FALSE FRIEND OR TRUE?
"I wish Ellen was at home," said Dan to himself, as he sat alone in
the parlor which served as his training-room; "the house is quite
lonely without her." Joshua had been gone from Stepney for four days,
and, knowing how Dan would miss Ellen, Mrs. Marvel had insisted that
he should stop at her house during that time. "There will be no one to
attend to you, my dear," Mrs. Marvel had said to him; "Mr. Kindred is
ill, and Minnie and Susan are fully employed waiting upon him." Dan
acknowledged the superior claims of Mr. Kindred on Minnie's and
Susan's attention, and consented to stop at Mrs. Marvel's house until
Ellen returned. Now that Joshua was gone, however, he could not help
thinking it strange that Minnie had not found time to run in and see
him, if only for two or three minutes. He expressed this to Mrs.
Marvel, who replied that Mr. Kindred was suffering much, she believed,
and did not like Minnie to be away from him, loving her so dearly.
"But it will be all right, my dear, when Ellen comes back," she said,
"she will be able to assist the girls in their nursing." The
uneasiness which Dan would have otherwise experienced at not seeing
Minnie was allayed by the knowledge that she was doing her duty. Still
he was glad when the morning came upon which Ellen was to return; for
patient as he was, he was hungering to see Minnie. And now at last he
was at home in his own little parlor, waiting almost impatiently for
Ellen. He heard a sound in the passage, and he raised his hand in a
listening attitude. "Ellen? No; Susan." The door opened, and Susan
entered. Accustomed as he was to Susan's strange manner and to the
alterations in it--morose one day and remorsefully affectionate the
next--he had never seen her as as he saw her now. Her face was pinched
as with some great agony, her hands wandered restlessly about her
dress and over one another, her eyes dilated as he remembered them in
the old days when she was tormented by the fear that terrible shapes
were stealing upon her unaware. Yet, notwithstanding these distressing
symptoms of a mind disturbed to its very uttermost, there was
something still more painful in her appearance. This was the effort to
appear calm and self-possessed, evidenced in the attempts she made to
keep her hands still and her eyes from wandering around. But she could
not bring color to her white face, nor composure to her quivering
lips. No nerves are more difficult to master than those which directly
affect the mouth, and many a hard-grained strong-minded man has
betrayed himself by a twitching of his lips, which he has found it
impossible to control. Dan had not seen Susan for more than a week,
and he was appalled at the change in her. His first thought was of
Minnie.
"What has happened, Susan?" he cried. "Minnie is not ill?"
He betrayed himself in the tone of anguish in which he made the
inquiry. Susan twisted her fingers so tightly together that the blood
left them, but she felt no pain.
"Why should Minnie be ill?" she asked. "You have not seen her, then?"
"Thank God!" Dan thought to himself; "it is not anxiety for Minnie
that has changed her so."
"And her father, Susan?" he said aloud, more softly.
"Her father!" exclaimed Susan, approaching Dan so that he could take
her hand; it was like ice. "Basil! He is stricken almost to death. I
don't know what to do; and I am pledged, miserable woman that I am--I
am pledged not to speak; not to divulge what I know!"
"Poor Susey!" said Dan soothingly, and in a tone of earnest sympathy,
thinking that Susan's last words referred to what the doctor had told
him of Basil's heart-disease. "Poor Mr. Kindred! I am grieved to the
soul to hear it."
She strove to free her hand from his grasp; but he retained it.
"Tell me about Minnie, Susey," he implored. "Ah, if you knew how I am
yearning to see her--how I am yearning to console her!"
At this appeal, so strong a trembling took possession of her, that her
words, to any but the acutest sense, would not have been
distinguishable.
"You, Dan!" she said, tightening her grasp upon his hand. "You
yearning to see her! You yearning to console her! Why?"
"Susey, you will help me when I tell you. You will let me see her when
I tell you. I love her!"
"My God!"
A deathlike silence followed, and Dan was almost frightened to break
it, but he was constrained by his fears to speak.
"There is a hidden meaning in your words, Susan," he said in hushed
tones, "that I cannot fathom. Give me some clew, if you have any love
for me."
"I can give you none," she answered hurriedly, "until I am released
from my pledge. Do not ask me any thing else--I don't think I am
conscious of what I am saying. I will go up to Basil--to Mr.
Kindred--and beg of him to see you. What is that?"
It was merely a knock at the street-door; but in Susan's nervous
condition the sound was sufficient to cause her to start in alarm from
Dan's side.
"Only a knock at the door, Susey. You have overtasked yourself, my
dear, with nursing."
Susan hastened to the street-door, and Dan heard a voice ask if Mr.
Basil Kindred lived there. "Yes," answered Susan. "Here is a letter
for him; is it right?" "Quite right." And taking the letter from the
messenger, Susan went up stairs to Basil Kindred's room. She had left
the street-door open, and before another minute had passed, sunshine
entered the house--sunshine, in the person of Ellen, who, radiant with
joy, ran into the house and into the parlor, and clasping Dan round
the neck, called him by the dearest of names, and kissed him again and
again. What a bright flower she was! What a lovely flower she was!
What nameless beauty had passed into her face, that caused Dan to
thrill with pride that she was his sister, and caused him to wonder at
the same time what change it was that had come over her and added to
her loveliness? The sombre aspect of the room was gone; the chill, the
fear, the dread of Susan's meaning was gone; the terror that had no
reason in it, as far as he could see, was gone. For sunshine had
entered the house.
"O my dear, dear Dan!" she cried, shedding tears in the fulness of her
joy. "O my darling, darling brother! I am so happy to be with you
again!"
She kissed his face a dozen times again, and hid hers on his neck, and
kissed that too, until from Dan's heart, infected by her happiness,
every particle of fear planted there by Susan's manner had fled.
Truly, she was sunshine--the best, the dearest, the warmest.
"My dear, dear Ellen!" said Dan, returning her affectionate embrace,
"how happy I am that you are back! I have been thinking how lonely the
house is without you. But"--holding her face between his hands and
looking at it, bright and blushing and beautiful--"you have grown
positively lovely. What have you been doing with yourself these last
four days?"
What had she been doing with herself? She laughed softly at the
question, then ran and shut the door, and came back and sat on the
floor at his feet, tucking up her dress to save it from the dust.
She was in such a flutter even then--taking Dan's hand and fondling
it--that he waited to speak until she was more composed. Presently she
grew quieter, and resting her head on his knees, said,--
"Now, Dan, I am quiet. Ask me questions."
"To commence, then, when did you come back?"
"This very minute."
"Who brought you back?"
"Mr. Meddler."
"The dear old friend! Why didn't he come in to see me?"
"For reasons. He said that we had best be left alone, so that we might
chat. He is coming to see you to-night."
"When did Joshua's ship go away?"
"The day before yesterday."
"Why, you little puss, you've been playing truant!"
"Mr. Meddler persuaded me; and yesterday Mr. Meddler and Mrs. Eliza
and me went for a ride in the country."
"What a grand young lady you've got to be! And Jo! What about Jo?"
She nestled to him more caressingly; and he, passing his hand over her
face, drew it away, with tears upon it.
"Crying, Nell?
"For happiness, Dan--for very happiness, my dear! What about Jo, you
ask. I will speak his exact words--almost his last, dear--'My undying
faithful love for Dan.'"
"Dear Jo! my dear, dearest brother!"
"That was not all he said, Dan; we were speaking of you all the
day--you were never out of our thoughts, never out of his, I am sure.
He is the dearest friend, the truest friend, the most faithful, the
most constant, that happy man or woman ever had!"
"He is all that you say, dear Ellen, and I thank Heaven for giving him
to us."
"Any more questions, Dan?"
"No; I can't think of any."
"Then I must tell you something without being asked," said Ellen: "I
am the happiest woman in the world."
She arose, and standing at the back of his chair, clasped him round
the neck, folding her hands one in the other, so that he should not
see her wedding-ring. Then she inclined her lips to his ear, and was
about to whisper the precious secret which made her the happiest woman
in the world, when an agonized scream rang through the house. With
affrighted looks they turned to each other for an explanation.
"It is Susan," said Dan, all his fears returning. "I have not had time
to tell you, Ellen, but her manner just now frightened me. For
Heaven's sake assist me up stairs!"
With his crutch under one arm, and his other round Ellen's neck, he
went to Basil Kindred's room, and, pushing open the door, entered.
Basil Kindred was sitting motionless in his chair, before a table on
which were writing-materials; his head was thrown back as if he were
asleep; one hand was on his heart, and the other, from which a letter
had fallen was hanging listlessly down. And kneeling by his side was
Susan, with a look of horror on her white face. But Minnie where was
Minnie? No one had gone out of the house; if she had come down stairs,
Dan must have heard her. He sank into a chair and gazed about him
vacantly. It was not that the power of thought had left him, but that
he was afraid to think. Susan, rocking herself to and fro, her face
turned away, had taken no notice of their entrance.
"Ask her where Minnie is," said Dan to Ellen. He had tried to utter
the words two or three times, but his throat was parched; and now his
voice sounded so strange to him, that he wondered if he or some one
else had spoken.
"Susan!" said Ellen, placing her hand on Susan's shoulder. "Susan,
where is Minnie?"
But Susan did not heed her; and Ellen raising her eyes from Susan's
face to that of Basil Kindred, retreated appalled to Dan's side. It
looked like the face of one to whom death had come suddenly; perfectly
peaceful, but terrible to see. Still she found strength to whisper to
Dan, "Be strong, my dear, be strong. Shall I run and fetch mother?"
"Mother!" echoed Dan, with the same doubt upon him as to whether he or
some one else were speaking. "Mother! Oh! Mrs. Marvel you, mean Jo's
mother."
"Yes, dear, Jo's mother and ours. Shall I run and fetch her?"
"No, not yet. What is that paper by his side? Pick it up; give it to
me."
Averting her eyes from Basil's face, Ellen picked up the letter and
gave it to Dan. "It is Minnie's writing," she whispered.
"Hark!" said Dan.
It was the cockatoo that Joshua had brought home that startled him. It
was screeching down stairs, "Dan, Ellen, Minnie! Bread-and-cheese and
kisses! and kisses, and kisses!" ending with the usual running fire of
kisses, until it lost its breath. When the bird was quiet, Dan looked
at the letter in his hand.
"Minnie's writing," he said, trying to read it; but the words swam in
his fading sight. "Read it, Ellen; I cannot make it out."
Ellen took the letter from his trembling hand, and read:--
"Father,--I have not gone from you because I do not love you, but
because it was my fate to do what I have done. I could not resist it.
I have nothing to say in justification of my conduct, except the words
I heard you use to Joshua when you were telling him of my mother. I
came into the room while you were speaking; it was dark, and neither
you nor Joshua saw me. What you said of my mother then sank into my
mind, and I can never forget it. Do you remember 'She loved me and
sacrificed herself for me. Loving me, she conceived it to be her duty
to follow me; she forsook friends and family for me, and I bless her
for it. Her devotion, unworldly as it was, was sanctified by love.
There is no earthly sacrifice that love will not sanctify.' As my
mother did, so I have done. It will be useless searching for me; for
when you read this, I shall be hundreds of miles away on the sea. If
you guess my secret, keep it for the sake of my good name; and for the
sake of my good name do not let any other eyes but yours see this
letter. If it were possible for me to have a wish fulfilled, I would
pray that I might die before this reaches you. On my knees I ask you
to forgive your unhappy
"Minnie."
No one but Ellen noticed the entrance of Solomon Fewster while the
letter was being read; and she, with a warning finger to her lips,
restrained him by that gesture from coming forward. So he stood silent
and attentive within the doorway. As the words came slowly and
painfully from Ellen's lips, each of them cut into Dan's heart like a
knife. Ellen had seen his sufferings, and would have ceased reading,
but that he motioned her to proceed.
"So, then," said Dan, after a long and painful pause, "Minnie is gone.
What have I to live for now? I would have been content if she had only
been near me; if I could have heard her voice or the rustle of her
dress to assure me of her beloved presence. Without that, my life is
dark indeed. But where has she gone?"
He asked the question of himself; but Susan starting to her feet,
answered him.
"Where has she gone? Where else but to sea in the 'Merry Andrew,' with
your false friend Joshua Marvel? And the knowledge of it has killed
her father!"
"It is false!" cried Dan in a clear ringing voice. "It is false, you
bad sister!"
"It is true, Daniel Taylor," said Solomon Fewster in his smooth oily
voice. "I have here a letter from a sailor on board the 'Merry Andrew,'
informing me that Minnie and Joshua are on the same ship."
At this corroborative testimony, Susan fell upon her knees, and raised
her arms.
"Curse that false friend!" she cried.
But Ellen fell at her side, exclaiming, "O Susan, Susan, restrain your
tongue! For all our sakes--for my sake! He is my husband!"
Whereat Solomon Fewster, upon whose face there had hitherto been an
ill-concealed expression of triumph, crushed the letter he held in his
hand, and muttered a bitter curse.
And Dan, folding Ellen in his arms, said,--
"Hush, my sister, hush! Blessings on your wedding-ring! Blessings on
your husband and my true friend! We shall live to see him give the lie
to slanderous tongues. I have something to live for now--to defend the
honor of my brother!"