COMPANY AT SCHUYLER HILL.
In the course of two or three weeks nearly everybody of any social
standing in Hampstead called upon the bride. Mrs. Barton and her
daughter Rosamond from the Ridge drove over at a very early day, much to
the discomfiture of Miss Rossiter, who had told her nieces in confidence
that “Mrs. Barton had no intention of calling upon a governess,” that
“Mrs. Schuyler need not expect much attention from the _beau monde_.”
Great, then, was her surprise when she went down to meet them; and
greeted them a little coldly even while affecting to appropriate their
call to herself. But neither Mrs. Barton nor Rosamond seemed to notice
her perturbation, and both were delighted with Mrs. Schuyler, who looked
and appeared as if all her life had been passed amid just such
surroundings as these at Schuyler Hill.
Miss Rossiter saw this, and thought best to change her tactics
altogether; and when, as she accompanied her friend to the door, the
latter said to her, “I find your sister-in-law very charming,” she
replied:
“Yes, I am glad you like her; and it was so kind in you to call. I
appreciate it, I assure you.”
And this was the ground she constantly took. Whoever called came
expressly for her sake and the sake of the family, rather than from any
desire to be polite to the bride.
“The Schuylers are so highly respected, and sister Emily was such a
favorite with everybody that you must expect attention, of course,” she
would say to Edith, who smiled quietly, and understood what was meant
quite as well as if it had been put in plainer words.
Miss Rossiter did not like her, but had she been asked a reason for her
dislike she could not have given one or brought a single accusation
against Edith, except that she was not to the purple born, and was there
in Emily’s place. That was all, and that was enough. She had declared
war against her, and she meant to carry it out.
But Edith understood her, and parried all her little mean thrusts, and,
when questioned before the young ladies of her life in England and the
people she knew, answered that she knew nobody except the families where
she had taught, and spoke unhesitatingly of her mother, who took lodgers
to eke out her slender income; and, when Miss Rossiter suggested to her
that it might be as well not to speak of her mother’s lodgers, and
offered her advice on certain points of etiquette, telling her it was
better not to laugh quite so much, and that such and such dresses were
not just the thing for certain occasions, Edith answered good-humoredly,
and thanked Miss Rossiter for her advice; but laughed just the same, and
shocked the spinster every day at dinner with the sight of her fair,
creamy arms and neck, and devoutly wished the lady would return to New
York, and leave her in peace. But Miss Rossiter was in no haste to do
this; she was averse to exertion of any kind, and found her brother in
law’s home so much to her taste and the bride so much better than she
had feared, that she had decided to remain in Hampstead until after the
grand party, which was to be given at Schuyler Hill, and for which great
preparations were making, both in the kitchen, where Mrs. Tiffe was in
the full tide of cake and cream and jelly, and in the town, where
everybody with any claim to society expected an invitation.
Mine came to the school-room, and I read it after school, with Gertie
standing at my side and looking over my shoulder.
“Oh, that’s the party I’ve heard about! They are to have a band and
lights in the trees, and colored waiters in white gloves, and
everything. Oh, I wish I could go! Do you think they will invite
children like me?” Gertie said, excitedly.
It did not occur to her that there could be any reason why she should
not be invited except that she was a child, and I did not enlighten her,
but said she was probably too young.
The next morning her face was very bright as she told me what she had
heard from Norah, who was down to see her mother. Mrs. Rogers was to
assist in the evening, and Gertie was to go, too, and perhaps see the
dancing from some post of observation, while Norah had promised to ask
Mrs. Schuyler if she might come in and see her after she was dressed,
and before she went down stairs.
“And then,” Gertie added, “next week they are to have the Church
Sociable, and everybody goes to that, you know, and auntie is to do up
my muslin dress, and I shall dance, maybe with Mr. Godfrey. Oh, I wish
it was now!”
She was quite as wild over the Church Sociable as the Hampstead ladies
were over the party, which came off the 10th of October, and was a grand
affair. The night was soft and warm as June, and though there was no
moon the lanterns in the trees and on the pedestals lighted up the
grounds sufficiently to show their beauty, and make it pleasant to walk
about in them. The house itself was ablaze with light, and brilliant
with rare and costly flowers, while the band played several sweet airs
before the guests began to arrive. In her room upstairs Edith stood
dressed in her bridal robes, and looking more beautiful than she had
upon her wedding day, for her cheeks were rounder now, with a soft,
delicate pink showing through the dazzling white, while her eyes had in
them a new brightness, and shone like the diamonds Norah was clasping on
her neck and arms.
“Oh, how lovely you are,” Norah said, when the last touch was given to
her mistress’s toilet, and she stood back to admire her. Then after a
moment’s hesitancy, she added: “There is a little girl down stairs dying
to see you, ma’am, in your party dress, Gertie Westbrooke. My cousin is
here assisting, you know, and brought the child. Would you mind her
coming up the back way just to look at you?”
“Certainly not,” Edith replied; and in a few moments Gertie came in, her
face glowing and sparkling with delight as she saw the beautiful woman
standing before the long mirror, decked in satin and lace and diamonds,
her golden brown hair curled as she used to wear it in her girlhood, and
falling over a comb behind.
“Oh, my lady! oh, Mrs. Schuyler, you ought to be the queen, only you are
a thousand times handsomer than she!” Gertie cried, clasping her hands
together, while tears started to her eyes and dropped from her
eyelashes.
“Why, child, what is the matter? What makes you cry?” Edith asked, and
Gertie replied:
“I don’t know, I always cry when I see a beautiful picture or hear the
grand music and the band playing outside, and the house and grounds
lighted up, and you so glorious. I can’t help it. Oh, if I only were
rich, and could go with the people below!”
“Poor child,” Edith said softly, as she laid her hand on the wavy hair
of the little girl. “You might not be as happy as you are now, and then
if you were rich you are too young to attend a party of this kind.”
“Yes, I know,” Gertie answered; “but I like fine dresses, and things,
and people, and I do wish I might some day be dressed just like you, and
stand where you do with my train so long behind me, and I waiting for
somebody.”
“Gertie,” the lady said, after a moment’s reflection, “the guests are to
remove their wraps in the large room opposite, and by sitting in that
chair and turning the gas down you can see them as they pass. Would you
like it?”
“Yes, so much,” was the eager reply, and just then the colonel came for
his bride to lead her to the drawing-room.
He saw Gertie, but thought she was there to render some service to his
wife and paid no attention to her. The moment he was gone Gertie turned
down the gas, and ensconcing herself in the large easy-chair waited the
coming of the guests. And while she waited Godfrey looked in, and seeing
the little figure in the chair, walked up to it and said:
“Who’s there? Gertie, as I live! What are you doing?”
“Mrs. Schuyler said I might sit here and see the ladies pass in their
gay dresses, so I’m making believe I’m one of them, and at the party,
too. Oh if it was only real, and I could dance the Lancers!”
“Gertie, I say, how are you dressed?” Godfrey asked, turning up the gas
and inspecting the child. “No, that won’t do,—not the ‘wedding
garments,’ you know. Gertie, I tell you what, we are to have the church
sociable next week, and that is a heap nicer than a party. Come, then,
and I’ll dance your shoes off with you. There’s a ring,—I must go. When
you get tired of making believe here, go round to the north staircase,
and you can look down into the hall and dining-room. Good-by.”
He was gone just as the first arrivals came up the stairs and into the
room opposite where Gertie sat. And Gertie watched them eagerly and
heard all they said, and mentally commented upon their attire, and
compared them with Edith; and then, when they were all gone, crept
cautiously round to the north staircase where Godfrey had said she could
see the dancing.
The party was a great success, with no drawback whatever, except the
fact that Tom Barton from the Ridge drank too much champagne and became
noisy and uproarious, and when by chance he stumbled upon Gertie, who
was making her way to the kitchen through a side passage, he told her:
“Ze was ze pressiest girl there, by gorrie,” and emphasized his
compliment with a kiss. For this audacity Godfrey, who happened to be in
sight, seized him by the collar and thrust him headlong out of doors,
bidding him stay there till he could behave.
Edith was pronounced perfectly charming by every one, and no young girl
received as much flattery and attention as the beautiful mistress of the
festivities, who bore herself like a princess, and received the
commendations of those about her with a sweet graciousness of manner
which won every heart. She was not fond of dancing and only went on the
floor twice, once with Godfrey and once with Robert Macpherson, who was
quite a lion with the girls, especially as he was new and a foreigner.
“The Macphersons are very rich, and there’s a title in the family; he
only paints and sketches because he likes it; he is not obliged to do
it,” Julia explained to Rosamond Barton, who was questioning his
antecedents and pronouncing him “splendid and _distingué_, with a face
like a poet.”
It was very late when the party broke up, and it was later still when
Mrs. Rogers’ duties were over and she led the tired, sleepy Gertie by
the hand through the morning moonlight to the cottage by the bridge.
Gertie had seen a great deal of the party, and had envied the young
ladies whom Godfrey whirled in the dance, and wished herself one of
them. But there had been a comfort in knowing that her turn would come
next week at the sociable, to which everybody was invited on the
following Sunday, when the Rev. Mr. Marks, the new Rector at St. Luke’s,
gave notice that the first church sociable of the season would be at
Schuyler Hill on Thursday evening, adding that as the proceeds were to
be appropriated for a new melodeon, which was greatly needed at the
Mission School, a full attendance was desired.