"Since it seems you have set your heart upon this thing, I do not forbid
it; but remember, you are acting in direct opposition to my judgment and
advice, and if you ever live to regret it (as I believe you shall) you
will have no one but yourself to blame."
John Allan's voice was harsher, more positive, than usual; his shoulders
seemed to square themselves and a frowning brow hardened an always
austere face. His whole manner was that of a man consenting against his
will. His young wife hung over his chair vainly endeavoring to smooth,
with little pats of her fair hands, the stubborn locks that _would_
stand on end, like the bristles of a brush, whatever she did. Her soft
and vivacious beauty was in striking contrast to the strength and
severity of his rugged and at the same time distinguished countenance.
His narrow, steel-blue eyes, deep sunk under bushy brows and a high, but
narrow, forehead, were shrewd and piercing; his nose was large and like
a hawk's beak. His face too, was narrow, with cheek-bones high as an
Indian's. His mouth was large, but firmly closed, and the chin below it
was long and prominent and was carried stiffly above the high stock and
immaculate, starched shirt-ruffles. Her figure, as she leaned against
the chair's high back, was slender and girlish,--childish, almost, in
its low-necked, short-waisted, slim-skirted, "Empire" dress, of some
filmy stuff, the pale yellow of a Marshal Niel rose. Her face was a
pure oval with delicate, regular features. Her reddish-brown hair,
parted in the middle, was piled on top of her small head, and airy
little curls hung down on her brow on either side of the part. Her
eyes--the color of her hair--were gentle and sweet and her mouth was
tenderly curved and rosy. With her imploring attitude, the sweetness of
her eyes and mouth and the warmth of her plea, her fresh beauty glowed
like a flower, newly opened. All unmoved, John Allan repeated,
"You will have no one but yourself to blame."
Her ardor undimmed by the chariness of the consent she had gained, she
showered the lowering brow with cool, delicate little kisses until it
grew smooth in spite of itself.
"Oh, I know I never shall regret it, John," she cooed. "He is such a
beautiful boy--so sweet and affectionate, so merry and clever! Just what
I should like our own little boy to be, John, if God had blessed us with
one."
"I grant you he seems a bonny little lad enough, Frances. But I realize,
as it seems you do not, the risk of undertaking to rear as your own the
child of any but the most unquestionable parentage. I confess the
thought of introducing into my family the son of professional players is
extremely distasteful to me."
"But John, dear, you know these Poes were not ordinary players. The
father was one of the Maryland Poes and I understand the mother came of
good English stock. She certainly seemed to be a lady and a good, sweet
woman, poor thing! The Mackenzies have decided to adopt the baby
Rosalie, though they have children, as you know; and with this charming
little Edgar for my very own I shall be the happiest woman alive."
"Well, well, keep your pretty little pet, but if he turns out to be
other than a credit to you, don't forget that you were warned."
* * * * *
And so the little Edgar Poe--the players' child--became Edgar Allan,
with a fond and admiring young mother who became at once and forever his
slave and whose chief object in life henceforth was to stand between him
and the discipline of a not intentionally harsh or unkind, but strict
and uncompromising father; who though he too was fond of the boy, in a
way, and proud of his beauty and little accomplishments, was constantly
on the lookout for the cloven foot which his fixed prejudice against the
child's parentage made him certain would appear.
In her delight over her acquisition, Frances Allan was like a child with
a new toy. She almost smothered him with kisses when, accepting her
bribe of a spaniel pup and his pockets full of sugar-kisses, he agreed
to call her "Mother." With her own fingers she made him the quaintest
little baggy trousers, of silk pongee, and a velvet jacket, and a tucker
of the finest linen. His cheap cotton stockings were discarded for
scarlet silk ones, and for his head, "sunny over with curls" of bright
nut-brown, she bought from Mrs. Fipps, the prettiest peaked cap of
purple velvet, with a handsome gold tassel that fell gracefully over on
one shoulder. Thus arrayed, she took him about town with her to show
him to her friends who were ecstatic in their admiration of his pensive,
clear-cut features, his big, grey eyes and his nut-brown ringlets; of
his charming smile and the frank, pretty manner in which he gave his
small hand in greeting.
"Oh, but you should hear him recite and sing," the proud foster-mother
would say. "And he can dance, too."
She gave a large dinner-party just to exhibit the accomplishments of her
treasure--actually standing him upon the table when it had been cleared,
to sing and recite for the guests. Even her husband unbent so far as to
applaud vigorously the modest, yet self-possessed grace with which the
mite drank the healths of the assembled company--making a neat little
speech that his new mother had taught him.
The boy's young heart responded to the affection of the foster-mother to
a certain degree; but, mere baby though he was, his real heart lay deep
in the grave on the hill-top, where the earthly part of that other
mother was lying so still, so white, with the roses on her hair and the
frozen smile on her lips.
The churchyard on the hill was but a short distance away from his new
home, and as spring opened, became a favorite resort of nurses and
children. The negro "mammy" who had replaced Nurse Betty used often to
take him there, and often, as she chatted with other mammies, her charge
would wander from her side to the grave against the wall, where he would
stretch his small body full length upon the turf and whisper the
thoughts of his infant mind to the dear one below; for who knew but
that, even down under ground she might be glad to hear, through her
white sleep, her little boy's words of love and remembrance--though
never, nevermore she could see him on earth. He would even imagine her
replies to him, until the conversations with her became so real that he
half believed they were true.
At night, when bed-time came, he said his prayers at the knee of his
pretty new mother, who told him jolly stories and sang him jolly songs,
and patted him and soothed him with caresses which he found very
agreeable, and accepted graciously. But he always took the miniature
which had been his dying mother's parting gift to bed with him and he
was glad when the new mother kissed him goodnight and put out the light
and softly closed the door behind her; for it was then, with the picture
close against his breast, that the visions came to him--the visions of
angels making sweet music upon golden harps and among them his lost
mother, with her sweet face saddened but made sweeter still by that
thought of nevermore.
Oh, that wondrous word nevermore! Its music charmed him, its
hopelessness filled and thrilled him with a strange, a holy sorrow, in
which there was no pain.
With the lovely vision still about him, the picture still clasped to his
breast, he would sink into healthful sleep to wake on the morrow a
bright, joyous boy, alive to all the pleasures of the new
day--delighting in the beauties of blue sky and sunshine, of whispering
tree and opening flower, ready for sport with his play-fellows and his
pets, and full of all manner of merry pranks and jokes. For in the frame
of this small boy there dwelt two distinct personalities--twin
brothers--yet as utterly unlike as strangers and foreigners, thinking
different thoughts, speaking different languages, and dominating
him--spirit and body--by turns. One of these we will call Edgar
Goodfellow--Edgar the gay, the laughter-loving, the daring, the real,
live, wholesome, normal boy; keen for the society of other boys and
liking to dance, to run, to jump, to climb, even to fight. The other,
Edgar the Dreamer, fond of solitude and silence and darkness, for they
aided him to wander far away from the everyday world to one of make
believe created by himself and filled with beings to whom real people
were but as empty shadows; but a world that the death and burial of his
beautiful and adored young mother and the impression made upon him by
those scenes, had tinged with an eternal sadness which hung over it as a
veil.
The life of Edgar the Dreamer was filled with the subtle charm of
mystery. It was a secret life. The world in which he moved was a secret
world--an invisible world, to whose invisible door he alone held the
key. Edgar the Dreamer was himself an invisible person, for the only
outward difference between him and his twin brother, Edgar Goodfellow,
lay in a certain quiet, listless air and the solemn look in his big,
dark grey eyes which his playmates--bored and intolerant--took as
indications that "Edgar was in one of his moods," and his
foster-father--eyeing him keenly and with marked displeasure--as an
equally unmistakable indication that he was "hatching mischief."
There were times when in the midst of the liveliest company this
so-called "mood" would possess the child. He would fall silent; his
mouth would become pensive, his dark grey eyes would seem to be
impenetrably veiled; his chin would drop upon his hand; he would seem
utterly forgetful of his surroundings. The familiar Edgar--Edgar
Goodfellow--would have given place to Edgar the Dreamer, who though
apparently of the company, would really have slipped through that
invisible portal and wandered far afield with the playmates of his
fancy.
At such times Mrs. Allan would say, "Eddie, what are you thinking
about?" And brought back to her world with a jolt, the boy would answer
quickly (somewhat guiltily it seemed to Mr. Allan--noting the startled
expression),
"Nothing." It was his first lie, and a very little one, but one that was
often repeated; for he that would guard a secret must be used to
practice deception.
Mr. Allan would say, "Wake up, wake up, child! Only the idle sit and
stare at nothing and think of nothing. You'll be growing up an idle,
trifling boy if you give way to such a habit."
Between the Allans and Edgar the Dreamer a great gulf lay--for how
should a dreamer of day-dreams reveal himself to any not of his own
tribe and kind? Upon Edgar Goodfellow Mrs. Allan doted. All of her
friends agreed with her that so remarkable a child--one so precocious
and still so attractive--had never been seen, and Mr. Allan was
secretly, as proud of his wrestling, running, riding and other out-door
triumphs as his wife was of his pretty parlor accomplishments. Their
friends agreed too, that she made him the best of mothers, barring the
fact (for which weakness she was excusable--he was such a love!) that
she spoiled him, and perhaps permitted him to rule her too absolutely.
Was he grateful? Oh, well, that would come in time. Appreciation was not
a quality to be expected in children, and what more natural than that
the boy should accept as a matter of course the good things which she
made plain it was her chief pleasure in life to shower upon him? She was
indeed, as good a mother as it was possible for a mother without a
highly developed imagination to be.
A most lovely woman was Frances Allan, justly admired and liked by all
who knew her. She was pretty and gracious and sunny-tempered and
sweet-natured; charitable--both to society and the poor--and faithful to
her religious duties. Withal, a notable house-keeper, given to
hospitality, fond of "company" and gifted in the art of making her
friends feel at home under her roof. If she was not gifted with a lively
imagination she did not know it, and so had not missed it. As Mr.
Allan's wife she had not needed it. And so she lavished upon Edgar
Goodfellow everything that heart could wish. She delighted to provide
him with pets and toys and good things to eat, and to fill his little
pockets with money for him to spend upon himself or upon treating his
friends. Fortunately, the other Edgar--Edgar the Dreamer--was not
dependent upon her for his pleasures, for the beauties of sky and river
and garden and wood which nourished his soul were within his own reach.
If Mrs. Allan had known Edgar the Dreamer, she would have been puzzled
and alarmed. If Mr. Allan had known him he would have been angry. A man
of action was John Allan. A canny Scotchman he, who owed his success as
a tobacco merchant to energy and strict attention to business. If there
were dreams in the bowl of the pipe, there was no room for them in the
counting-house of a thrifty dealer in the weed. Meditation had no part
in his life--was left out of his composition. He believed in _doing_.
Day-dreaming was in his opinion but another name for idling, and idling
was sin.
The son of their adoption vaguely realized the lack of kinship--the
impossibility of contact between his nature and theirs, and as time went
on drew more and more within himself. The life of Edgar the Dreamer
became more and more secret. So often however, did the warning against
his idle habit fall upon his ears that the plastic conscience of
childhood made note of it--confusing the will of a blind human guardian
with that of God. The Eden of his dreams, guarded by the flaming sword
of his foster-father's wrath, began to assume the aspect (because by
parental command denied him) of an evil place--though none the less
sweet to his soul--and it was with a consciousness of guilt that he
would steal in and wander there.
Thus the habit that nurtured God-given genius, branded as sin, and
forbidden, might have been broken up, altogether or in part, had not the
special providence that looks after the development of this rare exotic
transplanted it to a more fertile soil--a more congenial clime.