THE SISTERS.
On a cool piazza overlooking a handsome flower garden the breakfast
table was tastefully arranged. It was Rose's idea to have it there,
and in her cambric wrapper, her golden curls combed smoothly back, and
her blue eyes shining with the light of a new joy, she occupies her
accustomed seat beside one who for several happy weeks has called her
his, loving her more and more each day, and wondering how thoughts of
any other could ever have filled his heart. There was much to be done
about his home, so long deserted, and as Rose was determined upon a
trip to the seaside he had made arrangements to be absent from
his business for two months or more, and was now enjoying all the
happiness of a quiet, domestic life, free from care of any kind. He
had heard of Maggie's illness, but she was better now, he supposed,
and when Theo hinted vaguely that a marriage between her and Arthur
Carrollton was not at all improbable, he hoped it would be so, for the
Englishman, he knew, was far better adapted to Margaret than he
had ever been. Of Theo's hints he was speaking to Rose as they sat
together at breakfast, and she had answered, "It will be a splendid
match," when the doorbell rang, and the servant announced, "A lady in
the parlor, who asks for Mr. Warner."
"I told you someone would come," said Rose. "Do, pray, see who it is.
How does she look, Janet?"
"Tall, white as a ghost, with big black eyes," was Janet's answer;
and, with his curiosity awakened, Henry Warner started for the parlor,
Rose following on tiptoe, and listening through the half-closed door
to what their visitor might say.
Margaret had experienced no difficulty in finding the house of Mrs.
Warner, which seemed to her a second Paradise, so beautiful and cool
it looked, nestled amid the tall, green forest trees. Everything
around it betokened the fine taste of its occupants, and Maggie, as
she reflected that she too was nearly connected with this family, felt
her wounded pride in a measure soothed, for it was surely no disgrace
to claim such people as her friends. With a beating heart she rang the
bell, asking for Mr. Warner, and now, trembling in every limb, she
awaited his coming. He was not prepared to meet her, and at first he
did not know her, she was so changed; but when, throwing aside her
bonnet, she turned her face so that the light from the window opposite
shone fully upon her, he recognized her in a moment, and exclaimed,
"Margaret--Margaret Miller! why are you here?"
The words reached Rose's ear, and darting forward she stood within
the door, just as Margaret, staggering a step or two towards Henry,
answered passionately, "I have come to tell you what I myself but
recently have learned"; and wringing her hands despairingly, she
continued, "I am not Maggie Miller, I am not anybody; I am Hagar
Warren's grandchild, the child of her daughter and your own father!
Oh, Henry, don't you see it? I am your sister. Take me as such, will
you? Love me as such, or I shall surely die. I have nobody now in the
wide world but you. They are all gone, all--Madam Conway, Theo too,
and--and--" She could not speak that name. It died upon her lips, and
tottering to a chair she would have fallen had not Henry caught her in
his arms.
Leading her to the sofa, while Rose, perfectly confounded, still stood
within the door, he said to the half-crazed girl: "Margaret, I do not
understand you. I never had a sister, and my father died when I was
six months old. There must be some mistake. Will you tell me what you
mean?"
Bewildered and perplexed, Margaret began a hasty repetition of Hagar's
story, but ere it was three-fourths told there came from the open door
a wild cry of delight, and quick as lightning a fairy form flew across
the floor, white arms were twined round Maggie's neck, kiss after kiss
was pressed upon her lips, and Rose's voice was in her ear, never
before half so sweet as now, when it murmured soft and low to the
weary girl: "My sister Maggie--mine you are--the child of my own
father, for I was Rose Hamilton, called Warner, first to please my
aunt, and next to please my Henry. Oh, Maggie darling, I am so happy
now!" and the little snowy hands smoothed caressingly the bands of
hair, so unlike her own fair waving tresses.
It was, indeed, a time of almost perfect bliss to them all, and for
a moment Margaret forgot her pain, which, had Hagar known the truth,
need not have come to her. But she scarcely regretted it now, when she
felt Rose Warner's heart throbbing against her own, and knew their
father was the same.
"You are tired," Rose said, at length, when much had been said by
both. "You must have rest, and then I will bring to you my aunt, our
aunt, Maggie--our father's sister. She has been a mother to me.
She will be one to you. But stay," she continued, "you have had no
breakfast. I will bring you some," and she tripped lightly from the
room.
Maggie followed her with swimming eyes, then turning to Henry she
said, "You are very happy, I am sure."
"Yes, very," he answered, coming to her side. "Happy in my wife, happy
in my newly found sister," and he laid his hand on hers with something
of his former familiarity.
But the olden feeling was gone, and Maggie could now meet his glance
without a blush, while he could talk with her as calmly as if she
had never been aught to him save the sister of his wife. Thus often
changeth the human heart's first love.
After a time Rose returned, bearing a silver tray heaped with the most
tempting viands: but Maggie's heart was too full to eat, and after
drinking a cup of the fragrant black tea, which Rose herself had made,
she laid her head upon the pillow which Henry brought, and, with Rose
sitting by, holding lovingly her hand, she fell into a quiet slumber.
For several hours she slept, and when she awoke at last the sun was
shining in at the western window, casting over the floor a glimmering
light, and reminding her so forcibly of the dancing shadows on the
grass which grew around the old stone house that her eyes filled with
tears, and, thinking herself alone, she murmured, "Will it never be my
home again?"
A sudden movement, the rustling of a dress, startled her, and lifting
up her head she saw standing near a pleasant-looking, middle-aged
woman, who, she rightly guessed, was Mrs. Warner, her own aunt.
"Maggie," the lady said, laying her hand on the fevered brow, "I have
heard a strange tale to-day. Heretofore I had supposed Rose to be my
only child, but though you take me by surprise you are not the less
welcome. There is room in my heart for you, Maggie Miller, room for
the youngest-born of my only brother. You are somewhat like him, too,"
she continued, "though more like your mother;" and with the mention of
that name a flush stole over the lady's face, for she, too, was very
proud, and her brother's marriage with a servant girl had never been
quite forgiven.
Mrs. Warner had seen much of the world, and Maggie knew her to be a
woman of refinement, a woman of whom even Madam Conway would not be
ashamed; and, winding her arms around her neck, she said impulsively,
"I am glad you are my aunt; and you will love me, I am sure, even if I
am poor Hagar's grandchild."
Mrs. Warner knew nothing of Hagar save from Henry's amusing
description, the entire truth of which she somewhat doubted; but she
knew that whatever Hagar Warren might be, the beautiful girl before
her was not answerable for it, and very kindly she tried to soothe
her, telling her how happy they would be together. "Rose will leave me
in the autumn," she said, "and without you I should be all alone." Of
Hagar, too, she spoke kindly and considerately, and Maggie, listening
to her, felt somewhat reconciled to the fate which had made her what
she was. Still, there was much of pride to overcome ere she could
calmly think of herself as other than Madam Conway's grandchild; and
when that afternoon, as Henry and Rose were sitting with her, the
latter spoke of her mother, saying she had a faint remembrance of a
tall, handsome girl who sang her to sleep on the night when her own
mother died, there came a visible shadow over Maggie's face, and
instantly changing the conversation she asked why Henry had never told
her anything definite concerning himself and family.
For a moment Henry seemed embarrassed. Both the Hamiltons and the
Warners were very aristocratic in their feelings, and by mutual
consent the name of Hester Warren was by them seldom spoken.
Consequently, if there existed a reason for Henry's silence with
regard to his own and Rose's history, it was that he disliked bringing
up a subject he had been taught to avoid, both by his aunt and the
mother of Mr. Hamilton, who for several years after her son's death
had lived with her daughter in Leominster, where she finally died.
This, however, he could not say to Margaret, and after a little
hesitancy he answered laughingly, "You never asked me for any
particulars; and, then, you know, I was more agreeably occupied than I
should have been had I spent my time in enlightening you with regard
to our genealogy"; and the saucy mouth smiled archly, first on
Rose, and then on Margaret, both of whom blushed slightly, the one
suspecting he had not told her the whole truth, and the other knowing
he had not.
Very considerate was Rose of Maggie's feelings and not again that
afternoon did she speak of Hester, though she talked much of their
father; and Margaret, listening to his praises, felt herself
insensibly drawn towards this new claimant for her filial love. "I
wish I could have seen him," she said; and, starting to her feet, Rose
answered: "Strange I did not think of it before. We have his portrait.
Come this way," and she led the half-unwilling Maggie into an
adjoining room, where from the wall a portly, good-humored-looking man
gazed down upon the sisters, his eyes seeming to rest with mournful
tenderness on the face of her whom in life they had not looked upon.
He seemed older than Maggie had supposed, and the hair upon his head
was white, reminding her of Hagar. But she did not for this turn away
from him. There was something pleasing in the mild expression of his
face, and she whispered faintly, "'Tis my father."
On the right of this portrait was another, the picture of a woman, in
whose curling lip and soft brown eyes Maggie recognized the mother of
Henry. To the left was another still, and she gazed upon the angel
face, with eyes of violet blue, and hair of golden brown, on which the
fading sunlight now was falling, encircling it as it were with a halo
of glory.
"You are much like her," she said to Rose, who made no answer, for she
was thinking of another picture, which years before had been banished
to the garret by her haughty grandmother, as unworthy a place beside
him who had petted and caressed the young girl of plebeian birth and
kindred.
"I can make amends for it, though," thought Rose, returning with
Maggie to the parlor. Then, seeking out her husband, she held with him
a whispered consultation, the result of which was that on the morrow
there was a rummaging in the garret, an absence from home for an
hour or two, and when about noon she returned there was a pleased
expression on her face, as if she had accomplished her purpose,
whatever it might have been.
All that morning Maggie had been restless and uneasy, wandering
listlessly from room to room, looking anxiously down the street,
starting nervously at the sound of every footstep, while her cheeks
alternately flushed and then grew pale as the day passed on. Dinner
being over she sat alone in the parlor, her eyes fixed upon the
carpet, and her thoughts away with one who she vaguely hoped would
have followed her ere this. True, she had added no postscript to tell
him of her new discovery; but Hagar knew, and he would go to her for a
confirmation of the letter. She would tell him where Maggie was
gone, and he, if his love could survive that shock, would follow her
thither; nay, would be there that very day, and Maggie's heart grew
wearier, fainter, as time wore on and he did not come. "I might have
known it," she whispered sadly. "I knew that he would nevermore think
of me," and she wept silently over her ruined love.
"Maggie, sister," came to her ear, and Rose was at her side. "I have a
surprise for you, darling. Can you bear it now?"
Oh, how eagerly poor Maggie Miller looked up in Rose's face! The car
whistle had sounded half an hour before. Could it be that he had come?
Was he there? Did he love her still? No, Maggie, no; the surprise
awaiting you is of a far different nature, and the tears flow afresh
when Rose, in reply to the question "What is it, darling?" answers,
"It is this," at the same time placing in Maggie's hand an ambrotype
which she bade her examine. With a feeling of keen disappointment
Maggie opened the casing, involuntarily shutting her eyes as if to
gather strength for what she was to see.
It was a young face--a handsome face--a face much like her own, while
in the curve of the upper lip and the expression of the large black
eyes there was a look like Hagar Warren. They had met together thus,
the one a living reality, the other a semblance of the dead, and she
who held that picture trembled violently. There was a fierce struggle
within, the wildly beating heart throbbing for one moment with a
newborn love, and then rebelling against taking that shadow, beautiful
though it was, in place of her whose memory she had so long revered.
"Who is it, Maggie?" Rose asked, leaning over her shoulder.
Maggie knew full well whose face it was she looked upon, but not yet
could she speak that name so interwoven with memories of another, and
she answered mournfully, "It is Hester Hamilton."
"Yes, Margaret, your mother," said Rose. "I never called her by that
name, but I respect her for your sake. She was my father's pet, so
it has been said, for he was comparatively old, and she his young
girl-wife."
"Where did you get this?" Maggie asked; and, coloring crimson, Rose
replied, "We have always had her portrait, but grandmother, who was
very old and foolishly proud about some things, was offended at our
father's last marriage, and when after his death the portraits were
brought here, she--Forgive her, Maggie--she did not know you, or she
would not have done it--"
"I know," interrupted Maggie. "She despised this Hester Warren, and
consigned her portrait to some spot from which you have brought it and
had this taken from it."
"Not despised her!" cried Rose, in great distress, as she saw a dark
expression stealing over the face of Maggie, in whose heart a chord of
sympathy had been struck when she thought of her mother banished from
her father's side. "Grandma could not despise her," continued Rose;
"she was so good, so beautiful."
"Yes, she was beautiful," murmured Maggie, gazing earnestly upon the
fair, round face, the soft, black eyes, and raven hair of her who for
years had slept beneath the shadow of the Hillsdale woods. "Oh, I wish
I were dead like her!" she exclaimed at last, closing the ambrotype
and laying it upon the table. "I wish I was lying in that little grave
in the place of her who should have borne my name, and been what I
once was;" and bowing her face upon her hands she wept bitterly, while
Rose tried in vain to comfort her. "I am not sorry you are my sister,"
sobbed Margaret through her tears. "That's the only comfort I have
left me now; but, Rose, I love Arthur Carrollton so much--oh, so much,
and how can I give him up!"
"If he is the noble, true-hearted man he looks to be, he will not give
you up," answered Rose, and then for the first time since this meeting
she questioned Margaret concerning Mr. Carrollton and the relations
existing between them. "He will not cast you off," she said, when
Margaret had told her all she had to tell. "He may be proud, but he
will cling to you still. He will follow you, too--not to-day, perhaps,
nor to-morrow, but ere long he will surely come;" and, listening to
her sister's cheering words, Maggie herself grew hopeful, and that
evening talked animatedly with Henry and Rose of a trip to the seaside
that they were intending to make. "You will go, too, Maggie," said
Rose, caressing her sister's pale cheek, and whispering in her ear,
"Aunt Susan will be here to tell Mr. Carrollton where you are, if he
does not come before we go, which I am sure he will."
Maggie tried to think so too, and her sleep that night was sweeter
than it had been before for many weeks--but the next day came, and the
next, and Maggie's eyes grew dim with watching and with tears, for up
and down the road, as far as she could see, there came no trace of him
for whom she waited.
"I might have known it; it was foolish of me to think otherwise," she
sighed; and, turning sadly from the window where all the afternoon she
had been sitting, she laid her head wearily upon the lap of Rose.
"Maggie," said Henry, "I am going to Worcester to-morrow, and perhaps
George can tell me something of Mr. Carrollton."
For a moment Maggie's heart throbbed with delight at the thought of
hearing from him, even though she heard that he would leave her. But
anon her pride rose strong within her. She had told Hagar twice of
her destination, Hagar had told him, and if he chose he would have
followed her ere this; so somewhat bitterly she said: "Don't speak to
George of me. Don't tell him I am here. Promise me, will you?"
The promise was given, and the next morning, which was Saturday, Henry
started for Worcester on the early train. The day seemed long to
Maggie, and when at nightfall he came to them again it was difficult
to tell which was the more pleased at his return, Margaret or Rose.
"Did you see Theo?" asked the former; and Henry replied: "George told
me she had gone to Hillsdale. Madam Conway is very sick."
"For me! for me! She's sick with mourning for me!" cried Maggie.
"Darling grandma! she does love me still, and I will go home to her at
once."
Then the painful thought rushed over her: "If she wished for me, she
would send. It's the humiliation, not the love, that makes her sick.
They have cast me off--grandma, Theo, all, all!" and, sinking upon the
lounge, she wept aloud.
"Margaret," said Henry, coming to her side, "but for my promise
I should have talked to George of you, for there was a troubled
expression on his face when he asked me if I had heard from
Hillsdale."
"What did you say?" asked Maggie, holding her breath to catch the
answer, which was, "I told him you had not written to me since my
return from Cuba, and then he looked as if he would say more, but a
customer called him away, and our conversation was not resumed."
For a moment Maggie was silent. Then she said: "I am glad you did not
intrude me upon him. If Theo has gone to Hillsdale, she knows that
I am here, and does not care to follow me. It is the disgrace that
troubles them, not the losing me!" and again burying her head in the
cushions of the lounge, she wept bitterly. It was useless for Henry
and Rose to try to comfort her, telling her it was possible that Hagar
had told nothing. "And if so," said Henry, "you well know that I am
the last one to whom you would be expected to flee for protection."
Margaret would not listen. She was resolved upon being unhappy, and
during the long hours of that night she tossed wakefully upon her
pillow, and when the morning came she was too weak to rise; so she
kept her room, listening to the music of the Sabbath bells, which to
her seemed sadly saying, "Home, home." "Alas! I have no home," she
said, turning away to weep, for in the tolling of those bells there
came to her no voice whispering of the darkness, the desolation, and
the sorrow that were in the home for which she so much mourned.
Thus the day wore on, and ere another week was gone Rose insisted upon
a speedy removal to the seashore, notwithstanding it was so early in
the season, for by this means she hoped that Maggie's health would be
improved. Accordingly, Henry went once more to Worcester, ostensibly
for money, but really to see if George Douglas now would speak to him
of Margaret. But George was in New York, they said; and, somewhat
disappointed, Henry went back to Leominster, where everything was
in readiness for their journey. Monday was fixed upon for their
departure, and at an early hour Margaret looked back on what had
been to her a second home, smiling faintly as Rose whispered to her
cheerily, "I have a strong presentiment that somewhere in our travels
we shall meet with Arthur Carrollton."