"No," said Lois. "Let us take her to the place where you found me this morning; maybe she would like that."
"We must go, I suppose," groaned Julia, as Mr. Lenox helped her up over the rocks after the lighter-footed couple that preceded them. "George, I believe you are in the way."
"Thanks!" said the young man, laughing. "But you will excuse me for continuing to be in the way."
"I don't know—you see, it just sets Tom free to attend to her. Look at him—picking those purple irises—as if iris did not grow anywhere else! And now elderberry blossoms! And he will give her lessons in botany, I shouldn't wonder. O, Tom's a goose!"
"That disease is helpless," said Lenox, laughing again.
"But George, it is madness!"
Mr. Lenox's laugh rang out heartily at this. His sovereign mistress was not altogether pleased.
"I do certainly consider—and so do you,—I do certainly consider unequal marriages to be a great misfortune to all concerned."
"Certainly—inequalities that cannot be made up. For instance, too tall and too short do not match well together. Or for the lady to be rich and the man to be poor; that is perilous."
"Nonsense, George! don't be ridiculous! Height is nothing, and money is nothing; but family—and breeding—and habits—"
"What is her family?" asked Mr. Lenox, pursing up his lips as if for a whistle.
"No family at all. Just country people, living at Shampuashuh."
"Don't you know, the English middle class is the finest in the world?"
"No! no better than ours."
"My dear, we have no middle class."
"But what about the English middle class? why do you bring it up?"
"It owes its great qualities to its having the mixed blood of the higher and the lower."
"Ridiculous! What is that to us, if we have no middle class? But don't yousee, George, what an unhappy thing it would be for Tom to marry this girl?"
Mr. Lenox whistled slightly, smiled, and pulled a purple iris blossom from a tuft growing in a little spot of wet ground. He offered it to his disturbed companion.
"There is a country flower for you," he observed.
But Miss Caruthers flung the flower impatiently away, and hastened her steps to catch up with her brother and Lois, who made better speed than she. Mr. Lenox picked up the iris and followed, smiling again to himself.
They found Lois seated in her old place, where the gentlemen had seen her in the morning. She rose at once to give the seat to Miss Caruthers, and herself took a less convenient one. It was almost a new scene to Lois, that lay before them now. The lights were from a different quarter; the colours those of the sinking day; the sea, from some inexplicable reason, was rolling higher than it had done six hours ago, and dashed on the rocks and on the reef in beautiful breakers, sending up now and then a tall jet of foam or a shower of spray. The hazy mainland shore line was very indistinct under the bright sky and lowering sun; while every bit of west-looking rock, and every sail, and every combing billow was touched with warm hues or gilded with a sharp reflection. The air was like the air nowhere but at the Isles of Shoals; with the sea's salt strength and freshness, and at times a waft of perfumes from the land side. Lois drank it with an inexpressible sense of exhilaration; while her eye went joyously roving from the lovely light on a sail, to the dancing foam of the breakers, to the colours of driftwood or seaweed or moss left wet and bare on the rocks, to the line of the distant ocean, or the soft vapoury racks of clouds floating over from the west. She well-nigh forgot her companions altogether; who, however, were less absorbed. Yet for a while they all sat silent, looking partly at Lois, partly at each other, partly no doubt at the leaping spray from the broken waves on the reef. There was only the delicious sound of the splash and gurgle of waters—the scream of a gull—the breath of the air—the chirrup of a few insects; all was wild stillness and freshness and pureness, except only that little group of four human beings. And then, the puzzled vexation and perplexity in Tom's face, and the impatient disgust in the face of his sister, were too much for Mr. Lenox's sense of the humorous; and the silence was broken by a hearty burst of laughter, which naturally brought all eyes to himself.
"Pardon!" said the young gentleman. "The delight in your face, Julia, was irresistible."
"Delight!" she echoed. "Miss Lothrop, do you find something here in which you take pleasure?"
Lois looked round. "Yes," she said simply. "I find something everywhere to take pleasure in."
"Even at Shampuashuh?"
"At Shampuashuh, of course. That is my home."
"But I never take pleasure in anything at home. It is all such an old story. Every day is just like any other day, and I know beforehand exactly how everything will be; and one dress is like another, and one party is like another. I must go away from home to get any real pleasure."
Lois wondered if she succeeded.
"That's a nice look-out for you, George," Caruthers remarked.
"I shall know how to make home so agreeable that she will not want to wander any more," said the other.
"That is what the women do for the men, down our way," said Lois, smiling. She began to feel a little mischief stirring.
"What sort of pleasures do you find, or make, at home, Miss Lothrop?"Julia went on. "You are very quiet, are you not?"
"There is always one's work," said Lois lightly. She knew it would be in vain to tell her questioner the instances that came up in her memory; the first dish of ripe strawberries brought in to surprise her grandmother; the new potatoes uncommonly early; the fine yield of her raspberry bushes; the wonderful beauty of the early mornings in her garden; the rarer, sweeter beauty of the Bible reading and talk with old Mrs. Armadale; the triumphant afternoons on the shore, from which she and her sisters came back with great baskets of long clams; and countless other visions of home comfort and home peace, things accomplished and the fruit of them enjoyed. Miss Caruthers could not understand all this; so Lois answered simply,
"There is always one's work."
"Work! I hate work," cried the other woman. "What do you call work?"
"Everything that is to be done," said Lois. "Everything, except what we do for mere pleasure. We keep no servant; my sisters and I do all that there is to do, in doors and out."
"Out—of—doors!" cried Miss Caruthers. "What do you mean? You cannot do the farming?"
"No," said Lois, smiling merrily; "no; not the farming. That is done by men. But the gardening I do."
"Not seriously?"
"Very seriously. If you will come and see us, I will give you some new potatoes of my planting. I am rather proud of them. I was just thinking of them."
"Planting potatoes!" repeated the other lady, not too politely. "Thenthatis the reason why you find it a pleasure to sit here and see those waves beat."
The logical concatenation of this speech was not so apparent but that it touched all the risible nerves of the party; and Miss Caruthers could not understand why all three laughed so heartily.
"What did you expect when you came here?" asked Lois, still sparkling with fun.
"Just what I found!" returned the other rather grumbly.
Miss Caruthers carried on the tactics with which she had begun. Lois had never in her life found her society so diligently cultivated. If she walked out, Miss Caruthers begged to be permitted to go along; she wished to learn about the Islands. Lois could not see that she advanced much in learning; and sometimes wondered that she did not prefer her brother or her lover as instructors. True, her brother and her lover were frequently of the party; yet even then Miss Julia seemed to choose to take her lessons from Lois; and managed as much as possible to engross her. Lois could see that at such times Tom was often annoyed, and Mr. Lenox amused, at something, she could not quite tell what; and she was too inexperienced, and too modest withal, to guess. She only knew that she was not as free as she would have liked to be. Sometimes Tom found a chance for a little walk and talk with her alone; and those quarters of an hour were exceedingly pleasant; Tom told her about flowers, in a scientific way, that is; and made himself a really charming companion. Those minutes flew swiftly. But they never were many. If not Julia, at least Mr. Lenox was sure to appear upon the scene; and then, though he was very pleasant too, and more than courteous to Lois, somehow the charm was gone. It was just as well, Lois told herself; but that did not make her like it. Except with Tom, he did not enjoy herself thoroughly in the Caruthers society. She felt, with a sure, secret, fine instinct, what they were not high-bred enough to hide;—that they did not accept her as upon their own platform. I do not think the consciousness was plain enough to be put into words; nevertheless it was decided enough to make her quite willing to avoid their company. She tried, but she could not avoid it. In the house as out of the house. Tom would seek her out and sit down beside her; and then Julia would come to learn a crochet stitch, or Mrs. Caruthers would call her to remedy a fault in her knitting, or to hold her wool to be wound; refusing to let Mr. Lenox hold it, under the plea that Lois did it better; which was true, no doubt. Or Mr. Lenox himself would join them, and turn everything Tom said into banter; till Lois could not help laughing, though yet she was vexed.
So days went on. And then something happened to relieve both parties of the efforts they were making; a very strange thing to happen at the Isles of Shoals. Mrs. Wishart was taken seriously ill. She had not been quite well when she came; and she always afterwards maintained that the air did not agree with her. Lois thought it could not be the air, and must be some imprudence; but however it was, the fact was undoubted. Mrs. Wishart was ill; and the doctor who was fetched over from Portsmouth to see her, said she could not be moved, and must be carefully nursed. Was it the air? It couldn't be the air, he answered; nobody ever got sick at the Isles of Shoals. Was it some imprudence? Couldn't be, he said; there was no way in which she could be imprudent; she could not help living a natural life at Appledore. No, it was something the seeds of which she had brought with her; and the strong sea air had developed it. Reasoning which Lois did not understand; but she understood nursing, and gave herself to it, night and day. There was a sudden relief to Miss Julia's watch and ward; nobody was in danger of saying too many words to Lois now; nobody could get a chance; she was only seen by glimpses.
"How long is this sort of thing going on?" inquired Mr. Lenox one afternoon. He and Julia had been spending a very unrefreshing hour on the piazza doing nothing.
"Impossible to say."
"I'm rather tired of it. How long has Mrs. Wishart been laid up now?"
"A week; and she has no idea of being moved."
"Well, are we fixtures too?"
"You know what I came for, George. If Tom will go, I will, and thankful."
"Tom," said the gentleman, as Tom at this minute came out of the house, "have you got enough of Appledore?"
"I don't care about Appledore. It's the fishing." Tom, I may remark, had been a good deal out in a fishing-boat during this past week. "That's glorious."
"But you don't care for fishing, old boy."
"O, don't I!"
"No, not a farthing. Seriously, don't you think we might mend our quarters?"
"You can," said Tom. "Of course I can't go while Mrs. Wishart is sick.I can't leave those two women alone here to take care of themselves.You can take Julia and my mother away, where you like."
"And a good riddance," muttered Lenox, as the other ran down the steps and went off.
"He won't stir," said Julia. "You see how right I was."
"Are you sure about it?"
"Why, of course I am! Quite sure. What are you thinking about?"
"Just wondering whether you might have made a mistake."
"A mistake! How? I don't make mistakes."
"That's pleasant doctrine! But I am not so certain. I have been thinking whether Tom is likely ever to get anything better."
"Than this girl? George, don't you think hedeservessomething better? My brother? What are you thinking of?"
"Tom has got an enormous fancy for her; I can see that. It's not play with him. And upon my honour, Julia, I do not think she would do any thing to wear off the fancy."
"Not if she could help it!" returned Julia scornfully.
"She isn't a bit of a flirt."
"You think that is a recommendation? Men like flirts. This girl don't know how, that is all."
"I do not believe she knows how to do anything wrong."
"Now do set up a discourse in praise of virtue! What if she don't?That's nothing to the purpose. I want Tom to go into political life."
"A virtuous wife wouldn't hurt him there."
"And an ignorant, country-bred, untrained woman wouldn't help him, would she?"
"Tom will never want help in political life, for he will never go into it. Well, I have said my say, and resign myself to Appledore for two weeks longer. Only, mind you, I question if Tom will ever get anything as good again in the shape of a wife, as you are keeping him from now. It is something of a responsibility to play Providence."
The situation therefore remained unchanged for several days more. Mrs. Wishart needed constant attention, and had it; and nobody else saw Lois for more than the merest snatches of time. I think Lois made these moments as short as she could. Tom was in despair, but stuck to his post and his determination; and with sighs and groans his mother and sister held fast to theirs. The hotel at Appledore made a good thing of it.
Then one day Tom was lounging on the piazza at the time of the steamer's coming in from Portsmouth; and in a short time thereafter a new guest was seen advancing towards the hotel. Tom gave her a glance or two; he needed no more. She was middle-aged, plain, and evidently not from that quarter of the world where Mr. Tom Caruthers was known. Neatly dressed, however, and coming with an alert, business step over the grass, and so she mounted to the piazza. There she made straight for Tom, who was the only person visible.
"Is this the place where a lady is lying sick and another lady is tendin' her?"
"Thatisthe case here," said Tom politely. "Miss Lothrop is attending upon a sick friend in this house."
"That's it—Miss Lothrop. I'm her aunt. How's the sick lady? Dangerous?"
"Not at all, I should say," returned Tom; "but Miss Lothrop is very much confined with her. She will be very glad to see you, I have no doubt. Allow me to see about your room." And so saying, he would have relieved the new comer of a heavy handbag.
"Never mind," she said, holding fast. "You're very obliging—but when I'm away from home I always hold fast to whatever I've got; and I'll go to Miss Lothrop's room. Are there more folks in the house?"
"Certainly. Several. This way—I will show you."
"Then I s'pose there's plenty to help nurse, and they have no call for me?"
"I think Miss Lothrop has done the most of the nursing. Your coming will set her a little more at liberty. She has been very much confined with her sick friend."
"What have the other folks been about?"
"Not helping much, I am afraid. And of course a man is at a disadvantage at such a time."
"Are they all men?" inquired Mrs. Marx suddenly.
"No—I was thinking of my own case. I would have been very glad to be useful."
"O!" said the lady. "That's the sort o' world we live in; most of it ain't good for much when it comes to the pinch. Thank you—much obliged."
Tom had guided her up-stairs and along a gallery, and now indicated the door of Lois's room. Lois was quite as glad to see her aunt as Tom had supposed she would be.
"Aunty!—Whatever has brought you here, to the Isles of Shoals?"
"Not to see the Isles, you may bet. I've come to look after you."
"Why, I'm well enough. But it's very good of you."
"No, it ain't, for I wanted an excuse to see what the place is like. You haven't grown thin yet. What's all the folks about, that they let you do all the nursing?"
"O, it comes to me naturally, being with Mrs. Wishart. Who should do it?"
"To be sure," said Mrs. Marx; "who should do it? Most folks are good at keepin' out o' the way when they are wanted. There's one clever chap in the house—he showed me the way up here; who's he?"
"Fair hair?"
"Yes, and curly. A handsome fellow. And he knows you."
"O, they all know me by this time."
"This one particularly?"
"Well—I knew him in New York."
"I see! What's the matter with this sick woman?"
"I don't know. She is nervous, and feverish, and does not seem to get well as she ought to do."
"Well, if I was going to get sick, I'd choose some other place than a rock out in the middle of the ocean.Seemsto me I would. One never knows what one may be left to do."
"One cannot generally choose where one will be sick," said Lois, smiling.
"Yes, you can," said the other, as sharp as a needle. "If one's in the wrong place, one can keep up till one can get to the right one. You needn't tell me. I know it, and I've done it. I've held up when I hadn't feet to stand upon, nor a head to hold. If you're a mind to, you can. Nervous, eh? That's the trouble o' folks that haven't enough to do. Mercy! I don't wonder they get nervous. But you've had a little too much, Lois, and you show it. Now, you go and lie down. I'll look after the nerves."
"How are they all at home?"
"Splendid! Charity goes round like a bee in a bottle, as usual. Ma's well; and Madge is as handsome as ever. Garden's growin' up to weeds, and I don't see as there's anybody to help it; but that corner peach tree's ripe, and as good as if you had fifteen gardeners."
"It's time I was home!" said Lois, sighing.
"No, it ain't,—not if you're havin' a good time here.Areyou havin' a good time?"
"Why, I've been doing nothing but take care of Mrs. Wishart for this week past."
"Well, now I'm here. You go off. Do you like this queer place, I want to know?"
"Aunty, it is just perfectly delightful!"
"Is it? I don't see it. Maybe I will by and by. Now go off, Lois."
Mrs. Marx from this time took upon herself the post of head nurse. Lois was free to go out as much as she pleased. Yet she made less use of this freedom than might have been expected, and still confined herself unnecessarily to the sick-room.
"Why don't you go?" her aunt remonstrated. "Seems to me you ain't so dreadful fond of the Isles of Shoals after all."
"If one could be alone!" sighed Lois; "but there is always a pack at my heels."
"Alone! Is that what you're after? I thought half the fun was to see the folks."
"Well, some of them," said Lois. "But as sure as I go out to have a good time with the rocks and the sea, as I like to have it, there comes first one and then another and then another, and maybe a fourth; and the game is up."
"Why? I don't see how they should spoil it."
"O, they do not care for the things I care for; the sea is nothing to them, and the rocks less than nothing; and instead of being quiet, they talk nonsense, or what seems nonsense to me; and I'd as lieve be at home."
"What do they go for then?"
"I don't know. I think they do not know what to do with themselves."
"What do they stay here for, then, for pity's sake? If they are tired, why don't they go away?"
"I can't tell. That is what I have asked myself a great many times.They are all as well as fishes, every one of them."
Mrs. Marx held her peace and let things go their train for a few days more. Mrs. Wishart still gave her and Lois a good deal to do, though her ailments aroused no anxiety. After those few days, Mrs. Marx spoke again.
"What keeps you so mum?" she said to Lois. "Why don't you talk, as other folks do?"
"I hardly see them, you know, except at meals."
"Why don't you talk at meal times? that's what I am askin' about. You can talk as well as anybody; and you sit as mum as a stick."
"Aunty, they all talk about things I do not understand."
"Then I'd talk of somethingtheydon't understand. Two can play at that game."
"It wouldn't be amusing," said Lois, laughing.
"Do you calltheirtalk amusing? It's the stupidest stuff I ever did hear. I can't make head or tail of it; nor I don't believe they can. Sounds to me as if they were tryin' amazin' hard to be witty, and couldn't make it out."
"It sounds a good deal like that," Lois assented.
"They go on just as if you wasn't there!"
"And why shouldn't they?"
"Because you are there."
"I am nothing to them," said Lois quietly.
"Nothing to them! You are worth the whole lot."
"They do not think so."
"And politeness is politeness."
"I sometimes think," said Lois, "that politeness is rudeness."
"Well, I wouldn't let myself be put in a corner so, if I was you."
"But I am in a corner, to them. All the world is wheretheylive; andI live in a little corner down by Shampuashuh."
"Nobody's big enough to live in more than a corner—if you come to that; and one corner's as good as another. That's nonsense, Lois."
"Maybe, aunty. But there is a certain knowledge of the world, and habit of the world, which makes some people very different from other people; you can't help that."
"I don't want to help it?" said Mrs. Marx. "I wouldn't have you like them, for all the black sheep in my flock."
A few more days went by; and then Mrs. Wishart began to mend; so much that she insisted her friends must not shut themselves up with her. "Do go down-stairs and see the people!" she said; "or take your kind aunt, Lois, and show her the wonders of Appledore. Is all the world gone yet?"
"Nobody's gone," said Mrs. Marx; "except one thick man and one thin one; and neither of 'em counts."
"Are the Caruthers here?"
"Every man of 'em."
"There is only one man of them; unless you count Mr. Lenox."
"I don't count him. I count that fair-haired chap. All the rest of 'em are stay in' for him."
"Staying for him!" repeated Mrs. Wishart.
"That's what they say. They seem to take it sort o' hard, that Tom's so fond of Appledore."
Mrs. Wishart was silent a minute, and then she smiled.
"He spends his time trollin' for blue fish," Mrs. Marx went on.
"Ah, I dare say. Do go down, Mrs. Marx, and take a walk, and see if he has caught anything."
Lois would not go along; she told her aunt what to look for, and which way to take, and said she would sit still with Mrs. Wishart and keep her amused.
At the very edge of the narrow valley in which the house stood, Mrs. Marx came face to face with Tom Caruthers. Tom pulled off his hat with great civility, and asked if he could do anything for her.
"Well, you can set me straight, I guess," said the lady. "Lois told me which way to go, but I don't seem to be any wiser. Where's the old dead village? South, she said; but in such a little place south and north seems all alike.Idon' know which is south."
"You are not far out of the way," said Tom. "Let me have the pleasure of showing you. Why did you not bring Miss Lothrop out?"
"Best reason in the world; I couldn't. She would stay and see to Mrs.Wishart."
"That's the sort of nurse I should like to have take care of me," saidTom, "if ever I was in trouble."
"Ah, wouldn't you!" returned Mrs. Marx. "That's a kind o' nurses that ain't in the market. Look here, young man—where are we going?"
"All right," said Tom. "Just round over these rocks. The village was at the south end of the island, as Miss Lois said. I believe she has studied up Appledore twice as much as any of the rest of us."
It was a fresh, sunny day in September; everything at Appledore was in a kind of glory, difficult to describe in words, and which no painter ever yet put on canvas. There was wind enough to toss the waves in lively style; and when the two companions came out upon the scene of the one-time settlement of Appledore, all brilliance of light and air and colour seemed to be sparkling together. Under this glory lay the ruins and remains of what had been once homes and dwelling-places of men. Grass-grown cellar excavations, moss-grown stones and bits of walls; little else; but a number of those lying soft and sunny in the September light. Soft, and sunny, and lonely; no trace of human habitation any longer, where once human activity had been in full play. Silence, where the babble of voices had been; emptiness, where young feet and old feet had gone in and out; barrenness, where the fruits of human industry had been busily gathered and dispensed. Something in the quiet, sunny scene stilled for a moment the not very sensitive spirits of the two who had come to visit it; while the sea waves rose and broke in their old fashion, as they had done on those same rocks in old time, and would do for generation after generation yet to come. That was always the same. It made the contrast greater with what had passed and was passing away.
"There was a good many of 'em."—Mrs. Marx' voice broke the pause which had come upon the talk.
"Quite a village," her companion assented.
"Why ain't they here now?"
"Dead and gone?" suggested Tom, half laughing.
"Of course! I mean, why ain't the village here, and the people? The people are somewhere—the children and grandchildren of those that lived here; what's become of 'em?"
"That's true," said Tom; "they are somewhere. I believe they are to be found scattered along the coast of the mainland."
"Got tired o' livin' between sea and sky with no ground to speak of.Well, I should think they would!"
"Miss Lothrop says, on the contrary, that they never get tired of it, the people who live here; and that nothing but necessity forced the former inhabitants to abandon Appledore."
"What sort of necessity?"
"Too exposed, in the time of the war."
"Ah! likely. Well, we'll go, Mr. Caruthers; this sort o' thing makes me melancholy, and that' against my principles to be." Yet she stood still, looking.
"Miss Lothrop likes this place," Tom remarked.
"Then it don't make her melancholy."
"Does anything?"
"I hope so. She's human."
"But she seems to me always to have the sweetest air of happiness about her, that ever I saw in a human being."
"Have you got where you can seeair?" inquired Mrs. Marx sharply. Tom laughed.
"I mean, that she finds something everywhere to like and to take pleasure in. Now I confess, this bit of ground, full of graves and old excavations, has no particular charms for me; and my sister will not stay here a minute."
"And what does Lois find here to delight her?
"Everything!" said Tom with enthusiasm. "I was with her the first time she came to this corner of the island,—and it was a lesson, to see her delight. The old cellars and the old stones, and the graves; and then the short green turf that grows among them, and the flowers and weeds—whatIcall weeds, who know no better—but Miss Lois tried to make me see the beauty of the sumach and all the rest of it."
"And she couldn't!" said Mrs. Marx. "Well, I can't. The noise of the sea, and the sight of it, eternally breaking there upon the rocks, would drive me out of my mind, I believe, after a while." And yet Mrs. Marx sat down upon a turfy bank and looked contentedly about her.
"Mrs. Marx," said Tom suddenly, "you are a good friend of Miss Lothrop, aren't you?"
"Try to be a friend to everybody. I've counted sixty-six o' these old cellars!"
"I believe there are more than that. I think Miss Lothrop said seventy."
"She seems to have told you a good deal."
"I was so fortunate as to be here alone with her. Miss Lothrop is often very silent in company."
"So I observe," said Mrs. Marx dryly.
"I wish you'd be my friend too!" said Tom, now taking a seat by her side. "You said you are a friend of everybody."
"That is, of everybody who needs me," said Mrs. Marx, casting a side look at Tom's handsome, winning countenance. "I judge, young man, that ain't your case."
"But it is, indeed!"
"Maybe," said Mrs. Marx incredulously. "Go on, and let's hear."
"You will let me speak to you frankly?"
"Don't like any other sort."
"And you will answer me also frankly?"
"I don't know," said the lady, "but one thing I can say, if I've got the answer, I'll give it to you."
"I don't know who should," said Tom flatteringly, "if not you. I thought I could trust you, when I had seen you a few times."
"Maybe you won't think so after to-day. But go on. What's the business?"
"It is very important business," said Tom slowly; "and it concerns—Miss Lothrop."
"You have got hold of me now," said Lois's aunt. "I'll go into the business, you may depend upon it. Whatisthe business?"
"Mrs. Marx, I have a great admiration for Miss Lothrop."
"I dare say. So have some other folks."
"I have had it for a long while. I came here because I heard she was coming. I have lost my heart to her, Mrs. Marx."
"Ah!—What are you going to do about it? or what canIdo about it?Lost hearts can't be picked up under every bush."
"I want you to tell me what I shall do."
"What hinders your making up your own mind?"
"It is made up!—long ago."
"Then act upon it. What hinders you? I don't see what I have got to do with that."
"Mrs. Marx, do you think she would have me if I asked her? As a friend, won't you tell me?"
"I don't see why I should,—if I knew,—which I don't. I don't see how it would be a friend's part. Why should I tell you, supposin' I could? She's the only person that knows anything about it."
Tom pulled his moustache right and left in a worried manner.
"Have you asked her?"
"Haven't had a ghost of a chance, since I have been here!" cried the young man; "and she isn't like other girls; she don't give a fellow a bit of help."
Mrs. Marx laughed out.
"I mean," said Tom, "she is so quiet and steady, and she don't talk, and she don't let one see what she thinks. I think she must know I like her—but I have not the least idea whether she likes me."
"The shortest way would be to ask her."
"Yes, but you see I can't get a chance. Miss Lothrop is always up-stairs in that sick-room; and if she comes down, my sister or my mother or somebody is sure to be running after her."
"Besides you," said Mrs. Marx.
"Yes, besides me."
"Perhaps they don't want to let you have her all to yourself."
"That's the disagreeable truth!" said Tom in a burst of vexed candour.
"Perhaps they are afraid you will do something imprudent if they do not take care."
"That's what they call it, with their ridiculous ways of looking at things. Mrs. Marx, I wish people had sense."
"Perhaps they are right. Perhaps theyhavesense, and it would be imprudent."
"Why? Mrs. Marx, I am sureyouhave sense. I have plenty to live upon, and live as I like. There is no difficulty in my case about ways and means."
"What is the difficulty, then?"
"You see, I don't want to go against my mother and sister, unless I had some encouragement to think that Miss Lothrop would listen to me; and I thought—I hoped—you would be able to help me."
"How can I help you?"
"Tell me what I shall do."
"Well, when it comes to marryin'," said Mrs. Marx, "I always say to folks, If you can live and get along without gettin' married—don't!"
"Don't get married?"
"Just so," said Mrs. Marx. "Don't get married; not if you can live without."
"You to speak so!" said Tom. "I never should have thought, Mrs. Marx, you were one of that sort."
"What sort?"
"The sort that talk against marriage."
"I don't!—only against marryin' the wrong one; and unless it's somebody that you can't live without, you may be sure it ain't the right one."
"How many people in the world do you suppose are married on that principle?"
"Everybody that has any business to be married at all," responded the lady with great decision.
"Well, honestly, I don't feel as if I could live without Miss Lothrop.I've been thinking about it for months."
"I wouldn't stay much longer in that state," said Mrs. Marx, "if I was you. When people don' know whether they're goin' to live or die, their existence ain't much good to 'em."
"Then you think I may ask her?"
"Tell me first, what would happen if you did—that is, supposin' she said yes to you, about which I don't know anything, no more'n the people that lived in these old cellars. What would happen if you did? and if she did?"
"I would make her happy, Mrs. Marx!"
"Yes," said the lady slowly—"I guess you would; for Lois won't say yes to anybodyshecan live without; and I've a good opinion of your disposition; but what would happen to other people?"
"My mother and sister, you mean?"
"Them, or anybody else that's concerned."
"There is nobody else concerned," said Tom, idly defacing the rocks in his neighbourhood by tearing the lichen from them. And Mrs. Marx watched him, and patiently waited.
"There is no sense in it!" he broke out at last. "It is all folly. Mrs.Marx, what is life good for, but to be happy?"
"Just so," assented Mrs. Marx.
"And haven't I a right to be happy in my own way?"
"If you can."
"So I think! I will ask Miss Lothrop if she will have me, this very day. I'm determined."
"But I said,if you can. Happiness is somethin' besides sugar and water. What else'll go in?"
"What do you mean?" asked Tom, looking at her.
"Suppose you're satisfied, and supposeshe'ssatisfied. Will everybody else be?"
Tom went at the rocks again.
"It's my affair—and hers," he said then.
"And what will your mother and sister say?"
"Julia has chosen for herself."
"I should say, she has chosen very well. Does she like your choice."
"Mrs. Marx," said the poor young man, leaving the lichens, "they bother me to death!"
"Ah? How is that?"
"Always watching, and hanging around, and giving a fellow no chance for his life, and putting in their word. They call themselves very wise, but I think it is the other thing."
"They don't approve, then?"
"I don't want to marry money!" cried Tom; "and I don't care for fashionable girls. I'm tired of 'em. Lois is worth the whole lot. Such absurd stuff! And she is handsomer than any girl that was in town last winter."
"They want a fashionable girl," said Mrs. Marx calmly.
"Well, you see," said Tom, "they live for that. If an angel was to come down from heaven, they would say her dress wasn't cut right, and they wouldn't ask her to dinner!"
"I don't suppose they'd know how to talk to her either, if they did," said Mrs. Marx. "It would be uncomfortable—for them; I don't suppose an angel can be uncomfortable. But Lois ain't an angel. I guess you'd better give it up, Mr. Caruthers."
Tom turned towards her a dismayed kind of look, but did not speak.
"You see," Mrs. Marx went on, "things haven't gone very far. Lois is all right; and you'll come back to life again. A fish that swims in fresh water couldn't go along very well with one that lives in the salt. That's how I look at it. Lois is one sort, and you're another. I don't know but both sorts are good; but they are different, and you can't make 'em alike."
"I would never want her to be different!" burst out Tom.
"Well, you see, she ain't your sort exactly," Mrs. Marx added, but not as if she were depressed by the consideration. "And then, Lois is religious."
"You don't think that is a difficulty? Mrs. Marx, I am not a religious man myself; at least I have never made any profession; but I assure you I have a great respect for religion."
"That is what folks say of something a great way off, and that they don't want to come nearer."
"My mother and sister are members of the church; and I should like my wife to be, too."
"Why?"
"I told you, I have a great respect for religion; and I believe in it especially for women."
"I don't see why what's good for them shouldn't be good for you."
"That need be no hindrance," Tom urged.
"Well, I don' know. I guess Lois would think it was. And maybe you would think it was, too,—come to find out. I guess you'd better let things be, Mr. Caruthers."
Tom looked very gloomy. "You think she would not have me?" he repeated.
"I think you will get over it," said Mrs. Marx, rising. "And I think you had better find somebody that will suit your mother and sister."
And after that time, it may be said, Mrs. Marx was as careful of Lois on the one side as Mrs. and Miss Caruthers were of Tom on the other. Two or three more days passed away.
"HowisMrs. Wishart?" Miss Julia asked one afternoon.
"First-rate," answered Mrs. Marx. "She's sittin' up. She'll be off and away before you know it."
"Will you stay, Mrs. Marx, to help in the care of her, till she is able to move?"
"Came for nothin' else."
"Then I do not see, mother, what good we can do by remaining longer.Could we, Mrs. Marx?"
"Nothin', but lose your chance o' somethin' better, I should say."
"Tom, do you want to do any more fishing? Aren't you ready to go?"
"Whenever you like," said Tom gloomily.
The Caruthers family took their departure from Appledore.
"Well, we have had to fight for it, but we have saved Tom," Julia remarked to Mr. Lenox, standing by the guards and looking back at the Islands as the steamer bore them away.
"Saved!—"
"Yes!" she said decidedly,—"we have saved him."
"It's a responsibility," said the gentleman, shrugging his shoulders. "I am not clear that you have not 'saved' Tom from a better thing than he'll ever find again."
"Perhapsyou'dlike her!" said Miss Julia sharply. "How ridiculous all you men are about a pretty face!"
The remaining days of her stay in Appledore Lois roved about to her heart's content. And yet I will not say that her enjoyment of rocks and waves was just what it had been at her first arrival. The island seemed empty, somehow. Appledore is lovely in September and October; and Lois sat on the rocks and watched the play of the waves, and delighted herself in the changing colours of sea, and sky, and clouds, and gathered wild-flowers, and picked up shells; but there was somehow very present to her the vision of a fair, kindly, handsome face, and eyes that sought hers eagerly, and hands that were ready gladly with any little service that there was room to render. She was no longer troubled by a group of people dogging her footsteps; and she found now that there had been, however inopportune, a little excitement in that. It was very well they were gone, she acknowledged; for Mr. Caruthersmighthave come to like her too well, and that would have been inconvenient; and yet it is so pleasant to be liked! Upon the sober humdrum of Lois's every day home life, Tom Caruthers was like a bit of brilliant embroidery; and we know how involuntarily the eyes seek out such a spot of colour, and how they return to it. Yes, life at home was exceedingly pleasant, but it was a picture in grey; this was a dash of blue and gold. It had better be grey, Lois said to herself; life is not glitter. And yet, a little bit of glitter on the greys and browns is so delightful. Well, it was gone. There was small hope now that anything so brilliant would ever illuminate her quiet course again. Lois sat on the rocks and looked at the sea, and thought about it. If they, Tom and his friends, had not come to Appledore at all, her visit would have been most delightful; nay, it had been most delightful, whether or no; but—this and her New York experience had given Lois a new standard by which to measure life and men. From one point of view, it is true, the new lost in comparison with the old. Tom and his people were not "religious." They knew nothing of what made her own life so sweet; they had not her prospects or joys in looking on towards the far future, nor her strength and security in view of the trials and vicissitudes of earth and time. She had the best of it; as she joyfully confessed to herself, seeing the glorious breaking waves and watching the play of light on them, and recalling Cowper's words—
"My Father made them all!"
But there remained another aspect of the matter which raised other feelings in the girl's mind. The difference in education. Those people could speak French, and Mr. Caruthers could speak Spanish, and Mr. Lenox spoke German. Whether well or ill, Lois did not know; but in any case, how many doors, in literature and in life, stood open to them; which were closed and locked doors to her! And we all know, that ever since Bluebeard's time—I might go back further, and say, ever since Eve's time—Eve's daughters have been unable to stand before a closed door without the wish to open it. The impulse, partly for good, partly for evil, is incontestable. Lois fairly longed to know what Tom and his sister knew in the fields of learning. And there were other fields. There was a certain light, graceful, inimitable habit of the world and of society; familiarity with all the pretty and refined ways and uses of the more refined portions of society; knowledge and practice of proprieties, as the above-mentioned classes of the world recognize them; which all seemed to Lois greatly desirable and becoming. Nay, the said "proprieties" and so forth were not always of the most important kind; Miss Caruthers could be what Lois considered coolly rude, upon occasion; and her mother could be carelessly impolite; and Mr. Lenox could be wanting in the delicate regard which a gentleman should show to a lady; "I suppose," thought Lois, "he did not think I would know any better." In these things, these essential things, some of the farmers of Shampuashuh and their wives were the peers at least, if not the superiors, of these fine ladies and gentlemen. But in lesser things! These people knew how to walk gracefully, sit gracefully, eat gracefully. Their manner and address in all the little details of life, had the ease, and polish, and charm which comes of use, and habit, and confidence. The way Mr. Lenox and Tom would give help to a lady in getting over the rough rocks of Appledore; the deference with which they would attend to her comfort and provide for her pleasure; the grace of a bow, the good breeding of a smile; the ease of action which comes from trained physical and practised mental nature; these and a great deal more, even the details of dress and equipment which are only possible to those who know how, and which are instantly seen to be excellent and becoming, even by those who do not know how; all this had appealed mightily to Lois's nature, and raised in her longings and regrets more or less vague, but very real. All that, she would like to have. She wanted the familiarity with books, and also the familiarity with the world, which some people had; the secureà plomband the easy facility of manner which are so imposing and so attractive to a girl like Lois. She felt that to these people life was richer, larger, wider than to her; its riches more at command; the standpoint higher from which to take a view of the world; the facility greater which could get from the world what it had to give. And it was a closed door before which Lois stood. Truly on her side of the door there was very much that she had and they had not; she knew that, and did not fail to recognize it and appreciate it. What was the Lord's beautiful creation to them? a place to kill time in, and get rid of it as fast as possible. The ocean, to them, was little but a great bath-tub; or a very inconvenient separating medium, which prevented them from going constantly to Paris and Rome. To judge by all that appeared, the sky had no colours for them, and the wind no voices, and the flowers no speech. And as for the Bible, and the hopes and joys which take their source there, they knew no more of itsothan if they had been Mahometans. They took no additional pleasure in the things of the natural world, because those things were made by a Hand that they loved. Poor people! and Lois knew they were poor; and yet—she said to herself, and also truly, that the possession of her knowledge would not be lessened by the possession oftheirs. And a little pensiveness mingled for a few days with her enjoyment of Appledore. Meanwhile Mrs. Wishart was getting well.
"So they have all gone!" she said, a day or two after the Caruthers party had taken themselves away.
"Yes, and Appledore seems, you can't think how lonely," said Lois. She had just come in from a ramble.
"You saw a great deal of them, dear?"
"Quite a good deal. Did you ever see such bright pimpernel? Isn't it lovely?"
"I don't understand how Tom could get away."
"I believe he did not want to go."
"Why didn't you keep him?"
"I!" said Lois with an astonished start. "Why should I keep him, Mrs.Wishart?"
"Because he likes you so much."
"Does he?" said Lois a little bitterly.
"Yes! Don't you like him? How do you like him, Lois?"
"He is nice, Mrs. Wishart. But if you ask me, I do not think he has enough strength of character."
"If Tom has let them carry him off against his will, heisrather weak."
Lois made no answer. Had he? and had they done it? A vague notion of what might be the truth of the whole transaction floated in and out of her mind, and made her indignant. Whatever one's private views of the danger may be, I think no one likes to be taken care of in this fashion. Of course Tom Caruthers was and could be nothing to her, Lois said to herself; and of course she could be nothing to him; but that his friends should fear the contrary and take measures to prevent it, stirred her most disagreeably. Yes; if things had goneso, then Tom certainly was weak; and it vexed her that he should be weak. Very inconsistent, when it would have occasioned her so much trouble if he had been strong! But when is human nature consistent? Altogether this visit to Appledore, the pleasure of which began so spicily, left rather a flat taste upon her tongue; and she was vexed at that.
There was another person who probably thought Tom weak, and who was curious to know how he had come out of this trial of strength with his relations; but Mr. Dillwyn had wandered off to a distance, and it was not till a month later that he saw any of the Caruthers. By that time they were settled in their town quarters for the winter, and there one evening he called upon them. He found only Julia and her mother.
"By the way," said he, when the talk had rambled on for a while, "how did you get on at the Isles of Shoals?"
"We had an awful time," said Julia. "You cannot conceive of anything so slow."
"How long did you stay?"
"O, ages! We were there four or five weeks. Imagine, if you can.Nothing but sea and rocks, and no company!"
"No company! What kept you there?"
"O, Tom!"
"What kept Tom?"
"Mrs. Wishart got sick, you see, and couldn't get away, poor soul! and that made her stay so long."
"And you had to stay too, to nurse her?"
"No, nothing of that. Miss Lothrop was there, and she did the nursing; and then a ridiculous aunt of hers came to help her."
"You staid for sympathy?"
"Don't be absurd, Philip! You know we were kept by Tom. We could not get him away."
"What made Tom want to stay?"
"O, that girl."
"How did you get him away at last?"
"Just because we stuck to him. No other way. He would undoubtedly have made a fool of himself with that girl—he was just ready to do it—but we never left him a chance. George and I, and mother, we surrounded him," said Julia, laughing; "we kept close by him; we never left them alone. Tom got enough of it at last, and agreed, very melancholy, to come away. He is dreadfully in the blues yet."
"You have a good deal to answer for, Julia."
"Now, don't, Philip! That's what George says. It istooabsurd. Just because she has a pretty face. All you men are bewitched by pretty faces."
"She has a good manner, too."
"Manner? She has no manner at all; and she don't know anything, out of her garden. We have saved Tom from a great danger. It would be a terrible thing, perfectlyterrible, to have him marry a girl who is not a lady, nor even an educated woman."
"You think you could not have made a lady of her?"
"Mamma, do hear Philip! isn't he too bad? Just because that girl has a little beauty. I wonder what there is in beauty, it turns all your heads! Mamma, do you hear Mr. Dillwyn? he wishes we had let Tom have his head and marry that little gardening girl."
"Indeed I do not," said Philip seriously. "I am very glad you succeeded in preventing it But allow me to ask if you are sure youhavesucceeded? Is it quite certain Tom will not have his head after all? He may cheat you yet."
"O no! He's very melancholy, but he has given it up. If he don't, we'll take him abroad in the spring. I think he has given it up. His being melancholy looks like it."
"True. I'll sound him when I get a chance."
The chance offered itself very soon; for Tom came in, and when Dillwyn left the house, Tom went to walk with him. They sauntered along Fifth Avenue, which was pretty full of people still, enjoying the mild air and beautiful starlight.
"Tom, what did you do at the Isles of Shoals?" Mr. Dillwyn asked suddenly.
"Did a lot of fishing. Capital trolling."
"All your fishing done on the high seas, eh?"
"All my successful fishing."
"What was the matter? Not a faint heart?"
"No. It's disgusting, the whole thing!" Tom broke out with hearty emphasis.
"You don't like to talk about it? I'll spare you, if you say so."
"I don't care what you do to me," said Tom; "and I have no objection to talk about it—to you."
Nevertheless he stopped.
"Have you changed your mind?"
"I shouldn't change my mind, if I lived to be as old as Methuselah!"
"That's right. Well, then,—the thing is going on?"
"Itisn'tgoing on! and I suppose it never will!"
"Had the lady any objection? I cannot believe that."
"I don't know," said Tom, with a big sigh. "I almost think she hadn't; but I never could find that out."
"What hindered you, old fellow?"
"My blessed relations. Julia and mother made such a row. I wouldn't have minded the row neither; for a man must marry to please himself and not his mother; and I believe no man ever yet married to please his sister; but, Philip, they didn't give me a minute. I could never join her anywhere, but Julia would be round the next corner; or else George would be there before me. George must put his oar in; and between them they kept it up."
"And you think she liked you?"
Tom was silent a while.
"Well," said he at last, "I won't swear; for you never know where a woman is till you've got her; but if she didn't, all I have to say is, signs aren't good for anything."
It was Philip now who was silent, for several minutes.
"What's going to be the upshot of it?"
"O, I suppose I shall go abroad with Julia and George in the spring, and end by taking an orthodox wife some day; somebody with blue blood, and pretension, and nothing else. My people will be happy, and the family name will be safe."
"And what will become of her?"
"O, she's all right. She won't break her heart about me. She isn't that sort of girl," Tom Caruthers said gloomily. "Do you know, I admire her immensely, Philip! I believe she's good enough for anything. Maybe she's too good. That's what her aunt hinted."
"Her aunt! Who's she?"
"She's a sort of a snapping turtle. A good sort of woman, too. I took counsel with her, do you know, when I found it was no use for me to try to see Lois. I asked her if she would stand my friend. She was as sharp as a fish-hook, and about as ugly a customer; and she as good as told me to go about my business."
"Did she give reasons for such advice?"
"O yes! She saw through Julia and mother as well as I did; and she spoke as any friend of Lois would, who had a little pride about her. I can't blame her."
Silence fell again, and lasted while the two young men walked the length of several blocks. Then Mr. Dillwyn began again.
"Tom, there ought to be no more shilly-shallying about this matter."
"Nomore!Yes, you're right. I ought to have settled it long ago, before Julia and mother got hold of it. That's where I made a mistake."
"And you think it too late?"
Tom hesitated. "It's too late. I've lost my time.Shehas given me up, and mother and Julia have set their hearts that I should give her up. I am not a match for them. Is a man ever a match for a woman, do you think, Dillwyn, if she takes something seriously in hand?"
"Will you go to Europe next spring?"
"Perhaps. I suppose so."
"If you do, perhaps I will join the party—that is, if you will all let me."
So the conversation went over into another channel.
Two or three evenings after this, Philip Dillwyn was taking his way down the Avenue, not up it. He followed it down to nearly its lower termination, and turned up into Clinton Place, where he presently run up the steps of a respectable but rather dingy house, rang the bell, and asked for Mrs. Barclay.
The room where he awaited her was one of those dismal places, a public parlour in a boarding-house of second or third rank. Respectable, but forlorn. Nothing was ragged or untidy, but nothing either had the least look of home comfort or home privacy. As to home elegance, or luxury, the look of such a room is enough to put it out of one's head that there can be such things in the world. The ugly ingrain carpet, the ungraceful frame of the small glass in the pier, the abominable portraits on the walls, the disagreeable paper with which they were hung, the hideous lamps on the mantelpiece;—wherever the eye looked, it came back with uneasy discomfort. Philip's eye came back to the fire; andthatwas not pleasant to see; for the fireplace was not properly cared for, the coals were lifeless, and evidently more economical than useful. Philip looked very out of place in these surroundings. No one could for a moment have supposed him to be living among them. His thoroughly well-dressed figure, the look of easy refinement in his face, the air of one who is his own master, so inimitable by one whose circumstances master him; all said plainly that Mr. Dillwyn was here only on account of some one else. It could be no home of his.
As little did it seem fitted to be the home of the lady who presently entered. A tall, elegant, dignified woman; in the simplest of dresses, indeed, which probably bespoke scantiness of means, but which could not at all disguise or injure the impression of high breeding and refinement of manners which her appearance immediately produced. She was a little older than her visitor, yet not much; a woman in the prime of life she would have been, had not life gone hard with her; and she had been very handsome, though the regular features were shadowed with sadness, and the eyes had wept too many tears not to have suffered loss of their original brightness. She had the slow, quiet manner of one whose life is played out; whom the joys and sorrows of the world have both swept over, like great waves, and receding, have left the world a barren strand for her; where the tide is never to rise again. She was a sad-eyed woman, who had accepted her sadness, and could be quietly cheerful on the surface of it. Always, at least, as far as good breeding demanded. She welcomed Mr. Dilhvyn with a smile and evident genuine pleasure.
"How do I find you?" he said, sitting down.
"Quite well. Where have you been all summer? I need not ask howyouare."
"Useless things always thrive," he said. "I have been wandering about among the mountains and lakes in the northern part of Maine."
"That is very wild, isn't it?"
"Therein lies its charm."
"There are not roads and hotels?"
"The roads the lumberers make. And I saw one hotel, and did not want to see any more."
"How did you find your way?"
"I had a guide—an Indian, who could speak a little English."
"No other company?"
"Rifle and fishing-rod."
"Good work for them there, I suppose?"
"Capital. Moose, and wild-fowl, and fish, all of best quality. I wishedI could have sent you some."
"Thank you for thinking of me. I should have liked the game too."
"Are you comfortable here?" he asked, lowering his voice. Just then the door opened; a man's head was put in, surveyed the two people in the room, and after a second's deliberation disappeared again.
"You have not this room to yourself?" inquired Dilhvyn.
"O no. It is public property."
"Then we may be interrupted?"
"At any minute. Do you want to talk to me, 'unter vier Augen'?"
"I want no more, certainly. Yes, I came to talk to you; and I cannot, if people keep coming in." A woman's head had now shown itself for a moment. "I suppose in half an hour there will be a couple of old gentlemen here playing backgammon. I see a board. Have you not a corner to yourself?"
"I have a corner," she said, hesitating; "but it is only big enough to hold me. However, if you will promise to make no remarks, and to 'make believe,' as the children say, that the place is six times as large as it is, I will, for once take you to it. I would take no one else."
"The honour will not outweigh the pleasure," said Dillwyn as he rose."But why must I put such a force upon my imagination?"