University of Virginia Library

20. CHAPTER XX.
THE BALL.

Francia's letter, among more important items, contained the announcement
that Mr. Chilton's only brother, a lad of sixteen years, and a midshipman in the
United States Navy, had just arrived at home from a long cruise, and was about
to set off upon another.

Between the two, he had so strong a desire to be introduced to his brother's
fiancée, that Mr. Chilton had taken the liberty to invite him to Bonniemeer for
a night, and they would arrive the day after the letter. Nothing could be more
fortunately timed than this visit, as Francia immediately declared; for, besides
providing her with an escort of her own, it would give the visitors an opportunity
of seeing a phase of society to which they had probably never been introduced.

Her father and Neria acquiesced in what seemed to give her so much pleasure,
although neither of them could feel any great delight in the prospect of seeing
Ralfe Chilton, or extending their acquaintance with his family.

With careful hospitality, however, Vaughn sent his carriage to Carrick to
meet the coach upon the ensuing afternoon, and the two young men arriving in
time for tea, were informed of their prospective amusement, and then left in the
library to be entertained by Mr. Vaughn, while the ladies went up to dress.

Chilton, whose boasted self-possession and sang-froid were always severely
tried by the presence of his prospective father-in-law, fell into the mistake of
many young men, in supplying the place of ease by audacity, and told stories,
made jests, and asked questions, until Vaughn's glacial politeness froze him

into sudden silence, and the host, turning to his other guest, kindly questioned
him of his voyage, of his fancies for sea or land, and showed himself so thoroughly
master of one of the most difficult arts in the world —that of conducting
a conversation between a boy and a man—that Ned Chilton afterward declared
to his brother that his “governor-to-be was just the jolliest old brick there was
going.”

The door opened to admit, first, Neria, looking like the spirit of the mist, in
her dun-colored barege and green ribbons, then Francia, radiant in a diaphanous
white tulle and coquettish little bows of violet ribbon that contrasted well with
her clear complexion and sparkling eyes.

Chilton went to meet her, and his whispered admiration did not lessen the
bloom he admired or soothe the flutter of spirits in little Francia's heart.

The midshipman stood afar off and gazed, his heart filled with a boy's admiration
of beauty, his mind perturbed with a boy's wish to say something expressive
of that admiration, and a boy's terror of making himself ridiculous by
attempting it.

Neria did not know more of boys than she did of men, but a graceful instinct
led her to his side.

“You are not surprised at your brother's choice?” asked she, smiling, as
she followed his eyes.

“In his place, I shouldn't have been able to make a choice,” said the midshipman,
gallantly, although blushing scarlet while he spoke, and ready the next
instant to bite his tongue through lest he had been too forward.

Neria was a little surprised, but smiled unaffectedly.

“You sailors learn flattery with navigation, I believe,” said she. “Have
you been long at sea?”

Ned, following this lead, launched into his nautical adventures, and by the
time the carriage was announced, was quite at his ease, although suffering a
slight relapse under the doubt whether he should offer his arm to Mrs. Vaughn,
or leave that privilege to her husband. The question was solved by Neria herself,
who, while still speaking to him, quietly slipped her hand under Vaughn's
arm, and thus doubly attended, followed Francia, who was already seated in the
carriage.

When the party from Bonniemeer reached the Mermaid's Cave, still kept by
our friend Burroughs, now a widower, they found the festivities in full progress.
Prisoned in a gallery at one end of the large, low ball-room, sat the orchestra,
consisting of the two violins and a bass viol which, on Sundays, officiated in the
village choir. The area of the hall was well filled with a joyous company, the
ladies as smartly dressed as their wardrobes would allow, the swains varying in
costume, from swallow-tailed dress-coats with brass buttons to the more becoming
blue flannel shirt and belted trowsers—the fisherman's ordinary dress. A
prevailing atmosphere of fish and good humor was very apparent, slightly vitiated
in certain cases by the use of a perfume composed of musk and bergamot,
popular, under various titles, among the less enlightened classes of the community.

“O-h!” crowed Francia, clasping her hands over Chilton's arm. “Isn't it
charming? O, see that man shuffle, and oh, do look at that girl opposite him.”

“Barnum ought to get hold of the whole affair and set it up in Broadway.
It would draw immensely,” replied the young gentleman, fixing his eye-glass
upon his nose and coolly surveying the scene.

Mr. Vaughn turned round quickly.

“Francia!” said he in a sterner voice than she had often heard from him.
“Let me beg you to make no more remarks of this sort. These people are our
neighbors and well-wishers; they are in their own quarters and enjoying themselves
in their own way. If we come among them at all, it must be as a civility,
not as an insult.”

A deliberate look into Mr. Chilton's face pointed the rebuke, and when
Vaughn quietly led the way to the upper end of the hall, Francia and her lover
mutely followed. Here the party was welcomed by Jonas Merton and Cephas
Wild, the hearty master of the schooner Mary Ann, bound for the Banks upon
the ensuing day, and acting meantime as second manager to the grand ball given
in honor of the expedition.

These gentlemen Mr. Vaughn presented to his wife and daughter, and requested
for himself an introduction to some of the young ladies who sat near.
In these introductions Mr. Chilton and his brother shared, and the midshipman,
resolved not to lose any of his opportunities, immediately led a partner to
the foot of a country-dance already commenced.

“If you'll pick out a dance for next time, Miss Vaughn, I'll speak to the
music about it. Anything you'd rather have, so's't we know it,” suggested Captain
Wild, who had engaged Neria as his partner.

“But your programme is arranged already, is it not?” asked she, in some
surprise.

“That don't make no difference. We'll dance anything you'd rather.”

Could the courtesy of the Tuileries go farther?

Neria expressed her appreciation of the politeness, but begged that the
dance might go on in its regular order.

“Well, next comes Fisher's Hornpipe,” said the captain, consulting a scrap of
paper in his pocket-book. “How do you fancy that for a dance, ma'am?”

Neria was forced to acknowledge that she had never seen it, and begged to
have the figure explained beforehand.

“Never see Fisher's Hornpipe! Why, don't they dance up to the city?”
asked the mariner, in amazement.

“O yes, but seldom country dances. In those crowded rooms, cotillons and
the round dances are more convenient,” replied Neria, quite seriously.

“Round dances? Why, what sort 's that?”

“Polkas, waltzes, galops, and several others. Don't you dance the polka
here?” asked Neria, almost as much surprised as the captain had been at her
ignorance of Fisher's Hornpipe.

“I don't believe there's a feller here that knows polky by sight,” said the
captain, musingly. “Like enough, some of the gals do—they sort of pick up
things, you know. But you said waltz, didn't you?”

“Yes.”

“Like enough, now,” pursued the manager, “Jim Todd can play a waltz, and
you and the Square might dance it.”

“O no,” exclaimed Neria, alarmed. “I had much rather dance what the
rest do. Please tell me about the Fisher's Hornpipe.”

“That's easy enough. It's just down the outside, down the middle, cast off
right and left, and four hands round. Stop, we'll try it on beforehand, if you
and Miss Vaughn will stand up a minute 'long o' me and Jonas. Trypheny, you
and Zeb stand up, too.”

Trypheny, a tall, handsome brunette, who had just come in with the fine-looking
young fisherman alluded to as Zeb, took her place in the impromptu set,

and received Mr. Chilton's bold look of admiration with a conscious smile and
toss of the head, which made Zeb's eyes travel wrathfully in the direction of her
coquettish glance.

“There, that's all there is to it,” said Captain Wild, after taking his partner
twice through the figure. “Now we'll show 'em how it's done.”

He led Neria to the top of the set already forming; Francia and young Merton
came next, and next to them Chilton with Trypheny, whom he had quietly
invited while she was leaning upon the arm of her lover, who had not considered
it necessary to explicitly engage her for the first dance, supposing it an already
conceded privilege. He now stood indignant and astonished just where
the faithless fair one had deserted him, watching with wrathful eyes the movements
of his rival, who, scorning the etiquette of the dance, chose to stand by
his partner while the set was forming, talking in a style of careless flattery rather
appalling, but utterly captivating to the rustic belle.

“Rafe is making a fool of that girl, and she doesn't know it,” whispered
Francia, laughingly, to Neria, who shook her head disapprovingly; while Vaughn,
who did not dance, watched the movements of the young man with an uneasy
eye.

The other set was ambitiously headed by Ned Chilton, who had secured the
prettiest girl in the room as his partner, and left two others in the full conviction
that he had rather have danced with them. The music began, and Neria,
floating up and down the long lines, and through the intricacies of “cast-off”
and right and left, with perfect grace and accuracy, seemed to shed upon the
homely dance and dancers an atmosphere of fitness and refinement not always
to be found among the dances and dancers of the salons.

“I was wrong,” thought Vaughn. “This contact does not degrade her—it
elevates them. I did injustice to the strength of her influence.”

Next came Francia, who, commencing with the gravest propriety of bearing,
found herself, before she reached the end, so carried away by the exhilarating
motion, the sharp, quick time of the melody, and the half subdued impulse of
her partner, that not Trypheny herself made the chassé down the middle so
rapidly, or reached the foot in such a state of breathless mirth.

“Take care, little girl,” whispered her father, as she returned to his side;
“don't fall into the other extreme, and be too familiar instead of too supercilious.
Watch Neria, and see how she bears herself.”

Captain Wild had no sooner seated his partner than he sought the music
gallery, and the result of his instructions to the band presently appeared in a
lively strain from the first violin, greeted by Francia with the exclamation,

“A waltz! a waltz! How perfectly splendid, only I don't care to waltz with
all these—gentlemen! Must I, papa, if they ask me?”

“I fancy there is small danger,” said Vaughn, laughing. “Captain Wild
just said there was not probably a man in the room who had ever seen a waltz,
and this one is played entirely for our benefit. Mr. Chilton is coming for you.”

“Will you waltz, Franc?” asked Chilton, approaching.

“Certainly; but tell them to play more slowly.”

The message was transmitted, and Francia floated away upon the arm of her
lover, who, however he might fail in certain traits of morality and honor, certainly
possessed the cardinal virtue of dancing, to perfection, while Francia herself
deserved the title of Terpsichore.

“Will you do me the honor, Mrs. Vaughan?” asked the midshipman, blushing
and bowing.

“Thank you, but I only waltz with Mr. Vaughn,” said Neria, in a low voice;
and Ned went to look among his new friends for some one who knew how to
waltz.

Vaughn hesitated whether he should accept the sweet intimation of a resolution
he had never imagined, and then asking himself why he should be denied
a privilege which, with most ladies, any stranger might claim, he smilingly took
his wife's hand and said, “Come, then!”

Vaughn had waltzed in Vienna to the music of the elder Strauss, and the
“ gh born” frauleins and countesses who had been his partners were wont to
assure him that he danced better than their own countrymen. With a difference,
perhaps, he did, but the difference was on the side of stateliness, and a certain
grandeur of motion, that never deserted him. The waltz is the only round
dance in which it is possible for a man to look like a hero, and the waltz was the
only round dance to which Vaughn ever committed himself. Neria's style had
also its peculiarity. In dancing, especially in waltzing, she seemed to lose her
slight affinity for earth altogether, and airily glided over the floor like a dream
of beauty, visible but immaterial.

“Lean upon my arm a little, my mist-wreath,” murmured Vaughn, drawing
her closer to his breast. “You are too much of a fairy.”

Neria glanced smiling up, and her warm, pure breath swept his cheek.
Vaughn could hardly repress the wild desire to raise her in his arms, and cover
those smiling lips with the kisses tingling on his own. With a terrible effort he
paused, and released her from his embrace. “That is enough,” said he, abruptly,
and Neria looked wonderingly into his face for the cause of the harsh change
in his tone.

“Are you dizzy?” asked she, kindly.

Vaughn recovered himself, and smiled. “It is some time since I waltzed,”
said he, “and I find it does not agree with me. I shall not try again, but if you
like it, do not hesitate to accept such partners as your taste approves. You
must not give it up because you are married.”

Neria only answered with a smile, and the music ceased.

“Take partners for chorus jig,” shouted Jonas Merton, and Captain Wild,
after a whispered word with Mr. Vaughn, presented the young fisherman called
Zeb to Francia as “Mr. Lewis,” while an aspirant for Neria's hand appeared in
the shape of an uncouth lobster-catcher, named Barrows, whose bandy legs,
crooked fingers, and beady black eyes would of themselves have suggested his
avocation. Neria, a little startled, and not a little repelled, replied to his invitation
somewhat coldly.

“Thank you, but I am rather tired, and will sit still this dance.”

A look of blank mortification displayed itself upon the lobster-catcher's face.
“'xcuse me,” said he, “for taking the liberty to ask you.”

Neria's quick feelings were touched, and she made room upon the bench beside
her. “I do not know this dance,” said she. “Chorus jig they call it, do
they not?”

“Yes'm. Like enough you'd find it kind o' rough. A body gets pritty well
tuckered out by the time they're at the bottom on 't,” said Barrows, glancing
wistfully at the vacant seat, but not daring to take it.

“Do you go away with the fishermen to-morrow?” pursued Neria, smiling
in spite of herself at the gaping look of admiration with which the lobster man
regarded her.

“No'm. I'm a lobsterer, I am.”

“Indeed? And how do you catch lobsters?”

The chorus jig was shorter than the answer of the delighted Barrows; and
before it was over, Mrs. Vaughn, with no compromise of dignity or good taste,
had secured a humble admirer for life.

Francia, meanwhile, was undergoing a somewhat startling experience. Zeb
had placed her at the head of the dance, and briefly explained the figure, part
of it, by the direction, “first lady turn second gentleman until the music is
through.” Pondering a little upon this curious phrase, Francia arrived at the
designated point in the dance, and gave both hands to a stalwart young fellow,
who, with a little smile of amazement, enveloped the dainty offering in his own
hands, as brown and hard as a well-dried side of leather. Then they turned,
and they turned again, and again, and again, and again, until Francia, dizzy, bewildered,
and somewhat indignant, was very glad of the aid of the young fisherman's
sturdy grasp in keeping her upon her feet. The next gentleman performed
the same evolution, and, finding that this was the regular order of procedure,
Francia entered into the spirit of it, and allowed herself to be twirled
as rapidly and for as long a time as the music and her opponent's strength
allowed. Arriving at the foot, she perceived, by looking up the dance, that she
had been treated with the greatest circumspection, and that the tours de force
in progress between the fishermen and their more usual partners were quite another
affair from what she had experienced. In fact, the less agile and athletic
young ladies were continually whirled off their feet, and fell either to their knees
or into the arms of the whirler, who, to do justice, was generally ready to offer
aid. One young lady, of rather diminutive stature, became so exasperated by
repeated occurrences of this nature, that upon being whirled to the floor by a
powerful young fellow, standing in relation of cousin to her, she sprang to her
feet, and inflicted a box upon his ear so heartily as to affect him to tears, and
every one else to laughter, while mademoiselle herself impartially indulged in
both.

Four-hand reels followed, and Ned Chilton won the admiration of the company
by his skill in “shuffling out the tune,” and bringing down the final stamp
on the exact turn of the measure. His only rival was his partner, Trypheny,
who, with her hands upon her slender waist, head set saucily back, and lips and
cheeks glowing scarlet, looked as Rafe Chilton found an opportunity to whisper,
“Quite too charming.” So thought Zeb Lewis, who had given up dancing and
devoted himself to communion with the green-eyed monster, who prompted him,
as the reel finished, to seek his betrothed, and emphatically inform her that if
she was ever going home with him again she had “got to go now.” Trypheny,
somewhat awed by the suppressed emotion in her lover's face, submitted to authority,
and, with one sidelong look of farewell in Mr. Chilton's direction, allowed
herself to be led away.

The party from Bonniemeer soon followed, leaving the majority of the revellers
to dance until the day dawn summoned them to their hardy toil.