, and if Alice had
discovered anything, he trusted she would forget it.”
And this was all the satisfaction he would give the little girl, who,
feeling that he would rather be alone, turned away, leaving him again
with his unhappy thoughts.
That night he joined the young girls in the parlor and compelled himself
to listen while Marian made the old walls echo with her ringing, merry
music. But he would not look at her, nor watch her snowy fingers
sweeping over the keys, lest they should make worse havoc with his
heartstrings than they had already done. At an early hour he sought his
chamber where the livelong night he fought manfully with the love which,
now that he acknowledged its existence, grew rapidly in intensity and
strength. It was not like the love he had felt for Isabel—it was deeper,
purer, more absorbing, and what was stranger far than all, he could not
feel that it was wicked, and he trembled when he thought how hardened he
had become.
The next day, which was the Sabbath, he determined to see as little of
Marian as possible, but when at the breakfast table she asked him in her
usual frank, open-hearted way to go with her to church, he could not
refuse, and he went, feeling a glow of pride at the sensation he knew
she was creating, and wondering why she should be so excited.
“I cannot keep the secret much longer,” Marian thought, as she looked
upon the familiar faces of her friends, and longed to hear them call her
by her real name. “I will at least tell Alice who I am, and if she can
convince me that Frederic would be glad, I will perhaps explain to him.”
When church was out, Mrs. Rivers, who still lived at her father’s,
pressed forward for an introduction, and after it was over, whispered a
few words to Frederic, who replied, “Not in the least,” so decidedly
that Marian heard him, and wondered what Agnes’ remark could have been.
She was not long left in doubt, for as they were riding home, Frederic
turned to her and said: “Mrs. Rivers thinks you look like my wife.”
Marian’s cheeks were scarlet, as she replied:
“Josh and Hetty thought so, too, and it is possible there may be a
resemblance.”
“Not the slightest,” returned Frederic, half vexed that any one should
presume to liken the beautiful girl at his side to one as plain as he
had always considered Marian Lindsey to be.
Leaning back in the carriage, he relapsed into a thoughtful mood, which
was interrupted once by Marian’s asking “if he believed he should know
his wife in case he met her accidentally?”
“Know her? Yes—from all the world!” was the hasty answer; and, wrapping
his shawl still closer about him, Frederic did not speak again until
they stopped at their own door.
That night, as Marian sat with Alice in their chamber, she said to the
little girl:
“If you could have any wish gratified which you chose to make, what
would it be?”
For an instant Alice hesitated—then her eyes filled with tears, and, and
winding her arms around her teacher’s neck, she whispered:
“At first I thought I’d rather have my sight—but only for a moment—and
then I wished, if Marian were not dead, she would come back to us, for
I’m afraid Frederic is getting bad again, though he cannot help it, I’m
sure.”
“What do you mean?” Marian asked, and Alice replied:
“Don’t you know? Can’t you guess? Don’t you hear it in his voice when he
speaks to you?”
Marian made no response, and Alice continued:
“Frederic seems determined to love everybody better than Marian, and
though I love you more than I can tell, I want her to come back so
much.”
“And if you knew she were coming, when would you rather it should be?”
asked Marian, and Alice replied:
“Now—to-night; but as that is impossible, I’d be satisfied with
Christmas. Yes, on the whole, I’d rather it would be then; I should call
her our Christmas Gift, and it would be the dearest, sweetest one that I
could have.”
“Darling Alice,” thought Marian, “your wish shall be gratified.”
And, kissing the blind girl affectionately, she resolved that on the
coming Christmas, one at least of the inmates of Redstone Hall should
know that Marian Grey was only another name for the runaway Marian
Lindsey.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
TELLING ALICE.
One by one the bright November days went by and the hazy Indian Summer
light faded from the Kentucky hills, where now the December sun was
shining cold and clear. And as the weeks passed away, there hung over
Redstone Hall a dark, portentous cloud, and they who had waited so
eagerly the coming of the holidays trembled lest the merry Christmas
song should prove a funeral dirge for the pet and darling of them all.
Alice was dying, so the physician said, while Dinah, too, had prophesied
that ere the New Year came the eyes which never in this world had looked
upon the light would be opened to the glories of the better land.
For many weary days and nights the fever flame had burned in the young
girl’s veins, but it had left her now, and like a fragile lily she lay
among her pillows, talking of Heaven and the grave as something very
near to her. Noiselessly Marian trod across the floor, holding back her
breath and speaking in soft whispers, lest she should disturb the little
sufferer whose side she never for a moment left except to take the rest
she absolutely needed. Frederic, too, often shared her vigils, feeling
almost as anxious for one as for the other. Both were very dear to him,
and Marian, as she witnessed his tender care of Alice, and his anxiety
for herself lest her strength should be overtasked, felt more and more
that he was worthy of her love. Alice, too, appreciated his goodness, as
she had never done before, and once when he sat alone with her, and
Marian was asleep, she passed her hand caressingly over his face and
said:
“Dear Frederic, you have been so kind to me, that I am sure God has some
good in store for you.”
Then as she remembered what would probably be the greatest good to him,
she continued, “I know what’s in your heart, and I pity you so much, but
there is light ahead; I’ve thought strange things, and dreamed strange
dreams since I lay here so sick, and as I once was certain Marian was
alive, so now I’m almost certain that she’s dead.”
“Hush, Alice, hush,” said Frederic, laying his head upon the pillow
beside her, but Alice did not heed him, and she continued—
“I never saw her in this world, and maybe I shan’t know her right away,
though next to mother, I reckon she’ll be the first to welcome me to
Heaven, if she’s there, and I know she is, or we should have heard from
her. I shall tell her of her old home, Frederic; tell her how we mourned
for her when we thought that she was dead. I don’t know what it was that
made her go away, but I shall tell her you repented of the act, and how
you looked for her so long, and that if you had found her you would have
loved her, sure. That will not be a lie, will it, Frederic?”
“No, darling, no,” was the faintly spoken answer, and Alice continued:
“Then, when I have explained all, I’ll steal away from Heaven, just long
enough to come and tell you she is there. You’ll be in the library,
maybe, and I reckon ’twill be dark, though if you’d any rather, I’ll
come in the daytime, and when you feel there’s somebody near, somebody
you can’t see, you may know that it is me come to say that you are free
to love the other Marian.”
“Don’t, Alice, don’t,” said Frederic, for it made his heart bleed afresh
to hear her talk of what he had no hope would ever be.
But Alice’s faith was stronger, and to Marian Grey she sometimes talked
in a similar strain, saying “she knew she should meet the other one in
Heaven,” and Marian, while listening to her, felt that she must
undeceive her. “It may possibly make her better,” she thought, and when,
at last, the Christmas eve had come, and it was her turn to watch that
night, she determined to tell her, if she fancied that she had strength
to bear it. One by one, the family servants retired, and when at last
they were alone, Marian drew her chair close beside the bed, wondering
how she should commence, and what effect it would have upon the little
girl, who erelong awoke, and said to her:
“I’ve been dreaming of Marian, and I thought she looked like you do—but
she don’t of course; and I wonder how I’ll know her from my mother, for
she, too, was young when she died. If it were you, Miss Grey, I could
tell you so easily, for I should look among the brightest angels there,
and the one who sang the sweetest song and had the fairest face, would
certainly be Marian Grey: but the other Marian—how shall I know
her—think?”
Leaning forward so that her hot cheek touched the pale one of the sick
girl, Marian said:
“Wouldn’t you know her by her voice?”
“I’m afraid not,” answered Alice; “I thought you were she at first when
I heard you speak.”
“How is it now, darling?” Marian asked, in a voice so tremulous that
Alice started, and her white face flushed as she replied: “You are not
like her now, except at times, and then—it’s all so queer. There’s a
mystery about you, Miss Grey—and seems sometimes just like I didn’t know
what to think—you puzzle me so!”
“Shall I tell you, Alice? Have you strength to hear who and what I am?”
Marian asked; and Alice answered eagerly;
“Yes—tell me—do?”
“And you’ll promise not to faint, nor scream, nor reveal it to anybody,
unless I say you may?”
“It must be something terrible to make me faint or scream!”
“Not terrible, dearest, but strange!” and sitting down upon the bed,
Marian wound her arm around the little girl.
It was a hazardous thing the telling that secret then, but Marian did
not realize what she was doing, and in as calm a voice as she could
command, she began:
“People call me Marian Grey, but that is not my name!”
“Not Marian Grey!” and the brown eyes flashed wonderingly. “Who are you,
then, Marian what?”
Marian did not reply to this question, but said instead: “I had seen you
before that night at Riverside.”
“Seen me where?” and the little fingers trembled with an indefinable
dread of the shock which she instinctively felt was waiting for her.
“I had seen you many times,” said Marian, “and that is why my voice is
familiar. Put your hand upon my face again, and maybe you will know it.”
“I can’t, I can’t! You frighten me so!” gasped Alice, and Marian
continued:
“I must have changed much, for they who used to know me have never
suspected that I am in their midst again—none but Bruno. Do you remember
my power over him? Bruno and I were playmates together.”
Marian paused and gazed earnestly at the child, who lay panting in her
arms, her face upturned and the blind eyes fixed upon hers with an
intensity she had never before seen equalled. In the deep stillness of
the room she could hear the loud beating of Alice’s heart, and see the
bed-clothes rise and fall with every throb.
“Alice,” she said at last, “don’t you know me now?” and in her voice
there was a world of yearning tenderness and love.
“_Yes_,” and over the marble face there shone a smile of almost seraphic
sweetness. “You are _Marian_—my Marian—Frederic’s Marian—Dinah’s
Marian—_All of us Marian!_” and with a low, hysterical cry the blind
girl crept close to the bosom of her long lost friend.
Stretching out her feeble arms she wound them round Marian’s neck, and
raising herself upon her elbow, kissed her lips, her cheek, her
forehead, her hair, whispering all the time, “Blessed Marian—precious
Marian—beautiful Marian—our Marian—Frederic’s, and mine, and
everybody’s. Oh, I don’t want to go to heaven now: I’d rather stay with
you. Call him—call Frederic, quick, and tell him. Why haven’t you told
him before? Ho, Frederic, come here!” and the feeble voice raised to its
highest pitch, went ringing through the room and penetrated even to the
adjoining chamber, where, since Alice’s illness, Frederic had slept.
“Alice,” said Marian, “if you love me, you will not tell him now. I am
not ready yet.”
“What if I should die?” Alice asked, and Marian replied:
“You won’t die. I almost know you won’t. Promise, Alice, promise,” she
continued, as she heard Frederic’s step in the hall without.
“How can I—how can I? It will choke me to death!” was Alice’s answer,
and the next moment Frederic had crossed the threshold of the door.
“What is it, Miss Grey?” he asked. “Didn’t you call?”
“Alice is rather excited, that’s all,” said Marian, “and you can go
back. We do not wish to disturb you.”
“Frederic,” came a faint whisper from the bedside, and knowing that
farther remonstrance was useless, Marian stood like a rock, while
Frederic advanced toward the child, who lay with her head thrown back,
the great tears rolling down her cheeks, and the great joy of what she
had heard, shining out all over her little face.
“Did you want me, birdie?” he asked, but ere he had ceased speaking,
Marian was at his side.
Alice knew that she was there, and she pressed both hands upon her lips
to force back the secret she had been forbidden to divulge.
“Is she delirious?” Frederic asked, and shaking her head, Alice
whispered: “No, no, but happy, so happy. Oh, Frederic, I don’t want to
die! Must I? If I take a heap of Doctor’s stuff, will I get well,
think?”
“I hope so,” said Frederic, his suspicions of insanity rapidly
increasing.
“Give me your hand,” she continued, “and yours, too, Miss Grey.”
Both were extended, and joining them together she said, “Love her,
Frederic. Love her all you want to. You may—you may. It isn’t wicked.
Oh, Marian, Marian.”
The last word was a whisper, and as it died away, Marian seized
Frederic’s arm, and said, beseechingly: “Please leave the room, Mr.
Raymond. You see she is excited, and I can quiet her best alone. Will
you go?”
The brown eyes looked reproachfully at her and entreatingly at him, but
neither heeded the expression, and with a feeling that he scarcely
understood what the whole proceeding meant, and why he had been called
in if he must be summarily dismissed, Frederic went out, leaving Marian
alone with Alice.
“Why didn’t you let me tell him?” the latter asked, and Marian replied,
“I shall tell him by and by: but I am not ready yet, and you must not
betray me.”
“I’ll try,” said Alice, “but ’tis so hard. I had to bite my tongue to
keep the words from coming. Where have you been? Why didn’t you come to
us before. How came you so beautiful—so grand?” Alice asked, all in the
same breath.
But Marian absolutely refused to answer the question until she had
become quiet and been refreshed with sleep.
“All in good time, dearest,” she said, “but you must rest now. You are
wearing out too fast, and you know you do not want to die.”
This was the right chord to touch, and it had the desired effect.
“Let me ask _one_ question, and say _one_ thing,” said Alice, “and I
won’t talk another word till morning. When you are ready may _I_ tell
Frederic, if I ain’t dead?”
“Yes, darling,” was the ready answer, and winding her arms round
Marian’s neck, the blind girl continued: “Isn’t it almost morning?”
“Yes, dear.”
“And when it is, won’t it be Christmas day?”
“Yes, but you have asked three questions, instead of one.”
“I know—I know; but; what I want to say is this: I wished my Christmas
gift might be Marian, and it is. Last year it was of a beautiful little
pony, but you are worth ten hundred million ponies. Oh, I’m so glad—so
glad,” and on the childish face there was a look of perfect happiness.
Even after she shut her eyes and tried to sleep her lips continued to
move, and Marian could hear the whispered words: “Our own Marian—our
blessed Marian.”
The excitement was too much for Alice, and when next morning the
physician came, he pronounced her worse than she had been the previous
night.
“But I ain’t going to die,” said Alice resolutely; “I can’t die now,”
and it was this very determination on her part which did more to save
her life than all the doctor’s drugs or Dinah’s wonderful tears.
For many days she seemed hovering between life and death, while Marian
never for a moment left her, and Alice was more quiet when she was
sitting by, holding her feverish hand; she seemed to have lost all her
desire to tell, for she never made any attempt so to do, though she
persisted in calling her teacher Marian, and a look of pain always
flitted over her face when she heard her addressed as Miss Grey.
Sometimes she would start up, and winding her arms around her neck would
whisper in her ear, “Are you Marian for sure—our Marian, I mean?”
“Yes, Marian Lindsey, sure,” would be the answer, and the little girl
would fall away again into a half unconscious state, a smile of joy
wreathing her white lips, and an expression of peace resting on her
face.
At last, just as the New Year’s morning dawned, she woke from a deep,
unbroken sleep, and Marian and Frederic, who watched beside her, knew
that she was saved. There were weeks of convalescence, and Dinah often
wondered at Alice’s patience in staying so long and willingly in the
chamber where she had suffered so much. But to Alice that sick room was
a second paradise and Marian the bright angel whose presence made all
the sunlight of her life.
Gradually as she could bear it, Marian told her everything which had
come to her since she left Redstone Hall, and Alice’s eyes grew
strangely bright when she heard that the bracelet she had always prized
so much was made from Marian’s hair, and that Ben’s visit to Kentucky
was all a plan of his to see if Frederic were married.—Greatly was she
shocked when she heard of the letter which had almost taken Marian’s
life.
“Frederic never did that cruel thing,” she knew.
“But ’twas in his handwriting,” said Marian, “and until the mystery is
cleared away, I cannot forgive him.”
For a long time Alice sat absorbed in thought, then suddenly starting
forward, she cried: “I know, Marian. I know now, Isabel did it. I’m sure
she did. I remember it all so plain.”
“Isabel,” repeated Marian: “how could she? What do you mean?”
“Why,” returned Alice, “You say you sent it a few weeks after you went
away, and I remember so well Frederic’s going to Lexington one day,
because that was the time it came to me that you were not dead. It was
the first morning, too, that Isabel heard my lessons, and she scolded
because I didn’t remember quick, when I was thinking all the time of
you, and my heart was aching so. For some reason, I can’t tell what, I
showed her that note you left for me. You remember it; don’t you? It
read:
“Darling Alice! Precious Alice: If my heart were not already broken, it
would break in leaving you.”
“Yes, yes; I remember,” said Marian, and Alice continued:
“She said your handwriting was queer, when she gave me back the note.
That evening, Josh came back from Frankfort with a heap of letters for
Frederic, and one of them I know was from you. I was standing out under
the big maple tree thinking of you, when Isabel came and asked to take
the note again, and I let her have it. Ever so long after, I started to
go into the library, for I heard somebody rustling papers, and I didn’t
know but Dud was doing mischief. Just as I got to the door, I heard a
voice like Isabel’s only sounded scared like, exclaim, ‘It is from her,
but he shall never see it, never;’ or something like that, and when I
called to her she wouldn’t answer me until I got close to her, and then
she laughed as if she was choked, and said she was trying to frighten
me. Marian, that _her_ was you, and that _he_ was Frederic. She copied
his writing, and sent the letter back because she wanted Frederic
herself.”
“Could she do such a thing,” said Marian more to herself than to Alice,
who replied:
“She can do anything; for Dinah says she’s one of the ——, I reckon that
I’ll skip that word in there, because it’s almost swearing, but it means
_Satan’s unaccountables_,” and Alice’s voice dropped to a whisper at
what she fancied to be profanity.
Marian could understand why Isabel should do such a wicked thing even
better than Alice, and after reflecting upon it for a time, she accepted
it as a fact, and even suggested the possibility of Isabel’s having been
the author of the letter from Sarah Green.
“She was! she was!” cried Alice, starting to her feet! “It’s just like
her—for she thought Frederic would surely want to marry her then. I know
she wrote it, and managed to get it to New York somehow;” and as is
often the case poor Isabel was compelled to bear more than her share of
the fraud, for Marian, too, believed that she had been in some way
implicated with the letter from Sarah Green.
“And I may tell Frederic now—mayn’t I?” said Alice. “Suppose we set
to-morrow, when he’s in the library among the letters. He’ll wonder what
I’m coming in there for, all wrapped up in shawls. But he’ll know plenty
quick, for it will be just like me to tell it all at once, and he will
be so glad. Don’t you wish it was to-morrow now?”
Marian could not say she did, for she had hoped for more decisive
demonstration of affection on Frederic’s part ere she revealed herself
to him, but Alice was so anxious, and had waited so patiently, that she
at last consented, and when at supper she met Frederic as usual, she was
conscious of a different feeling towards him than she had ever
experienced before. He seemed unusually dejected, though exceedingly
kind to her, talking but little, it is true, but evincing, in various
ways, the interest he felt in her, and even asking her to sit with him
awhile ere returning to Alice’s chamber. There was evidently something
on his mind which he wished to say, but whatever it might have been,
seven o’clock found it still unsaid, and as Alice retired at that hour,
Marian arose to go.
“Must you leave me?” he said, rising too, and accompanying her to the
door. “Yes, you must!” and Marian little guessed the meaning these three
words implied.
She only felt that she was not indifferent to him—that the story Alice
was to tell him on the morrow would be received with a quiet kind of
happiness at least—that he would not bid her go away as she once had
done before—and with the little blind girl, she, too, began to think the
morrow would never come.
CHAPTER XXIX.
TELLING FREDERIC.
It was midnight, and from the windows of the library at Redstone Hall
there shone a single light, its dim rays falling upon the haggard face
of the weary man, who, since parting from Marian in the parlor, had sat
there just as he was sitting now, unmindful of the lapse of
time—unmindful of every thing save the fierce battle he was waging with
himself. Hour by hour—day by day—week by week, had his love for Marian
Grey increased, until now he could no more control it than he could stay
the mighty torrent in its headlong course. It was all in vain that he
kept or tried to keep Marian Lindsey continually before his mind, saying
often to himself: “She is my wife—she is alive, and I must not love
another.”
He did not care for Marian Lindsey. He did not wish to find her now—he
almost hoped he never should, though even that would avail him nothing,
unless he knew to a certainty that she were really dead. Perhaps he
never could know, and as he thought of the long, dreary years in which
he must live on with that terrible uncertainty forever haunting him, he
pressed his hands upon his burning forehead and cried aloud: “My
punishment is greater than I can bear. Oh, Marian Grey, can it be that
you, who might have been the angel of my life, were sent to avenge the
wrongs of that other Marian?”
He knew it was wicked, this intense, absorbing passion for Marian Grey,
but he could not feel it so, and he would have given half his
possessions for the sake of abandoning himself for one brief hour to
this love—for the sake of seeing her eyes of blue meet with the look he
had so often fancied her giving to the man she loved. And she loved him!
He was sure of it! He saw it those nights when he watched with her by
Alice’s bedside; he had seen it since in the sudden flushing of her
cheek and the falling of her eyes when he approached. And it was this
discovery which prompted him to the act he meditated. Not both of them
could stay there, himself and Marian, for he would not that she should
suffer more than need be. She had recovered from her first and early
love; she would get over this, and if she were only happy, it didn’t
matter how desolate her going would leave him, for she must go, he said.
He had come to that decision, sitting there alone, and it had wrung
great drops of perspiration from his brow and moans of anguish from his
lips. But it must be—there was no alternative, he thought, and in the
chair where Marian Lindsey once had written her farewell, he wrote to
Marian Lindsey’s rival that Redstone Hall could be her home no longer.
“Think not that you have displeased me,” he said, “for this is not why I
send you from me. Both of us cannot stay, and though for Alice’s sake I
would gladly keep you here, it must not be. I am going to New Orleans,
to be absent three or four weeks, and shall not expect to find you here
on my return. You will need money, and I enclose a check for a thousand
dollars. Don’t refuse to take it, for I give it willingly, and though my
conduct is sadly at variance with my words, you must believe me when I
say that in all the world you have not so true a friend, as
“FREDERIC RAYMOND.”
Many times he read this letter over, and it was not until long after
midnight that he sought his pillow, only to toss from side to side with
feverish unrest, and he was glad when at last Josh came in to make the
fire, for by that token he knew it was morning.
“Tell Dinah I will breakfast in my room,” he said, “and say to Phil that
he must have the carriage ready early, for I am going to New Orleans,
and he will carry me to Frankfort.”
“Ye-e-es, Sir,” was Josh’s answer, as he departed with the message.
“Marster have breakfast in his room, and a goin’ to New Orleans? In the
Lord’s name what’s happened him?” exclaimed Dinah, and when Marian came
down to her solitary meal, she repeated the story to her, asking if she
could explain it.
“Marster’s looked desput down in the mouth a long time back,” she said.
“What you ’spect ’tis?”
Marian could not tell; neither did she venture a suggestion, so fearful
was she that Frederic’s intended departure would interfere with the plan
of which Alice had talked incessantly since daylight. Hastily finishing
her breakfast, she hurried back to her chamber, whither the note had
preceded her.
“Luce brought this to you from Frederic,” said Alice, passing her the
letter, “and she says he looks like he was crazy. Read it and see what
he wants.”
Marian accordingly tore open the envelope, and with blanched cheek and
quivering lip read that she must go again from Redstone Hall, and worse
than all, there was no tangible reason assigned for the cruel mandate.
The check next caught her eye, and with a proud, haughty look upon her
face, she tore it in fragments and scattered them upon the floor, for it
seemed an idle mockery for him to offer what was already hers.
“What is it, Marian?” asked Alice, and recovering her composure Marian
read to her what Frederic said while Alice’s face grew white as hers had
done before.
“You go away!” she exclaimed, bounding upon the floor and feeling for
the warm shawl which she wore when sitting up. “You won’t do any such
thing. You’ve as much right here as he has, and I’m going this minute to
tell him so.”
She had groped her way to the door and was just opening it when Marian
held her back, saying:
“You must not go out undressed and barefooted as you are. The halls are
cold. Wait here while I go and learn the reason of this sudden freak.”
“But I want so much to tell him myself,” said Alice, and Marian replied,
“So you shall, I’ll send Dinah up to dress you and then I will come for
you when it’s time.”
This pacified Alice, who already began to feel faint with her exertions,
and she crept back to bed, while Marian descended the stairs, going
first to Dinah as she had promised, and then with a beating heart
turning her steps toward the library. It was much like facing the wild
beast in its lair, confronting Frederic in his present savage mood. He
felt himself as if his reason were overturned, for the deliberate giving
up of Marian Grey, and the feeling that he should probably never look
upon her face again, had stirred, as it were, the very depths of his
heart’s blood, and in a state of mind bordering upon distraction, he was
making the necessary preparations for his hasty journey, when a timid
knock was heard outside the door.
“Who’s there? I’m very busy,” was his loud, imperious answer, but Marian
was not to be thus baffled, and turning the knob, she entered without
further ceremony, recoiling back a pace or two when she met the
expression of Frederic’s eye.
With his hands full of papers, which he was thrusting into his pocket,
his hair disordered and his face white as ashes, he turned toward her,
saying; “Why are you here, Miss Grey? Haven’t you caused me pain enough
already? Have you received my note?”
“I have,” she answered, advancing still further into the room. “And I
have come to ask you what it means. You have no right to dismiss me so
suddenly without an explanation. How have I offended? You must tell me.”
“I said you had not offended,” he replied, “and further than that I can
give no explanation.”
“I shall not leave your house, nor yet this room until you do,” was her
decided answer, and with the air of one who meant what she said, Marian
went so near to the excited man that he could have touched her had he
chosen.
For an instant the two stood gazing at each other, Marian never wavering
for an instant, while over Frederic’s face there flitted alternately a
look of wonder, admiration, and perplexity. Then that look passed away
and was succeeded by an expression of the deep love he felt for
beautiful girl standing so fearlessly before him.
“I cannot help it,” he murmured at last, and tottering to the door, he
turned the key; then returning to Marian, he compelled her to sit down
beside him upon the sofa, and passing his arm around her, so that she
could not escape, he began: “You say you will not leave the room until
you know why I should send you from me. Be it so, then. It surely cannot
be wrong for me to tell when you thus tempt me to the act; so, for one
brief half-hour, you are mine—mine, Marian, and no power can save you
now from hearing what I have to say.”
His looks, even more than his manner, frightened her, and she said
imploringly, “Give me the key, Mr. Raymond. Unlock the door and I will
go away without hearing the reason.”
“I frighten you, then,” he answered, in a gentler tone, drawing her
nearer to him, “and yet, Marian Grey, I would sell my life inch by inch
rather than harm a hair of your dear head. Oh, Marian, Marian, I would
to Heaven you had never crossed my path, for then I should not have
known what it is to love as madly, as hopelessly, as wickedly as I now
love you. What made you come to me in all your bright, girlish beauty,
or why did Heaven suffer me to love you as I do? My punishment was
before as great as I could bear, and now I must suffer this anguish,
too. Oh, Marian Grey, Marian Grey!”
He wound his arms close around her, and she could feel his feverish
breath as his lips almost touched her burning cheek. In the words
“Marian Grey, Marian Grey,” there was a deep pathos, as if all the
loving tenderness of his nature were centered upon that name, and it
brought the tears in torrents from her eyes. He saw them, and wiping
them away, he said:
“The hardest part of all to me is the knowledge that you must suffer,
too. Forgive me for saying it, but as I know that I love you, so by
similar signs I know that you love me. Is it not so, darling?”
Involuntarily she laid her head upon his bosom, sobbing:
“I have loved you so long—so long.”
But for her promise to Alice she would then have told him all, but she
must keep her word, and when he rejoined, “It does, indeed seem long
since that night you came to Riverside,” she did not undeceive him, but
listened while he continued, “Bless you for telling me of your love.
When you are gone it will be a comfort for me to think that Marian Grey
_once_ loved me. I say _once_ for you must overcome that love. You must
tear it out and trample it beneath your feet. You can if you try. You
are not as hard, as callous as I am. My heart is like adamant, and
though I know that it is wicked to love you, and to tell you of my love,
I cannot help it. I am a wretch, and when I tell you, as I must, just
what a wretch I am, it will help you to forget me—to hate me, it may be.
You have heard of my wife. You know she left me on my bridal night, and
I have never known the joys of wedded bliss—never shall know, for even
if she comes back to me now, _I cannot live with her_!”
“Oh, Frederic!” And again the hot tears trembled through the hands which
Marian clasped before her eyes.
“Don’t call me thus,” said Frederic, entreatingly, as he removed her
hands, and held them both in his. “Don’t say Frederic, for though it
thrills me with strange joy to hear you, it is not right. Listen,
Marian, while I tell you why I married her who bears your name, and then
I’m sure you’ll hate me—nor call me Frederic again. I have never told
but one, and that one, William Gordon. I had thought never to tell it
again, but it is right that you should know. Marian Lindsey was, or is,
the Heiress of Redstone Hall. All my boasted wealth is hers—every cent
of it is hers. But she didn’t know it, for”—and Frederic’s voice was
very low and plaintive now as he told to Marian Grey how Marian Lindsey
was an heiress—told her of his dead parent’s fraud—of his desire to save
that parent’s name from disgrace, and his stronger desire to save him
from poverty. “So I made her my wife,” he said. “I promised to love and
cherish her all the time my heart was longing for another.”
Marian trembled now, as she lay helpless in his arms, and, observing it,
he continued:
“I must confess the whole, and tell you that I loved, or thought I
loved, Isabel Huntington, though how I could have fancied her is a
mystery to me now. My poor Marian was plain, while Isabel was beautiful,
and naught but Alice kept me from telling her my love. Alice stayed the
act—Alice sent me to New York to look for Marian——”
“And did you never hear from her? Did she never send you a letter?”
Marian asked, and he replied:
“Never! If she had I should have known where to find her.”
Then, as briefly as possible, for he knew time was hastening, he told of
his fearful sickness, and of the little girl who took such care of
him—told, too, of his weary search for her, and of the many dreary
nights he had passed in thinking of her, and her probable fate.
“Then _you_ came,” he said, “and, struggle as I would, I could not mourn
for Marian Lindsey as I had done before. I was satisfied to have you
here until the conviction burst upon me, that far greater than any
affection I had thought I could feel for that blue-eyed girl, and
tenfold greater than any love I had felt for Isabel Huntington, was my
love for you. It has worn upon me terribly. Look!” And pushing back his
thick brown locks, he showed her where the hair was turning white
beneath. “These are for you,” he said. “There are furrows upon my
face—furrows upon my heart—and can you wonder that I bade you go, and so
no longer tempt me to sin? And yet, could I keep you with me, Marian?
Could I hold you to my bosom just as I hold you now, and know that I had
a right so to do?—a right to call you mine—my Marian—my wife? Not Heaven
itself, I’m sure, has greater happiness in store for those who merit its
bliss than this would be to me! Oh, why is the boon denied to me? Why
must I suffer on through wretched, dreary years, and know that somewhere
in the world there is a Marian Grey, who might have been my wife?”
“Let me go for Alice,” said Marian, struggling to release herself.
“There is something she would tell you.”
“Yes, in a moment,” he replied; “but promise me first one thing. The
news may come to me that I am free, and if it does, and you are still
unmarried, will you then be my wife? Promise that you will, and the
remembrance of that promise will help me to bear a little longer.”
“I do!” said Marian, standing up before him, and holding one of his
hands in hers. “I promise you, solemnly, that no other man shall ever
call me wife save you.”
There were tears in Frederic’s eyes, and his whole frame quivered with
emotion, as, catching at her dress, for she was moving toward the door,
he added:
“And you will wait for me, darling—wait for me _twenty_ years, if it
needs must be? You will never be old to me. I shall love you just the
same when these sunny locks are grey,” and he passed his hands
caressingly over her bright hair. There was a world of love and
tenderness in the answering look which Marian gave to him as he opened
the door for her to pass out, and wringing his hands in anguish, he
cried to himself, “Oh, how can I give her up—beautiful, beautiful Marian
Grey!”
Swift as a bird Marian flew up the stairs in quest of Alice, who was to
tell the wretched man that it was not a sin for him to love the
beautiful Marian Grey.
“Alice, Alice! Go now—go quick!” she exclaimed, bursting into the room.
“Go whar—for the dear Lord’s sake?” said Dinah, who had that moment come
up, and consequently had made but little progress in dressing Alice. “Go
whar? Not down stairs—’strue as yer born. She’ll cotch her death o’
cold!”
“Hurry—_do_!” cried Alice, standing first on one foot and then upon the
other. “I must tell Frederic something before he goes away. There, he’s
going! Oh, Marian, help!” she fairly screamed, as she heard the carriage
at the door, and Frederic in the hall below.
Marian was terribly excited, and in her attempts to assist, she only
made matters worse by buttoning the wrong button, putting both stockings
on the same foot, pulling the shoe lacing into a hard knot, which
baffled all her nervous efforts, while Dinah worked on leisurely,
insisting that Alice “wasn’t gwine down, and if there was anythin’
killin’ which marster ’or’to know, Miss Grey could tell him herself.”
“Yes, Marian, go,” said Alice, in despair, as she heard Dud bid Frederic
good-by, and, scarcely conscious of what she was about, Marian ran down
the stairs, just as Phil cracked his whip, and the spirited greys
bounded off with a rapidity which left her faint call of “Stop,
Frederic, stop!” far behind.
“I can write to him,” she thought, as she slowly retraced her steps back
to Alice, who was bitterly disappointed, and who, after Dinah was gone,
threw herself upon the bed, refusing to be comforted.
“Three weeks was forever,” she said, and she suggested sending Josh
after the traveler, who, in a most unenviable frame of mind, was riding
rapidly towards Frankfort.
“No, no,” said Marian, “I will write immediately, so he can get the
letter as soon almost as he reaches New Orleans. It won’t be three weeks
before he returns,” and she strove to divert the child’s mind by
repeating to her as much as she thought proper of her exciting interview
with Frederic.
But Alice could not be comforted, and all that day she lamented over the
mischance which had taken Frederic away before she could tell him.
“There’s Uncle Phil,” she said, when towards night she heard the
carriage drive into the yard; “and hark, hark!” she exclaimed, turning
her quick ear in the direction of the sound, and rolling her bright eye
around the room; “there’s a step on the piazza that sounds like his—’tis
him—’tis him! He’s come back! I knew he would!” and in her weakness and
excitement the little girl sunk exhausted at Marian’s feet.
Raising her up, Marian listened breathlessly, but heard nothing save
Phil, talking to his horses as he drove them to the stable.
“He has not come,” she said, and Alice replied, “I tell you he has.
There—there, don’t you hear?” and Marian’s heart gave one great bound as
she, too, heard the well known footstep upon the threshold and Frederick
speaking to his favorite Dud, who had run to meet “his mars,” asking for
sugar-plums from New Orleans.
There had been a change in the time-table, and Frederic did not reach
Frankfort until after the train he intended to take had gone. His first
thought was to remain in the city, and wait for the next train from
Lexington. Accordingly he gave his parting directions to Phil, who being
in no haste to return, loitered away the morning and a portion of the
afternoon before he turned his horses homeward. As he was riding up the
long hill which leads from Frankfort into the country beyond, he
unexpectedly met his master, who had been to the cemetery, and was just
returning to the Capitol Hotel.
All the day Frederic had thought of Marian Grey, and with each thought
it had seemed to him more and more that he must see her again, if only
to hear her say that she would wait all time for him, and when he came
upon Phil, who he supposed was long ere this at Redstone Hall, his
resolution was taken, and instead of the reproof he knew he merited,
Phil was surprised at hearing his master say, as he made a motion for
him to stop:
“Phil, I am going home.”
And thus it was that he returned again to Redstone Hall, where his
coming was hailed with eager joy by Marian and Alice, and created much
surprise among the servants.
“My ’pinion he’s a little out of his head,” was all the satisfaction
Phil could give, as he drove the carriage to the barn, while Frederic,
half repenting of his rashness in returning, and wondering what good
excuse he could render, went to his own room—the one formerly occupied
by his father—where he sat before the glowing grate, when Alice
appeared, covered with shawls, and her face all aglow with her
excitement.
She would not be kept back another moment, lest he should go off again,
so Marian had wrapped her up and sent her on her mission. Frederic sat
with his face turned toward the fire, and though by the step he knew who
it was that entered the door, he did not turn his head or evince the
least knowledge of her presence until she stood before him, and said,
inquiringly:
“Frederic, are you here?”
“Yes;” was the answer, rather curtly spoken, for he would rather be
alone.
“Frederic!” and the bundle of shawls trembled violently. “I have come to
tell you something about Marian.”
“I don’t wish to hear it,” was his reply; and, nothing daunted, Alice
continued:
“But you must hear me. Her name isn’t Miss Grey. She is a married woman,
and has a living husband; and you——”
She did not finish the sentence, for like a tiger Frederic started up,
and seizing her by the shoulder, exclaimed: “You dare not tell me that
again. Marian Grey is not married. She never had a husband,” and as the
maddening thought swept over him, that possibly the blind girl told him
truly, he staggered against the mantel, where he stood panting for
breath, and enduring, as it were, all the agonies of a lingering,
painful death.
“Sit down,” said Alice, and like a child he obeyed, while she proceeded,
“Miss Grey has deceived us all, and it is strange, too, that none of us
should know her—none but Bruno. Don’t you remember how he wouldn’t bite
her, just because he knew her when we didn’t? Don’t you mind how I told
you once maybe the Marian who went away would come back to us some day
so beautiful we should not know her? You are listening, ain’t you?”
“Yes, yes,” came in a quick, short gasp from the arm-chair.
“Well, she has come back! She called herself Marian Grey so we would not
guess right off who she was, but she ain’t Marian Grey. She’s the other
one—she’s MY MARIAN, Frederic, AND YOUR WIFE—”
As Alice was speaking Frederic had risen to his feet. Drop by drop every
particle of blood receded from his face, leaving it colorless as ashes.
There was a wild, unnatural light flashing from his eyes—his hands
worked nervously together—his hair seemed starting from its roots, and
with his head bent forward, he stood transfixed as it were by the
dazzling light which had burst upon him. Then his lips parted slowly,
and more like a wailing cry than a prayer of thanksgiving, the words “I
thank thee, oh, my God,” issued from them. The next moment the air near
Alice was set in rapid motion—there was a heavy fall, and Frederic
Raymond lay upon the carpet white and still as a block of marble.
Like lightning Alice flew across the floor, but swift as were her
movements, another was there before her, and with his head upon her lap
was pressing burning kisses upon his lips and dropping showers of tears
upon his face. Marian had stood without the door, listening to that
dialogue, and when by the fall she knew that it was ended, she came at
once and knelt by the fainting man, who ere long began to show signs of
consciousness. Alice was first to discover this, and when sure that he
would come back to life, she glided silently from the room, for she knew
that she would not be needed there.
She might have tarried yet a little longer, for the shock to Frederic
had been so sudden and so great, that though his lips moved and his
fingers clutched eagerly at the soft hand feeling for his pulse, he did
not seem to heed aught else, until Marian whispered in his ear:
“My husband—may I call you so?”
Then, indeed, he started from his lethargy, and, struggling to his feet,
clasped her in his arms, weeping over her passionately, and murmuring as
he did so:
“My wife—my darling—my wife! Is it true that you have come to me again?
Are you my Marian?”
Daylight was fading from the room, for the Winter sun had set behind the
western hills, and leading her to the window, he turned her face to the
light, gazing rapturously upon it, and saying to her:
“You are mine—all mine! God bless you, Marian!”
He kissed her hands, her neck, her lips, her forehead, her hair, and she
could feel his hot tears falling amid the shining curls he parted so
lovingly from her brow. They were not hateful to him now—and he passed
his hand caressingly over them, whispering all the while:
“My own beautiful Marian—my bride—my wife!”
Surely, in this moment of bliss, Marian felt repaid for all that she had
suffered, when at last as thoughts of the dreadful past came over
Frederic, he led her to the sofa, and said, “Can you forgive me,
darling?” she turned her bright eyes up to his, and by the expression of
perfect happiness resting there, he knew she had forgotten the cold,
heartless words he spoke to her, when once, at that very hour, and in
that very place, he asked her to be his. That scene had faded away,
leaving no cloud between them. All was sunshine and gladness, and with
her fair head resting on his bosom—not timidly, as it had lain there in
the morning, but trustingly, confidingly, as if that were its rightful
resting place—they sat together until the rose-red tinge faded from the
western sky, and the night shadows had crept into the room.
More than once Alice stole on tiptoe to the door, to see if it were time
for her to enter, but as often as she heard the low murmur of their
voices, she went noiselessly back, saying to herself: “I won’t disturb
them yet.”
At last as she came once she stumbled accidentally, and this woke Marian
from the sweetest dream which ever had come to her.
“’Tis Alice,” she said; and she called to the little girl who came
gladly, and climbing into Frederic’s lap, twined her arms around his
neck and laid a cheek against his own, without word of comment.
“Blessed Alice, I owe you more than I can repay,” he said, and Marian,
far better than the child, appreciated the full meaning these words
conveyed.
But for the helpless blind girl this hour might never have come to them,
and the strong man felt it so, as he hugged the little creature closer
to him, blessing her as his own and Marian’s good angel. Observing that
she shivered as if with the cold, he arose, and drawing the sofa
directly before the fire, resumed his seat again, with Marian between
himself and Alice, his arm around her neck and his lips almost
constantly meeting hers. He could not remove his eyes from her, she
seemed to him so beautiful, with the firelight falling on her sparkling
face and shining on her hair. That hair—how it puzzled him, and winding
one of the curls about his fingers he said, half laughingly, half
reluctantly, “Your hair was not always this color.”
Then the blue eyes flashed up into his, and Marian replied by telling
whence came the change, and reminding him that she was the same young
girl of whom the Yankee Ben had spoken when he visited Kentucky.
“And you had almost died, then, for me, my precious one,” said Frederic,
kissing the sunny locks.
Just at this point, old Dinah appeared in the door, which, like most
Kentucky doors, was left ajar. She saw the position of the parties—saw
Frederic kiss Marian Grey—saw Alice’s look of satisfaction as he did so,
and in an instant all the old lady’s sense of propriety was roused to a
boiling pitch.
Since Marian had revealed herself to Alice, the little girl had said to
Dinah, by way of preparing her for the surprise when it should come,
that “there was some doubt concerning the death of Marian—that Frederic
believed she had been with him in New York, and had taken means to find
her.” This story was, of course, repeated among the servants, some of
whom credited it, while others did not. Among the latter was Dinah. She
wouldn’t believe “she had done all her mournin’ for nothin’,” and in
opposition to Hetty, she persisted in saying Marian was dead. When,
however, she saw her master’s familiarity with Miss Grey, she accepted
of her young mistress’s existence as a reality, and was terribly
incensed against the offending Marian Grey.
“The trollop!” she muttered. “But I’ll bring proof agin her,” and
hurrying back to the kitchen, she told to the astonished blacks, “how’t
marster done kissed Miss Grey spang on her har, and on her mouth, and
hugged her into the bargain, when he didn’t know for certain that
t’other one was dead; and if they didn’t b’lieve it, they could go and
see for themselves, provided they went mighty still.”
“Tole you he was crazy,” said Uncle Phil, starting to see the wonderful
sight, and followed by a troop of negroes, all of whom trod on tiptoe, a
precaution wholly unnecessary, for Frederic and Marian were too much
absorbed in each other to heed the dusky group assembled round the door,
their white eyes growing larger as they all saw distinctly the arm
thrown across Marian’s neck.
“Listen to dat ar, will you?” whispered Hetty, as Frederic said, “Dear
Marian,” while old Dinah chimed in, “’Clar for’t, it makes my blood
bile, and he not a widower nuther!”
“Quit dat!” she exclaimed aloud, as her master showed signs of repeating
the kissing offense; and, in an instant, Frederic sprang to his feet, an
angry flush mounting to his face when he saw the crowd at the door.
Then, as he began to comprehend its meaning, the frown gave place to a
good-humored laugh, and taking Marian’s hand, he led her toward the
assembled blacks, saying to them:
“Rejoice with me that the lost one has returned to us again, for this is
_Marian Lindsey_—my wife and your mistress—changed, it is true, but the
same Marian who went from us more than six years ago.”
“Wonder if he ’spects us to swallow dat ar?” said the unbelieving Hetty.
Dinah, on the contrary, had not the shadow of a doubt, and she dropped
on her knees at once, kissing the very hem of Marian’s dress, and
exclaiming through her tears:
“Lord bress you, Miss Marian. You’ve mightily altered, to be sure, but
ain’t none the wus for that. I’m nothin’ but a poor old nigger, and
can’t say what’s in my heart, but it’s full and runnin’ over, bless you,
honey.”
Dinah’s example was contagious, and more than one prostrated themselves
before their mistress, while their howling cries of surprise and delight
were almost deafening. Particularly was Josh delighted, and while the
noise went on, he took occasion to “balance to your partner,” in the
hall, with a young yellow girl, who thought his stammering was music,
and his ungainly figure the most graceful that could be conceived. When
the commotion had in a measure subsided, and Hetty had gone over to the
popular side, saying, “she knew from the first Marian was somebody,”
Frederic made a few brief explanations as to where their mistress had
been, and then dismissed them to their several duties, for he preferred
being alone again with his wife and Alice.
Supper was soon announced, but little was eaten by any one. They were
too much excited for that, and as soon as the meal was over, they
returned to Frederic’s room, where, sitting again between her husband
and Alice, Marian told them, as far as possible, everything which had
come to her since leaving Redstone Hall.
“Can’t I ever know what made you go away?” Alice asked; and Frederic
replied:
“Yes, birdie, you shall;” and, without sparing himself in the least, he
told her all.
“Marian an heiress, too!” she exclaimed. “Will marvels never cease?” and
she laid her head which was beginning to grow weary, upon Marian’s lap,
saying, “I never knew till now one half how good you are. No wonder
Frederic thought that he had killed you. It was wicked in him, very,”
and the brown eyes looked sleepily into the fire, while Marian replied:
“But is all forgotten now.”
It did seem to be, and in the long conversation which lasted till almost
midnight, there was many a word of affection exchanged, many a
confession made, many a forgiveness asked, and when, at last they
parted, it was with the belief that each was all the world to the other.
Like lightning the news spread through the neighborhood that Frederic
Raymond’s governess was Frederic Raymond’s wife; and, for many days the
house was thronged with visitors, most of whom remembered little Marian
Lindsey, and all of whom offered their sincere congratulations to the
beautiful Marian Grey, for so she persisted in being called, until the
night of the 20th of February, when they were to give a bridal party.
Then she would answer to Mrs. Raymond, she said, but not before, and
with this Frederic was fain to be satisfied. Great were the preparations
for that party, to which all their friends were to be bidden, and as
they were one evening making out the list, Marian suggested _Isabel_,
more for the sake of seeing what Frederic would say, than from any
desire to have her present.
“Isabel,” he repeated, “never. I cannot so soon forget her treachery,”
and a frown darkened his handsome face, but Marian kissed it away as she
said:
“You surely will not object to Ben, the best and truest friend I ever
had.”
“Certainly not,” answered Frederic. “I owe Ben Burt more than I ever can
repay, and I mean to keep him with us. He is just the man I want upon my
farm—_your_ farm, I mean,” he added, smiling knowingly upon her, and
catching in his the little hand raised to shut his mouth.
But Marian had her revenge by refusing to let him kiss her until he had
promised never to allude to that again.
“I gave you Redstone Hall,” she said, “that night I ran away, and I have
never taken it back, but have brought you in instead an incumbrance
which may prove a most expensive one.” And amid such pleasantries as
these Marian wrote the note to Ben, and then went back to her
preparations for the party, which, together with the strange discovery,
was the theme of the whole country.
CHAPTER XXX.
BEN.
Ben sat among his boxes and barrels cracking hickory nuts and carrying
on a one sided conversation with the well fed cat and six beautiful
kittens, which were gamboling over the floor, the terror of rats and
mice and the pride of their owner, who found his heart altogether too
tender to destroy any one of them by the usual means of drowning or
decapitation. So he was literally killing them with kindness, and with
his seven cats and odd ways was the wonder and favorite of the entire
village.
The night was dark and stormy, and fancying he had dismissed his last
customer he had settled himself before the glowing stove with nearly
half a peck of nuts at his side, when the door opened, and a little boy
came in, his light hair covered with snow, which had also settled upon
other portions of his person.
“Good evenin’, Sandy,” was Ben’s salutation.
“What brung you here to-night?”
“Got you a letter,” returned Sandy, who was the chore boy of the Post
Master. “It’s been a good while coming, too, for all it says ‘in
haste,’” and passing the note to Ben, he caught up five or six of the
kittens, while Ben, tearing open the envelope and snuffing a tallow
candle with his fingers read:
“DEAR BEN,
“Frederic knows it all, and we are so happy. We are to have a great
party on the 20th and you must surely come. Don’t fail us, that’s a
dear, good Ben, but come as soon as you get this. Then I will tell you
what I can’t write now, for Frederic keeps worrying me with teasing me
to kiss him.
Yours truly,
“MARIAN.
“P. S.—Alice sends her love, so does Frederic, and so do I, dear Ben.”
“I ‘most wish she’d left off that last, and that about his kissin’ her,”
said Ben, when, after the boy Sandy departed he was alone. “It makes me
feel so streaked like. Guy, wouldn’t I give all my groceries, and the
six cats into the bargain, to be in Fred Raymond’s boots;” and, taking
up the kitten he called “Marian Grey,” he fondled it tenderly, for the
sake of her whose name it bore. “I shall go to this party,” he
continued, as his mind reverted again to the letter, “though I’ll be as
much out of place as a toad in a sugar bowl; but, I can see Marian, and
that little blind girl, and Josh. Wa’n’t he a case, though?” And leaning
back in his chair, Ben mentally made the necessary arrangements for
leaving.
These arrangements were next day carried into effect, and as he must
start at once if he would be there in time for the party, he took the
night express for Albany, having left his feline family to the care of
the boy Sandy. The second night found him on the train between Buffalo
and Cleveland, and as the weather was very cold and the seat near the
stove unoccupied, he appropriated it to himself, and was just falling
away to sleep, when a lady, wrapped in velvet and furs, with a thickly
dotted vail over her face, came up to him, and said, rather haughtily:
“Can I have this seat, sir? I prefer it to any other.”
“So do I,” returned Ben; “but bein’ you’re a woman, I’ll give it up, I
guess.”
And he sought another, of which there were plenty, for it was the last
car, and not one-third full.
“Considerable kind o’ toppin’,” was his mental comment, as he coiled
himself in his shaggy overcoat for a second time, sleeping ere long so
soundly that nothing disturbed him, until at last, as they turned a
short curve, the car was detached from the others, and, leaving the
track, was precipitated down an embankment, which, fortunately, was not
very steep, so that none were killed, although several were wounded, and
among them the lady who had so unceremoniously taken possession of Ben’s
comfortable seat.
“Wall, now,” said Ben, crawling out of a window, and holding fast to his
hat, which being new, was his special care, “if this ain’t a little the
imperlitest way of wakin’ a feller out of a sound sleep, to pitch him
head over heels in among these blackb’ry bushes and stuns; but who the
plague is that a screechin’ so?—a woman’s voice, too!”
And with all his gallantry aroused, Ben went to the rescue, feeling his
way through briars and grass and broken pieces of the car, until he
reached the human form struggling beneath the ruins, in close proximity
to the hissing stove.
“Easy, now, my gal,” he said, lifting her up. “Haul your foot out, can’t
you?”
“No, no, it’s crushed;” and Ben’s knees shook beneath him at the cry of
pain.
Relief soon came from other sources, and as this lady seemed more
seriously injured than either of the other passengers, she was carried
carefully to a dwelling near by, and laid upon a bed, before Ben had a
chance to see her features distinctly.
“Pretty well jammed,” said he, examining the bonnet, which the women of
the farm-house had removed.
Supposing he meant herself, the lady moaned,
“Oh, sir, is my face entirely crushed?”
“I meant your bonnet,” returned Ben, “though if I was to pass judgment
on you, I should say some of your feathers was crumpled a little; but
law, beauty ain’t but skin deep. It’s good, honest actions that makes
folks liked.”
And taking the lamp, he bent to investigate, discovering to his utter
amazement, that the lady was none other than Isabel Huntington!
Some weeks before, and ere Marian’s identity with Frederic’s wife had
been made known, Mrs. Rivers had invited her to visit Kentucky, and as
there was now nothing in Yonkers to interest her she had accepted, with
the forlorn hope that spite of Frederic’s improbable story about a
living wife, he might eventually be won back to his old allegiance.
Accordingly she had taken the same train and car with Ben, and by rather
rudely depriving him of his seat near the stove had been considerably
injured, receiving several flesh wounds, besides breaking her ankle. For
this last, however, she did not care; that would get well again; but her
face—was it so disfigured as to spoil her boasted beauty? This was her
constant thought as she lay moaning upon her pillows, and when for a few
moments she was alone with Ben, whom she knew to be the Yankee peddler,
and who considered it his duty to stay with her, she said to him:
“Please, Mr. Butterworth, tell me just how much I am bruised, and
whether I shall probably be a fright the rest of my days.”
“Wall, now,” returned Ben, taking the lamp a second time and coming
nearer to her, “there’s no knowin’ how you will look hereafter, but the
fact is you ain’t none too han’some now, with your face swelled as big
as two, and all scratched up with them pesky briars.”
“Yes, yes,” interrupted Isabel, “but the swelling will go down and the
scratches will get well. That isn’t all.”
“You’re right,” said Ben, peering curiously at her; “that ain’t all. You
know, I ’spose, that six of your front teeth are knocked out.”
“Yes, but false ones will remedy that. I’ll have them made a little
uneven so as to look natural; go on.”
“Wall,” continued Ben, “you’ve fixed your teeth, but what are you goin’
to do with your _broke_ nose?”
“Oh!” screamed Isabel, clasping her hand to that organ, which, from its
classic shape had been her special pride. “Not broken—is it broken,
true?”
“Looks mighty’ like it,” answered Ben, “but law, doctors can do
anything. They’ll tinker it up so it will answer to sneeze out of and
smell with as good as ever; and they’ll sew up that ugly gash, too, that
runs like a Virginny fence from your ear up onto your forehead and part
of your cheek. Looks as though there’d been a scar of some kind there
before,” and looking closer, Ben saw the mark which the hot iron had
made that night when the proud Isabel had given the cruel blow to the
blind girl.
This she had heretofore managed to conceal by combing over it her hair,
but nothing could hide the seam she knew would always be upon her
forehead and cheek.
“Oh, I wish I could die,” she groaned, “if I must be so mutilated.”
“Pshaw! no you don’t,” returned Ben, now acting the part of a consoler.
“Your eyes ain’t damaged, nor your hair neither, only singed a little
with the stove. There’s some _white_ ones, I see, but they must have
been there before. Never used Wood’s brimstony stuff, did you? That’ll
keep it from turnin.’ I knew a chap once with a broke nose that looked
like the notch in the White Mountains, and nobody thought of it, he was
so good. Maybe your’n ain’t so bad. Perhaps it’s only out of jint. The
doctor’ll know—here he comes,” and Ben stood back respectfully, while
the physician examined the nature and extent of Isabel’s injuries.
There was nothing serious, he said; nothing from which she would not
recover. She was only stunned and bruised, besides having a broken
ankle. The cut on the face would probably leave a scar, and the nose
never be straight again, otherwise she would ere long be as well as
ever, but she must of course remain where she was for two or three
weeks, and he asked if she had friends with her.
“No,” she said, while Ben said; “Yes, I’m her friend, and though I want
to go on the wust way, I’ll stay till her mother comes. We’d better
telegraph, I guess.”
This brought the tears from the heartless Isabel, for she appreciated
Ben’s kindness in not deserting her, and when again they were alone, she
thanked him for so generously staying with her when she heard him say he
wished to go on.
“Were you going to Kentucky?” she asked, and Ben replied: “Yes, goin’ to
see how Miss Raymond looks at the head of a family. You’ve heard, I
s’pose, that Marian Grey was Fred’s runaway wife, and that they are as
happy now as two clams.”
Unmindful of the fierce twinges of pain it gave her to move, Isabel
started up exclaiming, “No, no, how can that be?”
“Just as easy,” said Ben, proceeding to narrate a few particulars to his
astonished listener, who, when he had finished, lay back again upon her
pillow, weeping bitterly.
This, then, was the end of all her secret hopes. Frederic was surely
lost to her; the beautiful Marian Grey was his wife, and what was worse
than all, her treachery was undoubtedly suspected, and what must they
think of her? Poor Isabel, she was in a measure suffering for her sins,
and she continued to weep while Ben tried in vain to sooth her, talking
to her upon the subject uppermost in his mind, namely, Marian’s
happiness and his own joy that it had all come right at last. Isabel
would rather have heard of anything else, but when she saw how kind Ben
was, she compelled herself to listen, even though every word he said of
Marian and Frederic pierced her with a keener pain than even her bruises
produced.
“I shan’t be in time for the doin’s any way,” thought Ben, when Mrs.
Huntington did not come at the expected time, and as he fancied it his
duty to let Marian know why he was not there, he telegraphed to her,
“We’ve had a break down, and Isabel is knocked into a cocked hat.”
This telegram, which created no little sensation at the office, was
copied verbatim and sent to Frederic, who read it, while Marian, in her
chamber, was dressing for the party. He could not forbear laughing
heartily, it sounded so much like Ben, but he wisely determined to keep
it from his wife and Alice, as it might cause them unnecessary anxiety.
He accordingly thrust it in his pocket, and then, when it was time, went
up for Marian, who, in her bridal dress of satin and lace, with pearls
and diamonds woven among her shining hair, and flashing from her neck
and arms, looked wondrously beautiful to him, and received many words of
commendation from the guests, who soon began to appear, and who felt
that the bride of Redstone Hall well became her high position. Many were
the pleasant jokes passed at Frederic’s expense, and the clergyman who
had officiated at his wedding more than six years before, laughingly
offered to repeat the ceremony. But Frederic shook his head, saying, he
was satisfied if Marian was, while the look the beautiful, blushing
bride gave to him, was quite as expressive of her answer as words would
have been. And so, amid smiles and congratulations, the song and the
dance moved on, and all went merry as a marriage bell, until at last, as
the clock told the hour of midnight, the last guest had departed, and
Frederic, with his arm round Marian, was calling her Mrs. Raymond, on
purpose to see her blush, when there came up the avenue the sound of
rapid wheels, followed by a bound on the piazza, and the next moment Ben
burst into the room, holding up both hands, as he caught sight of Marian
in her bridal robes.
“My goodness!” he exclaimed. “Ain’t she pretty, though. It’s curis how
clothes will fix up a woman,” and the tears came to Ben’s eyes in his
delight at seeing Marian so resplendent in jewels and costly lace.
The meeting between Frederic and Ben was like brother greeting brother,
for the former felt that he almost owed his life to the great-hearted
Yankee, and he grasped his hand warmly, bidding him welcome to Redstone
Hall, and, by his kind, familiar manner, putting him at once at his
ease. Alice, too, did her part well, and, pressing Ben’s hand to her
lips, she said:
“I love you, Ben Burt; love you a heap, for being so good to Marian.”
“Don’t now,” said Ben, whiningly. “Don’t set me to bellerin’ the fust
thing. I only did what anybody would have done, unless the milk of human
kindness was all turned to bonny clabber!” Then, as he thought of
Isabel, he continued, “I tried to get here sooner, but Miss Huntington
didn’t come till the last minute, and I couldn’t leave Isabel. How she
does take on about her sp’ilt beauty.”
“What do you mean?” asked Marian. “Where is Isabel?” and as Frederic
then passed her the telegram, she continued to ask questions, until she
had learned the whole.
“Poor girl!” she sighed; “I pity her, and if she were here, I would so
gladly take care of her.”
Instantly there flashed upon Alice’s mind an idea every way worthy of
her, but she would not suggest it then, as it was growing late, and when
she heard ere long a loud yawn from Ben, she thoughtfully rang the bell,
bidding the servant who came “show Mr. Burt to his room;” then, kissing
Frederic and Marian goodnight, she, too, departed, leaving them alone.
Next morning, at the breakfast table, she said to Frederic:
“Don’t folks most always take a bridal tour?”
“Sometimes, when they can’t be happy at home,” returned Frederic. “Where
does my blind birdie wish to go?”
“I don’t really wish to go,” answered Alice; “but wouldn’t it be nice to
surprise poor Isabel, lying so bruised and sick in that old farm-house
in Ohio? Maybe she wants money? I heard them say at Yonkers that she had
spent all Mr. Rivers left her, except the house, and that was mortgaged.
I’ve got ten dollars that I’ll give her.”
“Blessed baby!” said Ben, bringing out his pocket-handkerchief, which he
was pretty sure to need.
This suggestion was warmly seconded by Marian, and after a little
further consultation, it was decided that they should start the next day
for the place where Isabel lay sick.
“She may confess about the letters,” said Marian, “and that will make me
like her so much better.”
This being settled, Alice’s next inquiry was for her cat, and her brown
eyes opened wide with wonder when told of the six young kittens which
had a home in Ben Burt’s grocery, and one of which was called for her.
“It ought to be blind,” said the little girl, and, with a quivering
chin, Ben answered:
“That’s it, though I shouldn’t have told you for fear of hurtin’ your
feelin’s. The little cat _is_ blind, and when Sandy—that’s a boy who
lives there—said how he would kill it for me, it struck to my stomick to
once, for that little critter lies even nigher to my heart than the
handsomest, sleekest one, which I call ‘Marian Grey,’ and ’tis grey,
too, with mottled spots all over its back, while Alice is white as
milk!”
The cat story being satisfactorily concluded, Ben went out to renew his
acquaintance with the negroes, who vied with each other in paying him
marked attention. Though they did not quite understand it, they knew
that he was in some way connected with the return of their young
mistress, and neither Dinah nor Hetty made the least objection when,
before night, they saw the two black babies which had usurped the rights
of _Dud_ and _Victory_, seated upon his lap and “riding to Boston to buy
penny cakes,” at a rate which bade fair to throw them to the top of the
ceiling at least, if not to land them somewhere in the vicinity of the
bay state capital.
The next morning, Frederic, Marian and Alice started for Ohio, leaving
Ben in charge at Redstone Hall.
“He’d tend to the niggers,” he said, and he bade the “Square,” as he
persisted in calling Frederic, “not to worry at all about things to
hum.”
The family had scarcely been gone an hour when Dinah came in quest of
Ben, whom she found in the parlor drumming Yankee Doodle upon the piano
with one hand and whistling by way of accompaniment.
“Thar was the queerest actin’ man in the dinin’ room,” she said, “and he
done ax for marster, and when I tole him he had gone to the ’Hio with
his wife, he laughed so hateful, and say how’t she isn’t his wife, that
I come for you, ’case thar’s a look in his eye I don’t like.”
“Catch him tellin’ me Marian ain’t a lawful wife,” said Ben, starting
from the stool and hurrying to the dining room, where very much
intoxicated, Rudolph McVicar was sitting.
He had landed not long before at New Orleans, and coming up the river as
far as Louisville had stopped in that city, where he accidentally heard
a young man speak of Frederic’s wedding party, which had taken place the
previous night.
“Who is the bride?” he asked eagerly. “Is it Miss Huntington?” and the
young man who knew none of the particulars, and who had once heard that
Frederic was to marry a lady of that name, replied: “Yes, I believe it
is, or at all events she was his governess.”
Rudolph waited for no more, but started at once for Redstone Hall,
chuckling with delight as he thought of the consternation his visit
would create. He did not at first recognize Ben, neither did Ben know
him, so bloated had he become with drink, and so rough and red with
exposure upon the sea.
“Where is the woman they call Mrs. Raymond?” he asked with a sneer; and
Ben replied: “Gone with her husband to Ohio.”
“Her husband!” repeated Rudolph. “He isn’t her husband. She has no right
to be his wife, and I have come to tell her so.”
“You say that again if you dare!” said Ben, bristling up in Marian’s
defense. “You say that Marian ain’t Frederic’s lawful wife, and I’ll
show you the door, plaguy quick. I’m boss here now.”
As Ben was speaking, Rudolph remembered that they had met before, but he
scarcely heeded that, so intent was he upon the name which Ben had
uttered.
“Marian!” he repeated, a light breaking over him; “Is not Isabel
Huntington the bride?”
“No, sir,” answered Ben, snapping his fingers almost in the stranger’s
face. “She didn’t come that game, though she tried it hard enough. But
what do you know about it, any way?”
“I know I’ve been a fool,” answered Rudolph, explaining, in a few words,
what he once had done.
“So you wrote that letter, you scullion,” returned Ben. “But it didn’t
do no good; and the smartest trick you ever done was to sign yourself
_green_. Ugh!” and Ben’s voice was quite expressive of his contempt. “I
don’t blame you so much though,” he continued, “for wantin’ to pester
that Isabel, but you’d better let the Lord ’tend to such critters in his
own way. He can fix ’em better’n we can,” and Ben proceeded to give an
account of the accident in which Isabel’s beauty had been seriously
impaired.
“I am so glad,” was Rudolph’s exclamation, and he was proceeding further
to express his malicious joy, when Ben cut him short by saying:
“It don’t look well to rejoice over anybody’s downfall, though I’m none
too friendly to the gal, I shan’t hear her berated, and you may as well
quit.”
On ordinary occasions, Rudolph would have resented any attempt at
restraint, but he was too much intoxicated now fully to realize
anything, and staring vacantly at Ben, he made no reply, but ere long
fell asleep, dozing in his chair for several hours. Then, with faculties
somewhat brightened, he announced his intention of leaving. With an
immense degree of satisfaction Ben watched him as he went slowly down
the avenue, saying to himself:
“Poor drunken critter, he’s disappointed, I s’pose, in not gettin’
revenge his own way; but I don’t blame her much for givin’ him the
mitten. Wouldn’t they have scratched each other’s eyes out, if they’d
come together! Better be as ’tis—she a nervous old maid, and he in a
drunkard’s grave, where he will be mighty soon—the bloat!” and having
finished his soliloquy, Ben returned again to his music.
Meantime, in a most unenviable frame of mind, Isabel was chiding her
mother for doing everything wrong, and bewailing her own sad fate:
“Oh, why didn’t I stay at home,” she said; “and so not have become the
fright I know I am?”
It was in vain that her mother made her feel thankful that her life was
spared. Isabel did not care for that. She thought only of her lost
teeth, her disjointed nose, and ugly scar, and turning her face to the
wall she was wishing she could die, when the woman of the house came in,
telling her “some friends were there from Kentucky.”
“Who are they?” she asked; but ere the woman could reply, a sweet voice
said:
“It’s me, and all of us;” and Alice’s little hands were tenderly pressed
to Isabel’s feverish brow.
Then, indeed, the haughty girl wept aloud, for she knew she did not
deserve this kindness either from Alice or Marian, the latter of whom
soon came in, greeting her as pleasantly as if she had never received an
injury from her hands. Frederic, too, was perfectly self-possessed,
expressing his sympathy for her misfortune, and with these kind friends
to cheer her sick room, Isabel recovered in a measure her former
cheerfulness. But there was evidently something resting heavily upon her
mind, and that night, when alone with Frederic and Marian, she confessed
to them her wickedness in opening the letter, and sending it back with
so cruel a message.
“We knew you must have done it,” said Frederic, at the same time
assuring her of his own and Marian’s forgiveness. “It kept us apart for
many years,” he continued, “but I have found her at last, and love her
all the more for what I suffered.”
And Isabel, when she saw the look of deep affection he gave to his young
wife, covered her face with her hands, and wept silently, until Marian
asked “if she knew aught of the letter from Sarah Green?”
“No, no,” she answered; “I am surely innocent of that,” and they
believed her, wondering all the more whence it could have come or why it
had been sent.
Toward the close of the next day, they took their leave, cordially
inviting Isabel to visit them at Redstone Hall, should she ever feel
inclined so to do.
“We will let bygones be bygones,” said Frederic, taking her hand at
parting. “You and I have both learned that to deal fairly and openly is
the best policy, and it is to be hoped we will profit by the
experience.”
Isabel did not answer, but she pressed his hand, and returned warmly the
kiss which both Marian and Alice gave to her. As the latter was turning
away she detained her a moment while she whispered in her ear, “Will you
forgive me for that blow I gave you when I thought I was about to be
exposed?”
“Yes, willingly,” was the answer, and thrusting the golden eagle under
the pillow, Alice hurried away. They found it after she was gone, and
when at last Isabel was able to go home, they found their bills paid,
too, and were at no loss to know to whom they were indebted for the
generous act. “I do not deserve this from him of all others,” said
Isabel, and drawing her thick, green veil close over her marred face she
entered the carriage which had come to take them to the depot.
Not once during the journey home did she remove the veil, but in an
obscure corner of the car she sat, a forlorn, wretched woman, brooding
drearily over the past, and seeing in the future no star to cheer her
pathway. Frederic lost, Redstone Hall lost, her little fortune
wasted,—and worse than all, her boasted beauty gone forever. Poor, poor
Isabel!
CHAPTER XXXI.
SUMMING UP.
It is early June, and the balmy south wind is blowing soft and warm
round Redstone Hall, which, with its countless roses in full bloom, and
its profusion of flowering shrubs and vines, looked wondrously beautiful
without, while within, the sunlight of domestic peace is shining with no
cloud to dim its brightness. Frederic and Marian are perfectly happy,
for the dark night which enshrouded them so long has passed away, and
the day they fancy will never end has dawned upon them at last.
Ben, too, is there, ostensibly as an overseer, but really as a valued
friend, free to do whatever he pleases, and greatly esteemed by those
whom he worships with a devotion bordering upon idolatry. Everything
pertaining to the place he calls his, and Frederic hardly knows whether
himself or Ben is the master of Redstone Hall. The negroes acknowledge
them both, though, as is quite natural, the aristocratic Higginses give
the preference to Frederic, while the democratic Smitherses, with
stammering Josh at their head, warmly advocate Marster Ben, “as sayin’
the curisest things and singin’ the drollest songs.”
There is no spot in the world where Ben could be so supremely happy as
he is at Redstone Hall, with Marian and Alice; and when Frederic, on his
return from Ohio, suggested his remaining there, he evinced his delight
in his usual way, lamenting the while that his extremely tender heart
would always make him cry just when he did not wish to.
“I was never cut out for a nigger driver,” he said; “but I guess I can
coax as much out of ’em as that blusterin’ Warren did;” and making his
visit short, he hastened back to New England, where he found no
difficulty of disposing of his grocery, and five of his numerous family.
These last he bestowed upon different people in the village, taking
great care that none of them should go where there were children, and
numerous were his injunctions that they should be well cared for, and
suffered to die a natural death. Marian and Alice were destined for
Kentucky, where they were welcomed joyfully by those whose names they
bore. Particularly was the white one, with its bright, sightless eyes,
the pet of the entire household, negroes and all; while even Bruno, who,
on account of his recognition of Marian, was now allowed more liberty
than before, and was consequently far less savage, took kindly to the
little creature, tossing it up in his huge paws, licking its snowy face,
and sometimes coaxing it into his kennel, where it was more than once
found by the delighted Alice, sleeping half hidden under the mastiff’s
shaggy mane.
Frequently on bright days could Alice and her kitten be seen seated in a
miniature waggon, which the Yankee ingenuity of Ben had devised, and in
which he drew his blind pets from field to field, seeking out for them
the shadiest spot and watching all their movements with a vigilance
which told how dear to him was one of them at least. In all the wide
world there is nothing Ben Burt loves half so well as the helpless blind
girl, Alice—not as he loved Marian Grey, but with a tender, unselfish
devotion, which would prompt him at any time to lay down his life for
her, if it need must be. All the fairest flowers and choicest fruits are
brought to her. And when he sees how she enjoys them, and how grateful
she is to him, he murmurs softly:
“Blessed bird, I b’lieve I’d be blind myself, if she could only see.”
But Alice does not care for sight, except at times, when she hears the
people speak of Mrs. Raymond’s beauty, and she wishes she could look
upon the face whose praises so many ring. Still she is very happy in
Frederic’s and Marian’s love, and happy, too, with her faithful friend,
around whose neck she often twines her arms, blessing him for all he was
to Marian and all he is to her.
Once she hoped to improve his peculiar dialect somewhat by imparting to
him a greater knowledge of books than he already possessed, and Ben,
willing to gratify her, waded industriously through the many volumes she
recommended him to read, among which was “Watts on the Mind.” But vain
were all his efforts to grasp a single idea, and he returned it to
Alice, saying that “he presumed it was a very excitin’ story to some,
but blamed if he could make out a word of sense from beginnin’ to
finis.”
“‘Taint much use tryin’ to make a scholar of me,” said he, winking slyly
at Marian, who was present. “It’s hard enough teachin’ old dogs new
tricks, and if I’s to read all there is in the Squire’s library, I
shouldn’t be no better off.”
Marian thought so, too, and she dropped a few well-timed hints to Alice,
who gradually relaxed her efforts to teach one who, had he been
educated, would certainly not have been the simple-hearted, unselfish
man we now know as Ben Burt.
Away to the northward among the New England hills there is a forsaken
grave, where the inebriated Rudolph sleeps. His thirst for revenge is
over and the forlorn girl who, in her mother’s kitchen washes the dinner
dishes for college students just as she used to when Frederic Raymond
was a boarder there, has nothing to dread from him. Mrs. Huntington’s
house on the river has been sold to cancel the mortgage, and in the city
of Elms she has returned to her old vocation, and Isabel, with her
broken nose and ugly scar has scarcely a hope, that among her mother’s
boarders there will ever one be found weak enough to offer her his hand.
An humbled, and it is to be hoped, a better woman, she derives her
greatest comfort from the letters which sometimes come to her from
Marian, and which usually contain a more substantial token of regard
than mere words convey.
One word now of William Gordon and our story is done. Ben had claimed
the privilege of writing the news to him, and he did it in his
characteristic way, first touching upon the note which, he said, was
safe in his wallet and sure of being paid, then launching out into
glowing descriptions of Marian’s happiness with Frederic.
This letter was a long time in finding Will, and the answer did not
reach Redstone Hall until the family had returned from their summer
residence at Riverside. Then it came to them one warm November day, just
as the sun was setting, and its mellow rays fell upon the group
assembled upon the piazza. Frederic, to whom it was directed, broke the
seal and read the sincere congratulations which his early friend had
sent to him from over the sea,—read, too, that ‘mid the vine-clad hills
of Bingen, in a cottage looking out upon the Rhine, there was a
fair-haired German girl, with eyes like Marian Grey, and that when Will
came next to America he would not be alone.
“For this fair-haired German girl,” he wrote, “has promised to come with
me. I have told her of my former love, and when last night I read to her
Ben’s letter, the tears glistened in her lustrous eyes as she whispered
in her broken English tongue, ‘God bless sweet Marian Grey,’ and I, too,
Fred, from a full heart respond the same, God bless sweet Marian Grey,
the Heiress of Redstone Hall.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
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