"With a quick movement she threw the big stallion in front of Ça Ira""With a quick movement she threw the big stallion in front of Ça Ira"
"My wig—give it to me."
"No, don't give it to him." The doctor looked ruefully from the black to the angry spinster.
"What means this, madame? My wig—"
"I want you to go at once to see a sick woman at Mrs. Swanwick's."
"I will not. I am sent for in haste. In an hour or two I will go, or this afternoon."
"I don't believe you. You must go now—now. Who is it is ill?" People paused, astonished and laughing.
"It is Citizen Jefferson. He is ill, very ill."
"I am glad of it. He must wait—this citizen."
"But he has a chill—un diableof a chill."
"If the devil himself had a chill,—Lord, but it would refresh him!—he would have to wait."
He tried to pass by. She seized the rein of his horse. Her blood was up, and at such times few men cared to face her.
"You will go," she cried, "and at once, or—there is a tale I heard about you last year in London from Dr. Abernethy. That highwayman—you know the story. Your wig I shall keep. It is freshly powdered. Lord, man, how bald you are!"
He grew pale around his rouge. "You would not, surely."
"Would I not? Come, now, I won't tell—oh, not every one. Be a good doctor. I have quarreled with Dr. Rush—and come and see me to-morrow. I have a horrid rheum. And as to Citizen Jefferson, he won't die, more's the pity."
He knew from the first he must go, and by goodluck no one he knew was in sight to turn him into ridicule for the pleasure of the great Federalist dames.
"Give him his wig, Tom." The little doctor sadly regarded the dusty wig. Then he readjusted his head-gear and said he would go.
"Now, that's a good doctor. Come," and she rode off again after him, by no means inclined to set him free to change his mind.
At Mrs. Swanwick's door, as he got out of his chaise, she said: "This lady speaks only French. She is the Vicomtesse de Courval. And now, mind you, Doctor, no citizenesses or any such Jacobin nonsense."
"A votre service, madame," he said, and rapped discreetly low, feeling just at present rather humble and as meek as Ça Ira.
Mistress Wynne waited until the door closed behind him, and then rode away refreshed. Turning to her black groom, she said, "If you tell, Tom, I will kill you."
"Yes, missus."
"At all events, he won't bleed her," she reflected, "and he has more good sense than most of them. That young fellow is a fine figure of a man. I wonder what kind of clerk Hugh will make of him. I must have him to dine."
In the hall Dr. Chovet met Schmidt, who knew him, as, in fact, he knew every one of any importance in the city.
"These are to me friends, Doctor," he said. "I beg of you to come often," a request to the doctor'sliking, as it seemed to carry better assurance of pay than was the usual experience among his emigrant countrymen. He was at once a little more civil. He bowed repeatedly, was much honored, and after asking a few questions of De Courval, went up-stairs with Mrs. Swanwick, reflecting upon how some day he could avenge himself on Gainor Wynne.
De Courval, relieved by his presence and a little amused, said, smiling, "I hope he is a good doctor."
"Yes, he is competent. He manufactures his manners for the moment's need."
The doctor came down in half an hour, and, speaking French of the best, said: "Madame has had troubles, I fear, and the long voyage and no appetite for sea diet—bad, bad. It is only a too great strain on mind and body. There needs repose and shortly wine,—good Bordeaux claret,—and soon, in a week or two, to drive out and take the air. There is no cause for alarm, but it will be long, long."
Schmidt went with him to the door. De Courval sat down. Wine, drives, a doctor, and for how long? And perhaps additions to the simple diet of this modest household. Well, he must use some of the small means in Wynne's hands. And these women, with their cares, their brave self-denial of all help, how could he ever repay this unlooked-for kindness?
His mother soon grew better, and, having again seen Mr. Wynne, he felt that he might shortly take up the work which awaited him.
Meanwhile, the gentle nursing was effective, and went on without complaint and as a matter of course. Miss Wynne came at odd hours to inquireor to fetch some luxury, and soon the vicomte must call to see her.
The days went by, and there were strawberries for madame from Mr. Langstroth and from Merion, walks for De Courval, or a pull on the water with Schmidt, and anxiously desired news from France. At last, after a fortnight or more, well on into June, the doctor insisted on claret, and De Courval asked of Schmidt where it could be had. The German laughed. "I might lie to you, and I should at need, but I have already for the mother's use good Bordeaux in the cellar."
De Courval colored, and, hesitating, asked, "How much am I in your debt?"
"Six months of the five years. It is I shall be long in debt, I fear. It cannot be all on one side. The life of a man! What credit hath it in the account of things? Suppose it had gone the other way, would you contented bide?"
"Not I," laughed De Courval.
"Let us say, then, I have paid a score of thanks; credit me with these—one should be prudent. Only in the Bible it is a thank,—one. Be careful of the coin. Let it rest there. So you go to work to-morrow. It is well; for you have been anxious of late, and for that exacting work is no bad remedy."
The next day De Courval found himself before seven-thirty in the counting-house. "It is hard in winter," said the clerk who was to instruct him. "Got to make the fires then. Mr. Potts is particular. You must leave no dust, and here are brooms in the closet." And so, perched on a high stool,the clerk, well amused, watched his successor, Louis René, Vicomte de Courval, sweep out the counting-house.
"By George!" said the critic, "you will wear out a broom a day. What a dust! Sweep it up in the dust-pan. Sprinkle it first with the watering-pot. Lord, man, don't deluge it! And now a little sand. Don't build a sea-beach. Throw out the dust on the ash-heap behind the house." It was done at last.
"Take your coat off next time. The clerks will be here soon, but we have a few minutes. Come out and I will show you the place. Oh, this is your desk, quills, paper, and sand, and 'ware old man Potts."
They went on to the broad landing between the warehouse and Dock Creek. "There are two brigs from Madeira in the creek, partly unloaded."
The great tuns of Madeira wine filled the air with vinous odors, and on one side, under a shed, were staves and salt fish from the North for return cargoes, and potatoes, flour, and onions in ropes for the French islands.
"The ship outside," said the clerk, "is from the Indies with tea and silks, and for ballast cheap blue Canton china."
The vessels and the thought of far-away seas pleased the young man. The big ship, it seemed, had been overhauled by a small British privateer.
"But there is no war?"
"No, but they claim to take our goods billed for any French port, and as many men as they choose to call English."
"And she beat them off?"
"Yes; Mr. Wynne gave the master a silver tankard, and a hundred dollars for the men."
De Courval was excited and pleased. It was no day of tame, peaceful commerce. Malayan pirates in the East, insolent English cruisers to be outsailed, the race home of rival ships for a market, made every voyage what men fitly called a venture. Commerce had its romance. Strange things and stranger stories came back from far Indian seas.
After this introduction, he thanked his instructor, and returning to the counting-house, was gravely welcomed and asked to put in French two long letters for Martinique and to translate and write out others. He went away for his noonday meal, and, returning, wrote and copied and resolutely rewrote, asking what this and that term of commerce meant, until his back ached when he went home at six. He laughed as he gave his mother a humorous account of it all, but not of the sweeping.
Then she declared the claret good, and what did it cost? Oh, not much. He had not the bill as yet.
Despite the disgust he felt at the routine of daily domestic service, the life of the great merchant's business began more and more to interest De Courval. The clerks were mere machines, and of Mr. Wynne he saw little. He went in and laid letters on his desk, answered a question or two in regard to his mother, and went out with perhaps a message to a shipmaster fresh from the Indies and eager to pour out in a tongue well spiced with sea oaths his hatred of England and her ocean bullies.
The mother's recovery was slow, as Chovet had predicted, but at the end of June, on a Saturday, he told Mistress Wynne she might call on his patient, and said that in the afternoon the vicomtesse might sit out on the balcony upon which her room opened.
Madame was beginning to desire a little change of society and was somewhat curious as to this old spinster of whom René had given a kind, if rather startling, account. Her own life in England had been lonely and amid those who afforded her no congenial society, nor as yet was she in entirely easy and satisfactory relations with the people among whom she was now thrown. They were to her both new and singular.
The Quaker lady puzzled her inadequate experience—adame de pension, a boarding-house keeper with perfect tact; with a certain simple sweetness, as if any common bit of service about the room and the sick woman's person were a pleasure. The quiet, gentle manners of the Quaker household, with now and then a flavor of some larger world, were all to Madame's taste. When, by and by, her hostess talked more and more freely in her imperfect French, it was unobtrusive and natural, and she found her own somewhat austere training beginning to yield and her unready heart to open to kindness so constant, and so beautiful with the evident joy of self-sacrifice.
During the great war the alliance with France had made the language of that country the fashion. French officers came and went, and among the Whig families of position French was even earlier, as in Mary Plumstead's case, a not very rare accomplishment. But of late she had had little opportunity to use her knowledge, and with no such courage as that of Gainor Wynne, had preferred the awkwardness of silence until her guest's illness obliged her to put aside her shy distrust in the interest of kindness. She soon found the tongue grow easier, and the vicomtesse began to try at short English sentences, and was pleased to amuse herself by correcting Margaret, who had early learned French from her mother, and with ready intelligence seized gladly on this fresh chance to improve her knowledge.
One day as Mrs. Swanwick sat beside her guest's couch, she said: "Thy son told me soon after thy coming that thou art not, like most of the French, of the Church of Rome." He, it seemed, desired to see a Friends' meeting, and his mother had expressed her own wish to do the same when well enough.
"No," said madame; "we are of the religion—Huguenots. There is no church of my people here, so my son tells me, and no French women among the emigrants."
"Yes, one or two. That is thy Bible, is it not?" pointing to the book lying open beside her. "I am reading French when times serve. But I have never seen a French Bible. May I look at it? I understand thy speech better every day, and Margaret still better; but I fear my French may be queer enough to thee."
"It is certainly better than my English," said the vicomtesse, adding, after a brief pause: "It is the French of a kind heart." The vicomtesse as she spoke was aware of a breach in her usual reserve of rather formal thankfulness.
"I thank thee for thy pretty way of saying a pleasant thing," returned Mrs. Swanwick. "I learned it—thy language—when a girl, and was foolishly shy of its use before I knew thee so well. Now I shall blunder on at ease, and Margaret hath the audacity of youth."
"A charming child," said madame, "so gay and so gentle and intelligent."
"Yes, a good girl. Too many care for her—ah,the men! One would wish to keep our girls children, and she is fast ceasing to be a child."
She turned to the Bible in her hand, open at a dry leaf of ivy. "It has psalms, I see, here at the end."
"Yes, Clement Marot's. He was burned at the stake for his faith."
"Ah, cruel men! How strange! Here, I see, is a psalm for one about to die on the scaffold."
"Yes—yes," said the vicomtesse.
"What strange stories it seems to tell! It was, I see, printed long ago."
"Yes, two years before the massacre of St. Bartholomew."
"And here is one for men about to go into battle for God and their faith." The hostess looked up. Her guest's face was stern, stirred as with some deep emotion, her eyes full of tears.
She had been thinking, as she lay still and listened to Mary Swanwick's comments, of death for a man's personal belief, for his faith, of death with honor. She was experiencing, of a sudden, that failure of self-control which is the sure result of bodily weakness; for, with the remembrance of her husband's murder, she recalled, amid natural feelings of sorrow, the shame with which she had heard of his failure at once to declare his rank when facing death. For a moment she lay still. "I shall be better in a moment," she said.
"Ah, what have I done?" cried Mrs. Swanwick, distressed, as she took the thin, white hand in hers. "Forgive me."
"You have done nothing—nothing. Some day I shall tell you; not now." She controlled herself with effectual effort, shocked at her own weakness, and surprised that it had betrayed her into emotion produced by the too vivid realization of a terrible past. She never did tell more of it, but the story came to the Quaker dame on a far-off day and from a less reserved personage.
At this moment Margaret entered. Few things escaped the watchful eyes that were blue to-day and gray to-morrow, like the waters of the broad river that flowed by her home. No sign betrayed her surprise at the evident tremor of the chin muscles, the quick movement of the handkerchief from the eyes, tear-laden, the mother's look of sympathy as she dropped the hand left passive in her grasp. Not in vain had been the girl's training in the ways of Friends. Elsewhere she was more given to set free her face to express what she felt, but at home and among those of the Society of Friends she yielded with the imitativeness of youth to the not unwholesome discipline of her elders. She quietly announced Aunt Gainor as waiting below stairs.
"Wilt thou see her?" said Mrs. Swanwick.
"Certainly; I have much to thank her for. And tell my son not to come up as yet," for, being Saturday, it was a half-holiday from noon, and having been out for a good walk to stretch his desk-cramped legs, he was singing in the garden bits of French songs and teasing June or watching her skilful hunt for grasshoppers. He caroled gaily as he lay in the shade:
"La fin du jourSauve les fleurs et rafraîchit les belles;Je veux, en galant troubadour,Célébrer, au nom de l'amour,Chanter, au nom des fleurs nouvellesLa fin du jour."
"La fin du jourSauve les fleurs et rafraîchit les belles;Je veux, en galant troubadour,Célébrer, au nom de l'amour,Chanter, au nom des fleurs nouvellesLa fin du jour."
The message was given later, and as Mistress Gainor came in to his mother's room she was a striking figure, with the beaver hat tied under her chin and the long, dark-green pelisse cast open so as to reveal the rich silk of her gown. It was not unfit for her age and was in entire good taste, for as usual she was dressed for her rôle. Even her goddaughter was slightly surprised, well as she knew her. This was not the Gainor that Chovet knew, the woman who delighted to excite the too easily irritated Dr. Rush, or to shock Mrs. Adams, the Vice-President's wife, with well embroidered gossip about the Willing women and the high play at Landsdowne, where Mrs. Penn presided, and Shippens, Chews, and others came. This was another woman.
Margaret, curious, lingered behind Miss Wynne, and stood a moment, a hand on the door. Miss Wynne came forward, and saying in French which had amazed two generations, "Bon jour, madame," swept the entirely graceful courtesy of a day when even the legs had fine manners, adding, as the vicomtesse would have risen, "No, I beg of you."
"The settle is on the balcony," said the hostess, "and Cicero will come up by and by and carry theeout. Not a step—not a step by thyself," she added, gently despotic.
As Miss Wynne passed by, the girl saw her courtesy, and, closing the door, said to herself, "I think I could do it," and fell to courtesying on the broad landing. "I should like to do that for Friend Nicholas Waln," and gaily laughing, she went out and down the garden to deliver her message to the young vicomte.
Neither man, woman nor the French tongue dismayed Mistress Wynne. "C'était un long calembourg, my son," the vicomtesse said later—"a long conundrum, a long charade of words to representle bon Dieuknows what. Ah, a tonic, truly. I was amused as I am not often." In fact, she was rarely receptively humorous and never productively so. Now she spoke slowly, in order to be understood, comprehending the big woman and knowing her at once for a lady of her own world with no provincial drawbacks, a woman at her ease, and serenely unconscious of, or indifferent to, the quality of the astounding tongue in which she spoke.
She talked of London and of the French emigrant nobles in Philadelphia, of the Marquis de la Garde, who taught dancing; of the Comte du Vallon, who gave lessons in fencing; of De Malerive, who made ice-cream. Madame, interested, questioned her until they got upon unhappy France, when she shifted the talk and spoke of the kindness of Mr. Wynne.
"It will soon be too hot here," said Gainor, "and then I shall have you at the Hill—Chestnut Hill, and in a week I shall come for you to ride in mylandau,"—there were only four in the city,—"and the vicomte shall drive with you next Saturday. You may not know that my niece Mrs. Wynne was of French Quakers from the Midi, and this is why her son loves your people and has more praise for your son than he himself is like to hear from my nephew. For my part, when I hate, I let it out, and when I love or like, I am frank," which was true.
Just then came the old black servant man Cicero, once a slave of James Logan the first, and so named by the master, folks said, because of pride in his fine translation of the "De Senectute" of Cicero, which Franklin printed.
"Cicero will carry thee out," said Mrs. Swanwick.
"Will he, indeed?" said Gainor, seeing a shadow of annoyance come over the grave face of the sick woman as she said, "I can walk," and rose unsteadily. The pelisse was off, and before the amazed vicomtesse could speak, she was in Gainor's strong arms and laid gently down on a lounge in the outer air.
"Mon Dieu!" was all she could say, "but you are as a man for strength. Thank you."
The roses were below her. The cool air came over them from the river, and the violet of the eastward sky reflected the glow of the setting sun. A ship with the tricolor moved up with the flood, abonnet rougeat the masthead, as was common.
"What flag is that?" asked the vicomtesse. "And that red thing? I do not see well."
"I do not know," said Gainor, calmly fibbing; and seeing her goddaughter about to speak, she put a finger on her lips and thrust a hand ignorant of its strength in the ribs of the hostess as madame, looking down among the trees on the farther slope, said: "Who is that? How merry they are!"
"Adam and Eve—in the garden," replied Gainor.
"For shame!" murmured Mary Swanwick in English. "It is well she did not understand thee." Then she added to the vicomtesse: "It is Margaret, madame, and thy son."
Again gay laughter came up from the distance; the vicomtesse became thoughtful.
"I have left you lettuce and some fruit," said Miss Wynne, "and may I be pardoned for taking the place of Cicero?"
"Ah, madame, kindness in any form is easy to pardon." Then Gainor went away, while Mrs. Swanwick sat down, saying: "Now no more talk. Let me fan thee a little."
The next day being the first Sunday in July, Schmidt said after breakfast: "De Courval, you said last night that you would like to go to church. It shall be Christ Church, if you like—Episcopal they call it."
They set out early, and on Delaware Second Street saw the fine old church Dr. Kearsley planned, like the best of Christopher Wren's work, as De Courval at once knew.
"I shall go in. I may not stay," said Schmidt. "I do not like churches. They seem all too small for me. Men should pray to God out of doors. Well,it has a certain stately becomingness. It will suit you; but the Druids knew best."
They found seats near the chancel. Just before the service began, a black servant in livery entered by a side door. A large man, tall and erect, in full black velvet, followed. The servant opened a pew; the tall man sat down, and knelt in prayer; the servant went back to the door, and seated himself on the floor upon a cushion.
Schmidt whispered, "That is George Washington."
The young man, it is to be feared, paid small attention to the service or to good Bishop White's sermon. The grave, moveless, ruddy face held him with the interest of its history. The reverent attention of the great leader pleased him, with his Huguenot training. At the close the congregation remained standing until Washington had gone out.
"Come," said Schmidt, and crossing the church they waited at the south gate until the President passed. He raised his hand in soldierly salute, and bowing, took off his beaver as he met Mrs. Chew and the Chief-Justice.
The two men walked away, silent for a time. Then the German said: "You have seen a great man, a great soldier,—says our Frederick, who ought to know,—a statesman, too, and baited now by Jefferson's creature Freneau. It must have pleased the Almighty to have decreed the making of a man like George Washington."
That the God of Calvin should have pleasure in things made had never occurred to the young Huguenot,who was already getting lessons which in days to come would freely modify the effect of the stern tenets which through habit and education he accepted with small cost of thought. His mind, however, was of serious type, and inquiry was in the whole world's atmosphere of his time.
He said, "Herr Schmidt, can a man conceive of God as having enjoyment?"
"If you were God, the all-creative, the eternal power, the inconceivable master, would you not make for yourself pleasure, when you could make or mar all things? Does it shock you? Or has the thought of your church the clipped wings of an eagle that must ever stumble on the earth and yearn for the free flight of the heavens? Terrible shears are creeds."
De Courval was new to such comments. He felt hindered by all the child home-rule of habit, and the discipline of limiting beliefs held the more stringently for the hostile surroundings of neighbors and kinfolks of the Church of Rome.
The German was of no mind to perplex him. He had some clearly defined ideas as to what as a gentleman he could or could not do. As to much else he had no ruling conscience, but a certain kindliness which made him desire to like and be liked of men, and so now, with something akin to affection, he was learning to love the grave young noble to whom he owed a life endowed by nature with great power of varied enjoyment.
"We will talk of these things again," he said. "Once I was speaking of the making of men, and Isaid, 'If the father of Shakspere had married another woman, or his wife a year later, would "Hamlet" ever have been written?'"
De Courval laughed. "I do not know 'Hamlet.'"
The German looked around at him thoughtfully and said: "Is that indeed so? It is a sermon on the conduct of life. When once I spoke of this and how at birth we are fortuned, the king said to me, I think—" and he broke off his sentence. "You must not take me too seriously, De Courval. This is mere gossip of the imagination. I have lived too much in France with the philosophers, who are like Paul's men of Athens."
"I like it," said De Courval, pleased, puzzled, flattered, and immensely curious concerning the man at his side; but decent manners forbidding personal questions, he accepted the German's diversion of the talk and asked, "Who is that across the street?"
"A good soldier, General Wayne, and with him the Secretary of War, Knox. It is said he is one of the few whom Washington loves. He is a lonely man, the President, as are the kings of men, on thrones or elsewhere."
"To be loved of that man would be worth while," said his companion. He was to see him again in an hour of distress for himself and of trouble and grief for the harassed statesman.
When at home he told his mother he had seen Washington.
"What was he like?"
"I can not say—tall, straight, ruddy, a big nose."
She smiled at his description. "Your father,René, once told me of a letter Marquis La Fayette had of him the day after he last parted with Washington. It was something like this: 'When our carriages separated, I said, I shall never see him again. My heart said Yes. My head said No; but these things happen. At least I have had my day.' That is not like a man, René. He must have strong affections."
"Men say not, mother."
The years which followed our long struggle for freedom were busy years for the mind of man. The philosophers in France were teaching men strange doctrines, and fashion, ever eager for change, reveled in the new political philosophy. The stir of unrest was in the air, among the people, in the talk of the salons.
The Bastille had long since fallen, and already in the provinces murder and pillage had begun. The terrible example set by Jourdan late in '91 was received in Paris with other than reprobation. He was to return to Avignon and, strange irony of fate, to be condemned as a moderate and to die by the guillotine amid the rejoicing of the children of his victims; but this was to be far away in '94.
The massacres of August, '92, when the king left the Swiss to their fate, all the lightning and thunder of the gathering storm of war without and frenzied murder within the tottering kingdom, had not as yet in this midsummer been heard of in America.
After four years as our minister in Paris, Mr. Jefferson had long ago come back to add the mischief of a notable intellect to the party which sincerely believed we were in danger of a monarchy, and was all for France and for Citizen Equality, who, asHamilton foresaw, might come to be the most cruel of tyrants.
The long battle of States' rights had begun in America. The Federalists, led by Hamilton, were for strong central rule; their opponents, the Republicans, later to be called Democrats, were gone mad in their Jacobin clubs of many cities,bonnet rougeat feasts, craze about titles, with Citizen for Mr., and eagerly expecting a new French minister.
Washington, a Federalist, smiled grimly at the notion of kingship, and the creature of no party, with his usual desire for peace, had made up, of both parties, a cabinet sure to disagree.
To hear the clamor of the Jacobin clubs, a stranger coming among us in '92 might have believed us ruined. Nevertheless, Hamilton had rescued our finance, assured a revenue not as yet quite sufficient, founded the bank, and assumed the State debts. The country was in peril only from disorders due to excess of prosperity, the podagra of the state. There was gambling in the new script, lotteries innumerable, and the very madness of speculation in all manner of enterprises—canals, toll-pike roads, purchases of whole counties.
Cool heads like Schmidt looked on and profited. The Quaker merchants, no wise perturbed by the rashness of speculation, accumulated irredeemable ground rents, and thriving, took far too little interest in the general party issues, but quietly created the great schools which are of our best to-day, endowed charities, and were to be heard of later as fearless Christian gentlemen in a time of death anddespair, when men unafraid in battle shrank from the foe which struck and was never seen.
In the early August days, madame had driven now and then with Mistress Wynne, and at present was gone, not quite willingly, to stay a while at the Hill. Mrs. Wynne had called, and her husband, more than once, with a guarded word or two from his wife as to the manner of usefulness of his young clerk. "Mind you, Hugh, let it be secretary. Do not hurt the poor lady's pride." So counseled Darthea, kindly wise, and he obeyed, having come in time to accept his wife's wisdom in many matters social and other.
To the Hill farm came to call, on the vicomtesse, the Vicomte de Noailles, the prosperous partner of William Bingham; and, asked by the Wynnes, Mrs. Bingham, to be at a later day the acclaimed beauty of London; her kin, the Willings, with the gift of hereditary good looks; and the Shippens. The vicomtesse received them all with a certain surprise at their ceremonious good manners and their tranquil sense of unquestioned position. She would return no visits as yet, and her son was busy and, too, like herself, in mourning. In fact, she shrank from general contact with the prosperous, and dreaded for René this gay world of pretty young women.Ciel!What might not happen?
On their part, they were curious and kind. Emigrant ladies were rare; but, as to foreign titles, they were used to them in the war, and now they were common since a great influx of destitute French had set in, and not all who came were to their liking.
"There," said the German one evening, kindling a great pipe, "enough of politics, De Courval; you are of the insatiably curious. We are to dine to-morrow at the fashionable hour of four with Mistress Wynne and the maid, my Pearl. It is an occasion of some worthiness. She has come to town for this feast, one of her freaks. Did ever you see a great actress?"
"I?" said De Courval. "No, or yes—once, in France, Mademoiselle Mars. We of the religion do not go to the theater. What actress do you speak of?"
"Oh, women—all women; but to-morrow on the stage will be Miss Gainor, become, by pretty courtesy of possibilities declined, Mistress Gainor by brevet—"
De Courval, delighted, cried: "But your little Quaker lady—is she to have a rôle? She seems to me very simple."
"Simple! Yes, here, or at meeting, I daresay. Thou shouldest see her with Friend Waln. Her eyes humbly adore his shoe-buckles—no, his shoe-ties—when he exhorts her to the preservation of plainness of attire, and how through deep wading, and a living travail of soul, life shall be uplifted to good dominion. It is a godly man, no doubt, and a fine, ripe English he talks; and Arthur Howell, too."
"I must hear them."
"You will hear noble use of the great English speech. But best of all are the Free Quakers, like Samuel Wetherill, an apostate, says Friend Pennington with malignant sweetness, but for me a sterling,well-bred gentle, if ever God made one. Ah, then the maid, all godliness and grace, will take his hat and cane and, the head a bit aside, make eyes at him. Ah, fie for shame! And how we purr and purr—actresses, oh, all of them! There is the making of a QuakerJulietin that girl."
"One would scarce think it. My mother iséprise—oh, quite taken with Miss Margaret, and now, I think, begins a little to understand this household, so new and so wonderful to me and to her. But I meant to ask you something. I have part paid the queer doctor, and the bill, I suppose, is correct. It is long—"
"And large, no doubt."
"And what with a new gown my mother needs and some clothes I must have—"
The German interrupted him. "De Courval, may I not help you, to whom I owe a debt which can never be paid?"
"Oh, no, no. I shall soon have more wages." He grew red as he spoke.
"But why is money such a wonder thing that only some saleable article shall count against it? I lack hospitality to entertain the thought."
"Would you take it of me?"
"I? Yes. I took my life of you—a poor thing, but mine own."
"I think you had small choice in the matter," laughed René.
"Der Teufel!Very little. Let it be a loan, if you will. Come, now. You make me unhappy. I lend you five hundredlivres—a hundred dollars we call it here. You pay, when you can."
De Courval hesitated. Was there not something ignoble in refusing a kindness thus offered? Schmidt laughed as he added: "Reverse it. Put it in this fashion: good master of my fate, let me drown. I would owe no coin of life to any. To end it, I put to-night in this left-hand drawer money. Use it freely. Leave a receipt each time, if you like."
"I am so little used to kindness," said De Courval, wavering.
"I know," returned Schmidt—"bittersweet to some men, but should not be to the more noble nature."
"No, no, not to me. I take it and gladly, but"—and once more he colored, as he said with a certain shyness—"would you mind calling me René? I—I should like it."
"And I, too," said the German, as he put a hand of familiar kindliness on the younger man's knee. "Now that is settled, and you have done me another favor. I have an errand at Germantown, and shall join you at Miss Wynne's at four to-morrow. Are there any ships come in? No? There will be, I fear, evil news from France, and storms, storms that will roll across the sea and beat, too, on these shores. It will stir here some foolish echoes, some feeble mockery of what over there cries murder." De Courval had had too much reason to believe him. "Ach, I am sleepy. Shall you go to see your mother on Sunday? There is my mare at your service."
Yes, he had meant to walk, but he would be glad of the horse.
When, on Saturday, Mrs. Swanwick knew that Schmidt had gone to the country, she said Margaretwould walk with the vicomte, and show him the way. He felt a fresh surprise, a little embarrassment. Young women were not thus free in France; but as he was the only one thus amazed, he set out with the Pearl in some wonderment at what his mother would have said or thought.
They walked up Front Street, and at last along Fifth. She was now, as Schmidt had said, the other Margaret of whom De Courval had had brief knowledge at times. A frank, natural, gay good humor was in all her ways, a gentle desire to please, which was but the innocent coquetry of a young girl's heart. She stayed a moment as they crossed Walnut Street, and replying to a question, said: "Yes, that is the jail men called the Provostry in the war. My grandfather lay in it—oh, very long. We have his sword in the attic. I would hang it up down-stairs, but Friends would not approve, thou must know. And that is Independence Hall, but thou hast seen it."
"Yes. Are you proud of it?"
"Surely. My people shed our blood for what strong men did in that hall. My uncle and my grandfather came out of the jail to die, oh, both of them!"
"And of what party are you, Miss Margaret?"
"Of George Washington's," she cried. "But Friends must have no party, or their women, at least—not even tea-parties," and she laughed.
"I think I am of your party," said De Courval—"George Washington's."
The conventual shelter of the silk bonnet turnedtoward him as she said: "Then we agree; but I am not sure that I like people to agree with me. It spoils talk, Mr. Schmidt says."
"Then I am all for Jefferson," he cried gaily, thinking in his grave way that this young girl was of a sudden older than her years.
"I am not sure that I like that either," she replied, and so chatting with easy freedom they came to Miss Wynne's door, opposite the Quakers' burial-ground, where their dead lay in unmarked graves. A negro servant in the brown livery of the Wynnes opened the door, and Aunt Gainor appeared in the hall in more than usual splendor.
"Good day, Vicomte," and to Margaret: "Take off your bonnet, child. How can any one, man or woman, kiss thee with that thing on thy head? It might be useful at need, but I do suppose you could take it off on such occasions."
"For shame, Aunt Gainor!" said the Pearl, flushing and glad of the bonnet she was in act to remove. Miss Wynne kissed her, whispering, "Good Lord! you are on the way to be a beauty!"
De Courval, who of course had called long since to thank his hostess, had so far dined in no one of the more luxuriously appointed homes of Philadelphia. Here were portraits; much, too much, china, of which he was no judge; and tables for work that Miss Wynne never did, or for cards at which she liked high play.
"Mr. Hamilton was to dine here, but was with me just now to be excused."
"He was with my mother an hour this morning,"said Margaret, "about some small affairs we have in New York. He is to be here again on Saturday sennight to tell mother all about it."
"I am sorry to miss him," said Gainor; "but if I lose a guest I desired, I am to have one I do not want. Mr. Josiah Langstroth has bidden himself to dine with me."
"Uncle Josiah? I have not seen him for a month."
"There is a joss in the corner like him, Vicomte," said Miss Wynne. "If you look at it, you will need no presentation. I pray you to avoid the temptation of a look." Of course both young persons regarded, as she meant they should, the china god on his ebony stand.
"A reincarnation of the bulldog," remarked Gainor, well pleased with her phrase.
"If," said Margaret to the young man, "thou dost take my aunt or Uncle Josiah seriously, it will be what they never do one another. They fight, but never quarrel. My mother thinks this is because then they would stay apart and have no more the luxury of fighting again, a thing they do love."
"Are you sure that is thy mother's wisdom, Margaret?" said Gainor. "It is not like her."
"If I said it was mine, thou wouldst box my ears."
"Did ever one hear the like?"
The young girl occasionally ventured, when with aunt or uncle, upon these contributions of observation which now and then startle those who, seeing little change from day to day, are surprised by the sudden fruitage of developmental growth.
"I shall profit by Miss Swanwick's warning," said De Courval.
Miss Wynne, who kept both houses open, and now would not as usual, on account of the vicomtesse, fill her country house with guests, had come to town to dine Mr. Hamilton and to amuse herself with the young man. It cannot be said, despite her bluff kindness, that De Courval altogether or unreservedly liked her sudden changes of mood or the quick transitions which more or less embarrassed and at times puzzled him. Upon his inquiring for his mother, Miss Wynne replied:
"She is better, much better. You are to come to-morrow. You should come more often. It is absurd, most absurd, that you are so tied to the legs of a desk. I shall speak to my nephew."
"I beg of you, madame, to do no such thing. I am a clerk and the youngest." And then a little ashamed of his shame, he added: "I sweep out the office and lock up at evening. You would cause Mr. Wynne to think I had asked you." He spoke with decision.
"It is ridiculous. I shall explain, make it easy."
Then he said, "You will pardon me, who owe you so much, but I shall have to be beforehand and say I do not wish it."
"I retreat," said Miss Wynne. "I haul down my colors." He was quite sure that she never would.
"You are again kind, madame," he returned.
"I hear Mr. Schmidt and the joss," she said as she rose, while Margaret, unobserved, cast a thoughtful glance at the clerk. It was a new type to her. Thegravity, the decisiveness, and the moral courage, although she may not have so labeled the qualities, appealed to her who had proudly borne the annoyances of restricted means among friends and kindred who lived in luxury. She had heard Schmidt say to her mother that this De Courval was a man on the way to the making of a larger manhood. Even young as she was, about to be seventeen in September, she had among the young Friends those she liked and some who were disposed to like her too well; but this was another kind of man.
When Schmidt entered, followed by Friend Langstroth, De Courval was struck by the truth of Gainor's reference to the joss. Short, very fat, a triple chin and pendant cheeks under small eyes, and a bald head—all were there.
"You are both late. My back of mutton will be overdone. The Vicomte de Courval—Mr. Langstroth."
"Glad to see thee; meant to come and see thee. I was to give thee this letter, Friend Schmidt. Mr. Wynne sent it. A messenger came up from Chester while I was with him at the counting-house. TheSaucy Sisterswas lying below for the flood."
Schmidt glanced at it, hesitated a moment, and put it in his pocket as they went in to dinner.
"Any news?" asked Langstroth. "Any news from France?"
"I do not know," said Schmidt. He had no mind to spoil the meal with what he knew must very likely be evil tidings. "It is from England," he added. Miss Gainor, understanding him, said: "Wewere to have had Mr. Hamilton. I think I told you."
"I saw him at the office of the Secretary of the Treasury," said Schmidt; "a less capable successor he has in his place. We talked much about the rage for lotteries, and he would stop them by a law."
"He should let things alone," said Langstroth. "A nice muddle he has made of it with his bank and his excise."
"And what do you know about it?" said Gainor, tartly.
"Fiddlesticks! I know that a man who cannot manage his own affairs had better leave larger things alone."
"He has," said Schmidt quietly, "as I see it, that rare double gift, a genius for government and finance."
"Humph!" growled Langstroth.
Schmidt was silent, and took the Wynne Madeira with honest appreciation, while the young man ate his dinner, amazed at the display of bad manners.
Then the girl beside him said in a half-whisper: "Fiddlesticks! Why do people say that? The violin is hard to play, I hear. Why do men say fiddlesticks?"
De Courval did not know, and Aunt Gainor asked, "What is that, Margaret?"
"I was saying that the violin must be hard to play."
"Ah, yes, yes," returned the hostess, puzzled, while Schmidt smiled, and the talk fell upon mild gossip and the last horse-race—and so on to more perilous ground.
"About lotteries," said Josiah, "I have bought thee a ticket, Margaret, number 1792—the lottery for the college of Princeton."
"A nice Quaker you are," said Miss Wynne. "I see they forbid lotteries in Massachusetts. The overseers of meeting will be after you."
"I should like to see them. A damn pretty business, indeed. Suppose thee were to win the big prize, child." He spoke the intolerable language then becoming common among Friends. "Thee could beat Gainor in gowns."
"I should not be let to wear them." Alas! she saw herself in brocades and lutestring underskirts. The young man ignorantly shared her distress.
"There is small chance of it, I fear," said Gainor. "A hundred lottery chances I have bought, and never a cent the richer." And so the talk went on, Langstroth abusing all parties, Schmidt calmly neutral, the young people taking small part, and regarding the lottery business as one of Josiah's annoying jokes—no one in the least believing him.
At last the cloth was off the well-waxed mahogany table, a fresh pair of decanters set before the hostess, and each guest in turn toasted.
Langstroth had been for a time comfortably unamiable. He had said abusive things of all parties in turn, and now Schmidt amused himself by adding more superlative abuse, while Gainor Wynne, enjoying the game, fed Langstroth with exasperating additions of agreement. The girl, knowing them all well, silently watched the German's face, his zest in annoying Josiah unexpressed by even the faintestsmile—a perfect actor. De Courval, with less full understanding of the players, was at times puzzled, and heard in silence Schmidt siding with Josiah. "It was most agreeable, my dear," said Mistress Gainor next day to one of her favorites, Tacy Lennox. "Josiah should of right be a gentleman. He has invented the worst manners ever you saw, my dear Tacy. He was like a mad bull, eager for war, and behold—he is fed and petted. Ah, but he was furious and bedazed. Tacy, I would you had seen it."
It was at last quite too much of a trial for Josiah, who turned from Gainor to Schmidt, and then to De Courval, with wild opinions, to which every one in turn agreed, until at last, beginning to suspect that he was being played with, he selected a subject sure to make his hostess angry. A look of pugnacious greed for a bone of contest showed on his bulldog face as he turned to Mistress Wynne. "This Madeira is on its last legs, Gainor."
"All of us are," laughed Schmidt.
"It is hardly good enough for my toast."
"Indeed," said Gainor; "we shall know when we hear it."
Then Josiah knew that for her to agree with him would this time be impossible. He smiled. "When I am at home, Gainor, as thee knows, I drink to our lawful king." He rose to his feet. "Here's to George the Third."
Gainor was equal to the occasion.
"Wait a little, Josiah. Take away Mr. Langstroth's glass, Cæsar. Go to the kitchen and fetch one of the glasses I use no more because the Hessianhogs used them for troughs when they were quartered on me in the war. Cæsar, a Hessian wine-glass for Mr. Langstroth."
De Courval listened in astonishment, while Schmidt, laughing, cried, "I will drink to George with pleasure."
"I know," cried Margaret: "to George Washington."
Schmidt laughed. "You are too sharp, Pearl. In a minute, but for your saucy tongue, I should have trapped our Tory friend. To George the greater," said Schmidt.
The Quaker turned down his glass. "Not I, indeed."
"I hope the poor man will never hear of it, Josiah," said Miss Wynne as she rose laughing, and presently Schmidt and the young people went away, followed shortly after by Langstroth.
For a while Margaret walked on in silence, De Courval and the German talking. At last she said: "Thou shouldst know that my uncle is not as bad as he seems. He is really a kind and generous man, but he loves to contradict my aunt, and no one else can so easily make her angry."
"Ah, Pearl, the Madeira was good," said Schmidt—"too good; or, rather, the several Madeiras. In the multitude of vinous counselers there is little wisdom, and the man's ways would tempt an angel to mischief."
Mrs. Swanwick, being alone, had gone out to take supper with a friend, and as Margaret left them in the hall, Schmidt said to De Courval: "Come in. Ihave a great package from Gouverneur Morris, from Paris. You may as well hear what news there is. I saw your anxiety, but I was of no mind to have that imitation Quaker discuss the agony of a great nation."
It took two months or more to hear from France, and each week added to the gathering anxiety with which De Courval awaited news. He was grateful for the daily labor, with its steady exactions, which forbade excessive thought of the home land, for no sagacity of his friend or any forecast that man could make three thousand miles away was competent to predict the acts of the sinister historic drama on which the curtain was rising far away in France.
As the German opened the envelop and set aside letter after letter, he talked on in his disconnected way. "I could like some bad men more than Josiah Langstroth. He has what he calls opinions, and will say, 'Welladay,'—no, that is my bastard English,—he will say 'Well, at all events, that is my opinion.' What means 'all events,' Herr René? A kick would change them. 'T is an event—a kick. And Mistress Wynne is sometimes not easy to endure. She steps heavily on tender toes, even when on errands of goodness." The younger man scarce heard these comments as letter after letter was put aside, until at last he put down his pipe, and Schmidt said: "I was sorry to keep you, but now this last letter has it all—all. There is no detail, my friend, but enough—enough. He writes me all France is in a ferment. This is from Mr. Morris, whom our mobocrats loathe for an aristocrat. He writes: 'The King has vetoedtwo bills, one about the priests and one of less moment. La Fayette is in disgrace, and wants the surgeon's courage to let blood. Worst of all, and I write in haste,' he says, 'a mob on June 20th broke into the Tuileries and there, in the Œil de Bœuf, a butcher mocked the King to his face as Monsieur Veto. The King laughed, it is said, and set their damned bonnet on his head, and drew his sword, and cried "Vive la nation!" The war goes ill or well as you please; ill for all, I fear. Dillon was murdered by his own regiment after a retreat.'"
"I knew him in the army," said De Courval. "I was young then. But the king—has he no courage? Are they all mad?"
"No. He has not the courage of action. He has the courage to endure, if that is to be so nominated. The other is needed just now. That is all—all."
"And too much."
"Yes. Come, let us go out and fence a bit in the garden, and sweat out too much Madeira. Come, there is still light enough."
Through the quiet of a Sunday morning, De Courval rode slowly up Fifth Street, and into a land of farms and woodland, to spend a quiet day alone with his mother, Miss Wynne, not altogether to the young man's regret, having to remain in town over Monday. As he came to the scenes where Schmidt, in their walks of Sundays, had explained to him Washington's well-laid plan of the Germantown battle, he began at last to escape for a time the too sad reflection which haunted his hours of leisure in the renewed interest of a young soldier who had known only the army life, but never actual war. He bent low in the saddle, hat off to a group on the lawn at Cliveden, the once war-battered home of the Chews, and was soon after kissing his mother on the porch of the Hill farm.
There was disquieting news to tell of France, and he soon learned that despite the heat and mosquitos she preferred the tranquillity of the widow's home to the luxury of Miss Wynne's house. She was as usual calmly decided, and he did not urge her to stay longer. She would return to the city on Thursday. They talked of money matters, with reticence on his part in regard to Schmidt's kindness and good counsels, and concerning the satisfaction Mr. Wynne had expressed with regard to his secretary.
"It may be good training for thee, my son," shesaid and then, after a pause, "I begin to comprehend these people," and, pleased with her progress, made little ventures in English to let him see how well she was learning to speak. An habitual respect made him refrain from critical corrections, but he looked up in open astonishment when she said rather abruptly: "The girl in her gray gowns is on the way to become one of the women about whom men go wild. Neither are you very ugly, my son. Have a care; but a word from me should suffice."
"Oh, mother," he exclaimed, "do not misunderstand me!"
"My son, I know you are not as some of the light-minded cousins we knew in France; but a word of warning does no harm, even if it be not needed."
"I think you may be at ease,maman. You amaze me when you call her beautiful. A pleasant little maid she seems to me, and not always the same, and at times gay,—oh, when away from her mother,—and intelligent, too. But beautiful—oh, hardly.Soyez tranquille, maman."
"I did not say she was beautiful. I said she was good-looking; or that at least was what I meant. Certainly she is unlike our too ignorant demoiselles; but contrast with the familiar may have its peril. It is quite another type from our young women at home, and attractive enough in its way—in its bourgeois way."
He smiled. "I am quite too busy to concern myself with young women." In fact he had begun to find interest in a little study of this new type. "Yes, quite too busy."
"That is as well." But she was not at ease. On the whole, she thought it would be proper now for him to go to Mrs. Bingham's and to the President's receptions. Miss Wynne would see that he had the entrée. He was too occupied, he said once more, and his clothes were quite unfit. Neither was he inclined yet awhile. And so he rode away to town with several things to think about, and on Thursday the vicomtesse made clear to the well-pleased Mrs. Swanwick that she was glad of the quiet and the English lessons and the crisp talk of Schmidt, who spoke French, but not fluently, and concerning whom she was mildly jealous and, for her, curious. "Schmidt, my son? No; a name disguised. He is a gentleman to his finger-ends, but surely a strange one."
"It is enough,maman, that he is my friend. Often I, too, am curious; but—ah, well, I wonder why he likes me; but he does, and I am glad of it."
"You wonder. I do not," and she smiled.
"Ah, the vainmaman!" he cried. It was very rare that she praised him, and she was by long habit given to no demonstrations of affection.
Two weeks ran on in the quiet routine of the Quaker home and the increasing work of the great shipping merchant. De Courval was more and more used by Wynne in matters other than copying letters in French. Sometimes, too, he was trusted with business affairs demanding judgment, and although Wynne spoke no word of praise, neither was there any word of censure, and he watched the clerk with interest and growing regard. Twice hesent him to New York, and once on an errand to Baltimore, where he successfully collected some long-standing debts. A new clerk had come, and De Courval, to his relief, was no longer expected to sweep out the counting-house.
By degrees Wynne fully realized that he had found a helper of unusual capacity, and more and more, as the great and varied business attracted De Courval, he was taken into Wynne's confidence, and saw the ships come and go, and longed to share the peril and see the wonders of the ocean. There were great tuns of wine from Madeira on the pier or in the cellars. Gentlemen came to taste it, men with historic names—General Wayne, Colonel Lear for the President, and Mr. Justice Yeates. De Courval was bade to knock out bungs and dip in tasting vials. Also Miss Wynne came to refill her cellar, but took small notice of him. He was out of favor for a season, and her nephew had laughed at her remonstrances.
"A thoroughbred put to the work of a farm-horse!"
"Nonsense, Aunt Gainor! Let him alone. You can not spoil him, as you did me. There is stuff in the fellow worth a dozen of my clerks. At six they are gone. If there is work to do, he stays till nine. What that man wants, he will get. What he sets himself to do, he does. Let him alone."
"A miserably paid clerk," she cried. "He deserves no better. I wash my hands of him."
"There is soap in the closet," he laughed.
She went away angry, and saw the young nobletalking with a ruddy gentleman whose taste in wine has made his name familiar at the dining-tables of the last hundred years. Major Butler was asking the vicomte to dine, and promising a perilous education in the vintages of Madeira.
When the major had gone, Mr. Wynne sent for his clerk. To be opposed was apt to stiffen his Welsh obstinacy. "Your wages are to be now, sir, two hundred and fifty livres,—fifty dollars a month,—and you are doing well, very well; but the clerks are not to know, except Mr. Potts." He owed this unusual advance to Miss Wynne, but probably the master was as little aware of what had caused it as was the irate spinster. De Courval thanked him quietly, knowing perfectly well that he had fairly earned what was so pleasantly given.
It was now the Saturday sennight mentioned by Margaret as the day when Mr. Hamilton was to come to settle certain small business matters with Mrs. Swanwick. Some wit, or jealous dame, as Schmidt had said, called Mrs. Swanwick's the Quaker salon; and, in fact, men of all types of opinion came hither. Friends there were, the less strict, and at times some, like Waln, to protest in their frank way against the too frequent company of world's people, and to go away disarmed by gentle firmness. Mrs. Swanwick's love of books and her keen interest in every new thing, and now the opening mind and good looks of Margaret, together with the thoughtful neutrality of Schmidt, captured men, young and old, who were apt to come especially on a Saturday afternoon, when there was leisure even forbusy statesmen. Hither came Aaron Burr—the woman-hawk, Aunt Gainor called him, with his dark, fateful face; Pickering, in after days of the War Department; Wolcott, to be the scarce adequate successor of Hamilton; Logan, and gay cousins—not often more than one or two at a time—with, rarely, the Master of the Rolls and Robert Morris, and Mr. Justice Chew—in fact, what was best in the social life of the city.
Mr. Hamilton was shut up with Mrs. Swanwick in the withdrawing-room, busy. It was now too late to expect visitors—five o'clock of a summer afternoon. The vicomtesse avoided this interesting society, and at last René ceased to urge her to share what he himself found so agreeable. Margaret sat entranced in the "Castle of Otranto," hardly hearing theclick, click, of the fencing-foils on the grass plot not far away. Birds were in the air; a woodpecker was busy on a dead tree; bees, head down, were accumulating honey for the hive at the foot of the garden; and a breeze from the river was blowing through the hall and out at the hospitably open front door—a peaceful scene, with still the ring and clash of the foils and De Courval's merry laughter.
"A hit, a palpable hit!" said a voice behind Margaret as she rose.
"Thou art dead for a ducat—dead, Friend de Courval."
"Ah," said Schmidt, "a critic. Does it look easy, Mr. de Forest?"