Part 90 (2/2)
CHAPTER x.x.xVI.
”Uncle Orme, are you awake?”
”My dear girl, what is the matter? Is Minnie ill?”
”No, sir; but this is mother's birthday, and, if you please, I want you. There are a few late peaches hanging too high for my arms, and such grape-cl.u.s.ters! just beyond my finger tips. Will you be so kind as to gather them for me? I intended to ask you yesterday afternoon, but mother kept me on the terrace until it was too late. I have not heard you moving about? Do get up; the morning air is so delicious, and the lake lies like a huge rose with crimped petals.”
”You are a tormentingly early lark, chanting your hymns to sunrise, when you should be sound asleep. You waked me in the midst of a lovelier rose-coloured dream than your tiresome, stupid lake, and I shall not excuse you for disturbing me. Where is that worthless, black-eyed chattering monkey Giulio? Am I a boy to climb peach trees this time of the day, for your amus.e.m.e.nt? Oh, the irreverence of American youth!”
”Giulio has gone on a different errand, and I never should insult your venerable years by asking you to climb trees, even in honour of mother's birthday breakfast. You can easily reach all I want, and then you may come back and finish your dream, and I will keep breakfast waiting until you declare yourself ready. Here is the basket, I am going out to the garden.”
Regina ran down into the flower-plot at the rear of the house, and after a little while she saw her uncle unenc.u.mbered by his coat, bearing the basket on his arm and ascending one of the winding walks that terraced the hill.
To her lifelong custom of early rising she still adhered, and in the dewy hours spent alone in watching the sun rise over Como she indulged precious recollections that found audience and favour at no other season.
It was her habit to place each morning a fresh bouquet upon her mother's plate, and also to arrange the flower stand, that since their residence at the villa had never failed to grace the centre of the breakfast-table.
It was a parsonage custom, and had always been a.s.sociated in her mind with the pastor's solemn benediction at each meal.
To-day, while filling her basket with blossoms, some stray waft of perfume, or perhaps the rich scarlet lips of a geranium glowing against the grey stone of the wall, prattled of Fifth Avenue, and recalled a gay _boutonniere_ she once saw Mrs. Carew fasten in Mr.
Palma's coat.
Like a serpent this thought trailed over all, and the beauty of the morning suddenly vanished. Was that grey-eyed Cleopatra with burnished hair, low smooth brow, and lips like Lamia's, resting in her guardian's arms--his wife?
Three months had elapsed since the day on which Mr. Chesley received his last letter, containing tidings that bowed and broke the haughty spirit of Mrs. Laurance; and if Mr. Palma had written again, Regina had not been informed of the fact.
Was he married, and in his happiness as a husband had he for a time forgotten the existence of the friends in Europe?
A shadowy hopelessness settled in the girl's eyes when she reflected that this was probably the correct explanation of his long silence, and a deep yearning to see him once more rose in her sad heart. She knew that it was better so, with the Atlantic between them; and yet it seemed hard, bitter, to think of living out the coming years, and never looking upon him again.
A heavy sigh crossed her lips that were beginning to wear the patient lines of resignation, and turning from the red geranium which had aroused the memory coiled in her heart she stepped upon the terrace, leaned over the marble bal.u.s.trade, and looked out.
The sun was up, and in the verdant setting of its sh.o.r.e the lake seemed a huge sapphire, girdled with emerald.
In the distance a fis.h.i.+ng boat glided slowly, its taut sails gleaming as the sunlight smote them, like the snowy pinions of some vast bird brooding over the quiet water; and high in the air, just beneath a strip of orange cloud as filmy as lace, a couple of happy pigeons circled round and round, each time nearing the sun, that was rapidly paving the lake with quivering gold.
Solemn and serene the distant Alps lifted their glittering domes, which cut sharply like crystal against the sky that was as deeply, darkly blue as lapis-lazuli; and behind the white villas dotting the sh.o.r.e, vineyards bowed in amber and purple fruitage, plentiful as Eshcol, luscious as Schiraz.
The cool air was burdened with mysterious hints of acacias and roses, which the dew had stolen from drowsy gardens, and over the gently rippling waters floated the holy sound of the sweet-tongued bell, from
...”Where yonder church Stands up to heaven, as if to intercede For sinful hamlets scattered at its feet.”
Into the house Regina pa.s.sed slowly, a trifle paler from her matin reverie; and when she entered the pretty breakfast-room, Mr. Chesley had just deposited his fruity burden upon the floor.
”Thank you, dear Uncle Orme. Mother will enjoy her peaches when she knows you gathered them with the dew still upon their down. Go, finish your dream; Heaven grant it be sweet! No one shall even pa.s.s your door for the next hour, unless shod with velvet, or with silence. This is the first of mother's birthdays I have had an opportunity to celebrate, and I wish to surprise her pleasantly. Go back to sleep.”
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