University of Virginia Library

11. CHAPTER XI.
MAUDE GLENDOWER.

She was a most magnificent looking woman, as she sat
within her richly furnished room, on that warm September
night, now gazing idly down the street, and again bending
her head to catch the first sound of footsteps on the stairs.
Personal preservation had been the great study of her life,
and forty years had not dimmed the lustre of her soft,
black eyes, or woven one thread of silver among the luxuriant
curls which clustered in such profusion around her
face and neck. Gray hairs and Maude Glendower had
nothing in common, and the fair, round cheek, the pearly
teeth, the youthful bloom, and white, uncovered shoulders,
seemed to indicate that time had made an exception in
her favor, and dropped her from its wheel.

With a portion of her history the reader is already acquainted.
Early orphaned, she was thrown upon the care
of an old aunt, who proud of her wondrous beauty, spared
no pains to make her what nature seemed to will that she
should be, a coquette, and a belle. At seventeen, we find
her a school-girl in New Haven, where she turned the
heads of all the college-boys, and then murmured because
one, a dark-eyed youth of twenty, withheld from her the
homage she claimed as her just due. In a fit of pique she
besieged a staid, handsome young M. D., of twenty-seven,
who had just commenced to practice in the city, and who,
proudly keeping himself aloof from the college-students,

knew nothing of the youth she so much fancied. Perfectly
intoxicated with her beauty, he offered her his
hand, and was repulsed. Overwhelmed with disappointment
and chagrin, he then left the city, and located himself
at Laurel Hill, where now we find him the selfish,
overbearing Dr. Kennedy.

But in after years Maude Glendower was punished for
that act. The dark-haired student she so much loved was
wedded to another, and with a festering wound within
her heart, she plunged at once into the giddy world of
fashion, slaying her victims by scores, and exulting as
each new trophy of her power was laid at her feet. She
had no heart, the people said, and with a mocking laugh
she thought of the quiet grave 'mid the New England
hills, where, one moonlight night, two weeks after that
grave was made, she had wept such tears as were never
wept by her again. Maude Glendower had loved, but
loved in vain; and now, at the age of forty, she was unmarried
and alone in the wide world. The aunt, who had
been to her a mother, had died a few months before, and
as her annuity ceased with her death, Maude was almost
wholly destitute. The limited means she possessed would
only suffice to pay her board for a short time, and in this
dilemma she thought of her old lover, and wondered if he
could again be won. He was rich, she had always heard,
and as his wife, she could still enjoy the luxuries to which
she had been accustomed. She knew his sister—they had
met in the saloons of Saratoga, and though it hurt her
pride to do it, she at last signified her willingness to be
again addressed.

It was many weeks ere Dr. Kennedy conquered wholly
his olden grudge, but conquered it he had, and she sat

expecting him on the night when first we introduced her
to our readers. He had arrived in Troy on the western
train, and written her a note announcing his intention to
visit her that evening. For this visit Maude Glendower
had arrayed herself with care, wearing a rich silk dress
of crimson and black—colors well adapted to her complexion.

“He saw me at twenty-five. He shall not think me
greatly changed since then,” she said, as over her bare
neck and arms she threw an exquisitely wrought mantilla
of lace.

The Glendower family had once been very wealthy, and
the last daughter of the haughty race glittered with diamonds
which had come to her from her great-grandmother,
and had been but recently reset. And there she
sat, beautiful Maude Glendower—the votary of fashion—
the woman of the world—sat waiting for the cold, hard,
overbearing man, who thought to make her his wife. A
ring at the door, a heavy tread upon the winding stairs,
and the lady rests her head upon her hand, so that her
glossy curls fall over, but do not conceal her white, rounded
arm, where the diamonds are shining.

“I could easily mistake him for my father,” she thought,
as a gray-haired man stepped into the room, where he
paused an instant, bewildered with the glare of light and
the display of pictures, mirrors, tapestry, rosewood and
marble, which met his view.

“Mrs. Berkley, Maude Glendower's aunt, had stinted
herself to gratify her nieces whims, and their surroundings
had always been of the most expensive kind, so it
was not strange that Dr. Kennedy, accustomed only to
ingrain carpet, and muslin curtains, was dazzled by so

much elegance. With a well feigned start the lady arose
to her feet, and going to his side offered him her hand, saying:
“You are Dr. Kennedy, I am sure. I should have
known you any where, for you are but little changed.”

She meant to flatter his self-love, though thanks to
Maude Remington for having insisted upon the broad
cloth suit, he looked remarkably well.

“She had not changed at all,” he said, and the admiring
gaze he fixed upon her, argued well for her success.

It becomes us not to tell how that strange wooing sped.
Suffice it to say, that at the expiration of an hour, Maude
Glendower had promised to be the wife of Dr. Kennedy,
when another spring should come. She had humbled herself
to say that she regretted her girlish freak, and he had
so far unbent his dignity as to say that he could not understand
why she should be willing to leave the luxuries
which surrounded her and go with him, a plain old fashioned
man. Maude Glendower scorned to make him
think that it was love which actuated her, and she replied,
“Now that my aunt is dead, I have no natural protector.
I am alone and want a home.”

“But mine is so different,” he said: “There are no
silk curtains there, no carpets such as this”—

“Is Maude Remington there?” the lady asked, and in
her large black eyes there was a dewy tenderness, as she
pronounced that name.

“Maude Remington!—yes,” the doctor answered.
“Where did you hear of her? My sister told you, I suppose.
Yes, Maude is there. She has lived with me ever
since her mother died. You would have liked Mattie, I
think,” and the doctor felt a glow of satisfaction in having
thus paid a tribute to the memory of his wife.

“Is Maude like her mother?” the lady asked; a deeper
glow upon her cheek, and the expression of her face
evincing the interest she felt in the answer.

“Not at all,” returned the doctor. “Mattie was blue-eyed
and fair, while Maude is dark, and resembles her
father, they say.”

The white jeweled hands were clasped together for a
moment, and then Maude Glendower questioned him of
the other one, Matty's child and his. Very tenderly the
doctor talked of his unfortunate boy, telling of his soft
brown hair, his angel face and dreamy eyes.

“He is like Matty,” the lady said, more to herself than
her companion, who proceeded to speak of Nellie, as a
paragon of loveliness and virtue. “I shan't like her, I
know,” the lady thought, “but the other two,” how her
heart bounded at the thoughts of folding them to her
bosom.

Louis Kennedy, weeping that his mother was forgotten,
had nothing to fear from Maude Glendower, for a child of
Matty Remington was a sacred trust to her, and when as
the doctor bade her good night, he said again, “You will
find a great contrast between your home and mine,” she
answered, “I shall be contented if Maude and Louis are
there.”

“And Nellie, too,” the doctor added, unwilling that
she should be overlooked.

“Yes, Nellie too,” the lady answered, the expression
of her mouth indicating that Nellie too, was an object of
indifference to her.

The doctor is gone, his object is accomplished, and at
the Mansion House near by, he sleeps quietly and well.

But the lady, Maude Glendower, oh, who shall tell what
bitter tears she wept, or how in her inmost soul she
shrank from the man she had chosen. And yet there was
nothing repulsive in him, she knew. He was fine-looking,
—he stood well in the world,—he was rich while she was
poor. But not for this alone, had she promised to be his
wife. To hold Maude Remington within her arms, to
look into her eyes, to call his daughter child, this was the
strongest reason of them all. And was it strange that
when at last she slept, she was a girl again, looking across
the college green to catch a glimpse of one whose indifference
had made her what she was, a selfish, scheming,
cold-hearted woman.

There was another interview next morning, and then
the doctor left her, but not until with her soft hand in his,
and her shining eyes upon his face, she said to him, “You
think your home is not a desirable one for me. Can't you
fix it up a little? Are there two parlors, and do the windows
come to the floor? I hope your carriage horses are
in good condition, for I am very fond of driving. Have
you a flower garden? I anticipate much pleasure in
working among the plants. Oh, it will be so cool and
nice in the country. You have an ice-house of course.”

Poor doctor! Double parlors—low windows—ice-house,
and flower-garden—he had none—while the old carry-all
had long since ceased to do its duty, and its place was
supplied by an open buggy, drawn by a sorrel nag. But
Maude Glendower could do with him what Katy and
Matty could not have done, and after his return to Laurel
Hill, he was more than once closeted with Maude, to
whom he confided his plan of improving the place, asking
her if she thought the profits of next year's crop of wheat

and wool would meet the whole expense. Maude guessed
at random that it would, and, as money in prospect seems
not quite so valuable as money in hand, the doctor finally
concluded to follow out Maude Glendower's suggestions,
and greatly to the surprise of the neighbors, the repairing
process commenced.