directed to Fanny. In it were two boxes bearing the name of a New York
firm. One contained a dozen after-dinner coffees of fine Dresden china;
the other a dozen silver forks and four dozen spoons of different sizes,
and a dozen pearl handled knives, Carl’s wedding present to Fanny. They
were very beautiful, but it seemed to Annie like opening two coffins,
and her tears came near staining the satin lining of the boxes as she
bent over them and thought how Fanny’s eyes would have sparkled had she
been there to see them. The same train which brought the package brought
also a letter from Carl written from The Windsor in New York, where he
had been staying for two or three weeks.
“I got tired of loafing in Boston,” he wrote, “and I thought I would try
New York, and, by George, I am tired of that. I must do something or die
of _ennui_. Coming to the wedding will be a little diversion, and after
that I shall either open a corner grocery or go abroad. I have not
decided which. I envy Jack and Fanny being settled and done for. Wish I
were. I have selected at Tiffany’s a wedding present, which I think Fan
will like. I told them to engrave the silver ‘_F. H._’ and the stupid
rascals have left off the ‘_F._,’ and marked them simply ‘_H._’ I expect
to be with you the 23rd, if nothing happens. Very truly, CARL.”
There was a good deal of Carl in this letter, and Katy’s eyes grew very
bright for a moment, as Annie read it, and then took on a cold
expression, which Miss Errington, who was watching her, could not quite
understand. Annie had written to Carl in Boston, telling him there was
to be no wedding, but asking him to spend Christmas with them just the
same. This letter he evidently had not received. He was coming, and they
were all glad, and none more so than Norah. With all his faults there
was not a better man living than Carl, she said, and her face was
radiant as she prepared his favorite dishes. If they couldn’t have a
wedding-feast they should have a dinner that _was_ a dinner, with eight
or ten courses, and in the exuberance of her joy she allowed Phyllis to
stone the raisins for the pudding she was going to send to the table
over a blue flame of-alcohol. Carl’s own room was made ready for him,
and every time he heard the whistle of a Richmond train Paul stationed
himself at the window to watch for the village ’bus which was to bring
his brother from the station. But the trains came and went and brought
neither Carl nor any tidings of him, and every one gave him up but
Norah. She had more faith in him than anyone else, although admitting
that he was never of the same mind two hours at a time.
“But he’s comin’ now. I feel it in my bones,” she said, and made her
preparations for Christmas with as much certainty of his presence as if
he were already there.
It was a dreary Christmas Eve, with dark clouds scudding across the
starless sky and the wind roaring through the tall trees which skirted
the avenue leading from the highway to the house, and the morning was
drearier still. There had been a blizzard on the western prairies, and
it was spending itself on this part of Virginia in a cold, steady rain,
which drove against the windows and found its way under the door into
the hall, where it stood in little puddles until Phyllis swept it out,
letting in more rain as she did so, and shivering with cold as she
closed the door and went into the dining-room where breakfast was upon
the table and where Paul’s was the only happy face. He had found his
stockings full of gifts from Santa Claus, balls and carts and tops and
horns, the last of which he blew vigorously as Phyllis lifted him into
his high chair and fastened on his bib. Annie was pouring the coffee
when Phyllis suddenly exclaimed, “Praise de Lord, thar’s Mas’r Carl now
on de step with his umberill blown t’other side out.”
He did not stop to knock, but sprang into the hall, with the rain
dripping from his Mackintosh and hat, and his umbrella a total wreck.
“Hallo, Hallo, Hallo, all of you,” he said, as Annie and Katy and
Phyllis rushed into the hall to meet him. “This is a nice go for
Christmas and a wedding. Call _this_ the sunny south? I am frozen to my
bones,” he continued, as he divested himself of his wet garments. “Don’t
ask me any questions until I get near a fire and that coffee, which
smells so deliciously. I haven’t had a decent thing to eat since I left
New York and am half famished.”
He was soon by the open fire in the dining-room and drinking the hot
coffee which Annie poured for him.
“I meant to be here yesterday afternoon,” he said, “but was too late for
the train; so I came on at night in a cross between a lumber wagon and a
cattle car. Never slept a wink, but I was bound to get here if I walked.
What time is the ceremony, and where is Fan?” he asked. “Is she staying
in her room until she bursts upon us in all her bridal splendor?”
He looked at Annie, who replied, “You didn’t get my letter?”
“No. What letter? I have been in New York three weeks, and when I left
Boston I didn’t know how long I should be gone, and gave no directions
to have my mail sent to me. My correspondence is not very important
anyway, and I hate to answer letters. What did you write, and where _is_
Fan?”
He asked the question a little anxiously, for something in the faces at
the table surprised him. It was Paul who answered. With a toot upon his
horn and his mouth full of buttered muffins he said, “Fan-er-nan is
mar-yed and gone to Europe.”
“Married and gone to Europe!” Carl repeated. “What do you mean? Married
to whom?”
“To my brother,” Miss Errington said, taking upon herself the task of
explaining, which she did very briefly and without comment.
“Great guns!” Carl exclaimed. “I would not have believed that of Fan.
And so there is to be no wedding after all. That’s too bad, and I nearly
breaking my neck to get here,” he continued, as he rose from the table
and began to walk the floor, talking rapidly and asking many questions
which no one answered. “I tell you what,” he said suddenly, going up to
Katy, who stood by the window looking out into the rain, “it is too bad
to come all this distance without a wedding. We’ll have one yet, if you
say so. I’ll put on my other coat and you your other gown. We’ll send
for the minister, and, presto! it’s done! What do you say?”
There was a grey light in Katy’s eyes and a ring in her voice, although
she tried to laugh, as she replied, “Thank you! I’m not in so great a
hurry.”
There was a good deal of dignity in her manner, and her head was held
high as she stepped back from him and walked into the adjoining room.
“By Jove! Something is up,” Carl said under his breath. He was so
accustomed to have every girl respond to his call that when he met with
a rebuff it surprised him.
Katy had been so soft and yielding and so like wax in his hands when he
was there before that he did not know what to make of her now. She would
thaw of course. She must, for of all the girls he had ever met Katy had
made the strongest impression upon him, and was the one he liked best.
Away from her he could forget her in a measure, but with her again her
spell was upon him, intensified by her coolness, and if she had said so,
he would have probably sent for the minister, donned his other coat and
settled the matter forever. But she didn’t say so, and her manner piqued
and puzzled him. She was very gracious to him, however, when he joined
her in the parlor after a romp with Paul, and there was a look in her
eyes which made him think of the green woods and the mossy banks where
he had sat and talked with her the year before, and watched the color
deepening on her cheeks, and the coy drooping of her eyelids, as he held
her hand in his, or pushed back a stray curl of her hair from her face,
or put his arm around her when there was no other support for her back.
Katy had thought of this, too, and hated herself for the part she had
played in what was more a tragedy, for her, than a comedy to be lightly
forgotten. Not for worlds, however, would she let him know that she had
given more meaning to that summer idyl than he had done, and after her
first show of coldness she was herself again, and laughed and chatted
with him as merrily as ever.
At his request she sang for him, and sang, it seemed to her, as she had
never sung before. He was not at all a critic, or music mad in any
sense, but he listened in wonder as her rich, full voice filled the
house and made him feel hot and cold and faint all at the same time.
“Why, Katy!” he exclaimed, when she was through. “You take a fellow
right off his feet. Why don’t you go upon the stage? The whole world
would ring with your name.”
“I am going,” Katy replied, as she put up her music, and rose from the
stool.
“Never!” Carl exclaimed, so emphatically that Katy looked at him in
wonder.
“What have you against the stage?” she asked, and he replied, “Nothing
against those who are already there, and among whom, I dare say, there
are as many good people in proportion as there are off; but everything
against it for you, and when I said you ought to be there I was merely
in fun. Standing before the people to be criticised and talked about by
the men in the clubs and public places is bad enough, but when you get
behind the scenes and see the freedom which must necessarily exist
there, and when you come in contact with all classes of men who, because
of their talent for acting, or singing, or both, form a part of every
company, and with whom you have no choice except to play, _Bah!_ I
believe I’d rather see you dead than there.”
He was worse than Fanny, and Katy felt some of her castles melting into
air as he talked, for all the fame she had sometimes dreamed of winning
was not worth the loss of Carl’s good opinion.
“Perfect yourself in music,” he continued, “and sing for your friends;
sing in church; sing for charities; sing anywhere except with a troupe.
I couldn’t bear that. Better send for the minister now. It isn’t too
late. What do you say?”
He was standing with his hand on her shoulder, looking at her, while she
returned his gaze unflinchingly as she replied, “Just what I said this
morning. No, thank you. I am not in so great a hurry; and if I were, it
would be the mistake of my life and yours. What you do to-day you forget
or regret to-morrow, and I have my career to consider.”
If Carl had been in the habit of swearing he would have consigned her
_career_ to the lower regions, and in his excitement he might have done
so now if she had not released herself from him, and swept from the
room, leaving him discomfited and uncertain as to whether he had
actually proposed and been rejected, and if it were true that what he
desired to-day he tired of to-morrow.
“By Jove!” he said to himself. “No girl ever flouted me like that. I
know of forty, with their mothers at their backs, who would have gone
for the parson themselves and had him here by this time. I guess
Virginia girls are different from those of Boston; Katy certainly is.
_Career!_ Katy on the stage! Katy in tights,—with glasses leveled at
her! It might come to that sometime, if she sang in opera. I believe I’d
shoot her, or myself, should I live to see the sight. That is Miss
Errington’s work, but I won’t have it, and I’ll propose in _bona fide_
shape and have the thing settled. Katy is too young, perhaps. She can’t
be seventeen yet, but I’ll wait three years. There’s a lot of things I
want to do before I settle down into a steady-going married man. But
I’ll bind Katy and fix that stage business. I wonder if I would get
tired of a three years’ engagement.” On the whole, he concluded that he
would, and as he was not quite ready to marry, he decided to wait awhile
and keep his eyes on Katy until he saw dangerous signs of her _career_,
when he would step in and stop it.
Carl was a curious compound. There was no question that he loved Katy,
but he loved his freedom better, and, on the whole, he was glad that
after his talk with her of the stage she gave him no chance to see her
alone. If she had, her grace and sweetness and beauty would have
influenced him so strongly that he might have proposed in earnest,
and—“been rejected, I believe upon my soul,” he reflected, while
thinking the matter over after his return to Boston.
Before leaving he had a long talk with Annie with regard to Paul, for
whom he had conceived a great liking, and whom he began to think he had
neglected. To this thought he was helped by Norah, who, when he asked
how long she intended staying at The Elms replied, that she didn’t know.
Probably not long, as she knew Miss Annie could not afford to keep her.
“I don’t think her father left much for his daughters,” she said, “and
there is Paul to be taken care of, or he may be a cripple. Have you ever
thought of that?”
He had not, and he didn’t know what she meant. Accustomed all his life
to every luxury, he had not given much thought to the wants of others,
except as they were presented to him. When asked for a subscription to
some charity, as he often was, he gave liberally. When he passed an old
half-clothed man or woman on the corner turning a hand-organ, with “I am
blind” pinned on the breast, he always dropped a coin into the cup, and
would have lavished thousands upon the people of The Elms had it been
suggested to him that they needed it.
“I don’t believe I am so selfish a cad as I am thoughtless,” he said to
Annie.
“You see, I have more than I ought to have, and I have given myself to
spending it, and forgotten that something was due to others besides
charities,—to Paul for instance. He is my half-brother, as well as
yours, and I ought never to have let the whole burden fall on you.”
“It has been no burden,” Annie interposed quickly. “Paul could never be
that.”
“I don’t mean it that way,” Carl answered. “I mean that I ought to help,
and I’m going to. I shall provide for his education and settle something
upon him at once. And what is this Norah has been telling me about his
being a cripple? She talked as if I were a brute.”
In the excitement incident upon Fanny’s marriage, Annie had for the time
being forgotten the fear which had haunted her with regard to Paul, and
which came back to her with a shock when Carl asked about it. She told
him all she knew, saying, however, that she hoped her fears were
groundless, Paul seemed so active and well. Carl’s answer was not
reassuring.
“I have noticed him limping at times,” he said, “and once when I asked
him why he did so he replied, ‘It hurts me here,’ and put his hand on
his back. He must have the best medical advice in Richmond, and if that
does not answer we must take him to New York, and if that fails, I will
take him to Paris. He can be cured there. Don’t look so white and
scared. There may be nothing serious, and if there is, it can be cured.
Suppose you go to Richmond with me and take Paul.”
This was on Sunday, and the next day Carl left The Elms, and Annie and
Paul went with him as far as Richmond,—the little boy delighted with the
first journey he had ever taken in the cars, and Annie’s heart full of
anxiety as to what the doctor’s verdict might be.
CHAPTER V.—AUTHOR’S STORY CONTINUED.
ON THE CELTIC.
Everything which ingenuity could devise or money buy had been bought and
devised for the two staterooms which Col. Errington had engaged upon the
Celtic, and between which there was only a narrow passage. In the one
which the Colonel called Fanny’s boudoir, and where she was to sit when
it was too cold to be on deck and she did not care to stay in the
saloon, there was a large easy chair and footstool, with soft cushions
and pillows on the couch under the window. There was a basket of
champagne in one corner, with jars of French prunes, preserved ginger
and Albert biscuits in another. There were all the last magazines, with
three or four books on the shelves, and on the washstand a basket of
exquisite flowers filling the room with perfume. When they came on board
the ship the Colonel had only shown Fanny their sleeping-room and had
then hurried her to the deck, where they staid until the ship was moving
down the bay, across which the November wind blew cold and chill. “Now
come and see your parlor,” he said, taking her by the arm and leading
her to No. ——.
It was Fanny’s first knowledge of a steamer, but she readily understood
how infinitely superior this stateroom was to the others, and that she
was indebted to her husband’s forethought for it. In the excitement of
her hasty marriage there had been no chance for love-making, and her
heart was too sore and full of Jack to think of much else. She heard his
voice in the din around her as the passengers and their friends crowded
the deck, and saw his face on the wharf, waving her a good-bye as the
ship moved away and the objects began to grow dim in the distance.
“Oh, Jack, will you never leave me!” she thought, and her hands clasped
each other tightly and the lump in her throat was getting larger than
she could master when the Colonel broke the spell and led her to her
stateroom.
“How do you like it?” he asked, sitting down upon the couch and watching
her as her eyes took in every detail and then filled with tears.
He had asked her to call him George, but she had never done so until
now, when there awoke within her a throb of something more than
gratitude and less than love, and going up to him she put her arms
around his neck and kissed him on his forehead. “Oh, George,” she said,
“it is lovely, and you were so kind to do it all for me. I thank you,
and—and—I am going to be so good, only I must cry now.”
She was sobbing like a child, and he let her cry without protest, and
held her closely to him and gently smoothed her hair. Skilled in reading
faces, he had read hers on the deck and guessed that thoughts of home,
and possibly of Jack, were bringing the pallor around her lips, and the
wistful look of pain into her eyes. Just how much of Jack was in her
thoughts he did not know. She had told him distinctly that she did not
love him, and he had said it was not her love he wanted. It was her
beauty,—herself,—her person. He had all these, and when she put her arms
around his neck and kissed him, calling him George, there swept over him
a possibility of what might be in the future, and in that moment he was
as near loving her as he ever would be in his life. And because of this
love, if it could be called by that name, his jealousy of Jack and every
man who looked at her would be stronger and fiercer and make itself felt
at every point. When he thought she had cried enough, he told her so;
but her tears, once started, could not be easily stopped, and she kept
on until something in his voice and manner, which she could feel but not
define, checked them back; and lifting her head from his shoulder she
said, “I didn’t mean to cry like this, but I couldn’t help it. I am
thinking of Annie and Katy and Paul.”
“Yes, I know; I understand perfectly of what you are thinking, but
crying will not help you. Don’t do it again. It makes your eyes and nose
red, and I want you to look your best for dinner. I must go now and see
if the purser has secured our seats at table, as I told him to do. Dry
your eyes and let me see a bright face when I return; or, would you
prefer to go on deck and wait for me there.”
She chose the latter, feeling that, pretty as the stateroom was, she
should smother in its narrow confines. She wanted air and space in which
to breathe, and strangle, if possible, the lump in her throat, which
pained her so. Her husband brought her beautiful fur-lined cloak, and
fastened it around her neck and tied on her sea hood, which, with its
lining of quilted crimson satin was very becoming to her. “There, you
look like the pictures of Red Riding Hood,” he said, as he passed his
arm around her to steady her, and then led her to the deck. Their chairs
were still inextricably mixed up with a pile of other chairs, so he
found her a sheltered place on the seat near the railing, and throwing a
rug across her lap left her alone with the injunction, “Mind you don’t
cry again.”
“No-o,” she said, with a sob, like a little child trying to keep down
the tears it has been forbidden to shed.
There were many passing and repassing around her,—passengers, sailors
and officers of the ship, each one of whom glanced at the lovely face
slightly upturned to the cool wind which blew so refreshingly across the
burning cheeks. But Fanny saw none of them. Her eyes were with her
thoughts, and they were far away in her Virginia home, with Jack, and
every incident of her life as connected with him. How vivid it all was
to her. The tall boy and the little girl he had carried so often on his
back to school when the mud was deep and she was afraid of soiling her
shoes and dress;—the candy and sugar hearts and kisses with the mottoes
which he had hidden under her desk where she was sure to find them;—the
big red apples he gave her at recess, and his championship generally
when she needed it, as she frequently did,—for with her quick hot temper
she was a good deal of a fighter, and often battled both with the girls
and boys. Later on, when he was a grown young man and she a young lady,
how tender and true he had always been to her,—loving her with an
intensity which she realized now as she had never before. In his last
letter to her, received the day before she had decided to break his
heart, he had poured out his love like a torrent. “My darling,” he wrote
at the close, “you do not know how much I love you, or how glad I am
that I am so soon to see you. Only a few days more and you will be here,
and then in one short month you will be mine. It makes me faint with joy
to think of it. I am not half good enough for you, but if love and
devotion can make a woman happy, you shall be so, my darling, my queen,
my wife that is to be.”
She had burned the letter when she said yes to Col. Errington, but the
last sentences had stamped themselves upon her memory and came back to
her now, each one a stab as she sat there alone, seeing nothing, hearing
nothing, except the regular thud of the machinery, which she knew was
every moment taking her farther and farther away from the old life and
Jack. Yesterday at this time she was free, and could have withdrawn;
now, it was too late. She was bound; she could not go back if she would.
Possibly she would not if she could, so contradictory was her nature. A
life of wealth and luxury looked very attractive to her still, if she
could only have forgotten Jack. But she could not. His face was
everywhere. It looked at her from every wave which broke around the
boat; from every sail, and every angle on the deck where the dark
shadows were gathering as the short November day drew to a close; not
happy and buoyant as she had always seen it, but full of anguish, as she
knew it would be when her letter reached him. “Oh, Jack, Jack!” she said
aloud, as she leaned her head back so that her face was distinctly
visible to the man who stood behind her and whose approach she had not
heard.
Col. Errington had secured the seats he wanted at the Captain’s
table,—had met some New York acquaintances, had been congratulated on
his marriage, whose haste he had explained as he did to the clergyman,
and now he had come to introduce her and take her in to dinner and see
what impression she would make upon his friends. It was not particularly
pleasant for a bridegroom of less than twenty-four hours to hear his
bride repeating the name of his rival as Fanny repeated Jack’s, and for
a moment the Colonel clenched his fists and ground his teeth together,
muttering an oath under his breath. Then,—for he was not all hard,—there
came over him a feeling of pity for the girl who had never pretended to
love him, and whom he had lured from her allegiance to another man by
every art and argument of which he was capable.
“I shall not stand much of this, but for once I don’t mind,” he thought,
and his voice was very pleasant as he said to her, “Fanny, Fanny, have
you been asleep?”
“No, no,” she answered quickly, starting up from her reclining
position,—her face, which had looked so pale, flushing to the color of
the crimson satin lining of her hood; “why did you think me asleep?”
“You were talking aloud; better not give your thoughts to the winds
again,” he replied, rather significantly; then added, “dinner is ready
and I have come for you. Your seat is next to the Captain, and some of
my friends are at the same table. I want to present them to you. That
hood is very becoming to you, but you’d better not wear it to the table.
Give a brush or two to your hair and you are all right.”
They were in their stateroom now and Fanny was divesting herself of her
cloak and hood and giving the few touches to her hair which her husband
had suggested. Her gown of navy blue which Jack’s money had bought
fitted her fine figure admirably; the color had come back to her cheeks
and the sparkle to her eyes, and the Colonel was very proud of her as he
lead her into the dining-room and presented her to the Captain and those
of his friends whose seats were near his own. Gossip on a ship spreads
rapidly, and it had been rumored about so soon that she was the bride of
the elderly man who was so attentive to her. Also, that there was a
romance of some kind connected with the marriage, and many eyes were
directed to her as she took her seat at the table, with the Captain on
her left and her husband on her right. She knew she was attracting
attention, and her spirits began to rise as she talked with the Captain
and those near her to whom she had been introduced. In front of her was
a large bouquet of roses, with a card attached to it bearing her name;
near it was a basket of cut flowers, also bearing her name, both ordered
by the Colonel. In her ignorance of ship usages she fancied they might
be from the Captain, who was so attentive to her, or some other friend
of her husband’s, and she felt almost happy as she buried her face in
the lovely roses, which seemed to add a soft sweetness to her brilliant
beauty.
When dinner was over she went with her husband for a walk upon the deck
until the cold drove them to the saloon, where she was soon the center
of interest to the Colonel’s New York friends, who vied with each other
in paying her attention. Matters were not so bad after all, and it was a
pretty good thing to be the bride of a man as rich and well known as
Col. Errington. Jack and The Elms and Annie and Katy and Paul began to
grow misty and far away from this gay company of polished city people.
But they came back to her when, at a late hour, the party broke up and
the Colonel said he must have a cigar before retiring; but he conducted
Fanny to the door of her stateroom, and telling her he should not be
gone long left her alone with her wretched thoughts, which, as if to
make amends for the respite they had given her, came swarming into her
mind with redoubled force. The stateroom lost its prettiness; the
roaring of the sea reminded her of the wintry wind as it sometimes
howled through the woods and around the house at home when a wild storm
was sweeping over Lovering, and, worse than all, Jack’s eyes were
looking at her again from her wedding ring and the superb solitaire
which guarded it, to the gown his money had paid for and which she was
removing.
“Oh! Jack, Jack,—will your eyes haunt me always?” she whispered,
wringing her hands so hard that the diamond cut into her flesh.
Fanny could scarcely be called a religious person, but every night of
her life since she could remember, except her bridal night, she had said
the Lord’s Prayer, either with Annie, or Katy, or Paul, and now from
force of habit she knelt by her berth, which reminded her of a cupboard
shelf, and began the familiar words. Her voice was choked with sobs, and
when she reached “Forgive us our trespasses,” she said instead, “Forgive
what I have done, and take Jack’s eyes away, or I shall die.” Once in
her berth, which was as comfortable as a berth on a ship can ever be,
Jack’s eyes ceased to haunt her, and she might have fallen asleep if she
had not heard her husband’s step near the door. “I can’t speak to him
to-night,” she thought, with a shiver, and closing her eyes she feigned
sleep so successfully that when, as he called her name and she did not
answer, he cautiously parted the curtains and looked at her, he believed
her asleep, she lay so still, with her hands folded across her breast.
Jack would have kissed her at the risk of waking her. The Colonel only
thought how fair she was and that her beauty was his own, as he dropped
the curtain and went to his couch under the window, where he was soon
sleeping as soundly as if outside the wind was not rising until it blew
a gale, while the steamer rolled and pitched in a manner well calculated
to terrify one not accustomed to the sea.
For awhile Fanny listened to the roar outside and to the noise overhead
as the sailors hurried to and fro. At last when she could bear it no
longer, she called to her husband, “George, George, I am so frightened.
Are we in danger? Do ships ever tip over?”
“Tip over! No. There is no danger. It is only a little spurt of wind. It
will soon pass. Go to sleep, child,” the Colonel answered drowsily, and
his sonorous breathing soon idled the room again.
Fanny could not sleep, and as the wind increased and the ship rolled
more and more she decided that if she must drown it should be with her
clothing on. She got out of her berth and steadying herself by it
reached up for her dress which she had hung upon a hook and which was
swinging out in straight lines, with everything else which could swing.
Heretofore she had only been afraid. Now, however, she was suddenly
conscious of a new sensation so overmastering that she crept back into
her berth, wondering if she were dying, as the cold, clammy feeling
crept from her toes up to the roots of her hair, which seemed in her
nervous imagination to stand on end. As yet there was no other feeling
in her stomach than one of faintness and chill,—but when she raised her
head the nausea was so severe that the Colonel was roused from his sleep
and came at once to her aid.
“Am I dying?” she asked, and he answered with a laugh, “Dying! No. It’s
only seasickness. You will soon be over it.”
All night the retching and nausea continued, and when the grey dawn came
struggling through the porthole Fanny was as limp and white and still as
if she were dead.
The Colonel had called the doctor and stewardess when his remedies
failed, and they had removed her from the berth to the couch under the
window where she would have more air and light. And there she lay,
motionless, for if she stirred so much as a finger or turned her head
the terrible paroxysm seized and shook her until there was scarcely
strength in her to move. It was the worst case he had ever seen, the
doctor said, as the day wore on and she did not improve. He had said
this a good many times when he knew his patients wished to be
exceptions, but he meant it now, and became greatly interested in the
young bride, who puzzled him somewhat. As the seasickness decreased it
was succeeded by a severe pain in the head, with a burning fever, so
that at times she was delirious, and said things the Colonel would have
given much if she had left unsaid. Jack troubled her, or rather his
eyes, which were always looking at her. Many eyes he must have had, as
they were everywhere, and especially upon the wedding ring and the
solitaire. Here they blinded her if her hand lay outside the sheet. If
she covered it up, she saw them still;—not as distinctly, but saw them
looking at her, sometimes mockingly, but oftener reproachfully and full
of pain.
“Jack, Jack, go away!” she would say imploringly, and once, when the
Colonel was standing by her, she slipped the rings from her finger and
handing them to him said, “His eyes are on them all the time. Take them
away, and perhaps I shan’t see them so often.”
The Colonel took the rings and put them in his vest pocket, with a
feeling that he was beginning to reap in some small measure what he had
sown. It did not take long for his friends to know about the mysterious
Jack whose eyes haunted his wife, and one lady, bolder and more curious
than the others, asked him, “Who is Jack? Her brother?”
“He is not her brother,” was the curt reply, and the gleam in the
Colonel’s eyes warned the lady not to pursue the subject.
“Curse him!” the Colonel said to himself, as he went up on deck and in
the face of a fierce north-easter walked back and forth for half an hour
or more, his hands in his pockets and his head bent down as if to break
the force of the wind which beat so furiously upon him, but which he
didn’t feel at all.
A hurricane would scarcely have moved him, so bitter were his thoughts
and so deeply wounded his pride. He knew the ways of a ship and how the
passengers, shut up within themselves, hailed anything like gossip and
made the most of it, and he knew they were discussing his affairs and
building up theories with regard to the Jack whose eyes sat on his
wife’s pillow,—on the door,—on the window,—and lastly on her wedding
ring, which she had discarded. A few had been in to see her and what
they had not heard the stewardess had told, and every possible
conclusion was drawn with regard to the matter. All this he guessed as
he walked the deck cursing his rival, who, far away, was seeing Fanny’s
face just as she saw his, for this was on Tuesday night, when Jack was
at his worst.
“Curse him, and her, too, for loving a poor country fellow like that in
preference to _me_,” the Colonel said, and the emphasis on the _me_ told
how infinitely superior he though himself to Jack Fullerton and people
like him.
Accustomed all his life to deference and preference on account of his
wealth and family and distinguished appearance, he could not understand
how a man like Jack should be preferred to himself. In love in its
purest, truest sense he did not believe. It was a vealy sensation at its
best, fit only for the very young. Mature people knew better than to
indulge in it. The happiest marriages were marriages of convenience or
advancement, where for value received an equivalent was paid and the
bargain a fair one.
That he had not married before was his own fault. There was scarcely a
young woman of his acquaintance, either in Washington or New York, who
would not have thought twice before refusing Col. Errington, and he knew
it. Had it not been for his sister’s presence in his household he might
perhaps have married earlier, but aside from their little disagreements
she had made him so comfortable that he had never seriously considered
matrimony until little Fanny Hathern stood up so fearlessly and scorned
him to his face with all his troops behind him. He had never forgotten
her, and had always cherished a vague belief that she would some day be
his wife. When at last he made up his mind in earnest, he resolved that
nothing should stand in his way. He never asked himself if he loved her.
She would make a fine centre for his surroundings. She was bright and
spirited and beautiful and he wanted her, and had won her against the
odds of another suitor to whom she was pledged, and her wedding day only
a month in the distance. For Jack and what he might feel he did not care
at all. He was a man and would get over it, and possibly marry the other
twin,—the little brown-eyed woman whom he scarcely remembered, except
that she was small and quiet and gentle and far better suited to Jack
than Fanny with her piquancy and dash. It had been a fair bargain, he
thought; money and position _versus_ youth and beauty. He meant to
fulfill his part and give her everything his wife ought to have. Why
shouldn’t she fulfill her part, too, and be satisfied? Why should she
hanker so after that fellow, calling his name as he heard her call it on
the deck,—talking of him continually in her delirium,—seeing his eyes
everywhere until he himself began to have a creepy feeling and see them,
too. He had been as near loving her as he could love any one when she
kissed him in their stateroom and called him George, and that increased
his anger. Jealousy and mortified pride were torturing him about equally
as he strode on in the face of the wind, which increased more and more,
until a sudden lurch of the ship sent him into the midst of a pile of
chairs and brought his walk to a close.
With what sounded like an oath he struggled to his feet and descended to
the saloon, where a number of his friends were sitting, mostly ladies,
and all discussing the mysterious Jack. He did not hear a word they
said, but he knew at a glance the purport of their conversation, and a
hot, angry flash showed on his face for a moment. Then, on the instant,
he became his olden self,—the easy, courteous gentleman,—and when his
wife’s illness was alluded to, he spoke of her with great concern and
apparent affection.
The world should never know by any act of his of the rage in his heart
when he thought of Jack. Outwardly he would be the most devoted of
husbands, paying Fanny every possible attention. Alone with her, when
the world could not take note;—— Well, he hadn’t made up his mind what
he would do if this nonsense continued. The past could not be helped,
and she was not responsible for the secret she had betrayed to so many,
but in the future it must be different.
When at last he went to his stateroom he found her lying much as she did
that first night when she feigned sleep that he might not speak to her.
She was not feigning now. Her breath was regular and natural, and there
was a faint color in her cheeks which had grown thinner within the last
few days. Her hands were folded on her breast as they had been that
first night and he noticed more than he had ever done before how white
and small they were, and noted, too, with a pang, the absence of the
wedding ring still reposing in his vest pocket. When would she wear it
again? Would she ask for it, or would he have to offer it to her?
“Never! I’ll be —— first,” he said aloud, with so much vehemence that
Fanny stirred in her sleep,—moved her head a little, and with a smile
said, “What did you say, Jack?”
“I am not Jack. I’m your husband,” he answered savagely, and in a moment
Fanny’s eyes opened and looked at him questioningly. Then she said, “Oh,
George, is it you? I dreamed I was at home and somebody was swearing.”
“I know you were dreaming of home,” he replied, which made Fanny’s eyes
open wider and shine with a kind of reddish light, as they often did
when she was surprised and perplexed.
Was he angry, and why? and had she talked in her sleep? She didn’t know,
and she continued to look at him so appealingly, that he felt his wrath
giving way and a sensation of something like pity taking its place.
“You are better,” he said, and sitting down beside her told her whatever
he thought would interest her and that they were not very far from
Queenstown. “I shall cable from there to my sister, who, I suppose, is
at The Elms,” he said.
“What day is it?” Fanny asked, and he replied, “Sunday. We ought to be
at Queenstown this afternoon, but the rough weather has kept us back. We
shall see Ireland to-morrow.”
“Sunday;—yes;” Fanny said, remembering that everything was known in
Lovering by this time, and wondering how Jack took it.
The seasickness and fever were gone. She was only weak from their
effects, but quite herself mentally. She knew that she had dreamed of
home and Jack, and wondered if she had talked of him, but dared not ask.
Lifting up her hand to push her hair from her forehead she noticed the
absence of her rings, and looking at the Colonel with a smile she
extended the ringless hand to him and asked, “Where are they? I seem to
remember something about their worrying me. Did I take them off?”
“Yes; you said there were eyes in them looking at you all the time. They
are here. Do you want them again?” he replied, and held them up before
her.
“Why, yes,” she said. “Of course I want them. How it would look for me
to be passing as your wife with no wedding ring; put it on, please.”
It does not take much to soothe a man if he cares at all for a woman,
and in a way the Colonel did care for Fanny very much, and the touch of
her hand on his and the light which shone in her beautiful eyes fired
the flame again, and he held her hand for a moment before he put the
rings in their place; then, stooping over her, he kissed her on her
forehead.
The next day they reached Queenstown and a cablegram that they were safe
was sent to The Elms. Once he thought to stop at Queenstown and make the
remainder of the journey overland; but Fanny was very comfortable now;
the sea was comparatively calm and they kept on to Liverpool, which they
reached the eleventh day out from New York. He would like to have gone
directly to London, but Fanny was too utterly exhausted to allow of it.
She was almost as helpless as a little child, and a porter carried her
in his arms to the carriage in which she was driven to the North Western
Hotel. Here two or three days were spent until her strength came back
and she could walk across the room without a feeling that the floor was
rising up to meet her. It was Saturday before she was quite equal to the
journey. Then, securing a first class compartment all to himself, the
Colonel started on the second stage of his rather stormy honeymoon.
CHAPTER VI.
ON THE ROAD TO LONDON.
He was very attentive to Fanny during the rapid journey from Liverpool
to London. Fearful lest she should take cold, as the day was raw and
misty, he wrapped her fur-lined cloak around her,—made her put her feet
upon the hot water jugs,—gave her the whole of one side of the
compartment, himself taking the other, although he detested riding
backwards. Removing the arms of the seats on her side he arranged the
rugs and pillows so she could lie down when she was tired. Then, seating
himself in his corner opposite, he unfolded his newspaper, pretending to
read although he really was for the most of the time furtively watching
his wife and wondering of what she was thinking, and if all the luxury
and comfort with which he tried to surround her were as nothing when
compared to the lover she had given up for him. When they entered the
carriage she had sunk down wearily into the softly cushioned seat,—had
thanked him with a bright smile for his care, and then looked out upon
the people hurrying up and down the platform in quest of places, and
wondering a little who would come in with them and why they didn’t come.
Once the anxious face of a young English girl looked in at the window
and in a relieved voice called out, “Here mam-ma; here are plenty of
seats.” But the door did not yield to her touch. It was locked and the
Colonel’s quiet “Engaged for an invalid,” sent her on down the long line
of carriages destined for the St. Pancras Station in London. The English
girl was followed by a tall, strikingly handsome woman of twenty-eight
or thirty, wrapped in rich furs, and accompanied by a little withered
old man, who was talking French and gesticulating wildly with both
hands. As the lady was the taller of the two, it was she who glanced in
at the window, with the question “_Ya t’il des places ici,—oui, oui_,”
and she pulled at the handle of the door. “_Mon Dieu_,” was her next
exclamation, but whether elicited by the unyielding door and the
Colonel’s “Engaged, madame,” or Fanny’s face, on which her great black
eyes rested for a moment as if fascinated, was uncertain.
She moved on and the little old man waddled after her, while Fanny put
her head from the window to look again at the woman whose face had
struck her as one she had seen before.
It was not possible, though, as she had never known a real French woman,
such as this unquestionably was.
“Why is the door fastened, keeping everybody out?” she asked, and the
Colonel replied, “I don’t care to travel with Tom, Dick and Harry. I
have engaged the whole compartment.”
That one could do this was new to Fanny, and she sank back into her seat
with a feeling of dismay at the prospect of being shut up alone with her
husband for three or four hours. She was beginning to be a little afraid
of him. Not for anything he had done, but for something in the tone of
his voice and the expression of his eyes, which seemed to be looking at
her constantly until they made her almost as nervous as Jack’s had done
when she was ill. When the train left the station and the Colonel
resumed his paper she felt relieved, and began to look with curiosity
and interest upon the lanes and hedges and gardens and houses they were
passing so rapidly, and which, under the wintry sky, had none of the
freshness and greenness she had associated with England. Gradually she
became conscious that, instead of reading, her husband was watching her
over the top of his paper, with something hard and cruel in his eyes
which she could not understand. She knew nothing of what she had said in
her delirium, or how bare she had laid her love and longing for Jack,
and did not dream of the fierce jealousy and hatred of his rival filling
her husband’s mind and making him see _Jack_ written all over her face
just as she had seen his eyes everywhere when the fever was upon her. At
last, tired of the dreary landscape, and more tired of the scrutiny she
could not fathom, she lay down among the cushions and rugs and fell into
a dreamless sleep from which she did not fully rouse until they were
entering the suburbs of London. Once, when they were stopping at a large
town she was conscious that her husband said “Engaged” to some one, and
of hearing the hum of disappointed voices outside. Again, she knew that
a rug was thrown over her, and a window shade adjusted so as to shield
her from any cold air which might find its way to her. He was certainly
kind and she felt grateful for it, and when at last she was fully awake
and sitting up, she gave him a smile so bright and beaming that he felt
his pulse quicken, and the blue demons which had taken possession of him
were less blue and tantalizing.
“I have had a splendid sleep. Where are we now?” she said, pushing the
curtain away from the window which was covered with dirty splashes of
rain.
“In London,” he replied, and Fanny became alert and interested in a
moment.
To see London had been the dream of her life and one she had never
expected to be realized. Now, she was here, and the outlook was dreary
enough, with the yellow fog hanging low over the city,—the gas jets
dimly shining through it,—the pools of water in the streets,—and the
dirty streams mixed with coal dust and cinders falling from the roofs of
the houses. All her old homesickness came back, and she felt utterly
desolate and as if she wanted to be near someone. Taking her seat by her
husband and leaning her head on his shoulder she said, “Oh, George, this
is dreadful. London is ten times worse than New York ever thought of
being.”
“It is a deuced nasty day, but it will not always be foggy,” he replied,
as he busied himself with getting his bags and bundles together.
“No, it will not always be foggy, nor shall I always feel as I do now,”
Fanny thought, and the natural hopefulness of her nature began to assert
itself.
She was quite cheerful by the time the train ran into the St. Pancras
Station and began to unload its passengers.
As she alighted from the carriage she ran against and nearly knocked
down the little Frenchman, who was evidently trying to soothe and quiet
his wife, if she were his wife. Her back was towards Fanny, who saw only
the outline of her figure, and the coils of yellow hair under her hat.
She was talking loudly and evidently greatly enraged, but as she spoke
in French Fanny could not understand her. There was no more doubt that
she was a virago than there was that the little man was the most patient
and henpecked husband in the world. In response to Fanny’s, “I beg your
pardon, sir,” as she ran against him, he took off his hat and said in
broken English, “I you ask pardon, too, mademoiselle, to be so in your
way.”
Then turning towards the lady, “Madame quite—_fache_; madame, you
see,—_voiture_, so full _des Americaines, et des enfants_.”
At the sound of his voice, madame turned and Fanny met again the great
black, flashing eyes, with dark rings under them and a dusky look
generally, such as brush and pencil and belladonna give to eyes where
art has been at work. They were, however, quickly withdrawn, as if the
lady were ashamed that she had been heard, and while Fanny, puzzled
again, was trying to think if she could ever have seen those eyes
before, she hurried away with the little man following her.
“Were they quarreling?” Fanny asked, and the Colonel, who understood
French perfectly, replied, “I think she was angry because the
compartment she was in was full of children and Americans, whom she
evidently does not like.”
“Oh,” Fanny said, “you ought to have let her in with us. She interests
me somehow, and the old gentleman is lovely. I reckon it is good pious
work to live with Madame. I think he crossed himself once when she was
blowing him. See, there they are now,” and she pointed to the couple
entering a hansom at no great distance from them.
The lady was giving directions to the driver, who bowed assent, closed
the little trap door and drove away. Calling another hansom the Colonel
bade the man take them to Morley’s Hotel. It is a long way from St.
Pancras to Morley’s, and before the hotel was reached all the street
lamps were lighted, looking like so many tapers in the thick fog which
had settled everywhere and was almost as penetrating as rain. Damp to
her skin, tired and cold and homesick, Fanny was driven along the gloomy
streets, which seemed interminable.
“We shall soon be there now,” the Colonel said, as he saw how she
drooped, and felt her leaning against him.
A few moments later they turned into Trafalgar Square and she heard the
splash of the fountains and saw dimly the outlines of the huge lions
guarding the place.
“Here we are,” the Colonel said, as they drew up before the hotel, from
the windows of which cheerful lights were gleaming, while two or three
lackeys in uniform came hurrying out to meet them.
CHAPTER VII.—AUTHOR’S STORY CONTINUED.
AT MORLEY’S.
The Colonel had telegraphed for a suite of rooms on the second floor
looking out upon the Square, and he found them ready for him. A cheerful
fire in the salon, another in the bedroom, with every candle lighted in
the chandelier and in the candelabra upon the mantle. Divesting herself
quickly of her wet wrappings Fanny took an easy chair before the fire,
towards which she held her cold hands, while she said, “This is
delightful; the rooms are lovely, and I am so glad to be here.”
For a time she was glad. Jack and the old life had nothing to offer like
this luxurious apartment, with the warmth and the light, and a little
later on the waiter asking when Madame would have dinner served.
“Now,—at once,” the Colonel answered for her, saying, when the man had
gone, “We dine in here. I have no fancy for _table d’hôtes_ with all the
canaille and bourgeois round me. One can’t be too careful in Europe as
to his acquaintances.”
Fanny, who was very social in her nature and liked to see people,
preferred, as a rule, to mingle with them, but to-night she was so tired
that she was glad to dine by themselves, and she felt a thrill of
satisfaction that she was able to do so without counting the cost. Once,
when quite a young girl, she had gone to the Spotswood in Richmond, with
her father, who was not feeling well and to whom she had suggested that
he have his dinner in his room.
“No, daughter; there would be an extra charge and I cannot afford it,”
he had said.
She was very poor then;—she was rich now, and need not mind expense. It
was a good thing to be rich, and she felt glad and content as she
nestled down in the easy chair and felt its soft folds about her and the
glow of the fire on her face and watched the two waiters laying the
table for dinner, with cut glass and silver and the finest of linen, and
a vase of flowers in the centre.
“If father were only here to share it with me,” she thought, recalling
the many straits to which poverty had reduced them. “If he could share
it with me,—or Annie,—or Katy,—or—Jack!”
The last name sent her blood rushing so hotly through her veins that she
moved away from the fire as if it scorched her. She did not mean to be
disloyal to her husband, and it did not occur to her that she was as she
began to wonder how she should feel if it were Jack whom she heard
stepping around so briskly in the dressing-room, making himself ready
for dinner. She could see just how he would look lounging easily up to
her with a smile on his face and in his laughing eyes which had never
rested upon her except with love and tenderness. It was not Jack, but a
tall, stern, dignified man, who emerged from the dressing-room just as
the soup was put upon the table, and led her to her seat. The dinner was
excellent and well served, and Fanny, who was hungry for the first time
since her marriage, enjoyed it with a keen relish of a healthy appetite.
She was young and hopeful and elastic in her temperament, and as her
spirits rose she laughed and joked until her face, which had lost
something of its freshness during her illness, grew bright and
sparkling, and her husband thought with pride how beautiful she was and
almost forgave her for the _eyes_ which had troubled her so on
shipboard. They had gone through all the courses and the black coffee
had been brought in. This the Colonel took by the fire, while Fanny
still sat at the table sipping hers and occasionally tasting a Hamburg
grape. The waiter had just gone out when there was a knock at the door
and a servant entered bringing a cablegram upon a silver salver. It came
several days ago, he said, and the clerk at the office had forgotten to
give it to the gentleman when he registered.
Naturally the Colonel put out his hand to take it when the waiter said
quietly, “If you please, it is for the lady.”
“For me!” Fanny exclaimed in surprise. “Who can have telegraphed to me?”
Taking the message in her hand she read the address aloud:—“Mrs. Geo. W.
Errington, Morley’s Hotel, London, Eng.”
It was the first time she had seen her new name in writing, and it gave
her a peculiar sensation as she studied it for a moment.
“It’s a cablegram from home and may have bad news. Open it,” the Colonel
said, and instantly Fanny’s fingers were tearing at the envelope and she
was reading the message: “The Elms, Thanksgiving morning. To Mrs. G. W.
Errington. Mr. Fullerton is here and very ill with brain fever. Recovery
doubtful. C. Errington.”
For a moment everything in the room swam before Fanny’s eyes, but she
neither spoke nor stirred until the Colonel, alarmed at the whiteness of
her face, came to her side and asked “What is it?” She gave him the
cablegram which he read aloud and then said, “That’s bad. A fever is
likely to go hard with a man of Mr. Fullerton’s temperament.”
The next moment he repented his words, calling himself a brute, partly
for his thoughtlessness and more for the vindictive feeling which had
prompted it.
“Oh, Jack! I have killed you,” Fanny cried, stretching out her hands,
and then lying back in her chair in a dead faint, the first she had ever
had in her life.
It was one thing to give Jack up voluntarily, and know that somewhere in
the world he was still alive, remembering and loving her, as she
believed he would, and another thing to think of him as dead,—gone out
of her life forever,—murdered by her. That was the way she put it, and
murderess was the word in her mind when she cried out, “Oh, Jack, I have
killed you.” She had no doubt as to the cause of his illness. He had
received her letter, enclosed in Annie’s, and been stricken down at once
in the old home where he had expected to make her his wife and where
both Miss Errington and Katy were now. When Thanksgiving came on the
_Celtic_ she was too ill to know or care what day it was, and she had
not thought of it since. But she remembered now all the bright
anticipations of that day of which both Annie and Jack had written to
her,—the dinner they were to have and for which Phyllis was making so
great preparations, and after dinner the walk or drive to “Our house on
The Plateau.” This last was the burden of Jack’s letter to her, and now
she was another man’s wife, and Jack was dying, or dead. All her work,
and she was as surely a murderess as if with her hand she had killed
him. It takes some time to tell all this, but it scarcely took Fanny a
second to think it, so rapid were her thoughts and conclusions before
she became unconscious. The Colonel had seen death in many phases on the
battlefield, but no face had ever affected him like this, which was so
still and white with a grieved expression around the mouth pitiful to
see. He was glad he was alone with her, and when he heard the servant
coming to clear the table he called to him to wait until he got Madame
to her room, as she was ill. Taking her in his arms he carried her to
their sleeping-room, loosened her dress, laid her upon the bed, and then
applied every restorative which came to his mind, water, cologne,
camphor, bay rum and ammonia, with no effect whatever for a time, and he
began to wonder if it were possible for her to die upon his hands. At
last, however, after what seemed to him an interminable length of time,
she recovered and asked in some surprise what had happened, and why her
hair and dress were so wet and why she was on the bed.
“You had a cablegram and fainted,” the Colonel explained, and then it
came to her.
“Yes, I know,” she said, with a sob. “Jack is dead, and I killed him.”
“Humbug!” the Colonel answered, sternly. “He is not dead. If he were my
sister would have cabled again. This message was sent several days ago.
Brain fever runs its course quickly. He is better by this time. Don’t
make another scene. Restrain yourself. I am not fond of high tragedy,
especially when the hero is another man. I have had enough of it.”
Fanny had never heard him speak like this, and her heart stood still a
moment and her breath came in short gasps, as she watched him putting
the bottles of camphor and cologne and bay rum in their places and saw
how pale he was and how his hands trembled. Something like pity for him
was in her heart, but a stronger feeling overmastered it. She must know
if Jack were living.
“George,” she said, her voice compelling him to go to her against his
will. “George,” she continued, looking up at him with eyes which held
his, much as he wished to withdraw them, “I am sorry for it all, but I
must know if Jack is alive, and you must cable to your sister to-night,
if possible,—to-morrow, sure.”
Mentally the Colonel swore he wouldn’t, but Fanny’s face conquered, and
the message “How is Jack?” which his sister received was sent by him
with Fanny’s name appended. The next two days were not very merry ones
to either the Colonel or Fanny. _She_ sat silent and shivered by the
fire, counting the hours as they went by, and every time there was a
knock at the door starting up in hopes that the word which meant life or
death had come. _He_ spent many hours in the smoking and reading room
trying to divert his mind from what weighed upon him almost as heavily
as it did upon Fanny. Again, he took long walks through the damp and
fog, cursing his folly in marrying a girl who loved another as he now
knew Fanny loved Jack, and trying to arrange his future. She was his
wife. Nothing could undo that, and he did not know that he wanted it
undone. He could still be very proud of her, if she would behave herself
and not go pining and puling after another man, and this she should do.
He was resolved upon that. Whether Jack lived or died she was to seem to
forget him and be loyal to himself outwardly, whatever she might feel.
She had married him for money. She should have it in full measure, and
return to him an equivalent in obedience to his will. No one had ever
thwarted that with impunity, and his wife should not be the first to do
it. It seemed to him he had walked over nearly half of London when he
came to this conclusion and began to feel that he was tired. Hailing a
hansom he was driven to the hotel where he found his sister’s second
cablegram, which he took at once to his wife. She was sitting just as he
had left her hours before, wrapped in a shawl before the fire, with a
hopeless look upon her face, which made him angry, and also sorry for
her as he handed her the envelope and watched her as she tore it open
and read, “He is better.”
He had never dreamed that a face could change as hers did in an instant.
“George, George,” she exclaimed. “He is better; he will live; and I am
not a murderess. I am so glad; so glad.”
She was not chilly now. The shawl was thrown aside, and it was her own
suggestion that they should dine below with the other guests rather than
in their private salon as they had done heretofore.
“Now that I do not feel the mark of Cain on my forehead I want to see
people. I have been mewed up here long enough,” she said; and the
Colonel assented, although in his present state of mind he cared little
where he took his dinner.
He asked for a table apart by himself and to it he conducted his wife,
whose grace and beauty could not fail to attract attention, and who
talked with him as airily as if there were no sore spot in her heart
which would never quite cease to throb with a dull pain when memory’s
fingers touched it. At some little distance from them, at a table by
themselves, sat the Frenchman and his wife, the little man bowing and
throwing out his hand very politely to Fanny, while saying something to
the lady whose back was to them, and who never moved from her rather
stiff position. She was elaborately and elegantly attired, evidently for
the opera. Her dress, V-shaped before and behind, showed a part of her
white, plump neck, on which a few short golden curls were falling from
the coil arranged above them.
“Look, George; there’s the little old man and his wife; I wonder who
they are,” Fanny said, and the Colonel replied, “They are registered
‘Monsieur and Madame Felix, Paris.’ The clerk says they come here often
and that he is very rich. I imagine she is a terror, as I overheard her
giving him Hail Columbia for something. I couldn’t tell what, but
fancied it was about _you_, and that he either wanted her to call at our
door and inquire, or send you some flowers. He remembered seeing you at
the station and had taken the great liberty, he called it, to ask for
you, and seemed concerned when I told him that you were not well and
were keeping your room. She affects a great deal of hauteur and reserve,
but is a magnificent looking woman,—very Frenchy, with her dark eyes and
yellow hair. I thought at first it might be a wig, but it isn’t; it is
all her own, growing on her head. I had a glimpse of her in the hall one
day, hurrying to her room, in a crimson silk dressing-gown, with all
that hair hanging down her back below her waist. She knew I saw her and
actually smiled upon me, showing a set of very white, even teeth and a
pair of brilliant eyes.”
Cold and passionless as the Colonel seemed he never saw a beautiful
woman that he did not at once take in every point of her beauty from her
head to her feet, and as the French lady, who had excited Fanny’s
curiosity, was beautiful, or certainly very attractive, he waxed so
eloquent over her that some women might have been jealous. But Fanny
scarcely heard him. She was thinking of the cablegram which had relieved
her anxiety for Jack, and of the long letter she meant to write to Annie
that night. The Colonel was going to the opera and had asked her to
accompany him, but she did not feel quite strong enough. So he left her
alone and she began her letter, telling of her fearful seasickness and
homesickness, and her remorse and pain when she received the news that
Jack was dangerously ill; struck down, she was sure, by her act.
“If he had died I should never have known another moment’s peace of
mind, for I should have known I was the cause of his death,” she wrote.
“But, thank God he is better, and there has been a little song of joy in
my heart ever since I heard it. The world could never be the same to me
with Jack gone from it.”
As she began to feel tired she did not finish the letter, but left it
open on the writing desk, intending to finish it in the morning. She did
not hear her husband when he came in, nor knew that her letter had
caught his eye at once, with Jack’s name occurring so often on the page
open in view that he had stopped and unconsciously at first read a few
lines. Ordinarily he would have held another’s letter sacred, but now
with his anger and jealousy aroused he took up this and read it with
wrath and disgust. The next morning when Fanny awoke she found her
husband up and dressed and standing by the bedside looking at her.
Opening her eyes drowsily, and smiling up at him, she said, “Have I
overslept? What time is it, please?”
He did not answer her, but instead held up her letter which he had read
again with more bitterness than on the previous night.
“Fanny,” he began, and his voice was full of concentrated anger and
determination, “this nonsense must be stopped. I have had enough of it.
You are my wife. I cannot control your thoughts, but I can your actions,
and I will not have you writing home such sentimental trash as this
about seasickness and homesickness, as if you were the most wretched
woman in the world. If you were so fond of Jack, why under Heavens did
you take _me_,—and having taken me why do you prove faithless to your
marriage vows by clinging so to _him_. This letter will _not_ go for my
sister or your adorable Jack to exult over, saying we are both reaping
our just deserts.”
He tore the letter in shreds, which he threw into the fire. For a moment
Fanny was speechless, then all her spirit and temper rose and her eyes
were like two volcanoes, emitting spits of flame, as she said, “Do you
call yourself a gentleman, and is it usual for gentlemen to read their
wives’ letters as you have read mine?”
The taunt stung him, but he would not apologize, although he winced
under the blaze of her eyes and the lash of her tongue. For a moment he
let her have her own way and say what she chose; then buckled on his
armor, which she could no more resist than she could strike her head
against a wall hoping to move it. The fire in her black eyes was more
than matched by the steely hardness of his, as he met her impetuous
reproaches with words spoken very slowly and very low, but which left
her vanquished and him master of the field and of her. It was a terrible
battle, southern fire against northern coolness, and the latter
conquered. Henceforth Fanny would go when he told her to go, come when
he told her to come, do what he bade her do.
“But thank God I can _think_ what I please and of whom I please, and you
cannot help yourself,” was her last defiant fling, as she dressed
herself hurriedly and sat down to the breakfast which was served in
their parlor and had waited some time while the matrimonial difference
was settled.
Hot as was Fanny’s temper there was nothing sullen or vindictive in her
nature, while the Colonel prided himself upon never striking a
superfluous blow after the nail was driven in. If he was fierce in war
he could be generous in peace, and if the waiter who served them that
morning had been questioned upon the subject, he would have reported
them as examples of conjugal harmony and affection. Madame, he might
have said, was rather quiet, with a bright red spot on either cheek,
while _Milor_ was very attentive to her, urging her to eat, and planning
where he was to take her that day. First, shopping. He had met several
friends the night before, both English and American, all of whom were
coming to call. He had an invitation to dinner the next day but one at
the house of an English lady, who had spent a part of a winter in
Washington and been entertained by him and his sister. She had just
heard he was in London and hoped he would accept her invitation, if it
were rather late to give it. He also had tickets to hear Patti, and was
to occupy a box with Lady _Hyer_, an American, who had married an earl.
This necessitated a suitable outfit, and all the morning was spent at
Marshall & Snelgrove’s and Peter Robinson’s, deep in the mysteries of
silks and velvets and laces, as shown and recommended by the saleswoman
and pronounced upon by the Colonel, who proved a connoisseur in matters
of dress, and without really seeming to do so decided on every purchased
article. Surrounded by so much elegance and receiving so much attention
and deference, Fanny’s spirits rose. The scene of the morning, though
rankling a little, was partially forgotten in the glamour of the dinner
and evening dresses which were finally decided upon and were very
becoming to her. The corsage of both was high, notwithstanding that the
saleswoman had pleaded for something different.
“Madam’s neck was so white and smooth that it was a pity to cover it
even with lace,” she said, while Fanny’s choice was the same as hers,
but that did not matter. The Colonel knew her neck was smooth and fair,
but it was for him only. No other man should look upon it, and he vetoed
the low necks, but yielded to the short sleeves, which would only leave
bare her arms, over which the saleswoman went into ecstasies.
All that evening and a part of the next day boxes of dry goods of
various kinds kept coming to the Colonel’s apartments, which looked like
some gay bazaar with Fanny in the midst, excited and seemingly happy and
oblivious of all that had gone before, except occasionally when a sigh,
or a sudden pressure of her hand upon her heart told that she remembered
and was exercising her right to think her own thoughts untrammeled by
anyone. The Colonel was very suave and gracious, enjoying her enthusiasm
and smiling upon her as upon a wayward but conquered child. On the night
of the dinner party, as she stood before him, radiant and lovely, and
asked what he thought of her, he answered, “I think you will be the most
beautiful woman there, after I have made a few additions to your toilet.
Look here,” and pulling her down beside him, he laid in her lap a pair
of exquisite diamond earrings, the stones large and white and clear, and
showing their value by their brilliancy and depth. He fastened them in
her ears himself, and then clasped around her wrists a pair of superb
bracelets, scarcely less expensive than the diamonds.
“Oh, George,” she said, as she stood up and saw in the mirror the flash
of the precious stones which enhanced her beauty, “Oh, George, you are
kind, and I thank you so much, and I mean to be good.”
The last words were spoken with a half sob as she put her arms around
his neck. She didn’t kiss him. The memory of the bitter words he had
said to her was too fresh in her mind for that. But she was grateful and
pleased, and as the Colonel had predicted, she was by far the most
beautiful woman in Mrs. Harcourt’s drawing room and received the most
attention. There was nothing like _gaucherie_ in Fanny’s manner. She
conformed readily to the atmosphere around her, and the English, usually
so critical where Americans are concerned, forgot to criticise and found
her wholly charming and let her know they did. Never in her life had she
been so flattered and admired, and never had she been more sparkling and
said brighter, wittier things in a ladylike way than now. She had found
her place in society at last; the one she had dreamed of but never
thought to attain, and for the time she was happy, drinking the brimming
cup, and the past was blotted out. She had often said to herself, “It is
good to be rich and somebody,” and she said it now with great unction as
the people crowded around her and vied with each other in paying her
homage. Among them was Lady Hyer, who, proud of her countrywoman,
invited her with her husband to spend the Christmas holidays at her
house in Surrey, where she was to entertain a large party.
“Oh, I should like it so much, if my husband thinks best,” Fanny said,
her eyes dancing with delight as she anticipated the pleasures of a
visit in an English country house where she knew she would be the queen.
Yes, it was good to be rich and somebody, and as the Colonel, although
non-committal on the subject, seemed to favor the plan, she felt sure
that she should go, and began to think of other dresses which would be
necessary if a week were spent at Grey Gables, Lady Hyer’s country seat.
She might perhaps have gone there if it had not been for the undue
attentions of Tom Hyer, Lord Hyer’s younger brother, who made no attempt
to conceal his admiration, and who, when the gentlemen were left alone
with their cigars, urged the Colonel to accept his sister-in-law’s
invitation.
“You’ll meet no end of swell people there and in the neighborhood,” he
said. “Cream of society, and madame will be in the swim at once, don’t
you know: The Prince occasionally visits at some of the houses, and, by
Jove, I heard he was coming this winter. If so, Lou, that’s Lady Hyer,
will nab him if she can; and let him once see madame, her success is
sure, don’t you know.”
“Yes, I know,” the Colonel replied, bowing stiffly and longing to thrash
the cad who thought that the notice of the Prince could add to his
wife’s reputation.
On the contrary it would detract from it, and he wanted to tell him so.
But the shallow young man would not have understood him, if he had. He
had finished his cigar and joined the ladies, and when the Colonel
returned to the drawing room he found him seated by Fanny and filling
her ears with the gay times she would have at Grey Gables, where he
hoped to meet her again. But the festivities of Grey Gables and its
neighborhood, with the Prince of Wales as a possible central figure,
were not for Fanny, and when she asked her husband why he declined the
invitation, he answered curtly, “Because I choose to do so.”
Two days after the dinner party Fanny wrote another letter to her sister
very different from the first. There was no regret in it for what she
had done,—no mention of homesickness, or Jack; nothing, in short, that
the most jealous and exacting husband could not read. She offered it to
the Colonel when it was finished, but he declined, saying in much the
same tone a father might adopt towards a child who had been punished for
some misdemeanor, “I think I can trust you now that you know what my
wishes are. I will direct it for you, if you like.”
Fanny handed him the envelope, and while he was addressing it added the
few words which embodied so much love and longing for news from home and
Jack and told Miss Errington that the bending process had begun as she
had predicted it would begin. There were one or two more dinners with
lunches and calls and drives, and then the Colonel began to talk of the
continent and Paris. There he intended finding a maid for Fanny and a
valet for himself. Both were necessary adjuncts and would add to his
importance, he thought. To Fanny the idea of a maid was very pleasing,
but she preferred one who spoke her own language as well as French.
“If I could only find Julina Smith, I should like it,” she said, “and I
think she would be glad to see me. I suppose, though, she is married by
this time, or is too fine a person to be a maid. But she might know of
some one who would be trusty, which is a great thing to be considered.
Her aunt, whose name was Du Bois, kept a French pension, and Julina
lived with her. Perhaps Madame Felix might know the place, as she lives
in Paris. I wish I dared ask her. I know she is here yet, but she avoids
me as if I were the plague.”
For answer to this the Colonel laughed derisively at the idea of
consulting Madame Felix with regard to a _pension_. There were ways of
finding Du Bois and Julina, too, if necessary, he said, without
interviewing Madame, who never heard of either. He, too, knew that she
was still in the hotel, although he seldom saw her. The little old man
was ill and she took her meals in her room with him. Occasionally,
however, the Colonel came upon her walking up and down the hall as if
for exercise. At such times she always gave him a nod of recognition,
with a lighting up of her eyes which interested him more than he cared
to confess. She was very aristocratic in her feelings and very exclusive
he was sure, and this did not at all detract from his desire to know
her. Meeting her in the hall the day after his conversation with Fanny
he lifted his hat a little more deferentially than usual, and begging
her pardon for the liberty, ventured to inquire for her husband who he
had heard was ill.
Instantly Madame’s fine eyes became humid, and her voice full of pathos,
as she replied that Monsieur, although better, was still too ill to
continue their journey to Paris where she so desired to be, or rather to
Passy, where they had a chateau full of servants waiting impatiently for
them.
The Colonel was naturally very much concerned about Monsieur and very
sorry for Madame, who was most artistically dressed and looked very
handsome as she stood in the shadow with her back to the light. The
Colonel knew that she was artificial and Frenchy through and through,
but she attracted him as she did every man, and he went on to speak of
the weather and Paris, where he was soon going, and then he rather
awkwardly dragged in Julina Smith and the Du Bois Pension, which his
wife was anxious to find. It was hardly probable, but just possible that
Madame, who knew Paris so well, might have heard of the Du Bois Pension
and could direct him to it. Not that he expected to stop there, or at
any other pension. He was going to the Grand, he hastened to say, as
even in the shadow he saw the light kindling in Madame’s eyes and
mistook its meaning. His wife was very anxious to get on the track of
Julina Smith, who had once lived in her family, and might be of some
service to her in selecting a maid.
For an instant Madame Felix was silent; then, with an outward gesture of
her hand, as if thrusting from her something obnoxious, she said in a
hard, sarcastic tone, “Monsieur the Colonel does me great honor to
enquire of me for the Du Bois Pension and Julina Smith, but I know
neither one nor the other, I never kept an intelligence office. Good
morning, Monsieur.”
With a haughty shrug of her shoulders she swept down the hall, leaving
the Colonel discomfitted and abashed, and a good deal ashamed of
himself. What should a superb creature like Madame Felix know of Du Bois
and Julina Smith, and what a fool he had been to speak of them to her
and incur her contempt. He did not tell Fanny of his adventure, which he
knew was prompted not so much by a desire to learn of Julina Smith’s
whereabouts as to talk with Madame, who had rebuffed him as he deserved.
The little old man, as Fanny always called Monsieur, must have recovered
strength rapidly, for the next morning, when the Colonel went to the
office he found him sitting there wrapped in furs and shawls, waiting
for the carriage which was to take him to the Victoria Station. Putting
out his wrinkled, withered hand, he bade him good morning cheerily. He
was feeling better, he said, and as Madame had suddenly taken it into
her head to go home, they were going, as far as Paris at least. He had
an incurable and painful disease, and should probably never see England
or Monsieur again, he said; but he spoke very cheerfully, as if the next
world would be quite as pleasant as he had found this. Then he inquired
for Fanny and sent his best compliments to her.
“She has a bonny face, which interests me,” he said. “She has smiled
pleasantly upon me. I like her. I thank her. Tell her so. If I live, and
you stay long in Paris, come to the Hotel Felix in Passy. _Au revoir_,
Monsieur. Here is Madame.”
She came bustling in, muffled to her chin in her wraps and followed by
her maid and her husband’s valet, who took possession of his master and
almost carried him to the carriage outside. Madame’s adieus were
politely made, but she did not second her husband’s invitation to Passy,
or inquire for Fanny. She had not forgiven him for Du Bois and Julina
Smith, but her hauteur relaxed a little when he conducted her to the
carriage and stood with uncovered head as it drove away. Three days
later he followed in the same direction, and for a time fades from our
canvas and is lost sight of in the mazes of Continental travel.
CHAPTER VIII.—AUTHOR’S STORY CONTINUED.
CHANGES IN LOVERING.
Two years had passed since Annie sat with Jack in “our room” at The
Plateau and read the letter which came so near wrecking his life, and
now it was the day before Thanksgiving and she was alone in the great
silent house. Katy, Paul and Jack were all gone, and only the memory of
what had been was left to keep her company. It was nearly six months
since Katy left for Europe with Miss Errington, who had had the young
girl with her much of the time since Fanny’s marriage and had given her
the best musical instruction in Washington. Miss Errington, who had no
particular prejudice against the stage, and who believed that a pure
good woman could be as good and pure there as elsewhere, had not at
first discouraged Katy’s leaning towards it. This was before she knew
her well and understood how simple-hearted and innocent and trustful she
was; believing everyone to be what he seemed, and how she recoiled from
every thing like deception or sham or unpleasant familiarity. Such a
girl was not fitted for the stage, where she must at times come in
contact with much that would shock her refined and sensitive nature. And
when Miss Errington came to understand this she changed her tactics and
very quietly threw her influence the other way. But the seed had been
sown and Katy never listened to a prima donna that she did not feel a
desire to stand in her place and see what she could do towards moving
the crowd as Nilsson and others moved it. For the theatre and its plays
she did not care. The opera was her ambition, and she believed she could
fill the largest house in the world and scarcely feel the effort.
Several times she had sung at receptions, and once in public with other
amateurs for some charitable object, and as she heard the bursts of
applause which greeted her, and received the quantities of flowers
thrown at her feet, she thought, “If this is what it is to be a public
singer it must be delightful.” Then she remembered Carl’s words, “I
would rather see you dead than on the stage.”
Fan had said the same, but her saying was not quite like Carl’s. “And
yet he is nothing to me that I should care for his opinion,” she
thought, knowing the while that she did care, and that the most
thunderous applause that ever shook the Grand Opera House in Paris, or
Berlin, or Naples, would be nothing to her if Carl’s approval were
withheld. She had met him once or twice during her winter in Washington,
and his attentions had been so loverlike that Miss Errington had said to
her, “Carl Haverleigh will propose to you if he has a chance.”
“I shall not give it to him; for if I did and accepted him he would
forget me in a month,” was Katy’s answer.
She still remembered the rambles in the woods and the talks beneath the
pines in the hillside cemetery, at home, when he had looked and acted
love, if he had not spoken it, and she remembered, too, his words to
Annie, accidentally overheard, “If any girl thinks my attentions to her
more than those of a friend it is because she does not understand me.”
She did understand him, she thought, and as she had treated him on
Thanksgiving day at the Elms, when he had proposed sending for the
clergyman and having a wedding after all, so she treated him
now,—pleasantly, familiarly, but never giving him an opportunity of
being alone with her. He came to New York to see her off, when with Miss
Errington and Norah, who accompanied them as maid, she started for
Europe. Owing to some misapprehension with regard to the sailing of the
steamer he only reached it in time to see her for a few moments, and
that with a crowd of people surging around them. Just at the last, when
the command for “all ashore who are going ashore” was given, he said, “I
hear you are to study music in Berlin, and with Marchesi in Paris. Is
that so?”
“Possibly,” she replied, and he continued: “Have you still career on the
brain?”
Something in his tone irritated her, and she answered promptly, “Yes.”
“Then, good-bye,” he said, and taking her hand he wrung it hard and left
her.
There were hundreds of people upon the wharf and hundreds upon the ship
as it moved away, but Carl saw only one,—a tall, slender girl, in a
sailor hat with a blue veil twisted around it, who waved to him until
the boat swung out into the river and she was lost to view. Annie’s
good-bye had been said at home, where she was left alone with Paul and
Jack.
Over the latter a change was gradually coming. It is often the case that
when God takes one blessing from us he gives us another in its place,
and this was verified with Jack. He had lost Fanny, and the loss for a
time crushed him bodily and mentally, blotting all the sunshine of his
life and leaving him without hope or courage or faith in anything. Then
reaction came with renewed health and vigor, and he woke to the fact
that God was not the cruel master he had thought him when his hour was
at its worst. There was still something left to live for. Old interests
began to come back—in the people around him and in his business. The
latter was prospering greatly. Stocks in which he had invested were
rising in value. Lands which he had thrown upon the market with little
hope of sale were in demand, as were also his services as agent for a
large commercial house which paid him double the salary he had before
received. This necessarily took him a great deal from Lovering, which he
still called his home, although he had rooms in Richmond and St. Louis,
where a part of his time was spent. The house on The Plateau remained
unsold and closed,—not for lack of purchasers, as several offers had
been made him for it, but he declined them all. “Some time, perhaps, I
shall sell it, but not now. I am not ready to part with it yet,” he
would say, and clung to it with a persistency which surprised his
friends, and none more so than Annie. To her it seemed like a tomb, with
its barred doors and closed shutters and air of loneliness around it.
She still kept the keys, and every week or two went up and opened it to
let in the air and see that all was safe. Everything was there as it had
been two years ago, except the piano, which Miss Errington had insisted
upon having returned. The chair in which Fanny was to sit and watch for
Jack stood in the bay window with the table and the work-box upon it.
The medallion, so like Fanny as a child, still smiled on Annie whenever
she entered the room. Every time Jack came to town, whether for a longer
or shorter stay, he went to The Plateau, sometimes staying hours and
sometimes only minutes, as the fancy took him. What he thought or felt
as he sat or walked through the rooms, where so many hopes had been born
and died, no one ever knew, for he gave no sign except that his face,
when he left the place, was sad, as our faces are when we come from the
graves of our dead. But this was wearing away. His step was growing more
elastic, his voice more cheery, and his whole manner more like himself.
“He is getting over it,” people said, and were glad and rejoiced with
him in his recovered spirits and increasing prosperity. His home proper
in Lovering was now at the hotel, where his room was fitted up with some
of his mother’s furniture, but he spent most of his time at The Elms
with Annie. He did not call her Annie-mother now, or often call her
anything, or talk as much to her as he used to do. And she was content
to sit with him in silence, satisfied to have him with her and glad that
he was in a more healthful state of mind. Fanny’s name was never
mentioned by him, or to him by any one, and, for all he knew, she might
have been dead and buried.
The last Annie heard from her she was in Paris with her husband, who was
suffering from rheumatism and malaria, contracted either in Rome or on
the Riviera, and which was so severe as to confine him to his room and
chair. In her last letter, written in October, Fanny had said, “We are
coming home as soon as George can make up his mind to bear the journey
from Paris to Havre.” After this Annie knew nothing more of her except
the little she heard from Paul, who had been in Paris with Carl three
months or more. The physician in Richmond, to whom he had been taken by
Annie, had made light of his lameness, saying it would wear off in time.
But it did not wear off, and after Katy’s departure it increased so
rapidly that Annie felt constrained to write the truth to Carl and ask
what she was to do. As if anxious to make amends for any former neglect
or forgetfulness, Carl had written very often to Paul since his last
visit to The Elms, and had sent him many packages, containing sometimes
money, sometimes books and toys, or whatever else he thought would
please him. And now, on the receipt of Annie’s letter, he came at once
full of concern, which deepened when he saw the child’s worn face and
the slight limp he could not conceal. There was a rapid journey to
Philadelphia, another to New York, and a third to Boston, with
consultations in each city with the best surgeons and with the same
verdict,—hip disease in its incipient stage. Each one consulted was sure
he could effect a cure, and each also admitted that probably better
medical aid could be had in Paris than elsewhere.
“Then to Paris we will go,” Carl said to Annie on his return to The
Elms; “and you will go with us.”
But Annie shook her head. She had a mortal terror of the sea which she
could not overcome. To save Paul’s life she would cross it, but hardly
otherwise. Fanny was in Paris; Katy was somewhere in Europe with Miss
Errington and Norah, and would undoubtedly go to Paris if necessary.
“With Fanny and Katy both there you will not need me, and somebody must
stay and keep the home fire burning for the rest to come back to when
they are tired of wandering,” she said, conscious as she said it of
another reason of which she could not speak.
Aside from her dread of the long journey and her terror of the sea was a
growing feeling that she could not leave Jack. No word of love for her
had ever passed his lips, but something told her that over the grave in
his heart new hopes were springing, the tendrils of which were reaching
towards herself. When he last started on his journey west, which was to
last for a longer time than usual, he had thrown his arm across her
shoulders as he stood talking to her in the hall before bidding her
good-bye. Looking up in his face she had seen something in it she never
saw before and which made her drop her eyes and hang her head.
“God bless you, Annie,” he said, putting his hand under her chin and
turning her face up to his again, “God bless you for all you were to me
in the dark days which are brightening now so fast that I see the past
only through a mist, and that is rapidly lifting. Good-bye.”
He stooped and kissed her on her forehead and was gone, but his kiss
still burned where he had imprinted it, and she saw the look in his eyes
and heard his voice speaking to her as he had never spoken before. So
when Carl came and asked her to go to Europe, she shrank from it with a
feeling that she could not.
“I know I am selfish,” she said, “and it breaks my heart to have Paul go
without me, but indeed I cannot go.”
After this Carl did not urge her, but began to look around for some
reliable man with whom he could trust Paul at all times and in all
places. This point Paul settled himself. At the time when Sam Slayton
had been caring for Jack at The Elms a great friendship had sprung up
between the little boy and the man, and this had increased as time wore
on. Almost every day found Paul at the corner grocery, where he
sometimes waited upon customers, but oftener sat upon the counter
talking to Sam, who said of him to his friends that he was “the cutest
little cuss he ever saw;” while Paul in turn worshiped him as the best
man in the world, excepting Carl and Jack. When Miranda came, as she did
in due time, the intimacy was not interrupted, but rather increased; for
in her loneliness and longing for the five brothers she had left in
Vermont, Miranda took at once to the little boy, whose prattle amused
her so much. For a year the visits to Miranda continued, and then one
morning there were streamers of crape on the doors of the house and
grocery, and Miranda and her own little boy were coffined and ready for
the journey back to her grave among her native hills. This happened
while Paul was in New York with Carl, and on his return he found his
friend alone, and crying like a child as he talked of his dead wife and
baby.
“I’m broken all to smash,” he said, “and have got to go away from here,
where every pound of sugar and every quart of vinegar reminds me of
Miranda and the little shaver I was goin’ to call for you, if Miss Annie
was willin’.”
This made Paul feel at once related to the baby which had looked only a
few minutes upon the world before it died, and altogether akin to the
bereaved man whose rough hand he held between his small white ones,
patting and rubbing it in token of sympathy. When told that Paul was
going to Europe Sam began to cry again.
“I wish to lan’ I could go, too, and look after you and the Square,” he
said. “I’d be as faithful as a dog, an’ I can’t stay here with these
things hauntin’ me and makin’ me think of her.”
As a result of this, Sam Slayton was hired by Carl to go with him to
Europe and care for Paul.
“Not a high-toned valet,” Carl said to Annie; “but I like the fellow,
and can trust him, and he has promised to be a little more choice in his
language, and the slang phrases which Paul is apt to adopt.”
Sam rented his corner grocery, bought a new suit of clothes, went to the
hills of Vermont and said good-bye to Miranda; and then he joined Carl
and Paul in New York, and with them sailed away to Europe, shocking Carl
sometimes with his broad Yankee dialect, but proving the most faithful
and loyal servant a man ever had, and, when it was necessary, the most
efficient of nurses.
With Paul gone and Jack still away, Annie was very lonely. Carl had, in
a delicate way, made everything as easy for her as possible, depositing
to her account what seemed to her a large sum in a Richmond bank where
she kept her small funds. He had also insisted that a young girl should
be hired, and as Phyllis approved the plan, a bright mulatto named
Rachel was installed in the house as maid, though really she waited upon
Phyllis more than upon Annie. But she was young and full of life, and
sang as she worked, and often brought Annie bits of gossip from the
outside world, which kept her from stagnating. Paul’s letters were a
great comfort to her. He had early learned to write a childish irregular
hand, and every week there came a letter from him, sometimes longer,
sometimes shorter, but very dear to the Annie-mother, who he wished
could be with him and see all he was seeing. He was under treatment,
with the prospect that he would be cured in a little while, and this was
comforting. He was at the Grand Hotel in Paris, where they talked the
queerest talk he ever heard. Even the children spoke French, and he was
going to learn it, too,—and Sam, at whom everybody looked so funny,
especially the English, who sometimes laughed at him. But Sam didn’t
care a _su-mar-kee_ for one of them, and Paul didn’t care a _su-mar-kee_
either. Sam was just as nice as he could be, and had learned every ’bus
line in Paris, and knew that _couplet_ did not mean a place, as he had
first thought it did, trying in vain to go there, and hunting all over
the map of the city to find it. He hadn’t seen Katy, and didn’t know
when he should. She had been to the _North Pole_ to see the sun
rise,—then to Stockholm and Russia, and was now in Berlin and was going
to Egypt in the winter. _Fan-er-nan_ was in Switzerland, but was coming
to Paris by and by. All this was in his first letter.
Later on he wrote: “They’ve put me in a plaster jacket and it hurts me
some; but I try not to cry, and Sam takes me in a chair along the
boulevards and down to the Palais Royal, and everywhere, and yells like
a panther at the cabmen when he wants to cross the street and they are
aiming at us. ‘Git back, you scallywags, don’t you see the little boy is
lame?’ he says, and they _git_ every time. You ought to hear him try to
talk French. He can say ‘_Ong-tray_’ and _Com-bee-ang_, and _Petty
garsong_,’ and some more words, and screams when he talks to the people,
and they scream at him. I am learning French and teaching English to a
nice lady, and this is how it happened. I was sitting in my chair in the
court with Sam and my French primer, when there came up to me a very
handsome lady with great black eyes and yellow hair and rosy cheeks,
which Sam said were painted, but I don’t believe it. She put her hand on
my head and said something I couldn’t understand. I knew it was French
and answered, ‘_I nee parl paw French_’—I had learned so much from my
primer—and was very proud when the lady laughed and said, ‘_Tray
be-ang_;’ she meant very good, or very well. Then she tried Sam, but he
shook his head and said, ‘_Nix cum arouse_,’ at which she stared
awfully. She staid until Carl came up. He didn’t know her and she didn’t
know him, but she bowed and he bowed, and they talked some, and Carl
made her understand what ailed me. She looked real sorry, and put her
hand on my head again and kissed me and went away. I saw her at dinner,
where she sat near us, dressed oh! so beautiful, and everybody looked at
her, and she didn’t care.
“Carl said she was Madame Felix, and the little fussy-looking old
gentleman with her was her husband, and was ill; that’s why he looked so
yellow and shut his lips so hard as if he didn’t feel well. I like him,
and so does Sam. He came to me after dinner and talked English very bad,
but I understood him. Madame _Julee_ he calls her, wants me to teach her
English words and she will teach me French. Carl is willing, and every
morning now she comes to me and tells me French and I tell her English,
which she pronounces sometimes real good, as if she knew it before,—then
awfully, and I laugh, and she laughs, and Carl laughs. He is always with
us, learning French with me and teaching her English, too. Sam sits and
listens and catches on, he says. I’ve thought sometimes Carl wanted him
to go away, but he won’t. He don’t like Madame. He says she makes eyes
at Carl, and once, when he saw her talking and laughing with him, he
said, ‘What tarnal fools.’ I told Carl, and he was mad.
“Sam is going to learn French as fast as he can so as to know what Carl
and Madame Julee say to each other, but I am not to tell. I said I
wouldn’t, though I don’t see why Carl shouldn’t know that Sam can
understand. Do you?”
In Paul’s last letter he wrote: “The little old man, Monsieur Felix, has
gone to his chateau in Passy. Madame asked Carl and me to go, too, and
we wanted to, but Sam looked like a thunder cloud, and had some high
words with Carl, and said how was I to be treated in Passy. So we didn’t
go, nor Madame either. The little man told her to stay if she wanted to,
and she staid. She told Carl it was so lonesome in Passy,—_treest_, I
think she said, and the housekeeper and servants would take good care of
Monsieur, and she could not bear to be shut up in a sick-room with
camphire and odor-cologne and nerves; it made her head ache. And Carl
said he didn’t much blame her and should miss her awful. I am getting to
understand pretty well and faster than Sam, and made this out, but
didn’t tell him, he hates Madame so.
“My plaster jacket hurts me sometimes and I cry, but Sam is so good, and
says if I bear it like a man I will one day be tall and straight like
Carl. He is splendid, and I’d bear anything to be like him. We get on
beautiful in French, and Madame beautiful in English. Queer, how well
she pronounces at times. I told her so, and she said I was not to tell
Carl, because he’d think if she pronounced well once she might always,
and she is pretty bad when he is with us. Two secrets I have now,—her’s
and Sam’s,—and they make my head ache. Madame has taken me to drive two
or three times, and once she had a box at the Opera and took Carl and
me. Oh, it was beautiful,—the house and everything, except the ballet. I
didn’t like that,—the girls’ dresses were so short and thin, and they
whirled so fast and threw their feet so high that I didn’t dare look at
them much till I heard everybody cheer, Carl and Madame with the rest.
Carl looked at them through an opera glass, although he was pretty near
the stage. I had heard Fan-er-nan say something about Katy going on the
stage, and I whispered to Carl, “Would Katy do like that?”
“‘God forbid!’ he said, and turned white, and I said I’d get right down
on the floor and hide if she did.
“Madame laughed,—seems as if she understands all I say. She was splendid
that night,—nothing on her neck but diamonds, which glittered so in the
light. Ever so many glasses were aimed at her, and she liked it. After
the opera we went for supper to _Bean-yon’s_, an awful dear place. But
Carl didn’t mind. He ordered everything Madame wanted and a bottle of
wine. But he didn’t drink. He’d promised his sisters not to, he said.
Madame shrugged her shoulders and drank to the health of his sisters. I
was so tired I fell asleep in my chair, and when they tried to wake me
up they couldn’t. So they sent for Sam, who carried me home in his arms.
It isn’t far from _Bean-yon’s_ to the hotel. I slept late next morning,
and when I woke Sam was cross as a bear,—not to me, but at Carl, who had
gone to Passy with Madame to call on Monsieur. Sam slatted things round
and said he wished to Cain that Katy or Fan-er-nan would come and stop
it. I asked him ‘Stop what?’ and he said, ‘Stop your asking questions.’
“Sam is funny. Carl has come back and Madame hasn’t. I guess the little
old man is pretty sick. I miss Madame and so does Carl, but Fan-er-Nan
will be here soon.”
In his next letter Paul wrote: “Fan-er-Nan is here, and such a great
lady. Not like Madame,—stiller, prouder, whiter,—I can’t tell you what.
‘Big swell, but cold as a snowball. I knew it would be so,’ Sam said;
but she isn’t cold to me. She took me in her arms and hugged and kissed
me and sobbed like, but didn’t shed any tears. I told her not to feel so
bad,—my back was getting well. She hugged me harder, and said, ‘There
are worse things than backs.’
“What did she mean? Sam heard her, and after she went out he said, ‘The
cuss!’
“He didn’t mean Fan-er-Nan, for I asked him; and he didn’t mean Madame,
for she isn’t here. She was away. I tried my hand at a letter, half
French, half English, and told her to hurry up and see Fan-er-Nan, and
she wrote to Carl she couldn’t come, Monsieur was so ill. Fan-er-Nan has
a maid and talks French as well as Madame, but she is so——I don’t know
what,—like something bottled up. Sam says she dresses lovely,—not like
Madame exactly, plainer, but in a way you know is first class.
“I have seen the Colonel, and oh my, I don’t wonder Fan-er-Nan seems so
still. Why, he’s _old_, and his foot is all swelled up, and lies out on
a cushion, and he has a crutch, and scowls when he talks. He was nice to
me, but I didn’t stay long and was glad to get out of the room. They are
going home before long. I suppose I shall want to go with them. But I
must get straight first, and I like Paris and Carl, he is so kind to me,
and when I tell him I am a bother, he says, ‘Oh, Paul, you don’t know
all you are to me, you and Sam both.’ He calls me his good angel, and
Sam his watch-dog. Queer, isn’t it?”
Paul’s letters troubled Annie. Who was this French woman, and why was
Carl so interested in her? At last she decided to ask him about her. She
was owing him a letter and would write that night, she thought, as she
sat waiting for her supper to be served. Since she had been alone she
had abandoned the massive mahogany table which Mrs. Hathern had brought
from Boston, and taken her meals upon the little round table which had
been her mother’s. This now stood by her near the fire, for the day had
been cold, and as it drew to a close the wind began to rise, making it
colder still. Dark clouds were scudding across the sky, and as the sun
went down the rain began to fall, reminding Annie of that day two years
ago when she had brought Jack from The Plateau more dead than alive, and
Fanny had been on the sea. Where was Jack now, and where was Fanny? and
would she come to Lovering after her return? Paul had said she was
coming home soon. Perhaps she was there now and had not written.
The train which used to pass through Lovering at four o’clock now came
at quarter past five, and Annie heard the whistle and wondered if there
would be a letter for her. She would send Rachel after supper to
inquire, she thought, just as a rapid step came on to the piazza and
some one entered the side hall. The dining-room door was thrown open,
and starting to her feet Annie stood face to face with Fanny.
CHAPTER IX.—AUTHOR’S STORY CONTINUED.
FANNY.
She had been driven from the station to the head of the avenue where she
alighted, telling the driver she would walk to the house. Seeing no
light except the one in the dining-room she had entered that way, and in
a moment had Annie in her arms crying like a child for joy. Fanny didn’t
cry. It was a long time since any tears had come to soften the hardness
of her eyes. But there was a choking in her throat as she felt Annie’s
arms around her neck and took in all the old familiar objects,—the
carpet she remembered so well,—the clock on the mantel,—the wood fire on
the hearth,—the tall andirons,—the fender,—the round table with the
simple meal upon it,—and Annie herself, grown younger instead of older,
and so plump and round and fair that people called her handsome, with
her sweet face, her soft brown eyes and hair and the bright color on her
cheeks.
“Why, Annie,” Fan said at last, turning her round so that the fire-light
fell fully upon her. “How lovely you are, and how young. I might almost
pass for your mother, I am so old and have lived so many years since I
saw you. I believe that we are both twenty-eight, and that is not so
very ancient, but I feel a hundred.”
She was taking off her hat and sealskin sack and gloves, and stood at
last revealed to Annie an elegant woman in every respect, with fashion
and style and travel and wealth written all over her from the way she
spoke and wore her hair to the tip of her French boot which she held up
to the fire. Paul had said of her that she was still and white. She was
more than that, and seemed to Annie for a time like a marble statue,
talking and moving by machinery, with no will of her own. But she began
at last to thaw, shaken into something like the Fan of old by Phyllis,
who, hearing she was there, came rushing in and taking her in her arms
nearly squeezed the life out of her.
“Honey, honey,” she said, while the tears ran down her cheeks, “I thanks
my Heavenly Father dat dese ole eyes has lived to see de comin’ of de
glory of de Lord. Dat’s de song we sing in meetin’, and you’s de glory,
shoo’, so gran’ and fine. Oh, glory, glory, glory, hallelujah,
hallelujah, Amen!”
Then Fan’s old laugh rang through the room, as she said, “Don’t have the
power, Phyllis, for pity’s sake. It will take more than Annie and me to
drag you out. Better bring me some hot coffee and a plate, so I can have
my supper with Annie.”
This brought Phyllis from the skies down to the commonplace, and
lamenting that she hadn’t known her chile was comin’ so as to have had
something fit for her, she bustled in and out, bringing everything
eatable there was in the house, and then waiting upon the young ladies.
Rachel, she said, was well ’nuff for common, but she reckoned nobody was
gwine to wait on Miss Errin’ton but herself.
At the mention of that name Fanny shivered and put down the cup of
coffee she was drinking.
“Call me Miss Fanny while I am here as you used to do,” she said, and
laying her head back in her chair she closed her eyes, while there
passed before her in rapid review all that had happened since she was
Miss Fanny and sat with Annie as she was sitting now with Phyllis
attending her.
She had neither been beaten nor sworn at, nor had things thrown at her,
as she knew some wives had; the Colonel was too much of a gentleman to
do that, but she had been moulded and disciplined and thwarted until it
seemed to her she had but little will power left. Just how her husband
had subjugated her so completely she could not tell, but subjugated she
was, doing as a rule only what he bade her do, and going only where he
bade her go. For a time after leaving Paris he had been very proud to
see her admired and sought after and had taken her everywhere. Thoughts
of Jack ceased to trouble him. He supposed Fanny still thought of him,
but she was perfectly exemplary as his wife, and seemed to care little
for the attention she received, and he was quite content. Then, for no
fault of hers, he suddenly conceived a most violent jealousy of every
man who looked at her, or rather at whom she looked, and began to
curtail her liberty, telling her where she could go and where she
couldn’t. At Monte Carlo, where they spent several weeks, he took her
with him once into the roulette rooms, which interested her greatly. She
had no thought of playing, but she liked to watch the others. As there
were some friends with her she did not always keep by her husband, but
went from room to room, animated and excited and wholly oblivious to the
many who looked admiringly after her, commenting on her beauty and
graceful carriage and wondering who she was. But the Colonel saw it all,
and for a short time enjoyed it. Then, as he mixed with the crowd, he
overheard some one say, “Is it possible that stern, oldish-looking man,
with the bald head and scowl between his eyes, is that lovely girl’s
husband? I pity her, and him too. She’s a high-stepper.”
“That’s so,” was the reply of a second man, who seemed loaded with
information. “They say she had another lover whom she jilted for money
and who died. Quite a little romance, which will undoubtedly end in
another. Those eyes of hers don’t look at a fellow for nothing. They
actually talk. See, they are resting pityingly on that poor devil who is
losing his money so fast, and now they are laughing up into the face of
that Russian who has spoken to her. Her old cove of a husband needs to
watch her.”
The Colonel heard no more. He was boiling with rage, and would have
liked to knock down the man who called his wife a high-stepper, and the
other one who called him an old cove and predicted a second romance.
Evidently he had allowed his high-stepper too much latitude when men
commented on her like this, but he’d stop it now. Ten minutes later
Fanny was told it was time to leave.
“Oh please, George, not yet,” she said. “I like it here so much, and it
is not late.”
For answer he drew her arm in his and walked away, telling her it was no
place for her, with her propensity to attract attention. She was too
gushing, he said,—too demonstrative, pitying one man and smiling on
another and getting herself talked about. Thereafter he wished her to be
more quiet and reserved and keep her gush and smiles for him. She did
not know what he meant or to what he referred, but she grew quiet and
reserved and cold, and people called her proud and haughty, not knowing
that her heart was dead within her, and that every natural emotion was
kept down, with every semblance of affection for or interest in
anything. But if her fetters were strong they were golden. She had all
the money she wanted until it palled upon her, and sometimes when
driving in her luxurious carriage she envied the peasant woman whom she
saw in the street, knowing that she could do as she liked, with no one
to question her. After the Colonel’s lameness came on it was better. She
had more liberty, because she took it, and went where she pleased. She
never tried to deceive him, but told him where she had been, what she
had done, and whom she had seen. He knew he could trust her and always
believed her. Once she told him of a young Englishman who had only seen
him in his chair with her walking beside him, and who asked her when she
met him again how her father was. With a savage imprecation against the
young man, whom he called a fool, the Colonel cursed the fate which
deprived him of the use of his feet and was fast changing his once erect
and military figure into that of a bent old man. He would go back to
America and hide himself in his own house, he said, and Fanny did not
object. Two years of travel and seeing the world had satisfied her, and
she was glad when the day of sailing came, although she dreaded the
voyage. Fortunately, she was not sick, but the Colonel was and kept his
berth most of the time.
Since his marriage nothing had been said of the cottage at Newport, or
of Palmetto Villa in Florida, and the grand house which had been planned
before they went abroad still remained on paper only. With his jealousy
and morbid state of mind the Colonel’s enthusiasm had cooled. It was
better to have his Washington house built when he could see to it, he
said, and Fanny acquiesced, as she did in everything. So they went back
to the old house on Lafayette Square, and as the Colonel took possession
again of his rooms, with every comfort and convenience at his command,
he seemed happier than he had been since he left them two years before.
Fanny was very kind to him, and had been so ever since his first attack
of rheumatism which disabled him from walking, and here, in Washington,
she was especially attentive, for her heart was expanding with joy as
she thought how near she was to the dear old home which she meant to
visit, whether he were willing or not.
Much of all this she told to Annie when, after the table was cleared and
the lamp put upon it, she sat on a stool with her head lying in her
sister’s lap like a tired child which has come to its mother to rest.
And Annie listened with the tears sometimes running down her cheeks as
she caressed the beautiful head and smoothed the glossy coils of hair,
her heart aching as she detected in them more than one thread of silver
which was there before its time.
“I believe I told you in my letter that if I were unhappy no one should
ever know it,” Fanny said, in conclusion, “but here, alone with you, it
came out before I thought. Don’t suppose, though, it has been all bad,
for it has not. I have enjoyed the foreign travel, of course, and I have
been nice to George and he has been nice to me a good deal of the time.
We have had our spats as, I dare say, all married people do. I have
always felt like a slave, though, with an exacting master over me, and
only liberty to think what I pleased. He couldn’t help that, and I told
him so in the hottest battle we ever had. My thoughts are my own, and
that is about all of myself I can call mine. The rest of me belongs to
him. When I remember how high-tempered and self-willed I used to be, I
can’t see how he has done it. But he has. I am like a spirited horse
broken to the harness, stopping when its driver says ‘whoa,’ and
starting when he says ‘get up.’ It is better now,—a good deal
better,—and if I could forget I should really be quite contented. But
oh, the forgetting! I didn’t ask him if I could come. I told him I was
coming to spend Thanksgiving with you, and when he said ‘Going to see
your old lover, Jack, I suppose,’ I answered, ‘I do not know that he is
there. If he is, I shall see him; yes.’ Then I came, but can only stay
over to-morrow. I must go back next day. I promised I would.”
In all she had told of her married life she had not spoken of Jack until
now, and at the mention of his name Annie felt the blood rushing through
her veins, and her hands pressed very heavily upon Fanny’s head which
moved a little as for an easier position, so that a part of the white
face was visible in the fire-light playing over it. For a while there
was perfect silence in the room, and then Fanny asked very low, “Where
is he?”
Annie told her where he was and how long he had been gone, and that she
expected him now at any time, as he had written that he might spend
Thanksgiving with her.
“That would be jolly,” Fanny said, sitting up a moment with her hands
clasped around her knees and her eyes looking steadily into the fire.
“Annie,” she said at last, putting her head again in Annie’s lap, “you
never told me _how_ he took it, or what he said. I only know he was very
ill, and suppose I made him so. Tell me all about it,—where he heard it,
and when, and how he looked. I want to know everything.”
“Oh, Fan,—no, no!” Annie replied. “You couldn’t bear it.”
“Yes I can. I have borne worse things than that. Tell me everything.
Maybe it will make me cry. I haven’t cried in more than a year; not
since I was ill in Naples and dreamed I was a child again, and Jack came
and put his cool hand on my hot forehead and said ‘Poor little Fan, does
it hurt very bad?’ just as he did twenty years ago when I fell from the
swing in the barn and raised a great lump on my head. I was so glad to
see him, and when I woke and found _he_ wasn’t there,—that it was George
sitting by the window, and old Marcella trying to coax into a blaze a
smoky fire, I cried under the bedclothes till the tear cistern ran dry.
There has been nothing in it since, and my eyes feel so hot at times
that I’d like a real thunder-storm. Tell me what he said and did.”
Annie told her everything, sparing no detail and dwelling at length upon
Jack’s happiness in showing her all he had done for his promised bride
and his eager anticipations of the morrow when he expected her. Then she
told of the letter,—its effect upon herself and its worse effect on
him,—of his anguish as he read it,—his despairing cry which rang through
the room in which so many hopes had been centered,—his distraught manner
as they drove home through the rain,—his illness,—his loss of faith in
God, and his gradual recovery. Fanny’s face was hidden and Annie could
not tell whether she cried or not. She only knew that she never stirred,
but lay like one asleep or dead, until she repeated Jack’s words which
had burned themselves into her memory.
“Say it again, Annie. I didn’t hear you right. There’s a roaring in my
ears. Fanny—isn’t—married;—my Fanny,—who was to have this room,—and
watch for me. No-o, Annie. No-o.”
Then Fanny shook like a leaf, and one hand slid down at her side into
the light in which the costly jewels,—diamonds and rubies and
emeralds,—shone like eyes of fire. Then she was still again,—so still
that after the story was ended Annie began to wonder at her silence and
tried to lift up the face in her lap. It was ghastly white, and the long
heavy lashes which lay upon it brought out more clearly the dark circles
under the eyes. Fanny had fainted for the second time in her life. It
did not take long to restore her to consciousness. With the first dash
of water in her face she opened her eyes and gasped; then, realizing
what had happened, she shook the drops from her hair and forehead and
said with a laugh, “You needn’t drown me. I was a great deal worse than
this at the hotel when I thought Jack was going to die.” Then her eyes
grew so large and black that Annie looked at her in wonder. “It was
terrible,” she said, “and I am not worth all that pain. I could faint,
but I can’t cry; I wish I could. Poor Jack. You say he is over it now?”
“I think so,” Annie answered, with a thought of the kiss he had left on
her forehead at parting.
“Does he seem as he used to?”
“Very much.”
“Does he go to church?”
“He didn’t for awhile; he does now.”
“What does he say of me?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“No, never.”
“Do you mean he never speaks my name?” and there were red spots in
Fanny’s eyes and redder ones on her cheeks.
“No, he never speaks your name,” was Annie’s reply; and Fanny continued,
“And the house on The Plateau,—built for me. What has he done with
that?”
“Kept it,” Annie replied, while the red spots left Fanny’s eyes and
cheeks and there was an exultant ring in her voice as she said, “Then he
has not forgotten me. Oh, Annie, it has always been a comfort to believe
that, bad as I am, Jack still loved me. It has kept me from many things
I might have done. Col. Errington does not know how much of my loyalty
to him he owes to my faith in Jack. But for that I might have defied him
and been the veriest flirt in Europe. There were chances enough. I had
only to look at a man to bring him to me. But I seldom looked,—partly to
keep at peace with my husband, but more for Jack. Do you think he will
come to-morrow?”
Annie hardly thought he would, or she should have heard from him to that
effect.
“I feel that he will,” Fanny said with conviction. “I hope he will. To
see him again,—to hear his voice, and know he didn’t hate me would send
me back a better and happier woman to my cage, every bar of which is
golden, but they hurt me just the same when I beat my wings against
them.”
Annie did not reply. She couldn’t say that she hoped Jack would come.
She had hoped so when the day loomed before her long and lonely, but now
it was different, and the sight of Fanny might bring back the olden love
and leave her stranded just as the goal she longed for was within her
grasp.
It was late that night before the sisters went to their rooms, and later
still before Annie could sleep. Fanny slept soundly,—“like a top,” she
said next morning, when she went down to the tempting breakfast Phyllis
had prepared.
“You looks pearter and more like Miss Fanny,” the old negress said, as
she bustled around the table, while Annie, too, noticed the change.
There was color in Fanny’s cheeks and her eyes shone like stars, as she
went around the house, changing things a little, and wherever she went
leaving a more artistic finish than she found. Annie questioned her with
regard to Paul and Carl, and then spoke of the French woman, asking if
Fanny saw her.
“I saw her in London two years ago,—not in Paris,” Fanny said. “She was
in Passy with her husband, but I heard of her from Paul and Sam. By the
way, Carl never did a better thing than when he took that Yankee with
him. He’s a curiosity to the foreigners, but faithful as the sun. He
doesn’t like Madame Felix. He says she’s a sham and neglects her husband
shamefully,—that the old man is dying, and that if he does she’ll ‘set
her cap for Carl.’ That was the way he put it. But she’ll not succeed.
She is not a lady, and though Carl may like to talk with her, as he does
with every handsome woman, he’ll never go further than that.”
“Is she so very pretty?” Annie asked, and Fanny replied,
“Pretty is not the term to apply to her, any more than _petite_. She is
stout,—weighing at least a hundred and seventy; but her figure and dress
are so perfect that you forget her size. She has large black eyes and
yellowish hair,—a peculiar combination, but Frenchy,—fine teeth, high
color, which she owes as much to powder and paint as to nature, but it’s
well put on, and deceives the men. There is something about her which
attracts them, too. She even won upon George,—or tried to. Me she
ignored and avoided. She reminded me of somebody, I could not tell whom,
and Sam said the same. He will keep watch of her, and Katy will be in
the field by and by. From her pure lovely face Carl could never look the
second time at Madame.”
Then they talked of Katy and Miss Errington, neither of whom Fanny saw
in Europe,—and of the people in Lovering,—and the morning passed and the
two o’clock dinner was served, and Jack did not come, and Fanny’s
spirits began to fall a little. When dinner was over she said to Annie,
“You told me you had the key to the house. Give it to me, please. I am
going there.”
Annie gave it to her and she was soon on her way to The Plateau, taking
a circuitous path through the woods so as to avoid the villagers. It was
dark when she came back, and the lamp was lighted in the dining-room,
where Annie was sitting with the tea-table beside her. Fanny’s eyes were
very red as she knelt before the fire and held her cold hands to the
blaze.
“I have cried at last,” she said, with quivering lips and choking voice,
and that was all the reference she made then to that visit to the house
where God alone saw the anguish of her soul as she went through the
silent rooms, with a feeling that it was her own grave over which she
was walking.
It was in the upper room she lingered longest,—“Our Room;”—Annie’s
description had been concise and she knew the chair where Jack had sat
when he read her letter, and she saw him there in fancy and heard his
pitiful cry, “Fanny isn’t married;—my Fanny! No-o, Annie, no-o.”
She went to the bay window and sat down by the table where she was to
have waited and watched for Jack as he came up the hill, while from
every part of the room came the wailing cry, “No-o, Annie, no-o.”
The windows,—the doors,—the ceiling,—the walls,—all; caught it up and
sent it back to her, until it seemed as if her brain were on fire.
“I must cry or die,” she said, stretching out her hands and fanning
herself with them for more air.
Then rising up she threw herself upon what was to have been her bridal
bed and lay there a crushed, remorseful woman, hiding her face among the
pillows whose softness had a kind of healing in their touch, bringing
tears at last,—blessed tears,—which fell like rivers and cooled her
burning fever. She had wanted a thunder-storm, and she had it. The tear
cistern, empty so long, was filled and refilled as often as it
overflowed. The dainty pillow-shams with her initial upon them were
crumpled and soiled and lay at last in a heap under her head, while the
little girl in the medallion looked smilingly down upon her, mocking her
misery. When her tears were spent and the choking in her throat was gone
she rose up, and laying her hands caressingly upon every article in the
room, as if in farewell, went down stairs and out into the darkness,
locking the door behind her and saying as she did so, “Good-bye, home
which was to have been mine. I was not worthy of you. Good-bye.”
Then she went swiftly through the woods, reaching home just as Annie was
beginning to feel anxious about her.