Ant. He misses not much.
Ant. He misses not much.
Seb. No; he doth but mistake the truth totally.
Seb. No; he doth but mistake the truth totally.
Tempest.
Tempest.
It was the very next morning that several ladies and gentlemen were gathered on the piazza of the hotel at Montepoole, to brace minds or appetites with the sweet mountain air while waiting for breakfast. As they stood there a young countryman came by bearing on his hip a large basket of fruit and vegetables.
"O look at those lovely strawberries!" exclaimed Constance Evelyn running down the steps.--"Stop if you please--where are you going with these?"
"Marm!" responded the somewhat startled carrier.
"What are you going to do with them?"
"I ain't going to do nothin' with 'em."
"Whose are they? Are they for sale?"
"Well, 'twon't deu no harm, as I know," said the young man making a virtue of necessity, for the fingers of Constance were already hovering over the dainty little leaf-strewn baskets and her eyes complacently searching for the most promising;--"I ha'n't got nothin' to deu with 'em."
"Constance!" said Mrs. Evelyn from the piazza,--"don't take that! I dare say they are for Mr. Sweet."
"Well, mamma!--" said Constance with great equanimity,--"Mr. Sweet gets them for me, and I only save him the trouble of spoiling them. My taste leads me to prefer the simplicity of primitive arrangements this morning."
"Young man!" called out the landlady's reproving voice, "won't you never recollect to bring that basket round the back way?"
"'Tain't no handier than this way," said Philetus, with so much belligerent demonstration that the landlady thought best in presence of her guests to give over the question.
"Where do you get them?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"How?--" said Philetus.
"Where do they come from? Are they fresh picked?"
"Just afore I started."
"Started from where?" said a gentleman standing by Mrs. Evelyn.
"From Mr. Rossitur's down to Queechy."
"Mr. Rossitur's!" said Mrs. Evelyn;--"does he send them here?"
"He doos not," said Philetus;--"he doosn't keep to hum for a long spell."
"Who does send them then?" said Constance.
"Who doos? It's Miss Fliddy Ringgan."
"Mamma!" exclaimed Constance looking up.
"What does she have to do with it?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"There don't nobody else have nothin' to deu with it--I guess she's pretty much the hull," said her coadjutor. "Her and me was a picking 'em afore sunrise."
"All that basketful!"
"'Tain't all strawberries--there's garden sass up to the top."
"And does she send that too?"
"She sends that teu," said Philetus succinctly.
"But hasn't she any help in taking care of the garden?" said Constance.
"Yes marm--I calculate to help considerable in the back garden--she won't let no one into the front where she grows her posies."
"But where is Mr. Hugh?"
"He's to hum."
"But has he nothing to do with all this? does he leave it all to his cousin?"
"He's to the mill."
"And Miss Ringgan manages farm and garden and all?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"She doos," said Philetus.
And receiving a gratuity which he accepted without demonstration of any kind whatever, the basket-bearer at length released moved off.
"Poor Fleda!" said Miss Evelyn as he disappeared with his load.
"She's a very clever girl," said Mrs. Evelyn dismissing the subject.
"She's too lovely for anything!" said Constance. "Mr. Carleton,--if you will just imagine we are in China, and introduct a pair of familiar chop-sticks into this basket, I shall be repaid for the loss of a strawberry by the expression of ecstasy which will immediately spread itself over your features. I intend to patronize the natural mode of eating in future. I find the ends of my fingers decidedly odoriferous."
He smiled a little as he complied with the young lady's invitation, but the expression of ecstasy did not come.
"Are Mr. Rossitur's circumstances so much reduced?" he said, drawing nearer to Mrs. Evelyn.
"Do you know them!" exclaimed both the daughters at once.
"I knew Mrs. Rossitur very well some years ago, when she was in Paris."
"They are all broken to pieces," said Mrs. Evelyn, as Mr. Carleton's eye went back to her for his answer;--"Mr. Rossitur failed and lost everything--bankrupt--a year or two after they came home."
"And what has he been doing since?'
"I don't know!--trying to farm it here; but I am afraid he has not succeeded well--I am afraid not. They don't look like it. Mrs. Rossitur will not see anybody, and I don't believe they have done any more than struggle for a living since they came here."
"Where is Mr. Rossitur now?"
"He is at the West somewhere--Fleda tells me he is engaged in some agencies there; but I doubt," said Mrs. Evelyn shaking her head compassionately,--"there is more in the name of it than anything else. He has gone down hill sadly since his misfortunes. I am very sorry for them."
"And his niece takes care of his farm in the meantime?"
"Do you know her?" asked both the Miss Evelyns again.
"I can hardly say that," he replied. "I had such a pleasure formerly. Do I understand thatsheis the person to fill Mr. Rossitur's place when he is away?"
"So she says."
"And so she acts," said Constance. "I wish you had heard her yesterday. It was beyond everything. We were conversing very amicably, regarding each other through a friendly vista formed by the sugar-bowl and tea-pot, when a horrid man, that looked as if he had slept all his life in a hay-cock and only waked up to turn it over, stuck his head in and immediately introduced a clover-field; and Fleda and he went to tumbling about the cocks till I do assure you I was deluded into a momentary belief that hay-making was the principal end of human nature, and looked upon myself as a burden to society; and after I had recovered my locality and ventured upon a sentence of gentle commiseration for her sufferings, Fleda went off into a eulogium upon the intelligence of hay-makers in general and the strength of mind barbarians are universally known to possess."
The manner still more than the matter of this speech was beyond the withstanding of any good-natured muscles, though the gentleman's smile was a grave one and quickly lost in gravity. Mrs. Evelyn laughed and reproved in a breath; but the laugh was admiring and the reproof was stimulative. The bright eye of Constance danced in return with the mischievous delight of a horse that has slipped his bridle and knows you can't catch him.
"And this has been her life ever since Mr. Rossitur lost his property?"
"Entirely,--sacrificed!--" said Mrs. Evelyn, with a compassionately resigned air;--"education, advantages and everything given up; and set down here where she has seen nobody from year's end to year's end but the country people about--very good people--but not the kind of people she ought to have been brought up among."
"Oh mamma!" said the eldest Miss Evelyn in a deprecatory tone,--"you shouldn't talk so--it isn't right--I am sure she is very nice--nicer now than anybody else I know; and clever too."
"Nice!" said Edith. "I wishIhad such a sister!"
"She is a good girl--a very good girl," said Mrs. Evelyn, in a tone which would have deterred any one from wishing to make her acquaintance.
"And happy, mamma--Fleda don't look miserable--she seems perfectly happy and contented!"
"Yes," said Mrs. Evelyn,--"she has got accustomed to this state of things--it's her life--she makes delicious bread and puddings for her aunt, and raises vegetables for market, and oversees her uncle's farmers, and it isn't a hardship to her; she finds her happiness in it. She is a very good girl! but she might have been made something much better than a farmer's wife."
"You may set your mind at rest on that subject, mamma," said Constance, still using her chop-sticks with great complacency;--"it's my opinion that the farmer is not in existence who is blessed with such a conjugal futurity. I think Fleda's strong pastoral tastes are likely to develope themselves in a new direction."
Mrs. Evelyn looked with a partial smile at the pretty features which the business of eating the strawberries displayed in sundry novel and picturesque points of view; and asked what she meant?
"I don't know,--" said Constance, intent upon her basket,--"I feel a friend's distress for Mr. Thorn--it's all your doing, mamma,--you won't be able to look him in the face when we have Fleda next fall--I am sure I shall not want to look at his! He'll be too savage for anything."
"Mr. Thorn!" said Mr. Carleton.
"Yes," said Mrs. Evelyn in an indulgent tone,--"he was very attentive to her last winter when she was with us, but she went away before anything was decided. I don't think he has forgotten her."
"I shouldn't think anybody could forget her," said Edith.
"I am confident he would be here at this moment," said Constance, "if he wasn't in London."
"But what is 'all mamma's doing,' Constance?" inquired her sister.
"The destruction of the peace of the whole family of Thorns--shouldn't sleep sound in my bed if I were she with such a reflection. I look forward to heart-rending scenes,--with a very disturbed state of mind."
"But what have I done, my child?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"Didn't you introduce your favourite Mr. Olmney to Miss Ringgan last summer? I don't know!--her native delicacy shrunk from making any disclosures, and of course the tongue of friendship is silent,--but they were out ages yesterday while I was waiting for her, and their parting at the gate was--I feel myself unequal to the task of describing it!" said Constance ecstatically;--"and she was in the most elevated tone of mind during our whole interview afterwards, and took all my brilliant remarks with as much coolness as if they had been drops of rain--more, I presume, considering that it was hay-time."
"Did you see him?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"Only at that impracticable distance, mamma; but I introduced his name afterwards in my usual happy manner and I found that Miss Ringgan's cheeks were by no means indifferent to it. I didn't dare go any further."
"I am very glad of it! I hope it is so!" said Mrs. Evelyn energetically. "It would be a most excellent match. He is a charming young man and would make her very happy."
"You are exciting gloomy feelings in Mr. Carleton's mind, mamma, by your felicitous suggestions. Mr. Carleton, did your ears receive a faint announcement of ham and eggs which went quite through and through mine just now?"
He bowed and handed the young lady in; but Constance declared that though he sat beside her and took care of her at breakfast he had on one of his intangible fits which drove her to the last extreme of impatience, and captivation.
The sun was not much more than two hours high the next morning when a rider was slowly approaching Mr. Rossitur's house from the bridge, walking his horse like a man who wished to look well at all he was passing. He paused behind a clump of locusts and rose-acacias in the corner of the courtyard as a figure bonneted and gloved came out of the house and began to be busy among the rose-bushes. Another figure presently appeared at the hall-door and called out,
"Fleda!--"
"Well, Barby--"
This second voice was hardly raised, but it came from so much nearer that the words could be distinctly heard.
"Mr. Skillcorn wants to know if you're going to fix the flowers for him to carry?"
"They're not ready, and it won't do for him to vait--Mr. Sweet must send for them if he wants them. Philetus must make haste back, for you know Mr. Douglass wants him to help in the barn meadow. Lucas won't be here and now the weather is so fine I want to make haste with the hay."
"Well, will you have the samp for breakfast?"
"No--we'll keep that for dinner. I'll come in and poach some eggs, Barby,--if you'll make me some thin pieces of toast--and call me when it's time. Thin, Barby."
The gentleman turned his horse and galloped back to Montepoole.
Some disappointment was created among a portion of Mr. Sweet's guests that afternoon by the intelligence that Mr. Carleton purposed setting off the next morning to join his English friends at Saratoga on their way to the falls and Canada. Which purpose was duly carried into effect.
With your leave, sir, an' there were no more men living upon the face of the earth, I should not fancy him, by St. George.--Every Man Out of His Humour.
With your leave, sir, an' there were no more men living upon the face of the earth, I should not fancy him, by St. George.--Every Man Out of His Humour.
October had come; and a fair season and a fine harvest had enabled Fleda to ease her mind by sending a good remittance to Dr. Gregory. The family were still living upon her and Hugh's energies. Mr. Rossitur talked of coming home, that was all.
It sometimes happened that a pause in the urgency of business permitted Hugh to take a day's holiday. One of these falling soon after the frosts had opened the burrs of the chestnut trees and the shells of the hickories, Fleda seized upon it for a nutting frolic. They took Philetus and went up to the fine group of trees on the mountain, the most difficult to reach and the best worth reaching of all their nut wood. The sport was very fine; and after spoiling the trees Philetus was left to "shuck" and bring home a load of the fruit; while Fleda and Hugh took their way slowly down the mountain. She stopped him, as usual, on the old lookout place. The leaves were just then in their richest colouring; and the October sky in its strong vitality seemed to fill all inanimate nature with the breath of lile. If ever, then on that day, to the fancy, "the little hills rejoiced on every side." The woods stood thick with honours, and earth lay smiling under the tokens of the summer's harvest and the promise for the coming year; and the wind came in gusts over the lower country and up the hill-side with a hearty good-will that blew away all vapours, physical and mental, from its path, bidding everything follow its example and be up and doing. Fleda drew a long breath or two that seemed to recognize its freshening power.
Philetus was left to 'shuck' and bring home a load of the fruit.Philetus was left to "shuck" and bring home a load of the fruit.
"How long it seems," she said,--"how very long--since I was here with Mr. Carleton;--just nine years ago. How changed everything is! I was a little child then. It seems such an age ago!--"
"It is very odd he didn't come to see us," said Hugh.
"He did--don't you know?--the very next day after we heard he was here--when most unluckily I was up at aunt Miriam's."
"I should think he might have come again, considering what friends you used to be."
"I dare say he would if he had not left Montepoole so soon. But dear Hugh! I was a mere child--how could he remember me much."
"You remember him," said Hugh.
"Ah but I have good reason. Besides I never forget anything. I would have given a great deal to see him--if I had it."
"I wish the Evelyns had staid longer," said Hugh. "I think you have wanted something to brighten you up. They did you a great deal of good last year. I am afraid all this taking care of Philetus and Earl Douglass is too much for you."
Fleda gave him a very bright smile, half affection, half fun.
"Don't you admire my management?" said she. "Because I do. Philetus is firmly persuaded that he is an invaluable assistant to me in the mystery of gardening; and the origin of Earl Douglass's new ideas is so enveloped in mist that he does not himself know where they come from. It was rich to hear him the other day descanting to Lucas upon the evil effects of earthing up corn and the advantages of curing hay in cocks, as to both which matters Lucas is a thorough unbeliever, and Earl was a year ago."
"But that doesn't hinder your looking pale and thin, and a great deal soberer than I like to see you," said Hugh. "You want a change, I know. I don't know how you are to get it. I wish they would send for you to New York again."
"I don't know that I should want to go if they did," said Fleda. "They don't raise my spirits, Hugh. I am amused sometimes,--I can't help that,--but such excessive gayety rather makes me shrink within myself; I am too out of tone with it. I never feel more absolutely quiet than sometimes when I am laughing at Constance Evelyn's mad sallies--and sometimes I cannot laugh at them. I do not know what they must think of me; it is what they can have no means of understanding."
"I wish you didn't understand it either, Fleda."
"But you shouldn't say that. I am happier than they are, now, Hugh,--now that you are better,--with all their means of happiness. They know nothing of our quiet enjoyments, they must live in a whirl or they would think they are not living at all, and I do not believe that all New York can give them the real pleasure that I have in such a day as this. They would see almost nothing in all this beauty that my eyes 'drink in,' as Cowper says; and they would be certain to quarrel with the wind, that to me is like the shake of an old friend's hand. Delicious!--" said Fleda, at the wind rewarded this eulogium with a very hearty shake indeed.
"I believe you would make friends with everything, Fleda," said Hugh laughing.
"The wind is always that to me," said Fleda,--"not always in such a cheerful mood as to-day, though. It talks to me often of a thousand old-time things and sighs over them with me--a most sympathizing friend!--but to day he invites me to a waltz--Come!----"
And pulling Hugh after her away she went down the rocky path, with a step too light to care for the stones; the little feet capering down the mountain with a disdain of the ground that made Hugh smile to see her; and eyes dancing for company; till they reached the lower woodland.
"A most, spirited waltz!" said Hugh.
"And a most slack partner. Why didn't you keep me company?"
"I never was made for waltzing," said Hugh shaking his head.
"Not to the tune of the North wind? That has done me good, Hugh."
"So I should judge, by your cheeks."
"Poverty need not always make people poor," said Fleda taking breath and his arm together. "You and I are rich, Hugh."
"And our riches cannot take to themselves wings and flyaway," said Hugh.
"No, but besides those riches--there are the pleasures of the eye and the mind that one may enjoy everywhere--everywhere in the country at least--unless poverty bear one down very hard; and they are some of the purest and most satisfying of any. O the blessing of a good education! how it makes one independent of circumstances."
"And circumstances are education too," said Hugh smiling. "I dare say we should not appreciate our mountains and woods so well if we had had our old plenty of everything else."
"I always loved them," said Fleda. "But what good company they have been to us for years past, Hugh;--to me especially; I have more reason to love them."
They walked on quietly and soberly to the brow of the tableland, where they parted; Hugh being obliged to go home, and Fleda wishing to pay a visit to her aunt Miriam.
She turned off alone to take the way to the high road and went softly on, no longer certainly in the momentary spirits with which she had shaken hands with the wind and skipped down the mountain; but feeling, and thankful that she felt, a cheerful patience to tread the dusty highway of life.
The old lady had been rather ailing, and from one or two expressions she had let fall Fleda could not help thinking that she looked upon her ailments with a much more serious eye than anybody else thought was called for. It did not, however, appear to-day. She was not worse, and Fleda's slight anxious feeling could find nothing to justify it, if it were not the very calm and quietly happy face and manner of the old lady; and that if it had something to alarm, did much more to sooth. Fleda had sat with her a long time, patience and cheerfulness all the while unconsciously growing in her company; when catching up her bonnet with a sudden haste very unlike her usual collectedness of manner Fleda kissed her aunt and was rushing away.
"But stop!--where are you going, Fleda?"
"Home, aunt Miriam--I must--don't keep me!"
"But what are you going that way for? you can't go home that way?"
"Yes I can."
"How?"
"I can cross the blackberry hill behind the barn and then over the east hill, and then there's nothing but the water-cress meadow."
"I sha'n't let you go that way alone--sit down and tell me what you mean,--what is this desperate hurry?"
But with equal precipitation Fleda had cast her bonnet out of sight behind the table, and the next moment turned with the utmost possible quietness to shake hands with Mr. Olmney. Aunt Miriam had presence of mind enough to make no remark and receive the young gentleman with her usual dignity and kindness.
He staid some time, but Fleda's hurry seemed to have forsaken her. She had seized upon an interminable long grey stocking her aunt was knitting, and sat in the corner working at it most diligently, without raising her eyes unless spoken to.
"Do you give yourself no rest at home or abroad, Miss Fleda?" said the gentleman.
"Put that stocking down, Fleda," said her aunt, "it is in no hurry."
"I like to do it, aunt Miriam."
But she felt with warming cheeks that she did not like to do it with two people sitting still and looking at her. The gentleman presently rose.
"Don't go till we have had tea, Mr. Olmney," said Mrs. Plumfield.
"Thank you, ma'am,--I cannot stay, I believe,--unless Miss Fleda will let me take care of her down the hill by and by."
"Thank you, Mr. Olmney," said Fleda, "but I am not going home before night, unless they send for me."
"I am afraid," said he looking at her, "that the agricultural turn has proved an over-match for your energies."
"The farm don't complain of me, does it?" said Fleda, looking up at him with a comic grave expression of countenance.
"No," said he laughing,--"certainly not; but--if you will forgive me for saying so--I think you complain of it,--tacitly,--and that will raise a good many complaints in other quarters--if you do not take care of yourself."
He shook hands and left them; and Mrs. Plumfield sat silently looking at Fleda, who on her part looked at nothing but the grey stocking.
"What is all this, Fleda?"
"What is what, aunt Miriam?" said Fleda, picking up a stitch with desperate diligence.
"Why did you want to run away from Mr. Olmney?"
"I didn't wish to be delayed--I wanted to get home."
"Then why wouldn't you let him go home with you?"
"I liked better to go alone, aunt Miriam."
"Don't you like him, Fleda?"
"Certainly, aunt Miriam--very much.'
"I think he likes you, Fleda," said her aunt smiling.
"I am very sorry for it," said Fleda with great gravity.
Mrs. Plumfield looked at her for a few minutes in silence and then said,
"Fleda, love, come over here and sit by me and tell me what you mean. Why are you sorry? It has given me a great deal of pleasure to think of it."
But Fleda did not budge from her seat or her stocking and seemed tongue-tied. Mrs. Plumfield pressed for an answer.
"Because, aunt Miriam," said Fleda, with the prettiest red cheeks in the world but speaking very clearly and steadily,--"my liking only goes to a point which I am afraid will not satisfy either him or you."
"But why?--it will go further."
"No ma'am."
"Why not? why do you say so?"
"Because I must if you ask me."
"But what can be more excellent and estimable, Fleda?--who could be more worth liking? I should have thought he would just please you. He is one of the most lovely young men I have ever seen."
"Dear aunt Miriam!" said Fleda looking up beseechingly,--"why should we talk about it?"
"Because I want to understand you, Fleda, and to be sure that you understand yourself."
"I do," said Fleda, quietly and with a quivering lip.
"What is there that you dislike about Mr. Olmney?"
"Nothing in the world, aunt Miriam."
"Then what is the reason you cannot like him enough?"
"Because, aunt Miriam," said Fleda speaking in desperation,--"there isn't enough of him. He isverygood and excellent in every way--nobody feels that more than I do--I don't want to say a word against him--but I do not think he has a very strong mind; and he isn't cultivated enough."
"But you cannot have everything, Fleda."
"No ma'am--I don't expect it."
"I am afraid you have set up too high a standard for yourself," said Mrs. Plumfield, looking rather troubled.
"I don't think that is possible, aunt Miriam."
"But I am afraid it will prevent your ever liking anybody?"
"It will not prevent my liking the friends I have already--it may prevent my leaving them for somebody else," said Fleda, with a gravity that was touching in its expression.
"But Mr. Olmney is sensible,--and well educated."
"Yes, but his tastes are not. He could not at all enter into a great many things that give me the most pleasure. I do not think he quite understands above half of what I say to him."
"Are you sure? I know he admires you, Fleda."
"Ah, but that is only half enough, you see, aunt Miriam, unless I could admire him too."
Mrs. Plumfield looked at her in some difficulty;--Mr. Olmney was not the only one, clearly, whose powers of comprehension were not equal to the subject.
"Fleda," said her aunt inquiringly,--"is there anybody else that has put Mr. Olmney out of your head?"
"Nobody in the world!" exclaimed Fleda with a frank look and tone of astonishment at the question, and cheeks colouring as promptly. "How could you ask?--But he never was in my head, aunt Miriam."
"Mr. Thorn?" said Mrs. Plumfield.
"Mr. Thorn!" said Fleda indignantly. "Don't you know me better than that, aunt Miriam? But you do not know him."
"I believe I know you, dear Fleda, but I heard he had paid you a great deal of attention last year; and you would not have been the first unsuspecting nature that has been mistaken."
Fleda was silent, flushed and disturbed; and Mrs. Plumfield was silent and meditating; when Hugh came in. He came to fetch Fleda home. Dr. Gregory had arrived. In haste again Fleda sought her bonnet, and exchanging a more than usually wistful and affectionate kiss and embrace with her aunt, set off with Hugh down the hill.
Hugh had a great deal to say to her all the way home, of which Fleda's ears alone took the benefit, for her understanding received none of it; and when she at last came into the breakfast room where the doctor was sitting, the fact of his being there was the only one which had entered her mind.
"Here she is!--I declare!" said the doctor, holding her back to look at her after the first greetings had passed,--"I'll be hanged if you ain't handsome!--Now what's the use of pinking your cheeks any more at that, as if you didn't know it before?--eh?"
"I will always do my best to deserve your good opinion, sir," said Fleda laughing.
"Well sit down now," said he shaking his head, "and pour me out a cup of tea--your mother can't make it right."
And sipping his tea, for some time the old doctor sat listening to Mrs. Rossitur and eating bread and butter; saying little, but casting a very frequent glance at the figure opposite him behind the tea-board.
"I am afraid," said he after a while, "that your care for my good opinion won't outlast an occasion. Isthatthe way you look for every day?"
The colour came with the smile; but the old doctor looked at her in a way that made the tears come too. He turned his eyes to Mrs. Rossitur for an explanation.
"She is well," said Mrs. Rossitur fondly,--"she has been very well--except her old headaches now and then;--I think she has grown rather thin lately."
"Thin!" said the old doctor,--"etherealized to a mere abstract of herself; only that is a very bad figure, for an abstract should have all the bone and muscle of the subject; and I should say you had little left but pure spirit. You are the best proof I ever saw of the principle of the homoeopaths--I see now that though a little corn may fatten a man, a great deal may be the death of him."
"But I have tried it both ways, uncle Orrin," said Fleda laughing. "I ought to be a happy medium between plethora and starvation. I am pretty substantial, what there is of me."
"Substantial!" said the doctor; "you look as substantial a personage as your old friend the 'faire Una,' just about. Well prepare yourself, gentle Saxon, to ride home with me the day after to-morrow. I'll try a little humanizing regimen with you."
"I don't think that is possible, uncle Orrin," said Fleda gently.
"We'll talk about the possibility afterwards--at present all you have to do is to get ready. If you raise difficulties you will find me a very Hercules to clear them away--I'm substantial enough I can tell you--so it's just as well to spare yourself and me the trouble."
"There are no difficulties," Mrs. Rossitur and Hugh said both at once.
"I knew there weren't. Put a pair or two of clean stockings in your trunk--that's all you want--Mrs. Pritchard and I will find the rest. There's the people in Fourteenth street wants you the first of November and I want you all the time till then, and longer too.--Stop--I've got a missive of some sort here for you--"
He foisted out of his breast-pocket a little package of notes; one from Mrs. Evelyn and one from Florence begging Fleda to come to them at the time the doctor had named; the third from Constance.
"My darling little Fleda,
"I am dying to see you--so pack up and come down with Dr. Gregory if the least spark of regard for me is slumbering in your breast--Mamma and Florence are writing to beg you,--but though an insignificant member of the family, considering that instead of being 'next to head' only little Edith prevents my being at the less dignified end of this branch of the social system,--I could not prevail upon myself to let the representations of my respected elders go unsupported by mine--especially as I felt persuaded of the superior efficacy of the motives I had it in my power to present to your truly philanthropical mind.
"I am in a state of mind that baffles description--Mr. Carleton is going home!!----
"I have not worn earrings in my ears for a fortnight--my personal appearance is become a matter of indifference to me--any description of mental exertion is excruciating--I sit constantly listening for the ringing of the door-bell, and when it sounds I rush frantically to the head of the staircase and look over to see who it is--the mere sight of pen and ink excites delirious ideas--judge what I suffer in writing to you--
"To make the matter worse (if it could be) I have been informed privately that he is going home to crown at the altar of Hymen an old attachment to one of the loveliest of all England's daughters. Conceive the complication of my feelings!----
"Nothing is left me but the resources of friendship--so come darling Fleda, before a barrier of ice interposes itself between my chilled heart and your sympathy.
"Mr. Thorn's state would move my pity if I were capable of being moved by anything--by this you will comprehend he is returned. He has been informed by somebody that there is a wolf in sheep's clothing prowling about Queechy, and his head is filled with the idea that you have fallen a victim, of which in my calmer moments I have in vain endeavoured to dispossess him--Every morning we are wakened up at an unseasonable hour by a furious ringing at the door-bell--Joe Manton pulls off his nightcap and slowly descending the stairs opens the door and finds Mr. Thorn, who enquires distractedly whether Miss Ringgan has arrived; and being answered in the negative gloomily walks off towards the East river--The state of anxiety in which his mother is thereby kept is rapidly depriving her of all her flesh--but we have directed Joe lately to reply 'no sir, but she is expected,'--upon which Mr. Thorn regularly smiles faintly and rewards the 'fowling piece' with a quarter dollar--
"So make haste, dear Fleda, or I shall feel that we are acting the part of innocent swindlers.
"C.E."
There was but one voice at home on the point whether Fleda should go. So she went.
Host.Now, my young guest! methinks you're allycholy; I pray you, why is it?
Host.Now, my young guest! methinks you're allycholy; I pray you, why is it?
Jul. Marry, mine host, because I cannot be merry.
Jul. Marry, mine host, because I cannot be merry.
Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Some nights after their arrival the doctor and Fleda were seated at tea in the little snug old-fashioned back parlour, where the doctor's nicest of housekeepers, Mrs. Pritchard, had made it ready for them. In general Mrs. Pritchard herself poured it out for the doctor, but she descended most cheerfully from her post of elevation whenever Fleda was there to fill it.
The doctor and Fleda sat cosily looking at each other across the toast and chipped beef, their glances grazing the tea-urn which was just on one side of their range of vision. A comfortable Liverpool-coal fire in a state of repletion burned away indolently and gave everything else in the room somewhat of its own look of sousy independence. Except perhaps the delicate creature at whom the doctor between sips of his tea took rather wistful observations.
"When are you going to Mrs. Evelyn?" he said breaking the silence.
"They say next week, sir."
"I shall be glad of it!" said the doctor.
"Glad of it?" said Fleda smiling. "Do you want to get rid of me, uncle Orrin?"
"Yes!" said he. "This isn't the right place for you. You are too much alone."
"No indeed, sir. I have been reading voraciously, and enjoying myself as much as possible. I would quite as lieve be here as there, putting you out of the question."
"I wouldn't as lieve have you," said he shaking his head. "What were you musing about before tea? your face gave me the heart-ache."
"My face!" said Fleda, smiling, while an instant flush of the eyes answered him,--"what was the matter with my face?"
"That is the very thing I want to know."
"Before tea?--I was only thinking,--" said Fleda, her look going back to the fire from association,--"thinking of different things--not disagreeably--taking a kind of bird's-eye view of things, as one does sometimes."
"I don't believe you ever take other than a bird's-eye view of anything," said her uncle. "But what were you viewing just then, my little Saxon?"
"I was thinking of them at home," said Fleda smiling thoughtfully,--"and I somehow had perched myself on a point of observation and was taking one of those wider views which are always rather sobering."
"Views of what?"
"Of life, sir."
"As how?" said the doctor.
"How near the end is to the beginning, and how short the space between, and how little the ups and downs of it will matter if we take the right road and get home."
"Pshaw!" said the doctor.
But Fleda knew him too well to take his interjection otherwise than most kindly. And indeed though he whirled round and eat his toast at the fire discontentedly, his look came back to her after a little with even more than its usual gentle appreciation.
"What do you suppose you have come to New York for?" said he.
"To see you, sir, in the first place, and the Evelyns in the second."
"And who in the third?"
"I am afraid the third place is vacant," said Fleda smiling.
"You are, eh? Well--I don't know--but I know that I have been inquired of by two several and distinct people as to your coming. Ah, you needn't open your bright eyes at me, because I shall not tell you. Only let me ask,--you have no notion of fencing off my Queechy rose with a hedge of blackthorn,--or anything of that kind, have you?"
"I have no notion of any fences at all, except invisible ones, sir," said Fleda, laughing and colouring very prettily.
"Well those are not American fences," said the doctor, "so I suppose I am safe enough. Whom did I see you out riding with yesterday?"
"I was with Mrs. Evelyn," said Fleda,--"I didn't want to go, but I couldn't very well help myself."
"Mrs. Evelyn.--Mrs. Evelyn wasn't driving, was she?"
"No sir; Mr. Thorn was driving."
"I thought so. Have you seen your old friend Mr. Carleton yet?"
"Do you know him uncle Orrin?"
"Why shouldn't I? What's the difficulty of knowing people? Have you seen him?"
"But how did you know that he was an old friend of mine?"
"Question?--" said the doctor. "Hum--well, I won't tell you--so there's the answer. Now will you answer me?"
"I have not seen him, sir."
"Haven't met him in all the times you have been to Mrs. Evelyn's?"
"No sir. I have been there but once in the evening, uncle Orrin. He is just about sailing for England."
"Well, you're going there to-night, aren't you? Run and bundle yourself up and I'll take you there before I begin my work."
There was a small party that evening at Mrs. Evelyn's. Fleda was very early. She ran up to the first floor,--rooms lighted and open, but nobody there.
"Fleda Ringgan," called out the voice of Constance from over the stairs,--"is that you?"
"Yes," said Fleda.
"Well just wait till I come down to you.--My darling little Fleda, it's delicious of you to come so early. Now just tell me,--am I captivating?"
"Well,--I retain self-possession," said Fleda. "I cannot tell about the strength of head of other people."
"You wretched little creature!--Fleda, don't you admire my hair?--it's new style, my dear,--just come out,--the Delancys brought it out with them--Eloise Delancy taught it us--isn't it graceful? Nobody in New York has it yet, except the Delancys and we."
"How do you know but they have taught somebody else?" said Fleda.
"I won't talk to you!--Don't you like it?"
"I am not sure that I do not like you in your ordinary way better."
Constance made a gesture of impatience, and then pulled Fleda after her into the drawing-rooms.
"Come in here--I won't waste the elegancies of my toilet upon your dull perceptions--come here and let me shew you some flowers--aren't those lovely? This bunch came to-day, 'for Miss Evelyn,' so Florence will have it it is hers, and it's very mean of her, for I am perfectly certain it is mine--it's come from somebody who wasn't enlightened on the subject of my family circle and has innocently imagined thattwoMiss Evelyns could not belong to the same one! I know the floral representatives of all Florence's dear friends and admirers, and this isn't from any of them--I have been distractedly endeavouring all day to find who it came from, for if I don't I can't take the least comfort in it."
"But you might enjoy the flowers for their own sake, I should think," said Fleda, breathing the sweetness of myrtle and heliotrope.
"No I can't, for I have all the time the association of some horrid creature they might have come from, you know; but it will do just as well to humbug people--I shall make Cornelia Schenck believe that this came from my dear Mr. Carleton!"
"No you won't, Constance," said Fleda gently.
"My dear little Fleda, I shock you, don't I? but I sha'n't tell any lies--I shall merely expressively indicate a particular specimen and say, 'My dear Cornelia, do you perceive that this is an English rose?'--and then it's none of my business, you know, what she believes--and she will be dying with curiosity and despair all the rest of the evening."
"I shouldn't think there would be much pleasure in that, I confess," said Fleda gravely. "How very ungracefully and stiffly those are made up!"
"My dear little Queechy rose?" said Constance impatiently, "you are, pardon me, as fresh as possible. They can't cut the flowers with long stems, you know,--the gardeners would be ruined. That is perfectly elegant--it must have cost at least ten dollars. My dear little Fleda!" said Constance capering off before the long pier-glass,--"I am afraid I am not captivating!--Do you think it would be an improvement if I put drops in my ears?--or one curl behind them? I don't know which Mr. Carleton likes best!--"
And with her head first on one side and then on the other she stood before the glass looking at herself and Fleda by turns with such a comic expression of mock doubt and anxiety that no gravity but her own could stand it.
"She is a silly girl, Fleda, isn't she?" said Mrs. Evelyn coming up behind them.
"Mamma!--am I captivating?" cried Constance wheeling round.
The mother's smile said "Very!"
"Fleda is wishing she were out of the sphere of my influence, mamma.--Wasn't Mr. Olmney afraid of my corrupting you?" she said with a sudden pull-up in front of Fleda.--"My blessed stars!--there's somebody's voice I know.--Well I believe it is true that a rose without thorns is a desideratum.--Mamma, is Mrs. Thorn's turban to be an invariablependantto your coiffure all the while Miss Ringgan is here?"
"Hush!--"
With the entrance of company came Constance's return from extravaganzas to a sufficiently graceful every-day manner, only enough touched with high spirits and lawlessness to free it from the charge of commonplace. But the contrast of these high spirits with her own rather made Fleda's mood more quiet, and it needed no quieting. Of the sundry people that she knew among those presently assembled there were none that she wanted to talk to; the rooms were hot and she felt nervous and fluttered, partly from encounters already sustained and partly from a little anxious expecting of Mr. Carleton's appearance. The Evelyns had not said he was to be there but she had rather gathered it; and the remembrance of old times was strong enough to make her very earnestly wish to see him and dread to be disappointed. She swung clear of Mr. Thorn, with some difficulty, and ensconced herself under the shadow of a large cabinet, between that and a young lady who was very good society for she wanted no help in carrying on the business of it. All Fleda had to do was to sit still and listen, or not listen, which she generally preferred. Miss Tomlinson discoursed upon varieties, with great sociableness and satisfaction; while poor Fleda's mind, letting all her sense and nonsense go, was again taking a somewhat bird's-eye view of things, and from the little centre of her post in Mrs. Evelyn's drawing-room casting curious glances over the panorama of her life--England, France, New York, and Queechy!--half coming to the conclusion that her place henceforth was only at the last and that the world and she had nothing to do with each other. The tide of life and gayety seemed to have thrown her on one side, as something that could not swim with it; and to be rushing past too strongly and swiftly for her slight bark ever to launch upon it again. Perhaps the shore might be the safest and happiest place; but it was sober in the comparison; and as a stranded bark might look upon the white sails flying by, Fleda saw the gay faces and heard the light tones with which her own could so little keep company. But as little they with her. Their enjoyment was not more foreign to her than the causes which moved it were strange. Merry?--she might like to be merry; but she could sooner laugh with the North wind than with one of those vapid faces, or with any face that she could not trust. Conversation might be pleasant,--but it must be something different from the noisy cross-fire of nonsense that was going on in one quarter, or the profitless barter of nothings that was kept up on the other side of her. Rather Queechy and silence, by far, than New York andthis!
And through it all Miss Tomlinson talked on and was happy.
"My dear Fleda!--what are you back here for?" said Florence coming up to her.
"I was glad to be at a safe distance from the fire."
"Take a screen--here! Miss Tomlinson, your conversation is too exciting for Miss Ringgan--look at her cheeks--I must carry you off--I want to shew you a delightful contrivance for transparencies, that I learned the other day--"
The seat beside her was vacated, and not casting so much as a look towards any quarter whence a possible successor to Miss Tomlinson might be arriving, Fleda sprang up and took a place in the far corner of the room by Mrs. Thorn, happily not another vacant chair in the neighbourhood. Mrs. Thorn had shewn a very great fancy for her and was almost as good company as Miss Tomlinson; not quite, for it was necessary sometimes to answer and therefore necessary always to hear. But Fleda liked her; she was thoroughly amiable, sensible, and good-hearted. And Mrs. Thorn, very much gratified at Fleda's choice of a seat, talked to her with a benignity which Fleda could not help answering with grateful pleasure.
"Little Queechy, what has driven you into the corner?" said Constance pausing a moment before her.
"It must have been a retiring spirit," said Fleda.
"Mrs. Thorn, isn't she lovely?"
Mrs. Thorn's smile at Fleda might almost have been called that, it was so full of benevolent pleasure. But she spoiled it by her answer.
"I don't believe I am the first one to find it out."
"But what are you looking so sober for?" Constance went on, taking Fleda's screen from her hand and fanning her diligently with it,--"you don't talk! The gravity of Miss Ringgan's face casts a gloom over the brightness of the evening. I couldn't conceive what made me feel chilly in the other room, till I looked about and found that the shade came from this corner; and Mr. Thorn's teeth, I saw, were chattering."
"Constance!" said Fleda laughing and vexed, and making the reproof more strongly with her eyes,--"how can you talk so!"
"Mrs. Thorn, isn't it true?"
Mrs. Thorn's look at Fleda was the essence of good-humour.
"Will you let Lewis come and take you a good long ride to-morrow?"
"No, Mrs. Thorn, I believe not--I intend to stay perseveringly at home to-morrow and see if it is possible to be quiet a day in New York."
"But you will go with me to the concert to-morrow night?--both of you--and hear Truffi;--come to my house and take tea and go from there? will you, Constance?"
"My dear Mrs. Thorn!" said Constance,--"I shall be in ecstacies, and Miss Ringgan was privately imploring me last night to find some way of getting her to it. We regard such material pleasures as tea and muffins with great indifference, but when you look up after swallowing your last cup you will see Miss Ringgan and Miss Evelyn, cloaked and hooded, anxiously awaiting your next movement. My dear Fleda!--there is a ring!--"
And giving her the benefit of a most comic and expressive arching of her eyebrows, Constance flung back the screen into Fleda's lap and skimmed away.
Fleda was too vexed for a few minutes to understand more of Mrs. Thorn's talk than that she was first enlarging upon the concert, and afterwards detailing to her a long shopping expedition in search of something which had been a morning's annoyance. She almost thought Constance was unkind, because she wanted to go to the concert herself to lug her in so unceremoniously; and wished herself back in her uncle's snug little quiet parlour,--unless Mr. Carleton would come.
And there he is!--said a quick beat of her heart, as his entrance explained Constance's "ring."
Such a rush of associations came over Fleda that she was in imminent danger of losing Mrs. Thorn altogether. She managed however by some sort of instinct to disprove the assertion that the mind cannot attend to two things at once, and carried on a double conversation, with herself and with Mrs. Thorn, for some time very vigorously.
"Just the same!--he has not altered a jot," she said to herself as he came forward to Mrs. Evelyn;--"it is himself!--his very self--he doesn't look a day older--I'm very glad!--(Yes, ma'am--it's extremely tiresome--) How exactly as when he left me in Paris,--and how much pleasanter than anybody else!--more pleasant than ever, it seems to me, but that is because I have not seen him in so long; he only wanted one thing. That same grave eye-- but quieter, isn't it,--than it used to be?--I think so--(It's the best store in town, I think, Mrs. Thorn, by far,--yes, ma'am--) Those eyes are certainly the finest I ever saw--How I have seen him stand and look just so when he was talking to his workmen--without that air of consciousness that all these people have, comparatively--what a difference! (I know very little about it, ma'am;--I am not learned in laces--I never bought any--) I wish he would look this way--I wonder if Mrs. Evelyn does not mean to bring him to see me--she must remember;--now there is that curious old smile and looking down! how much better I know what it means than Mrs. Evelyn does--(Yes, ma'am, I understand--I mean!--it is very convenient--I never go anywhere else to get anything,--at least I should not if I lived here--) She does not know whom she is talking to.--She is going to walk him off into the other room! How very much more gracefully he does everything than anybody else--it comes from that entire high-mindedness and frankness, I think,--not altogether, a fine person must aid the effect, and that complete independence of other people.----I wonder if Mrs. Evelyn has forgotten my existence!--he has not, I am sure--I think she is a little odd--(Yes, ma'am, my face is flushed--the room is very warm--)"
"But the fire has gone down--it will be cooler now," said Mrs. Thorn.
Which were the first words that fairly entered Fleda's understanding. She was glad to use the screen to hide her face now, not the fire.
Apparently the gentleman and lady found nothing to detain them in the other room, for after sauntering off to it they sauntered back again and placed themselves to talk just opposite her. Fleda had an additional screen now in the person of Miss Tomlinson, who had sought her corner and was earnestly talking across her to Mrs. Thorn; so that she was sure even if Mr. Carleton's eyes should chance to wander that way they would see nothing but the unremarkable skirt of her green silk dress, most unlikely to detain them. The trade in nothings going on over the said green silk was very brisk indeed; but disregarding the buzz of tongues near at hand Fleda's quick ears were able to free the barrier and catch every one of the quiet tones beyond.
"And you leave us the day after to-morrow?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"No, Mrs. Evelyn,--I shall wait another steamer."
The lady's brow instantly revealed to Fleda a trap setting beneath to catch his reason.
"I'm very glad!" exclaimed little Edith who in defiance of conventionalities and proprieties made good her claim to be in the drawing room on all occasions;--"then you will take me another ride, won't you, Mr. Carleton?"
"You do not flatter us with a very long stay," pursued Mrs. Evelyn.
"Quite as long as I expected--longer than I meant it to be," he answered rather thoughtfully.
"Mr. Carleton," said Constance sidling up in front of him,--"I have been in distress to ask you a question, and I am afraid----"
"Of what are you afraid, Miss Constance?"
"That you would reward me with one of your severe looks,--which would petrify me,--and then I am afraid I should feel uncomfortable--"
"I hope he will!" said Mrs. Evelyn, settling herself back in the corner of the sofa, and with a look at her daughter which was complacency itself,--"I hope Mr. Carleton will, if you are guilty of any impertinence."
"What is the question, Miss Constance?"
"I want to know what brought you out here?"
"Fie, Constance!" said her mother. "I am ashamed of you. Do not answer her, Mr. Carleton."
"Mr. Carleton will answer me, mamma,--he looks benevolently upon my faults, which are entirely those of education! What was it, Mr. Carleton?"
"I suppose," said he smiling, "it might be traced more or less remotely to the restlessness incident to human nature."
"Butyouare not restless, Mr. Carleton," said Florence, with a glance which might be taken as complimentary.
"And knowing that I am," said Constance in comic impatience,--"you are maliciously prolonging my agonies. It is not what I expected of you, Mr. Carleton."
"My dear," said her father, "Mr. Carleton, I am sure, will fulfil all reasonable expectations. What is the matter?"
"I asked him where a certain tribe of Indians was to be found, papa, and he told me they were supposed originally to have come across Behring's Straits one cold winter!"
Mr. Evelyn looked a little doubtfully and Constance with so unhesitating gravity that the gravity of nobody else was worth talking about.
"But it is so uncommon," said Mrs. Evelyn when they had done laughing, "to see an Englishman of your class here at all, that when he comes a second time we may be forgiven for wondering what has procured us such an honour."
"Women may always be forgiven for wondering, my dear," said Mr. Evelyn,--"or the rest of mankind must live at odds with them."
"Your principal object was to visit our western prairies, wasn't it, Mr. Carleton?" said Florence.
"No," he replied quietly,--"I cannot say that. I should choose to give a less romantic explanation of my movements. From some knowledge growing out of my former visit to this country I thought there were certain negotiations I might enter into here with advantage; and it was for the purpose of attending to these, Miss Constance, that I came."
"And have you succeeded?" said Mrs. Evelyn with an expression of benevolent interest.
"No, ma'am--my information had not been sufficient."
"Very likely!" said Mr. Evelyn. "There isn't one man in a hundred whose representations on such a matter are to be trusted at a distance."
"'On such a matter'!" repeated his wife funnily,--"you don't know what the matter was, Mr. Evelyn--you don't know what you are talking about."
"Business, my dear,--business--I take only what Mr. Carleton said;--it doesn't signify a straw what business. A man must always see with his own eyes."
Whether Mr. Carleton had seen or had not seen, or whether even he had his faculty of hearing in present exercise, a glance at his face was incompetent to discover.
"I never should have imagined," said Constance eying him keenly, "that Mr. Carleton's errand to this country was one of business and not of romance,Ibelieve it's a humbug!"
For an instant this was answered by one of those looks of absolute composure in every muscle and feature which put an effectual bar to all further attempts from without or revelations from within; a look Fleda remembered well, and felt even in her corner. But it presently relaxed, and he said with his usual manner,
"You cannot understand then, Miss Constance, that there should be any romance about business?"
"I cannot understand," said Mrs. Evelyn, "why romance should not come after business. Mr. Carleton, sir, you have seen American scenery this summer--isn't American beauty worth staying a little while longer for?"
"My dear," said Mr. Evelyn, "Mr. Carleton is too much of a philosopher to care about beauty--every man of sense is."
"I am sure he is not," said Mrs. Evelyn smoothly. "Mr. Carleton,--you are an admirer of beauty, are you not, sir?"
"I hope so, Mrs. Evelyn," he said smiling,--"but perhaps I shall shock you by adding,--not ofbeauties."
"That sounds very odd," said Florence.
"But let us understand," said Mrs. Evelyn with the air of a person solving a problem,--"I suppose we are to infer that your taste in beauty is of a peculiar kind?"
"That may be a fair inference," he said.
"What is it then?" said Constance eagerly.
"Yes--what is it you look for in a face?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"Let us hear whether America has any chance," said Mr. Thorn, who had joined the group and placed himself precisely so as to hinder Fleda's view.
"My fancy has no stamp of nationality, in this, at least," he said pleasantly.
"Now for instance, the Miss Delancys--don't you call them handsome, Mr. Carleton?" said Florence.
"Yes," he said, half smiling.
"But not beautiful?--Now what is it they want?"
"I do not wish, if I could, to make the want visible to other eyes than my own."
"Well, Cornelia Schenck,--how do you like her face?"
"It is very pretty-featured."
"Pretty-featured!--Why she is called beautiful. She has a beautiful smile, Mr. Carleton?"
"She has only one."
"Only one! and how many smiles ought the same person to have?" cried Florence impatiently. But that which instantly answered her said forcibly that a plurality of them was possible.
"I have seen one face," he said gravely, and his eye seeking the floor,--"that had I think a thousand."
"Different smiles?" said Mrs. Evelyn in a constrained voice.
"If they were not all absolutely that, they had so much of freshness and variety that they all seemed new."
"Was the mouth so beautiful?" said Florence.
"Perhaps it would not have been remarked for beauty when it was perfectly at rest; but it could not move with the least play of feeling, grave or gay, that it did not become so in a very high degree. I think there was no touch or shade of sentiment in the mind that the lips did not give with singular nicety; and the mind was one of the most finely wrought I have ever known."
"And what other features went with this mouth?" said Florence.
"The usual complement, I suppose," said Thorn. "'Item, two lips indifferent red; item, two grey eyes with lids to them; item, one neck, one chin, and so forth.'"
"Mr. Carleton, sir," said Mrs. Evelyn blandly--"as Mr. Evelyn says women may be forgiven for wondering, won't you answer Florence's question?"
"Mr. Thorn has done it, Mrs. Evelyn, for me."
"But I have great doubts of the correctness of Mr. Thorn's description, sir--won't you indulge us with yours?"
"Word-painting is a difficult matter, Mrs. Evelyn, in some instances;--if I must do it I will borrow my colours. In general, 'that which made her fairness much the fairer was that it was but an ambassador of a most fair mind.'"