The Wetherel affair :: :: University of Virginia Library

“I like him very much,” replied Nestoria, with her characteristic frankness
and simplicity, a childlike smile of pleasure rising to her lips at the sound
of the name, and her eyes lighting up with eagerness to hear more of the
subject.

Alice looked at her friend in amazement; such straightforwardness in a
young lady on such a topic surprised and puzzled her; she could not judge
from it whether Nestoria liked Edward a great deal or only a little.

“What is the matter?” asked the missionary's daughter, while a blush of
gathering embarrassment mounted into her cheeks and burned away there like
a conflagration, until her very ears tingled. “Have I said anything very singular?”

“I never saw such another girl,” said Alice. “Do you really mean that
you think very highly of Edward?”

“He has been so kind and polite to me!” apologized Nestoria, the blush
meanwhile blazing in a manner to put one in mind of invaders ravaging some
fair country with fire. “How can I help being grateful to him?”

Miss Dinneford became uneasy; it occurred to her that she had done wrong
in leaving this artless child alone with her engaging but untoward relative; it
was much as if she had abandoned Parley the Porter to the wiles of that courteous
desperado, Mr. Flattery. In her own womanish, indirect way she set
about neutralizing whatever mischief might have resulted from Edward's fascinations,
by suggesting another admirer.

“This youngster is pleasant enough,” she observed quietly. “But I have
another cousin who would suit you a great deal better. It is Cousin Walter.
He isn't wonderfully handsome, perhaps, but he is wonderfully good.”

“And isn't Mr. Wetherel good?” asked Nestoria, startled by such a cruel
suspicion that she could not conceal her concern, nor even think of concealing
it.

“Oh, Edward is well enough,” hastily answered Alice, who had a natural
and generous repugnance to speaking ill of her relative, and in fact did not

think at all harshly of him because of his wild ways. “He is as good, I dare
say, as young men average. What I mean is that he isn't of your sort.”

“Alice, tell me the truth!” exclaimed Nestoria, losing her self-possession
in her anxiety. “Is Mr. Wetherel a bad man?”

“I didn't say so,” cried Alice, thoroughly discomposed. “Why, what nonsense!
Didn't I tell you,” she added, driven by erring good-nature into a fib,
“didn't I just tell you that he is well enough? Only this other one is so awfully
good,” she hurried on, seeking to slip away from the subject of that somewhat
dubious Edward. “He, I mean Cousin Walter, is fit to be a missionary.
I never hear him talk without thinking of St. Paul, or some such good little
man. We expect him here very soon, and you will be delighted with him, or
I don't know your tastes. Another relative, a Cousin John, is coming with
him; and that is all the cousins there are of us; big box, little box, band-box,
and bundle; just four cousins. Cousin John is the big box, for he is large and
lumbering and noisy. Walter is the little box; oh, he is too little for anything;
he is about your size. Edward is the band-box; and I must pass for
the bundle. All women are bundles, just good to be handed about and to be
in the way. And don't we make a fuss over each other when we get together!
You would suppose there were no other people in the world than Dinnefords
and Wetherels and their relatives. It is just like Noah's family coming out of
the ark, with everybody else drowned and got rid of and out of mind. I hope
you will put up with us. You must like Walter in spite of his littleness, and
John Bowlder, too, in spite of his bigness.”

Alice could prattle like a running brook, and she did her talkative best on
this occasion, struggling to get away from that ugly topic of Edward's charactor,
and struggling with success.

The bell rang for prayers; they rustled down stairs in obedience to it; then
followed the quiet routine of a Sea Lodge day; the customary talk with the
Judge about Nestorian missions, and other such godly matters; the drives after
old Sorrel, the readings and the walkings. Meantime Nestoria had Edward's
promise constantly in mind, and kept an anxious lookout for his expected call.
Not, however, until the afternoon of the next day, as she was reading the
“Puritan Recorder” or some similar edifying publication to the Judge in his
study, did she behold the young man entering the front gate of the grounds, a
desired and yet alarming visitant. Her heart gave a great leap of unexpected
terror; she looked at the Judge as a forlorn hope looks at the death-dealing
rampart which it must storm; and then, repeating to herself her watchword
of “duty,” she set on gallantly. Laying down her journal she walked firmly
up to the old man, met his inquiring gaze with a pleading smile, and said.
“Your nephew is coming.”

“Edward!” murmured the Judge, getting on his feet in his slow way,
much as a cautious man, fearful of falling, gets on a horse, and deliberately
bringing his spectacles to bear upon the astonishing apparition.

“Won't you see him?” begged Nestoria. “I think he wishes a reconciliation.
I want you to see him.”

The Judge stared at her; then his glassy eyes settled on vacancy, as was
his manner when in earnest thought; at last he said solemnly, “We are
taught out of the mouths of babes and sucklings. Yes, I will see him.”

Nestoria had one of those impulses which sometimes perform moral miracles.
Putting up her hands with spasmodic eagerness, she drew Mr. Wetherel's
hoary head down to her and kissed his wrinkled cheek. The old gentleman

was helpless in her soft grasp; his caput was no more under his control
than if it had been in a charger, borne before the daughter of Herodias; his
venerable neck bent as easily as male necks generally do when lovely woman
pulls at them. Perhaps it was the first kiss that he had received in many
years, for his austere deportment did not tempt to such familiarities, just as
his serious spirit did not crave them. But he was evidently gratified by this
touch of affectionate emotion; he looked very kindly after the girl as she hurried
out of the study. It is pretty certain, too, that he did not comprehend all
the motives which had prompted the kiss; for after Nestoria had left him he
murmured with grave simplicity, “The intereession of the righteous availeth
much.”

With this promise of peace on his thin, and one might almost say trenchant
lips, he hurried his heavy, squeaking boots to the front door of the house, and
opened it to the prodigal nephew.

“How do you do, uncle?” said the surprised young man; to which the
Judge answered with solemn though courteous brevity, “Come in.”

When both were in the study, the senior closed the door, motioned his
nephew to a chair, seated himself with his usual rheumatic deliberation, and
observed, perhaps too much in the tone of a father confessor, or of a physician
who is called to prescribe in a difficult case, “You wished to converse with
me?”

“I am very much obliged to you for granting me an interview,” bowed
Edward. Then he paused, much perplexed and already a little indignant; for,
in the first place, he did not know how gracefully to begin his act of submission;
in the second place, it seemed to him that his potent relative was cruelly
formal.

“If our meeting should bear any acceptable fruit,” responded the Judge,
“I will express myself as under obligations to you.”

It was not a cordial speech, and it was stiffly uttered; but the old man felt
that he had before him a great criminal.

“We parted on ill terms,” said the youngster, making a violent effort to
descend into the valley of humiliation. “I am sorry for it.”

“So am I,” answered the Judge. “I am not willingly on ill terms with
any human being, and much less with my own flesh and blood. You are the
son of my dearest and brightest brother—the last brother that was spared to
me—”

He suddenly came to a pause. If the youngster could have believed his
eyes, if he could have had faith in the tenderness and affection of an old man,
he might have been aware of a pathetic moisture behind those spectacles. The
aged, especially such as have been left nearly alone in the world, are sometimes
piteously shaken by the remembrance of a bereavement.

“You are Henry's son,” continued the Judge, mastering his always tremulous
voice. “I had accepted you in the place of all my own children whom
God took to himself long ago. You are the last Wetherel of our stock. I
do not think I am wrong in prizing the name of Wetherel. It represents to
my mind so many pious men and women who have led worthy, devout lives
on this favored New England soil, and have been translated from it to Paradise!
I must and do venerate and love the name. I desire to see it continued
in prosperity if it can also be continued in godliness. And you are the last
Wetherel! How can I willingly be on ill terms with you?”

The young man bowed silently and with a seriousness which showed emotion.

He too, we know, was proud of the name, and his uncle's feeling on the
subject moved him.

“But I cannot love sin nor abet sinners,” continued the old man. “If I
am guided by any one motive in life, it is, I humbly trust, a sense of duty.
That motive I must obey, whatever my natural desires may be, whatever my
earthly affections may urge. It will not let me hold fast to hands which
are full of wickedness, nor rejoice in feet which run in the ways of the
scorner.”

“You put it very strongly, sir,” said the nephew, his Wetherel temper and
stubbornness rising. “I have lived the life of a young man. That is all.”

“How can you abuse language thus?” demanded the Judge. “Have you
lived the life of that young man whom Jesus loved? Is the life of a young man
necessarily a seandal to all pure men and pure women? I must be plain with
you, Edward, as I have always been. You have lived the life which leads to
eternal death. You have banded yourself with the impure and with mockers.
Your chosen comrades have been the noisy sons of Belial. I will not speak,
for very shame and pity, of your own deeds and words. You know well what
they have been, and that they must fill me with horror.”

Edward was by this time angry and disgusted; he could not see that he had
been such a wretch as his uncle painted him; and the portrait, as held up to
his eyes, seemed the work of irrational prejudice and hostility. He was
tempted to speak out in bitter wrath, and with difficulty controlled the unwise
impulse.

“I came here to ask a reconciliation,” he said sullenly. “I see little prospeet
of obtaining it.”

“You see it, then, in your own heart,” declared the persuaded Judge, conscious
of rectitude. “In mine, if you had that sight which looks into hearts,
you would discover earnest yearning for kindliness. I ask for but one concession—repentance
of evil.”

“You want reformation, I suppose,” muttered Edward.

“Yes, repentance and its fruits. I would not believe in the soundness and
durability of reformation unless I could also see wise and devout sorrow for
the past. Where there is no root there can be no worthy fruit.”

The young man hesitated, querying what he should say. He could not feel
that he repented of his life of gayety, which had been to him while his money
lasted a life of real pleasure, so strong were his physical powers of enjoyment
and so keen his social instincts. But should he not, rather than lose all chance
of succeeding to his uncle's estate endeavor to counterfeit a penitential spirit?

For a little time the two men remained silent, the younger fluctuating between
passion and the dictates of policy, and the elder praying in soul for that
other soul.