A WASTED WARNING.
While Earle Moray watched Doris, and lost himself in delicious fancies
of a soul fair as the body that shrined it, Doris, on her part, gazed on
him with awakening interest. She had expected to see a young countryman,
a rhymster who believed himself a poet, one with whom she could "flirt
to pass away the time," and "to keep in practice"--not this gentleman in
air and dress, with the cultivated musical voice, the noble face, the
truthful, earnest eye.
Said Doris in her heart, "I did not know that little dairy-maid Mattie
had such good taste;" and in proportion as the value of Mattie's love
increased before her, so increased her joy in winning it away. Not that
Doris had any malice toward Mattie personally; but she had a freakish
love of triumphing in the discomfiture of others. Slowly she yielded to
the fascination of Earle's presence. She told herself that "the
detestable country" could be endurable with him to play lover at her
feet. To her, mentally arraigning "the detestable country," spoke
Earle:
"I love this scene; fairer is hardly found in any book of nature. What
is more lovely, more suggestive, than a wheat field with golden
sheaves?"
"I am a true child of the cities," said Doris, "despite my country birth
and rural name. I was just thinking how superior are the attractions of
paved streets, filled with men and women, and lined with glittering
windows. But if you will tell me some of the suggestions of the wheat
field, no doubt I shall learn from you to think differently."
How charming was this docile frankness!
"It suggests earth's millions filled daily with bread. It suggests that
gracious Providence, by long and lovely processes, forestalling man's
needs. It brings to mind the old-time stories of Joseph's dream of
bowing sheaves, of Ruth gleaning in the field of Boaz."
The stories of Ruth, Rebecca and Esther were the three Bible stories
that Doris knew; the face of Doris lighted as she answered:
"Oh, I like that! I have imagined Boaz--tall, grave, stately, dark; and
Ruth--young, and fair, and tender. I cannot quite fancy how Naomi
looked--like other old women with a sad history, I suppose--but the
words are lovely."
"'Whither thou goest I will go; thy people shall be my people, and thy
God my God.'"
His voice took a deep, passionate tone, and his eyes filled with the
light of love.
"Mattie says you are a poet!" cried Doris. "Are you?"
"I wish I could say 'I am.' Time will prove me. I have the poet's
longing. Shall I ever reach the poet's utterance?"
"Why, I think you have it now," said Doris, sweetly.
"It is because you inspire me, perhaps. As I came toward you, I wondered
whether you were Tennyson's 'Dora' or 'The Gardener's Daughter.'"
"Oh, neither! I am very different! They were content with trees and
flowers, and humble ways. Was it not Dora who 'dwelt unmarried till her
death?' I shall not do that. I shall marry and fly from the
country-side. I can _live_ among people in the city."
"What! cannot you live the truest life where wind, and rain, and
water-fall, and birds make music? the flowers mark the sweet procession
of seasons--all is calm, and security, and innocence."
"Tell me," said Doris, bending forward, glee in her sapphire eyes, her
small hand thrilling him as she touched his arm; "tell me, poet, are
_you_ content? Do _you_ not long for fame? To sway your fellows, to be
rich, to make money?"
"Oh, money is the lowest of all objects. What is money to love?"
demanded Earle.
"Money, just as metal, may be a low object, but money as money, as
getting what we want most, is a high object. Think of what it can buy.
Think of gorgeous pictures lighting your walls with beauty, of flashing
jewels and gleaming marbles, of many-fountained gardens, of homes fit to
live in, not stuffy little farm-houses, with windows under the eaves.
Tell me, are you content? Will you live and die a farmer? Is not this
money a thing worth winning to lay at the feet of love? Will you not
spread the wings of your soul for a wider life? Have you not ambition?"
"Yes!" cried Earle; "I have ambition."
The dimpling smile showed the shining pearly line of little teeth; the
soft fingers of the little hand touched his hand as she withdrew them;
and, leaning back against her oak tree, she laughed joyously:
"I have found a fellow-sinner."
"Ambition can be noble, rather than evil, and to aspire is not to sin.
Who could help being ambitious, with you as the apostle of ambition? You
enforce with your beauty each word that you utter!"
"You think me _beautiful_?" said Circe, in sweetest wonderment, as if
she had not studied dress, look, pose, gesture, minutely to enhance her
wonderful and rich endowments of nature.
"Words cannot tell how fair. A verse keeps singing through my brain; it
is this:
"'And she, my Doris, whose lap incloses
Wild summer roses of sweet perfume,
The while I sued her, smiled and hearkened,
Till daylight darkened from glow to gloom.'"
Ah, this was something like, thought Doris, to be wooed and flattered in
poetry. She dropped her dainty lids, the rose pink deepened in her
cheeks, and she gave a slow, sweet sigh.
"Did you make that poetry?"
"No: but would I could make immortal verses, for your sake," said Earle.
"The world should hear of you."
The world! Oh, rare delight! Had she not dreamed of driving men mad for
love, of making poets sing, and artists paint her charms? And these
conquests were begun.
She looked up archly. She knew when to check the tides of enthusiasm and
adoration, that they might grow stronger for the repression.
"Away with poetry, my singer, here comes prose."
Over the field toward them strode honest Mark Brace, looking for his
neophyte in rural toils. Mark's round face was crimson with heat and
exertion, but a broad smile responded to the pretty picture these two
young lovers made under the tree. He cried, heartily:
"A deal you are learning this morning, Master Earle. Will you put off
your lessons in wheat-stacking till next year? Lindenholm farm, at this
rate, will be a model farm to the county when the madam turns it over to
you."
"I was not in working humor," said Earle.
"Work won't wait for humors," quoth Mark. "And for you, my pretty miss,
I don't doubt your sister is making butter and your mother cooking
dinner, while you are playing shepherdess under a tree."
"Do I look as if I could work?" laughed Doris, springing to her feet and
extending a wee rose-leaf hand. "I am only for ornament, not use. But I
will leave Mr. Moray, for 'evil communications corrupt good manners,'
and I have made him lazy. Good-bye, poet. 'Blessings brighten as they
take their flight;' so I expect to look more and more charming as I
depart homeward."
The minx knew that she had done enough that day to turn Earle Moray's
head, and it would be well to let the effect deepen in absence. She
danced off homeward, and Earle whispered under his breath:
"Against her ankles as she trod,
The lucky buttercups did nod;
I leaned upon the gate to see--
The sweet thing looked, but did not speak--
A dimple came in either cheek,
And all my heart was gone from me!"
Mark Brace looked after his Fairy Changeling in dire perplexity. To him
work, honest labor--winning bread from the soil, was noble and happy; in
all the words of Doris rang some delicate undertone of irony and scorn,
of what he most esteemed. Fair, fair, indeed, but was it not selfish of
her to let those whom she deemed her blood, work, and she stay idle?
Yes, there was the hundred pounds, and she was not really their blood,
but of some idle never-toiling strain.
More and more his hands were bound concerning the beauty, as she grew up
in his care. He wished he could explain her to Moray, but he could not.
Honor held him to silence. He could warn. He spoke suddenly, laying a
hand on the lad's arm.
"Earle, I like you vastly. You are honest, good, a gentleman. I should
be sorry indeed to see you giving your time, and mind, and setting your
heart on that pretty, idle lass of mine."
"Sorry, Mark? Why sorry? She is sweet and lovely!"
"If it were Mattie, now," said honest Mark, speaking, not as a father or
match-maker, but as a man. "Well and good. I'd not say a word. A man's
heart may rest in Mattie--Heaven bless her! But Doris is of quite a
different strain. In her there is no rest. One could never find rest in
her. Never--never."
Earle tried to smile, but the words struck home, and were fixed in his
heart beside the thought of Doris.
Meanwhile Doris danced off home, and framed her lovely countenance in
the vines about the kitchen window.
"And what have _you_ been doing?" asked Patty, reprovingly.
"Turning Earle Moray's head," responded Doris, promptly.
Mattie started and paled a little.
"He thinks I'm lovely!" cried Doris, with a laugh.
"So you may be, but no thanks to you," said Patty, "and if you set
yourself to head-turning, mark my words, child, there will some terrible
evil overtake you both."