University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.

I know not why, but the whole proceeding,
with all its whirl and excitement, its odd merriment
and grotesque display of art, produced in
me a feeling of disquiet, approaching even to
melancholy. Perhaps, this was because it reminded
me of Leaside, and the fiddling of old
Ben, our venerable butler, when little Mary
Bonham was my partner, and we wandered
down together in the same sweet primitive movements
that now seemed to be desecrated wantonly
before my eyes. The whole scene of home
grew up before me as I gazed and mused. The
stately hall, hung with pictures, nicely curtained,
with the massive piano on one side, and the
equally massive book-case on the other; the one
a treasury of the sweetest sounds, the other of
the noblest sense. My father, with his white
hairs, on one side of the fireplace; my mother, with
her stiffly-starched white cap on the other;—the
one with his huge Shakspeare on the little table
beside him,—closed, with his silver spectacles
peeping out between the leaves;—the other with
her knitting apparatus in her lap, the work dropping
to her feet, as she watched our movements,
while the kitten, lying on its back, was disentangling
with mischievous painstaking that which had

tasked the ingenuity and industry of the good old
dame, to put together, for the last half dozen
evenings. That passing but sweet glimpse of the
dear old homestead, with all its holy associations,
was the first mental image which crossed my
mind, reproachful of my wanderings. You may
be sure I did not encourage it, but, anxious to
remove it, I hastened round the dancers, to the
opposite side, intending to make my escape at
the doorway, and go out beneath the skies; but
I was interrupted in this progress, and diverted
from this purpose, by finding the narrow way
occupied. I looked down at the person who
thus obstructed my pathway, and almost recoiled
in pleasurable surprise. Before me sat a young
girl of fifteen or thereabouts. She certainly
could not have been more than sixteen. The
first thing that struck me about her was the exquisite
but dewy brightness of her eye, which
was as dark of hue as the coal may be supposed
to be on the eve of that moment, when, under
the force of heat, it becomes a brilliant. The
face was small, very small, when you turned
suddenly from the blaze of the large expanding
eye to note the accompanying features;—but it
was also very beautiful. The skin was singularly
clear and transparent for such black eyes and
hair. The forehead, about which was bound a
narrow braid, was high and broad, and constituted
fully one half of the face. The hair was
parted, madonna fashion, as if art, after long experience,
had become assured that, in the present
case, her best policy was to obey the laws of
simplicity. Her neck, which was only half bared,
seemed very white and beautifully rounded. Her
figure, which was evidently slight, could not be
distinguished, by reason of the huge travelling
cloak in which she was still wrapped. The
whole appearance of this young creature, so
unique, yet so little like the rest in the assembly,
fixed my regard, and would have done so even
had the excessive brilliancy of her eyes and
beauty of her complexion not enchained it. Her
seeming isolation, too, so much like my own, was
another circumstance to commend her to my
sympathies. A scene like the present, in a frontier
country, I need not say to my readers, is apt
to set at defiance the more restraining laws of
society in the obviously social world; and, assuming
the exercise of one of the most understood
privileges of the place, I did not hesitate to accost
the stranger. She was evidently a stranger
like myself, and I jumped at once to the conclusion
that she was one of the inmates of the travelling
carriage that I had seen at the door.

“You do not dance,” I said to her, bending
down beside her, and speaking in those subdued
tones which seem the properest when addressing
the young, the timid and the artless.

She looked up, then around her, with something
of the expression of a startled fawn, away from
its dam, and trembling at the approach of some

strange monster of the wilderness. There was
an air of anxiety in her glance, which made me
more cautious in my approaches, and at the same
time, more earnest in my interest. As she did
not answer, I put my inquiry in another shape.

“Will you not dance with me?”

“Oh, no!” she answered, still looking anxiously
around her, and particularly at the entrance,—
“Oh, no! I do not wish to dance. I am a
stranger here,—I know nobody.”

“I too am a stranger here,” was my reply—
“let us therefore know one another—let us be
friends.”

She allowed her eyes to rise for a moment to
the level of mine, and when they encountered my
glance, a deep crimson overspread her cheek.

“Shall we not be friends?” I repeated, as I
found she did not design to answer.

“What can I do?” she answered; and the
question struck me as remarkable for its simplicity.
It seemed to indicate a higher standard of
duty, in the matter of friendship, on the part of
this young creature, than was customary among
mankind in general. I contrived, however, to reply,
though her question was evidently one not
easy of answer.

“What should a friend do, but love his friend,
and think of him, and pray for him, and be glad
to see him, and sorry to lose him.”

“Ah! but I shall soon be gone.”

“Gone! where?”

“To my own home—you to yours.”

“And why should we go different ways?”

“I don't know,” she said, in slow, subdued tones,
which so far flattered me, as they seemed to be
regretful ones.

“There is no reason why we should not go together,
at least for a little while. For my part, I
have set out to travel, and it does not matter
much whither I go. Where do you live?”

“Miles off—very far. Close by the river —”

“River—what river?”

“Far—far! You cannot go. No, no! You
cannot go there.”

I observed, as she replied, that her glances
sought anxiously the entrance, before which I
now discovered, in the dim light of evening, that
there stood a group of persons, three or four in
number.

“You little know how far I am willing to go
for my friend—for those whom I love;” was my
reply, and my hand rested, while I spoke, unconsciously
on my own part, on hers. I felt hers
tremble beneath it—withdrawn—and only then
was I conscious of the trespass, which, had I
been in a highly civilized world, had been committed
by this presumption. I proceeded:

“If one's friend is true and worthy, one follows
her to the end of the world, follows nobody else,
thinks of nobody else, cares for nobody else, loves
her over all the world.”

“Ah! that is friendship;” she answered with
a sigh.

“I would be your friend—I will follow you;”
I continued impetuously, encouraged by her
words.

“No! no!—I have no friend. I live very far,
—by the river—the road is hard to find—bad
swamps—you cannot follow me.”

Her answer was made with some trepidation,
and an increased anxiety of expression, as her
glance was directed towards the door.

“And why should it be hard to find, and why
should the bad roads and the swamps prevent me,
when it does not prevent you? Why can't I follow
you? I will follow you.”

“No, you must not!—as a friend you must not.”

This was spoken with singular emphasis; then
she paused abruptly, as if disquieted at the degree
of empressement which she had given to her utterance.
But she had also given peculiar force to
the word “friend,” and that pleased me. It
seemed to say that she herself was not displeased
with the appropriation. But there was a mystery
in the whole matter. Her strange mode of
speech—so artless, yet so reserved—her evident
anxiety, if not apprehension,—and the secrecy—
could it spring from ignorance—which she resolutely
maintained as the whereabouts of her
abode? I was resolved not to give the matter
up. But, for that moment, this resolution was
made in vain. We were interrupted, and, as I

thought, rather rudely, by some one thrusting
himself in between us. I turned to meet the intruder,
in a mood prompt enough to punish the
intrusion, and was confronted by the stern glance
of a man in middle life—perhaps a little beyond
it—such seemed the testimony afforded by thick
masses of grisly beard which stood about his
cheeks and chin. His keen, inquiring glance,
fixed upon my own face, rather tended to increase
the disposition which I felt to resent what
I esteemed his impertinence, but the momentary
reflection that he might be the father of the damsel,
moved me to tolerate a bearing which, under
any other circumstances, would have moved me
to do battle, and which, in the opinion of the
country, would not only have justified, but called
for it. While I was meditating what to say,—
for he still kept his glance fixed upon me—the
girl rose and took his arm. He turned from me
at this instant and led her off to an adjoining
apartment, followed by Yannaker, the host, who
seemed to be busy in no worse office than that
of showing the parties their several chambers.

“My game is up for the night!” was my muttered
reflection, and, so thinking, I dashed out of
the hall, and with hot brow and excited spirit,
stood, unknowing where to turn, beneath the cool
and mantling startlight.