In the small compass of thy clasping arms,
In reach and sight of thy dear lips and eyes,
There, there, for me the joy of Heaven lies.
Outside, lo! chaos, terrors, wild alarms,
And all the desolation fierce and fell
Of void and aching nothingness makes hell.
--ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.
The night was black as Erebus, the wind cut like a knife, and the air
was full of blinding snow that must have been falling for hours, it was
banked so heavily against the window-ledge, almost freezing Cinthia’s
hands as they plunged into it on leaning forward, for though she gasped
and caught her breath as the wild elements blew in her face and tried
to beat her back, she did not recoil from her fixed purpose, which was
to drop out upon the top of the porch and climb down to the ground by
the aid of a honeysuckle vine that wreathed over the trellis frame at
one end. The icy blast that shrieked in her ears was not enough to
chill the fiery ardor of her resentment at her father, and the yearning
of her heart for the dear lover from whom she feared to be separated
forever.
Her tender young heart went out to him with an intensity of feeling as
she peered out into the stormy darkness of the night, wondering if he
was there waiting, and if he was growing impatient at her delay.
“Ah, my love,” she murmured, impetuously, “I am coming to you--coming!
Neither bolts nor bars, nor storm nor darkness, nor anything under
Heaven, shall keep us apart!”
The wind whistled past the eaves and seemed to take on an almost human
voice of sorrowing, as though it echoed those dismal words: “Shall keep
us apart, shall keep us apart!”
Cinthia caught her breath and listened, it was so strange, that almost
human wail of the wind sighing through the great pine tree on the
corner. It seemed to be sobbing: “Apart, apart!”
“How mournful it sounds!” she uttered, in an awe-stricken tone; then
she climbed through the window and dropped with a dull thud out on the
porch. Mrs. Flint heard the sound in her adjoining room, and muttered,
drowsily:
“It is the snow sliding down from off the roof.”
Cinthia crawled to edge of the porch, and felt out carefully for the
thick mat of the honeysuckle.
She knew she was making a desperate venture, but she said to herself,
bitterly, that desperate emergencies require desperate remedies.
With infinite care and patience she managed to get hold of the strong
matted vines, and swung herself carefully over the trellis, beginning
to make the perilous descent with bated breath, for a fall might mean a
broken limb, or, at the least, a sprained ankle.
The wet snow clung to her face and garments and chilled her to the
bone; but she persevered, though the high wind threatened to loosen
her hold and blow her down every instant. What did she care for it
all, poor Cinthia fleeing from her dull life and her hated persecutors
to the tender arms of love? She would endure anything rather than be
cheated of her happiness.
The cold snow flecked her benumbed face and hands, the high wind swung
her light form to and fro like a flower upon the vine, her breath
seemed to freeze on her lips, but her courage never flagged. Out there
in the night and the storm her lover was waiting. The thought kept her
young heart warm.
She was more than half-way down now, and the wind began to lull.
Courage, Cinthia; the danger will soon be over, sweetheart, and love
rewarded for its brave struggles.
But, alas! how often bathos overcomes pathos.
Cinthia was only a girl, after all, with the usual feminine attributes.
As she swung herself carefully from branch to branch of the vine,
hoping and longing for her feet to touch _terra firma_, yet sustained
by unfaltering courage, there came to her a sudden wild and terrifying
thought that made the blood run colder in her veins than all the raging
storm had force to do.
She had remembered that of late the immense vine to which she clung had
afforded a delightful gymnasium for a score or so of large rodents,
causing her aunt to threaten to cut it down.
The feminine mind has one idiosyncrasy known of all men, and
accordingly ridiculed, but never overcome. Cinthia did not pretend
to be stronger than her sex. With that sudden terrifying thought an
uncontrollable shriek burst from her lips, her numb hands relaxed their
grasp, and she went crashing down through space plump into a great,
great bank of drifted snow blown into a heap below the vine.
Everard Dawn heard that shriek as he tossed on his pillow in restless
dreams, and suddenly raised his head.
“What a night!” he cried, for he had been watching the storm ere he
retired. “How the wind howls to-night, shrieking like a human voice
through that splendid pine on the corner! How I used to love the wind
in the pines in my far Southern home until--_afterward_! But since then
it is an embodied grief to me, as in the plaint of one of our Southern
poets:
“‘I hear the wind in the pines
With its soughing of wordless woe,
And the whisper of leafless vines,
Like a sad heart’s overflow.
Sigh on! they seem to say,
Sigh on, sad heart, to the night,
For the world is cold and gray,
And life has no delight.’”
He listened with his head on his arm but the wind had lulled for the
moment, and the strangely human shriek he had heard began to affect him
very unpleasantly.
“Was it really the wind?” he began to ask himself, wondering if it
might not be an hysterical shriek of his rebellious daughter.
“Poor little Cinthia, God help her!” he uttered, sadly, and rising
from his bed, began to dress hurriedly. “I will go and see if there is
anything wrong,” he muttered.
He had been very angry when he returned at dusk from his strange
interview with the scornful Mrs. Varian, and heard from his worried
sister about the flowers and candy she had taken up to Cinthia.
“How is my little girl now?” he asked, anxiously, and started when she
replied:
“She is in a dreadful temper, and when I took up the flowers and candy
you sent her, she ordered me to throw them away.”
“Did you do it?”
“No; I told her not to be a little fool, put them down on the table,
and came away.”
“Rebecca, I fear you have made a grave mistake. I did not send Cinthia
anything. I intended to purchase a gift for her, but--I was--so
troubled--I quite forgot it.”
Mrs. Flint studied a moment, then frankly admitted that the boy who
brought the flowers had not said Mr. Dawn sent them, in fact, had
merely said, “For Miss Cinthia,” and she had jumped at the conclusion
that they came from her brother.
“They must have come from Arthur Varian. I take this very ill of him
after what I said to him this morning,” angrily. “Are you sure,” he
continued, “that no letter accompanied the flowers?”
“I did not see any,” the old lady replied, uneasily.
Everard Dawn was more versed in the ways of romantic lovers than his
prosaic sister, so he said, with a troubled air:
“You may be sure that a sentimental note accompanied the gift, and they
may possibly have planned an elopement this very night. I desire that
you will lock her door on the outside without her knowledge when you
retire to-night.”
“Very well,” she replied, and obeyed him to the letter.
Recalling all this, the thought came to him that perhaps Cinthia,
finding her door locked, was indulging herself in a fit of hysterics.
“God help us all,” he sighed, as he finished dressing; and, taking his
night-lamp, stole upstairs to listen outside her door.
But all was still as death at first, then the wind rose again, and he
heard strange noises within the room. It was, in fact, the wind rushing
through the window and banging things about in confusion.
He went and tapped on Mrs. Flint’s door, and she soon confronted him in
her cap and gown, exclaiming:
“I thought I heard creaking steps in the hall. What is the matter? Are
you ill, Everard?”
“No; but I fancied I heard strange noises from Cinthia’s room. Did you
notice anything?”
“I heard the snow sliding off the roof, and the wind shrieking in the
branches of that great pine out there. It always sounds so human in a
storm, that I would cut it down only that Deacon Flint set store by it.
He said he planted it when he was a little boy. But I will go in and
peep at Cinthia just to ease your mind, Everard. ’Sh-h! we must not
wake her if she is asleep,” turning the knob with a cautious hand and
opening wide the door.
Whew! how the cold air rushed in her face and thrust her back. By
the light that Everard carried she saw the window wide open and the
snow-flakes flying in on the carpet.
“Why, how strange that the window should be open. Cinthia must be
crazy. Wait till I shut it, Everard, and bring in the light,” she
ejaculated.
He obeyed, and when he entered, they saw what had happened. The room
was empty and Cinthia was gone.
Mrs. Flint could not believe it at first. She ran all about the room,
and then all over the house, crying in wild dismay:
“Cinthia! Cinthia! Cinthia! where are you hiding, honey?”
But no reply came back, and very soon the unhappy father found out
the truth. She had actually escaped by way of the window. Securing a
lantern from the kitchen, he went out for a short while, and returned
with a very accurate report.
She had slid down the honeysuckle vine to the ground, and there were
tracks in the snow leading to a sleigh that had been in waiting not far
away. The marks of the runners were quite distinct, in spite of the
drifting snow.
“She has eloped with Arthur Varian. I must follow and bring them back,”
he said, with terrible calmness.
“Yes, for I found the letter that must have come with the flowers
blowing about the floor of her room,” she answered, giving it to him.
He read it, groaned bitterly, and thrust it into his pocket.
“I must pursue them,” he said again. “Tell me where to find the nearest
livery stable, Rebecca.”
“It is half a mile,” she said, giving him clear directions, but adding:
“Oh, Everard, you will not venture out in such a storm. You may catch
your death of cold!”
“You know not what you talk of, my sister. I would rather catch my
death, as you say, than permit Arthur Varian to marry Cinthia Dawn!” he
hurled back at her, hoarsely, as he rushed from the house out into the
night and storm.