LESSONS.
Arthur St. Claire had returned from Worcester, but it was several
days ere he presented himself at Collingwood; and Edith was
beginning to think he had forgotten her and the promised drawing
lessons, when he one evening was ushered by Victor into the
parlor, where she was singing to Richard his favorite songs. He
was paler than when she saw him before, and she fancied that he
seemed weary and worn, as if sleep and himself had been for a long
time strangers.
"Did you leave your friend better?" she asked.
"Yes, better," he answered hurriedly, changing the conversation to
topics evidently more agreeable.
One could not be very unhappy in Edith's presence. She possessed
so much life, vivacity and vigor, that her companions were sure to
become more or less imbued with her cheerful spirit; and as the
evening advanced, Arthur became much like the Arthur of Brier Hill
memory, and even laughed aloud on several occasions.
"I wish I was sure of finding at Grassy Spring somebody just like
you," he said to Edith when at last he arose to go. "Yon have
driven away a whole army of blues. I almost believe I'd be willing
to be blind, if, by that means, I could be cared for as Mr.
Harrington is."
"And crazy, too?" slily interrupted Edith, who was standing near
him as he leaned against the marble mantel.
"No, no--oh, heavens, no! anything but that," and the hand he
placed in Edith's shook nervously, but soon grew still between her
soft, warm palms.
There was something life-giving in Edith's touch, as well as soul-
giving in her presence, and standing there with his cold, nervous
hand in hers, the young man felt himself grow strong again, and
full of courage to hope for a happier future than the past had
been. He knew SHE could not share the future with him--but he
would have as much of her as possible, and just as she was
wondering if he would remember the lessons, he spoke of them and
asked when she could come.
"Just when Mr. Harrington thinks best," she replied, and thus
appealed to, Richard, guided by Edith's voice, came forward and
joined them.
"Any time," he said. "To-morrow, if you like," adding that he
believed he, too, was to be always present.
Edith's eyes sought those of Arthur, reading there a reflection of
her own secret thoughts, to wit, that THREE would he one too many,
but they could not tell him so and Arthur responded at once,
"Certainly, I shall expect you both, say to-morrow at ten o'clock;
I am most at leisure then."
The next morning, at the appointed time, Richard and Edith
appeared at Grassy Spring, where they found Arthur waiting for
them, his portfolio upon the table, and his pencils lying near,
ready to be used.
"I am afraid you'll find it tiresome, Mr. Harrington," he said, as
he assigned his visitor a chair, and then went back to Edith.
"I shall do very well," answered Richard, and so he did for that
lesson, and the next, and the next, but at last, in spite of his
assertion to the contrary, he found it dull business going to
Grassy Spring twice each week, and sitting alone with nothing to
occupy his mind, except, indeed, to wonder how NEAR Arthur was to
Edith, and if he bent over her as he remembered seeing drawing
teachers do at school.
Richard was getting very tired of it--very weary of listening to
Arthur's directions, and to Edith's merry laughs at her awkward
blunders, and he was not sorry when one lesson-day, the fifth
since they began, Grace Atherton's voice was heard in the hall
without asking for admission. He had long since forgiven Grace for
jilting him, and they were the best of friends; so when she
suggested their going into the adjoining room, where it was
pleasanter and she could play to him if he liked, he readily
assented, and while listening to her lively conversation and fine
playing, he forgot the lapse of time, and was surprised when Edith
came to him with the news that it was 12 o'clock.
"Pray, don't go yet," said Arthur, who was loth to part with his
pupil. "You surely do not dine till three, and I have already
ordered lunch. Here it comes," and he pointed to the door where
Phillis stood, bearing a huge silver salver, on which were wine
and cake and fruit of various kinds.
"Grapes," screamed Edith, as she saw the rich purple clusters,
which had been put up for winter use by poor, discarded Mrs.
Johnson. "I really cannot go till I have some of them," and as
there was no alternative Richard sat down to wait the little
lady's pleasure.
He did not care for lunch, but joined in the conversation, which
turned upon matrimony.
"It must be a very delightful state," said Edith, "provided one
were well matched and loved her husband, as I am sure I should
do."
"Supposing you didn't love him," asked Grace, "but had married him
from force of circumstances, what then?"
"I'd kill him and the circumstances too," answered Edith.
"Wouldn't you, Mr. St. Claire?"
"I can hardly tell," he replied, "not having matrimony in my mind.
_I_ shall never marry."
"Never marry!" and the pang at Edith's heart was discernible in
her soft, black eyes, turned so quickly toward this candidate for
celibacy.
"How long since you came to that decision?" asked Grace; and in
tones which indicated truth, Arthur replied,
"Several years at least, and I have never for a moment changed my
mind."
"Because the right one has not come, perhaps," put in Richard,
growing very much interested in the conversation.
"The right one will never come," and Arthur spoke earnestly. "The
girl does not live, who can ever be to me a wife, were she
graceful as a fawn and beautiful as---" he glanced at Edith as if
he would call her name, but added instead--"as a Hebe, it could
make no difference. That matter is fixed, and is as changeless as
the laws of the Medes and Persians."
"I am sorry for you, young man," said Richard, whose face,
notwithstanding this assertion, indicated anything but sorrow.
He could now trust Edith alone at Grassy Spring--he need not
always be bored with coming there, and he was glad Arthur had so
freely expressed his sentiments, as it relieved him of a great
burden; so, at parting, when Arthur said to him us usual, "I'll
see you again on Friday," he replied,
"I don't know, I'm getting so worried with these abominably
tedious lessons, that for once I'll let her come alone."
Alas, poor, deluded Richard! He did not know that to attain this
very object, Arthur had said what he did. It is true, he meant
every word he uttered. Matrimony and Edith Hastings must not be
thought of together. That were worse than madness, and his better
judgment warned him not to see too much of her--told him it was
better far to have that sightless man beside them when they met
together in a relation so intimate as the teacher bears to his
pupil. But Arthur would not listen; Edith was the first who for
years had really touched a human chord in his palsied heart, and
the vibration would not cease without a fiercer struggle than he
cared to make. It could do no harm, he said. He had been so
unhappy--was so unhappy now. Edith would, of course, be Richard's
wife; he had foreseen that from the very first--had predicted it
long ago, but ere the sacrifice was made, he was surely pardonable
if, for a little while, he gave himself to the bewildering
intoxication of basking in the sunshine of her eyes, of bending so
near to her that he could feel her fragrant breath, feel the warm
glow of her cheek, of holding those little hands a moment in his
own after he had ceased to teach her fingers how to guide the
pencil.
All this passed in rapid review before his mind while his lips
uttered the words which had so delighted Richard, and when he saw
the shadow on Edith's face, his poor, aching heart throbbed with a
joy as wild and intense as it was hopeless and insane. This was
Arthur St. Claire with Edith present, but with Edith gone, he was
quite another man. Eagerly he watched her till she disappeared
from view, then returning to the library he sat down where she had
sat--laid his head upon the table where her hands had lain, and
cursed himself for daring to dream of love in connection with
Edith Hastings. It would be happiness for a time, he knew, to hang
upon her smile, to watch the lights and shadows of her speaking
face, to look into her eyes--those clear, truthful eyes which had
in them no guile. All this would be perfect bliss, were it not
that the end must come at last--the terrible end--remorse bitterer
than death for him, and for her--the pure, unsullied, trusting
Edith--ruin, desolation, and madness, it might be.
"Yes, MADNESS!" he exclaimed aloud, "hateful as the word may
sound." And he gnashed his teeth as it dropped from between them.
"No, Edith, no. Heaven helping me, I will not subject you to this
temptation. I will not drag you down with me, and yet, save
Griswold, there lives not the person who knows my secret. May be
he could be bought. Oh, the maddening thought. Am I a demon or a
brute?" And he leaped from his chair, cursing himself again and
again for having fallen so low as to dream of an act fraught with
so much wrong to Edith, and so much treachery to one as fair, as
beautiful as she, and far, far more to be pitied.
Arthur St. Claire was, at heart, a noble, upright, honorable man,
and sure, at last, to choose the right, however rugged were the
road. For years he had groped in a darkness deeper, more hopeless
than that which enshrouded the blind man, and in all that time
there had shone upon his pathway not a single ray of daylight. The
past, at which he dared not look, lay behind him a dreary waste,
and the black future stretched out before him, years on years it
might be, in which there would be always the same old cankering
wound festering in his soul. He could NOT forget this plague spot.
He never had forgotten it for a single moment until he met with
Edith Hatings, who possessed for him a powerful mesmeric charm,
causing him in her presence to forget everything but her. This
fascination was sudden but not less powerful for that. Arthur's
was an impulsive nature, and it seemed to him that he had known
Edith all his life, that she was a part of his very being. But he
must forget her now, she must not come there any more, he could
not resist her if she did; and seizing his pen he dashed off a few
lines to the effect that, for certain reasons, the drawing lessons
must henceforth be discontinued.
Arthur though himself very strong to do so much, but when he arose
to ring for the servant who was to take this note to Collingwood,
his courage all forsook him. Why need he cast her off entirely?
Why throw away the only chance for happiness there was left for
him? 'Twas Arthur's weaker manhood which spoke, and he listened,
for Edith Hastings was in the scale, a mighty, overwhelming
weight. She might come just once more, he said, and his heart
swelled within his throat as he thought of being alone with her,
no jealous Richard hovering near, like a dark, brooding cloud, his
blind eyes shielding her from harm even more than they could have
done had they been imbued with sight. The next time she came, the
restraint would be removed. She would be alone, and the hot blood
poured swiftly through his veins as he thought how for one brief
moment he would be happy. He WOULD wind his arm around that
girlish waist, where no other manly arm save that of Richard had
ever been; he WOULD hug her to his bosom, where no other head than
hers could ever lie; he would imprint one burning kiss upon her
lips; would tell her how dear she was to him; and then--his brain
reeled and grew dizzy as he thought that THEN he must bid her
leave him forever, for an interview like that must not he
repeated. But for once, just once, he would taste of the forbidden
fruit, and so the good angel Arthur St. Claire wept over the
wayward man and then flew sadly away, leaving him to revel in
anticipations of what the next Friday would bring him.