A NEW HOME.
Eunice was going into the house after this speech, but Ellen followed
her.
“Eunice, will you give me that letter?” she said.
“Not to show her. I tell you that girl shan’t leave this house without
she wants to of her own self. Nobody on this arth shall drive her away.”
“But she will not remain after this—after her cousin comes back.”
“Ellen Nolan, there’s a thing that sets hard on Josh’s and my mind. You
sent a letter once down to the tavern from her, and that Mr. Brooks sent
one back agin. Besides, Josh says that the men about the tavern say that
you was down there one night to see him. Now was you?”
“Eunice, please don’t question me about that. It is all over now.”
“Ellen, you’re a good girl, and I won’t. But tell me one thing; you may,
for I don’t know anything more about love than I do about writing; but
did he kinder make her like him and then treat her bad, going over to
t’other? He’s a man, and it’s in ’em I know.”
“Eunice, please oblige me. Don’t talk of her, only to decide what is for
the best. She’s very feeble, and the least excitement may throw her upon
a sick bed again. If nothing had happened, we should have gone away.
This life is terrible!”
“Not without she wants to; remember Josh and I are agreed on that.”
“But it is impossible to stay—the—the—confusion would kill her. Think of
some quiet place that she can live in, where no trouble can come.”
“I’ll think it over. But it’s a burning shame.”
“Somewhere in the neighborhood of Newburg or Sing-Sing, if you can think
of a nice family,” said Ellen, faltering in the last part of her
sentence, while the slow color came into her face.
“I know a widow woman about four or five miles on this side of
Sing-Sing, back from the railroad; she’s a New England woman, and just
as kind as kind can be. Sometimes she takes one or two boarders. I’ll
send Josh right down to see about it if you want me to, and she _will_
go.”
“Do, Eunice, let him start at once.”
“It ain’t so far off that I can’t come and see you now and then.”
“I hope not, Eunice, for you have been a good friend to her.”
“No, I haven’t—more shame to me—but I wanted to be. You don’t know how
both Josh and I wanted to be her friend but couldn’t. Are you going? Do
you want the letter?”
“No, I can tell her; it only takes a few words.”
Half an hour after this Joshua was at the depot waiting for a train, and
Ellen sat in Virginia’s bed-room with both her arms around the invalid,
striving to arouse her from the state of dead silence into which she had
fallen.
“Oh! darling lady, make an effort and cry; just a few tears will make
your heart easier. Look up, look up, and say I haven’t killed you with
the news!”
Virginia heard this appeal through all her numbed senses. She lifted her
head and smiled in Ellen’s face—one of the most pitiful smiles that ever
parted human lips.
“Ellen, you told me of this, but I would not be warned.”
“Sweet lady—dear lady, cast him from your mind. He is cruel,
dishonorable, vile! Unworthy of your regret.”
“No, Ellen; in that you wrong Clarence, wrong me, if you think I can
believe such things of him. It is my cousin—I will not curse her, or
blame him. Let us go away, my friend. You are right, let us go away. She
took my inheritance and I was powerless to defend it. She has taken the
heart from my bosom now and crushed out all its life. Still I am
powerless. But some day he will learn the truth, whatever that wicked
truth may be; then she will suffer as I do. I do not ask it—I do not
wish it, but God is above all.”
A fortnight after Virginia Lander heard of the wedding which was to
drive her from under her father’s roof, a little figure, whose deformed
shoulders were but half concealed under a circular mantle of black silk,
entered one of the principal publishing houses in New York, with a paper
parcel in her arms; for it was too heavy for her weak hands. The vast
room which she entered was lined with placards of various
publications—divided into compartments by stands, crowded with specimen
books, and scattered over with desks, each of which represented a
department of that vast establishment. A large portion of the front of
this room was divided off from the stairs and main apartment by a light
wooden railing, which enclosed a well-trodden carpet, with some desks
and office chairs, all appropriated by the heads of this great firm,
which had existed since the eldest partner was a little child. They were
kindly-looking men, who found their greatest happiness in the brotherly
society which was sufficient to themselves; still they were at all times
ready to give a cordial greeting and kindly hearing to any one who came
to them, either in friendship or on business. It so happened that all of
the partners were present at the moment Ellen Nolan entered the room.
Genius may be modest and shrinking, but it is seldom at a loss for the
best means of attaining a proper object. These men were all strangers to
Ellen, but her earnest face and quiet movements won upon them at first
sight. The tallest and eldest of these gentlemen arose to meet her,
glanced at the parcel in her arms and directed her to another
pleasant-faced man, who sat by a desk, leaning back in his office chair
and calmly smoking a cigar, which he flung through the window as she
came up. This man, with a smile that brightened Ellen’s face like a
reflected sunbeam, reached forth his hand for the parcel, simply saying:
“Is it a book?”
Ellen sighed heavily as she gave up her manuscript. It had been so long
a part of her life that she shrunk from the separation when it came, as
an artist hates to sell the picture which is the embodiment of a
beautiful idea.
“Yes, sir, it is a book—a novel.”
He looked at her with kindly interest. Her bright face, and, more than
that, her helplessness awoke his sympathy. The man of business saw
genius in that face—and the man of feeling pitied one whom God had so
endowed and yet left imperfect.
“Your first, of course?”
“Yes, the very first I ever attempted.”
Ellen was trembling all over now. It seemed as if half her strength had
been taken away with the manuscript.
“Leave it, if you like. We will submit it to our reader.”
Ellen, of course, supposed that her book would be given over to the
judgment of some great author, capable of doing at least all that she
could accomplish, and gave it up with a sort of awe, for there is no
reverence in life so fervent as that which genius yields to genius.
I do not know how it was with this firm, but had she guessed that, in a
majority of cases, her manuscript would have been given to some
pretending school girl or favorite friend of the publisher, she might
have had less reverence and more apprehension. As it was, she felt
certain that the ideas which had thrilled her whole being in the
progress of that book would meet with kindred appreciation in some
powerful mind, and was content.
So Ellen left her book and went back to the little stone farm-house in a
hollow of the hills, where Virginia was longing for her presence as only
the suffering and feeble of health can long for companionship. The home
which these girls had chosen presented a great contrast to the noble
mansion they had left; yet it was a pleasant residence; neat,
old-fashioned, and shaded with a huge walnut tree, which was just
putting forth its most delicate green. Quantities of daffodils, jonquils
and snowdrops brightened the front yard and the garden. Peach and cherry
trees were in full blossom, and the great lilac bushes under the parlor
windows were budding with a famous promise of flowers. Humble as all
this was, it seemed to those girls far pleasanter than that marble
house, with all its discord and painful restraints. Virginia had
brightened a little under the comfort and freedom of her new home. The
wholesome scent of those garden flowers and walnut trees awoke
sensations of pleasure unknown to her former luxurious life. She sought
the open air now, and could ramble off at will without fear of meeting
her worst enemies. It was a new life in which she was becoming
interested; the languor and illness which had kept her indoors all
winter became less and less apparent every day.
One morning Joshua came riding toward the house, leading Snowball by the
bridle.
“I brought her down because the doctor ordered something nice to be sent
to you. ‘Sich as hosses?’ says I. ‘A white hoss with a mane and tail
like drifted snow, is that the medicine you was thinking of?’ sez I.”
“‘Jes so,’ says he, ‘that kind of a hoss is jest what she wants.’”
“‘Side-saddle and all?’ says I.”
“‘Yes,’ says he. ‘Side-saddle, riding-dress, hat, feather and whip?’
says I agin. Then he laughed and told me to bring everything, so I did.
Besides, Eunice would put up some jelly and sich like in this basket,
and I put something in for you, Miss Ellen. Remembered how you took to
the punch that rainy evening, and brought down some of the licker—jest
room for it in the basket. Writ out a receipt, too, for the punch with
my own hand. Here it is.”
Ellen took the paper and thanked him cordially. Persons like her are not
apt to ridicule a kindness, however uncouthly expressed. Virginia was
looking out of the window with something like animation. Snowball seemed
an old friend to her, spite of the memories she brought.
“Yes, Joshua, I promise to ride her; the beauty, see how she paws the
turf. Tell Eunice how pleasant everything is here—how much we like Mrs.
Rice. I am getting quite strong, as you see.”
“Well, yes, you do look better, marm. But it’s getting pleasant up our
way too. I was down in the gorge yesterday, setting things to rights
about the little log cabin. That big chestnut tree is putting out the
heaviest grist of leaves I ever saw, and the vines are all green about
the bridge. But what do you think I found in the cabin? Nigh upon half a
bushel of chestnuts heaped up in one corner. Been there all winter and
nobody teched ’em. Curous, wasn’t it?”
Virginia’s animation was all gone; she sat down in a chair by the
window, panting for breath.
“Well,” said Joshua, unconscious of the mischief he had done, “I suppose
I must be a going. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye, Joshua,” said Ellen, following the kind fellow from the room.
“When is it to be?”
“Next month, arly, I reckon by the orders we get. Eunice told me to tell
you she thought so. A pair of stupendous carriage hosses came up
yesterday, and a new barouche. The stables won’t hold ’em if she keeps
on.”
Ellen went back to the house. She had not yet told Virginia that her
cousin’s marriage was so near at hand. Indeed they seldom talked on that
subject now. It was too seriously painful.
“Ellen,” said Virginia, when her friend came in, “after it is all over,
tell me.”
You would have thought from the quivering pallor of her face that it was
the execution of some friend she was speaking of.
“I will,” said Ellen, in a low voice. “It is not yet.”
Virginia drew a struggling breath, and no more was said. She had seen
Ellen talking with Joshua, and guessed at the subject of their
conversation.