THE CUSTISES RUINED.
Vesta Custis, dressing in her chamber, heard early wheels upon the
morning air, and looking through the blinds saw a double team coming up
the road from Hardship.
"Mother," she said, "is that father coming, yonder? No, it is not his
driver."
"Why, Vesta!" exclaimed Mrs. Custis, "that is old Milburn's man."
"Samson Hat? so it is. What is he doing with two horses?"
Here Vesta laughed aloud, and began to skip about in her long, slender,
worked slippers, whose insteps would spare a mouse darting under.
"Mamma, it is Milburn himself, in a hack and span. See there; the
steeple-top hat, copper buckle and all! Isn't he too funny for anything!
But, dear me! he is staring right up at this window. Let us duck!"
Vesta's long, ivory-grained arms, divided from her beautiful shoulders
only by a spray of lace, pulled her mother down.
"Don't be afraid, dear! he can see nothing but the blinds. Perhaps he is
looking for the Judge."
Vesta rose again in her white morning-gown, like a stag rising from a
snow-drift. A long, trembling movement, the result of tittering, passed
down the graceful column of her back.
"He sits there like an Indian riding past in a show, mamma! Did you ever
see such a hat?"
"I think it must be buggy by this time," said the mother; and both of
them shook with laughter again. "Unless," added Mrs. Custis, "the bugs
are starved out."
"Poor, lonely creature," said Vesta, "he can only wear such a hat from
want of understanding."
"His _understanding_ is good enough, dear. He has the green gaiters on."
They laughed again, and Vesta's hair, shaken down by her merriment, fell
nearly to her slipper, like the skin of some coal-black beast, that had
sprung down a poplar's trunk.
"Ah! well," exclaimed Vesta, as her maid entered and proceeded to wind
up this satin cordage on her crown, "what men are in their minds, can
woman know? Old ladies, not unfrequently, wear their old coal-scuttle
bonnets long past the fashion, but it is from want. This man is his own
master and not poor. His companion is a negro, and his taste a mouldy
hat, old as America. How happy are we that it is not necessary to pry
into such minds! A little refinement is the next blessing to religion."
"Your father's mind is a puzzle, too, Vesta. He has everything which
these foresters lack,--education, society, standing, and comforts. But
he returns to the forest, like an opossum, the moment your eye is off
him. He can't be traced up like this man, by his hat. I think it's a
shame on you, particularly. If he don't come home this day, I shall send
for my brother and force an account of my property from Judge Custis!"
The wife sat down and began to cry.
"I'll take the carriage after breakfast, mamma, and seek him at the
Furnace or wherever he may be. Those bog ores have given him a great
deal of trouble."
"I wish I had never heard of bog ore," exclaimed Mrs. Custis. "When the
money was in bank, there was no ore about it. He goes to the forest
looking like a magistrate and a gentleman; he always comes back looking
like a bog-trotter and a drunkard. There must be _women_ in it!"
Here, in an impulse of weak rage, the poor lady got up and walked to her
mirror and looked at her face. Apparently satisfied that such charms
were trampled on, she dried her tears altogether, and resumed:
"Ginny, go out of the room! (to the neat mulatto lass). Vesta, my dear
daughter, I would not cast a stain upon you for the world; but flesh and
blood _will_ cry out. If your father don't do better I will separate
from him, and leave Princess Anne!"
"Why, _mother_!"
The daughter's bright eyes were large and startled now, and their
steel-blue tint grew plainer under her rich black eyebrows.
"I will do it, if I die, unless he reforms!"
"Why, mother!"
Vesta stood with her lips parted, and her beautiful teeth just lacing
the coral of the lip. She could say no more for a long moment. Rising as
she spoke, with her head thrown back, and her mould the fuller and a
pallor in her cheeks, she looked the Eve first hearing the Creator's
rebuke.
"A separation in this family?" whispered Vesta. "It would scandalize all
Maryland. It would break my heart."
"Darling daughter, my heart must be considered sometimes. I was
something before I was a Custis. I am a woman, too."
Vesta, still pale, crossed to her mother's side and kissed her.
"Don't, don't, mamma, ever harbor a thought like that again. You, who
have been so brave and patient longer than I have lived!"
"Ah, Vesta, it is the length of injury that wears us out! What if
something should happen to us? None are so unfit to bear poverty as we."
"We cannot be poor," said the daughter, soothingly. "Don't you remember,
mother, where it says: 'As thy day, so shall thy strength be'?".
"My child," Mrs. Custis replied, "your day is young. Life looks hopeful
to you. I am growing old, and where is the arm on which I should be
leaning? What are we but two women left? There is another passage on
which I often think when we sit so often alone: 'Two women shall be
grinding at the mill: the one shall be taken and the other left!' Is
that you, or is it I? Listen, my child! it is time that you should feel
the melancholy truth! Your father's habits have mastered him. He is
beyond reclamation!"
Vesta was kneeling, and she slowly raised her head and looked at her
mother, with her nostrils dilated. Mrs. Custis felt uneasy before the
aroused mind of her child.
"Don't look at me so, Vesta," the poor lady pleaded. "I thought you
ought to know it."
"How dare you say that of my father? Of Judge Custis?"
As they were in this suspense of feeling, wheels were heard. The
daughter went to the window and looked down, and then returned to her
mother's ear.
"Hush, mother, it is papa. Now, wash your eyes at the toilet. Let us
meet him cheerfully. Never say again that he is beyond reclamation,
while we can try!"
A kiss smoothed Mrs. Custis's countenance. Vesta was dressed for
breakfast in a few moments, and descended to the library and was
received in her father's arms. He held her there a long while, and held
her close, and by little fits renewed his embrace, but she felt that his
breath was feverish and his arms trembled. Looking up at him she saw,
indeed, that he was flushed, yet haggard and careworn.
"Vessy," he spoke with a feeble attempt to smile, "I want a glass of
brandy. Mine gave out at the Furnace, and the morning ride has weakened
me. Where is the key?"
She looked at him with a half-glance, so that he might not suspect, as
if to measure his need of stimulant. Then, without a word, she led the
way to the dining-room and unlocked the liquor closet, and turned her
back lest he might not drink his need from sensitiveness.
"Naughty man," said Vesta, standing off and looking at him when he was
done. "I was going down for you to the Furnace after breakfast. We will
have no more of this truantry. Mamma and I have set our feet down! You
must come back from the Furnace every night, and go again in the
morning, like other business men. Be very kind to mamma this morning,
sir! She feels your neglect."
Vesta had already rung for the Judge's valet, who now appeared, drew off
his boots, supplied his slippers and dressing-gown, and led the way to
his bath. In a quarter of an hour he reappeared, looking better, and he
irresolutely turned again towards the dining-room, smiling suggestively
at Vesta.
"Not that way," spoke she. "Here is mamma, and we are ready for prayers.
Here is the place in the Bible."
They all went to the family room, where the dressing-maids of Vesta and
her mother were waiting for the usual morning prayers. Vesta placed the
open Bible on her father's knee, and he began absently and stumblingly
to read. It was in the book of Samuel, and seemed to be some old Jewish
mythology. He suddenly came to a verse which arrested his sensibilities
by its pathos:
"'And David sent messengers to Ish-bosheth, Saul's son, saying, Deliver
me my wife Michal.... And Ish-bosheth sent, and took her from her
husband, even from Phaltiel, the son of Laish. And her husband went with
her along weeping behind her.... Then said Abner unto him: Go, return.
And he returned.'"
Judge Custis saw at once the picture this compact history aroused. The
inexorable David, perhaps, had married another's love. Occasion had
arisen to embitter her kin, and they took her back and gave her in
happiness to her pining lover. But, again, the man of correct habits
triumphed over the sons of the king, and despatched Abner to tear his
wife from her true husband's arms. Poor Phaltiel followed her weeping,
until ordered to go back--and back he went, forever desolate.
The scene recalled the brutal demand of his creditor upon his child. The
Judge's eyes silently o'erflowed, and he could not see.
Vesta had watched him closely, as her silent magistracy detected a great
anxiety or illness in her father. Lest her mother might also notice it,
she interposed in the lesson, as was her habit, by reading the Episcopal
form of prayer, in which they all bent their heads. Once or twice, as
she went on, she detected a suppressed sob, especially at the paragraph:
"Thou who knowest the weakness and corruption of our nature, and the
manifold temptations which we daily meet with, we humbly beseech thee to
have compassion on our infirmities and to give us the constant
assistance of thy Holy Spirit, that we may be effectually restrained
from sin and excited to our duty!"
They went to the breakfast-table, and the Judge's countenance was down.
He bit off some toast and filled his mouth with tea, but could not
swallow. A hand softly touched his elbow, and, looking there, he saw a
wine-glass full of brandy softly glide to the spot. As he looked up and
saw the rich, yearning face of his dark-eyed daughter tenderly
consulting his weakness, his heart burst forth; he leaned his head upon
the table and cried, between drink and grief:
"Darling, we are ruined!"
Mrs. Custis at once arose, and looked frightenedly at the Judge. Vesta
as quickly turned to the servants and motioned them to go.
"No, let them hear it!" raved Judge Custis, perceiving the motion. "They
are interested, like us. They must be sold, too. Faithful servants!
Perhaps it may warn them to escape in time!"
The servants, bred like ladies, quietly left the room.
Mrs. Custis, growing paler, exclaimed:
"Daniel Custis, have you lost everything in that furnace?"
"Everything!"
"And my money, too?"
"Yes."
"Merciful God!"
Before the weak lady could fall Vesta's arm was around her, and her
finger on the table-bell. Servants entered and Mrs. Custis was carried
out, her daughter following.
When Vesta returned her father was walking up and down the floor with
his long silk handkerchief in both hands, weeping bitterly, and speaking
broken syllables. She looked at him a moment with all the might of a
daughter, first called on to act alone in a great crisis. The feeling
she was wont to hold towards him, of perfect pride, had received a blow
in her mother's expression: "Your father's habits have mastered him
beyond reclamation."
Could this be true; that he, the grand, the kind, the gentleman, was
beneath the diver's reach, the plummet's sounding, where light could not
pierce, nor Hope overtake? _Her_ father, the first gentleman in
Somerset, a drunkard, going ever downward towards the gutter, and no ray
of heaven to beam upon his grave!
She saw his danger now: it was written on his face, where the image of
God shone dim that had once been crowned there. Hair thinner, and very
gray; the rich, dark eyes intimidated, as if manly confidence was gone;
the skin no more the pure scroll of regular life written in the healthy
fluid of the heart, but faded, yet spotted with alcohol; on the nose and
lips signs of coarser sensuality; the large skeleton bent and the
nervous temperament shattered. This father had been until this moment
Vesta's angel. Now, there might not be an angel in the universe to fly
to his rescue. Deep, dreadful humility descended into the daughter's
spirit.
"God forgive me!" she thought, "how blind and how proud and sinful I
have been!"
She walked over to her father tenderly and kissed him, and then, drawing
his weaker inclination by hers, brought him to a sofa, placed a pillow
for him, and made him stretch his once proud form there. Procuring a
bowl of water, she washed his face free of tears with a napkin, and
bathed it in cologne. The voluptuous nature of the Judge yielded to the
perfume and the easy position, and he sobbed himself to sleep like an
exhausted child.
Sitting by the sleeping bankrupt, watching his breast rise and fall, and
hearing his coarse snoring, as if fiends within were snarling in rivalry
for the possession of him, Vesta felt that the life which was
unconscious there was the fountain of her own, and, loving no man else,
she felt her heart like a goldfish of that fountain, go around and
around it throbbingly.
Then first arose the wish, often in woman's life repeated, to have been
born a man and know how to help her father. That suggested that she had
brothers who ought to be summoned, and confer with their father; but now
it occurred to her that every one of them had leaned upon him; and,
though conscious that it was wicked, Vesta felt her pride rise against
the thought that any being outside of that house, even a brother, should
know of its disgrace.
What could she do? She thought of all her jewels, her riding mare, her
watch, her father's own gifts, and then the thought perished that these
could help him.
Could she not earn something by her voice, which had sung to such
praises? Alas! that voice had lost the ingredient of hope, and she
feared to unclose her lips lest it might come forth in agony, crying,
"God, have mercy!"
"I have nothing," said Vesta to herself; "except love for these two
martyrs, my father and mother. No, nothing can be done until he awakens
and tells me the worst. Meantime it would be wicked for me to increase
the agitation already here, and where I must be the comforter."