_ CHAPTER XIII
The winter was coming on, as Cousin Bessie had said every leaf was blown from its bough, and the Autumn sky was grayer and cloudier than ever.
It was a lonely season, especially for one with such a heart full of memories as mine, the wind spoke to me in the most plaintive of whispers, now with the voice of one absent friend, now with that of another. I had no definite grief at this period under the safe protecting roof of my good, kind relatives, only that there was an emptiness about my comfort, which made it incomplete and not quite as satisfactory as it should have been.
Something was stirring in my breast as if with fluttering wings against these fetters of the flesh! Something was always asking, always wishing, always urging me, to do I knew not what '
Taedium vitae.' It is the merciless enemy of mortal man! the robber of our peace, the skeleton in the closet, the dreg in our pleasure-cup, the ruthless spoiler of our fancy-woven webs! It is the separate sorrow of men and women, and is the summing up of the stones of all human lives.
Some have grown weary of idleness, pleasure and wealth, and some are more weary of cold and starvation, and toil, the student is weary of study, and the artist is weary of art, the vicious grow weary of vice, and great men grow weary of fame; old men grow tired on their journey, and children get tired at their play, it is one of those "touches of nature" that makes our world become "kin." For a sigh is a whisper of sorrow, no matter what breast may have heaved it, and pain is a pall, thick and heavy, laid over hopes that are dead.
Some of us have strange lives! secrets, known only to ourselves, that change the face of all nature before our eyes, we are sent adrift on every passing current, to explore the truths of experience for ourselves, and sad lessons some of them are, which we read through our gathering tears, and learn with a beating heart!
As the autumn months drifted on towards a bleak November, I became more and more absorbed, looking wistfully out of the windows, or sitting dreamily before the fire. I often thought of that better land, whither my angel-mother had flown years ago, my father had gone there now, too. Would it not be well if I were with them? Only one more little mound of earth, rising beside theirs, one solitary little mortal falling back from the weary pilgrimage, and lying down to rest by the roadside, one heavy heart less among that throbbing multitude, one faint toiler more, borne from the crowded vineyard.
With my elbows resting on my knees and my face buried in my palms, I sat and thought of all such weird possibilities, as I looked vacantly into the fire. There are times when the world, with its exuberance of pleasure and wealth, is powerless to tempt or cheer us, when its most splendid pageantry is vapid and shallow to our tired gaze, when its laughter and song are a noisy discord, that deafens and distracts us! when its pledges and promises are instruments of selfish purposes and hidden cunning, and its policy, the exponent of a rabid and far-reaching materialism. These are moments, when our passions are at high tide, with our conscience riding on the topmost surface-waves, they are propitious intervals, if we choose to make the best of them, or they may only be fitful breaks in the glad monotony of our sensual, easy-going lives--breaks, that our evil tendencies most often survive, seeing them rise, and surge, and ebb, in fearless defiance, and then quietly resuming their old sway, when the moral struggle has subsided!
One afternoon, I made an effort to rouse myself from this growing lethargy, which had begun to undermine the whole tenor of my character. Zita and Louis were away, at their schools, and cousin Bessie was busy as usual over household duties, Girly was frying meat in the kitchen, and the frizzling, seething noises had almost sent me to sleep in my chair, where I sat sewing. It wanted a half hour yet of dinner-time, so I put on my hat and jacket and sauntered out into the open air.
It was a bracing November day, the dead leaves lay crisp and trodden by the roadside, and the gray clouds flitted in their solemn silence across the low-leaden sky, a light wind swayed the naked tree-tops, and tinged the beaming faces of pedestrians with a healthy roseate hue. This was a happy contrast to my cheerless mood, and with a quickened step, I overtook the stream of gayer people that thronged the lively thoroughfare, and gave myself wholly up to every passing distraction.
I had no particular business to discharge, except to run away from myself, and therefore every little peculiarity, every minute feature of men, women, or things, that suggested themselves to my aimless scrutiny were carefully reviewed and criticized. I went placidly on now casting a passing glance on exhibitions of stale confectionery, now on a display of attractive millinery, again it was a "ten cent" establishment, offering such bargains as might puzzle the most economical house-wife, and finally my attention was caught by a succession of dazzling windows, with their bewildering panorama of Japanese figures and coloured
bric-a-brac, windows crowded with fans and parasols, and variegated lamp-shades, oriental trays and glove-boxes, pieces of ware, from whose dirty green surface emptily peered the pale faces of native Japanese, there were whisk-holders, and wall-baskets, and all sorts of ornaments trimmed in Japanese fabrics, looking coaxingly out at the public.
Scrolls and mats, panels and firescreens, whereon the hand of art had caused to spring and flourish these slender Eastern stalks, which sprout in drooping foliage, at the summit of their lanky height. There was an endless variety gathered into this limited space, it was a scene which should provoke a regretful tear, for memory's sake, from the patriotic oblong eye of any exiled Japanese.
My eyes still wandered over these many-hued trifles, and my mind was still busy with its vagrant reflections, when a gruff voice said in my ear:
"Move on there--do you hear."
I started, and saw Zita on one side and Louis on the other; they were returning from their day's mental toil, and had spied me loitering by the shop windows. I joined them, and in happy, careless concourse, we trod our way towards our home. When we reached the house the lamps had been lighted and the curtains drawn, dinner steamed upon the table.
Feeling better for my walk, I sat down with rosy cheeks and sharpened appetite to my evening meal. As I was about to begin Mr. Nyle handed me a letter, which had arrived during my absence. I took it up and looked at it curiously, a smile broke over my countenance as I did so, for I recognized Hortense's delicate handwriting.
All during dinner this welcome little letter lay in my lap. Every now and then I touched it caressingly, as if trying to read it with my finger-tips, and wondered how long it would be before cousin Bessie would move her chair away from the table, that I might retire and gratify myself with its contents.
So much for human foresight and wisdom! We hold our misery in our own hand, and we do not know it, we look with impatient smiles and longing, upon that whose fruit is sorrow for our hearts, and we cannot see it or realize it.
Dinner was over at last, and I glided away from the happy circle to the quietude of my own quarters I lit the lamp, and seating myself comfortably in a rocking chair, tore open my friend's letter, and read as follows:
"My dearest Amey
"I have looked forward with such impatient eagerness to this pleasure of answering your last dear letter, and now that an opportunity occurs, I hardly know what to say to you.
"Perhaps it is because there is so much I
might tell, if it were only time, when the time comes you, and only you, shall know all, you must not blame me for my present reserve, for at best, I could but half tell it now, any way.
"It is something that has lain on my heart, day and night, for some years, and that is likely at last to make me happier than I have been for many a day. You will be glad of it, because it will have made your poor Hortense so happy. It concerns some one else, about whom, you must have made many strange conjectures, since your recent visit to me, I was doubtful then, or I would have told you a little, but now I feel more sure, and see my way better.
"However, I must not bewilder you with words in the beginning. I shall only repeat that I see much happiness in the near distance for Hortense de Beaumont. Heaven grant that nothing shall now come between me and this long-looked for realization. Mamma sends you her fondest love, and so does your own HORTENSE."
"
You will be glad, because it will have made your poor Hortense so happy!" These words seemed to stand out from all the rest, and attract my attention more forcibly. "
Some one about whom you must have made many strange conjectures since your recent visit to me." Ah! it was clear enough to me now. She may as well have written her story through; but, was it not what I had expected? What I had prepared for? Why should the announcement of its accomplishment shock or surprise me now? He was nothing to
me,--but a friend! as friends we had parted, and if we ever met again, it should only be as friends--perhaps not even as the friends we were then, if he were Hortense de Beaumont's husband.
I folded her letter slowly and quietly, and put it safely away; I wanted never to see it, or read it again, it was the story of my dear friend's happiness, and it should not bring sorrow, or disappointment to me, so long as I professed to love her, or sympathize with her. So kind, so thoughtful, so affectionate a little creature as she had ever shown herself to me. How many of her heart's treasures she had freely lavished upon me during the course of our eventful friendship!
If she had had the better fortune of the two, it was her luck, and she deserved it. "
Heaven grant that nothing now shall come between me and this long-looked for realization!" Poor child! how fond she was of him, could any one cast an impediment between such loves as these?
I turned down the light, and left the room: there were laughter and merry-making below, perhaps they would help me to forget these gloomy thoughts. I stepped lightly down the narrow stairway, and entered the cosy sitting room, where the family were assembled, with a pleasant, careless countenance.
They were engaged in a lively discussion when I came into the room; cousin Bessie had just conveyed the tidings, that an invitation had been left that afternoon for "Zita and Amey" from Mrs. Wayland Rutherby, asking them to go in on the following day, as Pansy and Lulu Rutherby had a young lady staying with them, and would like to introduce her to their friends. "Louis and Papa and myself" she was just adding, "are expected to drop in after dinner, when there will be music and a little dancing."
"Did you say we would go, Cousin, Bessie?" I put in, coming towards her and drawing up a seat beside hers.
"Of course, you will go," she answered emphatically. "Sophie Rutherby is my old school-friend, and we never refuse her."
"But I prefer not to go Cousin Bessie, I have not been out anywhere since--my father's death."
"Nonsense child! you are not going to mope away your young life like this," she broke in indignantly, "however, if you have any scruples, you can come away after dinner, before the active pleasures begin--there will be no one there in the afternoon but you and Zita. Surely you cannot object to that."
So it was settled, that we were to go to Mrs. Rutherby's, and the eventful afternoon came in due time. Zita was a little longer than usual before her looking-glass on that occasion, and was as pretty and fresh as a mountain daisy, when she came down at last to join me below.
We were received with gushing, girlish enthusiasm, by Pansy and Lulu Rutherby, in their rare and expensive toilets, they were both pretty and lively, and we talked and laughed during our first half-hour together, as though we had been old friends all our lives. Pansy and Lulu took poor Zita by storm, they showed their latest programmes of dances, and repeated for her benefit the newest compliments which had been paid to them by their respective admirers, since they had last entertained her.
Mrs. Rutherby and her senior guest, the mother of the younger lady, sat side by side on a remote sofa exchanging confidential whispers about their daughters. Miss Longfield, the Rutherby's "girl friend," and I, of necessity found ourselves thrown together, a little way from the rest. She was a tall, pale girl with a very high
chignon, a very stiff satin dress, and very queer little shoes with very pronounced heels.
"You belong to Canada, I suppose?" she began looking at me speculatively from head to foot.
"Yes, I have always lived here," I answered, returning the speculative glance and concluding that Miss Longfield's complexion was decidedly sallow.
"Then you've been to Court, I guess?" she next asked.
"To Court," I exclaimed, raising my voice and my eyebrows.
"Why, yes" she retorted somewhat indignantly, "you've got Royalty over here, haven't you?"
"Oh! now I understand," said I with a covert smile, "you mean, have I been presented to Her Royal Highness?"
She nodded her
chignon affirmatively with a satisfied air, and began biting her under lip, which operation, however, was immediately interrupted by an expressive--"It must be awfully nice."
I took the trouble to give my American friend a lengthy description of our drawing-room receptions, in which she became ardently interested, never interrupting me until I had come to the end. She then surprised me with the question.
"Don't you have any refreshments?" put in a high key.
"Not until we get home," said I laughing. "The ceremony is virtually over when the people have been presented."
This rather disappointed her, I am afraid, but what could I do? She dismissed the subject summarily by touching upon another new one--that of our winter sports. I had to describe the tobogganing costumes, their effect at night when bonfires were burning in the vicinity of the hills, the sensation of going down, and the excitement of trudging back again to the top. She listened admirably and seemed thoroughly appreciative of my generous effort to entertain her. When I had finished, she remarked very quietly.
"It must be real nice, and ever such good fun, but I could never try it. It would smother me right there--I'm always under doctors' orders, you know," she added in a subdued, confidential whisper, "I've got seven diseases?"
"Have you indeed?" I exclaimed in genuine consternation. "You don't look as if you had," I continued by way of encouragement, but without effect, for she interrupted me, fretfully saying:
"Oh, yes I do! Anyone would know I had anaemia, I am so pale, and dyspepsia, for I eat so few things, and such a little at a time; then there's dyscrasia, comes from poverty of the blood, and my palpitations, that prevent me from having any pleasures worth calling so, besides these," she added, putting her reckoning finger upon her thumb, "I suffer from neuralgia, and acute rheumatism, and," (on the second finger of the other, hand, which represented seven) "an inflammation of the spine. So now, what do you think of that?"
"Well, really I am very sorry for you, poor Miss Longfield'" I said with an effort to let my sympathy overcome my burning desire to laugh outright; "you have been very unfortunate indeed, to have contracted so many diseases at once."
"Oh my constitution has always been weak," she sighed; "I take some twenty different medicines, I believe," she added, as if she were trying to frighten me out of the room, "you'd hardly believe it, I know, you are so healthy."
Here we were interrupted by Mrs. Longfield's plaintive voice reminding her invalid daughter that she had been sitting "to one side too long," and would "excite her spinal inflammation" if she did not "straighten up against the cushions of her chair."
Miss Longfield sighed peevishly, as she fell back in languid obedience to this solicitous injunction; she was constantly exposing herself thus rashly to the mercy of her chronic complaints. Shortly after this, dinner was announced, and we were mutually delighted, I expect, to find the latest turn of our conversation, which threatened to be flat and uninteresting, thus brought to a happy, though abrupt termination.
As soon after dinner as manners would allow me to leave, I bade good evening to my amiable hostesses, who were profuse in their regrets and expressions of disappointment at my early departure, and I sauntered quietly back to cousin Bessie's house.
It was not yet dark, though the moon was visible in the clear sky, and relieved, to find myself once more alone, I walked with purposely slow and leisure steps towards my home, rehearsing in my mind, with much genuine amusement, my recent brilliant and highly intellectual conversation with Miss Longfield.
As I drew near the Nyles' gate, its familiar squeak and the accompanying clash of its iron latches, broke upon my ear. I started, and peering through the gathering dusk, I saw the figure of a man turn into the street and stride rapidly away in the opposite direction from the one I was then pursuing. My heart gave a great leap, I hardly knew why, and the blood rushed into my face, something caught in my throat and I gave a short, hysterical cough. I had reached the gate, and the air around it was yet laden with the scent of a rich cigar, though the figure had passed into the distant gloom.
I pushed it open nervously, and it fell to with the same squeak and clash as before. I stopped for a moment, and leaning over the low railing I looked eagerly up and down the silent street. The moon struggled through a feathery cloud at this instant, and flooded the scene before me with its gentle light; I saw a figure again, beyond the shadows of the tall, bare trees that lay upon the white moonlit walk, it stopped, and turned sharply around, a little red light was moving with it, back towards where I was standing.
My heart beat loud and fast, as the footsteps drew nearer and nearer. I recoiled impulsively behind the projecting post beside me: I was a coward at the last moment, the scent of the cigar became stronger and stronger, the ring of advancing footsteps quicker and louder--they had reached the gate and paused--there was only the post between us now. I held my breath, and did not dare to move while this suspense lasted. Would he never move on? I asked myself. How foolish I was to have waited there at all? I felt tempted to make one bound and spring up the garden-steps, but I had not courage enough even for this.
While I was busy with these thoughts, the interesting figure receded to the outer end of the sidewalk and scanned the upper portion of the house eagerly. I then heard him mutter an impatient "Pshaw!" under his breath, and he turned to walk away.
All my deserted courage rushed back to me the instant I saw him moving from me. I sprang from my hiding-place, and leaning my arms upon the bars of the gate as before, I said timidly:
"Who is that?"
The figure halted suddenly and turned around. In a moment he was standing beside me with his hat in one hand, the other extended towards me.
"Why, Dr Campbell, can this be
you?" I cried in slow bewilderment.
"Yes, Miss Hampden, it is I" he answered nervously, "Are you glad to see me?"
"Glad" I repeated, half reproachfully, "why should I not be glad? I am delighted to see you. Won't you come in" I asked, making a movement to open the gate.
"I have just been to the house, asking for you," he said. "They told me you had gone out to dine, and they could not say exactly when you would come back. I have only to-day to spend in the town, and was feeling quite disappointed at not finding you at home, when the clashing of the gate arrested my attention. But tell me," he interrupted gently, "How are you, how have you been since I saw you last?"
"Oh, I have been well enough, thank you. Cousin Bessie is the very personification of kindness, and gives me every comfort. I only hope you have been as well treated as I have," I returned, with an effort at ordinary civility.
He did not answer immediately; he looked away from me and then said slowly.
"I have been pretty well--but not well enough. I have been studying and working very hard."
"What,
you? " escaped me before I could control it. He laughed an odd little laugh and added: "Yes--
me, I have not gone out to a dance or pleasure party of any kind since--since you left. I have lived with my books, day and night"
"You must have had some ominous vision in your sleep, Dr. Campbell," I said with unrestrained surprise, "to have become converted to such sedentary habits in so short a time."
"Yes, you are right," he answered curtly and somewhat eagerly, "I had a strange, beautiful vision that showed me the folly and emptiness of my life more plainly than anything else could ever have done, and I thank that vision that I have been able to make amends in time for the omissions and transgressions of the past."
I was half frightened at his earnest voice and serious expression, I hardly knew what to answer him. When I did speak, I was conscious of a tremor in my voice that must have betrayed something of the suspicion his words had awakened in me.
"Your better life is worthier of you, Dr Campbell," I managed to reply. "You were disposed, I must admit, to make too little of your energies, which are above the ordinary level."
"It was hardly my fault," he said sadly, "I was in a sort of stupor, I believe. I rejected the light of faith and morals from my life, and tried to imagine myself above it. What else could I expect but the result which followed?"
He was terribly in earnest, his brow was deeply contracted and his face was whiter than the pale moonlight.
"Then you are a better man for it in every way, I perceive," was my timid rejoinder.
"I hope so, Amey, I have tried hard to be."
I was startled by the mention of my own name in such a solemn tone, but my heart was swelling with a rushing tide of sympathy for the man who had so pronounced it.
"Then you will not regret it, believe me," I said, infusing a buoyant encouragement into my voice.
"No, I will not, I feel sure," he answered, disengaging his hands and leaning one elbow on the bar to support his face in his palm. We stood for a few seconds in silence, during which I looked abstractedly into the space before me. I knew that his eyes were turned upon me, although I could not see them. Suddenly he said in a low tone, almost in a whisper.
"I wish I could read your thoughts, Amey?"
I looked at him quickly, and laughed. Before I had time to make any reply, the door of the house was opened wide, and cousin Bessie accompanied by her husband and Louis, stepped out upon the platform. A beam of lamplight fell full upon Arthur Campbell's face, which was stern and white, he gave me his unsteady hand, and said brusquely:
"Good-night! I will come and see you to-morrow if you will let me?"
He raised his hat, and bowing with a touch of his old grace and gallantry, he strode away.
"Well, well Amey!" said Mr. Nyle, in a teasing voice as I turned and confronted the family trio. "I never would have thought this of
you! you might have told us something about it, I'm sure--eh Bessie?"
"Oh we have no right to know her little secrets" cousin Bessie gently answered, while she drew on one glove. "Amey is sure not to do anything foolish, I feel certain of that. Is that the gentleman who called to see you a little while ago, Amey?" she asked, with a very discreet curiosity.
"Yes, Cousin Bessie, it is Dr. Campbell, he attended my father in his last illness, you know, I told you about him," I explained very earnestly.
"Oh yes, dear I remember! he seems to be a very nice person: I hope he will come again to see you before he goes."
"He asked leave to come to-morrow!" I answered "I suppose you don't mind?"
"Not in the least, child, why should I?" she put in, somewhat playfully. "Come Robert! come Louis!" she added, as she descended the steps leading to the gate. "We are not over early. I hope you won't be lonesome, Amey," she said, turning back, with one hand on the open gate.
"Not she," Mr. Nyle broke in, with mischief in his tone, "she'll keep herself busy with such pleasant thoughts that she will never miss us--go on."
He held the gate open until Cousin Bessie and Louis had passed out. I was standing on the topmost step waiting to see them off, and Mr. Nyle, looking at me to attract my attention, struck an attitude exactly like that in which they had surprised Dr. Campbell, leaning just as languidly upon the bars.
"How silver-sweet sound lovers tongues by night, Like softest music to attending ears!"
He exclaimed, in such a ridiculously sentimental tone, that we all laughed outright, and cousin Bessie pulling him forcibly away by the coat-sleeve, looked over his shoulder at me and said consolingly:
"Never mind, Amey, he can't throw stones from a glass house, he did this kind of thing many a time in his own day--you know you did," she added, linking her arm within his, and turning her eyes upon his beaming face with a dash of revived tenderness and old love. I caught his answering glance, with its accompanying smile so full of a deep meaning, and the tears came into my eyes. I bade them good-night and went quietly into the house. _