ONCE more a summer sunset at the old farm-house among the Berkshire Hills, where, for a hundred years, successive generations of Windsors had been born and bred; once more we see the level rays glance from the diamond-paned, dairy casement, left ajar to admit the fresh evening air; once more the airy banners of eglantine and maiden's-bower float against the clear blue sky; once more we tread in fancy the green velvet of the turf, creeping over the very edge of the irregular door-stone, worn smooth by feet that long since have travelled beyond earthly limits, and now tread celestial fields and sunny slopes of Paradise. Far across the meadow lies the shadow of the old house,—a strange, fantastic suggestion of a dwellings vague and enticing as the gray turrets of the Castle of St. John, which, as the legend says, are to be shaped at twilight from the crags and ravines of the lonely mountains, but vanish in the daylight. And beside it, not vague, but clear and sharp, lay the shadow of the old well-sweep, like a giant finger, pointing, always pointing, now to the east, whence cometh light and hope, and the promise of another day; and anon due west, as showing to the sad eyes that watched it the road to joy and comfort.
Within the house, much was changed. The floors were covered with matting, the walls with delicate paper-hangings; the old furniture replaced with Indian couches and arm-chairs, whose shape and material suggested luxurious ease and coolness. In the chamber that had been Dora's, was wrought, perhaps, the greatest change of all; for to the rugged simplicity, and, so to speak, severity, of the young girl's surroundings, had succeeded the luxury, the exquisite refinement, essential to the comfort of a woman born and bred in the innermost sanctuary of modern civilization. The martial relics of Dora's camp-life had disappeared from the walls, no longer simply whitewashed, but covered with a pearl-gray paper, over which trailed in graceful curves a mimic ivy-vine, colored like nature. Upon this hung a few choice pictures,—proof-engravings of Correggio's Cherubs; a Christ blessing Little Children; a Madonna, with sad, soft eyes resting upon the Holy Child, whose fixed gaze seemed to read his own sublime destiny; and a Babes in the Wood.
Over the fireplace, the rude sketch of the deformed negro was replaced by an exquisite painting, representing a little girl,—her sweet face framed in a shower of golden ringlets, her blue eyes fixed with a sort of wistful tenderness upon the beholder; this expression repeating itself in the lines of the curving mouth. The dress was carefully copied from that worn by 'Toinette Legrange upon the day she was lost; and the picture had been painted, soon after her disappearance, by an artist friend of the family, who had so often admired the beautiful child, that he found it easy to reproduce her face upon canvas; although his own knowledge of the circumstances, and perhaps the haunting presence of the sad eyes of the mother, as she asked, "Oh! can you give me even a picture of her?" had tinged the whole composition with a pathos not intended by the artist, but indescribably touching to the spectator.
Between the windows, in place of Dora's simple pine table, with its white drapery, its few plain books, and little work-box, stood a toilet-table, covered with the luxurious necessities of an elegant woman's wardrobe. The dressing-case, the jewel-box, the perfume-bottles; the velvet-lined and delicately-scented mouchoir and glove boxes; the varied trifles, so idle in detail, so essential to the whole,—all were there, and all evidently in constant use.
Nor let us too harshly judge the mode of life, differ though it may from our own, which regards these superfluities as essential, and can hardly less dispense with them than with its daily bread. The violet, the anemone, the May-flower, a hundred sweet and hardy blossoms, thrive amid the chills and storms of early spring in the most exposed situations. But are not the exquisite tea-rose, the fragile garden-lily, or the cereus, that dies after one sweet night of perfumed beauty, as true to their nature and to God's law? Did not the same hand form the sparrow, who scatters the late snow from his wings, and gayly pecks the crumbs from our doorstep, and the humming-bird, who waits for gorgeous summer noons to come and sip the honey from our jessamine?
So let us, if we will, love Dora in the Spartan simplicity of her soldierly adornments, and none the less love and cherish the woman who now lies upon the very spot, where, but a year ago, lay little Sunshine, wavering between this life and a better. For some reason unknown to herself, Mrs. Legrange had, from the first, felt a strong affection for this chamber, haunted, though she knew it not, by the presence of the beloved child; and she had taken much pleasure in its adornment; though, now that all was done, she rarely noticed the beautiful articles collected about her, liking best of all to lie in dreamy revery, recalling, day after day, with the minute fondness of a woman's memory, the looks, the gestures, the careless words, the pretty, graceful ways, the artless fascinations, of her whom now she rarely named, holding her memory as something too sacred for common speech, too far withdrawn into her own heart to be lightly brought to the surface.
Thus lying in the twilight of this evening, dreamily watching the long white curtains as they filled with the night-air and floated out into the room like the shadowy sails of a bark anchored in some Dreamland bay, and never guessing whose eyes had watched their waving but one short year before, when 'Toinette was first laid in Dora's little bed, Mrs. Legrange heard her husband coming up the stairs, and rose to receive him, with a strange fluttering at her heart,—a sort of nervous hope and terror all in one, as if she had known him the bearer of great news, but could not yet determine its tenor.
Mr. Legrange entered, holding a letter in his hand, and glanced tenderly, but with some surprise, at his wife, who stood with one hand pressing the white folds of her muslin wrapper convulsively to her bosom, the other outstretched toward him, a sudden hectic burning in her cheeks, and her eyes bright with feverish light.
"Fanny! what is it?" exclaimed the husband, pausing upon the threshold.
"That letter-you have some news! O Paul, you have news of"—
Her voice died in a breathless flutter; and Mr. Legrange, coming hastily to her side, drew her to a seat, saying tenderly,—
"No, darling, no news of her,—not yet, at least. What made you fancy it? This is only a letter from your protg at Antioch College: at least, I suppose so from the postmark. Do you care to read it now?"
Mrs. Legrange hid her face upon her husband's breast, trembling nervously.
"O Paul! when I heard you coming up the stairs, such a feeling came over me! I seemed to feel some great revelation approaching. I was sure it was news of her. Paul, Paul, I cannot bear it; I cannot live! My heart is broken; but it will not die, and let me rest. O my God! how long?"
"Hush, dearest, hush! Your wild words are to me worse than the grief we both suffer so keenly. But, my wife, have we not each other? and would you kill me by your own despair? Will God be pleased, that, because he has taken away our Sunshine, we refuse all other blessings, and disdain all other ties and obligations? Fanny, dearest, is it not an earnest duty with you to strive for strength?"
But the mother only moaned impatiently,—
"O Paul! do not try, do not talk: it is useless. When you let fall that crystal vinaigrette this morning, did you tell it that its duty was to be whole, and filled with perfume again? Do you tell those flowers that it is their duty to be fresh and sweet as they were yesterday? or, if you did, would they heed you?"
"No, darling; for they have neither mind nor soul," suggested the husband significantly.
"And mine are swallowed up in the sorrow that has swallowed all else. O Paul! forgive me, and ask God to forgive me; but I cannot, I never can, become resigned. I cannot live; I cannot wish or try to live. A little while, and I shall see her."
She spoke the last words softly, as to her own heart; and over her face passed such a look of solemn joy, such yearning tenderness, mingled with an infinite pathos, that the stronger and less sensitive male organization stood awed and subdued before it.
"Her love and grief are deeper than any words of mine can reach," thought the husband, and, so, tenderly soothed her head upon his breast, and said no more for several minutes, until, to his surprise, it was lifted, and the pale face looked into his with the pensive calmness under which it habitually hid its more intimate expressions.
"From whom did you say the letter came, Paul?" asked Mrs. Legrange.
"From Theodore Ginniss, I believe. Will you read it now?" asked her husband, in some surprise at the sudden transition: for no man ever thoroughly comprehends a woman, no woman a man; and so is the distinctive temperament of the sexes preserved.
"Yes: I told him to write to me once in every month, and he is very punctual."
She opened the letter, and read aloud:—"DEAR MRS. LEGRANGE,—
"Since writing to you last month, I have been going on with my studies under the Rev. Mr. Brown, as I then mentioned. I do not find that it hurts me to study in the hot weather at all; and I have enjoyed my vacation better this way than if I had been idle.
"Part of the month, however, Mr. Brown has been away on a visit to some friends in Iowa; and he says so much about the prairies, and the great rivers, and the wild life out there, that I think I should like to take the two remaining weeks of the vacation, and go and see them, if you have no objection. I have a great plenty of money from my last quarter's allowance, as I have only needed to spend a dollar and forty-five cents. Mr. Brown thinks I should come back fresher to my studies for a little rest; though I do not feel the need of it, and am glad of every day's new chance of learning.
"I hope you will excuse me, Mrs. Legrange, if it is too bold for me to say, but I do wish you could talk with Mr. Brown a little; he is so high in all his ideas, and seems to feel so strong about all the troubles of this world, and puts what a man ought to live for so much above the way he has to live!
"I took the liberty of talking with him about you, and about the great trouble I had helped to bring upon you; and what he said was first-rate, though I cannot tell it again. I felt ever so much better about my own doing wrong, and I could not help wishing you could hear what he said about you.
"This place is a great resort for invalids, and people who like to be retired. The iron-springs, that give the name to the town, are said to be very strengthening; and the Neff House, near them, is a beautiful hotel in very romantic scenery, and quite still. It seems to me that the ladies I see riding out from it on horseback get healthier-looking every day.
"I enclose a letter for mother, and will ask of you the favor to read it to her. I cannot tell you, Mrs. Legrange, how grateful I feel to you for making her so comfortable, as well as for what you are doing for me. And it is not only you I thank and remember every morning and every night; but, with yours, I say the name of the angel that we both love so dear. "Yours respectfully, "THEODORE GINNISS."
Mrs. Legrange slowly folded the letter, and looked at her husband, saying dreamily,—
"I should like to see this Mr. Brown. Perhaps he has some comfort for me; and that was what I felt approaching in that letter."
Mr. Legrange smiled a little compassionately, and more than a little tenderly.
"I am afraid, love, you would be disappointed. A man might seem a marvel of eloquence and wisdom to poor Theodore, while you would find him a very commonplace, perhaps obtrusive individual."
Mrs. Legrange slowly shook her head.
"I feel just as if that man could give me comfort. I must see him."
"Very well, dear: if it will give you the slightest pleasure, you shall certainly do so. Shall I send and invite him here? or do you think the journey to Ohio would be a pleasant variety for you? Perhaps it might; and Teddy's elaborately artless recommendation of the Neff House and the iron-springs is worthy of some attention."
"Yes: I will go there. I think I should like the journey, and I don't object to trying the springs; and I should like to see Theodore, and hear him talk about her. And I am sure I shall not find Mr. Brown commonplace or obtrusive."
"Very well, dear: it shall be as you say. When shall we go? It will be very hot travelling now, I am afraid."
"Oh, no! I don't mind. But I don't want to interfere with the Western excursion Theodore so modestly suggests; nor do I wish to go while he is away. We will go in the middle of September, I think."
"Yes, that will do, and will give you something to be thinking of meantime," said Mr. Legrange, looking with satisfaction at the healthy animation of his wife's face, as she re-read the portion of Teddy's letter relating to Yellow Springs and the Neff House.
"And now," said she, "go and send Mrs. Ginniss up to me to hear her letter too, that is, if you please; for, you humor me so much, I know I am growing tyrannical in speech as well as in act."
Mr. Legrange stooped to kiss his wife's cheek; and, to his eyes, the faint smile with which she repaid the caress was the fair dawn of a brighter day.
MR. BROWN had been a week at Outpost, and, at breakfast one morning, announced his departure for the succeeding day.
"And if you feel able to ride so far, Dora," continued he, "perhaps you will show me the way to the curious mounds we heard of from Dr. Gershom."
"They are full ten miles from here, he said," remarked Kitty disapprovingly.
"To-day is the 24th, isn't it, Dora? the 24th of August?" inquired Karl; and Dora, if no other of his auditors, saw the connection between this remark and the proposed long ride with Mr. Brown.
"Yes, Karl; it is the 24th: and I think we can make a party for the mounds, Mr. Brown. Kitty, wouldn't you like to go? and, Karl, can't you take a holiday? Sunshine might stay with Mehitable for once; mightn't she?"
"No; because she speaks too loud, and through her nose: but I'll stay with Argus and the woods," said Sunshine quietly.
"But have we horses enough?" asked Kitty with animation.
"That is easily settled," interposed Karl eagerly. "I will fixSunshine's pillion upon Major, and Dora can ride behind me. ThenKitty can take Max, and Mr. Brown will ride his own horse."
"Oh! there is no need of Major's carrying double," said Dora hastily. "Seth can spare Sally as well as not, and Kitty can ride her better than she can Max."
At this decision, Kitty looked a little vexed, and Karl a little discomfited; while Mr. Brown bent over his plate to hide a sudden gleam of humor in his dark eyes. As they all rose from table, Karl passed close to his cousin, and whispered,—
"I want to speak to you before we go."
Dora made no answer; nor, in the busy hour before they started, could her cousin find opportunity for a single private word. Nor was he more successful in the bold push made by him, so soon as they had started, for the place beside Dora; for she, thinking just then of some important communication for Kitty's ear, reined her pony close to that younger lady's, and good-humoredly desired him to ride on out of earshot. Karl obeyed the mandate with something less than his usual amiability, and was riding on in advance of the whole party, when he found himself detained by Mr. Brown, who asked some trifling, question about the road, and then attempted a conversation upon the crops and other ordinary topics for a few moments; until, unable to contend with the indifference, if not impatience, Karl was at no trouble to conceal, he remained silent for a moment, and then said abruptly,—
"Windsor, this is not soldierly or manly."
Karl looked at him, but made no reply.
"We both know what is in the other's mind," continued Mr. Brown, and we know that we cannot both succeed; but that is no reason for ill feeling toward each other. If we were Don Quixotes, we might fight; if we were gamesters, we might throw for the first chance: but as we are, I trust, Christian gentlemen, we owe each other every kindly feeling short of a wish for success."
"Yes: you can hardly expect that of me; and I'm sure I don't of you," said Karl, half laughing.
"No: that were inconsistent with a true earnestness of purpose," said Mr. Brown. "And, after all, the girl we both love is no such weakling as to accept a man simply because he asks her. She will decide between us fairly and justly."
"Then let me have the first chance, since you think it no advantage," said Karl impetuously.
Mr. Brown smiled grimly.
"Is there not some proverb about age before merit?" asked he. "Besides, you have had more than four years to ask your question in, and can very well wait a few hours longer. I came to Iowa on purpose to ask mine, and shall go away to-morrow."
"I don't see, sir, but you saints are just as obstinate in getting what you want as we sinners," said the younger man petulantly.
The chaplain laughed outright.
"A man at thirty has seldom subdued his worldly passions and intentions to the degree of sainthood," said he. "And I will not deny that my heart is very much engaged in this matter. However, I will be generous, and you may take your chance first."
He reined in his steed as he spoke, and, waiting beside the road until the young ladies came up, made some remark to Kitty relating to a question she had asked him concerning Virginian roads as compared with those of the West, and, by turning into the track beside her, rather obliged Dora to ride forward to the turn of the road, where Karl awaited her. But Kitty's satisfaction in the decided intention Mr. Brown had shown of speaking to her was rather dampened by perceiving how frequently his attention wandered from what she was saying, and how earnestly his eyes were fixed upon the two figures riding briskly in advance.
"If he can only look at Dora, why don't he go and ride with her?" muttered Kitty; and, as her companion turned his eyes inquiringly upon her, she asked aloud,—
"Are you pretty quick at hearing, Mr. Brown?"
"Not especially. Why?"
"Oh! I thought you looked as if you would like to hear what Charlie is saying to Dora."
"And you thought it was very rude of me to be so inattentive to you," added Mr. Brown, bending his dark eyes upon her with a smile.
Kitty colored guiltily, and answered hastily,—
"Oh dear, no! I'm used to finding myself of no account beside Dora."
Mr. Brown looked again at her, and then, with a sudden association of ideas, asked,—
"Kitty, are you going to tell me, before I go away, what made you feel so badly the day I came and found you in the wood?"
Again Kitty's face glowed beneath his gaze, and her bright black eyes drooped in rare confusion. She was about to answer hastily and coldly, but found herself checked by a softer impulse. Why should she not tell him somewhat of the trouble at her heart, and so win at least sympathy and pity, if nothing more? So she said in a low voice,—
"No one cares much for me, I think."
"No one?-not your brother?"
Kitty raised her eyes to the far vista point where Karl and Dora vanished into the forest, their horses moving close to each other's side, and then brought them back to the face of her companion. The look was eloquent, and he said,—
"Yes; but by and by, perhaps, he will not be so engrossed."
The young girl raised her head with a superb gesture.
"To wait for by and by, when some one else has done with him, is not my idea of love."
Mr. Brown looked at her more attentively, and smiled.
"I think the day will come when some man will love you first and best of all," said he, in a tone, not of flattery, but of honest admiration, which fell like sunlight upon the waste places of poor Kitty's heart.
"Oh! I'm not good enough, or smart enough, or good-looking enough. He never will," replied she hastily, and then colored crimson again at the meaning beneath her words.
Again Mr. Brown keenly eyed her, and asked,—
"He? Do you mean some one in particular? No: forgive me. I have no right to ask such a question. I am only your friend, not a father confessor."
Kitty, dumb with confusion and a sudden terror, made no effort to reply; and, after a moment, Mr. Brown led the way to a quiet conversation upon the young girl's previous life, her early pursuits and affections, and finally to the passionate love and regret for her dead mother, in which he found the key to all she was and all she might be. So employed, the psychological student even forgot his own affairs, and for half an hour hardly remembered Dora riding on beside Karl, who, like the cowardly bather, dallying first with one foot and then the other in the water's edge, and losing all his courage before the final plunge, had talked with her of almost every thing beneath the sun, and worn out his own patience and hers, before she said, turning her clear eyes full upon him,—
"Karl, be honest and straightforward. It is kinder to us both."
The young man heaved a sigh of relief.
"That's it, Dora. There isn't another such girl in the world. Don't you know, in camp I used to say I relied upon you for protection, and for making a man of me instead of an idle boy? O Dora! there's nothing you couldn't do with me."
He spoke the last words in an imploring voice, and fixed his eyes upon her averted face. Then, as she did not speak, he went on:—
"It isn't any thing I can offer you, Dora, except the chance of doing good: I know that well enough. What I am, you know; but what I might become to please you none of us can know. And I do love you so, Dora! I know it sounds bald and silly to say just those few words; but they mean so much to me! and I've meant it so long and so heartily! No; don't speak just yet: I want to make you feel first, if I can, how dreadfully in earnest I am. When I first saw you there at your old home, and you took care of me so tenderly, and looked at me, so pityingly out of your great brown eyes, my heart warmed to you; and then in camp, you know-O Dora Darling! you cannot say but you knew how dearly I grew to love you even then: and when I found you were my own kin; and when you came to my own home, and my mother took you to her heart, and thanked God for having given her another daughter, and such a daughter; and when I saw your daily life among us, and saw how noble, and how unselfish, and how true, and brave, you were through all the sorrow, and the trials, and the loneliness, and the petty spite and insults, you had to endure; and then here, where you are like a wise and gracious queen among her subjects,—O Dora! what is there in you that does not call forth my highest love, my truest reverence? and what better could life do for me than to grant me the privilege of worshipping and following you all my days, and making myself into just what sort of man would suit you best?"
And the true-hearted young fellow felt his words strike home to his own soul so earnestly that he could add to them nothing of the flood of tenderness and homage swelling there, but only looked at his cousin piteously; while she, with drooping head and averted eyes, rode on for a few moments in silence, and then said softly,—
"I hoped, dear Karl, you would never speak of it again. We have been so happy the last year!"—
"O Dora!" interposed the young man in a voice of agony, "never say you are going to refuse me! Happy! yes, I have been happy, because I have looked forward to this day, and thought it might be the beginning of a life to which this has been but the gray dawn before the sunrise. You have been so kind to me, so frank and affectionate! and all the time you knew-oh! you must have known-what was in my heart. Yes; and, if it had not been for this meddling parson's visit"—
"Hush, Karl!" interrupted Dora decisively. "I will not have you unjust or ungenerous to a man far nobler and purer and wiser than either you or I. Mr. Brown's visit has nothing to do with what I say to-day; nor did I know, as you think I did, that you would again ask me the question you asked a year ago. I only remembered it, when, last week, you reminded me of the date; and I only let you speak to-day, because it is better for us both to say out all that is in our hearts, and then to let the matter rest."
She, paused a moment, and recommenced in a lower and more tender voice:—
"I am so sorry, Karl, to give you pain! If the only trouble was that I don't want to marry you, I wouldn't mind saying no; for I love you very much: only I don't believe it is the way girls commonly love the men they marry. But it wouldn't be right."
"Not right! Oh! why not right, Dora?"
"Because it would spoil both of us. You ask me to make any thing of you I like; but that is not the way. It is you yourself that must make a man of yourself. If I should try to do it, I should only make a puppet of you, and a conceited, tyrannical woman of myself. It would not be good for me to rule as you want me to do; and surely no man would deliberately say it would be good for him to be ruled, and that by his wife."
There was a touch of scorn in the tone of the last words; and Karl's check flushed hotly, as he said,—
"It's hard that you should despise me for loving you so well that I am ready to forget pride and manly dignity, and every thing else, for the sake of it."
"No; but, Karl, don't you see yourself what an injury such a love must be to you? Forget pride and manly dignity and self-respect do you say? A true love, a good love, would make you cherish them as you never did before; would make you claim and hold every inch of manhood that is in you, so that you might feel yourself worthy of that love. O, Karl! never again offer to put yourself under the foot of any woman, but wait till you meet one whom you can hold by the hand, and lead along, keeping equal step with yourself, and both pressing forward to a common goal."
She turned her face upon him, all aglow with a noble enthusiasm far above the maiden bashfulness that but now had held it averted, and extended her hand, saying,—
"Come, dear Karl, forget this idle dream. Be once more my brother and my helper. Trust me, no one cares more for you so than I; not Kitty herself."
He took the hand, put it to his lips, then rode on silently.
Dora's kind eyes sought his again and again, but vainly. His face, pale and somewhat stern gave no clew to the feelings within: the mouth, more firmly set than its wont, seemed sealed to love forever.
For the first time in all the interview, Dora found herself troubled and perplexed. Here was nothing to soothe, nothing to combat, nothing to answer or to silence; and her womanly sympathies fluttered about this manly reticence like a humming-bird around a flower frozen into the heart of an iceberg.
At last, she spoke; and her voice had grown almost caressing in its softness:—
"You're not angry with me, Karl?"
He glanced at her, then away.
"Certainly not, Dora. On the contrary, I am much obliged to you."
"Obliged to me!" exclaimed Dora; her feminine pique just touched a trifle. "What, for saying no?"
"For showing me that I am a fool. It was time I knew it, and I had rather hear it from you than any one. Why should you care for me? I am not a man to respect, like Mr. Brown, or one to admire, like Mr. Burroughs,—I suppose it will be one of them; but I only hope either one may give you half—No matter, wait here a moment in the shade. I am going back to speak to Kitty."
He sharply wheeled his horse as he spoke, and was gone. Dora looked after him in sorrowful perplexity, and then tears gathered in her eyes; but, before they could fall, the unswerving rectitude underlying her whole nature came to its relief, and she dashed them away, murmuring,—
"But I was right."
REINING up her horse under the shadow of a clump of trees, Dora waited, as her cousin had requested, for his return; and so much pre-occupied was she with her own thoughts, that she failed to hear the quick footfalls of an approaching horse, until his rider slackened speed beside her, and Dora, looking up, saw that it was Mr. Brown.
She grew a little pale, divining, not only from the presence of the chaplain, but from a joyous and significant light in the eyes that encountered hers, what might be his errand; and though she had not failed to foresee this moment, no man, and surely no woman, is ever so prepared for the great crises of life that they fail to come at the last with almost as much of a shock as if they came quite unawares.
She turned her horse into the track, and rode on, her eyes fixed upon the wide prairie-view, which seemed to dance and shimmer before them as if all Nature had suddenly grown as strange and unreal as she felt herself. Her companion spoke, and in her ears his voice sounded as from some far mountain-cave, hollow, broken, and vague; and yet the words were far from momentous.
"Dora, I must leave you to-morrow."
"I am very sorry, sir," faltered Dora; and Mr. Brown, glancing at her face, could not but notice its unwonted agitation. His own wishes, and his sex, led him to misconstrue it; and, pressing, his horse closer to her side, he said joyfully,—
"And so am I sorry, Dora; but I need not be gone long if you wish for my return."
Dora did not speak; indeed, she could not: for the wild dance of sky and plain, of prairie and forest, grew yet wilder; and in her ears the voice of the chaplain mingled with a dizzy hum that almost drowned the words. She grasped the horn of her saddle with both hands, and only thought of saving herself from falling. The horse was halted, an arm was about her waist, her head drawn to a resting-place upon a steady shoulder; and that strange, far-off voice murmured,—
"My darling, my long-loved, long-sought treasure, calm yourself; be happy and secure in my love. Did you ever doubt that it was yours?"
He stooped to kiss her: but, at the motion, the virginal instincts of the young girl's nature rallied to the defence; and, with a sudden spring, Dora sat upright, her face very pale, but her eyes clear and steadfast as their wont.
"Oh, sir, indeed you must not!" cried she, as pleadingly as a little child, who will not be caressed, yet knows not why he should refuse.
"Must not, Dora?" persisted the lover gayly. "But why must I not kiss my own betrothed?"
"But I am not; I cannot be. Don't be angry, sir: I would have spoken sooner; but I could not. I believe I was a little faint;" and Dora's eyes timidly sought those of the chaplain, who, meeting them, remembered many such a glance when his pupil had feared to displease him by inattention or disobedience. Again he thought to have discovered the source of her refusal, and again he failed.
"Dora," said he gently, "you do not forget, that, some years ago, we bore the relation of master and pupil; and you still regard me with a certain deference and reserve, which, perhaps, blinds you to the true relation existing between us now. Remember, dear, that I am yet a younger man; and although my profession may have induced a certain gravity of manner, contrasting, perhaps unpleasantly, with your gay cousins joyous demeanor, I have all, or more than all, of his fervency of feeling; far more, I trust, of depth and steadfastness in my love for you."
"Please, Mr. Brown," interposed Dora, "do not let us say any thing about Karl. He is not concerned in this."
"You are right, Dora, and I was wrong," said Mr. Brown with a little effort of magnanimity. "But I was only trying to convince you that my love is quite as ardent, and quite as tender, as that of a younger and gayer man could be."
"Yes, sir," said Dora timidly, as he paused for her assent.
"Not 'Yes, sir,' child!" exclaimed the chaplain impatiently. "Don't treat me with this distant respect and timid reverence. I am your lover, your would-be comrade through life, as once through the less earnest battles of war. Call me Frank, and look into my face and smile as I have seen you smile on Karl."
A quick smile dimpled Dora's cheek, and passed.
"Not Karl, please, sir."
"Dora, if you say 'sir' to me again, I'll kiss you."
"Please not, Mr. Brown," said Dora demurely, "until you quite understand me."
"Well then, let me quite understand you very quick; for I think I shall exact the penalty, even without further offence."
"But I cannot promise,—I cannot be what you said," stammered Dora, half terrified, half confused.
"Nay, darling,—I am going to always call you that, as expressive both of name and nature,—it is you who do not quite understand either yourself or me. I do not expect, or even wish, you to profess a love for me as ardent, open, and pronounced as my own: that were to make you other than the modest and delicately reserved maiden I have loved so long. All I ask you to feel is, that you can trust yourself to my guidance through life; that you can place your future in my hands, believing me capable of shaping it aright; that you can promise to tread with me the path I have selected, sure that it shall be my care to remove from it all thorns, all obstacles that mortal power may control, and that my arms shall bear you tenderly over the rough places I cannot make smooth for you.
"Dora, years ago I resolved that you should be my wife, God and you consenting. I have waited until I thought you old enough to decide calmly and wisely; but, through these years of waiting, I have cherished a hope, almost a certainty, of success, that has struck deep roots among the very foundations of my life. You will not tear it away! Dora, you do not know me: you cannot guess at the ardor or the power of a love I have never dared wholly to reveal even to myself. Trust it, Dora: it cannot but make you happy. Give yourself to me, dear child; and I will account to God for the precious charge."
Never man was more in earnest, never was wooing at once so fervent and so lofty in its tone; and so Dora felt it. The temptation to yield, without further struggle, to the belief that Mr. Brown knew better what was good for her than she knew for herself, was very great; but, even while she hesitated, the inherent truthfulness of her nature rose up, and cried, "No, no! you shall not do such wrong to me who am the Right!" and turning, with an effort, to meet the keen eyes reading her face, she said, still timidly perhaps, but very calmly,—
"I am but a simple girl, almost a child in some things, and you are a wise and good man, learned in books and in the way of the world; but I must judge for myself, and must believe my own heart sooner than you in such matters as these. Years ago, as you say, I was your pupil, and you then nobly offered to adopt me as your child or sister."
"As my future wife, Dora. I meant it from the very first," interposed the chaplain impetuously.
"I did not know that: perhaps it makes a difference. But, at any rate, I promised then, that if I went home with Capt. Karl, and you wanted me afterward, I would come to you whenever you said so."
"Yes, yes; that is quite true: well?" demanded Mr. Brown eagerly.
"Well, sir, a promise is a promise; and, if you demand it now, I will come and live with you, or you can come, and live with me,—not as your wife, however, but as your sister and child and friend."
"You will come and live with me, but not marry me!" exclaimed the young man, with a gleam of amusement at the unworldly proposal lighting his dark eyes.
"Yes, sir," replied Dora, without looking up.
To her infinite astonishment and dismay, she found herself suddenly embraced, and a hearty kiss tingling upon her lips.
"I am sorry if you don't like it, Dora; but I said I would if you called me 'sir' again; and you are so scrupulous about your promises, you cannot wish me to break mine."
"Then I am afraid I must promise, if you do so again, to go back and ride with Kitty all the rest of the way," said Dora, as, with heightened color and a decided pout, she drew her left-hand rein so sharply as to wheel Max to the other side of the road.
"Dora, I am afraid you are a little of a coquette, after all!" exclaimed the lover, gazing at her with admiration.
"Oh, no indeed, Mr. Brown! I wouldn't be for the world! I said just what I meant to you. I always do."
"But why, then, if you love me well enough to live with me as sister, child, or friend, can't you also live with me as wife?"
"Because, sir,—oh, no! I didn't mean sir,—because"—
"Frank, I told you to call me."
"Because, Frank, I don't love you that way."
The answer was so explicit, so unembarrassed, and so quiet, that, for the first time, Mr. Brown believed it.
"Not love me, Dora, when I love you so much!" exclaimed he in dismay.
"Not love you in a wife way, Frank, but a great deal in every other way. And then I don't think we should be happy together if we were married."
"And why not?" asked the young man, smiling in spite of himself at the quiet opinion.
"Because, as you said, you want me to put my life into your hands, and you will shape it; and you want me to set my feet in your path, and follow it with you; and you want me to trust my soul to you, and you will guide it: but I could never do that, Mr. Brown; never for any man, I think. I could never forget that God has given me a life, and a path, and a soul, all my own, and not to be judged except by Him and myself: and I am afraid I should always be asking if your guiding was in the same direction that I was meant to go; and, if I thought it was not, I should be very unhappy, and should try to live my own life, and not yours; and that would make trouble."
"Yes, that would make trouble certainly, Dora," said the chaplain gravely. "But are you sure that a young and comparatively unlearned woman like yourself would be a better judge of what was right and best than a man of mature years, who has made the care of souls his profession and most earnest duty?"
"No, Mr. Brown, not if I judged for myself: but I think God has especial care of those, who, like me, have none else to guide them; and I think this voice in my heart is the surest teaching of all."
The profound conviction of her tone was final; the simple faith of her argument was unassailable: and Mr. Brown, skillful polemic that he was, found himself silenced.
After a moment, he said calmly,—
"Dora, you will not forget that this is, to me at least, a very serious, indeed a vital matter. Is what you have just said the solemn conviction of your own heart? or have you suffered yourself to be misled by the tendency to self-esteem and perverseness I have sometimes had occasion to reprove in you? Have you thoroughly searched your own heart to its deepest depths? and is not your refusal tinctured by the natural reluctance of a determined nature to yield to a love, which, in woman, must bring with it some degree of dependence and deference?"
He looked almost severely into the pale face and earnest eyes upraised to his, and read there pain, anxiety, an humble appeal, but not one trace of hesitation, not one shade of duplicity.
"I have searched my own heart, Mr. Brown; and I am sure of its answer. I never, never, can be your wife, so long as we both live."
"That is sufficient, Dora. I am rightly punished for building my hopes and my happiness upon the sandy foundations of an earthly love. They perish, and leave me desolate; but, among the ruins, I yet can say, 'It is rightly and justly done.'"
The bitter pain in his voice pierced to Dora's very heart, and wounded it almost as sorely as she had wounded his. The rare tears overflowed her eyes; and, pressing close to his side, she laid a hand upon his own, saying,—
"Oh, forgive me!-say you forgive me! Indeed, I must do and say what conscience bids me, at all cost."
"It is not for me to gainsay such a precept as that," said the chaplain.
"But I will come to you, and live as long as you want me. I will be everything but wife. Say I may do this, or I shall never forgive myself. Say I may make some amends for the pain I have given you."
The young man laughed bitterly, then, turning suddenly, seized both her hands, and looked deep into her eyes.
"My poor child," cried he, "my innocent lamb, who turns from the shepherd because she will not be guided, and yet is all unfit to guide herself! Do not even you, Dora, guileless and unworldly as you are, see how impossible it would be for a young and beautiful girl to live with a man who admires and loves her openly, without such scandal, as should ruin both in the world's eyes, even if they saved their own souls unspotted?"
Dora snatched away her hands, and her whole face flamed with a sudden shame.
She was learning fast to-day in the book of human passion, suffering, and sin.
Without comment upon her embarrassment, the chaplain went on:—
"No, Dora: I must lay aside the dream of four sweet years, and take up my lonely life without disguise or embellishment. I cannot dispute your decision. I will not by one word or look urge you to change it; for I too deeply respect the truthfulness of your character to dream that it is capable of change. I do not say that I forgive you, for you have done nothing calling for forgiveness; and yet, if your tender heart should suffer, in thinking of my suffering, remember always that what you have to-day said has increased my respect and esteem for you fourfold: and, if it has also added to the bitterness of my disappointment, I will not have you reproach yourself; for I would rather reverence you as the wife of another than to claim you as my own, and know you untrue to yourself. And now, dear, the subject is closed utterly and forever."