Читать книгу Wives and Widows; or, The Broken Life - Ann S. Stephens - Страница 5

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Mr. Olmsly was a very wealthy man. His property stretched far into an iron and coal district of Pennsylvania, and every day increased its value. It lay in and around a fine inland town, situated among some of the most picturesque scenery to be found in the State. His residence was about five miles from this town, and a most beautiful spot it was. The house was built on the last spur of a range of hills, which ran for some distance down the valley of the Delaware. Around this tall ridge the noble river made a bold sweep, turned an old stone mill on its outer curve, and went careering down one of the richest and most beautiful valleys that the eye ever dwelt upon. The whole of this mountain spur, the mill and the land down to the river, which swept around it like an ox-bow, was the property of Mr. Olmsly. His house of heavy stone was built half-way up the side of the ridge, in the form of the letter T, which ran lengthwise along the face of the hill, presenting a pointed roof, and one sharp gable in the front view. The walls were stuccoed like many houses to be found in European countries, and were settled back on the hill by three curving terraces, two of them blooming with rare flowers. These terraces cut the hill as with a girdle of blossoms about half-way up from its base. The first was a carriage-road, which was connected with the house by a long flight of steps leading across the first flower-terrace to the front door.

In front, the house was three stories high. The basement story opened on the first broad terrace, with its wreathing vines, and glowing blossoms. An oriel window curved out from the gable, and a square balcony surrounded by an arabesque railing, formed a pleasant lounging-place over the front entrance. At the back of the house the entrance was from the third terrace, directly to the second story, which was half occupied by a broad hall, ending in the square balcony; a noble drawing-room, whose latticed windows opened on every side save the front, from which the oriel jutted, opened upon a platform some ten feet wide, which formed a promenade around one end of the second story, and along the back of the building, surrounded by a low balustrade, to which a hundred rare plants and vines were clinging; beyond this was a labyrinth of flower-beds, through which a broad gravel-path wound gracefully, separating the green turf of the hill-side from the third and last terrace, which was most beautiful of all.

These terraces threw broad belts of flowers half across the face of the hill, and ended in pleasant footpaths which led through the turf and under some sheltering trees to the top of the ridge. There everything was wild as nature left to herself can be. At noonday the sunshine was darkened by the woven branches of pines, hemlocks, beech, and oak trees, with a tangle of blossoming laurel among the dusky undergrowth. From this eminence, you commanded a glorious sight of two magnificent valleys—one stretching off toward the Blue Ridge and overlooking the town, the other opening in rich luxuriance down the banks of the Delaware, mile after mile, league after league, till villages in the distance seemed scarcely more than a handful of snow-flakes.

Half-way down you saw the house I have been describing, the carriage-road that wound beneath it, and below that, the hill sloping downward in a broad, rolling lawn, which lost itself with gentle undulations in the green bosom of the valley.

This was the home to which I was brought, and this beautiful view lay before me as I stood upon the terrace-steps, wondering that the earth could be so lovely. Miss Olmsly paused by my side, enjoying my surprise.

"You like it," she said; "we shall be very happy here, for I know how it will be with my father when he sees your demure little face."

"Happy," I said, looking at the flowers which bloomed around me everywhere. "I did not know that there was any place in the world so lovely as this."

"I am glad you are pleased, young lady."

I started, turned toward the speaker, and saw a fine old gentleman, with soft brown eyes, and hair as white as snow, standing on the step above me.

"It is my father, dear," said Miss Olmsly, mounting a step higher and offering the old man a kiss; "she is a dear, good child, papa, and we love her already."

"I am glad of that," he said, stooping down and kissing me on the forehead. "Your father was my friend, child, and I will be yours. Come into the house; you must be tired and hungry."

We entered the house which was henceforth to be my home. Miss Olmsly took me directly to a pretty chamber, that had been evidently prepared for my coming. Everything was simple, neat, and pure as snow. As if they had known how I loved flowers, they were placed in the deep window-seats, on the white marble of the mantelpiece, and the principal window opened on the loveliest portion of the third terrace, where a world of flowers were in bloom from May till November.

There I hung up the bird-cage which I had brought from home in the carriage, and the little inmate began to sing joyously, as if he understood all the beauties of our new home and rejoiced over them.

Fanny, too, put her paws on the window-seat, and looked out demurely, as if taking a survey of the landscape. She dropped down with what seemed a little bark of approval, and curling herself up on my travelling-shawl, which had dropped to the floor, watched me as I unlocked my trunk and prepared for dinner.

Miss Olmsly was right. I had a demure little face, but it looked upon me from the glass less sorrowfully than I had seen it since my mother's death. The sombre blackness of my dress threw it all into shadow and made the deep blue-gray of my eyes darker, by far, than was natural. This, contrasting with the slightness of my form, made me look like a little woman who had known suffering, rather than the sensitive child that I really was.

The dinner filled me with awe; the bright silver, the cut-glass, and delicate china impressed me greatly, and I was half afraid to tell the waiter what I wanted, he seemed so great a gentleman. Everybody was kind, the conversation was bright and cheerful; I understood it all, and felt myself brightening under it. Once or twice I caught myself laughing at the pleasant things the old gentleman was saying.

After dinner, when Mr. Olmsly was asleep in his great easy-chair, Mr. Lee and Miss Olmsly went out on the platform, lifted a little from the third terrace, and walked up and down, now and then looking in through one of the open French windows, and saying a kind word to me. I remember thinking what a splendid couple they were, and how happy they seemed to be in each other's company. No wonder; she was a lovely creature, slender, graceful, and caressing in all her ways, while he was like a demigod to my imagination, grand as a monarch, and good as he was kingly. Even then, young as I was, the smile with which he occasionally bent to her, made my heart yearn with a strange desire that I, too, might be so smiled upon.

Still, I was neither lonely nor home-sick, for my whole heart had gone out toward those young people, and I had begun to connect the old gentleman lovingly with my own father, whose face and kind ways I could just remember.

After a while I stole up to my own room again, unpacked my trunk, hung up my mourning dresses, and lingered regretfully over my doll a few moments, ashamed of having loved it so; for the sneers of Mrs. Pierce had made a deep impression on me, and I began to feel that I ought to be something more than a child. Still I could not put the poor, broken thing entirely away, but a sight of it always gave me a heart-ache. It is a terrible thing when one's childhood is broken up with harsh words and coarse jeers.

Where refinement is, illusions remain beautiful far beyond childhood. They belong to innocence, and seldom dwell long with the worldly and the bad.

Mrs. Pierce had swept away one joy from my life, but a beautiful compensation had been sent me in my new home and my new friends. It all seemed like paradise to me when I went to bed that night.