It was a decided uncompromising rainy day. There were no showers,
coquetted with by veering winds or dubious mists, that at times grew
brighter, as if the sun were burning away their lining; but a uniform
expanse of iron-gray clouds--kept in close, grim column by a steady,
although not violent east wind--sent straight lines of heavy rain upon
the earth. The naked trees, that, during the earlier hours of the
deluge had seemed to shiver for the immature leaf-buds, so unfit to
endure the rough handling of the storm, now held out still, patient
arms, the rising sap curdled within their hearts. The gutters were
brimming streams, and the sidewalks were glazed with thin sheets of
water.
The block of buildings before which our story pauses, was, as a glance
would have showed the initiated in the grades of Gotham life, highly
respectable, even in the rain. On a clear day when the half-folded
blinds revealed the lace, silken and damask draperies within, when
young misses and masters--galvanized show-blocks of purple and fine
linen, that would have passed muster behind the plate-glass of Genin
or Madame Demorest--tripped after hoops or promenaded the smooth
pavement; when pretty, jaunty one-horse carriages, and more pretentious
equipages, each with a pair of prancing steeds, and two "outside
passengers" in broadcloth and tinsel hatbands, received and discharged
their loads before the brown-stone fronts--had the afore-mentioned
spectator chanced to perambulate this not spacious street, he would
have conceded to it some degree of the fashion claimed for it by its
inhabitants. There were larger houses and wider pavements to be had for
the same price a few blocks further on, in more than one direction,
but these were unanimously voted "less eligible" and "deficient in
style," in spite of the fact that as good and better materials were
employed in their construction, and they were in all respects equal in
external show and inside finish to those in this model quarter. "But
our block has a certain air--well--I don't know what; but it is just
the thing, you know, and so convenient! So near the avenue!" would be
the concluding argument.
The nameless, indescribable charm of the locality lay in the last
clause. "Just step around the corner and you are in the avenue," said
the favored dwellers in this vicinity, as the climax in the description
of their abode, and "that way fashion lies" to every right-minded New
Yorker of the feminine gender.
But the aristocratic quiet of the neighborhood, rendered oppressive
and depressing by the gloom of the day, was disturbed by a discordant
sound--a child's cry, and what was especially martyrizing to refined
auriculars, the lament had the unmistakable plebeian accent. The
passionate scream with which the pampered darling of the nursery
resents interference with his rights and liberty of tyranny or the
angry remonstrance of his injured playmates, would have been quite
another species of natural eloquence, as regards both quality and
force, from the weak, broken wail that sobbed along the wet streets.
Moreover, what respectable child could be abroad on foot in this
weather? So, the disrespectable juvenile pursued her melancholy way
unnoticed and unquestioned until she reached the middle of the square.
There a face appeared at a window in the second story of a house--which
only differed from those to its right, left and opposite in the number
upon the door--vanished and in half a minute more a young lady appeared
in the sheltered vestibule.
"What is the matter, little girl?"
The tone was not winning, yet the sobs ceased, and the child looked
up, as to a friendly questioner. She was about eleven years of age, if
one had judged from her size and form; but her features were pinched
into unnatural maturity. Her attire was wretched, at its best estate;
now, soaked by the rain, the dingy hood drooped over her eyes; the dark
cotton shawl retained not one of its original colors, and the muddy
dress flapped and dripped about her ankles. Upon one foot she wore an
old cloth gaiter, probably picked up from an ash heap; the remains of a
more sorry slipper were tied around the other.
"I am so cold and wet, and my matches is all sp'ilt," she answered in
a dolorous tone, lifting the corner of a scrap of oil-cloth, which
covered a basket, tucked for further security under her shawl.
"No wonder! What else could you expect, if you would go out to sell
them on a day like this? Go down into the area, there, and wait until I
let you in."
The precaution was a wise one. No servant in that well-regulated
household would have admitted so questionable a figure as that which
crept after their young mistress into the comfortable kitchen. The cook
paused in the act of dissecting a chicken; the butler--on carriage
days the footman--checked his flirtation with the plump and laughing
chambermaid, to stare at the wretched apparition. The scrutiny of the
first named functionary was speedily diverted to the dirty trail left
by the intruder upon the carpet. A scowl puckered her red face, and
her wrathful glance included both of the visitants as alike guilty of
this desecration of her premises. The housemaid rolled up her eyes and
clasped her hands in dumb show of horror and contempt to her gallant,
who replied with a shrug and a grin. But not a word of remonstrance or
inquiry was spoken. It was rather a habit of this young lady's to have
her own way whenever she could, and that she was bent upon doing this
now was clear.
"Sit down," she said, bringing up a chair to the fire.
The storm beaten wanderer obeyed, and eagerly held up her sodden feet
to the red grate.
"Have you no better shoes than those?"
"No, ma'am."
"Humph! Nor dress, nor shawl?"
"No, ma'am."
"Are you hungry?"
A ray shot from the swollen eyes. "Yes, ma'am."
The lady disappeared in the pantry and presently returned with five or
six slices of bread and butter hastily cut and thickly spread, with
cheese and cold meat between them.
"Eat!" She thrust them into the match-girl's fingers. "Wait here, while
I go and look for some clothes for you."
As may be supposed, the insulted oracle of kitchen mysteries improved
the time of the benefactress's absence by a very plain expression of
her sentiments towards beggars in general, and this one in particular;
which harangue was received with applause by her fellow-servants and
perfect equanimity by its object. She munched her sandwiches with
greedy satisfaction, watching, the while, the little clouds of steam
that ascended from her heated toes. She was, to all appearances,
neither a sensitive nor intelligent child, and had known too much of
animal want and suffering to allow trifles to spoil her enjoyment of
whatever physical comfort fell to her lot. Her mother at home could
scold quite as violently as the cook was now doing, and she was more
afraid of her anger, because she beat while she berated her. She was
convinced that she stood in no such peril here, for her protectress was
one in power.
"Have you eaten enough?" said the clear, abrupt voice behind her, as
she held two sandwiches in her fingers, without offering to put them to
her lips.
"Yes, ma'am. May I take 'em home?"
"Certainly, if you like. Stand up and take off your shawl."
She put around the forlorn figure a thick cloak, rusty and obsolete
in fashion, but which was a warm and ample covering for the child,
extending to the hem of her dress. The damp elf-locks were hidden by
a knitted hood, and for the feet there were stockings and shoes and a
pair of India-rubbers to protect these last from the water.
"Now," said the Humane Society of One, when the refitting was at an
end, "where do you live? Never mind--I don't care to know that yet!
Here is a small umbrella--a good one--which belongs to me. I have no
other for myself when I go out in bad weather. I mean to lend it to
you, to-day, upon the condition that you will bring it back to-morrow,
or the first clear day. Will you do it?"
The promise was readily given.
"Here's an old thing, Miss Sarah," ventured the butler, respectfully,
producing a bulky, ragged cotton umbrella from a corner of the kitchen
closet. "It's risky--trusting such as that with your nice silk one."
"That will let in the rain, and it is entirely too large for her to
carry. You understand, child? You are to bring this safely back to me,
the first time the sun shines. Can you find your way to this house
again?"
"Oh, yes, ma'am, easy. Thank you, ma'am!"
She dropped an awkward curtsey as Miss Sarah held open the door for her
to pass, and went out into the rain--warm, dry and shielded against
further damage from the storm.
Unheeding the significant looks of the culinary cabinet, Sarah Hunt
turned away and ascended the stairs. She was a striking-looking girl,
although her features, when in repose, could claim neither beauty of
form nor expression. Her complexion was dark and pale, with a slight
tinge of olive, and her hair a deep brown, lips whose compression was
habitual, an aquiline nose, and eyes that changed from dreamy hazel
to midnight blackness at the call of mind or feeling, gave marked
character to her countenance. Her sententious style of address to the
child she had just dismissed was natural, and usual to her in ordinary
conversation, as was also the gravity, verging upon sombreness, which
had not once during the interview relaxed into a smile.
The family sitting-room, her destination at present, and to which we
will take the liberty of preceding her, was furnished elegantly and
substantially, and there, leaning back in lounging chairs, were Miss
Lucy Hunt, the eldest daughter of the household, and her bosom friend,
Miss Victoria West. Each held and wielded a crochet needle, and had
upon her lap a basket of many-hued balls of double or single zephyr
worsted, or Shetland or Saxony wool, or whatever was the fashionable
article for such pretty trifling at that date. Miss West had completed
one-quarter of a shawl for herself, white and scarlet, and her friend
had made precisely the same progress in the arduous manufacture of one
whose centre was white and its border blue.
"Yours will be the prettiest," remarked Lucy regretfully. "Blue never
looks well in worsteds. Why, I can't say, I'm sure. It is too bad that
I can wear so few other colors. But I am such a fright in pink or
scarlet or any shade of red!"
"As if you could be a fright in anything," returned her companion, with
seeming indignation.
Lucy smiled, showing a set of faultless teeth that, to a stranger's
first glance, would have appeared by far the most attractive point of
her physiognomy. If closer examination discovered that her skin was
pearly in whiteness and transparency, that her form was exquisite, with
a sort of voluptuous grace; her hands worthy, in shape and hue, to
become a sculptor's model; still, in the cold, unflattering light of
this rainy afternoon her want of color, her light gray eyes, her yellow
hair, drawn straight back from the broad, low brow, precluded the idea
that she could ever, with all the accessories of artificial glare,
dress and animation, be more than a merely pretty girl. Miss West knew
better, and Lucy realized the power of her own charms with full and
complete complacency. Secure in this pleasant self-appreciation, she
could afford to be careless as to her every-day looks and home people.
She saw and enjoyed the manifest surprise of those who, having seen
her once in morning deshabille, beheld her afterwards in elaborate
evening toilet. Then the abundant hair waved in golden ripples about
the classic head, the most artfully simple of tasteful ornaments--a
camellia, a rosebud, or a pearl hairpin, its sole adornment; her eyes,
large, full and soft, were blue instead of gray, while the heat of
the assembly-room, the excitement of the crowd, or the exultation of
gratified vanity supplied the rounded cheek with rich bloom and dewy
vermillion to the lips. But nature's rarest gift to her was her voice,
a mellow contralto, whose skillful modulations stole refreshingly to
the senses amid the sharp clash of strained and higher tones, the
castanet-like jingle which most American belles ring unmercifully
into the ears of their auditors. Lucy Hunt was not "a great talker,"
still less was she profound or brilliant when she did speak; yet she
invariably conveyed the impression to the mind of a new acquaintance of
a thoroughly cultivated woman, one whose acquirements were far beyond
her modest exhibition of thought and sentiment. The most commonplace
phrase came smoothly and roundly from her tongue, and he was censorious
indeed who was willing to lose the pleasure afforded by its musical
utterance in weighing its meaning. At school she had never been
diligent, except in the study of music, and her painstaking in this
respect was rewarded by the reputation, justly earned, of being the
finest vocalist in her circle of associates. In society she shone as
a rising star of the first magnitude; at home she was happy, cheerful
and indolently amiable. Why should she be otherwise? From her babyhood
she had been petted and admired by her family, and the world--her
world--was as ready with its meed of the adulation which was her
element.
There were, besides the two sisters already introduced to the reader,
three other children in the Hunt household--a couple of sturdy lads,
twelve and fourteen years of age, and little Jeannie, a delicate child
of six, whom Lucy caressed with pet titles and sugar-plums of flattery,
and Sarah served in secret and idolatrous fondness. This family it was
Mrs. Hunt's care and pride to rear and maintain, not only in comfort,
but apparent luxury, upon the salary which her husband received as
cashier of a prominent city bank, an income sufficient to support
them in modest elegance, but which few besides Mrs. Hunt could have
stretched to cover the expense of their ostensible style of living.
But this notable manager had learned economy in excellent schools,
primarily as a country girl, whose holiday finery was purchased with
the proceeds of her own butter-making and poultry-yard; then as the
brisk, lively wife of the young clerk, whose slender salary had, up
to the time of his marriage, barely sufficed to pay for his own board
and clothes, and whose only vested capital was his pen, his good
character and perfect knowledge of book-keeping. But if his help-meet
was a clever housewife, she was likewise ambitious. With the exception
of the sum requisite for the yearly payment of the premium upon Mr.
Hunt's life insurance policy, their annual expenses devoured every cent
of their receipts. Indeed, it was currently believed among outsiders
that they had other resources than the cashier's wages, and Mrs. Hunt
indirectly encouraged the report that she held property in her own
right. They lived "as their neighbors did," as "everybody in their
position in society was bound to do," and "everybody" else was too
intent upon his personal affairs, too busy with his private train
of plans and operations to examine closely the cogs and levers and
boilers of the locomotive Hunt. If it went ahead, and kept upon the
track assigned it, was always "up to time," and avoided unpleasant
collisions, it was nobody's business how the steam was gotten up.
Every human plant of note has its parasite, and Miss Lucy Hunt was not
without hers. There existed no reason in the outward circumstances of
the two girls why Miss Hunt should not court Miss West rather than Miss
West toady Miss Hunt. In a business--that is, a pecuniary--point of
view, the former appeared the more likely state of the case, inasmuch
as Victoria's father was a stock-broker of reputed wealth, and with a
probable millionaireship in prospective, if his future good fortune
equalled his past, while Mr. Hunt, as has been stated, depended
entirely upon a certain and not an extravagant stipend. But the girls
became intimate at school, "came out" the same winter at the same
party, where Lucy created a "sensation," and Victoria would have been
overlooked but for the sentimental connection between the debutantes.
Since then, although the confidante would have scouted the imputation
of interested motives with virtuous indignation of wounded affection,
she had nevertheless "made a good thing of it," as her respected
father would have phrased it, by playing hanger-on, second fiddle, and
trumpeter general to the belle.
"As if you could be a fright in anything," she had said, naturally and
perhaps sincerely.
Lucy's smile was succeeded by a serious look. "I am sadly tempted
sometimes! Those lovely peach-blossom hats that you and Sarah wore this
past winter were absolute trials to my sense of right. And no longer
ago than Mrs. Crossman's party I was guilty of the sin of coveting the
complexion that enabled Maria Johnston to wear that sweet rose-colored
silk, with the lace skirt looped with rosebuds."
"You envy Maria Johnston's complexion? Why don't you go further and
fall in love with her small eyes and pug nose?" inquired Victoria,
severely ironical. "I have heard that people were never contented with
their own gifts, but such a case of blindness as this has never before
come under my observation."
"No, no! I am not quite so humble with regard to my personal appearance
as you would make out. Yet"--and the plaintive voice might have been
the murmur of a grieving angel--"I think that there are compensations
in the lot of plain people that we know nothing about. They escape the
censure and unkind remarks that uncharitable and envious women heap
upon those who happen to be attractive. Now, there is Sarah, who never
cares a button about her looks, so long as her hair is smooth and her
dress clean and whole. She hates parties and is glad of any excuse to
stay out of the parlor when gentlemen call. Give her her books and that
'snuggery,' as she calls it, of a room upstairs, and she is happier
than if she were in the gayest company in the world. Who criticises
her? Nobody is jealous of her face or manners or conversation. And she
would not mind it if they were."
"She has a more independent nature than yours, my dear. I, for one, am
rejoiced that you two are unlike. I could not endure to lose my darling
friend, and somehow I never could understand Sarah; never could get
near to her, you know."
"I do not wonder at that. It is just so with me, sisters though we are.
However, Sarah means well, if her manner is blunt and sometimes cold."
The entrance of the person under discussion checked the conversation
at this point, and both young ladies began to count their stitches
aloud, to avoid the appearance of the foolish embarrassment that ever
overtakes a brace of gossips at being thus interrupted.
Sarah's work lay on her stand near the window, where she had thrown it
when the crying child attracted her notice, and she resumed it now. It
was a dress for Jeannie. It was a rare occurrence for the second sister
to fashion anything so pretty and gay for her own wear.
"Have you taken to fancy work at last?" asked Victoria, seeing that the
unmade skirt was stamped with a rich, heavy pattern for embroidery.
"No!" Sarah did not affect her sister's friend, and did not trouble
herself to disguise her feelings towards her.
Lucy explained: "She is making it for Jeannie. She does everything for
that child."
"You are very sisterly and kind, I am sure," Victoria continued,
patronizingly. "You must quite despise Lucy and myself for thinking
of and doing so much for ourselves, while you are such a pattern of
self-denial."
A blaze shot up in Sarah's eye; then she said, coldly: "I am not
self-denying. Have I ever found fault with you or Lucy for doing as you
like?"
"Oh, no, my dear. But you take no interest in what we enjoy. I dare
say, now, you would think it a dull business to work day after day for
three or four weeks together, crocheting a shawl which may go out of
fashion before one has a chance to sport it at a watering-place."
"I certainly should!" The curl of the thin upper lip would have
answered for her had she not spoken.
"And you hate the very sight of shellwork and cone-frames, and Grecian
painting, and all such vanities?"
"If I must speak the truth, I do--most heartily."
Victoria was not easily turned from her purpose.
"Come, Sarah! Tell us what you would have us, poor trifling, silly
things, do to kill the time."
"If you must be a murderer, do it in your own way. I have nothing to
say in the matter."
"Do you mean that time never hangs upon your hands--that you are never
ennuyee--blasee?"
"Speak English, and I will answer you."
"I want to know," said the persevering tormentor, "if the hum-drum
books upstairs, your paint-box and your easel are such good company
that you are contented and happy always when you are with them--if you
never get cross with yourself and everybody else, and wonder what you
were put into the world for, and why the world itself was made, and
wish that you could sleep until doomsday. Do you ever feel like this?"
Sarah lifted her eyes with a wondering, incredulous stare at the
flippant inquisitor.
"I have felt thus, but I did not suppose that you had."
"Oh, I have a 'blue' turn now and then, but the disease is always more
dangerous with girls of your sort--the reading, thinking, strong-minded
kind. And the older you grow, the worse you will get. I haven't as
much book knowledge as you have, but I know more of the world we live
in. Take my advice and settle down to woman's right sphere. Drive away
the vapors with beaux and fancy-work now. By-and-by a husband and an
establishment will give you something else to think about."
Sarah would have replied, but Lucy broke in with a laugh, light and
sweet.
"You two are always at cross-questions! Why can't you be satisfied to
let one another alone? Sarah and I never quarrel, Vic.. We agree to
disagree. She gives me my way, and I don't meddle with her. If she
likes the blues (they say some people enjoy them), where's the harm of
her having them? They never come near me. If I get stupid, I go to bed
and sleep it off. Don't you think I have done ten rows since breakfast?
What a godsend a rainy day is, when one has a fascinating piece of work
on hand!"
Too proud to seem to abandon the field, Sarah sat for half an hour
longer, stitching steadily away at the complicated tracery upon the
ground to be worked; then, as the dimmer daylight caused the others to
draw near to the windows, she pushed aside her table and put by her
sewing.
"Don't let us drive you away!" said Victoria's mock-polite tones, and
Lucy added, kindly, "We do not mean to disturb you, Sarah, dear."
"You do not disturb me!" was the reply to the latter. The other had
neither glance nor word.
Up another flight she mounted to a room, much smaller than that she had
left and far plainer in its appointments. The higher one went in Mrs.
Hunt's house the less splendid everything became. In the state spare
chamber--a story below--nothing of comfort and luxury was wanting,
from the carved rosewood bedstead, with the regal-looking canopy
overshadowing its pillows, down to the Bohemian and cut-glass scent
bottles upon the marble of the dressing-cabinet. Sarah's carpet was
common ingrain, neither pretty nor new; a cottage bedstead of painted
wood; bureau and washstand of the same material; two chairs and a small
table were all the furniture her mother adjudged needful. To these the
girl had added, from her pittance of pocket-money, a set of hanging
bookshelves, a portable desk, an easel and two or three good engravings
that adorned the walls.
She locked the door after her, with a kind of angry satisfaction in
her face, and going straight to the window leaned upon the sash and
looked down into the flooded street. Her eyes were dry, but there was
a heaving in her throat, a tightening of the muscles about the mouth
that would have made most women weep for very relief. Sarah Hunt would
have scorned the ease purchased by such weakness. She did not despise
the sad loneliness that girt her around, any more than the captive
warrior does his cell of iron or stone, but she held that it would be
a cowardly succumbing to Fate to wound herself by dashing against the
grim walls, or bring out their sleeping echoes by womanish wailings.
So, presently, her throat ached and throbbed no longer, the rigid
muscles compressed the lips no more than was their wont, the hands
loosened their vise-like grasp of one another--the brain was free to
think.
The rain fell still with a solemn stateliness that befitted the coming
twilight. It was a silent storm for one so heavy. The faint hum of the
city, the tinkle of the car-bell, three blocks off, arose to her window
above its plashing fall upon the pavement, and the trickle of the drops
from sash to sill. A stream of light from the lamp-post at the corner
flashed athwart the sidewalk, glittered upon the swollen gutter, made
gold and silver blocks of the paving stones. As if they had waited for
this signal, other lights now shone out from the windows across the
way, and from time to time a broad, transient gleam from opening doors
told of the return of fathers, brothers, husbands from their day's
employment.
"In happy homes he sees the light."
What was there in the line that should make the watcher catch her
breath in sudden pain and lay her hand, with stifled moan, over her
heart, as she repeated it aloud?
Witness with me, ye maternal Hunts, who read this page--you, the
careful and solicitous about many things--in nothing more ambitious
than for the advancement and success in life of your offspring--add
your testimony to mine that this girl had all that was desirable for
one of her age and in her circumstances. A house as handsome as her
neighbors, an education unsurpassed by any of her late school-fellows,
a "position in society;" a reasonable share of good looks, which only
required care and cultivation on her part to become really distingue;
indulgent parents and peaceably inclined brothers and sisters--read
the list, and solve me, if you can, the enigma of this perturbed
spirit--this hungering and thirsting after contraband or unattainable
pleasures.
"Some girls will do so!" Mrs. Hunt assured her husband when he "thought
that Sarah did not seem so happy as Lucy. He hoped nothing ailed the
child. Perhaps the doctor had better drop in to see her. Could she be
fretting for anything, or had her feelings been hurt?"
"Bless your soul, Mr. H. There's nothing the matter with her. She
always was kind o' queer!" (Mrs. Hunt did not use her company grammar
every day.) "And she's jest eighteen year old. That's the whole of it!
She'll come 'round in good time, 'specially if Lucy should marry off
pretty soon. When Sarah is 'Miss Hunt,' she'll be as crazy for beaux
and company and as ready to jump at a prime offer as any of 'em. I know
girls' ways!"
Nor am I prepared to say that Sarah, as she quitted her look-out at the
high window at the sound of the dinner bell, could have given a more
satisfactory reason for her discontent and want of spirits.