"I have known longer voyages than that," said Miss Dane, wit_Old Friends and New

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HOUGHTON MIFFLIN AND COMPANY,

Boston and New York

OLD FRIENDS AND NEW

SARAH O. JEWETT

BOSTON AND NEW YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN AND COMPANY

The Riverside Press Cambridge

OLD FRIENDS AND NEW

CONTENTS.

------

A LOST LOVER

A SORROWFUL GUEST

A LATE SUPPER

MR. BRUCE

MISS SYDNEY'S FLOWERS

LADY FERRY

A BIT OF SHORE LIFE

------

A LOST LOVER.

For a great many years it had been understood in Longfield that Miss

Horatia Dane once had a lover, and that he had been lost at sea. By

little and little, in one way and another, her acquaintances had found

out or made up the whole story; and Miss Dane stood in the position,

not of an unmarried woman exactly, but rather of having spent most of

her life in a long and lonely widowhood. She looked like a person with

a history, strangers often said (as if we each did not have a

history); and her own unbroken reserve about this romance of hers gave

everybody the more respect for it.

The Longfield people paid willing deference to Miss Dane: her family

had always been one that could be liked and respected, and she was the

last that was left in the old home of which she was so fond. This was

a high, square house, with a row of pointed windows in its roof, a

peaked porch in front, with some lilac-bushes around it; and down by

the road was a long, orderly procession of poplars, like a row of

sentinels standing guard. She had lived here alone since her father's

death, twenty years before. She was a kind, just woman, whose

pleasures were of a stately and sober sort; and she seemed not unhappy

in her loneliness, though she sometimes said gravely that she was the

last of her family, as if the fact had a great sadness for her.

She had some middle-aged and elderly cousins living at a distance, and

they came occasionally to see her; but there had been no young people

staying in the house for many years until this summer, when the

daughter of her youngest cousin had written to ask if she might come

to make a visit. She was a motherless girl of twenty, both older and

younger than her years. Her father and brother, who were civil

engineers, had taken some work upon the line of a railway in the far

Western country. Nelly had made many long journeys with them before

and since she had left school, and she had meant to follow them now,

after she had spent a fortnight with the old cousin whom she had not

seen since her childhood. Her father had laughed at the visit as a

freak, and had warned her of the dulness and primness of Longfield;

but the result was that the girl found herself very happy in the

comfortable home. She was still her own free, unfettered, lucky, and

sunshiny self; and the old house was so much pleasanter for the

girlish face and life, that Miss Horatia had, at first timidly and

then most heartily, begged her to stay for the whole summer, or even

the autumn, until her father was ready to come East. The name of Dane

was very dear to Miss Horatia, and she grew fonder of her guest. When

the village-people saw her glance at the girl affectionately, as they

sat together in the family-pew of a Sunday, or saw them walking

together after tea, they said it was a good thing for Miss Horatia;

how bright she looked; and no doubt she would leave all her money to

Nelly Dane, if she played her cards well.

But we will do Nelly justice, and say that she was not mercenary: she

would have scorned such a thought. She had grown to have a great love

for her cousin Horatia, and she liked to please her. She idealized

her, I have no doubt; and her repression, her grave courtesy and rare

words of approval, had a great fascination for a girl who had just

been used to people who chattered, and were upon most intimate terms

with you directly, and could forget you with equal ease. And Nelly

liked having so admiring and easily pleased an audience as Miss Dane

and her old servant Melissa. She liked to be queen of her company: she

had so many gay, bright stories of what had happened to herself and

her friends. Besides, she was clever with her needle, and had all

those practical gifts which elderly women approve so heartily in

girls. They liked her pretty clothes; she was sensible and economical

and busy; they praised her to each other and to the world, and even

stubborn old Andrew, the man, to whom Miss Horatia herself spoke with

deference, would do any thing she asked. Nelly would by no means

choose so dull a life as this for the rest of her days; but she

enjoyed it immensely for the time being. She instinctively avoided all

that would shock the grave dignity and old-school ideas of Miss Dane;

and somehow she never had felt happier or better satisfied with life.

I think it was because she was her best and most lady-like self. It

was not long before she knew the village-people almost as well as Miss

Dane did, and she became a very great favorite, as a girl so easily

can who is good-natured and pretty, and well versed in city fashions;

who has that tact and cleverness that come to such a nature from going

about the world and knowing many people.

She had not been in Longfield many weeks before she heard something of

Miss Dane's love-story; for one of her new friends said, in a

confidential moment, "Does your cousin ever speak to you about the

young man to whom she was engaged to be married?" And Nelly answered,

"No," with great wonder, and not without regret at her own ignorance.

After this she kept her eyes and ears open for whatever news of this

lover's existence might be found.

At last it happened one day that she had a good chance for a friendly

talk with Melissa; for who should know about the family affairs better

than she? Miss Horatia had taken her second-best parasol, with a deep

fringe, and had gone majestically down the street to do some morning

errands which she could trust to no one. Melissa was shelling peas at

the shady kitchen-doorstep, and Nelly came strolling round from the

garden, along the clean-swept flag-stones, and sat down to help her.

Melissa moved along, with a grim smile, to make room for her. "You

needn't bother yourself," said she: "I've nothing else to do. You'll

green your fingers all over." But she was evidently pleased to have

company.

"My fingers will wash," said Nelly, "and I've nothing else to do

either. Please push the basket this way a little, or I shall scatter

the pods, and then you will scold." She went to work busily, while she

tried to think of the best way to find out the story she wished to

hear.

"There!" said Melissa, "I never told Miss H'ratia to get some citron,

and I settled yesterday to make some pound-cake this forenoon after I

got dinner along a piece. She's most out o' mustard too; she's set

about having mustard to eat with her beef, just as the old colonel was

before her. I never saw any other folks eat mustard with their roast

beef; but every family has their own tricks. I tied a thread round my

left-hand little finger purpose to remember that citron before she

came down this morning. I hope I ain't losing my fac'lties." It was

seldom that Melissa was so talkative as this at first. She was clearly

in a talkative mood.

"Melissa," asked Nelly, with great bravery, after a minute or two of

silence, "who was it that my cousin Horatia was going to many? It's

odd that I shouldn't know; but I don't remember father's ever speaking

of it, and I shouldn't think of asking her."

"I s'pose it'll seem strange to you," said Melissa, beginning to shell

the peas a great deal faster, "but, as many years as I have lived in

this house with her,--her mother, the old lady, fetched me up,--I

never knew Miss H'ratia to say a word about him. But there! she knows

I know, and we've got an understanding on many things we never talk

over as some folks would. I've heard about it from other folks. She

was visiting her great-aunt in Salem when she met with him. His name

was Carrick, and it was presumed they was going to be married when he

came home from the voyage he was lost on. He had the promise of going

out master of a new ship. They didn't keep company long: it was made

up of a sudden, and folks here didn't get hold of the story till some

time after. I've heard some that ought to know say it was only talk,

and they never were engaged to be married no more than I am."

"You say he was lost at sea?" asked Nelly.

"The ship never was heard from. They supposed she was run down in the

night out in the South Seas somewhere. It was a good while before they

gave up expecting news; but none ever come. I think she set every

thing by him, and took it very hard losing of him. But there! she'd

never say a word. You're the freest-spoken Dane I ever saw; but you

may take it from 'our mother's folks. I know he gave her that whale's

tooth with the ship drawn on it that's on the mantel-piece in her

room. She may have a sight of other keepsakes, for all I know; but it

ain't likely." And here there was a pause, in which Nelly grew

sorrowful as she thought of the long waiting for tidings of the

missing ship, and of her cousin's solitary life. It was very odd to

think of prim Miss Horatia's being in love with a sailor. There was a

young lieutenant in the navy whom Nelly herself liked dearly, and he

had gone away on a long voyage. "Perhaps she's been just as well off,"

said Melissa. "She's dreadful set, y'r cousin H'ratia is, and sailors

is high-tempered men. I've heard it hinted that he was a fast fellow;

and if a woman's got a good home like this, and's able to do for

herself, she'd better stay there. I ain't going to give up a certainty

for an uncertainty,--that's what _I_ always tell 'em," added Melissa,

with great decision, as if she were besieged by lovers; but Nelly

smiled inwardly as she thought of the courage it would take to support

any one who wished to offer her companion his heart and hand. It would

need desperate energy to scale the walls of that garrison.

The green peas were all shelled presently, and Melissa said gravely

that she should have to be lazy now until it was time to put in the

meat. She wasn't used to being helped, unless there was extra work,

and she calculated to have one piece of work join on to another.

However, it was no account, and she was obliged for the company; and

Nelly laughed merrily as she stood washing her hands in the shining

old copper basin at the sink. The sun would not be round that side of

the house for a long time yet, and the pink and blue morning-glories

were still in their full bloom and freshness. They grew over the

window, twined on strings exactly the same distance apart. There was a

box crowded full of green houseleeks down at the side of the door:

they were straying over the edge, and Melissa stooped stiffly down

with an air of disapproval at their untidiness. "They straggle all

over every thing," said she, "and they're no kind of use, only Miss's

mother she set every thing by 'em. She fetched 'em from home with her

when she was married, her mother kep' a box, and they came from

England. Folks used to say they was good for bee-stings." Then she

went into the inner kitchen, and Nelly went slowly away along the

flag-stones to the garden from whence she had come. The garden-gate

opened with a tired creak, and shut with a clack; and she noticed how

smooth and shiny the wood was where the touch of so many hands had

worn it. There was a great pleasure to this girl in finding herself

among such old and well-worn things. She had been for a long time in

cities or at the West; and among the old fashions and ancient

possessions of Long-field it seemed to her that every thing had its

story, and she liked the quietness and unchangeableness with which

life seemed to go on from year to year. She had seen many a dainty or

gorgeous garden, but never one that she had liked so well as this,

with its herb-bed and its broken rows of currant-bushes, its tall

stalks of white lilies and its wandering rose-bushes and honeysuckles,

that had bloomed beside the straight paths for so many more summers

than she herself had lived. She picked a little nosegay of late red

roses, and carried it into the house to put on the parlor-table. The

wide hall-door was standing open, with its green outer blinds closed,

and the old hall was dim and cool. Miss Horatia did not like a glare

of sunlight, and she abhorred flies with her whole heart. Nelly could

hardly see her way through the rooms, it had been so bright out of

doors; but she brought the tall champagne-glass of water from the

dining-room and put the flowers in their place. Then she looked at two

silhouettes which stood on the mantel in carved ebony frames. They

were portraits of an uncle of Miss Dane and his wife. Miss Dane had

thought Nelly looked like this uncle the evening before. She could not

see the likeness herself; but the pictures suggested something else,

and she turned suddenly, and went hurrying up the stairs to Miss

Horatia's own room, where she remembered to have seen a group of

silhouettes fastened to the wall. There were seven or eight, and she

looked at the young men among them most carefully; but they were all

marked with the name of Dane: they were Miss Horatia's brothers, and

our friend hung them on their little brass hooks again with a feeling

of disappointment. Perhaps her cousin had a quaint miniature of the

lover, painted on ivory, and shut in a worn red morocco case; she

hoped she should get a sight of it some day. This story of the lost

sailor had a wonderful charm for the girl. Miss Horatia had never been

so interesting to her before. How she must have mourned for the lover,

and missed him, and hoped there would yet be news from the ship! Nelly

thought she would tell her her own little love-story some day, though

there was not much to tell yet, in spite of there being so much to

think about. She built a little castle in Spain as she sat in the

front-window-seat of the upper hall, and dreamed pleasant stories for

herself until the sharp noise of the front-gate-latch waked her; and

she looked out through the blind to see her cousin coming up the walk.

Miss Horatia looked hot and tired, and her thoughts were not of any

fashion of romance. "It is going to be very warm," said she. "I have

been worrying ever since I have been gone, because I forgot to ask

Andrew to pick those white currants for the minister's wife. I

promised that she should have them early this morning. Would you go

out to the kitchen, and ask Melissa to step in for a moment, my dear?"

Melissa was picking over red currants to make a pie, and rose from her

chair with a little unwillingness. "I guess they could wait until

afternoon," said she, as she came back. "Miss H'ratia's in a fret

because she forgot about sending some white currants to the

minister's. I told her that Andrew had gone to have the horses shod,

and wouldn't be back till near noon. I don't see why part of the folks

in the world should kill themselves trying to suit the rest. As long

as I haven't got any citron for the cake, I suppose I might go out and

pick 'em," added Melissa ungraciously. "I'll get some to set away for

tea anyhow."

Miss Dane had a letter to write after she had rested from her walk;

and Nelly soon left her in the dark parlor, and went back to the

sunshiny garden to help Melissa, who seemed to be taking life with

more than her usual disapproval. She was sheltered by an enormous

gingham sunbonnet.

"I set out to free my mind to your cousin H'ratia this morning," said

she, as Nelly crouched down at the opposite side of the bush where she

was picking; "but we can't agree on that p'int, and it's no use. I

don't say nothing. You might's well ask the moon to face about and

travel the other way as to try to change Miss H'ratia's mind. I ain't

going to argue it with her: it ain't my place; I know that as well as

anybody. She'd run her feet off for the minister's folks any day; and,

though I do say he's a fair preacher, they haven't got a speck o'

consideration nor fac'lty; they think the world was made for them, but

I think likely they'll find out it wasn't; most folks do. When he

first was settled here, I had a fit o' sickness, and he come to see me

when I was getting over the worst of it. He did the best he could, I

always took it very kind of him; but he made a prayer, and he kep'

sayin' 'this aged handmaid,' I should think, a dozen times. Aged

handmaid!" said Melissa scornfully: "I don't call myself aged yet, and

that was more than ten years ago. I never made pretensions to being

younger than I am; but you'd 'a' thought I was a topplin' old creatur'

going on a hundred."

Nelly laughed; Melissa looked cross, and moved on to the next

currant-bush. "So that's why you don't like the minister?" But the

question did not seem to please.

"I hope I never should be set against a preacher by such as that." And

Nelly hastened to change the subject; but there was to be a last word:

"I like to see a minister that's solid minister right straight

through, not one of these veneered folks. But old Parson Croden spoilt

me for setting under any other preaching."

"I wonder," said Nelly, after a little, "if Cousin Horatia has any

picture of that Captain Carrick."

"He wasn't captain," said Melissa. "I never heard that it was any more

than they talked of giving him a ship next voyage."

"And you never saw him? He never came here to see her?"

"Bless you, no! She met with him at Salem, where she was spending the

winter, and he went right away to sea. I've heard a good deal more

about it of late years than I ever did at the time. I suppose the

Salem folks talked about it enough. All I know is, there was other

good matches that offered to her since, and couldn't get her; and I

suppose it was on account of her heart's being buried in the deep with

him." And this unexpected bit of sentiment, spoken in Melissa's

grummest tone, seemed so funny to her young companion, that she bent

very low to pick from a currant-twig close to the ground, and could

not ask any more questions for some time.

"I have seen her a sight o' times when I knew she was thinking about

him," Melissa went on presently, this time with a tenderness in her

voice that touched Nelly's heart. "She's been dreadful lonesome. She

and the old colonel, her father, wasn't much company to each other,

and she always kep' every thing to herself. The only time she ever

said a word to me was one night six or seven years ago this Christmas.

They got up a Christmas-tree in the vestry, and she went, and I did

too; I guess everybody in the whole church and parish that could crawl

turned out to go. The children they made a dreadful racket. I'd ha'

got my ears took off if I had been so forth-putting when I was little.

I was looking round for Miss H'ratia 'long at the last of the evening,

and somebody said they'd seen her go home. I hurried, and I couldn't

see any light in the house; and I was afraid she was sick or

something. She come and let me in, and I see she had been a-cryin'. I

says, 'Have you heard any bad news?' But she says, 'No,' and began to

cry again, real pitiful. 'I never felt so lonesome in my life,' says

she, 'as I did down there. It's a dreadful thing to be left all alone

in the world.' I did feel for her; but I couldn't seem to say a word.

I put some pine-chips I had handy for morning on the kitchen-fire, and

I made her up a cup o' good hot tea quick's I could, and took it to

her; and I guess she felt better. She never went to bed till three

o'clock that night. I couldn't shut my eyes till I heard her come

upstairs. There! I set every thing by Miss H'ratia. I haven't got no

folks either. I was left an orphan over to Deerfield, where Miss's

mother come from, and she took me out o' the town-farm to bring up. I

remember, when I come here, I was so small I had a box to stand up on

when I helped wash the dishes. There's nothing I ain't had to make me

comfortable, and I do just as I'm a mind to, and call in extra help

every day of the week if I give the word; but I've had my lonesome

times, and I guess Miss H'ratia knew."

Nelly was very much touched by this bit of a story, it was a new idea

to her that Melissa should have so much affection and be so

sympathetic. People never will get over being surprised that

chestnut-burrs are not as rough inside as they are outside, and the

girl's heart warmed toward the old woman who had spoken with such

unlooked-for sentiment and pathos. Melissa went to the house with her

basket, and Nelly also went in, but only to put on another hat, and

see if it were straight, in a minute spent before the old mirror, and

then she hurried down the long elm-shaded street to buy a pound of

citron for the cake. She left it on the kitchen-table when she came

back, and nobody ever said any thing about it; only there were two

delicious pound-cakes--a heart and a round--on a little blue china

plate beside Nelly's plate at tea.

After tea Nelly and Miss Dane sat in the front-doorway,--the elder

woman in a high-backed arm-chair, and the younger on the doorstep. The

tree-toads and crickets were tuning up heartily, the stars showed a

little through the trees, and the elms looked heavy and black against

the sky. The fragrance of the white lilies in the garden blew through

the hall. Miss Horatia was tapping the ends of her fingers together.

Probably she was not thinking of any thing in particular. She had had

a very peaceful day, with the exception of the currants; and they had,

after all, gone to the parsonage some time before noon. Beside this,

the minister had sent word that the delay made no trouble; for his

wife had unexpectedly gone to Downton to pass the day and night. Miss

Horatia had received the business-letter for which she had been

looking for several days; so there was nothing to regret deeply for

that day, and there seemed to be nothing for one to dread on the

morrow.

"Cousin Horatia," asked Nelly, "are you sure you like having me here?

Are you sure I don't trouble you?"

"Of course not," said Miss Dane, without a bit of sentiment in her

tone: "I find it very pleasant having young company, though I am used

to being alone; and I don't mind it so much as I suppose you would."

"I should mind it very much," said the girl softly.

"You would get used to it, as I have," said Miss Dane. "Yes, dear, I

like having you here better and better. I hate to think of your going

away." And she smoothed Nelly's hair as if she thought she might have

spoken coldly at first, and wished to make up for it. This rare caress

was not without its effect.

"I don't miss father and Dick so very much," owned Nelly frankly,

"because I have grown used to their coming and going; but sometimes I

miss people--Cousin Horatia, did I ever say any thing to you about

George Forest?"

"I think I remember the name," answered Miss Dane.

"He is in the navy, and he has gone a long voyage, and--I think every

thing of him. I missed him awfully; but it is almost time to get a

letter from him."

"Does your father approve of him?" asked Miss Dane, with great

propriety. "You are very young yet, and you must not think of such a

thing carelessly. I should be so much grieved if you threw away your

happiness."

"Oh! we are not really engaged," said Nelly, who felt a little

chilled. "I suppose we are, too: only nobody knows yet. Yes, father

knows him as well as I do, and he is very fond of him. Of course I

should not keep it from father; but he guessed at it himself. Only

it's such a long cruise, Cousin Horatia,--three years, I

suppose,--away off in China and Japan."

"I have known longer voyages than that," said Miss Dane, with a quiver

in her voice; and she rose suddenly, and walked away, this grave,

reserved woman, who seemed so contented and so comfortable. But, when

she came back, she asked Nelly a great deal about her lover, and

learned more of the girl's life than she ever had before. And they

talked together in the pleasantest way about this pleasant subject,

which was so close to Nelly's heart, until Melissa brought the candles

at ten o'clock, that being the hour of Miss Dane's bed-time.

But that night Miss Dane did not go to bed at ten: she sat by the

window in her room, thinking. The moon rose late; and after a little

while she blew out her candles, which were burning low. I suppose that

the years which had come and gone since the young sailor went away on

that last voyage of his had each added to her affection for him. She

was a person who clung the more fondly to youth as she left it the

farther behind.

This is such a natural thing: the great sorrows of our youth sometimes

become the amusements of our later years; we can only remember them

with a smile. We find that our lives look fairer to us, and we forget

what used to trouble us so much when we look back. Miss Dane certainly

had come nearer to truly loving the sailor than she had any one else;

and the more she had thought of it, the more it became the romance of

her life. She no longer asked herself, as she often had done in middle

life, whether, if he had lived and had come home, she would have loved

and married him. She had minded less and less, year by year, knowing

that her friends and neighbors thought her faithful to the love of her

youth. Poor, gay, handsome Joe Carrick! how fond he had been of her,

and how he had looked at her that day he sailed away out of Salem

Harbor on the ship Chevalier! If she had only known that she never

should see him again, poor fellow!

But, as usual, her thoughts changed their current a little at the end

of her reverie. Perhaps, after all, loneliness was not so hard to bear

as other sorrows. She had had a pleasant life, God had been very good

to her, and had spared her many trials, and granted her many

blessings. She would try and serve him better. "I am an old woman

now," she said to herself. "Things are better as they are; God knows

best, and I never should have liked to be interfered with."

Then she shut out the moonlight, and lighted her candles again, with

an almost guilty feeling. "What should I say if Nelly sat up till

nearly midnight looking out at the moon?" thought she. "It is very

silly; but it is such a beautiful night. I should like to have her see

the moon shining through the tops of the trees." But Nelly was

sleeping the sleep of the just and sensible in her own room.

Next morning at breakfast Nelly was a little conscious of there having

been uncommon confidences the night before; but Miss Dane was her

usual calm and somewhat formal self, and proposed their making a few

calls after dinner, if the weather were not too hot. Nelly at once

wondered what she had better wear. There was a certain black grenadine

which Miss Horatia had noticed with approval, and she remembered that

the lower ruffle needed hemming, and made up her mind that she would

devote most of the time before dinner to that and to some other

repairs. So, after breakfast was over, she brought the dress

downstairs, with her work-box, and settled herself in the dining-room.

Miss Dane usually sat there in the morning, it was a pleasant room,

and she could keep an unsuspected watch over the kitchen and Melissa,

who did not need watching in the least. I dare say it was for the sake

of being within the sound of a voice.

Miss Dane marched in and out that morning; she went upstairs, and came

down again, and she was busy for a while in the parlor. Nelly was

sewing steadily by a window, where one of the blinds was a little way

open, and tethered in its place by a string. She hummed a tune to

herself over and over:--

"What will you do, love, when I am going,

With white sails flowing, the seas beyond?"

And old Melissa, going to and fro at her work in the kitchen, grumbled

out bits of an ancient psalm-tune at intervals. There seemed to be

some connection between these fragments in her mind; it was like a

ledge of rock in a pasture, that sometimes runs under the ground, and

then crops out again. I think it was the tune of Windham.

Nelly found there was a good deal to be done to the grenadine dress

when she looked it over critically, and she was very diligent. It was

quiet in and about the house for a long time, until suddenly she heard

the sound of heavy footsteps coming in from the road. The side-door

was in a little entry between the room where Nelly sat and the

kitchen, and the new-comer knocked loudly. "A tramp," said Nelly to

herself; while Melissa came to open the door, wiping her hands

hurriedly on her apron.

"I wonder if you couldn't give me something to eat," said the man.

"I suppose I could," answered Melissa. "Will you step in?" Beggars

were very few in Longfield, and Miss Dane never wished anybody to go

away hungry from her house. It was off the grand highway of tramps;

but they were by no means unknown.

Melissa searched among her stores, and Nelly heard her putting one

plate after another on the kitchen-table, and thought that the

breakfast promised to be a good one, if it were late.

"Don't put yourself out," said the man, as he moved his chair nearer.

"I put up at an old barn three or four miles above here last night,

and there didn't seem to be very good board there."

"Going far?" inquired Melissa concisely.

"Boston," said the man. "I'm a little too old to travel afoot. Now, if

I could go by water, it would seem nearer. I'm more used to the water.

This is a royal good piece o' beef. I suppose couldn't put your hand

on a mug of cider?" This was said humbly; but the tone failed to touch

Melissa's heart.

"No, I couldn't," said she decisively; so there was an end of that,

and the conversation seemed to flag for a time.

Presently Melissa came to speak to Miss Dane, who had just come

downstairs. "Could you stay in the kitchen a few minutes?" she

whispered. "There's an old creatur' there that looks foreign. He came

to the door for something to eat, and I gave it to him; but he's

miser'ble looking, and I don't like to leave him alone. I'm just in

the midst o' dressing the chickens. He'll be through pretty quick,

according to the way he's eating now."

Miss Dane followed her without a word; and the man half rose, and

said, "Good-morning, madam!" with unusual courtesy. And, when Melissa

was out of hearing, he spoke again: "I suppose you haven't any cider?"

to which his hostess answered, "I couldn't give you any this morning,"

in a tone that left no room for argument. He looked as if he had had a

great deal too much to drink already.

"How far do you call it from here to Boston?" he asked, and was told

that it was eighty miles.

"I'm a slow traveller," said he: "sailors don't take much to walking."

Miss Dane asked him if he had been a sailor. "Nothing else," replied

the man, who seemed much inclined to talk. He had been eating like a

hungry dog, as if he were half-starved,--a slouching, red-faced,

untidy-looking old man, with some traces of former good looks still to

be discovered in his face. "Nothing else. I ran away to sea when I was

a boy, and I followed it until I got so old they wouldn't ship me even

for cook." There was something in his being for once so

comfortable--perhaps it was being with a lady like Miss Dane, who

pitied him--that lifted his thoughts a little from their usual low

level. "It's drink that's been the ruin of me," said he. "I ought to

have been somebody. I was nobody's fool when I was young. I got to be

mate of a first-rate ship, and there was some talk o' my being captain

before long. She was lost that voyage, and three of us were all that

was saved; we got picked up by a Chinese junk. She had the plague

aboard of her, and my mates died of it, and I was sick. It was a hell

of a place to be in. When I got ashore I shipped on an old bark that

pretended to be coming round the Cape, and she turned out to be a

pirate. I just went to the dogs, and I've been from bad to worse ever

since."

"It's never too late to mend," said Melissa, who came into the kitchen

just then for a string to tie the chickens.

"Lord help us, yes, it is!" said the sailor. "It's easy for you to say

that. I'm too old. I ain't been master of this craft for a good

while." And he laughed at his melancholy joke.

"Don't say that," said Miss Dane.

"Well, now, what could an old wrack like me do to earn a living? and

who'd want me if I could? You wouldn't. I don't know when I've been

treated so decent as this before. I'm all broke down." But his tone

was no longer sincere; he had fallen back on his profession of beggar.

"Couldn't you get into some asylum or--there's the Sailors' Snug

Harbor, isn't that for men like you? It seems such a pity for a man of

your years to be homeless and a wanderer. Haven't you any friends at

all?" And here, suddenly, Miss Dane's face altered, and she grew very

white; something startled her. She looked as one might who saw a

fearful ghost.

"No," said the man; "but my folks used to be some of the best in

Salem. I haven't shown my head there this good while. I was an orphan.

My grandmother brought me up. Why, I didn't come back to the States

for thirty or forty years. Along at the first of it I used to see men

in port that I used to know; but I always dodged 'em, and I was way

off in outlandish places. I've got an awful sight to answer for. I

used to have a good wife when I was in Australia. I don't know where I

haven't been, first and last. I was always a hard fellow. I've spent

as much as a couple o' fortunes, and here I am. Devil take it!"

Nelly was still sewing in the dining-room; but, soon after Miss Dane

had gone out to the kitchen, one of the doors between had slowly

closed itself with a plaintive whine. The round stone that Melissa

used to keep it open had been pushed away. Nelly was a little annoyed:

she liked to hear what was going on; but she was just then holding her

work with great care in a place that was hard to sew; so she did not

move. She heard the murmur of voices, and thought, after a while, that

the old vagabond ought to go away by this time. What could be making

her cousin Horatia talk so long with him? It was not like her at all.

He would beg for money, of course, and she hoped Miss Horatia would

not give him a single cent.

It was some time before the kitchen-door opened, and the man came out

with clumsy, stumbling steps. "I'm much obliged to you," he said, "and

I don't know but it is the last time I'll get treated as if I was a

gentleman. Is there any thing I could do for you round the place?" he

asked hesitatingly, and as if he hoped that his offer would not be

accepted.

"No," answered Miss Dane. "No, thank you. Good-by!" and he went away.

I said he had been lifted a little above his low life; he fell back

again directly before he was out of the gate. "I'm blessed if she

didn't give me a ten-dollar bill!" said he. "She must have thought it

was one. I'll get out o' call as quick as I can, hope she won't find

it out, and send anybody after me." Visions of unlimited drinks, and

other things in which the old sailor found pleasure, flitted through

his stupid mind. "How the old lady stared at me once!" he thought.

"Wonder if she was anybody I used to know? 'Downton?' I don't know as

I ever heard of the place." And he scuffed along the dusty road; and

that night he was very drunk, and the next day he went wandering on,

God only knows where.

But Nelly and Melissa both had heard a strange noise in the kitchen,

as if some one had fallen, and had found that Miss Horatia had fainted

dead away. It was partly the heat, she said, when she saw their

anxious faces as she came to herself; she had had a little headache

all the morning; it was very hot and close in the kitchen, and the

faintness had come upon her suddenly. They helped her walk into the

cool parlor presently, and Melissa brought her a glass of wine, and

Nelly sat beside her on a footstool as she lay on the sofa, and fanned

her. Once she held her cheek against Miss Horatia's hand for a minute,

and she will never know as long as she lives what a comfort she was

that day.

Every one but Miss Dane forgot the old sailor-tramp in this excitement

that followed his visit. Do you guess already who he was? But the

certainty could not come to you with the chill and horror it did to

Miss Dane. There had been something familiar in his look and voice

from the first, and then she had suddenly known him, her lost lover.

It was an awful change that the years had made in him. He had truly

called himself a wreck: he was like some dreary wreck in its decay and

utter ruin, its miserable ugliness and worthlessness, falling to

pieces in the slow tides of a lifeless southern sea.

And he had once been her lover, Miss Dane thought many times in the

days that came after. Not that there was ever any thing asked or

promised between them, but they had liked each other dearly, and had

parted with deep sorrow. She had thought of him all these years so

tenderly; she had believed always that his love had been greater than

her own, and never once had doubted that the missing ship Chevalier

had carried with it down into the sea a heart that was true to her.

By little and little this all grew familiar, and she accustomed

herself to the knowledge of her new secret. She shuddered at the

thought of the misery of a life with him, and she thanked God for

sparing her such shame and despair. The distance between them seemed

immense. She had been a person of so much consequence among her

friends, and so dutiful and irreproachable a woman. She had not begun

to understand what dishonor is in the world; her life had been shut in

by safe and orderly surroundings. It was a strange chance that had

brought this wanderer to her door. She remembered his wretched

untidiness. She would not have liked even to touch him. She had never

imagined him grown old: he had always been young to her. It was a

great mercy he had not known her; it would have been a most miserable

position for them both; and yet she thought, with sad surprise, that

she had not known she had changed so entirely. She thought of the

different ways their roads in life had gone; she pitied him; she cried

about him more than once; and she wished that she could know he was

dead. He might have been such a brave, good man, with his strong will

and resolute courage. God forgive him for the wickedness which his

strength had been made to serve! "God forgive him!" said Miss Horatia

to herself sadly over and over again. She wondered if she ought to

have let him go away, and so have lost sight of him; but she could not

do any thing else. She suffered terribly on his account; she had a

pity, such as God's pity must be, for even his wilful sins.

So her romance was all over with; yet the towns-people still whispered

it to strangers, and even Melissa and Nelly never knew how she had

lost her lover in so strange and sad a way in her latest years. Nobody

noticed much change; but Melissa saw that the whale's tooth had

disappeared from its place in Miss Horatia's room, and her old friends

said to each other that she began to show her age a great deal. She

seemed really like an old woman now; she was not the woman she had

been a year ago.

This is all of the story; but I so often wish when a story comes to an

end that I knew what became of the people afterward. Shall I tell you

that Miss Horatia clings more and more fondly to her young cousin

Nelly; and that Nelly will stay with her a great deal before she

marries, and sometimes afterward, when the lieutenant goes away to

sea? Shall I say that Miss Dane seems as well satisfied and

comfortable as ever, though she acknowledges she is not so young as

she used to be, and somehow misses something out of her life? It is

the contentment of winter rather than that of summer: the flowers are

out of bloom for her now, and under the snow. And Melissa, will not

she always be the same, with a quaintness and freshness and toughness

like a cedar-tree, to the end of her days? Let us hope they will live

on together and be untroubled this long time yet, the two good women;

and let us wish Nelly much pleasure, and a sweet soberness and

fearlessness as she grows older and finds life a harder thing to

understand and a graver thing to know.

A SORROWFUL GUEST.

Dear Helen,--What do you say to our going to housekeeping together?

I'm a very old bachelor, with many whims; but I'm your brother, and I

don't know that there was ever an act of Parliament that we should

spend our lives on opposite shores of the Atlantic. The Athertons'

lease of our house is out next month, and I have a fancy for taking it

myself. We will call it merely an experiment, if you like; but I'm

tired of the way I live now. I'm growing gray, and I shall be

dreadfully glad to see you. We will make a real home of it, and see

something of each other; you must not ask for any more pathos than

this. Pick up whatever you can to make the house look fine, but don't

feel in the least obliged to come, or put it off until the spring. Do

just as you like. I hear the Duncans are coming home in October;

perhaps you could take passage on the same steamer. I can't believe it

is three years since I went over last. Do you think we shall know each

other? _"L'absence diminue les petits amours et augmente les grandes,

comme le vent qui eteint les bougies et rallume la feu."_ I met that

sentiment in a story I was reading to-day, and I thought it would seem

very gallant and alluring if I put it into my letter. I think you will

not be homesick here: you will find more friends than seems possible

at first thought. I'm in a hurry to-day; but I'm none the less

Your very affectionate brother,

JOHN AINSLIE.

Boston, Aug. 2, 1877.

This was a letter which came to me one morning a year or two ago from

my only brother. We had been separated most of the time since our

childhood; for my father and mother both died then, and our home was

broken up, as Jack was to be away at school and college. During the

war he was fired with a love of his country and a longing for military

glory, and entered the army with many of his fellow-students at

Harvard. I was at school for a time, but afterwards went to live with

an aunt, whose winter home was in Florence; and when Jack left the

army he came to Europe to go on with his professional studies. He was

most of the time in Dublin and London and Paris at the medical

schools; but we were together a good deal, and he went off for several

long journeys with my aunt and me before he went back to America. I

always hoped that we might some day live together: but my aunt wished

me never to leave her; for she was somewhat of an invalid, and had

grown to depend on me more or less in many ways. She could not live in

Boston, for the climate did not suit her. If Jack and I had not

written each other so often, we should have drifted far apart; but, as

it was, I think our love and friendship grew closer year by year. I

should have begged him to come to live with me; but he was always in a

hurry to get back to his own city and his own friends when he

sometimes came over to pay us a visit in my aunt's lifetime, and I

knew he would not be contented in Florence.

At Aunt Alice's death I went on with the same old life for a time from

force of habit; and it was just then, when I was with some friends in

the Tyrol, and had been wondering what plans I should make for the

winter,--whether to go to Egypt again, or to have some English friends

come to me in Florence,--that Jack's letter came. I was only too glad

that he made the proposal, and I could not resist sending him a cable

despatch to say, "Hurrah!" I had not realized before how lonely and

adrift I had felt since Aunt Alice died. I had a host of kind friends;

but there is nothing like being with one's own kindred, and having

one's own home. It was very hard work to say so many good-byes; and my

heart had almost failed me when I saw some of my friends for, it might

be, the last time, as some of them were old people. And, though I said

over and over again that I should come back in a year or two, who

could be certain that I should take up the dear familiar life again?

But, though I had been so many long years away from dear old Boston, I

never had been so glad in my life to catch sight of any city as I was

that chilly, late October morning, when I came on deck, and somebody

pointed out to me a dull glitter of something that looked higher and

brighter than the land, and said it was the dome of the State House.

I felt more sure than ever that I was going home when I saw my brother

standing on the wharf, and I remembered so clearly many of the streets

we drove through; and when we came to the house itself, and the

carriage had gone, and we stood in the library together where the very

same books were in the cases, and the same dim old Turkey carpet on

the floor, the years seemed suddenly to vanish, and it was like the

dear old childish days again: only where were my mother and my father?

And Jack was growing gray, as he had written me, and so much had

happened to me since I had been in that room last! I sat down before

the wood-fire; and the queer brass dragons on the andirons made me

smile, just as they always used. Jack stood at the window, looking

out; and neither of us had a word to say, though we had chattered at

each other every minute as we drove over from the steamer.

That first evening at dinner I looked across the table at my brother:

and our eyes met, and we both laughed heartily for very contentment

and delight.

"I'm sure Aunt Marion ought to be here to matronize you," said Jack.

Neither of us like Aunt Marion very well; and this was a great joke,

especially as she was ushered in directly to welcome me home.

Jack had been living at the house for a few weeks already; but it was

great fun, this beginning our housekeeping together, and we were busy

enough for some time. I had brought over a good many things that my

aunt had had in Florence, and to which I had become attached; and in

the course of many journeys both Jack and I had accumulated a great

many large and small treasures, some of which had not been unpacked

for years. I very soon knew my brother's best friends; and we both

tried to make our home not only cheerful and bright and pleasant in

every way, but we wished also to make it a home-like place, where

people might be sure of finding at least some sympathy and true

friendliness and help as well as pleasure. Mamma's old friends were

charmingly kind and polite to me; and, as Jack had foretold, I found

more acquaintances of my own than I had the least idea I should. I had

met abroad a great many of the people who came to see me; but the

strangest thing was to meet those whom I remembered as my playmates

and schoolmates, and to find them so entirely grown up, most of them

married, and with homes and children of their own instead of the

playhouses and dolls which I remembered.

We soon fell into a most comfortable fashion of living, we were both

very fond of giving quiet little dinners, my brother often brought

home a friend or two, and we were charmingly independent; life never

went better with two people than it did with Jack and me. We often had

some old friends of the family come to stay with us, and I sent hither

and yon for my own old cronies, with some of whom I had kept up our

friendship since school-days; and, while it was not a little sad to

meet some of them again, with others I felt as if we had only parted

yesterday.