by the beauty of the maiden who stood before him; a beauty which now,
after nearly two centuries, is still a tradition of marvel. Something
unreal and almost supernatural there might seem in the wonderful
loveliness of this exquisite creature, were it not that she seemed so to
overflow with life and vitality. Her soft and dove like eyes were full
of gleams of human energy, of joy, of passion; she had all the beauty
of a perfect dream without its unreality; and then and there the young
Englishman's heart fell down and worshipped her, never after to swerve
from its allegiance.
"You must be Mr. Friendleton," the maiden said, courtesying
bewitchingly. "I knew your ship was in."
"I--I have been minding my luggage," he stammered, rather irrelevantly,
his eyes fastened upon her face.
"Be pleased to enter," said she, smiling a little at the boldness and
unconsciousness of his stare. "Your room has been preserved as you left
it at your departure. My aunt, good Mistress Henshaw, as I wrote you,
straitly enjoined in her will that everything should be kept for you as
you had left it. Her affections were marvellously set upon you."
That he should be allowed to enter under the same roof with this
beautiful creature seemed to John Friendleton the height of bliss, and
he had no words to express his delight when he learned that Mistress
Rose expected him to take up his abode there as in former times. Her
aunt had wished it; had especially spoken of it in her will, and so it
was to be.
It would be impossible to pretend that Friendleton struggled much
against this proposition, when inclination so strongly pleaded for the
carrying out of the wishes of his dead friend; and in this way he became
the lodger of young Mistress Rose.
III.
It did not long escape the eye of the young man that his new landlady
wore always at her throat a cluster of the white, waxy blossoms of
the tuberose. The circumstance was in itself sufficiently curious and
unusual to excite his attention, and it recalled to his mind the plant
he had given to Mistress Henshaw. He wondered what had been the fate of
his gift, and one day he ventured to ask Mistress Rose about it. For
reply she led him to the room formerly occupied by her aunt, and showed
him the tuberose in a quaint pot. It had grown tall and thrifty, and
half a dozen slim stalks upon it stood up stoutly, covered with buds,
which showed here and there touches of dull red evolved in their
transformation from green to white.
"I marvel how it hath increased," John said.
"It hath thriven marvellously," she replied. "Never before hath it been
known that the plant would bloom throughout all the year, but this sends
out buds continually. I daily wear a blossom, as you may see, and I find
its odor wonderfully cheering, although for most it is too powerfully
sweet."
"It is an ornament which becometh you exceedingly well," he responded,
flushing.
"My neighbors," returned she smiling, "regard it as exceeding
frivolous."
The fragrance of the flower which Mistress Rose wore at her throat
floated about John wherever his daily occupations led him, and doubly
did the delicious perfume steal through his dreams. He never thought of
the maiden without feeling in the air that divinely sweet odor; and a
thousand times he secretly compared her to the flower she wore. Nor was
the comparison inapt; since her beauty was rendered somewhat unearthly
by the strange pallor of her face, while the intense and passionate
intoxication it produced might, without great straining of the simile,
be directly compared to the exaltation which the delicious and powerful
fragrance produces in sensuous and sensitive natures.
The intimacy between the young people was at first hindered by the
shyness of Friendleton, who was only too conscious of the fervor and
depth of his passion; but as Rose had many of the well-remembered ways
of her aunt, and, stranger yet, appeared well versed in his own past
history, he soon became more at his ease. In defiance of the proverb
which condemns all true lovers to uneven ways and obstructed paths, the
wooing of lovely Mistress Rose by John Friendleton ran smoothly and
happily on, seeming to have begun with the young man's first meeting
with his lovely landlady. The gossips of Boston town, strangely enough,
left the relations of the lovers untouched by any but friendly comment;
and in a fashion as natural as the ripening of the year, their love
ripened into completeness.
It was early autumn when Rose became Mistress Friendleton. The wedding
was quietly celebrated in the old North Church, and never in its
century of existence before its timbers went to feed the campfires of
British soldiers, did that house shelter a more lovely bride or a more
manly and blissful groom. A faint flush softened the pallor of the
maiden, the one charm which could add to her beauty. Her only ornament
was her usual cluster of tuberoses, and more than one spectator noted
how like the flower was the lady. The circumstance was recalled
afterward when the slab was placed above her grave in Copp's Hill
burial-ground. There still lingers among certain old gossips of
tenacious memory the tradition of a stone which had on it "some sort
of a flower." It was the slab upon which John Friendleton, imaginative
at sorest need, had caused to be carved simply a bunch of tuberoses.
If John had been happy in anticipation, he was, if such a thing be
possible, no less so in reality. It is as trite to attempt as it is
impossible to effect the portraying of the life of two young people who
are profoundly happy in each other. Joy may be named, but not painted.
Even were it easy to picture their existence, their self-absorption
would prevent their being interesting. As I have sometimes passed the
old house on Moon Street, standing worn and stained with the storms of
two centuries, a picture has risen before me of the young bride and
groom sitting together and inhaling the fragrance of a quaint pot of
tuberoses, blooming so wonderfully that the whole house was filled with
their odor; and the memory brings always the tears to my eyes.
IV.
November was at its last day. A severe storm, half rain, half snow, was
sweeping over Boston. The beacon upon Trimount trembled in the blast,
and on the shores of the peninsula the waves roared sullenly. Few people
were abroad, and there was never a watchman in the city who did not for
that day at least regret having chosen a calling which kept him out of
doors in such weather.
The house on Sun Court Street was too stoutly built to tremble, yet
those within heard the wind howling over the hill as if scourged by all
the furies. It was one of those nights when a man sits before his fire
and realizes the value of all his blessings.
John and Rose sat together before the blazing hearth while the husband
told stories of his boyhood in England. The wife nestled close to him,
absorbed in the narration, yet not forgetting to fondle his hand with
her smooth, soft fingers.
Suddenly into the room burst black, dumb Dinah, wringing her hands and
moving her speechless lips with frightful earnestness. In her hands she
carried the fragments of the pot which had held the tuberose.
Rose sprang up with a cry of anguish.
"Dinah! Dinah! My tuberose!"
The negress gesticulated wildly, but her mistress rushed past her; and,
followed by her husband, hastened to see for herself the extent of the
mischief.
The pot had been overturned by the wind, which had burst in one of the
tiny greenish window panes, and the plant was completely crushed in the
downfall. Not a single flower had escaped, and mingled with fragments
of pottery and with the black church-yard mould in which the flower
had--perhaps ill-fatedly--been planted, were the leaves and petals, torn
and stained and mangled.
In the first sorrow of the discovery of the accident, Rose threw herself
into her husband's arms and burst into tears; but she soon controlled
herself, and became perfectly calm. She directed Dinah to remove the
débris, and returned to listen to her husband's stories; and, although
she was more quiet than before, she seemed no less interested.
It was late when they prepared to retire.
"John," Rose said, hesitatingly, as they lingered a moment side by side
before the wide hearth, "it is just a year to-night since Mistress
Henshaw died. If you are willing, I wish to pass the night alone in her
room."
"I am always willing you should do whatever pleaseth you best," he
answered, smiling upon her; "but why do you mean to shut me out from
your sorrow? I, too, loved her."
"I know," Rose returned, bending to kiss the hand he had laid upon hers,
"and I fear you can never be shut out from my sorrows, however much I
could wish to spare you. Still, I wish it to be so for to-night."
"Then let it be so. The storm does not fright you?"
"The storm does not fright me."
She took from her throat the tuberoses she had worn that day, and gazed
at them sadly.
"I can never wear another," she said. "These are faded like our happy
days."
"You speak but sadly," returned her husband, with a look of such
fondness that the tears started into her eyes despite all her efforts
to restrain them. "You would have spoken so had you been bidding me
farewell. The destruction of the flower makes you downcast. Mayhap there
is still life in the root, and it may be made once more to grow and
bloom."
"John," his wife said abruptly, "John, I have loved you from the first
moment I saw you; I love you now, and I shall love you to all eternity.
Whatever happens, remember that and believe it."
"I have never doubted that you love me," he answered, gathering her into
his arms; "how else could it be that you could have made me so utterly
happy?"
She clung to him passionately a moment. Then with an evident effort at
self-control, she kissed his lips fervently, disengaged herself from his
embrace, and turned away.
"Good-night, dear," she said.
Then upon the threshold of Mistress Henshaw's chamber she paused and
looked back, tears shining in her beautiful dark eyes.
"Good-night," she repeated; "good-night."
V.
It was somewhat past his usual hour of rising when John Friendleton
next morning came downstairs. The storm was over, but everywhere had it
left its traces in broken boughs, overturned fences, and dilapidated
chimneys, so that as he looked from the window, John could see on all
sides the evidences of its violence.
The house was strangely quiet, and he looked about him with the
impatience of a lover for his wife, that she might chase away the
unaccustomed sombreness which seemed to have descended upon the place.
"Dinah," he asked, "has not your mistress risen?"
The mute regarded him with a strange appearance of wildness and terror,
but she replied by a shake of the head,--instantly hurrying out of the
room as if in fear.
John looked after her an instant in bewilderment, not understanding her
odd manner; and then approaching the door of the room occupied by his
wife, he tapped softly.
There was no response.
He tapped again somewhat more loudly. Still there was no reply. A third
time he rapped, now with a heavy hand. All within was as silent as the
grave.
Startled by he knew not what fear, with a sudden impulse he set his
strong shoulder to the door, and strained until with a crash it flew
open.
The heavy curtains were undrawn, and a grey gloom filled the chamber.
A fearful silence followed the crash of the breaking lock, and met him
like a palpable terror. He saw Rose lying on the bed, her face buried
in the pillows; and by some fantastic jugglery, the light from the open
door, as it fell upon her hair,--those abundant tresses whose rich, dark
glory he so loved,--seemed to silver them to the whiteness of hoary age.
"Rose!" he cried, starting forward to seize her hand which lay upon the
coverlid.
The hand was cold with a chill which smote him to the very heart.
"Rose! Sweetheart!" he cried in a piercing voice, bending over and
tenderly turning her dear face up to the light.
What horrible mockery confronted him? He started back like one stung by
a serpent!
Along the pillow lay a crushed and withered tuberose, and he looked upon
the face, ghastly in death, and old and haggard and wrinkled--of
Mistress Henshaw.
Interlude Second.
AN EVENING AT WHIST.
AN EVENING AT WHIST.
[_The scene is the parlor of a modern house, much adorned, and furnished
with a wealth of bric-a-brac, which renders getting about a most
difficult and delicate operation, unless one is wholly regardless of
the consequences to the innumerable ornaments. Mrs. Greeleigh Vaughn,
a corpulent and well-preserved widow, who passes for forty, and is not
less, has just seated herself at the whist-table, with her daughter and
two guests. One of these, Mr. Amptill Talbot, is one of those young men
whose wits seem to be in some mysterious fashion closely connected with
the parting of their hair exactly in the middle; the other is a handsome
and keen-eyed gentleman of middle age, who answers to the name Colonel
Graham._]
_Mrs. Vaughn._ I am so glad you could and would come, Colonel Graham.
Now we shall have a delightful evening at whist. You are such a superb
player that I am sure I shall learn more about the game by playing with
you a single evening than I should by studying the books for a year.
_Colonel Graham._ You are too good. I make not the slightest pretence
of--
_Mrs. V._ Oh, of course not. You are too modest; but everybody says that
you are a wonderful player. I only hope you won't be too hard on me if
I make a mistake.
_Miss Vaughn._ Oh, I am so glad mamma is your partner, Colonel Graham. I
should be frightened to death if I had to play with you. Mr. Talbot will
be a good deal more merciful, I am sure.
_Mr. Talbot._ Anything you do is sure to be right, Miss Vaughn. If you
can put up with me, I am sure I can afford to overlook any mistakes you
make. I play whist so seldom that I am all out of practice.
_Miss V._ (_dealing_). Oh, I just never play, only when I have to make
up the table. I have so many things on hand. Why weren't you at the
Wentworths' last night, Mr. Talbot?
_Mr. T._ I was out of town. I think you gave yourself two cards that
time.
_Miss V._ Oh, dear! Have I made a misdeal? I wish you'd count your
cards.
_Colonel G._ You are right. The next card is mine.
_Miss V._ Thank you.
_Mrs. V._ That came out all right.
_Colonel G._ But the trump is not turned.
_Miss V._ Oh, which was the last card? I am sure I don't know; I've got
them all mixed up now.
_Mrs. V._ Well, never mind. Let me draw one. That will do just as well.
_Mr. T._ Diamonds? Can't you draw again? I haven't--
_Miss V._ I don't think it was diamonds. I am almost sure it was spades.
_Mrs. V._ No, diamonds suits me, and of course you can't change it now;
can she, Colonel Graham?
_Colonel G._ It isn't customary, I believe, unless we are to play
Auction Pitch, and bid for the trump.
_Miss V._ Oh, now you are going to be sarcastic! I don't think that's
fair.
_Mrs. V._ Do you put your trumps at one end of your hand, Colonel
Graham?
_Colonel G._ No, I do not, but some people find it a convenience.
_Mr. T._ Is it my lead?
_Colonel G._ No, it is my partner's.
_Mrs. V._ Oh, is it my lead? I'm sure I don't know what to play. You
always lead from your long suit, don't you? There, I hope that queen
will be good.
_Mr. T._ No, it won't, for I have the ace.
_Mrs. V._ Oh, you mean man! Partner, can't you trump that?
_Colonel G._ I have suit.
_Miss V._ There, I have got to put the king on, and I think it is mean.
_Mr. T._ I am awfully sorry. If I'd only known--
_Miss V._ I shook my head at you, but you wouldn't look up.
_Mrs. V._ That wasn't fair, and you deserve to be beaten. Now my jack is
good, any way.
_Mr. T._ It isn't your lead. I took the trick.
_Mrs. V._ Oh, I beg pardon.
_Miss V._ I would have trumped it, any way.
_Mr. T._ I wish I knew what you have.
_Miss V._ I wish I could tell you. Don't make it too dark.
_Mr. T._ Then I'll lead diamonds.
_Miss V._ That's just right.
_Mrs. V._ Diamonds are trumps.
_Miss V._ Oh, are they? Oh, that's too bad. I didn't want trumps led.
_Mr. T._ But you said-- Why, can't you go over Colonel Graham's
nine-spot?
_Miss V._ I made a mistake. I meant to play the ten.
_Mrs. V._ Shall I put on a small one or a high one, Colonel Graham?
_Colonel G._ The trick is ours as it lies.
_Mrs. V._ Then if I put on a high one it will get it out of the way, so
you'll know what to do next time.
_Mr. T._ Why, you've thrown away the king of trumps!
_Mrs. V._ Wasn't that right?
_Miss V._ Why, of course not, mamma. You ought to have put on either the
ace or a low one.
_Colonel G._ It is your lead, Mrs. Vaughn.
_Mrs. V._ She says she'll trump hearts, and I can't play my knave. I'll
try spades. I hope you'll take it.
_Mr. T._ And he did. How nice to have a partner do just what you tell
him to.
_Miss V._ That means that I don't.
_Mr. T._ You are always satisfactory, whatever you do.
_Miss V._ What was led? Clubs? Are clubs trumps?
_Colonel G._ No; diamonds.
_Miss V._ Second hand low. I know that, at any rate, so there's a
two-spot.
_Mr. T._ Your mother has taken it with the seven.
_Miss V._ Oh, and I had the ace, king, and queen. Ought I to have played
one of those?
_Colonel G._ If you tell us your hand you must expect us to play to it.
_Miss V._ I didn't mean to tell.
_Mrs. V._ (_leading spades_). That was your suit, wasn't it?
_Mr. T._ But I hold the ace.
_Miss V._ It was your own lead, mamma. Any way, I'll trump it.
_Mr. T._ Why, you've trumped my ace.
_Miss V._ Oh, did I? I didn't mean to. Can't I take it back?
_Colonel G._ It is a little late, but still--
_Miss V._ Oh, well, never mind. Let it go. I have the king, any way
(_leading it_).
_Colonel G._ But you just trumped a spade.
_Mrs. V._ A revoke! That gives us three points.
_Miss V._ Oh, it doesn't either! I didn't see that king at all when I
trumped, and that was the only spade I had. I'll change it on the last
trick, and then it will be all right.
_Mrs. V._ You can't do that; can she, Colonel Graham?
_Colonel G._ It isn't customary.
_Mr. T._ Oh, who wants to play the stiff club rules? I don't; there
isn't any fun in whist if you are going to be so particular.
_Miss V._ Whose lead is it now?
_Colonel G._ If it isn't yours it must be Mr. Talbot's, as you decide
about that trick.
_Mr. T._ Then I'll lead a spade, and you can trump it.
_Miss V._ There, that's better than having that trump wasted on your
ace.
_Mrs. V._ Did you ever play Stop? We played it last summer at Bar
Harbor. It's a Western game, and you have chips, just like poker; and
then you stop it if you have the stop cards; and sometimes you'll have
the meanest little cards left in your hands, and if it is the ace of
diamonds you have to pay five chips for it, or the king, or the queen,
or the knave, or the ten; not so much, of course, but it all counts up
awfully fast.
_Mr. T._ Why, that is ever so much like Sixty-six. Do you remember the
time we tried to play Sixty-six on the Bar Harbor boat, Miss Vaughn?
_Miss V._ Oh, yes; and Ethel Mott _was_ such fun. She just would cheat,
and there was no stopping her.
_Colonel G._ It is your lead, Miss Vaughn.
_Mrs. V._ Oh, just wait a moment. I want to know if fourth best has
anything to do with playing fourth hand?
_Colonel G._ Nothing whatever.
_Mr. T._ Oh, fourth best is one of those things they've put in to make
whist scientific. For my part, I don't think there's any fun--
_Miss V._ That's just what I say. When I play whist I want to have a
good time, and not feel as if I were going through an examination at a
scientific school. Oh, did you know we are going to have a whist figure
at Janet Graham's german, Mr. Talbot? Won't that be fun?
_Mr. T._ I am sure then that you'll be trump.
_Miss V._ Thank you.
_Mrs. V._ How pretty!
_Colonel G._ It is your lead, Miss Vaughn.
_Miss V._ Why, did I take the last trick? What shall I--oh, I know,--the
ace of clubs.
_Mrs. V._ The two-spot of diamonds ought to be good for that.
_Miss V._ How horrid! Now the rest of my clubs aren't any good. Well,
any way, I can throw them away.
_Mrs. V._ Have hearts been led?
_Mr. T._ I'm sure I can't remember.
_Miss V._ (_examining tricks_). Yes, here's one heart trick.
_Mrs. V._ Well, I must lead it, and I'm sure I don't remember about it
at all. I'll lead a small one. Was that right, Colonel Graham?
_Colonel G._ You might have led your knave.
_Mrs. V._ Why, how did you know I had the knave. I declare, it's like
witchcraft, the way you keep run of the cards. I suppose you know where
every card is. Who took that?
_Colonel G._ I did.
_Mr. T._ I ought to have trumped that, but I do hate to trump second
hand.
_Colonel G._ But you played suit.
_Mr. T._ So I did. I forgot that.
_Colonel G._ (_showing hand_). The rest of the tricks are mine.
_Miss V._ Why, I have the king and queen of clubs, and you haven't a
club in your hand.
_Colonel G._ That is why the tricks are mine. I can keep the lead to the
end. I am very sorry, Mrs. Vaughn; but I am suddenly attacked with a
nervous headache, so that I cannot possibly go on playing. I shall have
to ask to be excused.
_Mrs. V._ Oh, don't break up the game when we are getting along so well.
_Colonel G._ I am very sorry; but I must go. I have enjoyed the game
extremely.
_Mr. T._ Are you out?
_Colonel G._ Yes.
_Mrs. V._ I'm sure it was all owing to you.
_Colonel G._ It was all owing to the fall of the cards. I haven't done
anything.
_Miss V._ I'm sure we didn't have anything on our side at all. I hate
whist anyway; you have to be so quiet, and study on it so.
_Mr. T._ Yes, I think it's awfully hard work.
_Colonel G._ Oh, you'll have better luck next time. Good-by; don't rise.
[_And the Colonel goes to the club to relieve his mind by a quantity of
vigorous expletives, and then to settle down to an evening of what he
calls real whist._]
Tale the Third.
SAUCY BETTY MORK.
SAUCY BETTY MORK.
I.
"But, Miss Bessie--"
"I have told you a dozen times, Mr. Granton, that my name is not Bessie.
I abhor that final _ie_; and more than that, I was christened
Betty,--plain Betty,--and Betty I will be."
"Miss Betty, then, if that suits you; though why you should be so
particular about that old-fashioned name, I'm sure I can't conceive."
"In the first place, it is my name," Betty replied, bending upon him
a glance at once bewitching and tantalizing; "that ought to count for
something; and in the second place, my family name isn't one that lends
itself to soft prefixes. Besides all which, there has been a Betty Mork
from time immemorial; and I shall never be one to spoil the line by
changing my name."
"What?" Mr. Granton demanded mischievously. "Never change it? Are you
vowed to eternal single blessedness, then, or shall you imitate the
women's-rights women, who--"
"It is really none of your affair what I intend to do," returned she,
bridling; "only, to go back to what we started on, I do intend to play
in the tournament with Frank Bradford. I am not in the habit of breaking
my promises."
The pair walked along the shady country road without speaking for a
moment or two, the young man inclined to be sulky, his companion saucy
and good-natured. The dropping sunshine, falling through the gently
waving elm-boughs, struck golden lights out of Miss Mork's abundant
chestnut hair,--her one beauty, it amused her to call it, although
the smile which brought out her dimples and the lustre of her eyes
contradicted the words even while they were being spoken. Young Granton
was fully alive to the attractiveness of the lithe figure beside him;
indeed, for his own peace of mind, far too keenly. He was aware, too,
of the difficulty of managing the wilful beauty, whose independence was
sufficiently understood by all the summer idlers at Maugus.
"But you certainly knew I expected you to play in the tournament with
me," he began again, returning to the attack.
"It isn't modest for a girl ever to know what a man expects of her
until she's told," Betty replied demurely, "even in tennis. And besides,
it was presumptuous for you to be so royally certain of my acquiescence
in whatever you deigned to plan."
"I'll serve a cut so that you'll never be able to return it," threatened
he.
"I can serve a cut myself," she retorted, with an accent which seemed to
indicate a double significance in the words.
"Confound it!" he said, incisively, with sudden and inconsistent change
of base, "it is perfect folly letting ladies into a tournament anyway.
Who wants them? They always make trouble."