“Then, lest I should forget again when the week was over, we’ll settle it now, mademoiselle,” said Melmar. Desirée rose immediately to follow him. They went away through the long passage, he leading, suspicious and stealthy, she going after him, with the little feet which rang frankly upon the stones. Desirée thought the study miserable when she went into it. She longed to throw open the window, to clear out the choked fire—she did not wonder that her pupil’s papa had a heated face, even before dinner; the wonder seemed how any one could breathe here.
They had a conference of some duration, which gradually diverged from Desirée’s little salary, which was a matter easily settled. Mr. Huntley took an interest in her family. He asked a great many questions, which the girl answered with a certain frankness and a certain reserve, the frankness being her own, and the reserve attributable to a letter which Desirée kept in her pocket, and beyond the instructions of which nothing could have tempted her to pass. Mr. Huntley learned a great deal during that interview, though not exactly what he expected and intended to learn. The afternoon was darkening, and as he sat in the dubious light, with the window and the yew-tree on the other side of him,he became more and more like the big, brindled, watchful cat, which he had so great a tendency to resemble. Then he dismissed “mademoiselle” with a kindly caution. He thought she had better not mention—not even to any one in the house, that her mother was a Scotchwoman—as she was French herself, he thought the less said about that the better—he would not even speak of it much to Joanna, he thought, if she would take his advice—it might injure her prospects in life—and with this fatherly advice he sent Desirée away.
When she was gone, he looked out stealthily for some one else, though he had taken previous precautions to make sure that no one could listen. It was Patricia for whom her father looked, poor little delicate Patricia, whowouldsteal about those stone-cold passages, and linger in all manner of draughts at half-closed doors, to gain a little clandestine information. When Melmar had watched a few minutes, he discovered her stealing out of a little store-room close by, and pounced upon the poor little stealthy, chilly figure. He did not care that the grasp of his fingers hurt her delicate shoulders, and that her teeth chattered with cold; he drew her roughly into the dusk of the study, where the pale window and the black yew were by no means counterbalanced by any light from the fire. Once here, Patricia began to vindicate herself, and upbraid papa’s cruelty. Her father silenced her with a threatening gesture.
“At it again!” said Melmar; “what the deevil business have you with my affairs? let me but catch you prying when there is any thing to learn, and for all your airs, I’ll punish you! you little cankered elf! hold your tongue, and hear what I have to say to you. If I hear another word against that governess, French or no French—or if you try your hand at aggravating her, as I know you have done, I’ll turn you out of this house!”
For once in her life Patricia was speechless; she made no answer, but stood shivering in his grasp, with a hundred terrified malicious fancies in her mind, not one of which would come to utterance. Melmar proceeded:—
“If anybody asks you who she is, or what she is, you can tell themIknow—which is more than you know, or she either—and if you let any mortal suppose she’s slighted at Melmar, or give her ground to take offense, or are themeans of making her wish to leave this place—if it should be midnight, or the depths of winter, I’ll turn you out of doors that moment! Do you hear?”
Patricia did hear, with sullen terror and wicked passion, but she did not answer; and when she was released, fled to her own room, ready, out of the mere impotence of her revengeful ill-humor to harm herself, since she could not harm Desirée, and with all kinds of vile suspicions in her mind—suspicions further from the reality than Melmar’s had been, and still more miserable. When she came to herself a little, she cried and made her eyes red, and got a headache, and the supernumerary maid was dispatched up stairs to nurse her, and be tormented for the evening. Suffering is very often vicarious in this world, and poor Jenny Shaw bore the brunt which Desirée was not permitted to bear.
“I shouldlike to live here,” said Desirée, looking out of the window of the manse parlor, with a little sigh.
Katie Logan looked up at her with some little doubt. She had come by herself to the manse, in advance of Joanna, who had been detained to accompany her sister. The two girls had been invited some time before to “take tea” at the manse—and Desirée had been very curious and interested about her first visit to her white house on the hill. Now that she had accomplished it, however, it subdued her spirit a little, and gave the little Frenchwoman for once a considerable inclination to get “low,” and cry. The house and the room were very unlike any house she had ever known—yet they were so homelike that Desirée’s thoughts grew tender. And Katie Logan looked at her doubtfully. Desirée’s impulsive little heart had clung to Katie every time she saw her. She was so sweet and neat—so modest and natural—so unlike Patricia and Joanna, and all the womankind of that sloven house of Melmar. The girl, who had a mother and an elder sister, and was far from home, yearned to Katie—but the little mistress of the manse looked with doubtupon the French governess—principally, to tell the truth, because she was French, and Katie Logan, with all her good sense, was only a country girl, and had but a very, very small experience of any world beyond Kirkbride.
“Mamma came from this country,” said Desirée, again, softly. She had a letter in her pocket—rather a sentimental letter—from mamma, which perhaps a wiser person might have smiled at a little—but it made Desirée’s heart expand toward the places which mamma too had seen in her youth, and remembered still.
“Indeed! then you are a little bit Scotch, you are not all French,” said Katie, brightening a little; “is it very long since your mamma went away?—is she in France now? Is she likely to come back again?”
Desirée shook her head.
“I should like to be rich, and buy this house, and bring her here—I love this house,” cried the girl.
A little cloud came upon Katie’s face. She was jealous of any inference that some time or other the manse might change hands. She could not bear to think of that—principally because Katie had begun to find out with painful anxiety and fear, that her father was growing old, that he felt the opening chill of winter a great deal more than he used to do—and that the old people in the village shook their heads, and said to themselves that the minister was “failing” every time he passed their doors.
“This house can never be sold,” said Katie, briefly—even so briefly as though the words were rather hard to say.
“It is not like Melmar,” said Desirée. “I want the air and the sun to come into that great house—it can not breathe—and how the people breathe in it I do not know.”
“But they are very kind people,” said Katie, quickly.
Desirée lifted her black eyes and looked full at her—but Katie was working and did not meet the look.
“Joanna is fond of you,” said Desirée, “and I like her—and I am fond of the old lady whom they call Aunt Jean.”
This distinct summary of the amount of her affection for the household amused Katie, who was half afraid of a governess-complaint against her employers.
“Do you like to be so far from home?” she said.
“Like!” Desirée became suddenly vehement. “I shouldlike to live with mamma—but,” cried the girl, “how could you ask me?—do notyouknow?”
“I have no mother,” said Katie, very quietly; “boys are always eager to leave home—girls might sometimes wish it too. Do you know Cosmo Livingstone, whom you saw in Edinburgh, has gone abroad for no reason at all that I know—and his brothers have both gone to work, and make their fortunes if they can—and my little brothers speak already of what they are going to do when they grow men—they will all go away.”
“In this country, people always talk of making fortunes. I should like to make a fortune too,” said Desirée, “but I do not know what to do.”
“Girls never make fortunes,” said Katie, with a smile.
“Why?” cried the little governess, “but I wish it—yes, very much—though I do not know how to do it; here I have just twenty pounds a year. What should you do if you had no papa, and had to work for yourself.”
Katie rose from her chair in trouble and excitement.
“Don’t speak so—you frighten me!” she cried, with an involuntary pang. “I have all the children. You do not understand it—you must not speak ofthat.”
“Of what?” asked Desirée, with a little astonishment. But she changed the subject with ready tact when she saw the painful color on Katie’s face. “I should like mamma to see you,” she said in a vein of perfectly natural and sincere flattery. “When I tell her what kind of people I live among, I do not speak of mademoiselle at Melmar, or even of Joanna—I tell her of you, and then she is happy—she thinks poor little Desirée is very well where she is with such as these.”
“I am afraid you are too good to me,” said Katie, with a half conscious laugh—“you don’t know me well enough yet—is it Patricia whom you call mademoiselle?”
Desirée shrugged her little shoulders slightly; she gave no other answer, but once more looked out from the window down the pretty brae of Tyne, where all the cottages were so much the clearer from the winterly brown aspect of the trees, stripped of their foliage. It was not like any other scene familiar to Desirée, still it did seem familiar to her—she could not tell how—as if she had known it all her life.
“Does Cosmo Livingstone, whom you spoke of, live near?”asked Desirée, “and will you tell me ofhismother? Is she by herself, now that all her boys are gone?—is she a lady? Are they great people or are they poor? Joanna speaks of a great old castle, and I think I saw it from the road. They must be great people if they lived there.”
“They are not great people now,” said Katie, the color warming in her cheek—“yet the castle belonged to them once, and they were different. But they are good people still.”
“I should like to hear about them,” said Desirée, suddenly coming up to Katie, and sitting down on a stool by her feet. Katie Logan was slightly flattered, in spite of herself. She thought it very foolish, but she could not help it. Once more a lively crimson kindled in her cheek. She bent over her work with great earnestness, and never turned her eyes toward the questioning face of the girl.
“I could not describe the Mistress if I were to try all day,” said Katie at last, in a little burst, after having deliberated. Desirée looked up at her very steadily, with grave curiosity.
“And that is what I want most,” said the little Frenchwoman. “What! can you not tell if she has black eyes or blue ones, light hair or dark hair?—was she pretty before she grew old—and does she love her boys—and did her husband love her? I want to know all that.”
Desirée spoke in the tone of one who had received all these questions from another person, and who asked them with a point-blank quietness and gravity, for the satisfaction of some other curiosity than her own; but the investigation was half amusing, half irritating to Katie. She shook her head slightly, with a gesture expressing much the same sentiment as the movement of her hand, which drew away the skirts on which Desirée almost leaned. Her doubt changed into a more positive feeling. Katie rather feared Desirée was about to fulfill all her unfavorable anticipations as to the quality of French governesses.
“Don’t go away,” said Desirée, laying her little white hand upon the dress which Katie withdrew from her touch. “I like to sit by you—I like to be near you—and I want to hear; not for me. Tell me only what you please, but let me sit here till Joanna comes.”
There was a little pause. Katie was moved slightly, butdid not know what to say, and Desirée, too, sat silent, whether waiting for her answer or thinking, Katie could not tell. At last she spoke again with emotion, grasping Katie’s dress.
“I like Joanna,” said Desirée, with tears upon her eyelashes—“but I am older than she is—a great deal older—and no one else cares for me. You do not care for me—it is not likely; but let me sit here and forget all that house and every thing till Joanna comes. Ah, let me! I am far away from home—I am a little beggar girl, begging at your window—not for crumbs, or for sous, but for love. I am so lonely. I do not think of it always—but I have thought so long and so often of coming here.”
“You must come oftener then,” said Katie, who, unused to any demonstration, did not quite know what to say.
“I can not come often,” said Desirée, softly, “but let me sit by you and forget all the others—only for a very, very little time—only till Joanna comes. Ah, she is here!”
And the little Frenchwoman shrugged her shoulders, and ran to the window to look out, and came back with a swift gliding motion to take Katie’s hand out of her work and kiss it. Katie was surprised, startled, moved. She did not half understand it, and she blushed, though the lips which touched her hand were only those of a girl; but almost before she could speak, Desirée had sprung up again, and stood before her with a smile, winking her pretty long eyelashes to clear them of those wayward April tears. She was very pretty, very young, with her little foreign graces. Katie did not understand the rapid little girl, who darted from one thought to another, so quickly, yet with such evident truthfulness—but her heart was touched and surprised. Joanna came in immediately, to put an end to any further confidences. Joanna, loudly indignant at Patricia’s selfishness, and making most audible and uncompromising comparisons between Melmar and the manse, which Desirée skillfully diverted, soothed, and gradually reduced to silence, to Katie’s much amazement. On the whole, it was a very pleasant little tea-party to everybody concerned; but Katie Logan, when she stood at the door in the clear frosty moonlight, looking after her young guests, driving away in thedouble gig which had been sent for them, still doubted and wondered about Desirée, though with a kindly instead of an unfavorable sentiment. What could the capricious little foreigner mean, for instance, by such close questions about Norlaw?
AtNorlaw every thing was very quiet, very still, in this early winter. The “beasts” were thriving, the dairy was prosperous, the Mistress’s surplus fund—spite of the fifty pounds which had been given out of it to Cosmo—grew at the bank. Willie Noble, the factotum, lived in his cosy cottage at a little distance, and throve—but no one knew very well how the Mistress and Marget lived by themselves in that deserted house. No one could have told any external difference in the house, save for its quietness. It was cheerful to look upon in the ruddy winter sunshine, when the glimmer of the fire shone in the windows of the dining-parlor, and through the open door of Marget’s kitchen; and not even the close pressure of the widow’s cap could bring decay or melancholy to the living looks of the Mistress, who still was not old, and had much to do yet in the world where her three boys were wandering. But it was impossible to deny that both Mistress and servant had a little dread of the long evenings. They preferred getting up hours before daylight, when, though it was dark, it was morning, and the labors of the day could be begun—they took no pleasure in the night.
It was a habitual custom with the minister, and had been for years, to “take tea” occasionally, now and then, without previous invitation, at Norlaw. When Dr. Logan was new in his pastorate, he thought this device of dropping in to take tea the most admirable plan ever invented for “becoming acquainted with his people,” and winning their affections; and what was commenced as a famous piece of wisdom, had fallen years ago into natural use and wont, a great improvement upon policy. From the same astute reasoning, it had been the fancy of the excellent minister, whoseschemes were all very transparent, and, indeed, unconcealable, to take Katie with him in these domestic visitations. “It pleased the people,” Dr. Logan thought, and increased the influence of the ecclesiastical establishment. The good man was rather complacent about the manner in which he had conquered the affections of his parish. It was done by the most elaborate statesmanship, if you believed Dr. Logan, and he told the young pastors, with great satisfaction, the history of his simple devices, little witting that his devices were as harmless as they were transparent, and that it was himself, and not his wisdom, which took the hearts of his people. But in the meantime, those plans of his had come to be the course of nature, and so it was that Katie Logan found herself seated with her work in the Norlaw dining-parlor at sunset of a wintry afternoon, which was not exactly the day that either she or the Mistress would have chosen for her visit there.
For that day the Mistress had heard from her eldest son. Huntley had reached Australia—had made his beginning of life—had written a long, full-detailed letter to his mother, rich in such particulars as mothers love to know; and on that very afternoon Katie Logan came with her father to Norlaw. Now in her heart the Mistress liked Katie as well, perhaps better, than she liked any other stranger out of the narrow magic circle of her own blood and family—but the Mistress was warm of temper and a little unreasonable. She could not admit the slightest right on Katie’s part, or on the part of any “fremd person,” to share in the communication of her son. She resented the visit which interrupted her in the midst of her happiness and excitement with a suggestion of some one else who might claim a share in Huntley. She knew they were not lovers, she knew that not the shadow of an engagement bound these two, she believed that they had never spoken a word to each other which all the world might not have heard—yet, notwithstanding all these certainties, the Mistress was clear-sighted, and had the prevision of love in her eyes, and with the wildest unreasonableness she resented the coming of Katie, of all other days in the year, upon that day.
“She needna have been in such an awfu’ hurry; she might have waited a while, if it had only been for the thought of what folk might say,” muttered the Mistress toherself, very well knowing all the time, though she would not acknowledge it to herself, that Katie Logan had no means whatever of knowing what precious missive had come in the Kirkbride letter-bag that day.
And when the Mistress intimated the fact with a little heat and excitement, Katie blushed and felt uncomfortable. She was conscious, too; she did not like to ask a natural question about Huntley. She sat embarrassed at the homely tea-table, looking at the cream scones which Marget had made in honor of the minister, while Dr. Logan and the Mistress kept up the conversation between them—and when her father rose after tea to go out, as was his custom, to call at the nearest cottages, Katie would fain have gone too, had that not been too great an invasion of established rule and custom, to pass without immediate notice. She sat still accordingly by the table with her work, the Mistress sitting opposite withherwork also, and her mind intent upon Huntley’s letter. The room was very still and dim, with its long background of shade, sometimes invaded by a red glimmer of fire, but scarcely influenced by the steady light of the two candles, illuminating those two faces by the table; and the Mistress and her visitor sat in silence without any sound but the motion of their hands, and the little rustle of their elbows as they worked. This silence became very embarrassing after a few minutes, and Katie broke it at last by an inquiry after Cosmo—where was he when his mother heard last?
“The laddie is a complete wanderer,” said the Mistress, not without a little complacence. “I could not undertake to mind, for my part, all the places he’s been in—though they’re a’ names you see in books—he’s been in Eetaly, and he’s been in Germany, and now he’s back again in France; but I canna say he forgets hame either,” she added, with a tender pride, “only the like of him must improve his mind; and foreign travel, folk say, is good for that—though I canna say I ever had much to do with foreigners, or likit them mysel’.”
“Did you ever hear of any one from this country marrying a Frenchman, Mrs. Livingstone?” asked Katie.
“Marrying a Frenchman? I’ll warrant have I—it’s no’ such a great wonder, but the like of me might hear tell of it in a lifetime,” said the Mistress, with a little offense,“but marriage is no’ aye running in everybody’s head, Miss Katie, and there’s little fear of my Cosmo bringing me hame a French wife.”
“No, I did not think of that,” said Katie, with a smile, “I was thinking of the little French governess at Melmar, whose mother, they say, came from this quarter, or near it. She is an odd little girl and yet I like her—Cosmo saw her in Edinburgh, and she was very anxious, when she came to the manse, to hear about Norlaw. I thought perhaps you might have known who her mother was.”
The Mistress was slightly startled—she looked up at Katie quickly, with a sparkle of impatience in her eye, and a rising color.
“Me!” said the Mistress. “How should I ken? There might have been a hundred young women in the countryside married upon Frenchmen for any thing I could tell. ‘This quarter’ is a wide word. I ken nae mair about Melrose and what happens there, wha’s married or wha dies, than if it was a thousand miles away. And many a person has heard tell of Norlaw that I ken naething about, and that never heard tell of me.”
Katie paused to consider after this. She knew and understood so much of the Mistress’s character that she neither took offense nor wished to excite it. This had not been a quite successful essay at conversation, and Katie took a little time to think before she began again.
But while Katie’s thoughts left this subject, those of the Mistress held to it. Silence fell upon them again, disturbed only by the rustle of their sleeves as they worked, and the crackle of the fire, which burned brightly, when suddenly the Mistress asked:—
“What like is she?” with an abruptness which took away Katie’s breath.
“She?"—it required an effort to remember that this was Desirée of whom they had been speaking—“the little girl at Melmar?” asked Katie. “She is little and bright, and pretty, with very dark eyes and dark hair, a quick little creature, like a bird or a fairy. I confess I was half afraid of her, because she was French,” admitted the little mistress of the manse with a blush and a laugh, “but she is a very sweet, winning little girl, with pretty red lips, and white teeth, and black eyes—very little—less than me.”
The Mistress drew a long breath and looked relieved.
“I do not know any thing about her,” she said slowly; and it seemed quite a comfort to the Mistress to be able to say so, distinctly and impartially. “And so she’s at Melmar—a governess—what is that for, Katie? The oldest is woman grown, and the youngest is more like a laddie than a lassie. What are they wanting with a governess? I canna say I ken much of the present family mysel’, though my Huntley, if he had but sought his ain, as he might have done—but you’ll hear a’ that through your cousin, without me.”
“No,” said Katie.
“Ah, Katie Logan! you speak softly and fairly, and you’re a good lassie, and a comfort to the house you belong to,” cried the Mistress. “I ken a’ that, and I never denied it a’ your days! But my Huntley, do you ken what that laddie did before he went away? He had a grand laird-ship within his hand if he would gang to the law and fight it out, as the very writer, your ain cousin, advised him to do. But my son said, ‘No; I’ll leave my mother her house and her comfort, though they’re a’ mine,’ said my Huntley. ‘I’ll gang and make the siller first to fight the battle with.’ And yonder he is, away at the end of the world, amang his beasts and his toils. He wouldna listen to me. I would have lived in a cothouse or one room, or worked for my bread rather than stand in the way of my son’s fortune; but Huntley’s a man grown, and maun have his way; and the proud callant had that in his heart that he would make his mother as safe as a queen in her ain house before he would think of either fortune or comfort for himsel’.”
The Mistress’s voice was broken with her mother-grief, and pride, and triumph. It was, perhaps, the first time she had opened her heart so far—and it was to Katie, whose visit she had resented, and whose secret hold on Huntley’s heart was no particular delight to his mother. But even in the midst of the angry impatience with which the Mistress refused to admit a share in her son’s affections, she could not resist the charm of sympathy, the grateful fascination of having some one beside her to whom every thing concerning Huntley was almost as interesting as to herself. Huntley’s uncommunicated letter was very near running over out of her full heart, and that half-apologetic, half-defiantburst of feeling was the first opening of the tide. Katie’s eyes were wet—she could not help it—and they were shining and glowing behind their tears, abashed, proud, joyous, tender, saying what lips can not say—she glanced up, with all her heart in them, at the Mistress, and said something which broke down in a half sob, half laugh, half sigh, and was wholly and entirely inarticulate, though not so unintelligible as one might have supposed. It was a great deal better than words, so far as the Mistress was concerned—it expressed what was inexpressible—the sweet, generous tumult in the girl’s heart—too shy even to name Huntley’s name, too delicate to approve, yet proud and touched to its depths with an emotion beyond telling. The two women did not rush into each other’s arms after this spontaneous burst of mutual confidence. On the contrary, they sat each at her work—the Mistress hurriedly wiping off her tears, and Katie trying to keep her’s from falling, if that were possible, and keeping her eyes upon the little glancing needle, which flashed in all manner of colors through the sweet moisture which filled them. Ah! that dim, silent dining-parlor, which now there was neither father nor children to fill and bless!—perhaps by the solitary fireside, where she had sat for so many hours of silent night, alone commanding her heart, a new, tender, soothing, unlooked for relationship suddenly surprised the thoughts of the Mistress. She had not desired it, she had not sought it, yet all at once, almost against her will, a freshness came to her heart like the freshness after showers. Something had happened to Huntley’s mother—she had an additional comfort in the world after to-night.
But when Dr. Logan returned, after seeing Willie Noble, the good minister, with pleasant consciousness of having done his duty, was not disturbed by any revelation on the part of the Mistress, or confession from his daughter. He heard a great many extracts read from Huntley’s letter, feeling it perfectly natural and proper that he should hear them, and expressing his interest with great friendliness and good pleasure; and then Marget was called in, and the minister conducted family worship, and prayed with fervor for the widow’s absent sons, like a patriarch. “The Angel which redeemed me from all evil bless the lads,” said the minister in his prayer; and then he craved a special blessingon the first-born, that he might return with joy, and see the face of his mother, and comfort her declining years. Then the excellent pastor rose from his knees placidly, and shook the Mistress’s hand, and wended his quiet way down Tyne through the frosty moonlight, with his daughter on his arm. He thought the Mistress was pleased to see them, and that Katie had been a comfort to her to-night. He thought it was a very fine night, and a beautiful moon, and there were Orion, Katie, and the Plow; and so Dr. Logan went peacefully home, and thought he had spent a very profitable night.
Itwas frost, and Tyne was “bearing” at Kirkbride, where the village held a carnival of sliding and skating, and where even the national winter sport, the yearly curling matches, began to be talked of. There was, however, no one at Melmar to tempt Tyne to “bear,” even had it been easy to reach his glassy surface through the slippery whitened trees, every twig of which was white and stiff with congealed dew. The Kelpie fell scantily, with a drowsy tinkle, over its little ravine, reduced to the slenderest thread, while all the branches near it were hung with mocking icicles. The sun was high in the blue, frosty midday skies, but had only power enough to clear here and there an exposed branch, and to moisten the path where some little burn crept half frozen under a crust of ice. It was a clear, bracing, invigorating day, and Joanna and Desirée, spite of the frost, were on Tyne-side among the frozen woods.
When standing close together, investigating a bit of moss, both simultaneously heard a crackling footstep among the underwood, and turning round at the same moment, saw some one approaching from the house. He was one of her own countrymen, Desirée thought, with a little flutter at her heart. He wore a large blue cloak, with an immense fur collar, a very French hat, a moustache, and long black hair; Desirée gazed at him with her heart in her eyes, and her white little French hands clasped together. No doubt hebrought some message from mamma. But Desirée’s hopes were brought to an abrupt conclusion when Joanna sprang forward, exclaiming:
“Oh, Oswald, Oswald! have you really come home? I am so glad you have come home!” with a plunge of welcome which the stranger looked half annoyed, half pleased to encounter. He made a brotherly response to it by stooping to kiss Joanna, a salutation which the girl underwent with a heightened color, and a half-ashamed look; she had meant to shake both his hands violently; any thing in the shape of an embrace being much out of Joanna’s way—but Oswald’s hands were occupied with his cloak, which he could not permit to fall from his shoulders in the fervor of his brotherly pleasure. Holding it fast, he had only half a hand to give, which Joanna straightway possessed herself of, repeating as she did so her cry of pleasure: “Oh, Oswald, how glad I am! I have wished for such a long time that you would come home!”
“It was very kind of my little sister—or should I say my big sister,” said the stranger, looking gallant and courtier-like, “but why, may I ask, were you so anxious for me now? that was a sudden thought, Joanna.”
Joanna grew very red as she looked up in his face—then unconsciously she looked at Desirée. Mr. Oswald Huntley was a man of the world, and understood the ways and fancies of young ladies—at least he thought so. He followed Joanna’s glance, and a comical smile came to his lips. He took off his hat with an air half mocking, half reverential.
“May I hope to be introduced to your friend, Joanna?” said the new-found brother. With great haste, heat, and perturbation, blushing fiery red, and feeling very uncomfortable, Joanna stumbled through this ceremony, longing for some private means of informing the new-comer who “her friend” was, ere accident or Patricia made him unfavorably aware of it. He was a little amazed evidently by the half-pronounced, half-intelligible name.
“Mademoiselle Desirée?” he repeated after Joanna, with an evident uncertainty, and an air of great surprise.
“Oh, Oswald, you have never got my last letter,” cried Joanna; “did you really not know that Desirée was here?”
“I am the governess,” cried Desirée, with immense prideand dignity, elevating her little head and drawing up her small figure. Patricia had done her best during these three months to annoy and humiliate the little Frenchwoman—but her pride had never been really touched until to-day.
Oswald’s countenance cleared immediately into suavity and good-humor—he smiled, but he bowed, and looked with great graciousness upon the two girls. He could see at a glance how pretty and graceful was this addition to the household of Melmar—and Oswald Huntley was a dilettanti. He liked a pretty person as well as a pretty picture. He begged to know how they could find any pleasure out of doors in this ferocious climate on such a day—and with a glance, and a shrug and a shiver at the frosty languor of the diminished Kelpie, drew his cloak close round him, and turned towards the house, whither, Joanna eagerly, and Desirée with great reluctance and annoyance, the girls were constrained to follow. He walked between them, inclining his ear to his sister, who overwhelmed him with questions, yet addressing now and then a courteous observation to Desirée which gradually mollified that little lady. He was a great deal more agreeable than Melmar or than Patricia—he was something new in the house at least—he knew her own country, perhaps her own very town and house. Desirée became much softened as they drew near the house, and she found herself able to withdraw and leave the brother and sister together. To know the real value of a new face and a new voice, one needs to live for a long winter in a country house like Melmar, whose hospitality was not very greatly prized in the country-side. Desirée had quite got over her anger by the time she reached her own apartment. She made rather a pretty toilet for the evening, and was pleased, in spite of herself, that there would be some one else to talk to besides Melmar, and Aunt Jean and Joanna. The whole house, indeed, was moved with excitement. A dark Italian servant, whom he had brought with him, was regulating with a thermometer, to the dismay and wonder of all the maids, the temperature of Mr. Oswald’s room, where these unscientific functionaries had put on a great, uncomfortable fire, piled half-way up the chimney. Patricia had entered among them to peer over her brother’s locked trunks, and see if there was any thing discoverable by curiosity. Mrs. Huntley was getting up in haste to seeher son, and even Aunt Jean trotted up and down stairs on her nimble little feet, on errands of investigation and assistance. It made no small commotion in the house when the only son of Melmar came home.
Oswald Huntley, but for his dark hair, was like his sister Patricia. He was tall, but of a delicate form, and had small features, and a faint color which said little for his strength. When they all met together in the evening, the traveled son was by much the most elegant member of the household circle. His dainty, varnished boots, his delicate white hands, his fine embroidered linen, filled Joanna with a sentiment which was half impatience and half admiration. Joanna would rather have had Oswald despise these delicacies of apparel, which did not suit with her ideal of manhood. At the same time she had never seen any thing like them, and they dazzled her. As for Patricia, she looked from her brother to herself, and colored red with envious displeasure. One of Oswald’s rings would have purchased every thing in the shape of jewelry which Patricia ever had or hoped for—his valet, his dress, his “style,” at once awed and irritated his unfortunate sister. If papa could afford to keep Oswald thus, was it not a disgrace to confine “me!” within the tedious bounds of this country house? Poor little Patricia could have cried with envy and self pity.
In the meantime, Oswald made himself very agreeable, and drew the little party together as they seldom were drawn. His mother sat up in her easy chair, looking almost pretty with her pink cheeks, and for once without any invalid accompaniments of barley-water or cut oranges. Melmar himself staid in the drawing-room all the evening, displaying his satisfaction by some occasional rude fun with Joanna and jokes at “Mademoiselle,” and listening to his son very complacently though he seldom addressed him. Aunt Jean had drawn her chair close to Mrs. Huntley, and seriously inclined, not her ear only, which was but a dull medium, but the lively black eyes with which she seemed almost able to hear as well as see. Joanna hung upon her mother’s footstool, eagerly and perpetually asking questions. The only one out of the family group was Desirée, who kept apart, working at her embroidery, but whom Mr. Oswald by no means neglected. The new comer had goodtaste. He thought the little table which held the governess’s thread and scissors, and little crimson work-bag, and the little chair close by, where the little governess herself sat working with her pretty white hands, her graceful girlish dress, her dark hair in which the light shone, and her well-formed, well-poised head bending over her embroidery, was the prettiest bit in the room, and well worth looking at. He looked at it accordingly as he talked, distributing his favors impartially among the family, and wondered a little who this little girl might be, and what brought her here. When Oswald stooped forward to say something politely to the little Frenchwoman—when he brought a flush to her cheek by addressing her in her own language, though Desirée’s own good sense taught her that it was best to reply in English—when he pronounced himself a connoisseur in embroidery, and inspected the pretty work in her hands—his ailing mother and his deaf aunt, as well as the spiteful Patricia, simultaneously perceived something alarming in the courtesy. Desirée was very young and very pretty, and Oswald was capricious, fanciful, and the heir of Melmar. What if the little governess, sixteen years old, should captivate the son, who was only five-and-twenty? The fear sprang from one feminine mind to another, of all save Joanna, who had already given her thoughts to this catastrophe as the most desirable thing in the world. Oswald’s experience and knowledge of the world, on which he prided himself, went for nothing in the estimation of his female relatives. They thought Desirée, at sixteen, more than a match for him, as they would have thought any other girl in the same circumstances. People say women have noesprit du corps, but they certainly have the most perfect contempt for any man’s powers of resistance before the imagined wiles and fascinations of “a designing girl.” These ladies almost gave Oswald over, as he stood, graceful and self-satisfied, in the midst of them—a monarch of all he surveyed—extending his lordly courtesies to the poor little governess. Had he but known! but he did not know any thing about it, and said to himself compassionately, “Poor little thing—how pretty she is!—what could bring her here?” as he threw himself back upon the pillow in that room of which Antonio had regulated the temperature, and thought no more about Desirée; whereas poor little Desirée,charmed with the new voice, and the new grace, and the unusual kindness, dreamed of him all night.
“AmI to understand that our title is somehow endangered? I do not quite comprehend your last letter,” said Oswald, addressing his father somewhat haughtily. They were in Melmar’s study, where everybody went to discuss this business, and where the son sat daintily upon a chair which he had selected from the others for his own use, leaning the points of his elbows upon the table, and looking elaborately uncomfortable—so much so, that some faint idea that this study, after all, could not be a very pleasant apartment, entered, for the first time, the mind of Melmar.
“Come nearer to the fire, Oswald,” said Mr. Huntley, suddenly. He was really solicitous about the health and comfort of his son.
“Thank you; I can scarcely breathehere,” said the young man, ungratefully. “Was I right, sir, in supposingthatto be your reason for writing me such a letter as your last?”
“You were right in supposing that I wanted to see you,” said the father, with some natural displeasure. “You live a fine life in foreign parts, my lad; you’ve little to put you about; but what could you do for yourself if the funds at Melmar were to fail?”
“Really the idea is disagreeable,” said Oswald, laughing. “I had rather not take it into consideration, unless it is absolutely necessary.”
“If it were so,” said Melmar, with a little bitterness, “which of you could I depend upon—which of you would stretch out a helping hand to help me?”
“To helpyou? Upon my word, sir, I begin to think you must be in earnest,” said his son. “What does this mean? Is there really any other claimant for the estate? Have we any real grounds for fear? Were not you the heir-at-law?”
“I was the heir-at-law; and there is no other claimant,”said Melmar, dryly; “but there is a certain person in existence, Oswald Huntley, who, if she but turns up soon enough—and there’s two or three years yet to come and go upon—can turn both you and me to the door, and ruin us with arrears of income to the boot.”
Oswald grew rather pale. “Is this a new discovery?” he said, “or why did I, who am, next to yourself, the person most concerned, never hear of it before?”
“You were a boy, in the first place; and in the second place, a head-strong, self-willed lad; nextly, delicate,” said Melmar, still with a little sarcasm; “and it remains to be seen yet whether you’re a reasonable man.”
“Oh, hang reason!” cried the young man with excitement. “I understand all that. What’s to be done? that seems the main thing. Who is this certain person that has a better right to Melmar than we?”
“Tell me first what you would do if you knew,” said Mr. Huntley, bending his red gray eyes intently upon his son. Melmar knew that there were generous young fools in the world, who would not hesitate to throw fortune and living to the winds for the sake of something called honor and justice. He had but little acquaintance with his son; he did not know what stuff Oswald was made of. He thought it just possible that the spirit of such Quixotes might animate this elegant mass of good breeding and dillettanteism; for which reason he sat watching under his grizzled, bushy eyebrows, with the intensest looks of those fiery eyes.
“Pshaw! do? You don’t supposeIwould be likely to yield to any one without a struggle. Who is it?” said Oswald; “let me know plainly what you mean.”
“It is the late Me’mar’s daughter and only child; a woman with children; a woman in poor circumstances,” replied Mr. Huntley, still with a certain dry sarcasm in his voice.
“But she was disinherited?” said Oswald, eagerly.
“Her father left a will in her favor,” said Melmar, “reinstating her fully in her natural rights; that will is in the hands of our enemies, whom the old fool left his heirs, failing his daughter: she and her children, and these young men, are ready to pounce upon the estate.”
“But she was lost—did I not hear so?” cried Oswald, rising from his chair in overpowering excitement.
“Ay!” said his father, “but I know where she is.”
“In Heaven’s name, what do you mean?” cried the unfortunate young man; “is it to bewilder and overwhelm me that you tell me all this? Have we no chance? Are we mere impostors? Is all this certain and beyond dispute? What do you mean?”
“It is all certain,” said Melmar, steadily; “her right is unquestionable; she has heirs of her own blood, and I know where she is—she can turn us out of house and home to-morrow—she can make me a poor writer, ruined past redemption, and you a useless fine gentleman, fit for nothing in this world that I know of, and your sisters servant-maids, for I don’t know what else they’re good for. All this she can do, Oswald Huntley, and more than this, the moment she makes her appearance—but she is as ignorant as you were half an hour ago.Iknow—butshedoes not know.”
What will Oswald do?—he is pacing up and down the little study, no longer elegant, and calm, and self-possessed; the faint color on his cheeks grows crimson—the veins swell upon his forehead—a profuse cold moisture comes upon his face. Pacing about the narrow space of the study, thrusting the line of chairs out of his way, clenching his delicate hand involuntarily in the tumult of his thoughts, there could not have been a greater contrast than between Oswald at his entrance and Oswald now. His father sat and watched him under his bushy eyebrows—watched him with a steady, fixed, fascinating gaze, which the young man’s firmness was not able to withstand. He burst out into uneasy, troubled exclamations.
“What are we to do, then?—must we go and seek her out, and humble ourselves before her?—must we bring her back in triumph to her inheritance? It is the only thing we can do with honor. Whatarewe to do?”
“Remember, Oswald,” said Melmar, significantly, “shedoes not know.”
The young man threw himself into a chair, hid his face in his hands, and broke into low, muttered groans of vexation and despair, which sounded like curses, and perhaps were so. Then he turned towards his father violently and suddenly, with again that angry question, “What are we to do?”
He was not without honor, he was not without conscience; if he had there could have been little occasion for thatburning color, or for the cold beads of moisture on his forehead. The sudden and startling intelligence had bewildered him for a moment—then he had undergone a fierce but brief struggle, and then Oswald Huntley sank into his chair, and into the hands of his father, with that melancholy confession of his weakness—a question when the matter was unquestionable—“what are we to do?”
“Nothing,” said Melmar, grimly, regarding his son with a triumph which, perhaps, after all, had a little contempt in it. This, then, was all the advantage which his refinement and fine-gentlemanliness gave him—a moment’s miserable, weakly hesitation, nothing more nor better. The father, with his coarse methods of thought, and unscrupulous motives, would not have hesitated: yet not a whit stronger, as it appeared, was the honor or courage of the son.
“Nothing!” said Melmar; “simply to keep quiet, and be prepared against emergencies, and if possible to stave off every proceeding for a few years more. They have a clever lad of a lawyer in their interests, which is against us, but you may trust me to keep him back if it is possible; a few years and we are safe—I ask nothing but time.”
“And nothing from me?” said Oswald, rising with a sullen shame upon his face, which his father did not quite comprehend. The young man felt that he had no longer any standing ground of superiority; he was humiliated, abased, cast down. Such advantage as there was in moral obtuseness and strength of purpose lay altogether with Melmar. His son only knew better, without any will to do better. He was degraded in his own eyes, and angrily conscious of it, and a sullen resentment rose within him. If he could do nothing, why tell him of this to give him a guilty consciousness of the false position which he had not courage enough to abandon? Why drag him down from his airy height of mannerly and educated elevation to prove him clay as mean as the parent whom he despised? It gave an additional pang to the overthrow. There was nothing to be done—the misery was inflicted for nothing—only as a warning to guard against an emergency which, perhaps, had it come unguarded, might not have stripped Oswald so bare of self-esteem as this.
“We’ll see that,” said Melmar, slowly; then he rose and went to the door and investigated the passages. No onewas there. When he returned, he said something in his son’s ear, which once more brought a flush of uneasy shame to his cheek. The father made his suggestion lightly, with a chuckle. The young man heard it in silence, with an indescribable look of self-humiliation. Then they separated—Oswald to hurry out, with his cloak round him, to the grounds where he could be alone—Melmar to bite his pen in the study, and muse over his victory. What would come of it?—his own ingenuity and that last suggestion which he had breathed in Oswald’s ear. Surely these were more than enough to baffle the foolish young Livingstones of Norlaw, and even their youthful agent? He thought so. The old Aberdonian felt secure in his own skill and cunning—he had no longer the opposition of his son to dread. What should he fear?
In the meantime, Patricia, who had seen her brother leave the house in great haste, like a man too late for an appointment, and who had spied a light little figure crossing the bridge over Tyne before, wrapped herself up, though it was a very cold day, and set out also to see what she could discover. Malice and curiosity together did more to keep her warm than the cloak and fur tippet, yet she almost repented when she found herself among the frozen, snow-sprinkled trees, with the faint tinkle of the Kelpie striking sharp, yet drowsy, like a little stream of metal through the frost-bound stillness, and no one visible on the path, where now and then her foot slid upon a treacherous bit of ice, inlaid in the hard brown soil. Could they have left the grounds of Melmar? Where could they have gone? If they had not met, one of them must certainly have appeared by this time; and Patricia still pushed on, though her cheeks were blue and her fingers red with cold, and though the intensity of the chill made her faint, and pierced to her poor little heart. At last she was rewarded by hearing voices before her. Yes, there they were. Desirée standing in the path, looking up at the trunk of a tree, from which Oswald was stripping a bit of velvet moss, with bells of a little white fungus, delicate and pure as flowers, growing upon it. As Patricia came up, her brother presented the prize to the little Frenchwoman, almost with the air of a lover. The breast of his poor little sister swelled with bitterness, dislike, and malicious triumph. She had found them out.
“Oswald! I thought you were quite afraid of taking cold,” cried Patricia—“dear me, who could have supposed that you would have been in the woods on such a day! I am sure Mademoiselle ought to be very proud—you would not have come for any one else in the house.”
“I am extremely indebted to you, Patricia, for letting Mademoiselle know so much,” said Oswald. “One does not like to proclaim one’s own merits. Was it on Mademoiselle’s account that you, too, undertook the walk, poor child? Come, I will help you home.”
“Oh, I’m sure she does not wantme!” exclaimed Patricia, ready to cry in the height of her triumph. “Papa and you are much more in her way than I am—as long as she can make you gentlemen do what she pleases, she does not care any thing about your sisters. Oh, I know all about it!—I know papa is infatuated about her, and so are you, and she is a designing little creature, and does not care a bit for Joanna. You may say what you please, but I know I am right, and I will not stand it longer—I shall go this very moment and tell mamma!”
“Mademoiselle Huntley shall not have that trouble,” cried Desirée, who had been standing by utterly amazed for the first few moments, with cheeks alternately burning red and snow pale. “Ishall tell Mrs. Huntley; it concerns me most of any one. Mademoiselle may be unkind if she pleases—I am used to that—but no one shall dare,” cried the little heroine, stamping her little foot, and clapping her hands in sudden passion, “to say insulting words to me! I thank you, Monsieur Oswald—but it is for me, it is not for you—let me pass—I shall tell Mrs. Huntley this moment, and I shall go!”
“Patricia is a little fool, Mademoiselle,” said Oswald, vainly endeavoring to divert the seriousness of the incident. “Nay—come, we shall all go together—but every person of sense in the house will be deeply grieved if you take this absurdity to heart. Forget it; she shall beg your pardon. Patricia!” exclaimed the young man, in a deep undertone of passion, “you ridiculous little idiot! do you know what you have done?”
“Oh, I know! I’ve told the truth—I am too clear-sighted!” sobbed Patricia, “Ican not help seeing that both papa and you are crazy about the governess—it will break poor mamma’s heart!”
Though Desirée was much wounded, ashamed, and angry, furious rather, to tell the truth, she could not resist the ludicrous whimper of this mock sorrow. She laughed scornfully.
“I shall go by myself, please,” she said, springing through a by-way, where Oswald was not agile enough or sufficiently acquainted with to follow. “I shall tell Mrs. Huntley, instantly, and she will not break her heart—but no one in the world shall dare to speak thus again to me.”
So Desirée disappeared like a bird among the close network of frozen branches, and Patricia and her brother, admirable good friends, as one might suppose, together pursued their way home.
A seriesof violent scenes in Melmar made a fitting climax to this little episode in the wood. Desirée demanded an interview with Mrs. Huntley, and obtained it in that lady’s chamber, which interview was not over when Patricia appeared, and shortly after Melmar himself, and Oswald, who sent both the governess and her enemy away, and had a private conference with the unfortunate invalid, who was not unwilling to take up her daughter’s suspicions, and condemn the little Frenchwoman as a designing girl, with schemes against the peace of the heir of Melmar. Somehow or other, the father and son together managed to still these suspicions, or to give them another direction; for, on the conclusion of this conference Desirée was sent for again to Mrs. Huntley’s room; the little governess in the meanwhile had been busy in her own, putting her little possessions together with angry and mortified haste, her heart swelling high with a tumult of wounded pride and indignant feeling. Desirée obeyed with great stateliness. She found the mother of the house lying back upon her pillow, with a flush upon her pink cheeks, and angry tears gleaming in her weak blue eyes. Mrs. Huntley tried to be dignified, too, and totell Desirée that she was perfectly satisfied, and there was not the slightest imputation upon her, the governess; but finding this not answer at all, and that the governess still stood in offended state, like a little queen before her, Mrs. Huntley took to her natural weapons—broke down, cried, and bemoaned herself over the trouble she had with her family, and the vexation which Patricia gave her. “And now, when I had just hoped to see Joanna improving, then comes this disturbance in the house, and my poor nerves are shattered to pieces, and my head like to burst, and you are going away!” sobbed Mrs. Huntley. Desirée was moved to compassion; she went up to the invalid, and arranged her cushions for her, and trusted all this annoyance would not make her ill. Mrs. Huntley seized the opportunity; she went on bewailing herself, which was a natural and congenial amusement, and she made Desirée various half-sincere compliments, with a skill which no one could have suspected her of possessing. The conclusion was, that the little Frenchwoman yielded, and gave up her determination to leave Melmar; instead of that she came and sat by Mrs. Huntley all day, reading to her, while Patricia was shut out; and a storm raged below over that exasperated and unhappy little girl. The next day there was calm weather. Patricia was confined to her room with a headache. Joanna was energetically affectionate to her governess, and Mrs. Huntley came down stairs on purpose to make Desirée feel comfortable. Poor little Desirée, who was so young, and in reality so simple-hearted, forgot all her resentment. Her heart was touched by the kindness which they all seemed so anxious to show her—impulses of affectionate response rose within herself—she read to Mrs. Huntley, she put her netting in order for her, she arranged her footstool as the invalid declared no one had ever been able to do it before; and Desirée blushed and went shyly away to her embroidery, when Oswald came to sit by his mother’s little table. Oswald was very animated, and anxious to please everybody; he found a new story which nobody had seen, and read it aloud to them while the ladies worked. The day was quite an Elysian day after the troubles of the previous one; and Desirée, with a little tumult in her heart, found herself more warmly established in Melmar that evening than she had ever been hitherto;she did not quite comprehend it, to tell the truth. All this generous desire to make her comfortable, though the girl accepted it without question as real, and never suspected deceit in it, was, notwithstanding, alien to the character of the household, and puzzled her unconsciously. But Desirée did not inquire with herself what was the cause of it. If some fairy voice whispered a reason in her ear, she blushed and tried to forget it again. No, his father and mother were proud of Oswald; they were ambitious for him; they would think such a fancy the height of folly, could it even be possible that he entertained it. No, no, no! it could not be that.
Yet, next day, when Joanna and Desirée went out to walk, Oswald encountered them before they had gone far, and seemed greatly pleased to constitute himself the escort of his sister and her governess. If he talked to Joanna sometimes, it was to Desirée that his looks, his cares, his undertones of half-confidential conversation were addressed. He persuaded them out of “the grounds” to the sunny country road leading to Kirkbride, where the sun shone warmer; but where all the country might have seen him stooping to the low stature of his sister’s governess. Desirée was only sixteen; she was not wise and fortified against the blandishments of man;—she yielded with a natural pleasure to the natural pride and shy delight of her position. She had never seen any one so agreeable; she had never received before that unspoken but intoxicating homage of the young man to the young woman, which puts an end to all secondary differences and degrees. She went forward with a natural expansion at her heart—a natural brightening in her eyes—a natural radiance of young life and beauty in her face. She could not help it. It was the first tender touch of a new sunshine upon her heart.
A woman stood by herself upon the road before them, looking out, as it seemed, for the entrance of a little by-way, which ran through the Melmar woods, and near the house, an immemorial road which no proprietor could shut up. Desirée observed Joanna run up to this bystander; observed the quick, lively, middle-aged features, the pleasant complexion and bright eyes, which turned for a moment to observe the party; yet would have passed on without further notice but for hearing the name of Cosmo. Cosmo!could this be his mother? Desirée had her own reasons for desiring to see the Mistress; she went forward with her lively French self-possession to ask if it was Mrs. Livingstone, and if she might thank her for her son’s kindness in Edinburgh. The Mistress looked at her keenly, and she looked at the Mistress; both the glances were significant, and meant more than a common meeting; half a dozen words, graceful and proper on Desirée’s part, and rather abrupt and embarrassed on that of the Mistress, passed between them, and then they went upon their several ways. The result of the interview, for the little Frenchwoman, was a bright and vivid little mental photograph of the Mistress, very clear in external features, and as entirely wrong in its guess at character as was to be expected from the long and far difference between the little portrait-painter and her subject. Desirée broke through her own pleasant maze of fancy for the moment to make her rapid notes upon the Mistress. She was more interested in her than there seemed any reason for; certainly much more than simply as the mother of Cosmo, whom she had seen but twice in her life, and was by no means concerned about.
“Who is that?” asked Oswald, when the Mistress had passed.
“It is Mrs. Livingstone, of Norlaw,” said Joanna, “Cosmo’s mother; Desirée knows; but I wonder if she’s going up to Melmar? I think I’ll run and ask her. I don’t know why she should go to Melmar, for I’m sure she ought to hate papa.”
“That will do; I am not particularly curious—you need not trouble yourself to ask on my account,” said Oswald, putting out his hand to stop Joanna, “and, pray, how does Mademoiselle Desirée know? I should not suppose that ruddy countrywoman was much like a friend ofyours.”
“I have never seen her before,” said Desirée.
“Ah, I might have trusted that to your own good taste,” said Oswald, with a bow and a smile; “but you must pardon me for feeling that such a person was not an acquaintance meet for you.”
Desirée made no answer. The look and the smile made her poor little heart beat—she did not ask herself why he was so interested in her friendships and acquaintances. She accepted it with downcast eyes and a sweet, rising color;hedidconcern himself about all the matters belonging to her—that was enough.
“Mrs. Livingstone of Norlaw is not a common person—she is as good as we are, if she is not as rich,” cried Joanna. “Ilike her! I would rather see her than a dozen fine ladies, and, Desirée, you ought to stand up for her, too. If you think Norlaw is no’ as good as Melmar, it’s because you’re not of this country and don’t know—that is all.”
Desirée, looking up, saw to her surprise an angry and menacing look upon the face, which a minute ago had been bent with such gallant courtesy towards her own, and which was now directed to Joanna.
“Norlaw may be as good as Melmar,” said the gentle Oswald, with an emphasis which for the moment made him like Patricia; “but that is no reason why one of that family should be a worthy acquaintance for Mademoiselle Desirée, who is not much like you, Joanna, nor your friends.”
Joanna loved Desirée with all her heart—but this was going too far even for her patience; she ended the conversation abruptly by a bewildered stare in her brother’s face, and a burst of tears.
“Desirée used to be fond of me, till you came—shewas my only friend!” cried poor Joanna, whom Desirée’s kiss scarcely succeeded in comforting. She did not know what to do, this poor little governess—it seemed fated that Oswald’s attentions were to embroil her with all his family—yet somehow one can not resent with very stern virtue the injustice which shows particular favor to one’s self. Desirée still thought it was very kind of Oswald Huntley to concern himself that she should have proper friends.