Part 42 (2/2)
”I wish you could see his house in New York; it's a superb one, and on your favorite Fifth Avenue.”
”Yes, I know,” she replied absently.
”I should think you would envy Miss Warren.”
”I don't,” she said emphatically; ”the man is more than the house.”
”I don't think you would have said that a month ago.”
”I fear not. I fear thee didn't like me that Sunday afternoon when I was so self-satisfied. I've thought it over.”
”Indeed, Miss Adah, I would gladly be struck by lightning myself if it would change me for the better as greatly as you are changed.”
”It wasn't the lightning,” she said, blus.h.i.+ng and slowly shaking her head. ”I've been thinking.”
”Ah,” I laughed, ”you are shrewd. If women only knew it, there's nothing that gives beauty like thought, and it's a charm that increases every year. Well,” I continued, with the utmost frankness, ”I do like you now, and what is more, I honestly respect you. When you come to New York again, I am going to ask your mother to trust me as if I were your older brother, and I'll take you to see and hear much that I'm sure you'll enjoy.”
”Oh, that will be splendid!” she cried gladly. ”I know mother will let me go with thee, because--because--well, she says thee is a gentleman.”
”Do you know, Miss Adah, I'd rather have your mother say that than have all Mr. Hearn's thousands. But your mother judges me leniently. To tell you the honest truth, I've come lately to have a very poor opinion of myself. I feel that I would have been a much better man if, in past years, I had seen more of such people as dwell in this house.”
”Thee remembers what father said to thee,” she replied, shyly, with downcast eyes; ”this is thy home hereafter.”
”She looks now,” I thought, ”as if she might fulfil the dream I wove about her on that memorable day when I first saw her in the meeting-house. How perverse my fate has been, giving me that for which I might well thank G.o.d on my knees, and yet which my heart refuses, and withholding that which will impoverish my whole life. Why must the heart be so imperious and self-willed in these matters? An elderly gentleman would say, Everything is just right as it is. It would be the absurdity of folly for Miss Warren to give up her magnificent prospects because of your sudden and sickly sentiment; and what more could you ask or wish than this beautiful girl, whose womanhood has awakened and developed under your very eyes, almost as unconsciously as if a rosebud had opened and shown you its heart? Indeed, but a brief time since I would have berated any friend of mine who would not take the sensible course which would make all happy. If I could but become 'sane and reasonable,' as Miss Warren would say, how she would beam upon me, and, the thought of my disappointment and woe-begone aspect banished, how serenely she would go toward her bright future! And yet in taking this sane and sensible course I would be false to my very soul--false to this simple, true-hearted girl, to whom I could give but a cold, hollow pretence in return for honest love. I would become an arrant hypocrite, devoid of honor and self-respect.”
”Heaven bless you, Adah!” I murmured. ”I love you too well for all your kindness and goodness to pretend to love you so ill.”
Thoughts like these pa.s.sed through my mind as I thanked her for all that she had done for me, and told her of such phases of New York life as I thought would interest her. She listened with so intent and childlike an expression on her face that I could scarcely realize that I was talking to one in whose bosom beat the heart of a woman. I felt rather as if I were telling Zillah a fairy story.
Still I had faith in her intuition, and believed that after I was gone she would recognize and accept the frank, brotherly regard that I now cherished toward her.
Reuben was not very long in joining us, and boy-like did not note that his sister evidently wished him far away. My greeting was so cordial that she noted with a sigh that I did not regard him as the unwelcome third party. Then Mr. Yocomb and the little girls came to the door and asked if there was room for a crowd. Soon after Mrs. Yocomb appeared, with her comely face ruddy from exercise.
”I've hurried all I could,” she said, ”but thee knows how it is with housekeepers; and yet how should thee know, living all thy life alone in dens, as thee said? Why, thee's having a reception.”
”I fear your guests downstairs will feel neglected, Mrs. Yocomb.”
”Don't thee worry about that, Richard,” Mr. Yocomb said, laughing. ”I'm not so old, mother, but I can remember when we could get through an evening together without help from anybody. I reckon we could do so again--eh? mother? Ha, ha, ha! so thee isn't too old to blush yet?
How's that, Richard, for a young girl of sixty? Don't thee worry about Emily Warren. I fear that any one of us would make a large crowd in the old parlor.”
This was sorry comfort, and I fear that my laugh was anything but honest, while Mrs. Yocomb stared out of the window, at which she sat fanning herself, with a fixedness that I well understood.
But they were all so kind and hearty that I could no more give way to dejection than to chill and cheerlessness before a genial wood fire.
They seemed in truth to have taken me into the family. Barely was I now addressed formally as Richard Morton. It was simply ”Richard,” spoken with the unpremeditated friendliness characteristic of family intercourse. Heathen though I was, I thanked G.o.d that he had brought me among these true-hearted people; ”and may He blast me,” I muttered, ”if I ever relapse into the old sneering cynicism that I once affected. Let me at least leave that vice to half-fledged young men and to bad old men.”
One thing puzzled me. Miss Warren remained at her piano, and it struck me as a little odd that she did not find the music of her lover's voice preferable, but I concluded that music was one of the strongest bonds of sympathy between them, and one of the means by which he had won her affection. Sometimes, as her voice rose clear and sweet to my open windows, I answered remarks addressed to me with an inaptness that only Mrs. Yocomb understood.
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