Читать книгу Wives and Widows; or, The Broken Life - Ann S. Stephens - Страница 7

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This beautiful life must have an end. Even childhood has its duties, and mine could no longer be evaded.

One day Miss Olmsly came into my room, and looking around, sighed; but there was a smile on her lip and an expression in her face that made me wonder at the sigh; for I had not learned that superabundant joy has sometimes the same expression as grief; but oh, how different the feeling.

She sat down by the window, and drawing me close to her, kissed my forehead two or three times with so much feeling that I began to tremble.

"Is anything the matter?" I said, winding my arms around her neck; "have I done wrong?"

"Wrong, my sweet child, no; who ever accused you of being anything but the best girl in the world? I was only thinking how lonesome you would be without us."

"Without you?" I faltered—"without you?"

I felt myself growing pale, my arms fell away from that white neck, and I looked piteously in her kind face, afraid to ask the meaning of these words.

"Don't look so frightened, dear," said Miss Olmsly, drawing me fondly to her side. "Even if we were not going, you must have been sent to school. No young lady can get along without education, you know; still, I shall feel very anxious about you."

"Are you going away; am I to be left?"

I could ask no more; the very idea of parting with them choked me.

Miss Olmsly drew my face to hers as if she wanted to keep me from looking at her so earnestly. My cheek was wet with tears, but hers was red as it touched mine, and I could feel that it was burning.

"I am about to tell you something that I hope you will be glad to hear, darling," she said, almost in a whisper. "In two weeks Mr. Lee and I are going to be married. Why, how you shiver, child! I should have told you of this first; the very thought of a school terrifies you."

I heard this and no more. Another death seemed upon me; I fell upon my knees and caught at her dress with both hands.

"Oh, do not leave me—I shall die! I shall die!" She lifted me from the floor and attempted to soothe me, but I was not to be pacified. To live without him—never to see him! There would be nothing worth loving in my life after that.

"Is it so hard to part with us," she said, smoothing my hair with both hands.

I flung my arms around her neck in passionate grief.

"Let me go too; oh, take me, take me!"

"But we are going to Europe."

"Over the sea? I know, I know, take me!"

She kissed me again, and seemed thoughtful. My heart rose: I began to plead with hope. She listened tenderly; told me not to cry, and left me in a state of suspense hard to bear. An hour after this I saw her walking in the garden with Mr. Lee. She was addressing him with sweet earnestness. He looked smilingly down into her face and seemed to expostulate against something that she was urging. At last he appeared to give way, but shook his head and threatened her with his finger, which she answered by tossing the ripe leaves of an autumn rose in his face. As he shook them laughingly away, his eyes fell on me where I leaned from the window, and he made a sign for me to come down.

Breathless, and wild with anxiety, I ran down to the garden and stood beside him, panting for breath, eager to speak, and yet afraid.

"Well, little lady," he said, holding out a hand; "you are determined that we shall not leave you behind."

"It would kill me," I murmured, striving to read my fate in his eyes.

"But we shall be gone from home a long time."

"My home is where—where she is," I answered.

Why did I hesitate to include him. I think he noticed it, for he said, laughing, "Then you care everything for her, nothing for me?"

I burst into tears and cried out in my trouble, "Oh, you are cruel to me; you laugh when I am so unhappy."

"But no one shall be made so unhappy when—when—" Here Miss Olmsly broke off what she had begun to say, and flushed like the rose she had just torn to pieces.

"When we are married; that is what she will not say, sweetheart," broke in Mr. Lee, blushing a little himself; "and if it really will make you unhappy to stay behind, why, there must be some way found by which you can go with us."

I caught a deep breath and felt a glow of keen happiness rush up to my face, but no word would leave my lips.

"Now, this will make you happy?" questioned Miss Olmsly, looking into my eyes—I think as much to avoid his, as from a wish to read my joy there.

"So happy," I answered.

"But we shall be gone a long time and shall travel a great deal, while you must be put to school."

This dampened my spirits a little, but I answered, bravely, that I did not mind, so long as there was no ocean between us.

Then they informed me that Mr. Olmsly had consented that I should go with them to Paris and remain in school while they travelled. Then he would join us and make new arrangements for the future.

After explaining all this to me, the young people walked off together, satisfied that I was made happy as themselves; and so I ought to have been; but my poor heart would not rest, and I went off into the woods like a wild bird, wondering why it was that a flutter of pain still kept stirring in my bosom.

They were married just two weeks from that day. All the principal families of the place were invited, and the entertainment proved a grand affair. All the grounds were illuminated for the occasion. The house was one blaze of lights. Every tree on the hill-side or the sloping lawn seemed blossoming with fire, or drooping with translucent fruit, so numerous were the colored lamps and gorgeous lanterns that hung amid their foliage.

It was like fairy-land to me. The moon was at its golden fulness, and never before had the purple skies seemed so full of stars; but, spite of this, I was sad and restless. Miss Olmsly insisted upon it that my mourning should be laid aside, and I felt strange in the cloudy whiteness of my dress, simple and plain as it was. Indeed, the whole thing seemed to me like a dream which must pass away on the morrow. Perhaps it was this abrupt change in my dress which made me feel so lonely when all the world was gay and brilliant beyond anything my short life had witnessed. Perhaps I felt sad at the thought of leaving my native land. Be this as it may, I can look back upon few nights of my life more dreary than that upon which the two best friends I ever had, or ever shall have, were married.

Memory is full of pictures; events fade away, feelings die out, but so long as the heart keeps a sentiment or the brain holds an image, groups will start up from the past and bring back scenes which no effort of the mind can displace. It is strange, but such pictures are burned, as it were, upon the soul unawares, and often without any remarkable event which can be said to have impressed them there. You may have known a person all your life, yet remember him only as he was presented to you at some given moment. Whole years may pass in which you scarcely seem to have observed him; but at some one moment he comes out upon your recollection with all his features perfect and clearly cut as a cameo.

Of all the pictures burned in upon my life, that of Mr. Lee and his bride, as they stood up in that long drawing-room to be married, will be the last to die out from my mind. No bridesmaids were in attendance; no ushers coming and going drew attention from that noble couple. This was the picture—a woman standing at the left hand of a tall, stately man. He was upright, firm, and self-poised as the pillar of some old Grecian temple. She drooped gently forward, her hands unconsciously clasped, the long black lashes sweeping her cheeks; a soft tremor, as of red rose-leaves stirred by the wind, passing over her lips; draperies of satin, glossy and white as crusted snow, fell around her; a garland of blush-roses crowned the braids of purplish-black hair thickly coiled around a most queenly head. Draperies of rich, warm crimson fell from the windows just behind them, and swept around the foot of a noble vase of Oriental alabaster, from which a tall crimson and purple fuchsia-tree dropped its profuse bells. Directly the clergyman, with a book in his hand, broke into the picture; but my mind rejects him and falls back upon the man, and the woman who stood with lovelight in her eyes and prayers at her heart, waiting to become his wife.

There was great rejoicing after the picture was lost in a crowd of congratulating friends; music sent its soft reverberations out among the flowers, that gave back rich odors in return; for it was a lovely autumnal night, and the whole platform to which the windows opened was garlanded in with hot-house plants. I remember seeing groups of persons wandering about in the illuminated grounds. Their laughter reached me as I sat solitary and alone in the oriel window, over which lace curtains fell, and were kindled up like snow by the lights from without.

I was very sad that night, and felt the tears stealing slowly into my eyes. Every one was happy, but joy had forgotten to find me out. All at once the lace curtains were lifted softly and fell rustling down again. She had thought of me even in her happiest moments. Her arms were folded around me; her lips, warm with smiles, were pressed to my face.

"All alone and looking so sad! why will you not enjoy yourself like the rest?" she said.

"I am so young and so wicked," I answered, wiping the tears from my eyes.

"Wicked! oh, not that, only there is no one of your own age here; come out a little while; he has been asking for you."

"For me?"

"Of course; who else should he think of? Why, child, you will never know how dearly we both love you."

"And you always will?" I asked, holding my breath in expectation of her answer.

"And always will, be sure of that. Ah! here he comes to promise for himself."

Yes; there he stood holding back the curtains, proud, smiling, and strong, as I shall always remember him.

"Ah! you have found her, silly thing, hiding away by herself," he exclaimed, kindly.

"I have just made a promise for you," answered the bride with gentle seriousness.

"Which I will keep; for henceforth, fair lady, am I not your slave."

"I have promised to love this girl so long as I shall live, and that you will be her very best friend, and love her dearly."

"Dearly, you say?"

"Most dearly."

"Next to yourself?"

"Next to myself; and after me, best of all."

"Ah, it is easy to promise that, for, next to yourself, sweet wife, she is the dearest creature in existence." She held my hand in hers while he was speaking. When he uttered the word wife, I felt her finger quiver as if some strange thrill had flashed down from her heart, and the broad white lids drooped suddenly, veiling the radiance of her eyes.

"Now that I have promised, let us seal the compact," he said, with touching seriousness; and lifting me for a moment in his arms, he pressed a kiss upon my lips.

"Why, how she trembles; don't be afraid, you sensitive little thing; come, come go with us and see how the people are making themselves happy."

The bride took his arm, and leading me with his disengaged hand, he crossed the drawing-room and went out on the flower-wreathed platform, where a band of music was filling the night with harmonies.

Here an ecstasy of feeling came upon me; I remembered all that both these persons had promised, and that it would be a solemn compact which they would never think of breaking. I should be with them, not for a time only, but so long as I lived. Remember, I was an imaginative girl, and knew but little of the mutability of human affairs. I only felt in my soul that these two persons whom I loved so entirely, would be faithful to the promise they had made that night, and this certainly filled me with exultation that was, for the time, something better than happiness. After a while, Mr. Lee dropped my hand, but it crept back to his, and I made a signal that he should bend his head.

"It is a promise," I whispered; "you will never, never send me away from you?"

"It is a promise," he answered, smiling down upon me.

"Good night," I said, longing to be alone in my room where I could feel of a certainty that the few words spoken that night had anchored me for life. "Good night; I shall never leave you or her while I live."

It seemed a rash promise, but I made it to God in my prayers that night. The reader shall see how I kept it.