27. CHAPTER XXVII.
FANNY.
Fanny, the daughter of Puccoon the trapper—has the reader
forgotten her?—was sitting in the door of the hut in the hollow,
sewing. The garment she was mending seemed to be a conglomeration
of rags—it was supposed to be Puccoon's Sunday coat. A
large deer-hound was watching the girl; and the deer-hound was
employed in an altogether unphilosophical manner, if the love of
flowers be philosophical.
Fanny Puccoon was a veritable flower of the spring, blooming
there in the chill autumn sunshine. She seemed to be—whether
she was or not—about fourteen, as we have already said, and at
that age girlhood is in the bud—the flower that is to be just peeps
from its tender sheath. Fanny's eyes were of an exquisite blue,
her cheeks touched with a tint as delicate as that on the leaf of the
tea-rose, and the light hair, curling naturally, fell around a little
face full of candor and sweetness, and then upon the shoulders of
the girl bending over the ragged coat. Her own dress was not
much better, but was not ragged; and it fitted neatly to a figure
perfectly straight, delicately slender, and full of girlish grace.
Fanny was sewing busily, when all at once a man came out of
the bushes near the hut, and approached her. The deer-hound
was about to spring at him; but Fanny quickly rose, calling the
dog back. She had recognized St. Leger.
The young man came up, smiling, and held out his hand.
“How do you do, Fanny,” he said. “I see you did not expect
me. I am the prince in the fairly tale. I have risen out of the
ground.”
The girl gave him her hand cordially, and St. Leger took it in
his own, looking, with unconcealed admiration, into the fresh
young face.
“Did I frighten you?” he said, smiling.
“No, indeed, sir. I was not at all frightened.”
“I tied my horse at the foot of the hill, as the road was rough,
and walked up. I came from Mr. Harley's this morning—my
horse brought me in that direction.”
“I am very glad to see you again,” said Fanny, cheerfully.
And as St. Leger had taken his seat on a “split-bottomed chair”
beside her, and was caressing the deer-hound, who did not seem
averse to the ceremony, Fanny went back to her sewing, looking
up from time to time, in a natural and cheerful manner, as her
companion talked.
The young Englishman was twenty-five years of age, and had
seen an amount of “life” in his time which had in his own
opinion blunted his youthful romance, and made him a philosopher.
But the philosopher found himself looking at this mere
child, in her homespun dress at the door of a hut, with a singularly
youthful sensation—a feeling of boyish admiration.
“Fanny,” he said.
She raised her head, and the blue eyes looked out from the curls
into his own.
“I am going back to my home in England very soon, and I shall
never see you again.”
“I am very sorry, sir.”
St. Leger listened to the low music of the girl's voice, looked at
the exquisite face, and asked himself what was the matter with
him? His heart had filled with a sudden warmth. A moment
afterwards he began to laugh.
“Do you know what I thought just now, Fanny?” he said.
“No, sir.”
“I thought if I saw you often I should love you very much.”
The speech was absurd, he said to himself—and why be absurd?
What had aroused in him this odd feeling of romance? Was it
the autumn sunshine tangling itself in Fanny's curls—the blue sky
reflected in her eyes?
He had blundered, no doubt, in speaking thus to the girl. She
would become confused and ill at ease. He looked at her, but
there was not a particle of any such confusion or awkwardness in
her expression.
“I should like you to love me, and not forget me,” she said,
simply. “I have often thought of you since you were hurt that
day, sir.”
“When I held your hand so tight!” said St. Leger, laughing.
“Did you hold my hand?” Fanny said, smiling.
“Yes, and you did better; you bathed my poor head. But tell
me about yourself. Do you like living in this lonely place,
Fanny?”
“Oh, yes! sir. It is not lonely. I have father and Otter.”
“Who is Otter?”
But the owner of that name spoke for himself. He rose up and
put his paws around Fanny's neck, and Fanny did not repulse him
in the least. Otter then proceeded to learn his tawny muzzle upon
the girl's neck, and exhibit indications of perfect content.
St. Leger remembered that group for a long time. If he had been
a painter, he said to himself, he would have made a picture of the
girl and the dog. Fanny dispelled the picturesque in a moment.
“That will do, Otter,” she said. And Otter obediently resumed
his recumbent position in the sunshine.
St. Leger remained for more than an hour talking with Fanny,
and made her tell him all her little story—how her mother had died
before she remembered her; how her father had sent her to an
“old field-school” in the hills, where she learned to read; and how
she never felt lonely when he was hunting and trapping, as he was
doing at that moment, but passed her time very happily sewing or
singing, or making willow baskets. St. Leger listened to the sweet
tones of the girl with quiet happiness. Looking into her blue eyes,
he forgot Huntsdon, England, Harley. Could he be falling in love?
he suddenly asked himself. He began to laugh, rose to his feet,
and held out his hand.
“Good-bye, Fanny!”
Taking her small hand in his own, be bent down, pressed his lips
to it, and said, in a low voice:
“God bless you, my child!”
The tone of his voice was so earnest that the girl's face flushed,
and a tear was seen in her eye. St. Leger took his white handkerchief,
wiped away the tear, and went down the hill with a sadness
for which he could not account.
“Am I bewitched?” he murmured. He mounted his horse, and
said:
“I will keep this handkerchief.”
When he reached the high road he looked back. Fanny had
dropped the ragged coat in her lap, and was gazing at him. The
sunshine lit up her curls with a sort of tranquil splendor. She
always came back to him in memory as he saw her at that moment.
