For perhaps two hours after Beulah's departure Mrs. Chilton wandered
up and down the parlors, revolving numerous schemes explanatory of
her unexpected exodus. Completely nonplused, for the first time in
her life, she sincerely rued the expression of dislike and contempt
which had driven the orphan from her adopted home; and, unable to
decide on the most plausible solution to be offered her brother, she
paced restlessly to and fro. Engrossed by no particularly felicitous
reflections, she failed to notice Mazeppa's quick tramp, and
remained in ignorance of the doctor's return until he entered the
room, and stood beside her. His manner was hurried, his thoughts
evidently preoccupied, as he said:
"May, I am going into the country to be absent all of tomorrow, and
possibly longer. There is some surgical work to be performed for a
careless hunter, and I must start immediately. I want you to see
that a room is prepared for Percy Lockhart. He is very feeble, and I
have invited him to come and stay with me while he is in the city.
He rode out this evening, and is worse from the fatigue. I shall
expect you to see that everything is provided for him that an
invalid could desire. Can I depend upon you?"
"Certainly; I will exert myself to render his stay here pleasant;
make yourself easy on that score." It was very evident that the
cloud was rapidly lifting from her heart and prospects; but she
veiled the sparkle in her eye, and, unsuspicious of anything amiss,
her brother left the room. Walking up to one of the mirrors, which
extended from floor to ceiling, she surveyed herself carefully, and
a triumphant smile parted her lips.
"Percy Lockhart is vulnerable as well as other people, and I have
yet to see the man whose heart will proudly withstand the
allurements of flattery, provided the homage is delicately and
gracefully offered. Thank Heaven! years have touched me lightly, and
there was more truth than she relished in what Julia Vincent said
about my beauty!"
This self-complacent soliloquy was cut short by the appearance of
her brother, who carried a case of surgical instruments in his hand.
"May, tell Beulah I am sorry I did not see her. I would go up and
wake her, but have not time. She wished to ask me something. Tell
her, if it is anything of importance, to do just as she likes; I
will see about it when I come home. Be sure you tell her. Good-
night; take care of Percy." He turned away, but she exclaimed:
"She is not here, Guy. She asked me this evening if she might spend
the night at the asylum. She thought you would not object, and
certainly I had no authority to prevent her. Indeed, the parlor was
full of company, and I told her she might go if she wished. I
suppose she will be back early in the morning."
His face darkened instantly, and she felt that he was searching her
with his piercing eyes.
"All this sounds extremely improbable to me. If she is not at home
again at breakfast, take the carriage and go after her. Mind, May! I
will sift the whole matter when I come back." He hurried off, and
she breathed freely once more. Dr. Hartwell sprang into his buggy,
to which a fresh horse had been attached, and, dismissing Hal, whose
weight would only have retarded his progress, he drove rapidly off.
The gate had been left open for him, and he was passing through,
when arrested by Harriet's well-known voice.
"Stop, master! Stop a minute!"
"What do you want? I can't stop!" cried he impatiently.
"Are you going after that poor, motherless child?"
"No. But what the devil is to pay here! I shall get at the truth
now. Where is Beulah? Talk fast."
"She is at the asylum to-night, sir. I followed and watched the poor
little thing. Master, if you don't listen to me, if you please, sir,
you never will get at the truth, for that child won't tell it. I
heard her promise Miss May she would not. You would be ready to
fight if you knew all I know."
"Why did Beulah leave here this evening?"
"Because Miss May abused and insulted her; told her before some
ladies that she was a 'miserable beggar' that you picked up at the
hospital, and that you thought it was charity to feed and clothe her
till she was big enough to work. The ladies were in the front yard,
and the child happened to be sitting by the fountain; she had just
come from riding. I was sewing at one of the windows upstairs, sir,
and heard every word. When the folks were gone Miss May walks up to
her and asks her what she is doing where anybody could see her? Oh,
master! if you could have seen that child's looks. She fairly seemed
to rise off her feet, and her face was as white as a corpse. She
said she had wanted an education; that she knew you had been very
kind; hut she never dreamed of taking Miss Pauline's place in your
house. She said she would not stay where she was unwelcome; that she
was not starving when you took her home; that she knew you were kind
and good; but that she scorned--them were the very words, master--
she scorned to stay a day longer where she had been so insulted! Oh,
she was in a towering rage; she trembled all over, and Miss May
began to be scared, for she knew you would not suffer such doings,
and she tried to pacify her and make up the quarrel by telling her
she might stay and have an education, if that was all she wanted.
But the girl would not hear to anything she said, and told her she
need not be frightened, that she wouldn't go to you with the fuss;
she would not tell you why she left your house. She went to her room
and she got every rag of her old clothes, and left the house with
the tears raining out of her eyes. Oh, master, it's a crying shame!
If you had only been here to hear that child talk to Miss May! Good
Lord! how her big eyes did blaze when she told her she could earn a
living!"
By the pale moonlight she could see that her master's face was rigid
as steel; but his voice was even calmer than usual when he asked:
"Are you sure she is now at the asylum?"
"Yes, sir; sure."
"Very well; she is safe then for the present. Does anyone know that
you heard the conversation?"
"Not a soul, sir, except yourself."
"Keep the matter perfectly quiet till I come home. I shall be away a
day, or perhaps longer. Meantime, see that Beulah does not get out
of your sight. Do you understand me?"
"Yes, sir--I do."
The buggy rolled swiftly on, and Harriet returned to the house by a
circuitous route, surmising that "Miss May's" eyes might detect her
movements.
The same night Clara Sanders sat on the doorstep of her tumble
cottage home. The moonlight crept through the clustering honeysuckle
and silvered the piazza floor with grotesque fretwork, while it
bathed lovingly the sad face of the girlish watcher. Her chin rested
in her palms, and the soft eyes were bent anxiously on the
countenance of her infirm and aged companion.
"Grandpa, don't look so troubled. I am very sorry, too, about the
diploma; but if I am not to have it, why, there is no use in
worrying about it. Madam St. Cymon is willing to employ me as I am,
and certainly I should feel grateful for her preference, when there
are several applicants for the place. She told me this evening that
she thought I would find no difficulty in performing what would be
required of me."
This was uttered in a cheerful tone, which might have succeeded very
well had the sorrowful face been veiled.
"Ah, Clara, you don't dream of the burden you are taking upon
yourself! The position of assistant teacher in an establishment like
Madam St. Cymon's is one that you are by nature totally unfitted
for. Child, it will gall your spirit; it will be unendurable." The
old man sighed heavily.
"Still, I have been educated with an eye to teaching, and though I
am now to occupy a very subordinate place, the trials will not be
augmented. On the whole, I do not know but it is best as it is. Do
not try to discourage me. It is all I can do, and I am determined I
will not despond about what can't be helped."
"My dear child, I did not mean to depress you. But you are so young
to bow your neck to such a yoke! How old are you?" He turned round
to look at her.
"Only sixteen and a few months. Life is before me yet, an untrodden
plain. Who knows but this narrow path of duty may lead to a calm,
sweet resting-place for us both? I was thinking just now of that
passage from your favorite Wallenstein:"
"My soul's secure! In the night only, Friedland's stars can beam.'
"The darkness has come down upon us, grandpa; let us wait patiently
for the uprising of stars. I am not afraid of the night."
There was silence for some moments; then the old man rose, and,
putting back the white locks which had fallen over his face, asked,
in a subdued tone:
"When will you commence your work?"
"To-morrow, sir."
"God bless you, Clara, and give you strength, as he sees you have
need." He kissed her fondly, and withdrew to his own room. She sat
for some time looking vacantly at the mosaic of light and shade on
the floor before her, and striving to divest her mind of the
haunting thought that she was the victim of some unyielding
necessity, whose decree had gone forth, and might not be annulled.
In early childhood her home had been one of splendid affluence; but
reverses came, thick and fast, as misfortunes ever do, and, ere she
could realize the swift transition, penury claimed her family among
its crowding legions. Discouraged and embittered, her father made
the wine-cup the sepulcher of care, and in a few months found a
deeper and far more quiet grave. His mercantile embarrassments had
dragged his father-in-law to ruin; and, too aged to toil up the
steep again, the latter resigned himself to spending the remainder
of his days in obscurity, and perhaps want. To Clara's gifted mother
he looked for aid and comfort in the clouded evening of life, and
with unceasing energy she toiled to shield her father and her child
from actual labor. Thoroughly acquainted with music and drawing, her
days were spent in giving lessons in those branches which had been
acquired with reference to personal enjoyment alone, and the silent
hours of the night often passed in stitching the garments of those
who had flocked to her costly entertainments in days gone by. When
Clara was about thirteen years of age a distant relative, chancing
to see her, kindly proposed to contribute the sum requisite for
affording her every educational advantage. The offer was gratefully
accepted by the devoted mother, and Clara was placed at Madam St.
Cymon's, where more than ordinary attention could be bestowed on the
languages.
The noble woman whose heart had bled incessantly over the misery,
ruin, and degradation of her husband sank slowly under the
intolerable burden of sorrows, and a few weeks previous to the
evening of which I write folded her weary hands and went home to
rest. In the springtime of girlhood, Clara felt herself transformed
into a woman. Standing beside her mother's tomb, supporting her
grandmother's tottering form, she shuddered in anticipating the
dreary future that beckoned her on; and now, as if there were not
troubles enough already to disquiet her, the annual amount advanced
toward her school expenses was suddenly withdrawn. The cousin,
residing in a distant State, wrote that pecuniary troubles had
assailed him, and prevented all further assistance. In one more year
she would have finished the prescribed course and graduated
honorably; and, more than all, she would have obtained a diploma,
which might have been an "open sesame" to any post she aspired to.
Thus frustrated in her plans, she gladly accepted the position of
assistant teacher in the primary department, which, having become
vacant by the dismissal of the incumbent, madam kindly tendered her.
The salary was limited, of course; but nothing else presented
itself, and, quitting the desk, where she had so often pored over
her text-books, she prepared to grapple with the trials which
thickly beset the path of a young woman thrown upon her own
resources for maintenance. Clara was naturally amiable, unselfish,
and trusting. She was no intellectual prodigy, yet her mind was
clear and forcible, her judgment matured, and, above all, her pure
heart warm and loving. Notwithstanding the stern realities that
marked her path, there was a vein of romance in her nature which,
unfortunately, attained more than healthful development, and while
it often bore her into the Utopian realms of fancy, it was still
impotent to modify, in any degree, the social difficulties with
which she was forced to contend. Ah, there is a touching beauty in
the radiant up-look of a girl just crossing the limits of youth, and
commencing her journey through the checkered sphere of womanhood! It
is all dew-sparkle and morning glory to her ardent, buoyant spirit,
as she presses forward exulting in blissful anticipations. But the
withering heat of the conflict of life creeps on; the dewdrops
exhale, the garlands of hope, shattered and dead, strew the path,
and too often, ere noontide, the clear brow and sweet smile are
exchanged for the weary look of one longing for the evening rest,
the twilight, the night. Oh, may the good God give his sleep early
unto these many!
There was a dawning light in Clara's eyes which showed that, though
as yet a mere girl in years, she had waked to the consciousness of
emotions which belong to womanhood. She was pretty, and of course
she knew it, for I am skeptical of those characters who grow up to
mature beauty, all unsuspicious of the fatal dower, and are some day
startled by a discovery of their possessions. She knew, too, that
female loveliness was an all-potent spell, and, depressing as were
the circumstances of her life and situation, she felt that a
brighter lot might be hers, without any very remarkable or seemingly
inconsistent course of events.