University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER X.

After Kreutzner left him Norman hastened
home, and employed an hour in writing several
brief letters, and making notes of certain arrangements

which he desired to have attended to, in case
of the event he anticipated. Having finished these
duties, he resolved to call on Miss Temple; a melancholy
satisfaction which, while the party of the
preceding evening rendered it necessary, was peculiarly
in consonance with his own feelings. Accordingly
he once more bent his steps up Broadway,
and almost the first persons he met were Mr.
Romain and his daughter, in their carriage. The
beautiful girl bowed her nodding plumes to him
with that same dangerous smile to which, if report
spoke truth, he, in common with many an unwary
swain, had ventured too near. At a word from Mr.
Romain, the coachman drew in his horses near the
sidewalk, and a motion from Rosalie arrested his
steps.

“Well, Mr. Philosopher,” she said, gayly and
familiarly, “how does your wisdom hold out after
such a night of worldly pleasure?”

“Failing—vanished and gone,” he said, with
animation.

“Come, Leslie,” exclaimed the old gentleman,
“we are about, after one or two turns, calling on
the Temples, and—”

“And as pa is no `philosopher,' and I am a sad
hand at the business, we beg Mr. Leslie's company.”

“With pleasure,” cried Leslie; and in a few
minutes he was rolling rapidly along towards the
mansion.

“Mr. Leslie,” said Miss Romain, after a brief
silence, “do you know that you are very dull today,
and very—”

“Stupid,” said Leslie, rousing himself from his
revery. “Guilty—guilty,” he continued, gayly,
“and I put myself upon your mercy.”

“These women, Mr. Leslie,” said Mr. Romain,

“imagine all who talk nonsense fluently to be men
of parts, and all who think more than they speak
to be stupid—”

“No, pa—no,” said Rosalie, “I am fully aware,”
and her eyes crossed those of Leslie, “that a gentleman
may be a stupid companion to ladies without
being actually a stupid gentleman.”

“True,” added Norman; “Miss Romain is
right. All mankind, and womankind too, value
things according to their power upon their own
happiness. A Newton or a Galileo, listless, and
wrapped up in the solitude of his own meditations;
would meet, and would merit, less favour and cooler
welcome from a lady than the youth who joined her
in music, who sat by her side while she drew, who
spoke to her in a language congenial to her taste,
and who awoke in her images more interesting than
the stars or mathematics.”

“That is right,” Mr. Leslie; “I would rather
have a sweet bird for a companion than a philosopher;”
she glanced her eyes again, half archly,
half reproachfully, at Norman; “for a bird comes
at my call—feeds from my hand—sings for me the
warbles I have taught him—loves me only, and
nestles in my bosom.”

“Phoo, child, nonsense,” said Mr. Romain;
“men cannot always be chatting to girls. They
have other matters in hand. They are involved in
reflections upon business or science.”

“Old men, pa, like you, who have already wives
and daughters; but the young gentlemen are not—
or, at least,” with another slight look and emphasis,
“ought not to be so forgetful.”

“Stuff, girl, stuff,” answered the old gentleman,
bluntly; “aged men or young, in these times, have
enough else to do than to flutter and chirp about

women. The wisest do not most excel in the
parrot-talk of fashionable life.”

“Parrot-talk,—why, pa!—Why, Mr. Leslie!
how can you sit there, like an owl, and hear such
calumnies on yourself, and me, and all our friends!
As soon as gentlemen are married, and settled in
life, they think all talk `parrot-talk' that is not
about commerce and politics.”

“You are both right and both wrong,” replied
Norman: “you, Miss Romain, to judge so harshly
of all men who are not versed in the easy elegance
of the drawing-room, and your father in too great
lenity towards men of sense, who, in the pride of
learning, and in the importance of their various
avocations, forget what is due to woman, even
though she be not wife, mother, or sister; for,
after all, we must acknowledge that, although she
does nothing at our elections, and can neither build
nor command our ships, yet she exerts a greater
influence upon our happiness than they who can—”

The young lady clapped her hands in affected
delight.

“There, pa! Do you hear that? Now you see
a little severity upon these sensible men is very
useful. See what a pretty piece of eloquence I
have lashed out of Mr. Leslie.”

The young lady went on with her usual liveliness.
Sometimes she found in the huge omnibuses,
of which large numbers traversed the town in all
directions, loaded often with ten, fifteen, or twenty
people, an object of merriment. Never had Norman
known her to rattle on more unceasingly and
more gayly. There was Miss L—, who had
rejected thirty gentlemen actually already, at Washington,
during the present session: her character
was dissected in ten words. There was Mr. R—,
the author, turning the corner, whose new poem

she had just been reading, and which she criticised
with wit and judgment. Her father, a plain and
blunt man, rarely said much, and suffered her to run
on from topic to topic as wildly as she pleased. In
truth, she never appeared to Norman more like the
singular girl she really was than on this day. She
combined the most diametrically opposite features
of character. At one time appearing contemptible
and disagreeable; at another, amiable, elegant, and
delightful. With great intelligence, she was eccentric,
and at times shallow; with much sensibility
and temporary feeling, she was capable of committing
the most deliberately cruel and heartless
actions where the impulse seized her. No one, in
theory, was more alive to the sense of right, and
all the distinctions and shades of moral character.
No one could deliver more fine sentiments; yet,
in practice, she forgot all the rules which embellished
her conversation. She was afflicted, too,
with the mania for display. That passion weakened,
hid, and, at last, nearly swallowed up all the
rest. But for that, her character was not without
much to excite esteem. But esteem was too homely
a reward for her taste: she must create a sensation;
she must hear the murmur of applause;
behold the gaze of admiration; and detect the
glance of envy. She was ambitious, by her personal
charms and the allurements of her address,
to attract attention from all about her; particularly
from those the “daily beauty” of whose lives rebuked
her meretricious accomplishments. From
violations of strict propriety she advanced to those
of delicacy, though none could more sincerely
shudder at the approach of vice. Alas! she had
yet to learn that the path from the road of virtue
does not boldly strike out at once, but that its early
deviations are scarcely perceptible: that it conducts
the unsuspecting traveller many times aside
through the most enchanting prospects, and returns
her again safely to the right road, before it stretches
away at last to the fatal precipice, from whose brink
retreat is vain. She was sufficiently artful, too, to
trespass, both in dress and manners, over the
boundary line of modest decorum; but in a degree
so imperceptible, as to pass well enough among
her indulgent flatteres for commendable grace and
innocent unconsciousness. She thus succeeded in
securing the admiration of a host of lovers, but
she had long since forfeited the respect of Norman
Leslie. Her evident hints to him, and her rather
open compliments, at this solemn crisis of his life,
struck him very unfavourably.

“The siren,” he thought, as she leaned familiarly
over towards him, with more than the unrestrained
carelessness of a favoured sister: “these
are the women who lower the sex. Can they be
all thus? The sweet unconsciousness and irrepressible
spirits of Flora, that careless, happy girl
—can they be affected?”

He remembered Julia. Her he knew—her he
loved; and her image re-established that confidence
in woman which such as Miss Romain are too apt
to undermine.

Miss Romain appeared conscious of the unfavourable
effect which her usual artifices had produced
on Norman, and gradually elevated the tone
of her manner and conversation: and, when she
pleased, she could be really a charming companion.

The carriage stopped at Mrs. Temple's, and the
party were ushered into the presence of the ladies.
Norman was surprised to find the count there; and
apparently interested in conversation with Flora;
who looked, at least in Norman's eyes, beautiful
beyond herself. A slight colour overspread her

cheeks. Miss Romain thought it sprung from the
sudden sight of Leslie. Norman presumed it had
been called up by the previous conversation of the
count. The customary formalities were performed.
Norman bowed loftily to his now deadly foe, when
the latter stepped forward with an easy air, and,
extending his own, shook the hand of Leslie with
the careless ease of friendship. Never had he appeared
more gay and self-possessed. Indeed, all
the party were unusually animated; while Norman,
with a heart of lead, strove in vain to throw
off his gloom.

It was now that, with the unrestrained license
of imagination, he acknowledged, and painted in
the most lively colours, his love for Flora; nor
could he help once or twice, when their eyes met,
betraying with their wordless language the affection
of his soul. After one of these looks, hastily
withdrawn, as if the heart feared the treachery of
the eyes, Count Clairmont casually uttered a sentiment
evidently directed to Flora, and implying
by his air and manner, perhaps more than by his
words, that he was on familiar terms with her as a
favoured lover. It shot through Norman's ear and
heart; and, forgetful of his restraint, with a cloud
of melancholy on his brow, and a thought that a
few hours would relieve him from a proud and
unrequited love, he looked towards her again, and
once more fully and unequivocally caught her
glance. If ever woman's eyes had meaning, that
glance said, “Dear Norman, believe it not! I love
only you.” For one instant their gaze rested and
clung together, the delicious sense of vision entering
with a heavenly power into each other's hearts
and minds—an embrace of souls, perfectly returned,
perfectly understood, and steeped in the confidence,
the bliss, the enchantment of mutual love.

The blood leaped to the cheek and temple of the
before desponding youth; his heart ached, his soul
trembled with the shock of delight. “She loves
me!” he inwardly exclaimed, with such exquisite
happiness as he had never before known; and, as
much changed as if suddenly relieved from the
malign influence of a vile enchanter, and lifted into
the protection of some blessed spirit, he entered at
once into the conversation with more than his usual
ardour. But such ethereal gleams of joy shine on
mortals only with a transient brightness.

“Norman,” cried Miss Romain, coming suddenly
round to him, and putting her arm unconsciously
across his chair, so as to bring it nearly
around his shoulder. This was the first time she
had ever called him “Norman.” He would have
withdrawn, but she whispered in his ear—

“I have just heard a most profound secret.”

“What?”

“Flora Temple—”

“What of her?”—he asked eagerly, off his
guard, and forgetting his distant manner.

“She is engaged to be married in two months”
—and again, according to her frequent custom, she
placed her lips to his face, so close as nearly to
touch his cheek—“to Count Clairmont.”

What a vast fabric of bliss dissolved in a moment!
What a mighty world of gayety and splendour
quenched in the blackest night!

“Pray, what is all this whispering about?” said
Flora; but her manner was changed, and ill at
ease. “Miss Romain, I have to beg the pleasure
of your company to-morrow evening to a little musical
party.”

“Oh, delightful, delightful!” answered the gay
girl, with a secret triumph at the havoc which she
felt instinctively she had made.

“And Mr. Leslie,” said Flora, “will do us the
favour—”

“I cannot promise,” replied Norman, coolly.
“To-morrow evening I shall be necessarily absent.”

“Well, sir, just as you please; if you can find
leisure from more agreeable occupations, we shall
bid you welcome. Come, gentlemen,” she continued,
“you are all to contribute something, as
well as the ladies, towards the entertainment.
Count, you shall sing those beautiful airs of yours;
Miss Romain, the harp; and—Mr. Leslie, do you
not sing?”

“Why, you have heard him frequently,” said
Miss Romain: “how forgetful!”

“True, true; I beg his pardon—I had forgotten.”

“Let me tell you, in a duet,” resumed Miss
Romain, “he has few competitors.”

“Are you practised in any with him?”

“Oh, a whole host!” cried Miss Romain.
“There's `Dear maid, by every hope of bliss,'—
`By Love's first pledge, the virgin kiss,' your favourite,
you know, Norman—”

They were interrupted by the count, who, seating
himself at the piano, ran his fingers over the
chords, and sung with great taste a French air—
directly at Miss Temple. It was expressive of
successful love, and called forth “a beautiful” from
every lip. Flora received it with a gracious admiration;
that, while in reality it might spring from
wounded pride or love, and that retaliating propensity
which perhaps not only woman, but all the
victims of either sex, have experienced under the
operation of the capricious little deity, who transforms
character as he does all other worldly circumstances,
still went to the heart of Norman.

“I am, as the French say, quite desolé about
this,” said Flora, holding in her hand a small manuscript
piece of music. “It is the most touching
and plaintive air I ever heard; but is without
words. It has the melancholy pathos of a last
adieu. I should fancy, now, that some lover—
some passionate, faithful, chivalric lover—full of
distant pride and timid delicacy, and doubtful of
his mistress's favour, had sung it to her in the great
hall, with his minstrel harp—with `sandal shoon
and scallop shell.' I will bestow my thanks upon
any one who will supply appropriate words. Come,
count, your pen has been idle too long.”

“Why, Norman,” cried Miss Romain, “you
know this little air. It is the sweet morceau from
Rosini, which you admire so much.”

“But is Mr. Leslie an improvisatore?” asked
Flora.

“I assure you,” answered Miss Romain, with
an ostentatious blush, “I know it by many evidences;
and I am certain he will not refuse me
one more.”

“I fear,” cried Norman, “the subject is beyond
my comprehension.”

“If I dare ask, after Miss Romain has pleaded
unsuccessfully,” said Miss Temple, with a sarcasm
foreign from her nature, and very unusual in her;
but she perceived instantly she had given pain, and,
with another of those looks which from such eyes,
vibrate along the nerves of the lover with tremours
of heaven, she added, “Come, Mr. Leslie, it is my
first request.”

“Give it me,” said Norman; “I will—I will
try; and it shall be my last effort at poetry.”

Impulse, which so often betrays into dilemmas,
sometimes conducts to points which sober dulness
would never think of reaching. In a few moments

Norman availed himself of a pause in the conversation,
and addressed Flora:—

“Miss Temple, at your request, and on the hint
of your imagination, I have thrown together a few
lines, superficial and imperfect of course; but, as
the last effort, they may be pardoned any fault.
You are to suppose, then, exactly the circumstances
suggested by yourself. A fair lady is beloved
by a knight, who doubts, perhaps with too much
cause, whether his mistress approves, or even
knows his attachment. On the eve of a fierce battle,
in which he feels a certain presentiment that
he must fall, he ventures, what before he had never
by word or look ventured, to express a part of his
feelings to the lady. She listens coldly—applauds
without understanding; for she knows not that the
humble minstrel is a knight who loves her, and
who stands on the brink of danger. Thus eluding
his purpose, she suffers him to depart from her
presence, quite unconscious of their import and
their application, till the subsequent day, when she
hears that the gentle minstrel was a true knight,
and that the lips which breathed music and love to
her averted ear now lie cold in the earth.”

“And what then?” cried Flora, unconsciously
betraying her interest in the fiction.

“I do but jest, Miss Temple,” said Norman.
“Such events have often occurred, and will again.
How ladies feel when too late aware of faithful
love, cherished for them against hope by the unhappy,
must depend upon them.”

He raised his glance to her once more, and once
more their eyes met. Miss Romain, uneasy at
this communion, whether intentional or accidental,
exclaimed—

“I dare pronounce that the false creature smiled
just over his grave, as she had done on his living

love, and wedded, peradventure, the warrior who
slew him.”

“And I,” said Flora, “that she had loved him
all the while in secret; and, plunged in sudden
anguish at his fate, withdrew from the world, and
devoted herself to Heaven. That is the way,” she
added, with a smile, “in all those old stories.”

What passing shadow is too light for the aliment
of love? As in the visions of the sleeper the most
improbable and opposite fragments of adventures
sweep on and mingle together, changing and shifting
with a facility that renders all probable and
real, now leading the spirit along skyish cliffs and
endless oceans, through storms, deserts, battles,
and death, and now melting into gardens, bowers,
music, and bliss, so the victim of Cupid, however
sober and sensible his mind may be in sanity, now
finds the surrounding world breaking apart, and
blending together with mighty and incredible revolutions—the
vastest impossibilities at once within
his grasp, the most trivial commonplaces grown
vast and impossible.

Norman, who one moment before saw the bolt
of destruction fall on his hope, now—by the tone
of a voice, the beam of a pair of tender eyes, by
some half-unrepressed meaning in a word or an
attitude—saw piles of gorgeous hopes, heaven-kissing
mountains of joy, peer up before him, as he
listened to the simple and sweet conjectures of the
lovely girl. Without further preface, he begged
her to accompany him; for though quite without
the rapid execution of Rosalie, as often happens in
similar persons, she was infinitely her superior in
the intuitive power, taste, and feeling of an accompaniment.
All felt curiosity to hear the lines;
and as Flora ran over a sweet and plaintive prelude,
her countenance, half flung back over her

shoulder as she played, was raised towards his
face, and in a rich sweet voice he sang the following
lines:—

I.

II.

III.

There was something in Norman's manner and
appearance at all times high and commanding; but,
at the moment of his pronouncing the last line, his
tall form and noble features were so strongly expressive
of melancholy yet lofty emotion, so regardless
of all disguise and all propriety, that every
one present, except the gentle girl herself, felt instinctively
that he loved her devotedly. Even she,
as he thanked her for the sweetness with which
she had accompanied him, saw in his eyes a humid
brightness, and betrayed embarrassment and softness

unusual to her. The colour on her cheek,
higher and warmer than he had ever seen it before,
told a tale that made each glance of Norman's a
sweet and giddy rapture. Miss Romain again
hastened to interrupt an interview which, although
enjoyed in the presence of so many, was thus, by
the natural freemasonry of love, invested with half
the dear charm and confidence of a tête-à-tête.
The count, in turn, sat down at the piano, with a
jest and a compliment to Rosalie, and struck the
keys to a merry and brilliant French air, as if to
break the train into which the thoughts and feelings
of all seemed to have fallen.

Old Mr. Romain had kept Mrs. Temple busily
conversing in a distant corner of the adjoining room.
As they entered, Norman remembered the necessity
of his departure, took his leave, and with a
swelling heart regarded Flora, into whose sweet
blue eyes he might never look again.

But Fortune, who in some moods refuses what
mortals deem their simple rights, and in others
grants far beyond their expectations, now bestowed
upon the youth the precise blessing which, of all
others, at this moment he most earnestly desired.
A servant entered and informed Miss Temple that
her father wished to speak with her in the library.
Scarcely believing his own eyes, and while the rest
were absorbed in conversation together, Leslie saw
Flora rise, disentangle herself from the group, and
follow him into the hall. Some accident closed
the door behind her. They stood together—alone.