University of Virginia Library

7. CHAPTER VII.

The following morning James found himself too much indisposed, from
the injuries he had received in his rencounter with Jack Brigs, to leave the
house. The effects of the blows he had received were now more sensibly
felt than at the time he received them. He therefore wrote a note to Mr.
Weldon, stating that he was not well enough to go to the counting-room
that forenoon, but without telling him the cause of his indisposition.

`Sister,' he said to Frederica, who, pale and silent, had brought his coffee
and toast to his room, where his mother sat questioning him, with maternal
anxiety, respecting his meeting with the burglar, whom he informed her was
Jack Brigs. `Frederica,' he said, kindly, `if you are quite well be so kind
as to take this note to Mr. Weldon. He is probably at his house now at
breakfast. Do you know where he lives?'

`Oh, yes,' she answered, hurriedly.

`You can take the bonnet too, sister, at the same time. Then you will
see Grace. Also learn what you can about the robbery.'

`But I am not sure it is this Miss Weldon's hat,' said she, coloring, with
a look of embarrassment.

`Do you know, dear mother? Was it Miss Grace Weldon who ordered
this bonnet?'

`I now recollect the young lady with her did call her Grace,' said Mrs.
Daily.

`I am right, you see, sister,' he said, smiling. Frederica made no reply;
but taking the note, left the room, and in a few minutes was heard to quit
the house.

`Mother, what is the matter with Frederica of late?' he said, after a few
moments thoughtful silence.

`Is any thing, James?' inquired Mrs. Daily, looking up in his face with
surprise.

`Is she perfectly well?'

`She makes no complaint of illness.'

`Yet I fear she is not well. Does n't she work too closely, and confine
herself too much?'

`Not more than I do.

`But she is young, mother; and young persons require more air and more
exercise. I hope she is well, but I think her health is delicate. I must
walk out with her round the common two or three times a week. She must
have more exercise.'

`What have you noticed in her?'

`Only that she is very nervous. The least thing excites her! Now, last
night, when I came in — to be sure I looked rather badly hurt — she went
nearly wild; and when she found I was not so much injured after all, she
wept till I thought she would weep her eyes out! She lost all command of
herself! I hope she is quite well!'

Mrs. Daily looked her son steadily in the face with a thoughtful gaze, and
an expression sad and touching passed across her countenance. The truth,
which with the quick, observant eyes of a woman, she had been suspecting
for a long time, now pressed itself upon her mind. She could see, what she
perceived was unsuspected by him, that Frederica loved him with a love
tenderer far than that a sister entertains towards a brother. She felt sorrowful
for her, at this conviction, for she saw that James had no reciprocal
feelings — that he regarded her solely and only as a sister.'

`Mother, you look very grave!'

`I am sorry you are ill, my son,' she answered, evasively, for she was unwilling
he should make a discovery of a fact, the knowledge of which would
render him unhappy. Much as it would have delighted her to have James
and Frederica, by-and-bye, married, much as this subject had dwelt upon her
thoughts in her hours of meditation, she shrunk from first suggesting it to
him now; for she had penetration enought to discern that it would be impossible
for him to love Frederica otherwise than as a sister; moreover, she
more than suspected that his affections were bestowed upon the lovely daughter
of his employer.

`I shall be better by afternoon, and be able to go down on the wharf. I am
only a little dizzy this morning. I am much better since I have eaten
something. I trust I did not badly wound Brigs. What a course of wickedness
that man has pursued!'

`What house did you see him coming out of?'

`Of Mr. Weldon's, I thought, though the window of Col. Redway's mansion
is so nigh it that it might have been his. It was one or the other. I
did not allude in my note to it, as the robbery, ere this time, is known, in
which ever house it occurred; as I met a police officer and informed him of
it, and who the robber was. Whatever the booty may have been which
Jack obtained, he got off with it, unless he was arrested after he left me.
The officer I encountered after I got up, probably has apprehended him by
this time, as they are familiar with all the haunts of men of this class. And
when I told him the name of the burglar, he answered confidently, “I know
the rogue well, and he is as good as in my hands!”'

James was too modest to inform Mr. Weldon in his note that his indisposition
was owing to his courageous efforts to detain the burglar; and moreover,
he did not like to confess that he was near the house at that hour for
the purpose of serenading his daughter; for he would naturally, thought he,
ask him how he happened there at such a crisis; and James was altogether
ignorant of the deceit of lying. If he answered at all, he could answer
only the truth as it was.

Before going with Frederica, we will turn back again to the night preceding,
and follow the mulatto, Philip Clows, after he had quitted his abode
in the precincts of Dock Square. He took the direction of Washington
street, and kept on his way with his cloak covering his mouth, and his hat
slouched down low over his brows. Whenever he passed a lamp he would
bend his head to prevent the light falling upon his features and betraying
his personality to any one who might pass. After a walk of about ten
minutes, he came in front of the millinery kept by Mrs. Daily, and stopped
on the walk opposite to it. Not three minutes before his arrival, James
Daily, just returned from his battle with the burglar, had gone into the
house, and closed the door. The shop was shut, and all about the house
was quiet. The mulatto remained a few moments watching the outside of
the house with a stealthy air, and then rapidly crossed the street, and trod
softly up the passage to the front or side door. Here he cautiously listened,
and then advanced to the window of the back sitting-room, in which there
was a light. The curtains were drawn, but not so closely that he could not
see into the room by getting down upon one knee and peering through a
space in the lower part of the window. The sight he beheld caused him to
start back and utter an exclamation that sounded like an execration drawn
from his lips by surprise and anger. He beheld Frederica in tears, and James
with his arm folded around her, soothingly, as we have already described
this scene. He could not distinguish what was said, but he saw enough to
convince his own mind that they were lovers.

The quick, fiery passions of the mulatto would not suffer him to survey
in quiet a scene which aroused all the jealous fury of his nature; for, be it
said, and no doubt it will be heard with surprise, Philip Clow was deeply in
love with our lovely bonnet-girl! He rose up, and clenching his hand as if
it grasped a knife, he shook it thus clenched towards the window, with the
most vindictive menaces. He had not yet seen the features of the youth
who thus aroused his fierce resentment, nor would he have recognized them
had they been visible, as the face of James Daily was unknown to him.

After vain efforts to listen with success to their conversation, and maddened
at the discovery of a rival, who seemed so well acquainted with the
object of his mad passion, the mulatto, with a deep curse, turned from the
window, and hastened from the court. Recrossing the street to where he
had before delayed to inspect the house, he opened a wooden gate directly
over against Mrs. Daily's shop, and knocked at a side door situated precisely
like that at the milliner's; for in this neighborhood most of the tenements
stood end to the street, with a shop in front, and a dwelling in the rear.
The shop appertaining to this edifice was that of a mantua-maker, and one
of the most fashionable in the city.

The door was opened by a yellow girl of extraordinary beauty, with the
large bistre-brown eyes and finished profile of the Louisiana quadroon. Her
age could not have been more than eighteen. On seeing, by the lamp she
held, who it was, a look of displeasure came over her, and she drew backward
coldly.

`Is your mistress up?' asked the mulatto, in an authoritative tone.

`Yes,' was the scarcely audible and reluctant response of the young girl.

`Then I will see her,' he said, going up the crooked stair-way and entering
a front room that looked upon the street. `Leave the light with me,
and speak to her.'

The young girl obeyed, and left him alone, in a neat parlor, tastefully
hung with pictures, having handsome drapery at the windows, and very
commodious furniture. A table on one side of the room containing a bunch
of paper measures, portions of partly made dresses, and some few shreds and
`cuttings' strewn upon the carpet, gave indications of the mantua-making
occupation of the mistress of the house.

While the mulatto is waiting for her to come in, we will briefly show what
relation they stand in to each other, and how it is that poor Frederica has
happened to be so unhappy as to have unconsciously created an interest in
this dangerous man's bosom — dangerous for his fierce passions, for his intelligence
without principle, for his wealth, for his ambition to rise above his
race, for his power and deep subtlety.

The money which he had accumulated from time to time by his consociation
and dealings with such opposite yet kindred characters as Carlton Ellery
and Brigs, he invested in tenements, for it was a part of his aspiring
disposition to be a holder of lands and houses — to be a landlord over white
tenants. Where he could not purchase, he rented, and then under-rented
to others at a large advance upon the rent he paid. In this way he had got
into his possession three of those old-fashioned houses that are yet seen in
such numbers on Washington street, and under-rented them to shop-keepers
and others. One of these was the house he was now in. The present tenant
had held it at lease from him a little more than a year and a quarter, the
last quarter's rent having been due some days before, but yet unpaid. It
was while he was at this house two weeks before to collect his rent, and
while seated in the window, in a blue broadcloth cloak, false black whiskers,
and a luxuriant wig of glossy raven hair, a costume, or rather disguise, he
always wore in the street to conceal his African origin, he was attracted by
the face of Frederica, who was at the window opposite.

`Who is that beautiful girl, Mrs. Anson?' he asked of his tenant.

`I believe it is the daughter of Mrs. Daily.'

`Who is Mrs. Daily? They are strangers there.'

`Yes. They moved in the first of the month. She formerly kept higher
up, near Essex street.'

Clow sat closely surveying the lovely girl as she was seated at her work,
and after a few minutes he said abruptly,

`Do you know this Mrs. Daily?'

`Yes, a little.'

Clow said no more then, but on going into the street he went into the
milliner's shop. Frederica rose as he entered, to serve him, for his appearance
was very much that of an Italian gentleman; and very different from
Clow, the mulatto usurer and lender of money on stolen plate, when in his
tap-room at home. Indeed it would be difficult to recognize both characters
as having the same identity of person.

Upon a nearer view of Frederica the impression her beauty awakened on
seeing her at a distance through the window, was deepened. He stood a
moment gazing upon her with surprise and admiration, which he had self-control
enough to conceal from her observation. He purchased a ribbon,

and the sound of her voice as she spoke, thrilled to his soul! He left the
shop, feeling that his heart was no longer his own, and with the resolution
that henceforward that young girl's destiny and his own should be one and
united, if in the compass of human power!

The next day this aspiring mulatto entered the shop again, and made a
trifling purchase; but seeing that his intense regard of her features embarrassed
her, and caused her to drop her eyes, and that on the third time he
entered she rose hastily and retired from the shop into the back room, leaving
Mrs. Daily to wait upon him, he resolved for the present to keep away
from her, and in the meanwhile form some plan of action. He had, unfortunately,
the tenant of the house opposite in his power, and through her he
determined to effect his object of forming an acquaintance with Frederica,
and endeavoring to win her affections; for one of the chiefest points of this
man's ambition, next to associating in society as a foreigner of wealth, was
to win and marry a beautiful woman of the superior race, to an equality
with which he aspired. Frederica's fate it was, by waking in his bosom a
sudden and deep passion, to be the object of his wild and daring purposes.

In a few minutes after the quadroon had left the room, Mrs. Anson, the
mantua-maker his tenant, came in.