OLD FRIENDS AND NEW.
Lawrence Newt had called at Bunker's, and found Mrs. Dinks and Miss
Hope Wayne. They were sitting at the window upon Broadway watching the
promenaders along that famous thoroughfare; for thirty years ago the
fashionable walk was between the Park and the Battery, and Bunker's was
close to Morris Street, a little above the Bowling Green.
When Mr. Newt was announced Hope Wayne felt as if she were suffocating.
She knew but one person of that name. Her aunt supposed it to be the
husband of her friend, Mrs. Nancy Newt, whom she had seen upon a previous
visit to New York this same summer. They both looked up and saw a
gentleman they had never seen before. He bowed pleasantly, and said,
"Ladies, my name is Lawrence Newt."
There was a touch of quaintness in his manner, as in his dress.
"You will find the city quite deserted," said he. "But I have called with
an invitation from my sister, Mrs. Boniface Newt, for this evening to a
small party. She incloses her card, and begs you to waive the formality
of a call."
That was the way that Lawrence Newt and Hope Wayne came to be sitting
on the cane sofa under the great orange-tree in Boniface Newt's
conservatory.
They had entered the room and made their bows to Mrs. Nancy; and Mr.
Lawrence, wishing to talk to Miss Hope, had led her by another way to
the conservatory, and so Mr. Abel had failed to see them.
As they sat under the tree Lawrence Newt conversed with Hope in a tone of
earnest and respectful tenderness that touched her heart. She could not
understand the winning kindliness of his manner, nor could she resist it.
He spoke of her home with an accuracy of detail that surprised her.
"It was not the same house in my day, and you, perhaps, hardly remember
much of the old one. The house is changed, but nothing else; no, nothing
else," he added, musingly, and with the same dreamy expression in his
eyes that was in them when he leaned against his office window and
watched the ships--while his mind sailed swifter and farther than they.
"They can not touch the waving outline of the hills that you see from the
lawn, nor the pine-trees that shade the windows. Does the little brook
still flow in the meadow below? And do you understand the pine-trees? Do
they tell any tales?"
He asked it with a half-mournful gayety. He asked as if he both longed
and feared that she should say, "Yes, they have told me: I know all."
The murmurs of the singing came floating out to them as they sat. Hope
was happy and trustful. She was in the house of Abel--she should see
him--she should hear him! And this dear gentleman--not exactly like a
father nor an uncle--well, yes, perhaps a young uncle--he is brother of
Abel's mother, and he mysteriously knows so much about Pinewood, and his
smiling voice has a tear in it as he speaks of old days. I love him
already--I trust him entirely--I have found a friend.
"Shall we go in again?" said Lawrence Newt. But they saw some one
approaching, and before they arose, while they were still silent, and
Hope's heart was like the dawning summer heaven, she suddenly heard Abel
Newt's words, and watched him, speechlessly, as he and his companion
glided by her into the darkness. It was the vision of a moment; but in
the attitude, the tone, the whole impression, Hope Wayne instinctively
felt treachery.
"Yes, let us go in!" she said to Lawrence Newt, as she rose calmly.
Abel had passed. He could no more have stopped and shaken hands with Hope
Wayne than he could have sung like a nightingale. He could not even raise
his head erect as he went by--something very stern and very strong seemed
to hold it down.
Miss Plumer's head was also bent; she was waiting to hear the end of that
sentence. She thought society opened beautifully. Such a handsome fellow
in such a romantic spot, beginning his compliments in such a low, rich
voice, with his hair almost brushing hers. But he did not finish. Abel
Newt was perfectly silent. He glided away with Grace Plumer into grateful
gloom, and her ears, exquisitely apprehensive, caught from his lips not a
word further.
Lawrence Newt rose as Hope requested, and they moved away. She found her
aunt, and stood by her side. The young men were brought up and presented,
and submitted their observations upon the weather, asked her how she
liked New York--were delighted to hear that she would pass the next
winter in the city--would show her then that New York had some claim to
attention even from a Bostonian--were charmed, really, with Mr. Bowdoin
Beacon and--and--Mr. Alfred Dinks; at mention of which name they looked
in her face in the most gentlemanly manner to see the red result, as
if the remark had been a blister, but they saw only an unconscious
abstraction in her own thoughts, mingled with an air of attention to
what they were saying.
"Miss Hope," said Lawrence Newt, who approached her with a young woman by
his side, "I want you to know my friend Amy Waring."
The two girls looked at each other and bowed. Then they shook hands with
a curious cordiality.
Amy Waring had dark eyes--not round and hard and black--not ebony eyes,
but soft, sympathetic eyes, in which you expect to see images as lovely
as the Eastern traveler sees when he remembers home and looks in the drop
held in the palm of the hand of the magician's boy. They had the fresh,
unworn, moist light of flowers early in June mornings, when they are
full of sun and dew. And there was the same transparent, rich, pure
darkness in her complexion. It was not swarthy, nor black, nor gloomy.
It did not look half Indian, nor even olive. It was an illuminated
shadow.
The two girls--they were women, rather--went together to a sofa and sat
down. Hope Wayne's impulse was to lay her head upon her new friend's
shoulder and cry; for Hope was prostrated by the unexpected vision of
Abel, as a strong man is unnerved by sudden physical pain. She felt the
overwhelming grief of a child, and longed to give way to it utterly.
"I am glad to know you, Miss Wayne!" said Amy Waring, in a cordial,
cheerful voice, with a pleasant smile.
Hope bowed, and thanked her.
"I find that Mr. Newt's friends always prove to be mine," continued Amy.
"I am glad of it; but I don't know why I am his friend," said Hope. "I
never saw him until to-day. He must have lived in Delafield. Do you know
how that is?"
She found conversation a great relief, and longed to give way to a kind
of proud, indignant volubility.
"No; but he seems to have lived every where, to have seen every thing,
and to have known every body. A very useful acquaintance, I assure you!"
said Amy, smiling.
"Is he married?" asked Hope.
There was the least little blush upon Amy's cheek as she heard this
question; but so slight, that if any body had thought he observed it, he
would have looked again and said, "No, I was mistaken," Perhaps, too,
there was the least little fluttering of a heart otherwise unconscious.
But words are like breezes that blow hither and thither, and the leaves
upon the most secluded trees in the very inmost covert of the wood may
sometimes feel a breath, and stir with responsive music before they
are aware.
Amy Waring replied, pleasantly, that he was not married. Hope Wayne said,
"What a pity!" Amy smiled, and asked,
"Why a pity?"
"Because such a man would be so happy if he were married, and would make
others so happy! He has been in love, you may be sure."
"Yes," replied Amy; "I have no doubt of that. We don't see men of forty,
or so, who have not been touched--"
"By what?" asked Lawrence Newt, who had come up silently, and now stood
beside her.
"Yes, by what?" interposed Miss Fanny, who had been very busy during the
whole evening, trying to get into her hands the threads of the various
interests that she saw flying and streaming all around her. She had seen
Mr. Alfred Dinks devoted to Miss Wayne, and was therefore confirmed in
her belief that they were engaged. She had seen Abel flirting with Grace,
and was therefore satisfied that he cared nothing about her. She had done
the best she could with Alfred Dinks, but was extremely dissatisfied with
her best; and, seeing Hope and Amy together, she had been hovering about
them for a long time, anxious to overhear or to join in.
"Really," said Amy, looking up with a smile, "I was making a very
innocent remark."
"Perfectly innocent, I'm sure!" replied Fanny, in her sweetest manner.
It was such a different sweetness from Amy Waring's, that Hope turned
and looked very curiously at Miss Fanny.
"There are few men of forty who have not been in love," said Amy, calmly.
"That is what I was saying."
As there was only one man of forty, or near that age, in the little
group, the appeal was evidently to him. Lawrence Newt looked at the
three girls, with the swimming light in his eyes, half crushing them and
smiling, so that every one of them felt, each in her own way, that they
were as completely blinded by that smile as by a glare of sunlight--which
also, like that smile, is warm, and not treacherous.
They could not see beyond the words, nor hope to.
"Miss Amy is right, as usual," said he.
"Why, Uncle Lawrence, tell us all about it!" said Fanny, with a hard,
black smile in her eyes.
Uncle Lawrence was not in the slightest degree abashed.
"Fanny," said he, "I will speak to you in a parable. Remember, to _you_.
There was a farmer whose neighbor built a curious tower upon his land.
It was upon a hill, in a grove. The structure rose slowly, but public
curiosity rose with fearful rapidity. The gossips gossiped about it in
the public houses. Rumors of it stole up to the city, and down came
reporters and special correspondents to describe it with an unctuous
eloquence and picturesque splendor of style known only to them. The
builder held his tongue, dear Fanny. The workmen speculated upon the
subject, but their speculations were no more valuable than those of
other people. They received private bribes to tell; and all the great
newspapers announced that, at an enormous expense, they had secured the
exclusive intelligence, and the exclusive intelligence was always wrong.
The country was in commotion, dear Fanny, about a simple tower that
a man was building upon his land. But the wonder of wonders, and the
exasperation of exasperations, was, that the farmer whose estate adjoined
never so much as spoke of the tower--was never known to have asked about
it--and, indeed, it was not clear that he knew of the building of any
tower within a hundred miles of him. Of course, my dearest Fanny, a
self-respecting Public Sentiment could not stand that. It was insulting
to the public, which manifested so profound an interest in the tower,
that the immediate neighbor should preserve so strict a silence, and such
a perfectly tranquil mind. There are but two theories possible in regard
to that man, said the self-respecting Public Sentiment: he is either a
fool or a knave--probably a little of each. In any case he must be dealt
with. So Public Sentiment accosted the farmer, and asked him if he were
not aware that a mysterious tower was going up close to him, and that
the public curiosity was sadly exercised about it? He replied that he
was blessed with tolerable eyesight, and had seen the tower from the
very first stone upward. Tell us, then, all about it! shrieked Public
Sentiment. Ask the builder, if you want to know, said the farmer. But he
won't tell us, and we want you to tell us, because we know that you must
have asked him. Now what, in the name of pity!--what is that tower for?
I have never asked, replies the farmer. Never asked? shrieked Public
Sentiment. Never, retorted Rusticus. And why, in the name of Heaven, have
you never asked? cried the crowd. Because, said the farmer--"
Lawrence Newt looked at his auditors. "Are you listening, dear Fanny?"
"Yes, Uncle Lawrence."
"--because it's none of my business."
Lawrence Newt smiled; so did all the rest, including Fanny, who remarked
that he might have told her in fewer words that she was impertinent.
"Yes, Fanny; but sometimes words help us to remember things. It is a
great point gained when we have learned to hoe the potatoes in our own
fields, and not vex our souls about our neighbor's towers."
Hope Wayne was not in the least abstracted. She was nervously alive to
every thing that was said and done; and listened with a smile to Lawrence
Newt's parable, liking him more and more.
The general restless distraction that precedes the breaking up of a party
had now set in. People were moving, and rustling, and breaking off the
ends of conversation. They began to go. A few said good-evening, and had
had such a charming time! The rest gradually followed, until there was a
universal departure. Grace Plumer was leaning upon Sligo Moultrie's
arm. But where was Abel?
Hope Wayne's eyes looked every where. But her only glimpse of him
during the evening had been that glimmering, dreadful moment in the
conservatory. There he had remained ever since. There he still stood
gazing through the door into the drawing-room, seeing but not seen--his
mind a wild whirl of thoughts.
"What a fool I am!" thought Abel, bitterly. He was steadily asking
himself, "Have--I--lost--Hope Wayne--before--I--had--won--her?"