University of Virginia Library

6. CHAPTER VI.

Her father being absent, Kate did the honours of
the household, and we need not say how much gratification
Major Singleton felt in being accompanied by
his sweet cousin to the lower apartments. He had
another reason for his satisfaction in this attendance,
as it afforded him an opportunity which he had much
desired. We have already seen him urging those
claims upon her closest regards which she continued

to evade. He now determined to press them; and,
handing her to the sofa with a degree of solemnity in
his manner which led her to conclude that his object
was any thing but what it really was, she willingly
took the seat to which he conducted her. Singleton
was no sentimentalist, but a man of sterling character,
and deep, true feeling: he was one of those who never
trifle; and the prompter at his heart, though taking the
name of that capricious mood which is always fair
game for the arch jest and playful satire, was yet altogether
a more lofty and dignified sentiment. His love
was of his life a leading part: it made up his existence,
and imbodied in its own the forms of a thousand
strong obligations to society and man. It was now
prominent to his own view in the form of a sacred
duty—a duty to others not less than to himself. Perhaps,
too, as he was something of an idealist, and
strove to believe in attributes which are not always
found profusely in the world, there may have been
something of the spiritualizing character of poetry
mixed up in his devotions—giving dignity to a purpose
which is usually urged with timidity, but which, in the
present case, was treated with all the straightforward
singleness of aim which belongs to the man of mere
business.

“Katharine,” he said, after a brief pause, during
which his eyes gazed on her with a calm deep earnestness
which at length sent the glance of hers downward
beneath them—“Kate, my cousin, months have passed
since you were taught to know my feeling towards
you. Since I have known you, that feeling has been
hourly on the increase. I loved, the more I knew; and
though changes have come over us both—changes of
fortune, of condition, of appearance—yet I have only
admired you the more with every change. You have
always seemed to me the one—the one only—whom I
could truly love and cherish as a wife; and this thought,
my cousin, has not been because of your beauty, which,
though great, has never called forth, and shall never

call forth, so long as I think you what I think you now,
one single encomium from me.”

She would have interrupted him, but he simply placed
his finger upon her arm, and proceeded.

“Nay, fear not, and do not interrupt me. I know
you too well, and think of you too highly, to endeavour
now to fill your ears with praises of that beauty of
which neither of us can be utterly unconscious. I
shall speak of other qualities which have recommended
you to me, not in praise of them now, but only as, in
urging my pretensions to your hand, I would prove to
you that I have studied your character, and am so far
satisfied with the results as to be willing now to adventure
all my affections—and they are concentrated very
closely now, and will soon be more so—in the offer
which I shall make you. I think now that I know your
character. I have seen its firmness, its masculine good
sense, and its unostentatious delicacy. Such a character
will not be apt to misunderstand mine, and in this
lies one chief security of domestic bliss. Such, for a
long season, has been my thought, and I must now act
upon it, or never. I have reasons for desiring it now,
which your own reflections may not teach you, and
which you must know hereafter. Cousin, dear Kate,
forgive me if my speech be less than gentle—if it
seem abrupt or harsh; I am not apt at professions;
and with you I would rather avoid that show of sentiment
which I know makes up, most commonly, the language
of the lover. To you I would rather that my
words should be of the most simple and least equivocal
character. To your good sense, not your weaknesses,
the proffer of my hand is now made. Let me hope
that your good sense will determine the question, which
I would not willingly submit to any other tribunal.”

He took her hand, at the conclusion of his remarks,
and she suffered it to rest passively in his grasp. She
did not immediately answer, but appeared lost in reflections,
which were not, however, the less pleasing because
they exhibited themselves in doubt and indecision.
Her eye, meanwhile, did not fall beneath the

searching gaze of his: its deep and beautiful blue met
his own unshrinkingly; nay, with something of a sympathizing
fondness in its expression, which the tenor
of her uttered reply did not, however, confirm. The
pause of the moment over, she turned to her suitor.

“Robert, you have but this moment come from the
chamber of sickness—soon to be the chamber of death.
You cannot deceive yourself as to the condition of
Emily; she is sinking fast.”

“I know it—I feel it,” he answered, gloomily.

“How can you know it—how can you feel it, Robert,
when you come from the presence of one already linked
as it were with heaven, and thus immediately after urge
to me so earthly a prayer? How can I, so filled as my
thoughts should be, and are, with considerations of gloom
and the grave, thus give ear to any less sanctified consideration.
Pardon me, dear cousin; but it seems to
me almost irreverent that we should discourse of any
other themes at this moment than those of sorrow.”

“At another time, and with an affliction less severe
than this, your rebuke would have been felt. But this
to me is no common affliction. It leaves me alone—
unaccompanied—desolate in all the wide world of man.
You know our history. For years that girl has been
all to me: I had her to love; I was her brother—her
protector—her all; and upon her I expended a thousand
strong feelings and warm affections which, when
she goes, must crowd back upon, and overwhelm me.
We must have something in life giving us the right to
love—something which we can make our own exclusive
altar-place, which our loves and cares may hallow
to themselves, sacred from all intrusion, all rivalry, all
denial from another. While she lived—while there
there was hope for her—there was always one to me
of whose sympathies, when others were cold or stern,
I could be certain. When she leaves me, Kate, I am
alone; there is but one to whom I may turn with confidence
and trust—but one, and of that one I would
be secure in the proffer which I now make to you: it
is for you to say, and to say freely, with what hope.”

“Robert, you know well how I esteem you—”

“Utter no professions, Kate—not so coldly, at least
—if you really have regard for me.”

“You mistake—you do me injustice, cousin—I
would not be cold or inconsiderate. I do esteem
you—”

“Esteem!”

“Well, well—love you, then, if you like the word
better.” He pressed her hand. “I do love you, and
too well ever to be cold to your claims or unjust to your
merits. I have heard you with a degree of regard of
which I shall not speak; and I feel, deeply feel, the
high compliment which you have paid me, in the offer
of your hand. But let me ask of your reason—of
your own good sense—if the present be the season for
engagements of this nature? I speak not now of the
condition of your sister, but of the country. What is
the hope of repose, of domestic felicity, at such a period,
when the strong arm of power, at its caprice,
invades every sanctuary?—when the family mansion
of the wealthy planter shares the fate of the loghouse
of the squatter?—and when a renewal of injury only
meets your application for redress? You will see that
this is no season for thoughts such as those belonging
to the offer which you make me.”

“It is, then, to the time—to the consummation, at
this period—of my proposal, and not to the proposal
itself, which you object? Do I understand you thus,
dear cousin?”

“Not exactly, Robert. I object to all at this season;
I object to a consideration of the proposal at this moment,
as unseemly and improper, for many reasons;
and I beg, therefore, that you would withdraw your application,
and not exact from me any answer now.”

“And why not answer for the future, Kate? Why
not say, conditionally, in answer, that when the prospect
comes of peace for our country? I would not,
indeed, that we should marry now: I would only be
assured that I had in you, whatever may be the chances
of war or the vicissitudes of life, one to love me, and

one whom I could meet with an affection like her own.
I would have you even as an ark to me, shrining and
preserving my best affections, however the storms
raged and the billows rolled around us.”

“I will not deny to you, Robert, that were I disposed
to make at this moment a pledge of my heart to any,
I know not one to whom I would sooner make it than
to you. If my character has been your study, I too
have been somewhat observant of your own. I have
long regarded you as one to whom honour was dear,
and manliness habitual—as one delicate and true in
feeling, gentle in deportment, and properly sensible of
that consideration of the claims of others, without which
no man can possibly be a gentleman. These I hold,
in addition to your acknowledged bravery and good
sense, to be your characteristics; and they are such as
all sensible women must esteem, and which in you, as
my cousin, and one I have been so long accustomed to
esteem, I must love. Is not this enough? Wherefore
press me to say that I will not, at this time, make
pledges of affection with any man—that I will not bind
myself or my affections for the future—that in this
season of peril, owing as I do the duty of a child to
her parent, I will not, while he may need my attendance,
bind myself to other duties, which may be inconsistent
with those which I owe to him? Such must be
my answer, Robert, to the proffer which you make
me.”

“Ah, Kate! your pledge would be every thing to me,
amid the danger of the war we wage.”

“Nothing!” she replied quickly; “nothing more
than I would be to you, Robert, even now, were those
dangers to come home to you. Were you wounded,
believe me, cousin, or brother, or lover, I should watch
by your bedside, bathe your head, bring you refreshment;
ay, dress your wounds—I pledge it as a true
woman—with as little scruple as if you were even
now my wedded husband. Nay, shake not your head;
you know me not, Robert, if you doubt me in this. I

may not have the strength, but I have the heart, I am
sure, to do all this that I promise.”

“And wherefore not say more? Why, if you are
willing to perform such duties, will you not give the
right to claim them at your hands?”

“Urge me no more, Robert; but now I will not, I
cannot. Wait the due season: when the war is over;
when Carolina shall be free from hostile footsteps;
and when the land is cleansed of its pollution;—come
to me then, if you hold this same temper, and then, if
there be no change in me, I shall give you my hand,
perfectly and all your own, as fully as I give it to you
this moment in sisterly regard. There, take it, and
leave me, for the hour is growing late.”

He carried the extended fingers to his lips, and
without farther word was about to hurry from the
apartment, when he was arrested in his purpose by the
sudden appearance of his aunt bringing a message
from his sister, requiring to see him, if he had not
already departed. An unlooked-for change had come
over her, according to the old lady's representations;
she had grown sensibly weaker, and she thought her
incoherent and slightly wandering. With palpitating
heart and trembling footsteps, followed by the two
ladies, he again ascended the stairs leading to the
chamber of death; but remembering the reference of
Emily to his pistols, and how their presence had disturbed
her, he took them from his belt and placed them
upon a table which stood fronting the gallery. The
next moment, he resumed his seat beside the
shadowy person of the maiden.