University of Virginia Library

24. CHAPTER XXIV.
OF THE EFFECT OF VERTY'S VIOLIN-PLAYING UPON MR. RUSHTON.

The young man had just reached the foot of the hill, upon
which the Bower of Nature stood—have we not mentioned before
the name which Miss Sallianna had bestowed upon the
seminary?—when he heard himself accosted by a laughing
and careless voice, and raised his head, to see from whom it
proceeded.

The voice, apparently, issued from a gentleman who had drawn
rein in the middle of the road, and was gazing at him with great
good humor and freedom. Verty returned this gaze, and the
result of his inspection was, that the new-comer was a total
stranger to him. He was a young man of about nineteen, with
handsome features, characterized by an expression of nonchalance
and careless good humor; clad in a very rich dress, somewhat
foppish, but of irreproachable taste; and the horse he bestrode
was an animal as elegant in figure and appointments as
his master.

“Hallo, friend!” the new-comer had said, “give you good-day.”

Verty nodded.

“You don't recognize me,” said the young man.

“I believe not,” replied Verty.

“Well, that's all right; and it would be strange if you did,”
the young man went on in his careless voice; “we have never
met, I think, and, faith! all I recognize about you is my coat.”

“Your coat?”

“Coat, did I say?—worse than that! I recognize my knee-breeches,
my stockings, my chapeau, my waistcoat!”

And the new-comer burst into a careless laugh.

Verty shook his head.

“They are mine, sir,” he said.

“You are mistaken.”

Verty returned the careless glance with one which seemed to
indicate that he was not very well pleased.

“How?” he said.

“I maintain that you are wearing my clothes, by Jove! Come,
let us fight it out;—or no! I've got an engagement, my dear
fellow, and we must put it off. Fanny is waiting for me, and
would be dying with disappointment if I did'nt come.”

With which the young fellow touched his horse, and commenced
humming a song.

“Fanny?” said Verty, with a sad smile, “what! up at old
Scowley's?”

“The very place! Why, you have caught the very form of
words by which I am myself accustomed to speak of that respectable
matron.”

“I know Miss Fanny.”

“Do you?”

“Yes.”

“Stop!” said the young man, laughing with his easy noncha
lance; “tell me if we are rivals.”

“Anan? said Verty.

“Are you in love with her? Honor bright now, my dear
fellow?”

“No,” said Verty, drawn, he did not know how, toward the
laughing young man; “no, not with—Miss Fanny.”

“Ah, ah!—then with whom? Not the lovely Sallianna—the
admirer of nature? Faith! you're too good-looking a fellow to
throw yourself away on such a simpering old maid. By Jove!

my dear friend, and new acquaintance, I like you! Let us be
friends. My name's Ralph Ashley—I'm Fanny's cousin. Come!
confidence for confidence!

Verty smiled.

“My name is Verty,” he said; “I havn't any other—I'm an
Indian.”

“An Indian!”

“Yes.”

“Is it possible?”

Verty nodded.

“Why, you are an elegant cavalier, or the devil take it! I'm
just from Williamsburg—from the college there; and I never
saw a finer seigneur than yourself, friend Verty. An Indian!”

“That's all,” said Verty; “the new clothes change me. I
got'em at O'Brallaghan's.”

“O'Brallaghan's? The rascal! to sell my suit! That accounts
for all! But I don't complain of you. On the contrary,
I'm delighted to make your acquaintance. Have you been up
there?—I suppose you have?”

And the young man pointed toward the Bower of Nature.

“Yes,” said Verty.

“Visiting?”

“Yes—Redbud.”

“Pretty little Miss Summers?”

Verty heaved a profound sigh, and said, “Yes.”

The young man shook his head.

“Take care, my dear fellow,” he said, with a wise air, “I saw
her in town the other morning, and I consider her dangerous.
She would not be dangerous to me; I am an old bird among the
charming young damsels of this wicked world, and, consequently,
not to be caught by chaff—such chaff as brilliant eyes, and rosy-cheeks,
and smiles; but, without being critical, my dear friend, I may
be permitted to observe, that you look confiding. Take care—it
is the advice of a friend. Come and see me at Bousch's tavern

where I am staying, if my visnomy has made a favorable impression—Ah!
there's Fanny! I must fly to her—the charming
infant.”

And the young man gave a farewell nod to Verty, and went
on singing, and making signs to the distant Fanny.

Verty gazed after him for a moment; then heaving another sigh
much more profound than any which had yet issued from his lips,
went slowly on toward the town—his shoulders drooping, his arms
hanging down, his eyes intently engaged in staring vacancy out
of countenance. If we are asked how it happened that the
merry, joyous Verty, whose face was before all sunshine, now
resembled nobody so much as some young and handsome Don
Quixote, reflecting on the obduracy of his Toboso Dulcinea, we
can only reply, that Verty was in love, and had not prospered
lately—that is to say, on that particular day, in his suit; and, in
consequence, felt as if the world no longer held any more joy or
light for him, forever.

With that bad taste which characterizes the victims of this
delusion, he could not consent to supply the place of the chosen
object of his love with any other image; and even regarded the
classic and romantic Miss Sallianna as wholly unworthy to supplant
Redbud in his affections. Youth is proverbially unreasonable
and fastidious on these subjects, and Verty, with the true
folly of a young man, could not discern in Miss Sallianna those
thousand graces and attractions, linguistic, philosophical, historical
and scientific, which made her so far superior to the child
with whom he had played, and committed the folly of falling in
love with. So he went along sighing, with his arms hanging
down, as we have said, and his shoulders drooping; and in this
melancholy guise, reached the office of Judge Rushton.

He found Mr. Roundjacket still driving away with his pen,
only stopping at intervals to flourish his ruler, or to cast an
affectionate glance upon the MS. of his great poem, which,
gracefully tied with red tape arranged in a magnificent bow, lay
by him on the desk.

On Verty's entrance the poet raised his head, and looked at
him curiously.

“Well, my fine fellow,” he said, “what luck in your
wooing? You look as wo-begone as the individual who drew
Priam's curtain at the dead of night. Come! my young savage,
why are you so sad?”

Verty sat down, murmuring something.

“Speak out!” said Mr. Roundjacket, wiping his pen.

“I'm not very sad,” Verty replied, looking perfectly disconsolate—“what
made you think so, Mr. Roundjacket?”

“Your physiognomy, my young friend. Are you happy with
such a face as that?”

“Such a face?”

“Yes; I tell you that you look as if you had just parted with
all your hopes—as if some adverse fate had deprived you of the
privilege of living in this temple of Thespis and the muses. You
could not look more doleful if I had threatened never to read
any more of my great poem to you.”

“Could'nt?” said Verty, listlessly.

“No.”

The young man only replied with a sigh.

“There it is—you are groaning. Come; have you quarreled
with your mistress?”

Verty colored, and his head sank.

“Please don't ask me, sir,” he said; “I have not been very
happy to-day—everything has gone wrong. I had better get to
my work, sir,—I may forget it.”

And with a look of profound discouragement, which seemed
to be reflected in the sympathizing face of Longears, who had
stretched himself at his master's feet and now lay gazing at him,
Verty opened the record he had been copying, and began to write.

Roundjacket looked at him for a moment in silence, and then,
with an expression of affection and pity, which made his grotesque
face absolutely handsome, muttered something to himself, and
followed Verty's example.

When Roundjacket commenced writing, he did so with the
regularity and accuracy of a machine which is set in motion by
the turning of a crank, and goes on until it is stopped. This
was the case on the present occasion, and Verty seemed as
earnestly engaged in his own particular task. But appearances
are deceptive—Indian nature will not take the curb like Anglo-Saxon—and
a glance over Verty's shoulders will reveal the
species of occupation which he became engaged in after finishing
ten lines of the law paper.

He was tracing with melancholy interest a picture upon the
sheet beneath his pen; and this was a lovely little design of a
young girl, with smiling lips, kind, tender eyes, and cheeks which
were round and beautiful with mirth. With a stroke of the pen
Verty added the waving hair, brushed back a la Pompadour, the
foam of lace around the neck, and the golden drop in the little ear.
Redbud looked at you from the paper, with her modest eyes and
smiles—and for a moment Verty gazed at the creation of his
pencil, sighing mournfully.

Then, with a deeper sigh than before, he drew beneath this
another sketch—the same head, but very different. The eyes
now were cold and half closed—the lips were close together, and
seemed almost disdainful—and as the gentle bending forward in
the first design was full of pleasant abandon and graceful kindness,
so the head in the present sketch had that erect and frigid
carriage which indicates displeasure.

Verty covered his eyes with his hand, and leaning down upon
the desk, was silent and motionless, except that a stified sigh
would at times issue from his lips, a sad heaving of his breast indicate
the nature of his thoughts.

Longears rose, and coming to his master, wagged his tail,
and asked, with his mute but intelligent glance, what had happened.

Verty felt the dog lick his hand, and rose from his recumbent
posture.

“Yes, yes, Longears,” he murmured, “I can't help showing it
—even you know that I am not happy.”

And with listless hands he took up the old violin which lay
upon his desk and touched the strings. The sound died away in
trembling waves—Roundjacket continued writing.

Verty, without appearing to be conscious of what he was
doing, took the bow of the volin, and placing the instrument
upon his shoulder, leaned his ear down to it, and drew the hair
over the strings. A long, sad monotone floated through the
room.

Roundjacket wrote on.

Verty, with his eyes fixed on vacancy, his lips sorrowfully
listless, his frame drooping more and more, began to play a low,
sad air, which sounded like a sigh.

Roundjacket raised his head, and looked at the musician.

Verty leaned more and more upon his instrument, listening
to it as to some one speaking to him, his eyes closed, his
bosom heaving, his under lip compressed sorrowfully as he
dreamed.

Roundjacket was just about to call upon Verty to cease his
savage and outrageous conduct, or Mr. Rushton, who was in the
other room, would soon issue forth and revenge such a dreadful
violation of law office propriety, when the door of that gentleman's
sanctum opened, and he appeared upon the threshold.

But far from bearing any resemblance to the picture of the
poet's imagination—instead of standing mute with rage, and
annihilating the musician with a horrible scowl from beneath his
shaggy and frowning brows, Mr. Rushton presented a perfect
picture of softness and emotion. His head bending forward, his
eyes half closed and filled with an imperceptible mist, his whole
manner quiet, and sad, and subdued, he seemed to hang upon the
long-drawn sighing of the violin, and take a mournful pleasure
in its utterances.

Verty's hand passed more and more slowly backward and

forward—the music became still more affecting, and passing
from thoughtfulness to sadness, and from sadness to passionate
regret, it died away in a wail.

He felt a hand upon his shoulder, and turned round. Mr.
Rushton, with moist eyes and trembling lips, was gazing at him.

“Do not play that any more, young man,” he said, in a low
tone, “it distresses me.”

“Distresses you, sir?” said Verty.

“Yes.”

“What? `Lullaby?”'

“Yes,” muttered the lawyer.

Verty's sad eyes inquired the meaning of so singular a fact,
but Mr. Rushton did not indulge this curiosity.

“Enough,” he said, with more calmness, as he turned away,
“it is not proper for you to play the violin here in business hours;
but above all, never again play that music—I cannot endure the
memories it arouses—enough.”

And retiring slowly, Mr. Rushton disappeared, closing the door
of his room behind him.

Verty followed him with his eyes until he was no longer visible,
then turned toward Mr. Roundjacket for an explanation.
That gentleman seemed to understand this mute interrogation,
but only shook his head.

Therefore Verty returned to his work, sadly laying aside the
two sketches of Redbud, and selecting another sheet to copy the
record upon. By the time he had finished one page, Mr. Roundjacket
rose from his desk, stretched himself, and announced that
office hours were over, and he would seek his surburban cottage,
where this gentleman lived in bachelor misery. Verty said he
was tired, too; and before long had told Mr. Roundjacket good-bye,
and mounted Cloud.

With Longears at his side, soberly walking in imitation of the
horse, Verty went along toward his home in the hills, gazing
upon the golden west, and thinking still of Redbud.