University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER X.
UNCLE ISRAEL.

No railway had as yet invaded the quiet of
Milvor woods and fields, no steamboat had
desecrated the waters of Milvorhaven, and
such communication as was held by inhabitants
of either with the outer world was
carried on by means of a stage-coach visiting
them semi-weekly, and a packet-sloop making
its passage when wind, weather, and the humor
of the skipper's wife allowed.

The day whose morning we have noted
was one of those made memorable by the arrival
of the stage, and punctually at five o'clock
it appeared, rattling down the hill, across the
little bridge and round the corner, until, with a
superfluous whirl and flourish in honor of its
freight, it paused at the gate of the Old Garrison
House, whose inmates awaited it at the
open door.

“Here's all your folks waiting to see you,”
said Aaron Bunce, the driver, swinging himself
off his box and opening the door, while a
sympathetic smile opened a cleft in his red
face wide enough to display an ample set of
ivory.

“So I see, Aaron, so I see,” replied a handsome
middle-aged gentleman, slowly descending
from the coach, and putting a hand in his
pocket, while the smile upon the driver's rubicund
face widened expectantly. And while
Mr. Israel Barstow pays his passage-money, and
adds, according to his gracious wont, a buonomano
for the benefit of his old friend and playmate,
Aaron Bunce, we have time to notice that
he is a man of about fifty years old, handsomely
and soberly attired, although his watch-chain
is of the heaviest, and the solitaire diamond
fastening his black cravat is of the costliest.
For the rest, Israel Barstow is the oldest and
now only son of the old man watching his
arrival from the open door; is a bachelor, and
a very prosperous merchant in the China
trade, a circumstance memorized to the inhabitants
of the Old Garrison House by the
periodical arrival of chests of tea, boxes
containing blue-printed china jars of preserved
ginger, bamboo, limes, sugar-cane,
and a curious compound called chow-chow
sweetmeat; dress-patterns of silk, handkerchiefs,
shawls, toys of carved ivory, pictures
upon rice-paper, monstrously drawn and gorgeously
colored; an occasional bit of furniture
or china, and all the other odd or useful presents
abounding among the fortunate friends
of oriental traders. Nor can it be denied that
Mr. Israel Barstow's visits to his paternal
home were hailed with all the more pleasure
and interest from the circumstance of his
never coming empty-handed, or failing to
bring some especial gift to each member of
the family carefully adapted to the especial
taste of the individual—a style of gift-making
contrasting favorably with the practice of those
persons who offer presents as Timothy, Lord
Dexter did punctuation — namely: in the
lump, to be distributed according to taste.

But Mr. Barstow is already upon the door-step,
with his mother's arms around his neck,
and her withered lips pressed to his. Then
came the warm hand-pressure and the blessing
of his father; then an angular embrace
from Miss Rachel; and then, by way of bonne
bouche, a frank kiss from the fresh, ripe mouth
of Beatrice.

“Glad to see you looking so well, friends,
every one of you. Father, you are as hearty
as I am, for any thing that I can see; and as for
mother, I expect her to dance at my wedding
yet—unless, to be sure, Rachel gets the start
of me. How's the doctor, Rachel? And as
for that monkey, Trix—where is she?”

“Never mind just now, brother,” interposed
Miss Rachel, a little nervously. “Let me take
your bag and show you up-stairs.”

“Show me up-stairs, Shell! Why, I carried
you up and down those very stairs before
you could walk alone. You are grown amazingly
ceremonious, it seems to me.”

“No; but I want to speak to you a minute
before you see Beatrice, if you please, Israel,”
insisted Miss Rachel; and her brother, with a
shade of alarm upon his florid face, suffered
himself to be led away to the guest-chamber,

pride of Miss Rachel's heart, with its neat
canton matting, its bed, and window-furniture
of white linen, embroidered by some Penelope
of an ancestress in huge bouquets of flowers,
dwarf-trees, and wonderful birds, decked in
Joseph coats of many-colored silks; its high-backed
carved chairs, black-mahogany clothes-press
and chest of drawers; its spider-legged
dressing-table and light stand, and the great
easy-chair, covered with silk patchwork of
Rachel's own composition—each article resting
solidly upon the carved eagle-claw feet so
charming to virtuosi in antique furniture, and
perfect in all its ornaments.

Over the fireplace hung a piece of embroidery,
framed and glazed, depicting, in glowing
colors, the death of Absalom, who hung pendant
from an oak whose acorns were considerably
larger than his own head, while Joab
dismounted from a horse smaller than the
dog who followed him, attacked his master's
son with a lance longer than the oak was tall.
Beyond a division-line composed of harps and
crowns, set one above another, was shown
King David sitting upon his throne, with a
sceptre like Magog's mace at his feet, and both
his royal hands clutched in a mass of hair
which the most admiring courtier must have
confessed needed thinning; while Bathsheba
the fair stood beside him, a head and shoulders
taller than her lord, and with two large
tears wrought in white floss streaming down
the most hideous face that ever haunted a
Christmas-supper dream.

Upon the mantleshelf below this prodigy
stood a pair of Chinese josses grinning fiendishly
at each other in mockery of the Biblical
memorial above, and between them lay a
rosary of carved ivory, whose use or intent
Miss Rachel understood as little as she did the
worship of the josses, or the droll mixture of
religious faiths thus placed in juxtaposition.

“Well, what is the matter with Trix?” demanded
Mr. Barstow, as his sister followed
him into the room and closed the door.

“Nothing, Israel; only she has broken off
with Marston Brent, and, of course, it's a sore
subject, and she would rather not have it
spoken of. So I thought I would tell you,
lest you should hurt her feelings without
knowing it.”

“Of course, of course. But what is it?
What's the matter? He hasn't treated her
badly, has he?” asked Mr. Barstow, growing
very red in the face.

“Oh! no. At least, I know he couldn't have;
but Beatrice has never said a word about it,
except just that it was broken off and all over,
and he has gone out West.”

“He has, has he? Why, I thought—but
it is just as well. Broken off, have they?
Sho! I thought Trix was all settled, and just
the same as married; but, after all she might
do better. Brent was a good fellow, but she
is a girl to shine among a thousand. I'll have
her to spend the winter with me, Shell. I'll
take her home Monday, if you'll get her
ready. It is just the change she wants, and
it'll brighten up my old house there amazingly.”

Miss Rachel stood aghast.

“Carry her right off Monday!” exclaimed
she.

“Yes; why not? I suppose her stockings
are mended and night-caps washed, aren't
they? And if she needs a new gown, she can
buy it after she gets there. It will be amusement
for her.”

“But, brother—why, who will take care of
the child?”

“Child! She was twenty last birthday, I
know, for there are twenty stones in the ruby
bracelet I sent her; and as for care, why, I
shall look out for her, of course; and then
there is Mrs. Grey.”

“Your housekeeper?'

“Yes. And as nice a woman as ever trod.”

“But is she suitable—does she go out to
parties and the theatre, and such places?
You know Beatrice ought not to go alone,
and you won't want to be following her round
all the time,” said Aunt Rachel, whose ideas
of social propriety had not all been learned in
Milvor.

“Well—yes, there is something in that, I
suppose. How much more fuss there is about
a girl than a boy!” said Uncle Israel rather
testily, as he rubbed the somewhat scanty
hair from his forehead, and looked reproachfully
at his sister, who looked meekly back at
him.

“Mrs. Grey don't go into company, does
she?” inquired Miss Rachel presently.

“No, no, of course she don't—that is, not
into the sort of company Trix will frequent. I
suppose I could find some lady—why, there's
June Charlton!”

And Mr. Barstow's face lighted with an Eureka
glow, as he stopped opposite to Miss
Rachel, his large handkerchief suspended from

his hand, and his hair in a state of frightful
confusion.

“June Charlton!” echoed Miss Rachel.

“Yes; my friend Chappelleford's niece, you
know. Now, Shell, don't tell me you don't remember
Chappelleford, who came down here
with me last year—no, two years ago—and
took such an interest in the Old Garrison.”

“Oh! yes; that old gentleman who cut a
piece out of the sitting-room wainscot to see
the logs behind it,” said Aunt Rachel rather
acrimoniously.

“Well, I told him he might if he didn't believe
that it was a log-house originally; and I
suppose he didn't believe it, that being a good
deal his way, and so— But all that is neither
here nor there,” said Mr. Barstow, resuming,
with a slight air of vexation, the interrupted
use of his handkerchief. “All that is neither
here nor there, but what I am coming to is:
Chappelleford has a niece, a young widow—
somewhere about thirty, I should say—who
has boarded with him for the last year at
the Grandarc House, and who is about the
most charming woman you ever laid eyes on,
Miss Shell. I'll get her to come and make me
a visit, and go out with Beatrice. So, there
now.”

“And she is a clever, nice woman, isn't
she? For you know, brother, Beatrice is new
to the world, and a great deal depends upon
the first start.”

“Clever and nice! Ha! ha!” laughed Mr.
Israel Barstow, rubbing his hands together.
“Well, I don't believe, Shell, that any one
ever put those words to June Charlton's name
before, and you would laugh at yourself if you
should see her once—only just see her, you
know.”

“Why, brother?” asked Miss Rachel, a little
hurt.

“Why because she's splendid, gorgeous,
bewitching — I don't know what — but not
clever—that is, not the way you use clever,
Shell; and as for nice—why, I shouldn't call
the sun nice, should you?”

Miss Rachel looked very thoughtful, and
made no reply.

“And now,” continued her brother presently,
“run away, like a good girl, while I
change my clothes, and then I will come down
to tea. Can Paul bring up my trunk, do you
think? It is a little one this time.'

“Paul has gone West with Marston Brent,
but there is a man here doing his work until
we can get some one, and he will, or Nancy
will.”

“No, no; not Nancy. If your man is away,
I'll fetch it up myself. No woman ever lugs
trunks or blacks boots for Israel Barstow, nor
will while he has the use of his own arms
and legs,” said the sturdy bachelor; and Miss
Rachel hastened from the room just as her
brother laid violent hands upon the lappets
of his coat.