The Unknown Nymph
One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a
cat has only nine lives.--Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar.
The company broke up reluctantly, and drifted toward their several
homes, chatting with vivacity, and all agreeing that it would be many a
long day before Dawson's Landing would see the equal of this one again.
The twins had accepted several invitations while the reception was in
progress, and had also volunteered to play some duets at an amateur
entertainment for the benefit of a local charity. Society was eager to
receive them to its bosom. Judge Driscoll had the good fortune to secure
them for an immediate drive, and to be the first to display them in
public. They entered his buggy with him, and were paraded down the main
street, everybody flocking to the windows and sidewalks to see.
The Judge showed the strangers the new graveyard, and the jail, and
where the richest man lived, and the Freemasons' hall, and the Methodist
church, and the Presbyterian church, and where the Baptist church was
going to be when they got some money to build it with, and showed them
the town hall and the slaughter-house, and got out the independent fire
company in uniform and had them put out an imaginary fire; then he let
them inspect the muskets of the militia company, and poured out an
exhaustless stream of enthusiasm over all these splendors, and seemed
very well satisfied with the responses he got, for the twins admired his
admiration, and paid him back the best they could, though they could
have done better if some fifteen or sixteen hundred thousand previous
experiences of this sort in various countries had not already rubbed off
a considerable part of the novelty of it.
The Judge laid himself out hospitably to make them have a good time, and
if there was a defect anywhere it was not his fault. He told them a good
many humorous anecdotes, and always forgot the nub, but they were always
able to furnish it, for these yarns were of a pretty early vintage, and
they had had many a rejuvenating pull at them before. And he told them
all about his several dignities, and how he had held this and that and
the other place of honor or profit, and had once been to the
legislature, and was now president of the Society of Free-thinkers. He
said the society had been in existence four years, and already had two
members, and was firmly established. He would call for the brothers in
the evening if they would like to attend a meeting of it.
Accordingly he called for them, and on the way he told them all about
Pudd'nhead Wilson, in order that they might get a favorable impression
of him in advance and be prepared to like him. This scheme
succeeded--the favorable impression was achieved. Later it was confirmed
and solidified when Wilson proposed that out of courtesy to the
strangers the usual topics be put aside and the hour be devoted to
conversation upon ordinary subjects and the cultivation of friendly
relations and good-fellowship,--a proposition which was put to vote and
carried.
The hour passed quickly away in lively talk, and when it was ended the
lonesome and neglected Wilson was richer by two friends than he had been
when it began. He invited the twins to look in at his lodgings,
presently, after disposing of an intervening engagement, and they
accepted with pleasure.
Toward the middle of the evening they found themselves on the road to
his house. Pudd'nhead was at home waiting for them and putting in his
time puzzling over a thing which had come under his notice that morning.
The matter was this: He happened to be up very early--at dawn, in fact;
and he crossed the hall which divided his cottage through the center,
and entered a room to get something there. The window of the room had no
curtains, for that side of the house had long been unoccupied, and
through this window he caught sight of something which surprised and
interested him. It was a young woman--a young woman where properly no
young woman belonged; for she was in Judge Driscoll's house, and in the
bedroom over the Judge's private study or sitting-room. This was young
Tom Driscoll's bedroom. He and the Judge, the Judge's widowed sister
Mrs. Pratt and three negro servants were the only people who belonged in
the house. Who, then, might this young lady be? The two houses were
separated by an ordinary yard, with a low fence running back through its
middle from the street in front to the lane in the rear. The distance
was not great, and Wilson was able to see the girl very well, the
window-shades of the room she was in being up, and the window also. The
girl had on a neat and trim summer dress, patterned in broad stripes of
pink and white, and her bonnet was equipped with a pink veil. She was
practising steps, gaits and attitudes, apparently; she was doing the
thing gracefully, and was very much absorbed in her work. Who could she
be, and how came she to be in young Tom Driscoll's room?
Wilson had quickly chosen a position from which he could watch the girl
without running much risk of being seen by her, and he remained there
hoping she would raise her veil and betray her face. But she
disappointed him. After a matter of twenty minutes she disappeared, and
although he stayed at his post half an hour longer, she came no more.
Toward noon he dropped in at the Judge's and talked with Mrs. Pratt
about the great event of the day, the levee of the distinguished
foreigners at Aunt Patsy Cooper's. He asked after her nephew Tom, and
she said he was on his way home, and that she was expecting him to
arrive a little before night; and added that she and the Judge were
gratified to gather from his letters that he was conducting himself very
nicely and creditably--at which Wilson winked to himself privately.
Wilson did not ask if there was a newcomer in the house, but he asked
questions that would have brought light-throwing answers as to that
matter if Mrs. Pratt had had any light to throw; so he went away
satisfied that he knew of things that were going on in her house of
which she herself was not aware.
He was now waiting for the twins, and still puzzling over the problem of
who that girl might be, and how she happened to be in that young
fellow's room at daybreak in the morning.