REINETTE AT HOME.
When Phil envied Mr. Beresford his opportunity for being alone with
Reinette and listening to her conversation, he made a mistake, for
during the first of the drive from the cemetery to Hetherton Place, she
scarcely spoke to him, but sat with closed eyes and locked hands,
leaning back in a corner of the carriage, as motionless as if she had
been asleep. Once, however, when they were crossing the river, she
looked out and asked:
“Isn’t this the Chicopee?” and on being told it was, she said to Pierre,
in French:
“This is the river, Pierre, where papa used to gather the pond lilies
when he was a boy. It empties into the Connecticut as the Seine does
into the sea. You know you looked it out on the map for me.”
Pierre nodded, and Reinette, although she now kept her eyes open, did
not speak again until they reached the long hill which wound up to the
house Then, as she saw to her left a lovely little sheet of water
sparkling in the sunlight, she started up, exclaiming:
“That must be Lake Petit, where father used to keep his boat, the Waif.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Beresford, surprised at her knowledge of the
neighborhood. “Your grandmother, Mrs. Hetherton, called it Lake Petit, I
believe, but to most of the people here it is the Mill Pond.”
Reinette shrugged her shoulders, and asked:
“Isn’t it on papa’s land?”
“Yes, it belongs to the Hetherton estate,” was the reply, and she
continued, in a decisive tone:
“Then it is never any more to be Mill Pond. It is Lake Petit forever.”
They were half way up the hill by this time, and as one after another
views of the surrounding country greeted Reinette’s wondering gaze, her
delight knew no bounds, and, forgetting for a moment the load of pain at
her heart, she gave vent to her delight in true girlish fashion,
uttering little screams of surprise and gladness, and occasionally
seizing Pierre by the shoulder and shaking him to make him see what she
was seeing, and appreciate it, too.
“It’s better than Switzerland, better than France—better than anything!
I like America,” she cried, but Pierre shook his head, and gave a sigh
for “La Belle France,” the best country in the world, where he wished he
had staid, he said, adhering to his opinion in spite of all his mistress
could say.
Mr. Beresford could not understand them, but he knew that some
altercation was going on between them, and was astonished to see the
different expressions which passed in an instant over Reinette’s face,
and how beautiful she grew as the bright color came and went, and she
sparkled, and flashed, and laughed, and frowned, and shook up the stupid
Pierre all in the same breath. They were driving up to the house by this
time, and the moment the carriage stopped she sprang to the ground and
began to look about her, gesticulating rapidly, and talking now in
French and now in English, now to Mr. Beresford and now to Pierre, who
was almost as excited as she was. The chateau, as she called it, was so
much larger than she supposed, and the grounds more pretentious, and
“Oh, the flowers!” she cried, darting in among them like a little
humming-bird, and filling her hands with the sweet summer pinks, which
she pressed to her lips and kissed as if they had been living things and
sharers of her joy.
“The flowers are the same everywhere, and I love them so much, and the
world is so bright just like a picture, up here where it is so high; so
near Heaven, and I am so happy,” she exclaimed, as she hopped about;
then suddenly as a cloud passes over the sun on an April day, a shadow
came over her face and great tears rolled down her cheeks as, turning to
Mr. Beresford, she said, “What must you think of me to be so gay, and he
dead over in the grave-yard? But it is one part of me; there are two
natures in me you see, and I can’t help it, though all the time I’m
missing him so much, and there’s a pain in my heart and a lump in my
throat till it feels as if it would burst. And still I must love the
brightness even though it’s all dark where he lies alone. Oh, father, if
you, too were here!”
She was sobbing bitterly, and Pierre was crying too, even while he tried
to comfort her. Suddenly at something he said her sobbing ceased, and
dashing the tears from her eyes she smiled brightly at Mr. Beresford and
said:
“Forgive me, do, for troubling you with an exhibition of my grief. I
forgot myself. Father told me not to cry before people, and I will not
again. Come, let us go into the chateau; it looks so cool and inviting
with the doors and windows open and the muslin curtains blowing in and
out, and the scent of clover and new hay everywhere. The world is very
beautiful, and I mean to be happy.”
During this scene in the grounds Mrs. Jerry, the housekeeper, had been
inspecting the little lady from behind the kitchen blinds, and now, as
the party entered the wide hall, she came forward to meet her in her
neat calico dress and clean linen collar, with her hair combed smoothly
back from her frank, open brow. She knew she was there on trial, subject
to Miss Reinette’s fancy, and as she liked the place, and was desirous
of keeping it, she naturally felt some anxiety with regard to the
impression she should make upon the girl. She was not long kept in
suspense, for something in her face attracted Reinette at once, and
without the least hauteur in her manner she went forward with
outstretched hands, and said:
“Mrs. Jerry, I am so glad you are here, I know I shall like you, and you
must like me in all my moods, for I am not always alike. There are two
of me, one good and one bad—though I mean to shut the bad one out of
doors in this my new home. And now, please, take these flowers and put
them in water for me. I don’t wish any one to show me over the house.”
Turning now to Mr. Beresford she said,
“I’d rather find my way alone and guess which is my room and which was
meant for him,”—here her lip began to quiver, but she kept up bravely
and went on: “You will come and see me to-morrow, and I shall ask you so
many things. Father said I was to trust you and go to you for
everything. By and by, though, I shall take care of myself. And now,
good-by till to-morrow afternoon.”
She gave him her hand, and he had no alternative but to go, although he
would so gladly have lingered longer, so deeply interested was he
already in this strange girl with the two natures, one proud, cold,
scornful, and passionate; the other gentle, and soft, and sweet as the
flowers she loved so dearly. He might have been more interested still
had he seen her standing in the door with the great tears drooping from
her long eyelashes as she watched him going down the hill and felt that
now, indeed, she was alone in her desolation with her new life all
before her.
“I like him because he was father’s friend, and because he seems a
gentleman,” she thought; and then as she remembered _those other people_
who had claimed her for their own, and who were not like Mr. Beresford,
she shuddered and felt her other self mastering her again.
Just then Mrs. Jerry appeared, asking if she could do anything for her,
and if she would not like to go to her room.
“No, no—go away!” Reinette answered, almost angrily; “I want nothing but
to be let alone. I can find my way. I must work it out myself.”
So Mrs. Jerry went back to the kitchen, and Pierre, who knew the first
approaches of his mistress’ moods, sat down upon the grass quietly
waiting the progress of events.
Reinette’s face was very white, and as was usual when she was trying to
repress her feelings, her hands were locked together as she stood
looking about her at the trees under which her father had played when a
boy, and the honeysuckle which grew over the trellis-work and which must
have blossomed for him, and more than all at his initials cut by himself
on the door-post. Then with a little smothered cry she turned suddenly,
and ran up stairs to the room which she had heard described so often,
and which at a glance she knew was hers.