THE NEW SUITOR.
How! Will she none? Doth she not give us thanks?
Is she not proud? Doth she not count her blessed,
Unworthy as she is, that we have wrought
So worthy a gentleman to be her bridegroom?
_—Shakspere._
First came the news of the glorious victory of Yorktown—the final and
signal triumph of the American arms. There were no railroads and
telegraphic wires in those days, and very few newspapers. The report,
the re-echo of this splendid victory, rolled on toward their quiet
neighborhood like a storm; in clouds of doubt, in thunder and lightning
of astonishment, joy, and mad triumph. The most delirious rejoicing
convulsed the whole village and neighborhood for days, before any
newspaper arrived with an account of the battle.
And the same mail that brought the newspaper, with a long account of the
battle, headed in great capital letters line below line, brought also a
letter sealed with black that sped like a bullet through the foreboding
heart of Mrs. Chester, a letter from Colonel Chester, announcing the
glorious death of his two brave sons upon the field of victory.
Mrs. Chester was overwhelmed with grief by the twofold bereavement, the
fall of both her gallant sons, of whom she was as proud as fond.
She did not dream of the calamity, worse than death, that had befallen
Alice, in the disguise of a princely inheritance, destined to darken her
whole life with sorrow, while it mocked her in the face of the world
with its unreal light and splendor.
But there was one who was not so forgetful—Colonel Chester. He was still
with the army, but another letter was received from him, announcing his
speedy return home, accompanied by his friend and companion in arms,
General Garnet, a young officer, who, though but thirty years of age,
had risen to the highest rank in the army, and won an immortal fame.
Colonel Chester came at length, accompanied by General Garnet. He met
Alice with great empressement—for it was scarcely great
affection—praised her growth and her beauty, introduced General Garnet,
and, excusing himself for a few moments, passed to the sick-chamber of
his wife.
Left alone with her guest Alice examined him shyly, with the curiosity
of a woman and the bashfulness of a country girl. General Garnet was
what young ladies call a fine, military-looking man. He certainly had a
fine, martial figure and bearing, or that which is our ideal of it—a
tall and elegantly proportioned figure, a calm, majestic carriage, yet
withal suggestive of great reposing strength and fire. His voice was
perfect harmony itself. His manner was dignified and imposing, or
graceful, earnest, and seductive. Yet, sometimes, one in a sudden, vague
astonishment, would feel that he was a man who could unite the utmost
inflexibility, and even cruelty of purpose, with the most graceful and
gracious urbanity of manner. With all his marvelous powers of
fascination he was a man to darken, chill, repel a bright-spirited,
warm-souled, pure-hearted girl like Alice. Yet she did the honors of her
father’s house to her father’s guest until that guest merged into the
lover, and then Alice felt and betrayed the utmost soul-sickened
repugnance to him and his suit.
It was now that the object of Colonel Chester in inviting this
distinguished visitor to Mount Calm became evident—that of bestowing the
hand of his daughter and heiress upon him.
After a conversation with General Garnet he sent for Alice, and, without
any preface at all, bade her make up her mind to a speedy marriage with
the husband he had chosen for her, his distinguished and dear friend,
General Garnet.
Alice passed from the room, mechanically pressing her hands to her
temples, trying to awake as from a heart-sickening dream. And so she
passed to her now frequent post of duty, her declining mother’s darkened
room and sick-bed. The senses, or the intuitions, or the instincts of
those on the confines of the unseen world are sometimes preternaturally
acute. There was that in the falling footstep, in the very form and
bearing, of Alice, as she glided through the shadows of that dark room,
that revealed to the mother the existence of some heavy cloud teeming
with sorrow, that was ready to burst upon the devoted head of her child.
She called Alice to her bedside, took her hand in her gentle grasp,
looked with wondering sadness into her eyes—her eyes set in the stare of
blank stupor—and murmured tenderly:
“What is the matter, Alice? Tell your mother?”
Her mother’s loving voice and touch unsealed the spellbound founts of
tears and speech.
“Oh, mother! mother! I am ruined! ruined!” she wildly gasped, and,
sinking down upon the floor, dropped her head upon the bed with
hysterical sobs and gasps, and inarticulate wailings.
Her mother laid her gentle hand upon her child’s burning and throbbing
head, and raised her tender eyes in silent prayer for her, while this
storm raged, and until it passed, and Alice, exhausted, but calm, was
able to rise, sit by her side, and while she held her hand, tell her
what had happened.
“I will speak to him, Alice,” she then said. “I will tell him how you
and Sinclair love each other—as you could not tell him, my child. I will
show him how vain—oh, how vain! are wealth, and rank, and honor, and
glory, in the hour of grief, by the bed of death, in the presence of
God! how love, and truth, and faith are all in all! Yes! and I will make
him feel it, too. And, though he should not realize it as I do, yet he
will never refuse me a request now!”
And the next morning, directly after breakfast, Colonel Chester received
a message from his wife, requesting him to come to her room for a few
minutes, if convenient, as she wished to speak with him.
Colonel Chester went. What passed at that interview no one knew more
than what might be guessed from what followed.
Colonel Chester came out of the room, banging the door after him, with a
half-uttered imprecation upon “sickly fancies,” “irritable nerves,” and
“foolish women.” But immediately after this interview Mrs. Chester
became much worse; her fever rose to delirium, and she was alarmingly
ill for several days. Milton Sinclair heard of her state, and, little
suspecting the cause, came to see her. He was met by Colonel Chester,
who informed him that his wife was too ill to receive even her pastor,
and requested him to walk into the library. There Colonel Chester
informed him that circumstances had occurred which made it his painful
duty to beg that Mr. Sinclair would temporarily suspend his visits to
Mount Calm.
“Alice!” exclaimed the young man. That name contained everything, and
rendered a full explanation indispensable. It was given.
Deadly pale, Sinclair walked up and down the floor, pressing his head
tightly between his two palms and groaning—groaning the name, the
prayer, that in the bitterest agony of the soul starts to every lip:
“My God! oh, my God! have pity on me! God have mercy on me!”
The heart-broken tone of these words touched even that hard man of the
world, Colonel Chester.
“Come, come, Sinclair; you must have been prepared for this for some
months past. I did not violently and at once separate you from Alice
when I first came home, although you must have known that all our plans
were changed. I gave you time to wean yourself gradually off. In other
circumstances, indeed, I should have felt myself most honored, most
happy in the alliance; but we do not control our own destinies.
Good-day, Sinclair. You will forget Alice.”