 | CHAPTER IV. Macaria, or, Altars of sacrifice |  |
4. CHAPTER IV.
From early childhood Irene had experienced
a sensation of loneliness. Doubtless
the loss of her mother enhanced this feeling,
but the peculiarity of her mental organization
would have necessitated it even under happier
auspices. Her intellect was of the masculine
order, acute and logical, rather deficient in
the imaginative faculties, but keenly analytical.
It is an old predicate that women are deductionists,
that womanly intuitions are swift
and infallible. In richly-endowed female
minds it not unfrequently happens that tedious,
reflective processes are ignored; but Irene
was a patient rather than brilliant thinker,
and with singular perseverance searched every
nook and cranny, and sifted every phase of
the subject presented for investigation. Her
conclusions were never hasty, and consequently
rarely unsound. From the time her baby-fingers
first grasped a primer she became a
student; dolls and toys such as constitute the
happiness of most children had never possessed
any attraction for her, and before she was
eight years old she made the library her favorite
resort. She would climb upon the moroeco-covered
table where stood two globes, one
celestial, the other terrestrial, and spend hours
twined among the stars. When weary of
studying the index of the thermometer and
barometer, and wondering why the quicksilver
varied with sunshine and shower, she would
throw herself down on the floor and fall asleep
over the quaint pictures in an old English encyclopædia,
numbering thirty volumes. She
haunted this room, and grew up among books
centuries old. Thus until her tenth year there
was no authority exerted over her, and the
strong, reflective tendency of her mind rapidly
developed itself. This was an abnormal
condition, and indisputably an unfortunate
training, and perhaps in after years it might
have been better had she spent the season
of careless, thoughtless childhood in childish
sports and childhood's wonted ways, for anxious
inquiry and tedious investigations come
soon enough with maturity.
She was not an enthusiastic, impulsive nature,
fitful in moodiness or ecstacy, inclined to
passionate demonstrations of any kind; but
from infancy evinced a calm, equable temperament,
uniformly generous and unselfish, but
most thoroughly firm, nay obstinate, in any
matter involving principle, or conflicting with
her opinions of propriety. How she obtained
these notions of right and wrong in minor details,
was a subject of some mystery. They
were not the result of education in the ordinary
acceptation of that term, for they had
never been instilled by anybody; and like a
wood-flower in some secluded spot, she lived,
grew, and expanded her nature, without any
influences to bias or color her views. In her
promiscuous reading she was quite as apt to
imbibe poisonous as healthy sentiments, and
knowing that she had been blessed with few
religious instructions, her father often wondered
at the rigidness of her code for self-regulation.
Miss Margaret considered her “a
strange little thing,” and rarely interfered
with her plans in any respect, while her father
seemed to take it for granted that she required
no looking after. He knew that her beauty
was extraordinary; he was proud of the fact;
and having provided her with a good music
master, and sent her to the best school in the
county, he left her to employ her leisure as
inclination prompted. Occasionally her will
conflicted with his, and more than once he
found it impossible to make her yield assent to
his wishes. To the outward observances of
obedience and respect she submitted, but
whenever these differences occurred he felt
that in the end she was unconquered. Inconsistent
as it may appear, though fretted for the
time by her firmness, he loved her the more
for her “wilfulness,” as he termed it; and
despotic and exacting though he certainly
was in many respects, he stood somewhat in
awe of his pure-hearted, calm-eyed child.
His ward and nephew, Hugh Seymour, had
resided with him for several years, and it was
well known that Mr. Huntingdon had pledged
his daughter's hand to his sister's son. The
age of infant betrothals has passed away,
consequently this rare instance gave rise to a
deal of gossiping comment. How the matter
became public he never knew; probably
Sparrowgrasse's “carrier pigeon” migrated
southward, for it is now no uncommon thing
to find one in our cities and country towns;
and at all events Mr. Huntingdon soon found
that his private domestic affairs were made an
ordinary topic of conversation in social circles.
Irene had never been officially apprised of
her destiny, but surmised very accurately the
true state of the case. Between the two
cousins there existed not the slightest congeniality
of taste or disposition; not a sympathetic
link, save the tie of relationship. On
her part there was a moderate share of cousinly
affection; on his, as much love and tenderness
as his selfish nature was capable of feeling.
They rarely quarrelled as most children
do, for when (as frequently happened) he
flew into a rage and tried to tyrannize, she
scorned to retort in any way, and generally
locked him out of the library. What she
thought of her father's intentions concerning
herself, no one knew; she never alluded to
the subject, and if in a frolicsome mood Hugh
broached it, she invariably cut the discussion
short. When he went to college in a distant
state, she felt infinitely relieved, and during
his vacations secluded herself as much as possible.
Yet the girl's heart was warm and
clinging; she loved her father devotedly, and
loved most intensely Electra Grey, whom she
had first met at school. They were nearly
the same age, classmates, and firm friends.
That she was beautiful, Irene of course knew
quite as well as her father or any one else;
how could she avoid knowing it? From her
cradle she had been called “Queen” and
“Beauty;” all her acquaintances flattered her
—strangers commented on her loveliness; she
no more doubted it than the fact of her existence;
and often stopped before the large parlor
mirrors and admired her own image, just
as she would have examined and admired and
enjoyed one of the elegant azaleas or pelargoniums
in the greenhouse. I repeat it, she
prized and enjoyed her loveliness, but she was
not vain. She was no more spoiled by adulation
than a meek and snowy camelia, or one of
those immense golden-eyed pansies which astonish
and delight visitors at the hot-houses on
Long Island. God conferred marvellous beauty
on her, and she was grateful for the gift—but
to the miserable weaknesses of vanity, she was
a stranger. In the midst of books and flowers
she was happy, and seemed to desire no companions
but Erebus and Paragon. She rode
every day when the weather permitted, and
the jetty horse with its graceful young rider,
followed by the slender, silky greyhound, was
a familiar spectacle in the vicinity of her home.
miles of the town; could tell where the richest,
rarest honeysuckles grew, where the yellow
jasmine clambered in greatest profusion,
and always found the earliest sprays of graybeard
that powdered the forest. Often Mr.
Huntingdon had ordered his horse, and gone
out in the dusky twilight to search for her,
fearing that some disaster had overtaken his
darling; and at such times met Erebus laden
with her favorite flowers. These were the
things she loved, and thus independent of society,
yet conscious of her isolation, she grew
up what nature intended her to be. As
totally different in character as appearance
was Electra Grey. Rather smaller and much
thinner than Irene, with shining purplish
black hair, large, sad, searching black eyes,
from which there was no escape, a pale olive
complexion, and full crimson lips that rarely
smiled. The forehead was broad and prominent,
and rendered very peculiar by the remarkable
width between the finely-arched
brows. The serene purity characteristic of
Irene's features was entirely wanting in this
face, which would have seemed Jewish in its
contour, but for the Grecian nose; and the
melancholy yet fascinating eyes haunted the
beholder with their restless, wistful, far-reaching
expression. Electra was a dreamer, richly
gifted; dissatisfied because she could never
attain that unreal world which her busy brain
kept constantly before her. The child of
genius is rarely, if ever, a happy one—
“Heaven lies about us in our infancy.”
those who, like Electra, seek continually for
the airy castles of an ideal realm. Her vivid
imagination shaped and painted, but, as too
often happens, her eager blood and bone
fingers could not grasp the glories. The thousand
cares, hardships, and rough handlings of
reality struck cold and jarring on her sensitive,
highly-strung nature. She did not complain;
murmuring words had never crossed
her lips in the hearing of any who knew her;
she loved her aunt too well to speak of sorrow
or disappointment. Fourteen years had
taught her an unusual amount of stoicism,
but sealed lips can not sepulchre grief, and
trials have a language which will not be repressed
when the mouth is at rest. She
looked not gloomy, nor yet quite unhappy,
but like one who sees obstacles mountain-high
loom between her and the destined goal, and
asks only permission to press on. Hers was
a passionate nature; fierce blood beat in her
veins, and would not always be bound by
icy fetters. There was no serene plateau of
feeling where she could repose; she enjoyed
keenly, rapturously, and suffered acutely, fearfully.
Unfortunately for her, she had only
Himalayan solitudes, sublime in their dazzling
height, or valleys of Tophet, appalling with
flame and phantom. She knew wherein she
was gifted, she saw whither her narrow pathway
led, and panted to set her little feet in
the direction of the towering steeps crowned
with the temple of art. To be an artist; to
put on canvas the grand and imperishable
images that crowded her brain, and almost
maddened her because she could not give
them tangible form; this was the day-dream
spanning her life like a bow of promise, but
fading slowly as years thickened o'er her head,
and no helping hand cleared the choked path.
“Poverty! poverty!” Many a night she buried
her face under the pillow, and hissed the
word through closed teeth, fearful of disturbing
the aunt, who slumbered at her side.
Poverty! poverty! What an intolerable chain
it binds around aspiring souls! And yet
the world's great thinkers have felt this iron
in their flesh, and, bursting the galling bonds,
have carved their way to eminence, to immortality.
It is a lamentable and significant
truth that, with a few honorable, noble exceptions,
wealth is the Cannæ of American
intellect. Poverty is a rigid school, and the
sessions are long and bitter; but the men
and women who graduate therein come forth
with physical frames capable of enduring all
hardships, with hearts habituated to disappointment
and fortified against the rebuffs of
fortune, with intellects trained by patient,
laborious, unbending application. The tenderly-nurtured
child of wealth and luxury
very naturally and reasonably shrinks from
difficulties; but increase the obstacles in the
path of a son or daughter of penury, inured
to trial, and in the same ratio you strengthen
his or her ability and determination to surmount
them.
Electra's love of drawing had early displayed
itself; first, in strange, weird figures
on her slate, then in her copy-book, on every
slip of paper which she could lay her hands
upon; and, finally, for want of more suitable
material, she scrawled all over the walls of
the little bed-room, to the great horror of her
aunt, who spread a coat of whitewash over
the child's frescos, and begged her to be guilty
of no such conduct in future, as Mr. Clark
might with great justice sue for damages. In
utter humiliation, Electra retreated to the
garden, and here, after a shower had left the
sandy walks white and smooth, she would
sharpen a bit of pine, and draw figures and
faces of all conceivable and inconceivable
shapes. Chancing to find her thus engaged
one Sunday afternoon, Russell supplied her
with a package of drawing-paper and pencils.
So long as these lasted she was perfectly
happy, but unluckily their straightened circumstances
admitted of no such expenditure,
and before many weeks she was again without
materials. She would not tell Russell that
she had exhausted his package, and passed
sleepless nights trying to devise some method
torture for her to sit in school and see
the drawing-master go round, giving lessons
on this side and that, skipping over her every
time, because her aunt could not afford the
extra three dollars. How longingly the eyes
followed the master's form, how hungrily they
dwelt upon the sketches he leaned over to
examine and retouch? Frequently during
drawing-hour she would sit with her head bent
down pretending to study, but the pages of
the book were generally blistered with tears,
which no eye but the Father's looked upon.
There was, however, one enjoyment which
nothing could steal from her; the town contained
two book-stores, and here she was wont
to linger over the numerous engravings and
occasional oil paintings they boasted. The
proprietors and clerks seemed rather pleased
than otherwise by the silent homage she paid
their pictures, and, except to tender her a
seat, no one ever interfered with her examinations.
One engraving interested her particularly;
it represented St. John on Patmos,
writing Revelations. She went as usual one
Saturday morning for another look at it, but
a different design hung in its place; she
glanced around, and surmising the object of
her search, the proprietor told her it had
been sold the day before. An expression of
sorrow crossed her face, as though she had
sustained an irreparable loss, and, drawing
her bonnet down, she went slowly homeward.
Amid all these yearnings and aspirations she
turned constantly to Russell, with a worshipping
love that knew no bounds. She loved
her meek, affectionate aunt as well as most
natures love their mothers, and did all in her
power to lighten her labors, but her affection
for Russell bordered on adoration. In a character
so exacting and passionate as hers there
is necessarily much of jealousy, and thus it
came to pass that, on the day of Irene's visit
to the cottage, the horrible suspicion took
possession of her that he loved Irene better
than herself. True, she was very young, but
childish hearts feel as keenly as those of maturer
years; and Electra endured more agony
during that day than in all of her past life.
Had Irene been other than she was, in every
respect, she would probably have hated her
cordially; as matters stood, she buried the
suspicion deep in her own heart, and kept
as much out of everybody's way as possible.
Days and weeks passed very wearily; she
busied herself with her text-books, and, when
the lessons had been recited, drew all over
the margins — here a hand, there an entire
arm, now and then a face, sad-eyed as Fate.
Mrs. Aubrey's eye became so blurred that
finally she could not leave the house without
having some one to guide her, and, as cold
weather had now arrived, preparations were
made for her journey. Mr. Hill, who was
going to New Orleans, kindly offered to take
charge of her, and the day of departure was
fixed. Electra packed the little trunk, saw it
deposited on the top of the stage, in the
dawn of an October morning saw her aunt
comfortably seated beside Mr. Hill, and in
another moment all had vanished. In the
afternoon of that day, on returning from
school, Electra went to the bureau and, unlocking
a drawer, took out a small paper box.
It contained a miniature of her father, set in
a handsome gold frame. She knew it had
been her mother's most valued trinket; her
aunt had carefully kept it for her, and as
often as the temptation assailed her she had
resisted: but now the longing for money
triumphed over every other feeling. Having
touched the spring, she took a knife and cautiously
removed the bit of ivory beneath the
glass, then deposited the two last in the box,
put the gold frame in her pocket, and went
out to a jewelry store. As several persons
had preceded her, she leaned against the
counter, and, while waiting, watched with
some curiosity the movements of one of the
goldsmiths, who, with a glass over one eye,
was engaged in repairing watches. Some
had been taken from their cases, others were
untouched; and as her eyes passed swiftly
over the latter, they were suddenly riveted to
a massive gold one lying somewhat apart. A
half-smothered exclamation caused the workman
to turn round and look at her; but in an
instant she calmed herself, and, thinking it a
mere outbreak of impatience, he resumed his
employment. Just then one of the proprietors
approached, and said politely, “I am
sorry we have kept you waiting, miss. What
can I do for you?”
“What is this worth?”
She laid the locket down on the counter,
and looked up at him with eyes that sparkled
very joyously he thought. He examined it a
moment, and said rather drily:
“It is worth little or nothing to us, though
you may prize it.”
“If I were to buy another just like it, would
you charge me `little or nothing?'”
He smiled good-humoredly.
“Buying and selling are different things,
don't you know that? Come, tell me what
you want to sell this for?”
“Because I want some money.”
“You are Mrs. Aubrey's niece, I believe?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, how do I know, in the first place,
that it belongs to you? Jewellers have to
be very particular about what they buy.”
She crimsoned, and drew herself proudly
away from the counter, then smiled, and held
out her hand for the locket.
“It is mine; it held my father's miniature,
but I took it out because I want a paint-box,
and thought I could sell this case for enough
to buy one. It was my mother's once; here
are her initials on the back, H. G., Harriet
I am telling the truth; I will bring my cousin
with me, he can prove it. Sir, are you so
particular about everything you buy?”
“We try to be.”
Again her eyes sparkled; she bowed, and
left the store.
Once in the street, she hurried to Mr.
Campbell's office, ran up the steps, and rapped
loudly at the door.
“Come in!” thundered the lawyer.
She stopped on the threshold, glanced
round, and said timidly:
“I want to see Russell, if you please.”
“Russell is at the post-office. Have you
any particular spite at my door, that you
belabor it in that style? or do you suppose I
am as deaf as a gate-post?”
“I beg your pardon; I did not mean to
startle you, sir. I was not thinking of either
you or your door.”
She sprang down the steps to wait on the
sidewalk for her cousin, and met him at the
entrance.
“Oh, Russell! I have found your watch.”
A ray of light seemed to leap from his eyes
as he seized her hand.
“Where?”
“At Mr. Brown's jewelry store.”
“Thank God!”
He went up the stairway, delivered the
letters, and came back, accompanied by Mr.
Campbell.
“This is my cousin, Electra Grey, Mr.
Campbell.”
“So I inferred from the unceremonious
assault she made on my door just now. However,
shake hands, little lady; it seems there is
some reason for your haste. Let 's hear about
this precious watch business.”
She simply told what she had seen. Presently
Russell said:
“But how did you happen there, Electra?”
“Your good angel sent me, I suppose; —”
and she added in a whisper, “I will tell you
some other time.”
On re-entering the store, she walked at
once to the workman's corner, and pointed
out the watch.
“Yes, it is mine. I would know it among a
thousand.”
“How can you identify it, Aubrey?”
He immediately gave the number, and
name of the manufacturer, and described the
interior tracery, not omitting the quantity of
jewels. Mr. Campbell turned to the proprietor
(the same gentleman with whom Electra
had conversed), and briefly recapitulated the
circumstances which had occurred in connection
with the watch. Mr. Brown listened attentively,
then requested Russell to point out
the particular one that resembled his. He did
so, and on examination, the number, date, name,
and all the marks corresponded so exactly that
no doubt remained on the jeweller's mind.
“Young man, you say you were accused of
stealing your own watch?”
“Yes.”
“Then I will try to clear your name. This
watch was brought here several weeks since,
while I was absent. I am very guarded in
such matters, and require my young men here
to take a certificate of the name and place of
residence of all strangers who offer articles for
sale or exchange. I once very innocently
bought some stolen property, and it taught me
a lesson. This watch was sold for ninety dollars
by a man named Rufus Turner, who lives
in New Orleans, No. 240 — street. I will
write to him at once, and find out, if possible,
how it came into his possession. I rather
think he had some horses here for sale.”
“Did he wear green glasses?” inquired
Russell of the young man who had purchased
the watch.
“Yes, and had one arm in a sling.”
“I saw such a man here about the time my
watch was missing.”
After some directions from Mr. Campbell
concerning the proper course to be pursued,
Electra drew out her locket, saying—
“Now, Russell, is not this locket mine?”
“Yes; but where is the miniature? What
are you going to do with it?”
“The miniature is at home, but I want to
sell the frame, and Mr. Brown does not know
but that it is another watch case?”
“If it is necessary, I will swear that it belongs
lawfully to you; but what do you want
to sell it for? I should think you would
prize it too highly to be willing to part with
it.”
“I do prize the miniature, and would not
part with it for any consideration; but I want
something far more than a gold case to keep
it in.”
“Tell me what you want, and I will get it
for you,” whispered her cousin.
“No, I am going to sell this frame.”
“And I am going to buy it from you,” said
the kind-hearted merchant, taking it from her
hand and weighing it.
Russell and Mr. Campbell left the store,
and soon after Mr. Brown paid Electra several
dollars for the locket.
In half an hour she had purchased a small
box of paints, a supply of drawing-paper and
pencils, and returned home, happier and
prouder than many an empress, whose jewels
have equalled those of the Begums of Oude.
She had cleared Russell's character, and her
hands were pressed over her heart to still its
rapturous throbbing. Happy as an uncaged
bird, she arranged the tea-table and sat down
to wait for him. He came at last, later than
usual, and then she had her reward; he took
her in his arms and kissed her. Yet, while
his lip rested on hers, Irene's image rose before
her, and he felt her shiver as she clung to
him. He was her idol, and the bare suggestion
blood in her veins. He spoke little of the
watch, appeared to miss his mother, and soon
went to his room and began to study. How
ignorant he was of what passed in his cousin's
heart; how little he suspected the intensity of
her feelings. Constantly occupied during the
day, he rarely thought of her away from
home; and, though always kind and considerate,
he failed to understand her nature, or
fully appreciate her affection for him. Many
days elapsed before Mr. Turner's answer arrived.
He stated that he had won the watch
from Cecil Watson, at a horse-race, where
both were betting; and proved the correctness
of his assertion by reference to several
persons who were present, and who resided in
the town. Russell had suspected Cecil from
the moment of its disappearance, and now,
provided with both letter and watch, and accompanied
by Mr. Brown, he repaired to Mr.
Watson's store. Russell had been insulted,
his nature was stern, and now he exulted in
the power of disgracing the son of the man
who had wronged him. There was no flush
on his face, but a cold, triumphant glitter in
his eyes as he approached his former employer,
and laid watch and letter before him.
“What business have you here?” growled
the merchant, trembling before the expression
of the boy's countenance.
“My business is to clear my character which
you have slandered, and to fix the disgrace
you intended for me on your own son. I
bring you the proofs of his not my villany.”
“Come into the back-room, I will see Brown
another time,” said Mr. Watson, growing paler
each moment.
“No, sir, you were not so secret in your
dealings with me. Here where you insulted
me you shall hear the whole truth. Read
that. I suppose the twenty-dollar gold piece
followed the watch.”
The unfortunate father persued the letter
slowly, and smothered a groan. Russell watched
him with a keen joy which he might have
blushed to acknowledge had he analyzed his
feelings. Writhing under his empaling eye,
Mr. Watson said:
“Have you applied to the witnesses referred
to?”
“Yes, they are ready to swear that they
saw Cecil bet Turner the watch.”
“You did not tell them the circumstances,
did you?”
“No.”
“Well, it is an unfortunate affair; I want
it dropped as quietly as possible. It will
never do to have it known far and wide.”
“Aha! you can feel the sting now. But
remember you took care to circulate the slander
on my name. I heard of it. You did not
spare me, you did not spare my mother; and,
Jacob Watson, neither will I spare you. You
never believed me guilty, but you hated me
and gloried in an opportunity of injuring me.
Do you suppose I shall shield your unprincipled
son for your sake? You showed me no
mercy, you may expect as little. The story of
the watch shall make its way wherever we—”
He paused suddenly, for the image of his
gentle, forgiving mother rose before him, and
he knew that she would be grieved at the
spirit he evinced. There was an awkward
silence, broken by Mr. Watson.
“If I retract all that I have said against
you, and avow your innocence, will it satisfy
you? Will you be silent about Cecil?”
“No!” rose peremptorily to his lips, but he
checked it; and the patient teaching of years,
his mother's precepts, and his mother's prayers
brought forth their first fruit, golden charity.
“You merit no forbearance at my hands,
and I came here intending to show you none;
but, on reflection, I will not follow your example.
Clear my name before the public, and I
leave the whole affair with you. There has
never been any love between us, because you
were always despotic and ungenerous, but I
am sorry for you now, for you have taught me
how heavy is the burden you have to bear in
future. Good-morning.”
Afraid to trust himself, he turned away and
joined Mr. Campbell in the office.
In the afternoon of the same day came a
letter from Mr. Hill containing sad news.
The oculist had operated on Mrs. Aubrey's
eyes, but violent inflammation had ensued; he
had done all that scientific skill could prompt,
but feared she would be hopelessly blind. At
the close of the letter Mr. Hill stated that he
would bring her home the following week.
One November evening, just before dark,
while Russell was cutting wood for the kitchen-fire,
the stage stopped at the cottage-gate,
and he hurried forward to receive his mother
in his arms. It was a melancholy reunion;
for a moment the poor sufferer's fortitude forsook
her, and she wept. But his caresses
soothed her, and she followed Electra into
the house while he brought in the trunk.
When shawl and bonnet had been removed,
and Electra placed her in the rocking-chair,
the light fell on face and figure, and the cousins
started at the change that had taken place.
She was so ghastly pale, so very much reduced.
She told them all that had occurred during
the tedious weeks of absence; how much she
regretted having gone since the trip proved so
unsuccessful; how much more she deplored
the affliction on their account than her own;
and then from that hour no allusion was ever
made to it.
| CHAPTER IV. Macaria, or, Altars of sacrifice | |