RECONCILIATION.
Alice Wilde had been taught by her father to "read, write, and cipher,"
and was not ignorant of the rudiments of some of the sciences; for,
curiously enough, considering surrounding circumstances, there
was quite a little library of books at the cabin-home, and some
old-fashioned school-books among the number. If, when she first went
into the seminary at Center City, some of the young ladies were
disposed to ridicule her extreme ignorance upon some matters, they
would be surprised by superior knowledge upon others; and finally were
content to let her assert her own individuality, and be, what she
was--a puzzle; a charming puzzle, too, for her kindness and sweetness
made her beauty so irresistible that they could look upon it without
envy. Another thing which helped her along both with teachers and
pupils was the excellence of her wardrobe and her lavish supply of
pocket-money, for it is tolerably well known that the glitter of gold
conceals a great many blemishes. Before the first term was over she was
the praise, the wonder, and the pet of the school; flying rumors of her
great beauty and her romantic "belongings" having even winged their way
over the pickets which sentineled the seminary grounds, and wandered
into the city.
The evening that Philip Moore reached home, after his eastern journey,
chanced to be the same as that upon which the seminary began its
annual exhibition, previous to closing for the long August holiday. He
would not have thought of attending any thing so tiresome; but, taking
tea with his partner, whose pretty wife was going and urged him to
accompany them, he was persuaded against his inclination.
"As you are already spoken of for mayor, Raymond, and as I am one of
the city fathers, I suppose we must show a becoming interest in all the
various 'institutions' which do honor to our rising town," laughed
Philip, as he consented to attend with his friends.
"It will be very encouraging, especially to the young ladies, to see
your wise and venerable countenance beaming upon them," remarked
Raymond.
"But really, Mr. Moore, there's somebody there worth seeing, I'm
told--somebody quite above the average of blue-ribbon and white-muslin
beauty. I've heard all kinds of romantic stories about her, but I
haven't seen her yet," chatted the young wife. "She's the daughter of
a fisherman, I believe, who's grown enormously rich selling salmon
and white-fish, and who's very proud of her. Or else she's an Indian
princess whose father dug up a crock of buried gold--or something out
of the common way, nobody knows just what."
Philip's heart gave a great bound. "Could it be?" he asked himself.
"No--hardly--and yet"--he was now as anxious to be "bored" by the
stupid exhibition as he had hitherto been to escape it.
They took seats early in the hall, and had leisure to look about
them. Philip bowed to acquaintances here and there. After a time he
began to feel unpleasantly conscious of some spell fastening upon
him--some other influence than his own will magnetizing his thoughts
and movements, until he was compelled to look toward a remote part of
the room, where, in the shadow of a pillar, he saw two burning eyes
fixed upon him. The face was so much in the shade that he could not
distinguish it for some time; but the eyes, glowing and steady as those
of a rattlesnake, seemed to pierce him through and transfix him. He
looked away, and tried to appear indifferent, yet his own eyes would
keep wandering back to those singular and disagreeable ones. At last
he made out the face: it was that of the young man who had brought him
down from Wilde's mill the last autumn. What was Ben Perkins doing in
such a place as this? He began to feel certain who the mysterious pupil
was.
"She has thought to please and surprise me," he mused; "yet I believe I
would rather she would have kept herself just as unsophisticated as she
was, until she learned the world under _my_ tutelage."
Young ladies came on to the stage, there was music and reading--but
Philip was deaf, for _she_ was not amid the graceful throng.
At last she came. His own timid wild-flower, his fawn of the forest,
stole out into the presence of all those eyes. A murmur of admiration
could be heard throughout the hall. She blushed, yet she was
self-possessed. Philip gazed at her in astonishment. Her dress, of
the richest blue silk, the flowers on her breast and in her hair, the
bow, the step, the little personal adornments, were all _a la mode_.
His woodland sylph had been transformed into a modern young lady. He
was almost displeased--and yet she was so supremely fair, such a queen
amid the others, that she looked more lovely than ever. He wondered
if everybody had been teaching her how beautiful she was. There was
nothing of coquetry or vanity in her looks--but a pride, cold and
starry, which was entirely new to her.
He turned to look at Ben Perkins, who had leaned forward into the light
so that his face was plainly visible; and the suspicions he had often
entertained that the youth loved Alice were confirmed by his expression
at that moment.
"Poor boy! how can he help it?" thought the proud and happy gentleman,
regarding the untaught lumberman with a kind of generous compassion. He
now saw that Mr. Wilde was sitting by Ben's side, his heart and eyes
also fixed upon the stage.
"I've seen that face before," whispered Mr. Raymond; "where was it?
Ah, I remember it well, now. I can tell you who she is, Philip. She's
the daughter of Captain Wilde, that queer customer of ours, who hails
from the upper country. She's a glorious, remarkable girl! By the way,
Phil., did you flirt with her? Because I've a message for you. Capt.
Wilde told me to inform you that if you ever set foot on his premises
again he should consider himself at liberty to shoot you."
"Flirt with her! let me tell you, Raymond, I'm engaged to her, and
intend to marry her just as soon as I can persuade her to set a day.
I love her as deeply as I honor her. There's something gone wrong,
somewhere, or her father would not have left such word--he's a stern,
high-tempered man, but he does not threaten lightly. They could not
have received my letters."
"I presume I made part of the mischief myself," confessed Raymond, "for
almost the first thing I told them when they entered my store this
spring, was, that you had gone off to marry your elegant cousin. You
needn't look so provoked, Phil.; I told them in good faith. You used to
love Virginia in the days when you confided in me; and if you'd have
kept up your confidence, as you should, I would have been posted, and
could have given your friends all the information they were in search
of. Don't you see 'twas your own fault?"
"I suppose it was," replied Philip, with a smile, but still feeling
uneasy, and oh, how intensely anxious to get where he could whisper
explanations to the heart, which he now saw, had suffered more in his
absence than he could have dreamed. Henceforth his eyes were fixed only
upon Alice. Soon she perceived him; as their eyes met, she grew pale
for a moment, and then went on with her part more calmly than ever. To
him, it seemed as if they both were acting a part; as if they had no
business in that hour, to be anywhere but by each other's side; he did
not even know what share she had in the performances, except that once
she sung, and her voice, full, sweet, melancholy, the expression of the
love-song she was singing, seemed to be asking of him why he had been
so cruel to her.
The two hours of the exercises dragged by. The people arose to go;
Philip crowded forward toward the stage, but Alice had disappeared. He
lingered, and presently, when she thought the hall was vacated, she
came back to see if her father had waited to speak with her. He was
there; other parties were scattered about, relatives of the pupils, who
wished to speak with them or congratulate them. She did not see him,
but hurried down the aisle to where her father and Ben were standing.
She looked pale and fatigued--all the pride had gone out of her air as
the color had gone out of her cheek.
"Alice! dear Alice!" exclaimed Philip, pressing to her side, just as
she reached her father.
Instantly she turned toward him with haughty calmness.
"Mr. Moore. Allow me to congratulate you. Was that your bride sitting
by your side during the exercises."
"That was Mrs. Raymond, my partner's wife. But what a strange question
for _you_ to ask, Alice. I supposed _you_ had consented to take that
name, if ever any one. Mr. Wilde, I received your message through Mr.
Raymond, but I knew you were once too sincere a friend of mine, and are
always too honorable a man, to refuse me a chance of explanation."
"Say your say," was the raftsman's curt reply.
"You need not speak one word, Philip. It is I who ought to beg _your_
forgiveness, that I have wronged you by doubting you. Love--oh, love,
should never doubt--never be deceived!" exclaimed Alice.
"It would have taken much to have disturbed my faith in you, Alice."
"Because I had every motive for loving you; while you--you had pride,
prejudice, rank, fashion, every thing to struggle against in choosing
me."
"Indeed!" cried Philip. "Yes, every thing, to be sure!" and he cast
such an expressive glance over her youthful loveliness that she blushed
with the delicious consciousness of her own charms. "Old, ugly,
awkward, and ignorant, how ashamed I shall be of my wife!"
"But, Philip!" her tearful eyes, with the smiles flashing through them,
made the rest of her excuses for her.
Holding her hand, which was all the caress the presence of strangers
would permit, Philip turned to the raftsman.
"I asked you for your daughter's hand, in the letter which I sent you
on the return of the young man who brought me from your home, last
autumn, since your sudden change of plans prevented my asking you in
person. I have not yet had your answer."
When he said "letter" Alice's eyes turned to Ben, who had been standing
within hearing all this time; he met her questioning look now with one
of stubborn despair.
"You gave us no letters, Ben."
Philip also turned, and the angry blood rushed into his face.
"Did you not deliver the letters I sent by you, young man?"
"Ha! ha! ha! no, by thunder, I didn't! Did you think a man was such a
fool as to help put the halter round his own neck? I didn't give the
letters, but I told all the lies I could to hurt you, Philip Moore. You
ought to be a dead man now, by good rights. The game's not up yet. Let
me tell you that!" and scowling at the party, he strode away into the
night.
"He ought to be arrested--he is a dangerous fellow," said Mr. Wilde,
looking after him uneasily.
"I am sorry for him," said Philip, "but that can do him no good."
"Look out for him, Philip; you can not be too wary--he will kill you if
he gets a chance. Oh, how much trouble that desperate boy has given me.
I can not be happy while I know he is about."
"Thar', thar', child, don't you go to getting nervous again. We'll take
care of Ben. Don't you trouble your head about him."
"If you could guess what I have suffered this winter past," whispered
Alice, pressing closer to her lover.
"My poor little forest-fawn," he murmured. "But we must stop talking
here; eavesdroppers are gathering about. I suppose this ogre of
a seminary will shut you up to-night; but where shall I see you
to-morrow, and how early? I have yet to explain my absence to you and
your father--and I'm eager, oh, so eager to talk of the future as well
as the past."
"Meet us at the Hotel Washington, at my room," replied Mr. Wilde,
speaking for her. "We will be there at nine o'clock in the morning. And
now good-night, puss. You did bravely to-night. I'm going to see Philip
safe home, so you needn't dream of accidents."
Alice kissed her father good-night. That she wanted to kiss his
companion too, and that he wanted to have her, was evident from the
lingering looks of both; but people were looking askance at them, and
their reluctant hands were obliged to part.
That night the store of Raymond & Moore was discovered to be on fire;
the flames were making rapid headway when the alarm was given; it was
the hour of night when sleep is soundest, but the alarm spread, and
persons were thundering at the door and windows in two minutes.
"Does any one sleep in the store?" shouted one.
"Yes! yes! young Moore himself--he has a room at the back."
"Why don't he come out then? He'll be burned alive. Burst in the doors.
Let us see what has happened him."
"The fire seems to come from that part of the building. He will surely
perish."
The crowd shouted, screamed, battered the doors in wild
excitement--some ran round to the back, and a ladder was placed at the
window of his room, which was in the second story. Light shone from
that room. David Wilde, whose hotel was not far distant, mingling with
others who rushed out at the alarm, as is the custom in provincial
towns, was the first to place his foot upon the ladder; his strength
was great, and he broke in the sash with a stroke of his fist, leaped
into the building, appearing in a moment with the young man, whom he
handed down to the firemen clambering up the ladder after him.
"He's nigh about suffocated with the smoke--that's all. Dash water on
him, and he'll be all right presently," he cried to those who pressed
about. "It's that Ben, I know--cuss me, if I don't believe the boy's
crazy," he muttered to himself.
Philip soon shook off the stupor which had so nearly resulted in the
most horrible of deaths, and was able to help others in rescuing his
property. The fire was got under without much loss to the building,
though its contents suffered from smoke and water. The young firm was
not discouraged by this, as all loss was covered by insurance; they had
the promise of a busy time "getting to rights" again, but that was the
worst.
It was apparent, upon examination, that the fire was the work of an
incendiary; Philip felt, in his heart, what the guilty intention was,
and shuddered at his narrow escape. It was decided by him and Mr. Wilde
to put the authorities upon the proper track; but the perpetrator had
fled, and no clue could be got to him in the city. Mr. Wilde at once
suspected he had gone up the river, and feeling that they should have
no peace until he was apprehended, and not knowing what mischief he
might do at the mill, he took the sheriff with him and started for
home, leaving Alice, for the present, at the school, with permission
of the principal to see her friends when she chose, as it was now
vacation. Before he left there was a long consultation between the
three--Philip, Alice, and her father. Philip explained his absence. As
he went on to speak of Mortimer Moore and his daughter, of his death,
the troubled state of the family affairs, etc., the raftsman betrayed
a keener interest than his connection with those affairs would seem to
warrant.
"Poor Virginia! she is all alone, and she is your cousin, Philip," said
Alice.
"She tried hard to get back her old power over me, Alice. You must
beware how you compassionate her too much. But when we are married,
and have a home of our own, we will share it with her, if you consent.
I've no doubt she can find somebody worthy of her, even in this savage
West, as she thinks it. And, by the way, I think we ought to get a home
of our own as soon as possible, in order to have a shelter to offer my
cousin--don't you, Alice?"
"She's tongue-tied. Girls always lose their tongues when they need 'em
the most."
"Now, father, I should think you might answer for me," said Alice,
trying to raise her eyes, but blushes and confusion would get the
better of her, and she took refuge in her father's lap.
"Well, puss, I s'pose you want to go to school five or six years
yet--tell him you've made your cacklations to keep in school till
you're twenty-two."
"School! I'll be your teacher," said Philip.
"Choose for yourself, puss. I s'pose the sooner you shake off yer old
father, the better you'll like it."
"I shan't shake you off, father. Neither shall I leave you alone up
there in the woods. That matter must be settled at the start. I shall
never marry, father, to desert you, or be an ungrateful child."
"Suppose we arrange it this way then. We will live with your father in
the summer, and he shall live with us in the winter. I don't want a
prettier place than Wilde's mill to spend my summers in."
"Oh, that will be delightful," exclaimed the young girl; and then she
blushed more deeply than ever at having betrayed her pleasure.
"Then don't keep me in suspense any longer, but tell me if you will get
ready to go back to New York with me in the latter part of September.
We will be gone but a few weeks, and can be settled in the new mansion
I've given orders for, before the winter is here. Shall it be so?"
"Say 'yes,' cubbie, and done with it, as long as you don't intend to
say 'no.' I see she wants to say 'yes,' Mr. Moore, and since it's got
to be, the sooner the suspense is over, the better I'll like it;"
and with a great sigh, the raftsman kissed the forehead of his child
and put her hand in that of Philip. With that act he had given away
to another the most cherished of his possessions. But children never
realize the pang which rends the parent heart, when they leave the
parent nest and fly to new bowers. "All I shall be good for now, will
be to keep you in spending-money, I s'pose. You're going to marry a
fashionable young man, you know, cubbie, and he'll want you tricked out
in the last style. How much can you spend before I get back?" and he
pulled his leather money-bag out of his pocket.
"I haven't the least idea, father."
"Sure enough, you haven't. You'll have to keep count of the dollars,
when you get her, Mr. Moore; for never having been indulged in the
pastime of her sex, going a-shopping, she won't know whether she ought
to spend ten dollars or a hundred. Like as not, she'll get a passion
for the pretty amusement, to pay for having been kept back in her
infancy. You'd better get some of your women friends to go 'long with
you, puss. Here's, then, for the beginning." He poured a handful or
more of gold into her lap.
"Nay, Mr. Wilde, you need not indulge her in any thing beyond your
means, upon _my_ account, for--although she may have to conform to more
modern fashions, as she has already done, since moving among others
who do--she will never look so lovely to me in any other dress, as in
those quaint, old-fashioned ones she wore when I learned to love her.
And Alice, whatever other pretty things you buy or make, I request
you to be married in a costume made precisely like that you wore last
summer--will you?"
The raftsman heard, two or three times, on his way up the river, from
boatmen whom he hailed, of Ben's having been seen only a little way
ahead of him, and he, with the sheriff, had little doubt but they
should capture him immediately upon their arrival at Wilde's mill. But
upon reaching their destination they could not find him. The men had
seen him hovering about the mill, and Pallas had given him his dinner
only a few hours before, when he came to the house, looking, as she
said, "like a hungry wild beas', snatching what I give him and trotting
off to de woods agin."
Help was summoned from the mill and the woods scoured; but no farther
trace of the fugitive could be discovered. They kept up the search for
a week, when the sheriff was obliged to return. David Wilde wished to
believe, with the officer, that Ben had fled the country and gone off
to distant parts; but he could not persuade himself to that effect. He
still felt as if the unseen enemy was somewhere near. However, nothing
further could be done; so cautioning the house-servants to keep a good
watch over the premises, and the mill-hands to see that the property
was not fired at night, or other mischief done, he returned for his
daughter.
"Give Pallas this new dress to be made up for the occasion, and tell
her to be swift in her preparations, for the time is short. It will
be a month, Alice, before I see you again--a whole, long month--and
then I hope for no more partings. I shall bring Mr. and Mrs. Raymond
to the wedding, with your permission," said Philip, with other parting
words, which being whispered we can not relate, as he placed her on
the sail-boat, well laden down with boxes and bales containing the
necessary "dry-goods and groceries" for the fete.
"We'll charter a steam-tug next time," growled the raftsman, looking
about him on the various parcels.