ELSIE.
Oh! the words
Laugh on her lips; the motion of her smiles
Showers beauty, as the air-caressed spray
The dews of morning.
_—Milman._
But ever still,
As a sweet tone delighteth her, the smile
Goes melting into sadness, and the lash
Droops gently to her eye, as if she knew
Affection was too deep a thing for mirth.
_—Willis._
General Garnet was certainly not a parsimonious man; perhaps his
interest in his little godchild had died with her mother; perchance,
being a very wealthy man, he could not appreciate the strait to which
poor Miss Joe and her little family were reduced; possibly, he did not
wish to give his personal attention to little Garnet’s necessities;
probably, he intended that Miss Joe should get what was needed at the
village store, upon his account; certainly, if Miss Joe had liberally
interpreted his letters, and done so, he would, without demur, have
settled the bill. But Miss Joe was far too cautious to put a doubtful
construction on his letters, and run in debt. I never clearly
comprehended the difficulty between them, but I believe they each
misunderstood the other, and so General Garnet remained with the stigma
of cruelty and ingratitude resting upon him, when, perhaps, he could be
justly accused of indifference only.
Just about the time of Miss Joe’s last application also, General Garnet,
like Martha, was troubled with many things. He was a candidate for the
Senate, and all his thoughts engaged in the secret, intriguing,
vexatious, multifarious business of electioneering; or if he had a
thought or a moment to spare, it was divided between the negotiation
with his neighbor, Mr. Hardcastle, of a marriage between Magnus
Hardcastle and Elsie Garnet, or in preparations for the return of his
daughter—having his house repapered, repainted, and newly furnished.
Magnus Hardcastle had obtained his diploma, and was getting into some
little practice, despite the grumbling, growling, and swearing
objections of his uncle, who could see no necessity for his nephew
“making a slave of himself for nothing.”
Yes, absolutely for nothing! Let Magnus show a dollar that he had ever
earned by all his practicing of medicine. Let him show even a dollar
that he had ever got back for the medicines that he had dispensed along
with his attention and advice!
It was true, Magnus’ receipt-book, if he owned one, was an unwritten
volume. His practice was mostly among poor people, who had no dollars to
spare.
Well, then, what did he do it for? What good did it do him? There he
was, rapped up out of his warm bed in the middle of the winter’s night,
in the midst of a snowstorm, to ride five or six miles to some old woman
in a cramp colic, or some child with the croup! What good did it do? And
this was not the case once or twice, but five or six times in a month.
And what good did it do him?
Lives were saved!
Yes, but what did he get for his trouble? Thanks, maybe. Pooh! he knew
very well that half the time he got nothing but ingratitude and coarse
abuse. He had better remember that Irishwoman, with an inflammatory
fever, who took her powders every hour in a gill of whisky, and, being
near death, swore the d—— doctor’s stuff had murdered her. He had better
remember how the other woman cursed him for cutting off her husband’s
mortified leg to the saving of his life. Pooh! Let him give up the dirty
profession. He did not adopt him, did not intend to give him a fortune
for the sole purpose of enabling him to be a poor doctor without even
parish pay!
Sometimes Magnus would answer to this effect:
“Nonsense, my good uncle! If I can do any good in my day and generation,
let me do it. Though I do sometimes get abuse from some poor, ignorant
man, or, more frequently, a blowing up from some poor, nervous,
overtasked woman, who, by the way, would defend me, to the death, the
very next hour, if anyone else attacked me—why should I care? I am quite
as well liked as I deserve to be. Most people are, in fact. Some day the
people around here will send me to Congress in my own despite, I am so
popular.”
“Send you to Congress! I expected that—I was only waiting for that. It
only wanted that to complete my despair and your ruin.”
“Dear uncle, be easy—I shan’t go,” Magnus would reply, laughing.
Yes, Dr. Magnus Hardcastle was very popular, and could have carried as
many votes as any man in the county. He was the constant companion of
General Garnet, by what sort of attraction and association the reader
cannot fail to know. Never was such a zealous partisan as Magnus! Never
was such a stump orator,—earnest, eloquent, impassioned, large-souled,
great-hearted, full of human sympathies,—he could sway a crowd to and
fro in a manner that might have been amusing, if it had not been sublime
in its exhibition of power. It was his personal appearance, as well as
his temperament, that was the cause of much of this power over others.
But it is time to give you some idea of Magnus Hardcastle at
twenty-three. He was a fine illustration of the beauty of the vital
system. He had the tall, athletic form that distinguishes the men of the
Western Shore; a face rather square, by reason of the massive forehead
and massive jaws, both indicating intellect and strength; but it was in
the fullness of the beautifully rounded chin and cheeks, in the fullness
of the large, but beautifully curved lips, that the fine, genial
serenity, and joyous temperament was revealed; the line of the nose and
forehead was nearly straight, and the eyes were clear blue, the
complexion was clear and ruddy; and the face was surrounded by the
darkest chestnut hair, and whiskers that met beneath the chin. The
prevailing expression of this fine countenance was confidence and
cheerfulness.
Magnus had been corresponding with Elsie for the last three years, and
looked forward to her return with more of joyful anticipation than
anyone else in the world, perhaps, except her mother. A year before
this, two miniature portraits of Elsie, in her young womanhood, had been
forwarded from England. One of them had been retained by her mother; the
other was presented by General Garnet to Magnus. He wore it in his—vest
pocket. It was his charm, his talisman, his abracadabra. When, if ever,
he would become, for the instant, lazy, stupid, hopeless, or impatient,
he would take that miniature out, touch the spring so that the case
would fly open, and gaze upon that handsome, wholesome, happy face until
energy, inspiration, hope, and patience came again; and he would close
it, and replace it in his pocket with a joyous faith in his coming life,
that not all the powers of evil could have shaken.
I told you that Magnus was the zealous, active, and most efficient
partisan of General Garnet; he was also the dear friend and confidant of
Mrs. Garnet. Many and long were the confidential talks they would have
in Alice’s dressing room; and the subject of these conversations was
Elsie—still Elsie.
One day, after reading with Mrs. Garnet Elsie’s last delightful letter,
and discussing with her Elsie’s expected arrival, he exclaimed joyfully:
“This makes me gladdest of all!—that our fresh, dewy, charming Elsie
will come at once to us. Well!—at once to me—that she will not have had,
as most young ladies have, many other lovers; that the sun of the world
will not have stolen the bloom and the dew from our beautiful Maryland
rose.”
But Magnus “reckoned” his future without destiny, his “host.”
Elsie had been withdrawn from school, indeed, and was quite ready and
anxious to get home. She was to return with General A——’s family, who
were soon expected to sail for the United States. But one circumstance
following another, and connected with his diplomatic business, had
deferred his departure from time to time, until six months passed
away—during which time Miss Garnet had been presented at court, and was
moving in the best society in London. Yes; and, though still impatient
to come home, enjoying her happy self to the utmost, as every letter
testified.
Now, you would think that after having congratulated himself so upon the
unsunned freshness of this beautiful Maryland rose, that Magnus would
lament that she was blooming in the very blaze of the sun of fashion, in
the very conservatory of a court.
By no means; her letters reassured him, every one.
“It is well, very well, upon the whole,” he said. “She has now an
opportunity of forming an acquaintance with one order of society that
may never occur again—of getting an insight into one phase of human
nature that nothing but this experience could afford her.”
And time sped on, and brought the day when a letter came to them, dated
at Liverpool, and announcing that General A——, with his family, and Miss
Garnet, would sail within a few days, in the ship _Amphytrite_, bound
from that port to Norfolk. Therefore, it was expected that within a few
days after, if not before the arrival of the letter, the _Amphytrite_
would be in port.
General Garnet, accompanied by Dr. Hardcastle, left Mount Calm
immediately for Norfolk, to welcome his daughter, if the ship had come;
to wait for her if it had not.
Mrs. Garnet remained at home to receive her, in fond, impatient
expectation.
She had Elsie’s bed chamber decorated, and a fire made in it every day,
and the parlors lighted and warmed, and the tea table set for the whole
party every evening.
At last, one night,—a week after they had left home,—while she was
standing before the parlor fire, trimming a lamp on the chimney-piece,
and wondering sadly if she were not merely imagining that her long-lost
daughter was expected home, a carriage drove rapidly up the shaded
avenue, steps were let down, people came, a little bustle ensued, hasty
steps and joyous voices were heard. Alice ran out, and, in an instant,
the mother, weeping, laughing, exclaiming, had caught, and was hugging
her daughter laughing to her bosom. Yes, Elsie herself!—Elsie, warm,
alive, real, and such an armful of bright, rosy, joyous life, and love
and reality! I leave you to imagine the joy of the party around the
tea-table that night, where all were too joyful to eat—or the late hour
at which they separated for the night and retired to their several
rooms, where each one was too happy to sleep.
The next morning, happy, joyous Elsie had to hold a sort of levee for
the benefit of the colored folks. Every negro in the house, or on the
plantation, who had known her before she went away, had to come and
shake hands with her, and welcome her back. And every little one that
had grown from infancy to childhood during her absence, and to whom she
was a sort of fabulous demigoddess, or, it might be, one of the angels,
had to come and stare at her and be patted on the head, and get its
paper of sugar-plums or its toy.
And then, later in the day, when her trunks and boxes arrived in the
wagon, and were unpacked, she had to distribute her presents and tokens
of remembrance to all and each of the colored people.
And in the course of the second day, when the news of her arrival began
to be rumored about, the companions of her childhood, now grown up to be
young men and women, flocked in to see her. And it was from their sly
hints and innuendos that Elsie was taught that it was expected of her
father to give a ball, and that, indeed, a great many people would be
very greatly disappointed if he did not. And good-natured Elsie, in
order to make so many young folks happy, named the matter to her father,
and begged him, as a personal favor to herself, in consideration of her
recent arrival home, to give a party. So General Garnet, willing to
please his child, and believing, besides, that a large party might
forward his electioneering prospects, gave his consent. He consulted
Mrs. Garnet and Dr. Hardcastle, and fixed the time of the ball for that
day two weeks. Magnus was with Elsie every day. She perfectly
understood, though she could scarcely have told why, for no one had as
yet hinted the subject to her, that she was at no very distant period of
time to be married to Magnus. She considered her marriage, like her
leaving school, her presentation at court, and her coming-out ball, a
part of the programme of her happy drama of life, and was content. She
loved Magnus. During her absence in England, she had remembered and
loved him as she had remembered and loved her father and mother—as one
of the elements of her life’s joy.
When she returned, she had met him with the fond and free affection of a
sister for an only brother.
And when she had been at home a week, and Magnus had found opportunity
and courage, and led the beautiful and happy girl to a shady nook in the
twilight parlor, and told her with the burning eloquence of passion how
long, how deeply, how greatly he had loved her; how she had been at once
his one memory and his one hope—his incentive, his dream, his
inspiration, his guiding star, Elsie heard him with undisguised
astonishment at his earnestness and enthusiasm, and wondered to herself
where it all came from. And when he, full of doubt and fear, for her
free and unembarrassed manner discouraged him, begged her to give him
answer, she replied, without the slightest hesitation or
embarrassment—nay, even in her native, gladsome, confident manner—that
he need not have given himself so much anxiety; that of course everybody
knew they were going to be married; didn’t their lands join? and, of
course, she had never even thought of retreating.
Now you may think from that speech that Elsie was a sadly heartless and
mercenary and calculating little baggage. She was as far as possible
from being that. She was a fresh, innocent, totally inexperienced girl,
who repeated, parrot-like, the sentiments of those around her.
Magnus knew that, and caught her, strained her to his bosom, pressed
kisses on her brow, her cheeks, her lips, in the delirious joy of “first
and passionate love.” And Elsie broke from his arms and ran from the
room suffused with blushes, trembling with a strange, painful, blissful
tumult. All that evening Elsie wandered about upstairs, or sat dreaming,
half in terror, half in joy, until her mother came in and asked of what
she was thinking so deeply?
Elsie started, and blushed violently.
Alice took both her hands and gazed deeply into her face.
At that earnest and tender mother’s gaze, the tears sprung into Elsie’s
eyes, and then, as struck by something ludicrous in herself or her
position, Elsie laughed.
Alice pressed her hands, and released them, saying:
“It is time to dress, my dear Elsie, your father expects you in the
parlor. Let me fix your hair; it is in sad disorder.” And she smoothed
and twined the rich ringlets around her fingers, letting them drop in
long tendrils of golden auburn.
And then she arranged her dress of purple cashmere, and they went below
to the lighted parlor, where General Garnet and Magnus awaited them. The
general and Magnus were engaged in a political discussion, but Magnus
broke off and came at once to meet them.
Elsie, with a bright blush, turned away and walked to a distant table,
where she ensconced herself with her tambour frame.
But from that day Elsie gradually changed. She kept out of the way of
Magnus most sedulously. The courtship became a regular hunt. All Magnus’
ingenuity was employed in devising how he could circumvent Elsie’s arch
and saucy prudery, and entrap her into a little lover’s talk or walk.
And all Elsie’s tact was engaged in devising means to avoid without
offending Magnus.
And so days went on, until one day it fell like ice upon the warm heart
of Magnus, that Elsie might not love him except as a brother; and oh! he
thought of her first, free, fond, sisterly affection for him, until the
evening upon which he first declared his passion, and then of her calm
agreement to marry him because their lands joined, and her cold
avoidance of him ever since. “Yes,” he said to himself, “it is too true.
Elsie does not love me. I am wooing an unwilling bride. Shall I continue
to do so? Shall I marry her and seal her misery? No, my God! No, though
she is the first and last hope of my life, I will resign her if that
will make her happy.” And so Magnus suddenly abandoned the pursuit of
Elsie, and grew thoughtful, sorrowful, pale, and weary-looking.
Then he absented himself from Mont Calm for several days. Elsie did not
grow pale or thin; she was too sanguine for that; but she became uneasy,
then anxious, then restless, and would walk about looking silently from
the windows, particularly the back windows that overlooked the forest
road leading down to the Hollow; or looking into her father’s or her
mother’s face with an anxious, appealing look of silent inquiry. If the
door-bell were rung, she would start violently, pause breathlessly, turn
very pale, ask eagerly of the servant who returned, “who was that?” The
answer, “Judge Jacky Wylie,” or “Marse Roebuck” caused her to sink back
in her seat, disappointed and blushing with mortification. And yet only
two or three days had passed; but then Magnus had been in the habit of
coming twice a day, and staying over night; and two or three days seems
to a young, impatient heart like two or three eternities.
At last General Garnet, in the blackest rage and the brightest smile,
put a pair of pistols in his pocket, mounted his magnificent black
war-horse Death, and rode down to Hemlock Hollow, with the deliberate
intention of courteously inquiring into Dr. Hardcastle’s motives of
conduct, and blowing his brains out if the answer should not prove
satisfactory. Not that he sympathized with Elsie, or believed in broken
hearts, but that he had a saving faith in the junction of estates, and a
high respect for the “honor of his house.”
He found Magnus looking sallow and haggard, and immediately surmised
that he had been ill, reproached him in a polite, gentlemanly way for
not having informed his friends of his indisposition, and finally hoped
that he had recovered.
Magnus pleaded guilty to illness, and much care and anxiety, and spoke
of the pain that enforced absence from Elsie gave him. Not for the world
would Magnus have hinted that Elsie’s coldness had driven him away, and
that despair had made him ill; he knew too well that such a
communication would be visited with great severity by her father upon
the head of Elsie. And he judged rightly—General Garnet’s heart was set
on the marriage of those two joining plantations. If Magnus had backed
out, he would have shot him like a dog. If Elsie had retreated, he would
have turned her out of doors. If both had broken off, by mutual consent,
he would have—Satan only knows what he would not have done.
As it was now, he was perfectly satisfied with Magnus, insisted that he
should come over the day of the ball, if not before, received his
promise to do so, and took leave.