University of Virginia Library

34. CHAPTER XXXIV.
MRS. PENELOPE SEYMOUR.

MAGDALEN felt herself growing very nervous and
uneasy as the long train came slowly into New York,
and car after car was detached and drawn away by
horses. She was in the last of all, and was feeling very forlorn
and homesick and half inclined to cry, just as a voice by the
door asked: “Is Miss Lennox, from Belvidere, here?”

There was reassurance in the tone of the voice, and reassurance
in the expression of the frank, open face of the young
man, who, as Magdalen rose from her seat, came quickly to
her side, and doffing his hat, said: “Miss Lennox, I presume?
I am Guy Seymour, Aunt Pen's nephew, or as she would tell

you, her husband's nephew, and she has kept me in a constant
state of worry the entire day on your account. I was at the
depot at least an hour before there was any possible hope of
the train, and as you are an hour behind, that makes two hours
I have waited, so you see I have done my duty. Allow me to
take your satchel and umbrella. You haven't a bandbox, have
you?”

The comical look in the saucy brown eyes, which turned
upon Magdalen, betrayed the fact that he was quizzing her a
little. But Magdalen did not mind it. She felt a kind of
security with him, and liked him at once in spite of the bandbox
thrust.

“This way, please; perhaps you'd better take my arm,” he
said, as he made his way through the crowd to a carriage, which
was waiting for him.

When once fairly seated, Magdalen had leisure to study her
vis-à-vis more closely. He was apparently twenty-five or
twenty-six years of age, a young man who had seen a great deal
of fashion and society, and who still retained about him a certain
air of frankness and candor and simplicity, which opened
a way for him at once to every stranger's heart. There was
something in the wave of his hair and the cast of his head which
reminded Magdalen of Roger, and made her feel as if she had
found a friend. He was inclined to be quite sociable, and after
exhausting the weather, he said to her, “You are from Belvidere,
I believe? Do you know a Mr. Irving there, the one
who has so recently come into a fortune?”

Magdalen looked quickly up, and her face was scarlet as she
replied, “I know him, yes. Is he an acquaintance of yours?”

“I was two years behind him in college, but sophs and seniors
are as widely apart as the poles. I wonder if he is greatly
improved. I used to think him a kind of a prig.”

“I may as well start with a right understanding at once,”
Magdalen thought, and she answered a little haughtily. “Mr.
Frank Irving is a friend of mine. I have known him ever since
I can remember. Millbank is the only home I have ever had.”

Magdalen thought her companion came near whistling in his
surprise, and she felt sure that he was regarding her more curiously
than he had done before, while for some reason he seemed
more attentive and polite, and by the time the St. Denis was
reached, she felt as if she had known him months instead of a
brief half hour.

“You must not mind if you find Aunt Pen a little stiff at
first. She has a great deal of starch in her composition,” he
said as he ran up the stairs and down the hall in the direction
of No. —.

And stiff, indeed, Magdalen did find Aunt Pen, as the nephew
called her. A little, short, straight, square-backed woman of
sixty or thereabouts, with iron-gray hair, arranged in puffs
around her forehead, — a proud, haughty, wrinkled face, and
round bright eyes, which seemed to look straight through Magdalen
as Guy ushered her into the room.

“Miss Lennox, Auntie Pen,” he said, and taking Magdalen
by the arm he led her up to his aunt, who felt constrained to
offer her jewelled hand, but who did it in such a way that Magdalen
felt the conventional gulf there was between them in the
lady's mind, and winced under it.

“I hope you'll order dinner at once,” Guy continued. “The
train was an hour behind, and Miss Lennox is fearfully tired.
I'll ring myself,” and he touched the bell rope while Mrs. Seymour
was saying something about being glad to see Miss Lennox,
and hoping she was not very tired.

Oh how strange and lonely Magdalen felt, when at last she
was alone in her room for a few moments, while she arranged
her hair and made herself more presentable for dinner! The
windows looked out into a dreary court, and tears sprang to
Magdalen's eyes as she felt the contrast between these dingy
brick walls and that damp, moudly pavement, and the fresh
green grass and wealth of flowers and shrubbery and forest
trees which for years had been hers to gaze upon. Suppose she
was to live at the St. Denis for years, and to occupy that room
into which the sun never penetrated. And for aught she knew,

such was to be her fate. She had made no inquiries as to
where she was to live, whether in city or country, hotel or
private house. Her orders were to come to the St. Denis, and
there she was, and her heart was aching with homesickness, and
a longing to be away,—not at Millbank, but with Roger, wherever
he was. With him was home and happiness and rest, such as
Magdalen felt she should never find again. But it would not
do now to indulge in feelings like these. There was dinner
waiting for her, as Guy's cheery voice announced outside her
door. “Never mind stopping to dress to-night. It won't pay,
and Aunt Pen don't expect it. She is dressed enough for both,”
he said; then he went away, and Magdalen heard him whistling
a part of a favorite opera, and felt glad and grateful that at the
very outset of her career she had met Guy Seymour to smooth
away the rough places for her as he was doing in more ways
than she knew of, or ever would know. To him she owed it
that she was not left to find her way alone from the depot to the
hotel.

“There is no need of your going for her. People of her class
can always find their way,” his aunt had said to him in the
morning, when he asked what time she expected her Yankee
school-ma'am to arrive, saying he wished to know so as to have
nothing in the way of his going up to meet her.

To his aunt's suggestion that “people of her class could
usually find their way,” he gave one of his pet whistles, and said,

“How do you know she is one of the `people of her class?'
And supposing she is, she is a woman, and young and possibly
good looking, and New York is an awful place for a young, good-looking
woman to land in, an entire stranger. So, ma chère
auntie, I shall meet her just as I should want some chap of a
Guy Seymour to meet my sister if I had one. And, auntie, I
beg of you to unbend a little, and try to make her feel at home.
I've no doubt she'll be as homesick as I was the first time I
ever visited you when I was a boy, and cried so hard to go
home that I vomited up that quart of green gooseberries I had
eaten surreptitiously out in the garden. Do you remember it?'

And so kind-hearted Guy had his way, and when he told
Magdalen that his aunt had kept him in a constant worry on
her account, he had reference to a widely different state of
affairs from what his words implied and what he meant they
should imply. He had been fighting for her all day and insisting
that if she was a lady she should be treated as a lady, and
when he met her at the depot, he felt that he had been wholly
right in the course he had pursued.

She was a lady, and pretty, too, as nearly as he could judge
through the drab veil which covered her face. The veil was
off when she came out to dinner, and Guy, who met her at the
door and conducted her to the table, started a little to see how
beautiful and graceful she was, and how like a queen she bore
herself toward his aunt, who took her in now, from her black,
shining hair to the sweep and cut of her fashionable travelling
dress.

“That is last spring's style. It must have been made in
New York,” was Mrs. Seymour's mental comment, and she felt
a growing respect for one whose dress bore so unmistakably the
New York stamp upon it.

She was dressed in satin, — soft, French gray satin, — whose
heavy folds stood out from her slender figure and covered up
the absence of hoops, which she never wore. There was a point
lace coiffure on her head and point lace at her throat and wrists,
and diamonds on her fat white hands, and she looked to the
full a lady of the high position and blood which she professed,
and she was very kind to Magdalen, albeit there was a certain
stiffness in her manner which would have precluded the slightest
approach to anything like familiarity had Magdalen attempted
it.

Evidently there was something about Magdalen which riveted
her attention, for she omitted no opportunity for looking at her
when Magdalen did not know it, and at certain turns of the
head and flashes of the large, restless eyes which sometimes
met hers so suddenly, she found herself perplexed and bewildered,
and wondering when or where she had seen eyes like

these whose glance she did not like to meet, but which nevertheless
kept flashing upon her, and then turning quickly away.
Guy, too, caught now and then a familiar likeness to something
seen before; but it was not in the eyes or the turn of the
head, — it was more in the expression of the mouth and the
smile which made Magdalen so beautiful, while there was something
in the tone of her voice like another voice which in all the
world made the sweetest music for him. He knew of whom
Magdalen reminded him, though the faces of the two were no
more alike than a brilliant rose and a fair, white water-lily.
Still the sight of Magdalen and the silvery ring of her voice
brought the absent one very near to him, and made him still
kinder and more attentive to the young girl whose champion he
had undertaken to be.

“Is it still your intention to leave New York to-morrow, or
will you give Miss Lennox a day in the city for sight-seeing?
I dare say she would like it better than plunging at once into
that solitude of rocks and hills and running rills,” Guy said to
his aunt, who replied: “I had intended to leave to-morrow. I
am beginning to long for the solitude, as you call it, and unless
Miss Lennox is very anxious to see the city —”

“Of course she is. Every young girl wants to see the Park
and Broadway and the picture galleries, especially if she has
never been in New York before. But I beg your pardon, Miss
Lennox; for aught I know you were born here.”

Magdalen had been a close listener to the conversation between
the aunt and nephew, and gathered from it that her
destination was the country, and she was not to live in the
noisy city, which would seem to dreary to her from contrast
with the gayeties of last winter, when she was there under very
different auspices. She had no desire to see Broadway, or the
Park, or the pictures. She had seen them all, with Roger as
her escort, and they would look so differently now. So to Mr.
Seymour's suggestion that she was possibly born in New York,
she replied:

“I was here last winter, and saw, I think, all there is worth

seeing. I would rather go at once to `the rocks and hills and
running rills.' I feel most at home with nature.”

She flashed a bright smile on Guy, who felt his blood tingle a
little, while his aunt thought, “I knew her clothes were made in
New York;” then to Magdalen she said, “I have many acquaintances
in the city. Possibly you may have met some of
them, if you were in society.”

She laid great stress upon the last two words, and Magdalen
colored, while Guy, who saw his aunt's drift, said laughingly,
“Don't pray drive Miss Lennox into telling whether she was a
belle or a student, copying some picture, or perfecting herself
in music. You'll be asking next if she knew the Dagons and
Draggons, whom not to know is to be nobody indeed.”

He spoke sarcastically now, and Magdalen's face was scarlet,
though she could not help laughing at his allusion to the “Dagons
and Draggons” whom she had met, and so was not lacking
in that accomplishment. She knew it was very natural that
Mrs. Seymour should wish to know something of her antecedents,
and she said, “I was not here to copy pictures. I
came with friends, and saw, I suppose, what is called society;
at least I met the Dagons and Draggons, if that is any proof.
I was chaperoned by Mrs. Walter Irving, of whom you may
have heard.”

“Mrs. Walter Scott Irving, of Lexington avenue,” Mrs. Seymour
exclaimed; “I have heard of her. Are you a relative of
hers?”

“No, madam, not a relative. I was adopted by her husband's
half brother, Mr. Roger Irving, when I was a very little
child. He was as kind to me as if I had been his sister. I
have always lived at Millbank, and always intended to live
there until circumstances occurred which made it desirable for
me to seek a home elsewhere and earn my own livelihood.
There was found a later will than the one proven at the time
of Squire Irving's death, and by virtue of that will Mr. Roger's
nephew, Frank, came into possession of the estate, and Roger
went away, while I preferred not to be dependent.”

She had told all of her history which it was necessary to tell,
and after a little more conversation she bade her new acquaintance
good-night and retired to her room.

“Well, Guy, what do you think of her?” Mrs. Seymour said,
coming to her nephew's side.

“I think she's splendid,” he replied; “but who the deuce is
it she looks like? She has evidently been as delicately brought
up as Alice herself. It's the finding of that will which has
turned her adrift upon the world, no doubt, and I pity her, for
she is every inch a lady; and, Aunt Pen, don't for gracious,
sake put on airs with her, as if you were the great Mogul, and
she some Liliputian. Remember from what a height she has
fallen! Think of her knowing the Dagons and Draggons!”

He was teazing her now, but however much of a scapegrace
she might think him to be, Auntie Pen was pretty sure to consider
and follow his advice, and the next morning she was very
polite to Magdalen, and offered of her own accord to stay another
day in New York if she liked, saying Guy should drive
them to the Park, or wherever she wished to go. But Magdalen
longed to be out of the city, and an hour or two after breakfast
the carriage came round to take them to the train.

Mrs. Seymour had not been very communicative with regard
to Beechwood, the place to which they were going. She had
said merely that it was on the Hudson. That it was her niece
who was the invalid; that they had been some years abroad;
that the house was very pleasant; that for certain reasons they
saw but little company; and then had asked abruptly if Miss
Lennox was nervous. Guy, who was not to accompany them,
had asked the same question in connection with something he
was saying of Beechwood, but Magdalen did not heed the question
then, or attach to it any importance. She was very anxious
to be off, and was glad when, at last, the car began to move,
and she knew she was leaving New York.

It was a warm, still day in early October, and Magdalen enjoyed
the ride along the beautiful river, and was sorry when at
last it came to an end, and she was left standing on the same

platform where, years before, another young girl had stood
looking about her, half sadly, half regretfully, and wishing herself
away. It was a different carriage now which was waiting
for the travellers, — a new, stylish carriage, drawn by two
beautiful horses, which would have driven Frank Irving wild,
and John, the coachman, in high-crowned hat and white
gloves, was very deferential to Mrs. Seymour, and touched his
hat to Magdalen, and saw them both into the carriage, and
then, closing the door, mounted to his seat, and started up the
mountain road, over which Alice Grey had ridden many a
time, for it was to her that Magdalen was going. She knew it
at last, for as they rode up the mountain side she said to Mrs.
Seymour:

“I do not think you have told me the name of your niece. I
have heard you call her Alice, and that is all I know of her.”

“Surely, you must excuse me,” Mrs. Seymour replied; “I
thought I had told you that her name was Alice Grey. You
may have heard of her from Mr. Irving. We met him abroad,
and again in New York.”

“Yes, I have heard of her,” Magdalen replied, her face
flushing, and her heart beating rapidly as she thought of the
strange Providence which was leading her to one of whom she
had heard so much, and of whom when a little girl she had been
so jealous.

“Hers is a most lovely character, and you are sure to like
her,” Mrs. Seymour continued. “She has been sorely tried.
We are all sorely tried. You told me, I think, that you were
not nervous?”

This was the second time she had put the question to Magdalen,
who was not now quite so certain of her nerves as she had
been when the question was asked her before; but Mrs. Seymour
did not wait for an answer, for just then they came in
sight of the house, which she pointed out to Magdalen, who
thought of Millbank as she rode through the handsome grounds
and caught glimpses of the river in the distance. The carriage
stopped at last at a side door, and conducting Magdalen into a

little reception-room Mrs. Seymour asked the servant who met
them, “where Miss Grey was?”

Magdalen could not hear the answer, it was so low; but she
saw a cloud on Mrs. Seymour's brow and divined that something
was wrong.

“Show Miss Lennox to her room, the one next to my
niece's,” the lady said, and Magdalen followed the girl to a
large upper room the windows of which looked out upon the
river and the country beyond.

It was very pleasant there, and Magdalen threw off her hat
and shawl and was just seating herself by the window for a better
view of the charming prospect, when there came a gentle
knock at her door, and a sweet musical voice said softly,
“Please, may I come in?”