"The Crick" wasn't half a mile across. The Doctor's house was in plain
sight from our windows. 'Twas just a pleasant walk round there, and we
called them neighbors. The two young men had always been on the very
best of terms. Warren liked David because he knew how good he was, and
David liked Warren because he didn't know how bad he was. The chief bond
between them was the boat. Our stylish young gentleman, when he came
down to Nature, wanted to get as near her as he could,--not, perhaps,
that he loved her, but he liked a change. Nothing suited him better than
"camping out," or starting off before light a-fishing with David.
I was not at all surprised, therefore, that he should appear bright and
early the next morning, to make some arrangement for the day.
I saw him coming, from my window, and was pleased that I had lingered at
home rather beyond office-hours,--for Mary Ellen was shelling peas in
the back-doorway beneath, and I should have an opportunity of advancing
somewhat in my new chapter. It was a nice shady place. The door-steps
and the ground about them were still damp from the dew.
He came trippingly along, inquiring for David. Mary Ellen blushed some.
I saw that their acquaintance had commenced the night before. He chatted
a little with the old folks, but directed most of his talk to Mary
Ellen, that he might have an excuse for looking her full in the face,
and drinking in her beauty. I saw him seat himself on the flat stone. I
saw him glance admiringly at the pretty white hands, handling so
daintily the green pods. I saw him show her how to make a boat of one,
putting in sticks for the thwarts. And finally, I saw David come round
the house and stop short.
Warren sprang up.
"Waiting for you, David," said he. "Tide coming, stiff breeze. We can be
on Jake's Ledge in a twinkling."
And passing over a high hill, on my way to the Square, I saw the
sloop-boat, with flag flying, putting off towards Jake's Ledge.
For the next two months the Doctor's boy walked straight in the path
which my prophetic vision had marked out for him. Morning, noon, and
evening brought him paddling across "the Crick," or footing it round by
the shore-way.
Emily and I were troubled. We had once feared that our good brother and
friend would pass through life as a blind man wanders through a
flower-garden, lost to its chief beauty and sweetness. But his eyes had
been opened. And now was his life-path to lead him into a thorny
wilderness? was a worse darkness to settle down upon him?
I fancied there was a hopeless look in his face,--that he shrank into
himself more than ever. The Doctor's boy had fairer gifts than he to
offer, and no lack of well-chosen words. It was with the utmost
uneasiness that I caught, occasionally, some of these telling phrases. I
liked not his air of devotedness, his eye constantly following Mary
Ellen's movements. I liked not the flower-gatherings, the rambles among
the rocks, the rowing by moonlight. Emily's short sentence came often to
mind, "I fear."
For I felt almost sure that Warren Luce was in earnest,--that he was
deeply and truly in love with Mary Ellen. Not that he intended this at
first, but that her beauty conquered him. Most likely this was the first
of his knowing he had a heart, 'twas so small. Still, 'twas the best
thing he had, and appeared to hold considerable love for one of its
size.
And how was it with Mary Ellen? Ah, she was enough to puzzle a justice!
I was not long, though, in perceiving that this unenlightened maiden
felt instinctively that her personal appearance should be attended to a
little more carefully than when only David was to admire. Her hair was
always in nice order, and I observed that even in the morning she would
have some bit of muslin or lace-work peeping from beneath her short
sleeve. I hope there is no harm in saying that I had, even before this,
noticed the shapeliness of her arm. I think I was struck with it the
first morning, when she came across the entry.
And was she really a coquette, carrying herself steadily along between
two lovers, that she smiled just as pleasantly on David, giving him
never a cold word, even while the blushes kindled by the soft speeches
of Warren Luce still burned upon her cheeks?
I found myself getting confused. My new studies were very absorbing in
their nature, and extremely intricate. Three books to translate, and
never a dictionary!
After patient investigation, I settled down upon the conviction that
there was in the heart of our little country-girl one corner of which
David's constant goodness, and earnest, though unspoken love, had given
him the entire possession.
I thought thus, because I saw that in her own nature were truth and
goodness. And she was quick of perception. I was often struck by the
shrewdness of her remarks. I thought the more favorably of her, too,
that she was fond of pictures. Before they came to live in the other
part, she had taken a dozen lessons of an itinerant drawing-master. I
had often encountered her in my walks, trying to make a sketch of a tree
or a house. She always tucked it behind her, though, or into her pocket,
the minute I came in sight.
It was certainly true that she had not yielded to the fascinations of
the Doctor's boy so readily and so entirely as I had feared. "The girl
has some common sense," I thought, "some stability,--and likewise some
ideas of the eternal fitness of things." For I noticed, with pleasure,
one night in Emily's room, when somebody said, "There comes the Doctor's
boy," that she got up and closed the door.
She had been singing the old-fashioned hymn commencing,--
"On the fair Heavenly Hills."
The last line,
"And all the air is Love,"
was repeated. The music was peculiar,--the notes rising and falling and
rolling over each other like waves.
She had just stopped. Nobody moved. The silence was broken only by the
rustling of the lilac-bushes, as the night-wind swept over them.
"The whispering of angels!" said Emily, softly.
I was pleased that she closed the door. It showed that she felt his
unfitness to enter our little paradise. I took heart for David. And yet
it was only the next day that came the crowning with hop-blossoms.
I had returned home early, and was in my own room, waiting for tea.
Casting my eyes towards the garden, I saw Mary Ellen sitting beneath a
tree, leaning against the trunk. Near by was a hop-pole, laden with its
green. And near by, also, stood Warren Luce, holding in his hand a thin,
square book. He had gathered a quantity of the beautiful hop-blossoms
and tendrils, and was directing her how to arrange them about her head.
It appeared to be his object to make her look like a picture in his
book. "A little more to the right. A few leaves about the ear," I heard
him say; and then, "They must drop a little lower on the other side. In
the picture, the tendrils touch the left shoulder. Now hold the basket
full of them, in this way. The blossoms must be trailing over it, and
your right hand upon the handle. Not so. Let me show"--And as he touched
her hand to place it in the right position, I almost sprang from my
seat, I was so indignant for David.
I might have saved myself the trouble, though, for the next moment David
himself appeared, walking slowly home from the Square, with something in
a basket he was bringing for Emily. David was a good brother.
"Perfect!" exclaimed Warren, as he completed his _tableau_. "Just like
the picture, only"--And here he dropped his voice.
"David, come here," he called out, "and see which picture is the
prettiest."
Poor David! I saw that it was all he could do, to walk straight past
without speaking.
"Take them off," said Mary Ellen. "They are heavy."
And she pulled the wreath from her head.
That evening, coming home late, I saw a bright light in her room, and
glanced up, as I came near. She stood at the looking-glass between the
windows, holding a light in her hand. Upon her head, trailing down upon
her left shoulder, was a wreath of hop-blossoms. She wanted to know how
she looked in them. At least, this was my interpretation of the vision.
And while she held the light, first in one hand, then in the other,
turning this way and that, I stood debating whether there was any harm
in a girl's knowing she was pretty, or in her wishing to inform herself
whether any adornments rather out of the common course--hop-blossoms,
for instance--were becoming. That question, and the other, about all
women being coquettes, remain in my mind undecided to this day.
Emily must have noticed something peculiar in David's manner, when he
brought her the basket. For it was the next day, I think, that she said
to me, in her quiet way,--
"Mr. Turner, a new feeling is taking hold of me. I'm afraid I--_hate_!"
She made this announcement in her usual calm voice, as if she had been
speaking of some new manifestation of her disease. Then she told what
she had been observing in David's manner, and in Mary Ellen's. Said
she,--
"The girl has no heart. She trifles with David, and he is so wretched.
Better the stone had never been rolled away than his love be so thrown
back upon him. I pity him so much, and can do nothing."
I hardly knew what to say in reply, for I was just as troubled as she
about David. He wandered off by himself, in the chill autumn evenings,
returned late, and stole off to his bed in silence. Stories of suicides
came to me. A man who never spoke might do anything. And this, I
thought, was the point. If I could only make him speak!
He had always been more open with me than anybody,--had expressed
himself freely about the homestead, and his plans for redeeming it, and
about his anxiety for Emily. I could certainly, I thought, bring him to
speak of his trouble, if I only had for him a sure word of
encouragement. But this I had not, because Mary Ellen was such a puzzle.
Her openness served better for hiding the truth than did David's
reserve. At the bottom of my heart, though, was full faith in her love
for him. I paid her the compliment of believing she was too good to care
seriously for such a man as Warren Luce. But, then, I couldn't give my
faith to David.
How would it do to make a bold move,--to speak to her? Might I not show
her how much was at stake, and in some way have my faith confirmed?
Would, or wouldn't it answer for me to do this? Should, or shouldn't I
make bungling work of it? I turned the matter over in my mind, to assure
myself of my right to intermeddle.
We, too, had a sort of friendship, and I conceived that she very much
respected my opinion. In some ways, I had been of service to her. The
old man, her father, had been involved in legal troubles. She was
anxious to understand all about it. So I talked law to her, read law to
her, and marked law for her in my big books, besides giving advice
gratis. She had also taken other books from my library, whenever she
chose. I had lent her pictures to copy, and had shown her the way to
various points, in the country round about, whence a simple view might
easily be taken. Moreover, I was all the same as one of the family, and
felt a brother's interest in David. And, lastly, I was eight or ten
years older than she.
'Twas certainly my right to speak. I could well see, however, that it
was a matter of some delicacy. My superior age and wisdom might shed a
halo around me; still, I was nothing more nor less than a young man, for
all that.
It was one pleasant afternoon in the latter part of September, that,
engaged in these perplexing meditations, I strolled down towards the
shore. Mary Ellen hadn't been in to tea, her mother said, and I was
wondering what had become of her.
One solitary buttonwood stood close to the edge of the bank,--so close
that at high tide its brandies hung over the water. I climbed up into a
reserved seat which was always kept for me there, a comfortable little
crotch among the boughs. Upon extraordinary occasions,--a splendid
sunset, or a rain, coming over the water, or an uncommonly fine moon, or
a furious storm,--I used to mount to this seat for a good view.
On this particular afternoon the tide was unusually high,--in some
places, up to the top-rail of the meadow-fence. Our "Crick" was quite a
little bay.
A skiff came paddling along-shore. As it drew near, I saw that it
contained two people,--the Doctor's boy and Mary Ellen. He was singing,
but I was unable to distinguish the words. Then there was some laughing.
After that, she began singing to him, and I made out both words and
tune, for then the boat was quite near. It was an old-fashioned ballad,
which I once heard her sing to Emily. It began thus:--
"As I was walking by the river-side,
Where little streams do gently glide,
I heard a fair maiden making her moan,--
'Oh, where is my sweet William gone?
Go, build me up a little boat,
All on the ocean I will float,
Hailing all ships as they pass by,
Inquiring for my sweet sailor-boy.'"
I liked the music, it was so plaintive, so different from the common
well-bred songs.
Not a breath of air was stirring. Her voice rang out upon the stillness,
clear and shrill as a wild bird's. It was such a voice as you frequently
meet with among country-girls, entirely uncultivated, but of great
power, and, on some notes, of wonderful sweetness. Her admiring
listener rested upon his oars, letting his skiff drift along upon the
tide. It floated underneath the tree, and up into "the Crick." As it
passed, I saw, in the bottom of the boat, a little basket of wild
cherries.
While watching their progress, I heard a rustling among some
alder-bushes that grew about a fence, and, upon looking that way, saw
David. He, too, was watching the play, though he had not, like me, the
benefit of a seat in the gallery.
The expression on his countenance was something like what I had seen on
the faces of people at the theatre: a sort of fixed, immovable look, as
if its wearer were determined on being sensation-proof.
I glanced at the skiff. The Doctor's boy was throwing cherries at Mary
Ellen, and she was catching them in her mouth. She was in a great
frolic, laughing, showing her pretty teeth, and so earnest that one
might suppose life had no other object than catching wild cherries.
Just then I perceived, a little to the right of me, the head and
shoulders of a woman rising slowly above the bank, and recognized at
once the small features and peculiarly small gray eyes of Miss Joey. She
had been gathering marsh-rosemary along-shore.
She, too, was a spectator of the play,--was, in part, an actor in it;
for, while David's eyes were fixed upon the boat, hers were fixed upon
him, and with the same despairing expression.
"Poor Miss Joey!" I said mentally, "doomed to see your beautiful plan
fail and come to nought! You and he suffer the same suffering, but it
can be no bond between you."
She turned, and slowly descended the bank, and I watched her small
figure as it picked its way among the rocks, and finally disappeared
around a point.
Meanwhile the voyagers had landed, and were making their way to the
house. I could see them until they reached the garden-gate, could see
Mary Ellen swinging her sun-bonnet by its string, and hear her laughing,
as she tried to mock the katydids.
Then I looked for David. The feeling came over me that I was in some
magnificent theatre, where I was like a king, having a play acted for me
alone. David was lying upon the ground, with his face buried in the damp
grass.
No matter how much we may read of the effects of great sorrow or great
happiness, they will always, in real life, come to us as something we
never heard of. I involuntarily turned my head aside, feeling that I was
where I had no right to be, that I had intruded my profane presence into
the innermost sanctuary of a human heart.
While I was debating whether to remain concealed, or to go to him, throw
my arms around him, and say some word of comfort, he arose and walked
slowly towards the house. And I noticed that he went by exactly the same
route which the two had taken before him,--which brought to mind Miss
Joey's expression, "as if there'd ben a chain a-drawin' him."
That very evening, as I was sitting at my window, watching the moon rise
over the water, I saw Mary Ellen pass along the road, and sit down upon
a little wooden step which was attached to a fence for convenience in
getting over. She was watching the moon rise, too.
The scene I had so recently witnessed from the buttonwood-tree had made
me desperate. I felt that now, if ever, I must speak. Seizing my hat, I
walked rapidly to the spot, hoping it would be given me in that hour
what to say.
After we had talked awhile about the moon, how it looked, rising over
the waters, as we saw it, and rising over the mountains, as she had seen
it, I turned my face rather aside, and said, quite suddenly,--
"Mary Ellen, I want to speak to you about something important. I hope
you will take it kindly."
She made no answer; seemed startled. I hardly know how I stumbled along,
but I finally found myself speaking of my friendship for David, and of
my aversion to Warren Luce. She appeared not at all displeased, but said
very little. This was not as I expected. I thought she might answer
carelessly,--lightly.
There came a pause. I couldn't seem to get on. She safe with averted
face, her arm on the fence, her head in her hand. In the strong light of
the moon, every feature was revealed. How beautiful she was in the
moonlight! But what was her face saying? A good deal, certainly; but
what?
I stood leaning against the fence.
"Mary Ellen," said I, with a sudden jerk, as it were, "it can't be that
Warren Luce--that he is the one whom--that--that you"--And here I
stopped.
"I think Warren Luce has great power over me," said she, calmly, as if
coolly scanning her own feelings; "but you said right. He is not the one
whom--that"--
And here she smiled, as if at the thought of my broken-off sentences,
but without looking up.
"My dear girl," said I, earnestly, and taking a forward step,--"forgive
me, but--I think--I hope--you love David,--don't you?"
'Twas a bold question, and I knew it; but I was thinking how pleasant
'twould be to carry good tidings to my friend.
"I love his goodness," said she, just as calmly as before. "And I love
him for loving me. I wish he was happy. I hope no harm will come to him.
I would do everything for him,--but"--and here her voice fell--"_I don't
love him as Jane loved_."
"_Jane who_?" I asked, in surprise.
"Jane Eyre."
Here was a dilemma for me. What should I say next? What business had I,
meddling with a young girl's heart? I had been almost sure of finding
soundings, yet here I was in deep water! And, with all my pains, what
had I accomplished?
She arose, and moved towards the house. I walked along by her side,
without speaking.
"I'm going away to-morrow," said she, as we reached the gate, "to make a
visit at the old place; then everybody will be happier."
It was my turn then to be silent,--for I was trying to take in the idea
that there was to be no Mary Ellen in the house. She had occupied our
thoughts so long, had been so prominent an actor in our daily life,--how
we should miss her!
"Oh, no," I said, calmly,--for I had thought away all my surprise,--"we
shall all miss you very much."
And there we parted.
She left us the next morning, for a visit to her old home.
The latter part of the day I went into Emily's room. She had been
growing worse for some time, and had been removed to the westerly room
to be rid of the bleak winds. David was sitting on a low stool by her
bedside, his head resting upon the bed, looking up in her face. She
smiled as I entered.
"David is so tall," said she, "that I can't see his face away up there,
and so he brings it down for me to look at."
She held in her hand the ruby bracelet.
"David says," she continued, "that he is going to the gold-country, to
get money to pay off the mortgages,--and that, when he begins to get
gold, he shall get a heap, and will bring me home a whole necklace of
rubies, and make a beautiful home for me: _when_ he goes," she repeated,
with an unbelieving smile.
I smiled, too, and passed on, feeling that I had already intruded too
much upon the privacy of hearts, and would leave the brother and sister
in peace.
A few nights after this, I came home late from the Square, and found the
household in great commotion. David went out fishing, long before
daybreak, and had not yet returned. Other boats had come in, but nothing
had they seen of him, either on the Ledge or off in the Bay. This was
the more mysterious, as the weather had been unusually mild, with but
little wind.
After talking over the matter with them, I suggested that he might have
gone farther than usual, and, on account of the light winds, had not
been able to get back. The night was calm, with plenty of moonlight.
There could be no possible danger to one so accustomed to the water as
David.
This appeared very reasonable; and, at a late hour, all retired to bed.
The next morning I looked from my window at daybreak. Miss Joey was
standing on the hill, gazing off upon the water. In a few minutes the
old folks came out. They crept up the hill, and stood looking off with
Miss Joey. I joined them. There was a fine strong breeze, and fair for
boats bound in. Not one, however, was in sight. Away off in the Bay was
a homeward-bound schooner, with colors flying. A fisherman, probably,
returning from the Banks. The morning air was chilly. We silently
descended the hill.
During the day we heard that a vessel from Boston had spoken, half-way
on her passage, a small sloop-boat, with one man in it. Boston was sixty
miles distant, and it was something very unusual for a small boat to
make the passage. Friends in the city were written to, but no
information was obtained, and day after day passed without relieving our
suspense.
But this was at last ended by a letter from David himself. It was
written to me. He had sold his boat in Boston, and had gone to New York,
where his letter was dated. He was going to sail for California the next
day.
"I have long been meaning to go," he wrote, "but never thought of
leaving in this way, until I reached the fishing-ground, last Wednesday
morning. It came into my mind all at once, and I kept straight along. If
I'd gone back, the old folks, maybe, wouldn't have let me come, because,
you know, I'm the last. Besides, I thought I could go easier while--But
you know all about it, Turner. I saw that you knew. It has been very
hard. Somehow, trouble don't slip off of me easy. Taking everything as
it was, I couldn't stay by any longer. Otherwise, I don't know as I
could have left the old folks and Emily. I can't ask you to stay, unless
it's convenient; but while you do, I hope you'll have a care over all
I've left behind. You can cheer up Emily better than anybody."
"The strength and the beauty of the house are gone!" remarked Emily to
me, as I sat down one afternoon by her window.
Poor girl! It was but seldom she was able to speak at all. David's
sudden departure, and the anxiety attending it, had been too much for
her. Besides, she missed Mary Ellen. That little country-girl had,
besides her innocence and her good looks, a vein of drollery, which made
her a very entertaining companion. And then, being so quick-witted, and
so kind-hearted, she thought of various little things to do for Emily's
comfort, which never would have occurred to her mother or Miss Joey.
Emily wanted her back again. She had got over that feeling of hatred of
which she once accused herself.
"It wasn't her fault," said she, one day, quite suddenly.
"What?" I asked.
"That she didn't love David in the way he loved her. I don't think she
deceived him. He never said anything, you know; so, of course, she had
no reason for being any other than kind to him. I believe she felt badly
about it, herself. I've seen her, when she thought I was asleep, lean
her head upon her hand, and sit so for a great while. Maybe, though,
it's because I want so much to love her that I make excuses for her. I
wish she'd come,--it's so lonely."
And it was lonely. It was like remaining in the theatre after the play
is over and the actors retired. For Warren Luce, too, was gone. His
visit was only for the summer, and he had returned to his clerkship.
"How would it have been, if he hadn't come?" I asked myself. "Might
David have been happy? Might she have loved him as 'Jane' loved? And how
much of her heart had the Doctor's boy carried away? Perhaps his power
over her was greater than she would own,--greater than she knew herself.
Perhaps he was even then corresponding with her. He might even be with
her among the mountains."
Thus I debated, thus I questioned.