Читать книгу Infelice - Augusta J. Evans - Страница 8

Table of Contents

"Please let me come in, and help you."

Regina knocked timidly at the door of the parsonage guest's chamber, and Mrs. Lindsay answered from within:

"Come in? Of course you may, but what help do you imagine you can render, you useless piece of prettiness? Shall I set you on the mantlepiece between the china kittens, and the glass lambs, right under the sharp nose of my grandmother's portrait, where her great solemn eyes will keep you in order? Whence do all those delectable odours come? Are you a walking sachet?"

She was kneeling before an open drawer of the bureau, methodically arranging sundry garments, and, pausing in the task, looked over her shoulder at the girl who stood near, holding her hands behind her.

"I am sure I could help you, if I were only allowed to try. I am quite a large girl now, more than a year older than when I came here, and Hannah has taught me to do ever so many things. She says I will be a famous cook some day. You didn't know that I made up the Sally Lunn for tea?"

"What an ambitious bit of majesty you are! You wish to reign in the kitchen, rule in the poultry yard, and now presume to invade my province—my special kingdom of making things ready for the Bishop? Have you been anointing yourself with a whole vial of Lubin's extract of—Ah!—delicious—what is it?"

"Whatever it may be, will you let me fix it to suit myself on the

Bishop's bureau?"

"No, you impertinent, wily Delilah in short clothes! I never promise in the dark; show it to me first, and then perhaps I may negotiate with you. You know as well as I do that the Bishop dearly loves perfumes, and if I should generously concede you the privilege of presenting 'sweet-smelling savours' unto him you might some day depose me—and I wish you distinctly to understand that I intend to reign over him as long as I live; not an inch of territory shall you filch."

Regina held up her hands, displaying in one several feathery sprays of Belgian honeysuckle, with half of its petals pearl, half of the palest pink; in the other a bunch of double violets of the rarest shade of delicate lilac, so unusual in the floral kingdom.

"You should be called 'Mab,' and ride about the world on a butterfly, or a streak of moonshine. How did you coax or conjure that honeysuckle into blooming before its appointed time?"

"Here are three pieces, two for the Bishop, and one for you. May I fasten it in your hair?"

"You recite a lesson in history every day, don't you?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Have you come to the Salem-witches yet?"

"Not yet. What has my history to do with this honeysuckle?"

"When you study metaphysics and begin the chase after that psychological fox—the-law-of-association-of-ideas, you will understand. Meanwhile, thank your stars, dear, that you did not live in Massachusetts some years ago, or you would certainly nave gone to heaven in the shape of smoke. How you stare, you white owl! As if you thought St. Vitus had rented my tongue for a dancing-saloon. It is all because the Bishop is coming. My blessed Bishop! Yes, put the handsomest spray in my hair, and then, if you make me look young and very pretty, you may do as you like with the others."

Still kneeling, she inclined her head, while Regina twisted the wreath around the coil of neatly braided hair. Then, kissing the girl lightly on her cheek, Mrs. Lindsay closed the drawer and rose. Drawing a silver cup from her pocket, Regina filled it with water, placed it close to the mirror, and proceeded to arrange the violets and honeysuckle. Stepping back to inspect the effect, she folded her hands and smiled.

"Mrs. Lindsay, tell him I gathered them for him, because he was kind to me when I came here a stranger, and I wish to thank him. When he is at home it seems always summer-time, don't you think so?"

The mother's eyes filled, and, laying a hand on the girl's head, she answered:

"Yes, dear, he is my sunshine, and my summer-time."

"How long will he stay with us?"

"He could not say positively when his last letter was written, but I hope to keep him several months. You know it is possible he may be forced to go to England, in order to complete some of his studies before—oh, Regina! could we bear to have two oceans swelling between our Bishop and us?"

"Why, then, will you let him go?"

"Can I help it?"

"You are his mother, and he would never disobey you."

"But he is a man, and I cannot tie him to my apron strings as I do my bunch of keys. I must not stand in the way, and prevent him from doing his duty."

"I suppose I don't yet know everything about such matters, but I should think it was his duty first to please you. How devoted he is to 'duty'? It must be horrible to leave all one loves, and go out to India among the heathens."

"Pray, what do you know about the heathens?" said a manly voice, and instantly two strong arms gathered the pair in a cordial embrace.

"My son! You stole a march upon me! Oh, Douglass, I never was half so glad to see you as now!"

"If you do not stop crying, I shall feel tempted to doubt you. Tears are so unusual in your eyes that I shall be disposed to regard your welcome as equivocal."

He kissed her on cheek and lips, and added:

"Regina, can't you contrive to say you are a little glad to see me?"

There was no reply, and, turning to look for her, he found she had vanished.

"Queer little thing, she has gone without a word, though she insisted on dressing her silver cup with those flowers, which she thought would suggest to you her gratitude for your numerous little acts of kindness. Have you seen your uncle?"

"Yes, mother, I stopped a few moments at the church, where he is engaged with one of the committee. Uncle Peyton is not looking well. Has he been sick?"

"He has suffered a good deal with his throat since you left us, and now and then I notice he coughs. He is overworked, and now that you can fill his pulpit he will have an opportunity to rest. Oh, my son! in every respect your visit is a blessing."

Leaning her head on his breast, she looked up with proud and almost adoring tenderness, and, drawing his face down to hers, held it close, kissing him with that intense clinging fervour which only mother-love kindles.

"Does my little mother know that she is spoiling her boy by inches; making a nursery darling, instead of a hardy soldier of him? You are weaving silken bonds to fasten me more securely here, when you ought rather to aid me in snapping the fetters of affection, habit, and association. Come, be so good as to brush the dust out of my hair, while you tell me everything about everybody, which you have failed to write during these long months of absence."

For some time they talked of family matters, of occurrences in V——, of some invidious and unkind remarks, some caustic personal criticisms upon the pastor's household affairs, which had emanated from Mrs. Prudence Potter, a widowed member of the congregation, who had once rashly dreamed of presiding over the clerical hearth as Mrs. Peyton Hargrove, and having failed to possess her kingdom had become a merciless spy upon all that happened in the forbidden realm.

"Poor Mrs. Prue! what a warfare exists between her name and her character. She should petition the legislature to allow her to be called—Mrs. Echidna! My son, I think modern civilization will remain incomplete, will not perform its mission, until it relieves society from the depredations of these scorpions, by colonizing them where they will expend their poison without dangerous results. If sting they must, let it be among themselves. If I were lunatic enough to desire to vote, I should spend my franchise in favour of a 'Gossip Reservation'—somewhere close to the Great Western Desert, to which the disappointed widows, spiteful old maids, and snarling dyspeptic bachelors of this much-suffering generation should be relegated for domiciliation and reform. Freedom serves America much as Æsop's stork did the frogs: we are appallingly free to be devoured by envy, stabbed by calumny, strangled by slander. I believe if I were a painter, and desired to portray Cleopatra's death, I would assuredly give to the asp the baleful features and sneering smirk of Mrs. Prudence. Every Sunday when she twists those two curls on her forehead till they lift themselves like horns, puts up her eye-glasses and pays her respects to our pew, I catch myself whispering 'Cerastes!' and wishing that I were only the camera of a photographer."

"Take care, mother! would you accept a homestead in your contemplated

'Reservation'?"

She pinched his ear.

"Don't presume, sir, to preach to me. Really, I often wonder how Peyton can force himself to smile and parry the vinegar cruets that woman throws at him in the shape of observations upon the 'rapid decline of evangelical piety,' and the 'sadly backslidden nature' of the clergy."

"Because he is the very best man in the world, and faithfully practises what he preaches—Christian charity. What is Mrs. Pru's latest grievance?"

"That Peyton does not admit her to his confidence, and supply her with all the particulars of Regina's history and family, which he withholds even from you and me, and about which we should never dream of catechizing him. In a better cause, her bold effrontery would be sublime. Fortunately she was absent in Vermont for some months after the child came, and curiosity had subsided into indifference until she returned—when lo! a geyser of righteous anxiety and suspicion boiled up in the congregation, and wellnigh scalded us. What do you suppose she blandly asked me one day, in the child's presence? 'Were not Mr. Hargrove's friends mistaken in believing he had never married?' Now I contend that the law of the land should indict for just such cruel and wicked innuendoes, because these social crimes that the statutes do not reach work almost as much mischief and misery as those offences against public peace which the laws declare penal. I confess Mrs. Potter is my bête-noire, and I feel as no doubt Paul did when he wrote to Timothy: 'Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil; the Lord reward him according to his works.'"

"Mother, what reply did you make to her? I can imagine you towering like Mrs. Siddons."

"You may be sure I unmasked a battery. I looked straight into her little faded grey eyes, which straggle away from each other as if ashamed of their mutual ferret experiences—for you know one looks out so, and one turns always up—and I answered, that my brother had been exceedingly fortunate, as, notwithstanding the numerous matrimonial nets adroitly spread for him, he had escaped, like the Psalmist, 'as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers,' and fled for safety unto the mountain of celibacy. Bishop, if the new school of science lack the link that binds us to the ophidian type, I can furnish a thoroughly 'developed' specimen of an 'evolved' Melusina; for Mrs. Pru's ancestors must have been not very remotely, cobra-capellos. Such a chronic blister as she is keeps up more inflammation in a church than all the theology at Andover can cool. As for general society here in V——, she damages it more than all the three hundred foxes of Samson did the corn-fields, vineyards, and olives of the Philistines. What are you laughing at?"

"The ludicrous dismay that will seize you when the constablery of your progressive civilization notify you that you must emigrate to the Gossip and Slander Reservation. Poor Mrs. Prudence Potter! from my earliest recollection she has been practising archery upon the target of her neighbours' characters, and she seeks social martyrdom as diligently as Sir Galahad hunted the Sangreal. In the form of ostracism, I think she is certainly reaping her reward. Mother, let her rest."

"With all my heart! ''tis a consummation devoutly to be wished;' but that is just the last thing she proposes, until the muscles of her tongue and eyes are paralyzed. Rest indeed! Did you ever see a hyena caged in a menagerie? Did you ever know it to rest for an instant from its snarling, snapping, grinning round? My son, I would not for my right hand malign or injure her, but how can I sincerely indulge charitable reflections concerning a person who has so persistently persecuted your uncle?"

"Then, dear little mother, do not think of her at all. Be assured her ill-natured shafts will fall as blunt and harmless upon the noble well-tried armour of my uncle's Christian character, as a bombardment of cambric needles against the fortress of Cronstadt. How rapidly Regina has grown, since she came among us? Her complexion is perfect. Is she the same straightforward, guileless child I left her?"