Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860. No. XXXVI. - Various
John leaned toward her, saying, with a look that made his plain face
handsome,--
"Di, my father began the world as I begin it, and left it the richer
for the useful years he spent here,--as I hope I may leave it some
half-century hence. His memory makes that dingy shop a pleasant place
to me; for there he made an honest name, led an honest life, and
bequeathed to me his reverence for honest work. That is a sort of
hardware, Di, that no rust can corrupt, and which will always prove a
better fortune than any your knights can achieve with sword and
shield. I think I am not quite a clod, or quite without some
aspirations above money-getting; for I sincerely desire that courage
which makes daily life heroic by self-denial and cheerfulness of
heart; I am eager to conquer my own rebellious nature, and earn the
confidence of innocent and upright souls; I have a great ambition to
become as good a man and leave as green a memory behind me as old John
Lord."
Di winked violently, and seamed five times in perfect silence; but
quiet Nan had the gift of knowing when to speak, and by a timely word
saved her sister from a thunder-shower and her stocking from
destruction.
"John, have you seen Philip since you wrote about your last meeting
with him?"
The question was for John, but the soothing tone was for Di, who
gratefully accepted it, and perked up again--with speed.
"Yes; and I meant to have told you about it," answered John, plunging
into the subject at once. "I saw him a few days before I came home,
and found him more disconsolate than ever,--'just ready to go to the
Devil,' as he forcibly expressed himself. I consoled the poor lad as
well as I could, telling him his wisest plan was to defer his proposed
expedition, and go on as steadily as he had begun,--thereby proving
the injustice of your father's prediction concerning his want of
perseverance, and the sincerity of his affection. I told him the
change in Laura's health and spirits was silently working in his
favor, and that a few more months of persistent endeavor would conquer
your father's prejudice against him, and make him a stronger man for
the trial and the pain. I read him bits about Laura from your own and
Di's letters, and he went away at last as patient as Jacob, ready to
serve another 'seven years' for his beloved Rachel."
"God bless you for it, John!" cried a fervent voice; and, looking up,
they saw the cold, listless Laura transformed into a tender girl, all
aglow with love and longing, as she dropped her mask, and showed a
living countenance eloquent with the first passion and softened by the
first grief of her life.
John rose involuntarily in the presence of an innocent nature whose
sorrow needed no interpreter to him. The girl read sympathy in his
brotherly regard, and found comfort in the friendly voice that asked,
half playfully, half seriously,--
"Shall I tell him that he is not forgotten, even for an Apollo? that
Laura the artist has not conquered Laura the woman? and predict that
the good daughter will yet prove the happy wife?"
With a gesture full of energy, Laura tore her Minerva from top to
bottom, while two great tears rolled down the cheeks grown wan with
hope deferred.
"Tell him I believe all things, hope all things, and that I never can
forget."
Nan went to her and held her fast, leaving the prints of two loving,
but grimy hands upon her shoulders; Di looked on approvingly, for,
though rather stony-hearted regarding the cause, she fully appreciated
the effect; and John, turning to the window, received the
commendations of a robin swaying on an elm-bough with sunshine on its
ruddy breast.
The clock struck five, and John declared that he must go; for, being
an old-fashioned soul, he fancied that his mother had a better right
to his last hour than any younger woman in the land,--always
remembering that "she was a widow, and he her only son."
Nan ran away to wash her hands, and came back with the appearance of
one who had washed her face also: and so she had; but there was a
difference in the water.
"Play I'm your father, girls, and remember it will be six months
before 'that John' will trouble you again."
With which preface the young man kissed his former playfellows as
heartily as the boy had been wont to do, when stern parents banished
him to distant schools, and three little maids bemoaned his fate. But
times were changed now; for Di grew alarmingly rigid during the
ceremony; Laura received the salute like a grateful queen; and Nan
returned it with heart and eyes and tender lips, making such an
improvement on the childish fashion of the thing, that John was moved
to support his paternal character by softly echoing her father's
words,--"Take care of yourself, my little 'Martha.'"
Then they all streamed after him along the garden-path, with the
endless messages and warnings girls are so prone to give; and the
young man, with a great softness at his heart, went away, as many
another John has gone, feeling better for the companionship of
innocent maidenhood, and stronger to wrestle with temptation, to wait
and hope and work.
"Let's throw a shoe after him for luck, as dear old 'Mrs. Gummage' did
after 'David' and the 'willin' Barkis!' Quick, Nan! you always have
old shoes on; toss one, and shout, 'Good luck!'" cried Di, with one of
her eccentric inspirations.
Nan tore off her shoe, and threw it far along the dusty road, with a
sudden longing to become that auspicious article of apparel, that the
omen might not fail.
Looking backward from the hill-top, John answered the meek shout
cheerily, and took in the group with a lingering glance: Laura in the
shadow of the elms, Di perched on the fence, and Nan leaning far over
the gate with her hand above her eyes and the sunshine touching her
brown hair with gold. He waved his hat and turned away; but the music
seemed to die out of the blackbird's song, and in all the summer
landscape his eye saw nothing but the little figure at the gate.
"Bless and save us! here's a flock of people coming; my hair is in a
toss, and Nan's without her shoe; run! fly, girls! or the Philistines
will be upon us!" cried Di, tumbling off her perch in sudden alarm.
Three agitated young ladies, with flying draperies and countenances of
mingled mirth and dismay, might have been seen precipitating
themselves into a respectable mansion with unbecoming haste; but the
squirrels were the only witnesses of this "vision of sudden flight,"
and, being used to ground-and-lofty tumbling, didn't mind it.
When the pedestrians passed, the door was decorously closed, and no
one visible but a young man, who snatched something out of the road,
and marched away again, whistling with more vigor of tone than
accuracy of tune, "Only that, and nothing more."
* * * * *
HOW IT WAS FOUND.
Summer ripened into autumn, and something fairer than
"Sweet-peas and mignonette
In Annie's garden grew."
Her nature was the counterpart of the hill-side grove, where as a
child she had read her fairy tales, and now as a woman turned the
first pages of a more wondrous legend still. Lifted above the
many-gabled roof, yet not cut off from the echo of human speech, the
little grove seemed a green sanctuary, fringed about with violets, and
full of summer melody and bloom. Gentle creatures haunted it, and
there was none to make afraid; wood-pigeons cooed and crickets chirped
their shrill roundelays, anemones and lady-ferns looked up from the
moss that kissed the wanderer's feet. Warm airs were all afloat, full
of vernal odors for the grateful sense, silvery birches shimmered like
spirits of the wood, larches gave their green tassels to the wind, and
pines made airy music sweet and solemn, as they stood looking
heavenward through veils of summer sunshine or shrouds of wintry snow.
Nan never felt alone now in this charmed wood; for when she came into
its precincts, once so full of solitude, all things seemed to wear one
shape, familiar eyes looked at her from the violets in the grass,
familiar words sounded in the whisper of the leaves, and she grew
conscious that an unseen influence filled the air with new delights,
and touched earth and sky with a beauty never seen before. Slowly
these May-flowers budded in her maiden heart, rosily they bloomed, and
silently they waited till some lover of such lowly herbs should catch
their fresh aroma, should brush away the fallen leaves, and lift them
to the sun.
Though the eldest of the three, she had long been overtopped by the
more aspiring maids. But though she meekly yielded the reins of
government, whenever they chose to drive, they were soon restored to
her again; for Di fell into literature, and Laura into love. Thus
engrossed, these two forgot many duties which even blue-stockings and
_innamoratas_ are expected to perform, and slowly all the homely
humdrum cares that housewives know became Nan's daily life, and she
accepted it without a thought of discontent. Noiseless and cheerful as
the sunshine, she went to and fro, doing the tasks that mothers do,
but without a mother's sweet reward, holding fast the numberless
slight threads that bind a household tenderly together, and making
each day a beautiful success.
Di, being tired of running, riding, climbing, and boating, decided at
last to let her body rest and put her equally active mind through what
classical collegians term "a course of sprouts." Having undertaken to
read and know _everything_, she devoted herself to the task with great
energy, going from Sue to Swedenborg with perfect impartiality, and
having different authors as children have sundry distempers, being
fractious while they lasted, but all the better for them when once
over. Carlyle appeared like scarlet-fever, and raged violently for a
time; for, being anything but a "passive bucket," Di became prophetic
with Mahomet, belligerent with Cromwell, and made the French
Revolution a veritable Reign of Terror to her family. Goethe and
Schiller alternated like fever and ague; Mephistopheles became her
hero, Joan of Arc her model, and she turned her black eyes red over
Egmont and Wallenstein. A mild attack of Emerson followed, during
which she was lost in a fog, and her sisters rejoiced inwardly when
she emerged informing them that
"The Sphinx was drowsy,
Her wings were furled."
Poor Di was floundering slowly to her proper place; but she splashed
up a good deal of foam by getting out of her depth, and rather
exhausted herself by trying to drink the ocean dry.
Laura, after the "midsummer night's dream" that often comes to girls
of seventeen, woke up to find that youth and love were no match for
age and common sense. Philip had been flying about the world like a
thistle-down for five-and-twenty years, generous-hearted, frank, and
kind, but with never an idea of the serious side of life in his
handsome head. Great, therefore, were the wrath and dismay of the
enamored thistle-down, when the father of his love mildly objected to
seeing her begin the world in a balloon with a very tender but very
inexperienced aeronaut for a guide.
"Laura is too young to 'play house' yet, and you are too unstable to
assume the part of lord and master, Philip. Go and prove that you have
prudence, patience, energy, and enterprise, and I will give you my
girl,--but not before. I must seem cruel, that I may be truly kind;
believe this, and let a little pain lead you to great happiness, or
show you where you would have made a bitter blunder."
The lovers listened, owned the truth of the old man's words, bewailed
their fate, and--yielded,--Laura for love of her father, Philip for
love of her. He went away to build a firm foundation for his castle in
the air, and Laura retired into an invisible convent, where she cast
off the world, and regarded her sympathizing sisters through a grate
of superior knowledge and unsharable grief. Like a devout nun, she
worshipped "St. Philip," and firmly believed in his miraculous powers.
She fancied that her woes set her apart from common cares, and slowly
fell into a dreamy state, professing no interest in any mundane
matter, but the art that first attracted Philip. Crayons,
bread-crusts, and gray paper became glorified in Laura's eyes; and her
one pleasure was to sit pale and still before her easel, day after
day, filling her portfolios with the faces he had once admired. Her
sisters observed that every Bacchus, Piping Faun, or Dying Gladiator
bore some likeness to a comely countenance that heathen god or hero
never owned; and seeing this, they privately rejoiced that she had
found such solace for her grief.
Mrs. Lord's keen eye had read a certain newly written page in her
son's heart,--his first chapter of that romance, begun in Paradise,
whose interest never flags, whose beauty never fades, whose end can
never come till Love lies dead. With womanly skill she divined the
secret, with motherly discretion she counselled patience, and her son
accepted her advice, feeling, that, like many a healthful herb, its
worth lay in its bitterness.
"Love like a man, John, not like a boy, and learn to know yourself
before you take a woman's happiness into your keeping. You and Nan
have known each other all your lives; yet, till this last visit, you
never thought you loved her more than any other childish friend. It is
too soon to say the words so often spoken hastily,--so hard to be
recalled. Go back to your work, dear, for another year; think of Nan
in the light of this new hope; compare her with comelier, gayer girls;
and by absence prove the truth of your belief. Then, if distance only
makes her dearer, if time only strengthens your affection, and no
doubt of your own worthiness disturbs you, come back and offer her
what any woman should be glad to take,--my boy's true heart."
John smiled at the motherly pride of her words, but answered with a
wistful look.
"It seems very long to wait, mother. If I could just ask her for a
word of hope, I could be very patient then."
"Ah, my dear, better bear one year of impatience now than a lifetime
of regret hereafter. Nan is happy; why disturb her by a word which
will bring the tender cares and troubles that come soon enough to such
conscientious creatures as herself? If she loves you, time will prove
it; therefore let the new affection spring and ripen as your early
friendship has done, and it will be all the stronger for a summer's
growth. Philip was rash, and has to bear his trial now, and Laura
shares it with him. Be more generous, John; make _your_ trial, bear
_your_ doubts alone, and give Nan the happiness without the pain.
Promise me this, dear,--promise me to hope and wait."
The young man's eye kindled, and in his heart there rose a better
chivalry, a truer valor, than any Di's knights had ever known.
"I'll try, mother," was all he said; but she was satisfied, for John
seldom tried in vain.
"Oh, girls, how splendid you are! It does my heart good to see my
handsome sisters in their best array," cried Nan, one mild October
night, as she put the last touches to certain airy raiment fashioned
by her own skilful hands, and then fell back to survey the grand
effect.
Di and Laura were preparing to assist at an "event of the season," and
Nan, with her own locks fallen on her shoulders, for want of sundry
combs promoted to her sisters' heads, and her dress in unwonted
disorder, for lack of the many pins extracted in exciting crises of
the toilet, hovered like an affectionate bee about two very full-blown
flowers.
"Laura looks like a cool Undine, with the ivy-wreaths in her shining
hair; and Di has illuminated herself to such an extent with those
scarlet leaves, that I don't know what great creature she resembles
most," said Nan, beaming with sisterly admiration.
"Like Juno, Zenobia, and Cleopatra simmered into one, with a touch of
Xantippe by way of spice. But, to my eye, the finest woman of the
three is the dishevelled young person embracing the bed-post; for she
stays at home herself, and gives her time and taste to making homely
people fine,--which is a waste of good material, and an imposition on
the public."
As Di spoke, both the fashion-plates looked affectionately at the
gray-gowned figure; but, being works of art, they were obliged to nip
their feelings in the bud, and reserve their caresses till they
returned to common life.
"Put on your bonnet, and we'll leave you at Mrs. Lord's on our way. It
will do you good, Nan; and perhaps there may be news from John," added
Di, as she bore down upon the door like a man-of-war under full sail.
"Or from Philip," sighed Laura, with a wistful look.
Whereupon Nan persuaded herself that her strong inclination to sit
down was owing to want of exercise, and the heaviness of her eyelids a
freak of imagination; so, speedily smoothing her ruffled plumage, she
ran down to tell her father of the new arrangement.
"Go, my dear, by all means. I shall be writing; and you will be
lonely, if you stay. But I must see my girls; for I caught glimpses of
certain surprising phantoms flitting by the door."
Nan led the way, and the two pyramids revolved before him with the
rigidity of lay-figures, much to the good man's edification; for with
his fatherly pleasure there was mingled much mild wonderment at the
amplitude of array.
"Yes, I see my geese are really swans, though there is such a cloud
between us that I feel a long way off, and hardly know them. But this
little daughter is always available, always my 'cricket on the
hearth.'"
As he spoke, her father drew Nan closer, kissed her tranquil face, and
smiled content.
"Well, if ever I see picters, I see 'em now, and I declare to goodness
it's as interestin' as play-actin', every bit. Miss Di, with all them
boughs in her head, looks like the Queen of Sheby, when she went
a-visitin' What's-his-name; and if Miss Laura a'n't as sweet as a
lally-barster figger, I should like to know what is."
In her enthusiasm, Sally gambolled about the girls, flourishing her
milk-pan like a modern Miriam about to sound her timbrel for excess of
joy.
Laughing merrily, the two Mont Blancs bestowed themselves in the
family ark, Nan hopped up beside Patrick, and Solon, roused from his
lawful slumbers, morosely trundled them away. But, looking backward
with a last "Good night!" Nan saw her father still standing at the
door with smiling countenance, and the moonlight falling like a
benediction on his silver hair.
"Betsey shall go up the hill with you, my dear, and here's a basket of
eggs for your father. Give him my love, and be sure you let me know
the next time he is poorly," Mrs. Lord said, when her guest rose to
depart, after an hour of pleasant chat.
But Nan never got the gift; for, to her great dismay, her hostess
dropped the basket with a crash, and flew across the room to meet a
tall shape pausing in the shadow of the door. There was no need to ask
who the new-comer was; for, even in his mother's arms, John looked
over her shoulder with an eager nod to Nan, who stood among the ruins
with never a sign of weariness in her face, nor the memory of a care
at her heart,--for they all went out when John came in.
"Now tell us how and why and when you came. Take off your coat, my
dear! And here are the old slippers. Why didn't you let us know you
were coming so soon? How have you been? and what makes you so late
to-night? Betsey, you needn't put on your bonnet. And--oh, my dear
boy, _have_ you been to supper yet?"
Mrs. Lord was a quiet soul, and her flood of questions was purred
softly in her son's ear; for, being a woman, she _must_ talk, and,
being a mother, _must_ pet the one delight of her life, and make a
little festival when the lord of the manor came home. A whole drove of
fatted calves were metaphorically killed, and a banquet appeared with
speed.
John was not one of those romantic heroes who can go through three
volumes of hairbreadth escapes without the faintest hint of that
blessed institution, dinner; therefore, like "Lady Leatherbridge," he
"partook copiously of everything," while the two women beamed over
each mouthful with an interest that enhanced its flavor, and urged
upon him cold meat and cheese, pickles and pie, as if dyspepsia and
nightmare were among the lost arts.
Then he opened his budget of news and fed _them_.
"I was coming next month, according to custom; but Philip fell upon
and so tempted me, that I was driven to sacrifice myself to the cause
of friendship, and up we came to-night. He would not let me come here
till we had seen your father, Nan; for the poor lad was pining for
Laura, and hoped his good behavior for the past year would satisfy his
judge and secure his recall. We had a fine talk with your father; and,
upon my life, Phil seemed to have received the gift of tongues, for he
made a most eloquent plea, which I've stored away for future use, I
assure you. The dear old gentleman was very kind, told Phil he was
satisfied with the success of his probation, that he should see Laura
when he liked, and, if all went well, should receive his reward in the
spring. It must be a delightful sensation to know you have made a
fellow-creature as happy as those words made Phil to-night."
John paused, and looked musingly at the matronly tea-pot, as if he saw
a wondrous future in its shine.
Nan twinkled off the drops that rose at the thought of Laura's joy,
and said, with grateful warmth,--
"You say nothing of your own share in the making of that happiness,
John; but we know it, for Philip has told Laura in his letters all
that you have been to him, and I am sure there was other eloquence
beside his own before father granted all you say he has. Oh, John, I
thank you very much for this!"
Mrs. Lord beamed a whole midsummer of delight upon her son, as she saw
the pleasure these words gave him, though he answered simply,--
"I only tried to be a brother to him, Nan; for he has been most kind
to me. Yes, I said my little say to-night, and gave my testimony in
behalf of the prisoner at the bar, a most merciful judge pronounced
his sentence, and he rushed straight to Mrs. Leigh's to tell Laura the
blissful news. Just imagine the scene when he appears, and how Di will
open her wicked eyes and enjoy the spectacle of the dishevelled lover,
the bride-elect's tears, the stir, and the romance of the thing.
She'll cry over it to-night, and caricature it to-morrow."
And John led the laugh at the picture he had conjured up, to turn the
thoughts of Di's dangerous sister from himself.
At ten Nan retired into the depths of her old bonnet with a far
different face from the one she brought out of it, and John, resuming
his hat, mounted guard.
"Don't stay late, remember, John!" And in Mrs. Lord's voice there was
a warning tone that her son interpreted aright.
"I'll not forget, mother."
And he kept his word; for though Philip's happiness floated temptingly
before him, and the little figure at his side had never seemed so
dear, he ignored the bland winds, the tender night, and set a seal
upon his lips, thinking manfully within himself, "I see many signs of
promise in her happy face; but I will wait and hope a little longer
for her sake."
"Where is father, Sally?" asked Nan, as that functionary appeared,
blinking owlishly, but utterly repudiating the idea of sleep.
"He went down the garding, miss, when the gentlemen cleared, bein' a
little flustered by the goin's on. Shall I fetch him in?" asked Sally,
as irreverently as if her master were a bag of meal.
"No, we will go ourselves." And slowly the two paced down the
leaf-strewn walk.
Fields of yellow grain were waving on the hill-side, and sere
corn-blades rustled in the wind, from the orchard came the scent of
ripening fruit, and all the garden-plots lay ready to yield up their
humble offerings to their master's hand. But in the silence of the
night a greater Reaper had passed by, gathering in the harvest of a
righteous life, and leaving only tender memories for the gleaners who
had come so late.
The old man sat in the shadow of the tree his own hands planted; its
fruitful boughs shone ruddily, and its leaves still whispered the low
lullaby that hushed him to his rest.
"How fast he sleeps! Poor father! I should have come before and made
it pleasant for him."
As she spoke, Nan lifted up the head bent down upon his breast, and
kissed his pallid cheek.
"Oh, John, this is not sleep!"
"Yes, dear, the happiest he will ever know."
For a moment the shadows flickered over three white faces and the
silence deepened solemnly. Then John reverently bore the pale shape
in, and Nan dropped down beside it, saying, with a rain of grateful
tears,--
"He kissed me when I went, and said a last 'good night!'"
For an hour steps went to and fro about her, many voices whispered
near her, and skilful hands touched the beloved clay she held so fast;
but one by one the busy feet passed out, one by one the voices died
away, and human skill proved vain. Then Mrs. Lord drew the orphan to
the shelter of her arms, soothing her with the mute solace of that
motherly embrace.