THE END.
Max and his uncle entered the office, and were ushered into Mr. Beal's
private room.
"Be seated, gentlemen--one moment;" and in a moment the tired man of
affairs turned, with that uninterested bow, as if he knew they had
nothing of any import to say.
But when Max, man fashion, held up his head and entered squarely on his
story, Mr. Beal colored and was all attention. A minute more, and Mr.
Beal rose and closed the door, that he might be sure they were not
heard. Indeed, he listened eagerly, and yet as if he did not wish Max
to be proved in the wrong.
"In short," said Max, at the end, "if what I have done is wrong, I have
come to say that I do not want any fight with the company, and I should
be glad to make amends."
Strange to say, the man of affairs hardly seemed to heed him. Mr. Beal
was already in a brown study.
"Oh, yes, certainly. I am sure I am much obliged. I beg your pardon.
Have you said all you wished to say?"
"Nothing more," said Max, half offended.
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Beal again.
"I came to beg yours," said Max, just rising to the drollery of the
position.
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Beal once more, "but--I have been
afraid--of this thing ever since I was on the line. You say you do not
want to fight with the company. Quite right, young man, quite right!
The company is friends with all the world, and wants no fighting."
But after this pacific beginning Mr. Beal went on to say that he was
well aware, and that the directors were aware, that any man had a right
to use their rails if he did not interfere with the public convenience.
He did not say, but Max was quick enough to see, that the fact that he
and Bertha had used the rails for so long a time, and the company never
knew it, was itself evidence that the public had suffered no
inconvenience.
In an instant Max saw, and his uncle saw, that Mr. Beal was much more
anxious to keep this fact from the public than he was to apprehend any
offenders, if offenders they had been.
"Mr. Keesler, the press would make no end of fun of us if this thing
was known."
This after a pause.
"Suppose, Mr. Keesler, you turn your stock over to us, at a fair
valuation, and I give you the first berth I have as a driver? I am
afraid I cannot engage your conductor."
This with a sick smile. Max was amazed. He came to be scolded. It
seemed he was expected to offer terms.
"Frankly, Mr. Keesler, we had rather not have much public discussion as
to the rights of individuals to put their cars on our rails. You seem
to be tired of the business. What do you say?"
Max made a very short answer.
The truth was, he was sick to death of the business. In very little
time he had named his price for the car, and as soon as it was named,
Mr. Beal agreed.
"But how shall I take possession?" said Mr. Beal. "If I send one of my
men for it, the story will be in the Herald within three days."
"Trust me for that," said Max. "Till you have your car you need not
send your check."
The Cosmopolitan cars do not run after midnight. At one the next
morning Max drew out the fatal truck upon the avenue, down to the top
of the steep grade at De Kalb Street, braked up, and then took off his
horses. Then, with the exquisite relief with which a soldier after his
enlistment leaves his barracks, Max loosened the brake, jumped from the
platform, and saw the car run from him into the night.
The first morning driver on the Cosmopolitan, in the gray of the
morning, met an empty car on the long causeway at Pitt's Dock. He
coupled it to his own car, reported it, and was told to take it to the
new Herkimer stables.
* * * * *
And Max?
And Bertha?
Uncle Stephen and the good frau found life in Sprigg Court too
comfortable to want to move. Little Elaine was such a pet, and dear
Bertha was so much like her mother!
It ended when they took the rest of the house upstairs, and Uncle
Stephen made Max his man of business in that curious commerce of his
with Natal and the Mozambique Channel.
* * * * *
Still Max's conscience sometimes disturbs him. In one of such moods he
comes to me to confess and receive counsel. Absolution I do not give.
And it is thus, gentle reader, that it happens that I tell his story to
you.
THE MODERN PSYCHE.[1]
[Footnote 1: Readers not quite at home in Mrs. Tighe or Apuleius may be
glad to revive their memories of the ancient Psyche by this note from
the Cyclopedia. The prettiest rendering of that story is in William
Morris's "Earthly Paradise"; but the reader will ask himself seriously
whether it be anything but an allegory to cover the moral in the
matter-of-fact tale before him.
Psyche, whose two elder sisters were of moderate beauty, was so lovely
that she was taken for Venus herself, and men dared only to adore her
as a goddess, not to love her. This excited the jealousy of Venus, who,
to revenge herself, ordered Cupid to inspire her with love for some
contemptible wretch. But Cupid fell in love with her himself. Meanwhile
her father, desiring to see his daughter married, consulted the oracle
of Apollo, which commanded that Psyche should be conveyed, with funeral
rites, to the summit of a mountain, and there left, for she was
destined to be the bride of a destructive monster, in the form of a
dragon, feared by gods and men. With sorrow was the oracle obeyed, and
Psyche was left alone on the desert rock, when suddenly Zephyr hovers
around her, gently raises and transports her to a beautiful palace of
the God of Love, who visits her every night, unseen and unknown,
leaving her at the approach of day. Perfect happiness would have been
the lot of Psyche, if, obedient to the warning of her lover, she had
never been curious to know him better. But by the artifices of her
jealous sisters, whom she had admitted to visit her, contrary to the
commands of Cupid, she was persuaded that she held a monster in her
arms, and curiosity triumphed. As he slept, she entered with a lamp to
examine him, and discovered the most beautiful of the gods. In her joy
and astonishment she let a drop of the heated oil fall upon his
shoulders. Cupid awoke, and, having reproached the astonished Psyche
for her suspicions, fled. She wandered everywhere in search of her
beloved, but she had lost him. Venus kept her near her person, treated
her as a slave, and imposed on her the severest and most trying tasks.
Psyche would have sunk under the burdens had not Cupid, who still
tenderly loved her, secretly assisted her in her labors.
When Psyche was finally reunited to Cupid in Olympus, her envious
sisters threw themselves from a precipice.]
CHAPTER I.
No, I do not know by what accident it was that Edward Ross came to
spend a week in August at the Columbia Hotel, at Hermon Springs.
No, and I do not know by what accident it was that all the Verneys were
there. The home of the Verneys is at Painted Post, as I suppose you
know. But this year the Verneys took a holiday for a month at the
Columbia Hotel, and while they were away from home the ceilings were
whitened, the house was painted inside and out, and new railings were
added to the outside steps at the side door.
What I do know is that it was at the Columbia Hotel that Edward Ross
first saw Psyche, who was the youngest daughter of the Verney
household. All the world of the Columbia Hotel had gone across to the
Solferino House, which was the other side of the way. There was a hop
at the Solferino House, and the general public had gone to the hop.
Ross had arrived late, the only passenger by that little one-horse
railway from Hudson. He came into the great drawing-room, and thought
he was alone. But he was not alone. Psyche, youngest of the Verney
girls, was at the piano, not playing, but looking over some music which
the Jeffrey girls had left there.
If you had asked the gossips of the hotel why Psyche did not go to the
hop where all her older sisters had gone, you would have been told that
she was but the half-sister of the other Verneys; that since her mother
died, these three older sisters had held a hard rein on poor Psyche;
that some one of them had laid down the law that there were so many of
them they must not all go together to any frolic. In the interpretation
of this law, Psyche always stayed at home if the party were pleasant,
and one or two of the older sisters stayed if it were likely to be
stupid. This is what the gossips of the hotel would have said, and this
is what I believe.
Anyway, it happened that on this particular evening Edward Ross threw
himself at length on a long sofa in the drawing-room, not knowing that
any one was there; and little Psyche, not knowing that he had come in,
crooned over the Jeffreys' music, and at last picked out something from
Mercadante which she had never seen before, and which did not seem to
her very difficult, and, after she had read the whole page down, tried
it, and tried it again, in her resolute, wide-awake, very satisfactory
way.
The third time she tried she was quite well pleased with her own
success, and this time, as she came down to the last staff, upon that
first page, Edward Ross's hand appeared on the top of the page, ready
to turn it over. Psyche neither screamed nor flinched. She nodded
simply: she was under the inspiration of the music now, and she played
well. She played the whole piece through. Then he thanked her, and she
thanked him. She played a good deal for him that evening. He brought
down his William Morris and showed it to her, and read to her some of
the best things in it. And so they spent two hours together very
nicely, and by the time the madding crowd came back from the Solferino
House, Psyche was not in the least sorry that she had not gone to the
hop, and Edward Ross was very glad she had not gone.
There is a lovely little burn or brook which runs through a shady
ravine behind the Columbia House, I forget what they call it. It might
be called the Lovers' Brook or the Maiden's Home or the Fairy's Bath,
or anything that verdant seventeen thought sweet enough. Age cannot
wither nor custom stale its infinite variety. Edward Ross found no
difficulty in making up a party of the young people at the hotel to go
on a picnic up this brook the next day. By some device he made Agnes
Verney think she would stay at home to flirt with an old West Indian,
who was far too gouty to go even to the first fall. This left the
pretty Psyche free to go. And she went, in the charming adornment of
the unadorned simplicity of her pretty mountain walking-dress. And
there were quite as many gentlemen as there were ladies, to help at all
the hard fords and to lift them at all the steep climbings. So
Priscilla Verney had her cavalier, and Polly Verney, whom the young men
called "Bloody Mary," had her Philip, and the Garner girls were taken
care of, and the Spragues and the Dunstables. For every girl, there was
a young man; and if at most of the separating places Edward Ross and my
pretty Psyche were together, it was not that they did not their full
duty by society; for they did.
And a very pleasant day it was. That day Jabez Sprague asked Ann Garner
to marry him, and she refused him point-blank: that made it a very
pleasant day to her. That day Tunstall Dunstable asked Martha Jeffrey
to marry him, and she said she would: that made it a very pleasant day
to her. They all came home at five or six in the afternoon, very bright
and jolly most of them, and those who were not bright and jolly
pretended they were. Edward Ross had not asked Psyche to marry him, but
I believe they had enjoyed the day as much as any one.
He had found out that this simple, shy, pretty little thing, who was
snubbed in the household, who was left in the cold in their
arrangements, and seemed to have no friends, had, all the same, a
sweet, happy, contented temper; that she had her own notions and
enthusiasms about books and men and duties; that she could not be made
to say that yellow was white, or even that crimson was scarlet; that
she never said she understood a thing but could not express herself, or
that she knew a thing unless she did know it. He found a woman of
principle under the form and method and semblance of a child.
And she had found out a man as fond of ferns as she was, who knew every
fern in this glen, and every fern like it in the Himalayas; a man as
fond of music as she was, who could not play as well as she could, and
yet he had heard Chopin play, had seen "The Huguenots" in Paris, and
had dined with Lang and Bennett and the Abbé Liszt himself. This man
loved her heroes, though he had travelled in a stage-coach with Wendell
Phillips, and had helped Mr. Sumner look up the authorities for one of
his speeches. This man could quote twenty lines of Tennyson to her one,
he had met Christina Rossetti at a party; and yet he really deferred to
Psyche's own recollection of a stanza of Mrs. Browning's which he had
quoted wrong. Psyche was not used to men who dared show their
enthusiasm, who dared confess their ignorance, who dared speak as if it
were a matter of course to trust God's love, and who owned they had
other objects in life than making money. Psyche and Edward Ross
returned to the hotel after a very happy day.
The next day Edward Ross brought out the largest and best apparatus for
water-color work that Psyche or any of the girls had ever seen. And
before long it proved that, though one "had no talent for drawing," and
another "could not sketch from nature," and another "could not do
landscape," and another "hated trees," that on the broad piazza of the
Columbia House five or six of them, Psyche included, could spend a very
pleasant morning, under his directions, reproducing, after a fashion,
on various blocks and in various books, the outlines of the blue Hoosac
Mountains and of the valleys between. And my pretty Psyche went far
beyond any of the rest, because she did as she was bid; she had no
conceit about her own ways; she waited till her teacher could attend to
her; she did not want to attract the attention of all the gentlemen on
the piazza; and she was not gabbling all the time she was working. So
that day they had a very happy day.
It is not within the space assigned to this story to tell how
pleasantly the rainy morning passed when Edward Ross read the "Earthly
Paradise" aloud to them, nor to describe the excursion which he
organized to Williams College Commencement, nor the party which he made
to see the Shakers, nor the evening concert of vocal and instrumental
music which he arranged, and for which he had such funny bills printed
at Pittsfield. No; these and the other triumphs of that week, long
remembered, shall be unrecorded.
Of its history, this is all that shall be told: that on Saturday Edward
Ross told Psyche that he loved her more than he loved his own life. She
told him that she loved him more than she loved hers. And so it was
that, in the exquisite joy of the new discovery of what life is and
what it is for, Edward Ross accompanied the Verneys on their way home
to Painted Post on Monday. There he asked for and there he gained the
consent of Psyche's father for their speedy marriage.
On Tuesday he had to go home to Boston, for his holiday was over. It
was a bitter parting, as you may imagine, between him and his Psyche,
who had never been separated for more than ten hours at a time till
now. For the last farewell Psyche took him on her favorite walk at
Painted Post. It is only less beautiful than the "Vestal's Glade," or
whatever we determined to call that burnie at Hermon.
"Dear Psyche," said he to her, "your life is mine henceforth, and mine
is yours. God knows I have but one wish and one prayer henceforth, and
those are to make you happy. It is because I wish that you may be happy
that I ask one thing now. Do you think you can grant it? It is a very
great thing to ask."
"Can I?" said the proud girl. "Why, darling, you do not know me yet."
She had never called him "darling" till an hour before.
"You must not promise till you know," said Edward Ross.
"I can promise and I will promise now. There is nothing you think right
to ask which I shall not think it right to do."
"Dearest, I do think this is right; I know it is right. It is because I
know it, because we shall be ten thousand times happier, and because I
shall be ten thousand times better for it, that I ask it. I would not
dream of it but for your sake--" And he paused.
"Why do you stop, my dear Edward? I have promised. What shall I do?"
"Dearest, you are to do nothing. Simply, you are not to ask what my
daily duty is, and you are not to ask me to introduce you to my
friends. It separates me less from my sunbeam than most men's cares.
Without knowing it, you can help me in a thousand ways in it. But to
know what it is will only bring care on you and grief on me. Can we not
live, as you trust me and as I love you, without my worrying you with
these petty cares?"
"Is that all?" said Psyche, with her pretty laugh. "Why, darling, if it
were to sweep the street-crossing,--as in that funny story you told
us,--I would sweep too. If it were to keep a gambling-table, you would
not have asked me to marry you. It is something honorable, that I know,
because you are my own Edward. Why need I know anything more?"
And he kissed her, and she kissed him; and they went home to his little
lunch; and then the express swept by, with Jim Fisk in uniform, as it
happened, in a palace-car. And so Edward Ross went to Boston and made
ready for his wedding.
CHAPTER II.
And a perfect wedding it was. I doubt if Painted Post remembers a
prettier wedding or a prettier bride. And in that same express train
Mr. E. Ross and his pretty bride swept off to New York, and so to
Boston; and there he took her to the first sight of her pretty home.
How pretty it was! It was in Roxbury, so it was half country; and there
was a pretty garden, with a little greenhouse such as Psyche had always
longed for. Nay, there was even a fern-house, with just the ferns she
loved, and with those other Himalaya ferns which he had talked of on
that lovely first day of all. And there was a perfect grand piano, of a
tone so sweet, and only one piece of music on the open rack, and that
was the Mercadante of the first evening. And when they went upstairs,
Psyche's own dressing-room was papered with the same paper which her
pretty room had at her old home, and the carpet on the floor was the
same, and every dear picture of her girlhood's collections was
duplicated; and just where the cage of her pretty bullfinch, Tom, had
hung, there hung just such a cage. Why, it was her cage, and her Tom
was in it!
For Psyche and Edward had spent a night and a day in New York, that she
might see Mr. Stewart's pictures and Mr. Johnson's; but Edward's
office-boy, who had been left at Painted Post especially that he might
bring the bullfinch, had taken a later train, indeed, but had come
through without stopping.
And when they went into Edward's little den, it had but two pictures:
one was Psyche's portrait, and the other was that miserable little
first picture of the Hoosac Hills.
And then such a happy life began for these young people! No, Psyche did
not find housekeeping hard. She had been the Cinderella at Mr. Verney's
house too long for that. Now that she was the mistress of servants, she
knew how to be kind to them and to enter into their lives. As Mrs.
Wells says, "she tried the Golden Rule" with them. She loved them, and
they loved her. And Edward was always devising ways to systematize the
housekeeping and make it easier. Every morning he worked in his study
for two hours, and she "stepped round" for an hour, and then lay on the
lounge for an hour, reading by herself. Then he and she had two golden
hours together. They made themselves boy and girl again. Two days in
the week they painted with the water-colors; and Psyche really passed
her master, for her eye for color was, oh! much better than his. Two
days they worked at their music together--worked, not played. Two days
they read together, he to her or she to him. And after lunch he always
took his nap; and then, if it were cool enough, the horses came round,
and he took Psyche off on one of the beautiful drives of Brookline or
Milton or Newton or distant Needham; and she learned the road so well
and learned to drive so well that she would take him as often as he
took her. And at five they were at home, and at six Psyche's charming
little dinner was served, always so perfectly; and then at eight
o'clock he always kissed her, and said, "Good-by, sweet; now I must go
out a little while. Do not think of sitting up for me." And then Psyche
wrote her letters home or read a while; and at ten she went to bed, and
fell asleep, wondering how she could have lived before she was so
happy.
And in the morning her husband was always asleep at her side. He slept
so heavily that she would try to get up and dress without his knowing
it. But he always did know. And because he could dress quicker than
she, he would put on his heavy Persian dressing-robe, after he had
plunged his head into cold water, and while she "did her hair" he would
read her "Amadis of Gaul," or the "Arabian Nights," or "Ogier the
Dane," or the "Tales of the Round Table," till he saw she was within
five minutes of being done. Then he would put down the book--yes,
though Oriana were screaming in the arms of a giant--and he would run
and dress himself, and they would run a race to see which should first
reach the piazza and give to the other the first morning-glory.
And then would come another happy day, like and yet unlike to
yesterday.
No one called, you see. But I do not think Psyche cared for that. She
always hated to make calls, nor did she want much to receive them. Both
she and Edward were alone fully half their lives, though sometimes he
would call her into the study to work with him, and often he would come
to her to work with her. He would ask her if she was lonely, and he
planned visits from his sisters, who were very nice girls, and his
mother, who was perfectly lovely, and after a while, from some of the
Western girls whom Psyche had known at the Ingham University. But
never, by any accident, did any visitor come who made any allusion to
his daily business. He never spoke of it to Psyche, and she, dear
child, thought of it much less than you would think. She had promised
not to ask, and she had sense to learn that the best way not to ask was
not to care. Yes, Versatilla, dear,--and a girl of principle who
determines not to care will not care. She knows how to will and to do.
I do not know whether Psyche the more enjoyed the opera or the pictures
which she and Edward saw together. There seemed to her to be no nice
private house in Boston where dear Edward did not seem welcome when he
sent in his card, and asked if he and Mrs. Ross might see the pictures.
Psyche often said that she owned more Corots and Calames, more
Daubignys and Merles and Millets and Bonnats than any lady in the land,
and that she kept them in more galleries. At the opera they often found
pleasant people whom Edward knew sitting next to them, and they always
chided him that he was such a stranger; and he always introduced Psyche
to them as his wife as proudly as a king; and with many of these people
she talked pleasantly, and some of them she met and bowed to at church
or as they were driving. But none of them ever called upon her, nor did
she call upon them. One day she said to Edward that she believed he
knew more people than anybody else in the world. And he said, with a
sad sigh, "I am afraid I do"; and she saw that it worried him, and so
the dear child said no more.
In all this happy time Psyche had had no visit from her own sisters.
Perhaps that was one reason why it was so happy. But it happened, after
a happy life of a year and more, that a darling baby boy came to Psyche
to make her wonder how she could have thought her life before was life
at all. And the birth of the boy and his wonderful gifts were duly
reported in the letters to Painted Post, and then there came quite a
hard letter from Priscilla, putting in form the complaint that neither
of the sisters had ever been asked to make Psyche a visit since they
were married.
Psyche showed the letter to Edward on the moment, and he laughed.
"I have only wondered it did not come before."
Psyche tried to laugh too, but she came very near crying. "I have not
wanted them to come before, and I don't want them to come now."
"Then they shall not come," said Edward, laughing again, and taking her
on his knee.
"But I do want them to come, partly. I wish they had come and had gone,
and that it was all over. It does not seem quite nice that my own
sisters should not visit me."
"Well, my darling, as to that, they are not your own sisters; and even
if Mrs. Grundy does not think it is quite nice, I do not know why you
and I should care. Still, if you want to have them and have it over,
let them come. _'Olim meminisse juvabit.'_ That means, 'You will be
glad to remember it.'"
Psyche said she knew that; and she pulled his whiskers for him because
he pretended to think she did not; and he kissed her, and she kissed
him. And so the next day, after Psyche had written ten different
letters and had torn them up, she concocted the following, which, as it
met Edward's approval, was despatched to Painted Post by the mail of
the same evening:--
"ROXBURY, May 10, 18--.
"MY DEAR PRISCILLA,--Indeed you must not think that Edward has
prevented me from asking you to make a visit here. If it gives you
any pleasure to come and see me and my housekeeping, you know very
well how much pleasure it will give to me. You know we live very
quietly, and are not in the least gay; so I think you must all come
together and entertain each other. But little Geoffrey will entertain
you, and you will think he is the dearest little fellow that ever
lived.
"Come as soon as you can, for we are all going to the sea-shore on
the 25th, and if you do not come soon it will be a very short visit."
And then the letter went on about Ann Garner's engagement, and the new
styles for prints, and so on.
So the invitation was well over.
CHAPTER III.
If Edward Ross, or Psyche his wife, or Bim, the nurse of Geoffrey his
son, had any hope that Agnes Verney and Priscilla Verney, and Bloody
Mary, their sister, would decline the invitation, or that any one of
them would decline it, they were very much mistaken. Allowing a day and
a half for the letter to go to Painted Post, and a day for the three
ladies to pack their trunks, and a day and a half for them to come to
Boston, you have four days, which is precisely the interval which
passed between the mailing of the letter and the arrival, late at
night, of a carriage at Edward Ross's door with the three ladies, and
of an express-wagon with the six trunks with which they had prepared
for the ten days' visit. This was the night of the 14th, and, as they
had been kindly informed by Psyche, their visit must end on the 24th.
And such a visit as it was! Not one day was unprovided for by Edward's
forethought, and one amusement after another crowded upon the time, so
that, if it were possible, the three ladies might not have a moment's
time either for caballing against each other, or for lecturing poor
Psyche. It was a little funny to see how, as a matter of course, they
all taught her how to carry on her household. They would tell her, to
Edward's great amusement and to her well-concealed rage, how to cheapen
her mutton, how to keep her butter, how to save eggs in her
sponge-cake, and even how to arrange the dishes on the table.
Everything was elegant and tasteful in Psyche's house, wholly beyond
any standard which they had ever seen at home; but all the same, they
would make this suggestion and give that direction, as if, she said to
her husband, crying, one morning--"as if this were poor papa's house,
and I were Cinderella again."
And Edward only laughed and kissed her, and said, "O my sunbeam, keep a
bright eye for them! There are now only six days more, and then Mrs.
Grundy will be satisfied. '_Olim meminisse juvabit_.'" And then he
pinched her ear, and she pulled his whiskers, and she laughed through
her tears.
The first day was a day fresh from heaven; the apple-blossoms were in
their prime, the air was sweetness itself; and after a late breakfast
two pretty carriages came to the door. And Psyche took Agnes, who was
the least hateful of the three, in her little pony-carriage, and
herself drove Puss and Doll, her pretty ponies, after she had given to
each an Albert biscuit from her own hand. And Edward took Priscilla and
Bloody Mary with him, and as he passed the Norfolk House, he stopped
and picked up Jerry Fordyce, who was stout and handsome and jolly, and
Jerry took the back seat with Bloody Mary, and flirted desperately with
her all that day, while Priscilla sat with Edward, and for miles on
miles drove his beautiful bays. And they took a drive more lovely than
any of these girls had ever seen. They came out upon the sea-shore--I
will not tell you where. They ate such a dinner as neither Bloody Mary
nor Agnes nor Priscilla had ever dreamed of. They came home by five in
the afternoon, and Edward made all the women lie down and sleep. And
when they had waked, he made them all dress again, and there were two
carriages at the door, which took them to see Warren at the Museum. And
they laughed till they almost died. And then they had a charming little
supper in a private room at Copeland's; and after midnight they all
came home. And this was what Psyche meant when she said she lived very
quietly, and was not at all gay!
Bloody Mary was literary, and she had said at breakfast, the first day,
that she hoped they should see some of the Boston _literati_; that she
should be ashamed to go home to Painted Post unless she had seen Mr.
Fields and Mr. Lowell and Mr. Longfellow and Dr. Holmes. And the second
day, Edward said, should be Polly's day, and they should see the
bookshops and the libraries. So this day he did not order the ponies,
but two open barouches came up, and they drove first to the dear old
corner of Hamilton Place, and went up to the pretty "authors' parlor"
of Fields & Osgood. And Mr. Fields came in and told them some very
pretty stories, and gave Bloody Mary an autograph of Tennyson; and Mr.
Osgood and Mr. Clark came in and showed them the English advance-sheets
of the new Trollope, and some copy of the new Dickens in manuscript.
And the gentlemen begged all the ladies to come up whenever they passed
in shopping. Then Edward took them to the Historical Rooms, and they
saw Prescott's sword and Linzee's. Mr. Winthrop happened to come in,
and they saw him; and Dr. Holmes was there, looking at some old MSS.,
and he was very courteous to the ladies, and showed Miss Polly the
picture of Sebastian Cabot. Then they drove out to the College Library,
and while they were looking at the old missals and evangelistaries, it
happened that Mr. Longfellow crossed the hall and spoke to Edward; and
Edward actually asked Agnes and Polly if he might present Mr.
Longfellow to them; and then found Priscilla, and presented him to her
and to Psyche. And when Mr. Longfellow found they were strangers, he
told them just what they should see and how they should see it. And
Polly slipped out her album, and he wrote his name in it, and said he
was sorry he could not stay longer; but he pointed out to her some of
the most interesting autographs there. And then they started for the
Museum, and by great good luck they met Lowell in Professors' Row. And
Edward stopped the carriage, actually, and hailed him, and asked if he
should be at home in an hour; and when Mr. Lowell said he was engaged
with a class, Edward arranged--so promptly!--that they should all go
and hear his lecture. And then they went to the Museum, and by the same
wonderful luck Agassiz was going out as they came in; and he turned
back, and showed the ladies everything. That was a day indeed! They
came home to the most beautiful little family dinner, and in the
evening they all went to Selwyn's Theatre, where was another charming
play.
There was quite a similar day on the strength of a word from Agnes.
Agnes was so much awed at first by Edward's hospitable condescension
and by his giving up so much of his time to them that she did not dare
to be cross for the first four days. But she did say to him that
Polly's pretence of letters was all nonsense, and, that for her part,
she was interested in politics and social reform; that at an era like
that, when etc., etc., etc., every true woman ought etc., etc., etc.,
for the benefit of etc., etc., etc. So the very next day he showed them
all a note from Mr. Sumner, saying that if the ladies would excuse the
formality of a call, he should be happy to show them his prints and
some other things which would please them at noon, and enclosing
tickets for reserved seats to an address he was to deliver in the
evening. That day was wholly given to politics and politicians. They
went to the State-House, and sat in a sort of private gallery, when the
young Duke of Gerolstein, who was on his travels, was received on the
floor; and several very handsome and very nice young senators and
representatives came up and were presented to the ladies. And when it
came time for lunch, Edward invited three of the very nicest to go down
to Parker's to a little dinner he had ordered there, and they had a
very jolly time, in which Agnes studied social reform with a very merry
senator from Essex County, quite to her heart's content.
As for Priscilla, she spoke but coldly of literature and politics,
though she did not object to the dinner at Parker's or to flirting with
senators. But she said to Edward that her heart was with the poor and
sinful; that she would gladly do something in this complex civilization
of ours to save those that were lost. How happy could she be if she
were only eating locusts and wild honey on the brink of Jordan! But
that seemed impossible, and she sighed. So a day was arranged for
charity and its ministers--failing locusts. Fortunately the Diocesan
Convention was in session, and among the presbyters and delegates
Edward seemed as much at home and at ease as among the _literati_ and
the politicians. He presented Dr. Temple and Dr. South and Mr. Teinagle
to the girls, and these gentlemen explained to them all the
proceedings. At the little lunch for delegates and their wives, the
bishop spoke courteously to all of them, and Edward brought to them the
very famous Bishop of Parabata, who was on his travels to a
Pan-Anglican Council. After the lunch they heard Mr. Tillotson preach,
and then they were whisked down to the North End Mission, where there
was that day an entertainment for destitute shop-girls. And here Mrs.
Oberlin, a very famous philanthropist, enlisted them all to help her in
her table at the great Fair in the Music Hall for the benefit of the
mission; and then the next day all the girls spent a very charitable
and very successful afternoon.
But I did not describe that week at Hermon. Why should I describe these
ten days at Boston? A day at Nahant, _al fresco_, with two perfect
black waiters, who arranged the lunch on the grass, because no one had
moved down to Nahant so early; a visit to Plymouth and the Forefathers'
Rock; a visit to the Antiquarian Hall at Worcester, and one to the
witches' home at Salem,--these occupied so many days. Then there was
the famous ball given by the City of Boston to the Duke of Gerolstein
in the Boston Theatre, when all Colonnade Row was taken for
supper-tables.
The old rules of the Verney family were wholly violated: all four of
the girls went; and they danced with elegant young men till they almost
died. And at last not only the ball was over, but everything else was
over; and on the 24th of May the girls went home, after such a visit as
even they were staggered to look back upon.
Edward and Psyche took them to the train, and, when it had fairly
rolled out of the station, she took both his hands, and they looked
each other in the face and laughed till the tears ran out of all four
eyes. And, as they mounted the carriage, Psyche said, "Now we will live
like civilized beings again!"
CHAPTER IV.
Dear Psyche, could you not cast the future better?
That day, as they had arranged, she packed her things and Geoffrey's
for the country, and the next day they went, bag and baggage, to a
beautiful place Mr. Ross had hired, at the corner of Hale Street and
Beach Street, for a sea-shore home in Beverly, so that dear Geoffrey
might have the south wind off the sea, the purest of air, and the
freshest of salt-water brought up for his daily bath.
The only grief was that Edward had to take the evening train for Boston
five nights in the week. But he always appeared fresh and bright at
breakfast; and in the bath at noon, in the daily walk, or in the
evening ride to the station, life seemed all the happier because the
three hags of Painted Post had returned to their lair.
But this paradise lasted only a fortnight, when the tempter came. This
letter arrived from Priscilla:--
"_Very Private_.
"PAINTED POST, June 5.
"MY DEAREST PSYCHE,--Your sisters and I have had a very serious
_conversation_ about you and the _life_ you are leading. You seem to
be very _happy_; but have you _thought_, my dear Psyche, that you are
_dancing_ on the edge of a volcano? Have you asked no _question_ as
to the future? Are you so blinded as _to forget_ that the wages of
sin is death, and that _the joys_ of this moment are as nothing
compared with _the terrors_ of eternity?
"Your _sisters_ and I have spoken to _dear papa_ about the _life you
lead_. He has _bidden_ me write to you just what _I think_, and your
sisters also say it is my _duty_ to do so. I write you,
_therefore_--how sadly you know--to say that, as a _Christian woman_,
you _ought not to continue_ in this life. You _should_ rise above it,
and assert the _freedom_ of a child of God. _What is a dinner_ at
Parker's if eaten with a _guilty conscience_? Better is a dinner of
herbs where love is.
"_I am sorry_ to write you a _letter_ which seems severe. But _you
know_, my dear child, that I am as _a mother_ to you. And _surely_
the counsels of a mother will be _sweeter_ to you than the
_flatteries_ of any not so near as she.
"Always your loving sister,
"PRISCILLA."
"Counsels of a fiddlestick!" said Psyche; and she wrote this answer:--
"What in the world is the matter? I saw no dislike of Parker's
dinners when you were here. I believe you are crazy.
"Always yours,
"PSYCHE."
And she threw Priscilla's letter into the kitchen-fire. This was her
mistake. She would have been wiser had she shown it to Edward, as she
did the other. But she was ashamed to.
Another week brought her another letter.
"_Private and Particular_.
"PAINTED POST, June 13.
"MY DEAR CHILD,--I am _shocked_ with the _levity_ of your note,
_without date_, which lies before me.
"Dear Psyche, fools make a _mock_ of sin. How can you exult in your
own _shame_? How can you live as the wife of a _man_ of whom you know
_nothing_, whose whole life is _suspicious_ and a _scandal_, who is
himself so _ashamed_ of it that he does not admit _his own wife_ to a
knowledge of its _secret ways_? I cannot see how a child of
_Christian parents_ should be _so blinded_ and _misled_.
"_Rouse yourself_ in your strength, dear child. Ask your husband
_honestly_ and _bravely_ what it is that he does in his _nightly
orgies_. Do not think that we observed nothing in our _visit_. Do not
think that we were _lulled_ or put to _sleep_ in our watch over our
_sister_. _Never_, dear Psyche. We love you as much as ever. And we
are _determined_ to tear every shred of _mystery_ from your life,
once so _artless_ and _pure_.
"Truly, your sister-mother,
"PRISCILLA."
"Sister-mother indeed!" said Psyche; and she wrote this letter:--
"DEAR PRIS,--If you will mind your business, I will mind mine. P."
And she threw Priscilla's letter into the sea at high tide, torn into
little bits. This was her second mistake.
This time this answer came:--
"PAINTED POST, June 21.
"MY DEAR LOST LAMB,--I have _spent_ the _night_ in _prayer_ for you.
This morning Agnes and Polly and I showed your _profligate letter_ to
our dear father. He has charged me to _write_ what I _think_ best to
you.
"Is it not my _business_ to care for the _life and soul_ of a dear
sister who has no _mother's love_? Am I not right when I fall on my
_knees_ to pray for her _welfare_? How could I _enjoy_ the good of
this life or the hopes of _another_, knowing that my sister is
_eating_ the _bread of wickedness_ and drinking from the _cup of
sin_? Shall the watchman desert his post because the _soldier
sleeps_?
"_Ask yourself_ why no person except the hireling tradesman ever
_visits_ at this _house_ of luxury and _extravagance_, which your
husband makes the prison-house of _your soul_.
"Ask yourself what is the fountain of this gold which he spends so
shamelessly.
"Ask yourself, dear Psyche, what you would have said _two years ago_
had any one told you that _you_ should become the wife of a
_counterfeiter_ or a _forger_ or a _gambler_ or a _keeper of a
dance-house_ or a _detective_, or any other of those horrid things
which are done in _secret_. If any one had said to you that you
should have _pleasure_ in those that do them, what would you _have
said_? O my _dear lost lamb_, how often has that _sweet_ text (see
Romans i. 32) come back to me since I came to see you, in the _faint
hope_ that I might rescue my _lamb_ even as a brand from the
_burning_! My dear Psyche, will you not _turn_ before it is _too
late_? _Why will you die_?
"Thus asks and _prays_ your own
"PRISCILLA."
"My own cat and dog!" said little Psyche scornfully. But she did not
put the letter into the fire, nor did she tear it to shreds to throw
them into the sea. I am very sorry; but, even in her wonder, she kept
the letter hid away.
"What in the world did they find out about Edward that I do not know?"
This was the first fatal question which Psyche asked herself.
"Forger, counterfeiter, detective, gambler--what do the vile creatures
mean? They shall not say such horrid things about the best of men!"
"Ask yourself what is the fountain of this gold." Psyche had asked
herself very often, and she did not know, and she knew she did not
know. Edward was not lavish, and he was not parsimonious. She and he
went over the bills together once a month, and when they were too
large, they both took care that that should not happen again. And he
gave her nice crisp bills to pay them with, and always gave her a
separate sum for "P," which he said was her "private, personal, or
peculiar share," which she had better not keep any account of. Where it
all came from she did not know, and she knew she did not know; and she
had promised not to ask him.
As for asking herself why nobody called to see her, she had asked that
too, and she had no better answer. The minister did call once a year;
but they had been out both times, and he had left his card. The doctor
had called before Geoffrey was born, and after; but she had not asked
him why nobody else called. She supposed it was the Boston way.
Certainly she had called on nobody but on Mrs. Royall and Mrs. Flynn
and a few more of her protegées. She was sure she did not want people
to call on her, and she did not want to call on them.
Still the iron had entered her soul. And, as Satan ordered, for this
week of all weeks, Edward was called away to New York; and although
there were two letters a day from dear Edward, and very funny scraps
from bills of fare and play-bills, and one or two new novels by post,
and an English edition of the new "Morris," still her "earthly
paradise" was a very gloomy paradise without him.
And every day the poor child read over Priscilla's venomous letter; and
at last she went so far that she determined that she would ask him why
nobody except the minister and the doctor ever came to see her.
Of course she did no such thing; for Friday night came, and--joy of
joys!--Edward came. And Geoff was dragged out of his crib to see papa,
and came down in his dear little flannel night-gown, and really knew
papa, or was said to; and Geoff really grabbed at the new coral papa
had brought to him, and held it in his hand and swayed it to and fro
wildly, as a man very drunk would do; and they laughed happily over
Geoff and put him to bed again; and then they sat and talked, and
talked and sat, till long after any bedtime Psyche had ever dreamed of;
and then they went to bed together, and as Psyche undressed, Edward
read the story of the "Four Sons of Aymon" aloud to her. It was all as
beautiful as it could be; and was she to bother him with talking about
callers? Not she! She had him till Monday night, and she was not going
to destroy her own paradise before then.
So there was one long, lovely Saturday, when he worked with her and she
worked with him, and they went to the beach together, and went to drive
together, and painted together, and in the evening they tried some new
music that he had brought home; and he had a whole pile of lovely
English and French letters which had come since he went away, and they
had those to read together; and there was one German letter from his
old Heidelberg friend, Welsted, and Psyche helped him puzzle out the
words of the writing: he said she always guessed these riddles better
than he did. And Welsted was married too, and he had a little girl
baby, and made great fun about marrying her to Geoffrey. And they wrote
an answer to Welsted, and it was midnight before they came round to the
"Four Sons of Aymon" and to their bed.
And Sunday was another lovely day. They drove to church, and the drive
was charming. They drove to Essex Woods, and that was charming. And
Edward got out some of his old college diaries and read to her; and she
fell to telling him about Ingham University. Oh dear! I do not know
what they did not talk about. And it was midnight before they went to
bed again.
Edward went right to sleep. Psyche had noticed that before. He would
say, "God bless us, darling!" and he would be asleep in two seconds.
But Psyche could not sleep. She had lost all her chances to ask him
about the calls. She could not bear to wake him up and ask him. Nay,
had she not promised him that she would not ask him? Not this very
thing, perhaps, but what was just the same thing.
Why should she ask him? Why should she not find out without asking him?
Priscilla seemed to know, but Priscilla had never asked him. How did
Priscilla know? How did Priscilla know?--how? how? how? The poor child
said this over to herself in words,--"How? how? how?"--and she fell
asleep.
But she did not sleep well. All of a sudden, in a horrid dream, in
which they were dragging Edward off to prison, she woke up. Oh, how
glad she was to be awake! What in the world were they taking him to
prison for? What had he done? Priscilla knew. Did Priscilla know? Why
should not Psyche know?
Poor little Psyche! It was very still, and Edward was dead asleep. And
one word from him would make her perfectly happy. And yet she did not
dare ask him to speak that one word.
Why should she not be perfectly happy? Why should she disturb him at
all? Why should she not keep her promise, and be perfectly happy too?
Dear little Psyche! Poor little Psyche! She got out of bed, and she
stepped gently across the room to Edward's dressing-room, and she
pushed the door to. It was the first time in her life that Psyche had
ever tried to part herself from her husband. And she knew it was. And a
cold shudder ran through her as she thought of this. But she was not
born to be frightened by cold shudders. There was too much Lady Macbeth
in her for that. She struck a match, lighted a candle, and sat for a
minute thinking. Then she bravely took her husband's coat and drew from
the breast-pocket that Russia leather letter-book which she gave him at
Christmas. How little she thought then that she should be handling it
stealthily at the dead of night!
She opened the book, which was full of letters. She seized the first:--
"MR. EDWARD ROSS, No. 999 State Street, Boston."
Then that was his office. She could drive down State Street some day
and just look at the number. She set the candle on her knee to free her
hand while she opened the letter.
"DEAR ROSS,--Could you spare me Orton for half an hour?
"E. J. F."
Miserable girl! She had violated all confidence--to learn nothing!
But Lady Macbeth went on.
"_Mr. Edward Ross, 999 State Street:_
"DEAR ROSS,--If you can come to club again, you will come to-day.
Hedge reads, and Emerson and James will be there. We have not seen
you for a year."
And she knew why he had not dined at club for a year, why he had spent
every moment that he could spend at home. Miserable girl! It was for
this that she had stolen out of bed!
So Lady Macbeth read No. 3.
"_Mr. Edward Ross, 999 State Street:_
"DEAR SIR,--We cannot match the turquoise here. But on the catalogue
of Messrs. Roothan, Amsterdam, there are four such stones. Shall we
telegraph them? We have very little time before July 31."
July 31 was her birthday. It was for this that she was reading her
husband's secrets. Wretched Psyche!
Lady Macbeth went on.
"_Private and Confidential_.
"_Edward Ross, Esq., 999 State Street:_"
Lady Macbeth paused, but her hand was in.
"DEAR SIR,--The committee met and read your letter with great care.
Mr. Potter said that he had seen you on Tuesday, and that you
expressed the same view then. I also laid before the committee
General G----'s letter to you, and the telegram you had received from
Syracuse. If you can persuade your friends to--"
Here the page ended, and Psyche had to turn over. As she turned, the
candlestick tipped on her knee, fell bottom up upon the ground, and
Psyche was in darkness.
What a noise it made! And what a guilty fool Psyche felt like! No Lady
Macbeth now! But she folded the letter and put it back in the
letter-case. She put the letter-case in the pocket, and folded the
coat. She picked up the candle, and put it on the table. Then she slunk
back into her bedroom. All this time Edward was crying out, "Dear
Psyche, are you ill? What is it, dear?" He was out of bed, and was
fumbling in the dark in Psyche's dressing-room. But the ways of the
sea-shore home were not familiar to him.
When Psyche dared--that is, when she was at the foot of the bed--she
cried out to Edward that nothing was wrong. She had had a bad dream,
and was frightened, and had got up to strike a light, but she had not
meant to call him. And he found her shivering on the bedside; and he
cooed to her and comforted her, and made her promise to call him
another time. And Psyche had just force enough to say sadly, "Call
you--yes, if you are here." And then he sang to her a little crooning
song his mother sang to him when he was a child, and poor Psyche cried
herself to sleep.
CHAPTER V.
The next morning Psyche slept too heavily. She did not wake till Edward
was out of bed. Then she started like a guilty thing. But she did not
dare go into his dressing-room.
And he brought in the "Four Sons of Aymon," and read to her. Oh, she
was as long as ever she could be about her dressing; but, alas! the
breakfast-bell rang, and Edward ran into his room.
One minute,--it seemed forever,--then he came in with his coat, and
with a look which tried to be comical, but was, oh, so sad! he pointed
at the long swirl of spermaceti which ran from one end of it to the
other.
Then he bent over the poor crying girl and kissed her, and kissed her
again.
"How can you, Edward? I am so wicked--and such a fool!"
"Darling, you are not wicked at all, and it is I who am the fool."
"Dear Edward, hear me. I was perfectly happy till they came--"
"Sweetheart, you need not say so."
"Edward, hear me; read what they write to me. Read this. Read where
they say you are a forger and a counterfeiter, a detective and a
gambler."
"Really," said Edward, as he read, "they compliment me. The New York
'Observer' could not treat a man worse."
Psyche was amazed, and she saw that Edward was more amused than angry.
"Dear Edward, I am a fool. But I could not bear that Bloody Mary should
know more of my own boy than I did."
"No, my darling," said he stoutly; "and there is no reason why you
should. But hear that bell! Ellen is crazy that we shall come to
breakfast. Finish your hair. I will find another coat; and at
breakfast, as Miss Braddon says, I will tell you _all_."
* * * * *
And at breakfast he told her all. It was so little to tell that I am
ashamed to have wasted ten thousand words without relieving the
reader's anxiety.
As soon as Ellen had attended to the table and left the room, Edward
said, "Dearest, all is that I am a greater fool than Clarence Hervey
himself. I am the leading editor of the 'Daily Argus.' That is all."
Psyche fairly laid down her fork. "What a fool I am! I have read things
I told you myself in the paper, yet I never dreamed that you put them
there. But why keep such a secret from your poor little butterfly?"
"Why, my darling," said he more seriously,--"why, but that I wanted to
have my butterfly to myself? You will see, dearest. God grant it may
not be as I fear. But if--I am afraid--if one person knows where you
live, he will know where I live. If one person knows, two will know. If
two know, two hundred thousand will know. If they know, there is an end
to breakfasts without door-bells, an end to German together, an end to
water-colors and to music, an end to the pony-wagon and the drives.
That was my only reason for trying to protect you from the necessity of
keeping a secret. I thought, in that new part of Boston, if we called
on nobody, nobody would call on us. So far I was not wrong. Then I took
care at the office to have it understood that no messenger was to be
sent to my house. I bit off old Folger's head one day when he offered
to send me a proof-sheet. Then I thought if we sent out 'No cards,' if
I could only make you happy without 'receiving,' my friends would not
know where to find me, and so my enemies would never know, nor the
intermediate mass who are neither friends nor enemies. A little skill
in May was enough to keep my name out of the Directory, excepting with
the office address. Indeed, I thought if I did my six hours' work there
between nine and three every night, it was all the world had a right to
ask of me. But all this has made you wretched, so it has been all
wrong, and it shall come to an end. You shall have a state dinner-party
next Saturday."
Psyche cried and cried and cried, as if her heart would break. And
Edward cried a little too.
"But why not go on so now?" said she. "I can keep a secret." This she
said proudly, though she blushed as she said it. "Wild horses shall not
draw it from me."
"No," said Edward sadly, "I know wild horses will not drag it from my
darling; but I know they will try, and I do not choose to have her torn
by wild horses: she has suffered enough from the pulling and hauling of
three wild asses."
And so it was all settled that they should begin to see people. All was
as clear as light between them now, and the new dynasty began.
And for a month or two there was no great change. At first it was only
that Ross brought out one or two gentlemen with him to spend Sunday.
They made the house very pleasant, and dear little Psyche did the
honors beautifully. Then they whispered round what a charming home it
was. And the Beverly people, some of whom are very nice persons, found
out what a pretty neighbor they had, and that it was Ross of the
"Argus," and they called, and asked to tea, and then Psyche and Edward
returned the calls, and asked to tea.
It was not till they went back to Roxbury that the real change came.
Then was it that before breakfast the door-bell began to ring; and
women with causes, and men out of employment, and inventors with
inventions, began to wait in the ante-room till Mr. E. Ross came
downstairs. Then was it that he poured down his hasty cup of coffee,
and ran to be rid of them. Then was it that councilmen came out as soon
as breakfast was over to arrange private schemes for thwarting the
aldermen; and that while the councilmen arranged, aldermen called and
waited for Mr. E. Ross to be at leisure, because they wanted to make
plans for thwarting the council. Then was it that, from morning to
night, candidates for the House and candidates for the Senate came for
private conferences, and had to be let out from different doors lest
they should meet each other. Then was it that men who had letters of
introduction from Japan and Formosa and Siberia and Aboukuta sat in
Psyche's parlor six or seven hours at a time, illustrating the customs
of those countries, and what Mr. Lowell calls "a certain air of
condescension observable in foreigners." Then was it that Psyche
received calls from wives of senators and daughters of congressmen, to
say in asides to her that if Mr. E. Ross could find it in his way to
say this, he would so much oblige thus and so. Then was it that, trying
to screen him from bores, she received all the women who sold Lives of
Christ, and all the agents who exhibited copies of maps or heliotypes.
Then was it that, when the ponies came to the door, railroad presidents
drew up, who just wanted a minute to talk about their new bonds. Then
was it that, after the ponies had been sent back to the stable, grand
ladies drew up to send in cards to Psyche, and to persuade her to take
tables at fairs and to be vice-president of almshouses. Then was it
that every Saturday Psyche gave a charming literary dinner, not bad in
its way; and the counterpart of this was that Psyche and Edward dined
at other people's houses four days out of the remaining six. The sixth
day Edward was kept down town for some of the engagements these
wretches had forced him into. Thus was it in the end that moths ate up
the camel's-hair pencils, and no one ever found it out; that the upper
G string in the piano rusted off, and no one discovered it; that
Bridget Flynn put ten volumes of Grillparzer into the furnace-fire, and
nobody missed them; and that all the ferns in the fern-house died, and
nobody wept for them.
From early morning round to early morning Psyche never saw her
lover-husband, except as he and she gorged a hurried and broken
breakfast, or as he took in to dinner some lady he did not care for,
and as she, at her end of the table, talked French or Cochin Chinese to
some man who had brought letters of introduction.
She knew what her husband's business was and who his friends were. But,
for all intents and purposes, she had lost him forever.
As for the three step-sisters at Painted Post, they went to a
Sunday-School picnic one day, and fell off a precipice and were killed.