University of Virginia Library

14. CHAPTER XIV.
AT THE TRAP, AND ELSEWHERE.

One morning, a few days after the scenes we have just related,
Mr. Effingham received a note couched in the following
terms:

“`The Trap,'—on a splendid morning.”

For a moment Mr. Effingham was determined not to go,
and ordered the servant who brought the note to be directed
to wait. The servant from the Trap had departed however,
and Mr. Effingham finally determined to embrace his friend's
invitation.

“Why annoy the honest fellow?” he said, “he is one of
my very best friends, and I cannot afford to throw away such
—I have not enough. Now what can he want? Here I am
languidly speculating, and cannot, to save me, come to any
conclusion. It is too late in the season to hunt—and yet he
says I must come in buff and leather. I am to ride Tom,
and sleep there. Decidedly I will give it up.”

And Mr. Effingham dismissed the subject from his mind,
returning it seemed to some vague train of thought that had
possession of his mind. Sitting before the slight fire of
crackling twigs, with his feet upon the old grotesque and-irons,
he gazed into the coals:—then upon the old portrait
high upon the carved wainscot—then through the window
on the breezy lawn, covered with flowers which bowed their

heads as the wind passed over them. The blustering wind of
March rang merrily round the gables, and whistled through
the keyhole, and rose and fell, and died away. Only the
ticking of the huge clock in the hall was heard in these
pauses, and footsteps of Miss Alethea, or Kate, or some servant—in
the apartments overhead.

The thinker gazed long at the portraits.

“I believe in blood,” said Mr. Effingham, musingly.
“The blood of men is quick or sluggish, generous or mean,
just as that of animals is. The race-horse has an ancestry
of race-horses—the common drudge, an ancestry of drudges;
the offspring of tigers are fierce, as the lamb follows its dam
in meekness—very trite and very true; every thing true is
trite. And man, the supreme animal, is not an exception.
There now is old Harry Effingham, in his armor—he fought
at Agincourt, they say, and did good service with his stout
arm. And there is the Chevalier Huon, of Effenghame, as
they call him, the princeps of all, who married a damsel of
the accursed race of Mahound, the family chronicle says, in
the Crusades—a wild fellow, I do not doubt, and perhaps I
have now, in this good year of grace, 1765, something of Sir
Huon in me. Possibly; I came very near wedding one who
—well, well; I will not rake in those cold ashes. What
boots it? The fire is burnt out, it is true; but why soil my
fingers? I think I have suffered enough. If not pleasure,
give me the next thing, apathy, which I think I have.”

A servant entered, to replenish the fire.

“Ned, have the piebald, Tom, saddled, and brought
round,” said Mr. Effingham.

“Yes, sir.”

The servant retired, and Mr. Effingham fell into another
fit of thought, from which he was roused by the intelligence
that his horse was ready.

“I suppose I may be allowed to disregard the caution
about dress,” he said to himself. “Bring my boots and
spurs,” he added, to the servant.

He was soon on his way, and before long, reached the
Trap. This abode of Mr. Jack Hamilton was a very handsome
specimen of the old hipped roof mansions which crown
so many hills in Virginia, and one might have seen at a
glance that none but a bachelor resided there. The front

door was permanently open, one hinge having given way, and
the few abortive efforts to open and close it, having resulted
in nothing more than a semi-circular mark upon the floor.
The door had been in this condition just one year, and remained
unchanged until—but we anticipate. Upon the
small porch half-a-dozen dogs were dozing, and snapping at
the flies; and in the yard a score of hounds bayed, gambolled,
basked in the sun, or dragged their blocks.

An old white-haired negro came, with the well-bred courtesy
of the Virginia family servant, to take Mr. Effingham's
horse, and he entered.

Jack Hamilton came forth to greet him, and then they
entered the dining-room, or rather the apartment used for
that purpose when Mr. Hamilton was alone, which was very
seldom. Here Mr. Effingham found half-a-dozen gentlemen
from the neighborhood, all his acquaintances. They received
him with the cordial frankness of boon companions,
and after a few questions about his travels, commenced again
conversing, at the top of their voices, on hunting, plantation
matters, politics—especially upon politics. Did half-a-dozen
Virginians ever remain together half an hour, without talking
politics? We have never been present on such an occasion.

Dinner, and copious libations—perhaps we might say copious
libations and dinner also—succeeded. Afterwards a
cloud of smoke, from as many tobacco pipes as there were
men, Mr. Effingham excepted, and then politics more ferociously
than ever. Navigation laws—yes, sir, infamous, unconstitutional—dare
to pass that stamp act they talk of—
try it—the continent will be in a blaze—pshaw!—yes sir!
in a blaze—puff! puff!—I tell you, sir—no, sir—yes, sir—
I like the governor—he don't suit the times—here Oscar!
Is this Black's pup, Jack? But we refrain even from reporting
stenographically this chaos of voices, the new Babel
of confused tongues.

The afternoon passed, and night came, and then a substantial
supper, preceded by a walk out to look at the horses,
the dogs, the tobacco, the stock, every thing. Then all go to
the door to greet a stalwart gentleman, approaching on a
fine roan; and Captain Ralph greets his friends with a multiplicity
of morbleus! and they all sit down to supper.

After supper, cards, and wine, and tobacco smoke. Spadille
reigns supreme, and the Captain loses a pile of gold,
spite of his most desperate efforts, a circumstance which
causes him to explode a whole magazine of gunpowder-like
morbleus! and curse the stars, which are made responsible
for the ills that happen upon earth, much too often.

Mr. Effingham has long since heard that the object of
the gathering is nothing less than a real bona fide fox-hunt,
spite of the lateness of the season, and the smile which has
greeted this transparent device of the worthy Jack Hamilton,
has yielded to apathy again. Mr. Effingham will ride
after the hounds—it is not worse than idleness.

Cards and dice lose their charm at last, pipes emit only
acrid smoke, claret, and the best Jamaica, only make the
head muddier, even politics has died a natural death, and the
revellers sleep.

But before the day has reddened in the east, they are
flying after the hounds, who have struck a warm trail, and
the far distance swallows them, the yelping of the dogs dies
away, the Trap has caught silence, and holds it tight.

Mr. Effingham rides more madly than them all. He begins
to think that Mr. Hamilton is not so contemptible a
physician as he thought him, for his cheek is full of blood,
which was before so pale; his eyes are brilliant; his breast
feels no longer as though some heavy load oppressed it—he
is conscious of the effect which the body exerts upon the
mind. Mr. Effingham's habit was to sleep late in the morning;
here he was scouring the cold, fresh, shivering, dewy
fields, before sunrise, following the music of the dogs, and
whirling over fences, ditches, and hollows. One or two of
the hunters stumbled, and once a rider was rolled in a ditch.
Mr. Effingham positively found himself laughing.

They rode all the morning; they had started one of
those old gray foxes, who take pleasure in running all day,
and sleep all the sounder after their hen-roost supper, for the
exercise. By noon Reynard had disappeared—sunk into the
earth—vanished; the dogs were at fault, and after two hours
search for the provoking animal's traces, the hunt was abandoned.

Mr. Effingham, Captain Ralph, and Jack Hamilton, took
their way back together; calculating the distance they had

ridden between twenty and thirty miles, perhaps more. Mr.
Effingham was not at all weary, and said he never felt
better.

They passed Mr. Lee's about noon, and the old gentleman
insisted on their going in to dinner. To this, Mr. Hamilton
and the Captain consented at once, but Mr. Effingham
at first demurred.

“You will offend Mr. Lee, Champ, my boy,” said Hamilton,
in a low tone.

Mr. Effingham gave his friend a strange look, sighed languidly,
and entered with them.

How it was, Mr. Effingham did not know, but Jack
Hamilton persuaded him to stay, and return with him, and
whenever he intimated to his friend a desire to go, the intimation
was received with a look which seemed to say, “Don't
hurry, my dear fellow; just let me finish this anecdote to
Miss Clare, and I'm with you;” or, “Let us hear Miss Henrietta
finish that rattling song which the Captain has worried
her into singing;” or, “Just let me refute these ideas of Mr.
Lee, on the mode of curing tobacco.” And so evening drew
on, and Mr. Effingham, to his own astonishment, did not feel
very unhappy.

They were all gathered now around the harpsichord,
whereat sat Henrietta, dazzlingly beautiful, and striking indifferently
all her visitors, with her satirical speeches, and
proud, laughing eyes.

The Captain listened with delight, or an excellent affectation,
to

and declared that he had never heard any thing more beautiful,
except the songs of the French soldiers on the night
preceding the battle of Mindon. This observation caused
Miss Henrietta to say, that perhaps Captain Waters preferred
male to female voices. To which satirical observation,
the Captain, with great candor, and cordial frankness,
replied that he did. Miss Henrietta thereupon requested a
song from some gentleman present, but failing in her desire,
retired to the opposite side of the room, where Captain
Ralph permitted her to remain, very cheerfully.

Finding this position somewhat dull, Miss Henrietta returned

by degrees, from the window to the sofa, from the
sofa to the centre-table, from the table to the harpsichord
again, with a volume in her hand. She said that nothing
was more stupid than these accounts of battles—holding the
history of the late war, open, as she spoke. The Captain
roused himself, and replied, politely, yes, it was a very fine
evening. Miss Henrietta thereupon tossed her head; the
Captain said that the perfume of the hair-powder she used
was delightful. Thereupon Miss Henrietta, in great ill-humor,
turned her back upon him, and began to talk with
Mr. Effingham; and not to be exceeded in civility, the Captain
turned his back too, and began to converse, very cheerfully,
with Clare and Mr. Hamilton.

Clare, as we may imagine, supported with difficulty this
long interview with Mr. Effingham. He had not addressed
more than half a dozen words to her, and these had been
characterized by a calm reserve; but once or twice their
eyes furtively met, and they saw plainly that each was watching
the other. Clare seemed uneasy at his presence. Mr.
Effingham felt his heart stir, in the young girl's presence—a
nameless charm seemed to envelope her—but he kept his resolution
to avoid engaging in any conversation which could
bring on any allusion to former times and events. This was
not difficult, for Mr. Hamilton engrossed much of Clare's attention,
and she seemed to seek in his society a refuge from
that of Mr. Effingham. He commented inwardly on her
evident partiality for his friend, trying to say calmly to
himself that he would make her an excellent husband.
Perhaps the gloom upon his brow grew somewhat deeper,
when the innocent girl smiled upon Hamilton so kindly and
sweetly, but he controlled his feelings.

She sat down, at the request of Mr. Hamilton, and unaffectedly
commenced singing. The song was “Logan
Water,” and she sang it with great feeling and sweetness.
The sound of her voice affected him strangely, and sitting
down, he drank in the clear, tender carol, his dreamy eyes
fixed on her face.

That song revived all the past for him. She had sung it
often for him, and perhaps this was what led her to refuse
Mr. Hamilton's request for that particular song at first. As
she sang, all those bright, happy days of youth, returned to

him:—the days in the woods—the evening playing games—
the mornings, when, with her fair hair unbound, she ran hand
in hand with him, over emerald meadows, by rippling,
laughing streams. Again the birds carolled over head, as
they carolled in the past, and a flood of memories flowed in
upon his apathetic heart, and made its dull tide leap again.
As the last notes died away, he felt as though he were leaving
some fairy isle of warmth and verdure, and a million
flowers, to breast the cold, stormy seas of real life; and with
the last plaintive notes, the volume of his memory closed
again, and his heart sank.

As she rose, they exchanged a long look; and Mr.
Effingham turned away.

Her look had said: “Do not avoid me thus, because we
have both been unhappy and unfortunate; because our relations
are changed, forget, as I do.”

His own said as plainly: “I have tried your heart
cruelly, I know it; I suffer without complaining, or expecting
the past to return; you can never love me again; I do
not complain. I deserve all; but will bear my suffering in
silence.”

Had the lips but said it!—had those glances spoken
plainly!

Mr. Effingham, when he departed, merely bowed. He
looked at her again, with his old dreamy gaze, and went
away with his companions.

As he went to his chamber that night, he murmured:
“Well, I was mistaken; some of the old feeling, for a
wonder, still remains, surviving the storm. Let me beware
of it.”

And his head sank as he spoke.