University of Virginia Library

6. CHAPTER VI.

—Willis.

Solitude and seclusion, doubtless, have their charms, but these
were not found sufficient at all times to keep Blanche and Emily
within the purlieus of the dove-cot. It was on a bright afternoon
in June, not many days after they had become domiciled in their
new home, that they ventured together upon a stroll, seeking to gain
a glimpse of the world around them. Their hostess, who dealt
largely in the marvellous, had held out, from time to time, divers
intimations of impending dangers with which every other place was
beset excepting the ground sheltered by her sacred roof; and Emily's
excitable imagination became populous with buccaneers, banditti,
ghosts, goblins, and witches, until almost every spot seemed to
harbor one or another of these unwelcome neighbors. There was,
indeed, an air of wildness and novelty pervading the new world into
which she had been introduced, which favored the most colossal
growth of credulity. Its many wonderful realities formed, of course,
the basis of still more wonderful fables, and rendered the boundary
line of rational belief not always easily discernible, even by more
sagacious minds than that of Miss Roselle. Sleepless, however, as
were her apprehensions, they did not extend to the anticipation of

danger on the present occasion, and the cousins, yearning for the
freedom of the green fields and the open air, of which they had been
so long restrained, went joyously upon their way. They passed
through the central gate of the city, and following up the windings
of a small creek, which led past some quiet farm-houses, they reached
the base of the sandy embankment of which mention has been made,
and toiled, panting, up its grassy sides, exhilarated by the deep
inhalations of fresh air which they were forced to imbibe, and
charmed with the widening circuit of view which each upward stage
extended before them. Properly speaking, they could not be said
before to have seen the magnificent spectacle of the bay of New
York, which now, with its fairy islands, its romantic shores, and the
entrance of its broad tributaries, the Hudson and East rivers, were
comprised in a single picture, dwelling upon the eye with a most
pleasing effect. They gazed long and delightedly, pointing out to
each other the objects of attraction which successively fell under
their notice, and for a while scarcely conscious that they were suffering
from the sun of June, which, although far past the meridian, was
pouring its slant rays through the air with an oppressive intensity.
When at length, sated with the prospect, they turned their
gaze northward, the adjacent forest, with its cool dense shades,
presented an aspect too inviting to be resisted. There certainly
could be no danger, they imagined, while keeping only in its
border; and with some trepidation, arising from the mysterious
warnings of their hostess, they ventured to avail themselves of the
retreat. It was, indeed, a temptation difficult to resist. The voice
of birds alone disturbed the tranquil repose of Nature, as, flitting
from bough to bough, their tiny plumes flashed momentarily upon
the eye; and the dreamy hum of the bee, as on gauzy wing suspended
he now hung buzzing above some tempting flower, and now
buried himself in its fragrant depths. A brook, most diminutive of
its race, gurgled at their feet; and, as it rattled down the declivity
towards a still thicker shade, seemed hastening with fear from the
scorching sunbeams which threatened its very existence. Strange
odors were in the air, grateful to the sense, and hinting of forest
flowers, hidden in a thousand lonely nooks, peeping from beneath
piled leaves, crouching beside decayed logs, clinging to crevices of
rocks, or bending above the glassy brook, and resting their warm
petals on its wave.

Blanche possessed a spirit happily attuned to the harmonies of
nature, and in unison with all its charms. Sorrow and fear, and a
sense of loneliness, had clouded for a while her sunny heart, but it
answered now with elastic impulse to the witcheries around her. She
had recently recovered from the illness of her voyage, and the gradual
re-action of her spirits had been suddenly accelerated until joy and
hope and gratitude seemed to have filled her heart. The sunbeam
was not brighter, the flowers were not purer, nor the singing birds
more blithesome than was Blanche. Miss Roselle, although widely
uncongenial to her cousin in the points most essential to friendship,
was in the main a good-natured girl, and the possessor of some
cleverness much obscured by conceit. Her romantic views of life,
also, were continually conflicting with its common-place events, and
not infrequently drawing upon herself a ridicule, which she was fortunate
enough never to perceive. Such as she was, however, she
was the only friend of Blanche, for whom she entertained a profound
respect, not untinctured with envy, and founded on qualities which
were lightly prized by their possessor—her beauty and rank. The
latter was too painfully connected with the idea of an unfeeling
parent to be the subject of much self-gratulation; and mere personal
charms, in a mind constituted like Blanche's, are little valued until
they have proved an attraction to some beloved object. Then,
indeed, does beauty vindicate its power, and the heart, however
innocent and artless, learns to prize every minute charm and grace
which can help to rivet the rosy chains of love.

Half an hour had glided past, while Blanche and Emily had
tarried just within the edge of the woods, at times roaming idly

about, and at times seated conversing upon a fallen tree: they were
in the latter position, absorbed in the examination of a rare and
beautiful wild-flower, when a quick sudden tramp was heard at their
side, and they sprang in terror to the ground. The appearance of the
intruder was one that might reasonably have excited some alarm in
the minds of the ladies, even had they not been, as they were, highly
predisposed to that emotion; for an armed man, with marks of
blood not only upon his garments, but upon his face, stood at their
side. Emily uttered a succession of piercing shrieks, and fled towards
the city; while Blanche, with a contagious terror, fell fainting to the
earth. The stranger, who was none other than the young Huntington
returning from the singular adventure which has been related in
a preceding chapter, and who had not perceived the ladies until they
sprang from their seat, stood paralysed for a moment with contending
emotions. He was indeed scarcely less startled than those to whom
he had proved such an object of dread, and before he could recover
sufficient self-possession either to recall Miss Roselle or to conjecture
the probable cause of her fright, she had disappeared over the brow
of the hill. His attention was immediately given to Blanche, whose
extraordinary beauty, as she lay seemingly lifeless before him, was
scarcely less a matter of surprise than everything else connected with
the adventure. He sprang to the neighboring brook, and bringing
water in his cap, dashed it freely and not without effect, in the face
of the patient, who slowly revived, but on the sight of Henrich
standing near had well nigh swooned a second time. The young
man hastened to allay her fears by such explanations and assurances
of safety as the excited state of his own feelings would permit him
to make, and he had the happiness of seeing her in a short time
restored to a comparative degree of composure.

“I fear we have been very foolish,” she said, smiling faintly, as
Huntington assisted her to rise, “but we are strangers in the country,
and have been taught, perhaps, some unnecessary apprehensions.”

So saying, she turned to depart, when Huntington begged that

he might be allowed to accompany and protect her from further
danger, a proposal which, in her still weak and trembling state, she
could scarcely refuse. She was yet far from certain that the stranger
was not an outlaw of some kind, but his courteous manner partly
assuaged her alarm, and she did not feel disposed to risk giving
offence by refusing his civilities. The blood-stains were still upon
him, and her own blood ran cold as she saw them, yet she dared not
appear to observe such a seeming token of crime in her companion.
They walked slowly together, but the brook which they were compelled
to cross, fortunately recalled to Henrich an intention which he
had formed before his recent adventure, of making his ablutions in
its waters. With this remembrance came of course a sudden consciousness
of his appearance, and coloring to the temples, he quickly
explained everything to his fair companion, and then hastened to
the cleansing wave. It was no small relief to Miss Montaigne to
feel convinced, as she now did, that all her suspicions were unfounded;
and when Henrich re-appeared, with freshened features and smiling
face, the last vestige of her fears had departed.

“Let us hasten and find poor Emily,” she said, “who may have
fainted upon the road, for her fright, I believe, was greater, if possible,
than mine.”

Miss Roselle, however, had reached home nearly senseless, and
scarcely able to articulate; but she had succeeded in informing her
frightened hostess that Blanche had been carried forcibly off by a
horrid-looking bandit, armed to the teeth, and that she herself
had narrowly escaped the same fate. Her arrival, however, had fortunately
been retarded by the indirect route which she had taken,
and before any alarm could be communicated to the neighbors,
Blanche and Henrich were distinctly seen at a distance, descending
the hill side, and approaching towards home.

“She's rescued—she's rescued,” shouted Emily, and darting from
the house, she hastened to meet her friend with every token of
delight. Visions of chivalrous knights of the silver cross or the

golden plume, began to pass through her mind, and she only
regretted that she did not see her swooning cousin, hanging, with
dishevelled hair, across the pommel of the saddle, held by one gauntleted
hand of her rescuer, while another guided his fiery steed.
Reluctantly pardoning the approaching hero for the absence of the
horse and its accessaries, she was conning fit phrases to commend
his bravery, when the merry smiles of Blanche and something in
the appearance of her companion began to impress her with a mortifying
presentiment of the true state of the case. As this was at
once verified by her cousin's explanation, Miss Roselle was not a
little discomfited, but inasmuch as Henrich politely took his leave
after consigning his charge to her care, she still entertained the hope
that he might be a bandit after all, who had indulged in a sudden
fit of magnanimity. Convinced that this was not probable, her
hopes successively fell to a smuggler and a housebreaker, and she was
sure he bore a resemblance to some pictures she had seen of such
characters, who were quite apt, she said, to be handsome, with small
white necks, and waving hair. That he did not dare to accompany
them quite home, that he departed in the direction of the woods on
pretence of having forgotten his gun, that he did not mention his
name or inquire Blanche's, or ask permission to call and learn if she
had quite recovered, were so many arguments for her opinion; and
Miss Montaigne, much amused, did not care to controvert a position
which, however convinced of its incorrectness, she had no means
of disproving. On reaching home they found Mrs. Sniff fully
inclined to adopt the views of Emily, but when the cousins had with
much difficulty agreed upon a tolerably correct description of the
stranger, she could not fail to recognise the picture as that of Mr.
Huntington, on whom she had previously bestowed a glowing panegyric
in their presence. Emily was therefore driven from the last
foothold of her romantic theory, and abandoning it with little
grace she contrived to throw the burden of her blunder on the
widow to whose unnecessary warnings all their alarm was attributable.
Mrs. Sniff was a lady of meek manners, when policy dictated
humility, and she shouldered the reproach manfully, only hoping
that the dear young ladies might never find occasion to credit her
assertions more fully.

To Henrich the adventure was fraught with interest; the impression
made by the charms of Blanche, and especially by her artless
and graceful deportment, hung around him like a spell. Her swoon
and recovery, her succeeding alarm, and her final relief from apprehension,
had presented with rapid transition, so many phases of a
beauty, which dazzled alike in each, and seemed an epitome of every
variety of loveliness. Mingled with this admiration, a strong curiosity
pervaded his mind. Who was this fascinating stranger, and
from what region, benighted by her absence, had she come, to
irradiate the New World with her charms? Such were the questions
which, in a moment of enthusiasm, Henrich mentally propounded,
and which, smiling at his own ardor, he determined
speedily to solve. Not that it could avail him aught to know. If
the bright picture would bear a close and continued inspection, if
there was no dark reverse to its first dazzling surface, his fears at
once suggested some other barrier, high and insuperable, which
would intervene between himself and so attractive an object. Hope,
like the hooded falcon, refused to soar, and gained with difficulty
even an upward glance of aspiration. How strange a feature of
the human heart is that which adjusts its doubts to the magnitude
of its desires, and sees, by the light which streams from some
coveted goal, only the obstacles which crowd the path of attainment!

But Henrich reflected with pleasure that politeness demanded of
him a visit to the strangers after their singular meeting; and he did
not hesitate to call upon them on the same evening. He was
received with evident pleasure by both the ladies, and the event of
the day formed the theme of no little merriment.

“It was really very ridiculous of us, Mr. Huntington,” said

Blanche, “and you must be generous enough not to tell the story
greatly to our disadvantage: please to throw in a few additional
marks of blood, for our excuse and, if possible, the wolf's head and
ears.”

“It is quite unnecessary, Miss Roselle,” replied Henrich; “the
rivulet in which I washed told me that your fears were fully justifiable.
I little thought that my encounter with the beast would be
the cause of so much suffering.”

“Do not speak of it,” Blanche rejoined; “the joke is well worth
its cost—but pray, tell us, what were your own sensations at so
strange an interruption to your reverie?”

“You will laugh,” answered Henrich, “when I tell you, that at
first I fully believed I had startled a covey of partridges; the fluttering
of dresses was not unlike the noise of their wings, and the fallen
tree, which is the frequent resort of these birds, doubtless confirmed
the illusion.”

“This is really quite too bad!” exclaimed Miss Montaigne; “I
had fully hoped to make you own to a little fright or trepidation,
or something that might make an offset to our fears; but instead of
that, it seems we have all the ridicule to ourselves, and have narrowly
escaped being shot, as birds, besides.”

“You are truly unfortunate,” said Henrich. “I do not see that
your misery admits of any palliation.”

“Well, well,” continued Blanche, laughing; “we may at least
be thankful that Mr. Huntington did not mistake us for owls
instead of partridges, which our stupidity would have rendered quite
excusable.”

The interview was prolonged somewhat beyond the limits of a
formal call, and when Henrich rose to depart, it was with a reluctance
that surprised himself. Mrs. Sniff politely asked him to
repeat his visit, and, unconsciously, his eye turned to Miss Montaigne,
with the hope of hearing the invitation seconded from the
only quarter which could give it value; but Blanche, with instinetive

delicacy, remained silent, and Emily, to whom, in her character
as an elder sister, such a duty more properly pertained, saw fit to
follow her cousin's example. After a moment's hesitation, the visiter
replied ceremoniously, and withdrew. With admiration undiminished,
hope unaugmented, curiosity unsated, he returned slowly and
thoughtfully to his home. If Miss Montaigne had given the simplest
form of assent to the widow's polite request—a bow, a smile,
or even a marked look, there would have been a little loop on which
to hang a little hope of favor; now there was none, and he might
not again seek their presence. The rumors of their rank, which
Mrs. Sniff sedulously diffused, doubtless by way of aiding their
design of seclusion, did not fail soon afterwards to reach his ears,
and confirmed him in the mortifying belief that the omission of the
much coveted invitation was by no means accidental.