A DISCOVERY
"I am so glad to see you, Mr. Young. Louisa is not sick, I hope?"
"I came for you in Louisa's place; she is not well enough to quit her room.
Did you suppose that I intended leaving you here for another month?"
"I was rather afraid you had forgotten me; the prospect was gloomy ten
minutes ago. It seems a long time since I was with you."
She stood close to him, looking gladly into his face, unconscious of the
effect of her words.
"You sent me no note all this time; why not?"
"I was afraid of troubling you; and, besides, I would rather tell you what
I want you to know."
"Miss Irene, the carriage is at the door. I am a patient man, and can wait
half an hour if you have any preparation to make."
In much less time she joined him, equipped for the ride, and took her place
beside him in the carriage. As they reached his father's door, and he
assisted her out, she saw him look at her very searchingly.
"It is time that you had a little fresh air. You are not quite yourself.
Louisa is in her room; run up to her."
She found her friend suffering with sore throat, and was startled at the
appearance of her flushed cheeks. Mrs. Young sat beside her, and after most
cordial greetings the latter resigned her seat and left them, enjoining
upon her daughter the necessity of remaining quiet.
"Mother was almost afraid for you to come, but I teased and coaxed for
permission; told her that even if I had the scarlet fever you had already
had it, and would run no risk. Harvey says it is not scarlet fever at all,
and he persuaded mother to let him go after you. He always has things his
own way, though he brings it about so quietly that nobody would even
suspect him of being self-willed. Harvey is a good friend of yours, Irene."
"I am glad to hear it; he is certainly very kind to me. But recollect you
are not to talk much; let me talk to you."
The following morning found Louisa much better, and Irene and the mother
spent the day in her room. Late in the afternoon the minister came in and
talked to his sister for some moments, then turned to his mother.
"Mother, I am going to take this visitor of yours down to the library;
Louisa has monopolized her long enough. Come, Miss Irene, you shall join
them again at tea."
He led the way, and she followed very willingly. Placing her in a chair
before the fire, he drew another to the rug; and seating himself, said just
as if speaking to Louisa--
"What have you been doing these two months? What is it that clouds your
face, my little sister?"
"Ah, sir! I am so weary of that school. You don't know what a relief it is
to come here."
"It is rather natural that you should feel home-sick. It is a fierce ordeal
for a child like you to be thrust so far from home."
"I am not home-sick now, I believe. I have in some degree become accustomed
to the separation from my father; but I am growing so different from what I
used to be; so different from what I expected. It grieves me to know that I
am changing for the worse; but, somehow, I can't help it. I make good
resolutions in the morning before I leave my room, and by noon I manage to
break all of them. The girls try me and I lose my patience. When I am at
home nothing of this kind ever troubles me."
"Miss Irene, yours is not a clinging, dependent disposition; if I have
rightly understood your character, you have never been accustomed to lean
upon others. After relying on yourself so long, why yield to mistrust now?
With years should grow the power, the determination, to do the work you
find laid out for you."
"It is precisely because I know how very poorly I have managed myself thus
far that I have no confidence in my own powers for future emergencies.
Either I have lived alone too long, or else not long enough; I rather think
the last. If they had only suffered me to act as I wished, I should have
been so much better at home. Oh, sir, I am not the girl I was eight months
ago. I knew how it would be when they sent me here."
"Some portentous cloud seems lowering over your future. What is it? You
ought to be a gleeful girl, full of happy hopes."
She sank farther back in her chair to escape his searching gaze and drooped
her face lower.
"Yes, yes; I know I ought, but people can't always shut their eyes."
"Shut their eyes to what?"
"Various coming troubles, Mr. Young."
His lip curled slightly, and, replacing the book on the table, he said, as
if speaking rather to himself than to her--
"The heart knoweth his own bitterness, and a stranger doth not intermeddle
with his joy."
"You are not a stranger, sir."
"I see you are disposed to consider me such. I thought I was your brother.
But no matter; after a time all will be well."
She looked puzzled; and, as the tea-bell summoned them, he merely added--
"I do not wonder. You are a shy child; but you will soon learn to
understand me; you will come to me with all your sorrows."
During the remainder of this visit she saw him no more. Louisa recovered
rapidly, and when she asked for her brother on Sabbath evening, Mrs. Young
said he was to preach twice that day. Monday morning arrived, and Irene
returned to school with a heavy heart fearing that she had wounded him;
but a few days after, Louisa brought her a book and brief note of kind
words. One Saturday morning she sat quite alone in her small room; the week
had been specially painful, and, wearied in soul, the girl laid her head
down on her folded arms, and thought of her home in the far South. A loud
rap startled her from this painful reverie, and ere she could utter the
stereotyped "come in," Louisa sprang to her side.
"I have come for you, Irene; have obtained permission from Dr. ---- for you
to accompany us to the Academy of Design. Put on your bonnet; Harvey is
waiting in the reception room. We shall have a charming day."
"Ah, Louisa! you are all very kind to recollect me so constantly. It will
give me great pleasure to go."
When they joined the minister, Irene fancied he received her coldly, and as
they walked on he took no part in the conversation. The annual exhibition
had just opened; the rooms were thronged with visitors, and the hushed
tones swelled to a monotonous hum. Some stood in groups, expatiating
eagerly on certain pictures; others occupied the seats and leisurely
scanned now the paintings, now the crowd. Furnished with a catalogue, the
girls moved slowly on, while Mr. Young pointed out the prominent beauties
or defects of the works exhibited. They made the circuit of the room, and
began a second tour, when their attention was attracted by a girl who stood
in one corner, with her hands clasped behind her. She was gazing very
intently on an Ecce-Homo, and, though her face was turned toward the wall,
the posture bespoke most unusual interest. Irene looked at her an instant,
and held her breath; she had seen only one other head which resembled
that--she knew the purplish waving hair, and gliding up to her she
exclaimed--
"Electra! Electra Grey!"
The orphan turned, and they were locked in a tight embrace.
"Oh, Irie! I am so glad to see you. I have been here so long, and looked
for you so often, that I had almost despaired. Whenever I walk down
Broadway, whenever I go out anywhere, I look at every face, peep into
every bonnet, hoping to find you. Oh! I am so glad. Do come and see me
soon--soon. I must go now--I promised."
"Where do you live? I will go home with you now."
"I am not going home immediately. Mr. Clifton's house is No. 85, West ----
Street. Come this afternoon."
With a long, warm pressure of hands they parted, and Irene stood looking
after the graceful figure till it glided out of sight.
"In the name of wonder, who is that? You two have been the 'observed of all
observers,'" ejaculated the impulsive Louisa.
"That is my old schoolmate and friend of whom I once spoke to you. I had no
idea that she was in New York. She is a poor orphan."
"Are you ready to return home? This episode has evidently driven pictures
out of your head for to-day," said Mr. Young, who had endeavoured to screen
her from observation.
"Yes, quite ready to go, though I have enjoyed the morning very much
indeed, thanks to your kindness."
Soon after they reached home, Louisa was called into the parlour to see a
young friend, and as Mrs. Young was absent, Irene found it rather lonely
upstairs. She thought of a new volume of travels which she had noticed on
the hall-table as they entered, and started down to get it. About half-way
of the flight of steps she caught her foot in the carpeting, where one of
the rods chanced to be loose, and despite her efforts to grasp the railing
fell to the floor of the hall, crushing one arm under her. The library-door
was thrown open instantly, and the minister came out. She lay motionless,
and he bent over her.
"Irene! where are you hurt? Speak to me."
He raised her in his arms and placed her on the sofa in the sitting-room.
The motion produced great pain, and she groaned and shut her eyes. A
crystal vase containing some exquisite perfume stood on his mother's
work-table, and, pouring a portion of its contents in his palm, he bathed
her forehead. Acute suffering distorted her features, and his face grew
pallid as her own while he watched her. Taking her hand, he repeated--
"Irene, my darling! tell me how you are hurt?"
She looked at him, and said with some difficulty--
"My ankle pains me very much, and I believe my arm is broken. I can't move
it."
"Thank God you are not killed."
He kissed her, then turned away and despatched a servant for a physician.
He summoned Louisa, and inquired fruitlessly for his mother; no one knew
whither she had gone; it would not do to wait for her. He stood by the sofa
and prepared the necessary bandages, while his sister could only cry over
and caress the sufferer. When the physician came the white dimpled arm was
bared; and he discovered that the bone was broken. The setting was
extremely painful, but she lay with closed eyes and firmly compressed lips,
uttering no sound, giving no token of the torture, save in the wrinkling of
her forehead. They bound the arm tightly, and then the doctor said the
ankle was badly strained and swollen, but there was, luckily, no fracture.
He gave minute directions to the minister and withdrew, praising the
patient's remarkable fortitude. Louisa would talk, and her brother sent her
off to prepare a room for her friend.
"I think I had better go back to the Institution, Mr. Young. It will be a
long time before I can walk again, and I wish you would have me carried
back. Dr. ---- will be uneasy, and will prefer my returning, as father left
me in his charge." She tried to rise, but sank back on the pillow.
"Hush! hush! You will stay where you are, little cripple; I am only
thankful you happened to be here."
He smoothed the folds of her hair from her temples, and for the first time
played with the curls he had so often before been tempted to touch. She
looked so slight, so childish, with her head nestled against the pillow,
that he forgot she was almost sixteen, forgot everything but the beauty of
her pale face, and bent over her with an expression of the tenderest love.
She was suffering too much to notice his countenance, and only felt that he
was very kind and gentle. Mrs. Young came in very soon, and heard with the
deepest solicitude of what had occurred. Irene again requested to be taken
to the school, fearing that she would cause too much trouble during her
long confinement to the house. But Mrs. Young stopped her arguments with
kisses, and would listen to no such arrangements; she would trust to no one
but herself to nurse "the bruised Southern lily." Having seen that all was
in readiness, she insisted on carrying her guest to the room adjoining
Louisa's, and opening into her own. Mr. Young had gone to Boston the day
before, and, turning to her son, she said--
"Harvey, as your father is away, you must take Irene upstairs; I am not
strong enough. Be careful that you do not hurt her."
She led the way, and, bending down, he whispered--
"My little sister, put this uninjured arm around my neck, there--now I
shall carry you as easily as if you were in a cradle."
He held her firmly, and as he bore her up the steps the white face lay on
his bosom, and the golden hair floated against his cheek. If she had looked
at him then, she would have seen more than he intended that anyone should
know: for, young and free from vanity though she was, it was impossible to
mistake the expression of the eyes riveted upon her. Mrs. Young wrote
immediately to Mr. Huntingdon, and explained the circumstances which had
made his daughter her guest for some weeks at least, assuring him that he
need indulge no apprehension whatever on her account, as she would nurse
her as tenderly as a mother could. Stupefied by the opiate, Irene took
little notice of what passed, except when roused by the pain consequent
upon dressing the ankle. Louisa went to school as usual, but her mother
rarely left their guest; and after Mr. Young's return he treated her with
all the affectionate consideration of a parent. Several days after the
occurrence of the accident Irene turned toward the minister, who stood
talking to his mother.
"Your constant kindness emboldens me to ask a favour of you, which I think
you will scarcely deny me. I am very anxious to see the friend whom I so
unexpectedly met at the Academy of Design. Here is a card containing her
address; will you spare me the time to bring her here to-day? I shall be
very much obliged to you."
"Very well. I will go after her as soon as I have fulfilled a previous
engagement. What is her name?"
"Electra Grey. Did you notice her face?"
"Yes; but why do you ask?"
"Because I think she resembles your mother."
"She resembles far more an old portrait hanging in my room. I remarked it
as soon as I saw her."
He seemed lost in thought, and immediately after left the room. An hour
later, Irene's listening ear detected the opening and closing of the hall
door.
"There is Electra on the steps; I hear her voice. Will you please open the
door?"
Mrs. Young laid down her work and rose to comply, but Harvey ushered the
stranger in and then retired.
The lady of the house looked at the new-comer, and a startled expression
came instantly into her countenance. She made a step forward and paused
irresolute.
"Mrs. Young, allow me to introduce my friend, Miss Electra Grey." Electra
bowed, and Mrs. Young exclaimed--
"Grey! Grey! Electra Grey; and so like Robert? Oh! it must be so. Child,
who are you? Where are your parents?"
She approached and put her hand on the girl's shoulders, while a hopeful
light kindled in her eyes.
"I am an orphan, madam, from the South. My father died before my birth, my
mother immediately after."
"Was your father's name Robert? Where was he from?"
"His name was Enoch R. Gray. I don't know what his middle name was. He came
originally from Pennsylvania, I believe."
"Oh! I knew that I could not be mistaken! My brother's child! Robert's
child!"
She threw her arms around the astonished girl, and strained her to her
heart.
"There must be some mistake, madam. I never heard that I had relatives in
New York."
"Oh! child! call me aunt! I am your father's sister. We called him by his
middle name, Robert, and for eighteen years have heard nothing of him. Sit
down here, and let me tell you the circumstances. Your father was the
youngest of three children, and in his youth gave us great distress by his
wildness; he ran away from college and went to sea. After an absence of
three years he returned, almost a wreck of his former self. My mother had
died during his long voyage to the South Sea Islands, and father, who
believed him to have been the remote cause of her death (for her health
failed soon after he left), upbraided him most harshly and unwisely. His
reproaches drove poor Robert to desperation, and without giving us any
clue, he left home as suddenly as before. Whither he went we never knew.
Father was so incensed that he entirely disinherited him; but at his death,
when the estate was divided, my brother William and I decided that we would
take only what we considered our proportion, and we set apart one-third for
Robert. We advertised for several years, and could hear nothing of him; and
at the end of the fifth year, William divided that remaining third. Oh, my
dear child! I am so glad to find you out. But where have you been all this
time? Where did Robert die?"
She held the orphan's hand, and made no attempt to conceal the tears that
rolled over her cheeks. Electra gave her a detailed account of her life
from the time when she was taken to her uncle, Mr. Aubrey, at the age of
four months, till the death of her aunt and her removal to New York.
"And Robert's child has been in want, while we knew not of her existence!
Oh, Electra! you shall have no more sorrow that we can shield you from. I
loved your father very devotedly, and I shall love his orphan quite as
dearly. Come to me, let me be your mother. Let me repair the wrong of
bygone years."
She folded her arms around the graceful young form and sobbed aloud, while
Irene found it difficult to repress her own tears of sympathy and joy that
her friend had found such relatives. Of the three, Electra was calmest.
Though glad to meet with her father's family, she knew better than they
that this circumstance could make little alteration in her life, and
therefore, when Mrs. Young had left the room to acquaint her husband and
son with the discovery she had made, Electra sat down beside her friend's
sofa just as she would have done two hours before.
"I am so glad for your sake that you are to come and live here. Until you
know them all as well as I do, you cannot properly appreciate your good
fortune," said Irene, raising herself on her elbow.
"Yes, I am very glad to meet my aunt," returned Electra, evasively, and
then she added earnestly--
"I don't know that I ought to talk about things that should have been
buried before you were born. But you probably know something of what
happened. We found out after you left why you were so suddenly sent off to
boarding-school; and you can have no idea how much my poor aunt was
distressed at the thought of having caused your banishment. Irene, your
father hated her, and of course you know it; but do you know why?"
"No; I never could imagine any adequate cause."
"Well, I can tell you. Before Aunt Amy's marriage your father loved her,
and to please her parents she accepted him. She was miserable, because she
was very much attached to my uncle, and asked Mr. Huntingdon to release her
from the engagement. He declined, and finding that her parents sided with
him she left home and married against their wishes. They adopted a distant
relative and never gave her a cent. Your father never forgave her. He had
great influence with the governor, and she went to him and entreated him to
aid her in procuring a pardon for her husband. He repulsed her cruelly, and
used his influence against my uncle. She afterwards saw a letter which he
wrote to the governor, urging him to withhold a pardon. Now you have the
key to his hatred; now you understand why he wrote you nothing concerning
us. Not even Aunt Amy's coffin could shut in his hate. Irene, I must go
home now, for they will wonder what has become of me. I will see you again
soon."
She was detained by her aunt, and presented to the remainder of the family,
and it was arranged that Mr. and Mrs. Young should visit her the ensuing
day. While they talked over the tea-table of the newly-found, Harvey went
slowly upstairs and knocked at Irene's door. Louisa was chattering
delightedly about her cousin, and, sending her down to her tea, he took her
seat beside the sofa. Irene lay with her fingers over her eyes, and he said
gently--
"You see that I am wiser than you, Irene. I knew that it would do you no
good to have company. Next time be advised."
"It was not Electra that harmed me."
"Then you admit that you have been harmed?"
"No; I am low-spirited to-night; I believe that is all."
He opened the _Rambler_, of which she was particularly fond, and began to
read. For a while she listened, and in her interest forgot her forebodings,
but after a time her long silky lashes swept her cheeks, and she slept. The
minister laid down the volume and watched the pure girlish face; noted all
its witching loveliness, and thought of the homage which it would win her
in coming years. He knew as he sat watching her slumber that he loved her
above everything on earth; that she wielded a power none had ever possessed
before--that his heart was indissolubly linked with hers. He had wrestled
with this infatuation, had stationed himself on the platform of common
sense, and railed at and ridiculed this piece of folly. His clear, cool
reason gave solemn verdict against the fiercely-throbbing heart, but not
one pulsation had been restrained. As he sat looking down at her, a mighty
barrier rose between them. His future had long been determined--duty called
him to the rude huts of the far West; thither pointed the finger of
destiny, and thither, at all hazards, he would go. He thought that he had
habituated himself to sacrifices, but the spirit of self-abnegation was
scarcely equal to this trial. Reason taught him that the tenderly-nurtured
child of Southern climes would never suit him for a companion in the
pioneer life which he had marked out. He folded his arms tightly over his
chest, and resolved to go promptly.
The gaslight flashed on Irene's hair as it hung over the side of the sofa;
he stooped, and pressed his lips to the floating curls, and went down to
the library, smiling grimly at his own folly. Without delay he wrote two
letters, and was dating a third, when his mother came in. Placing a chair
for her, he laid down his pen.
"I am glad to see you, mother; I want to have a talk with you."
"About what, Harvey?"--an anxious look settled on her face.
"About my leaving you, and going West. I have decided to start next week."
"Oh, my son! how can you bring such grief upon me? Surely there is work
enough for you to do here, without your tearing yourself from us."
"Yes, mother, work enough, but hands enough also, without mine. These are
the sunny slopes of the vineyard, and labourers crowd to till them; but
there are cold, shadowy, barren nooks and corners, that equally demand
cultivation. There the lines have fallen to me, and there I go to my work.
I have delayed my departure too long already."
"Oh, Harvey! have you fully determined on this step?"
"Yes, my dear mother, fully determined to go."
"It is very hard for me to give up my only son. I can't say that I will
reconcile myself to this separation; but you are old enough to decide your
own future; and I suppose I ought not to urge you. For months I have
opposed your resolution; now I will not longer remonstrate. Oh, Harvey! it
makes my heart ache to part with you. If you were married I should be
better satisfied; but to think of you in your loneliness!" She laid her
head on his shoulder, and wept.
The minister compressed his lips firmly an instant, then replied--
"I always told you that I should never marry. I shall be too constantly
occupied to sit down and feel lonely. Now, mother, I must finish my
letters, if you please, for they should go by the earliest mail."