University of Virginia Library

11. CHAPTER XI.
WOOING.

Nothing could have been more unlike than the two pairs
of lovers who from April to August haunted Mr. Yule's
house. One pair was of the popular order, for Mark was
tenderly tyrannical, Jessie adoringly submissive, and at all
hours of the day they were to be seen making tableaux of
themselves. The other pair were of the peculiar order,
undemonstrative and unsentimental, but quite as happy.
Moor knew his power, but used it generously, asking little
while giving much. Sylvia as yet found nothing to regret,
for so gently was she taught, the lesson could not seem
hard, and when her affection remained unchanged in kind,
although it deepened in degree, she said within herself —

“That strong and sudden passion was not true love, but
an unwise, unhappy delusion of my own. I should be glad
that it is gone, because I know I am not fit to be Warwick's
wife. This quiet feeling which Geoffrey inspires must be
a safer love for me, and I should be grateful that in making
his happiness I may yet find my own.”

She tried heartily to forget herself in others, unconscious
that there are times when the duty we owe ourselves is
greater than that we owe to them. In the atmosphere of
cheerfulness that now surrounded her she could not but be
cheerful, and soon it would have been difficult to find a

more harmonious household than this. One little cloud
alone remained to mar the general sunshine. Mark was
in a frenzy to be married, but had set his heart on a double
wedding, and Sylvia would not fix the time, always pleading
—

“Let me be quite sure of myself before I take this step,
and do not wait.”

Matters stood thus till Mark, having prepared his honeymoon
cottage, as a relief to his impatience, found it so irresistible
that he announced his marriage for the first of
August, and declared no human power should change his
purpose. Sylvia promised to think of it, but gave no decided
answer, for though she would hardly own it to
herself she longed to remain free till June was past. It
came and went without a sign, and July began before the
longing died a sudden death, and she consented to be
married.

Mark and Jessie came in from the city one warm morning
and found Sylvia sitting idly in the hall. She left her
preparations all to Prue, who revelled in such things, and
applied herself diligently to her lesson as if afraid she
might not learn it as she should. Half way up stairs Mark
turned and said, laughing —

“Sylvia, I saw Searle to-day, — one of the fellows whom
we met on the river last summer, — and he began to tell
me something about André and the splendid cousin, who is
married and gone abroad it seems. I did not hear much,
for Jessie was waiting; but you remember the handsome
Cubans we saw at Christmas, don't you?”

“Yes, I remember.”

“Well, I thought you 'd like to know that the lad had
gone home to Cleopatra's wedding, so you cannot have him

to dance at yours. Have you forgotten how you waltzed
that night?”

“No, I've not forgotten.”

Mark went off to consult Prue, and Jessie began to display
her purchases before eyes that only saw a blur of
shapes and colors, and expatiate upon their beauties to ears
that only heard the words — “The splendid cousin is married
and gone abroad.”

“I should enjoy these pretty things a thousand times
more if you would please us all by being married when we
are,” sighed Jessie, looking at her pearls.

“I will.”

“What, really? Sylvia, you are a perfect darling!
Mark! Prue! she says she will!”

Away flew Jessie to proclaim the glad tidings, and Sylvia,
with a curious expression of relief, regret, and resolve, repeated
to herself that decided —

“I will.”

Every one took care that Miss Caprice should not have
time to change her mind. The whole house was soon in a
bustle, for Prue ruled supreme. Mr. Yule fled from the
din of women's tongues, the bridegrooms were kept on a
very short allowance of bride, and Sylvia and Jessie were
almost invisible, for milliners and mantua-makers swarmed
about them till they felt like animated pin-cushions. The
last evening came at length, and Sylvia was just planning
an escape into the garden when Prue, whose tongue wagged
as rapidly as her hands worked, exclaimed —

“How can you stand staring out of window when there
is so much to do? Here are all these trunks to pack,
Maria in her bed with every tooth in a frightful state of
inflammation, and that capable Jane What 's-her-name gone

off while I was putting a chamomile poultice on her face.
If you are tired sit down and try on all your shoes, for though
Mr. Peggit has your measure, those absurd clerks seem to
think it a compliment to send children's sizes to grown
women. I'm sure my rubbers were a perfect insult.”

Sylvia sat down, tugged on one boot and fell into a
reverie with the other in her hand, while Prue clacked on
like a wordmill in full operation.

“How I'm ever to get all these gowns into that trunk
passes my comprehension. There 's a tray for each, of
course; but a ball dress is such a fractious thing. I could
shake that Antoinette Roche for disappointing you at the
last minute; and what you are to do for a maid, I don't
know. You 'll have so much dressing to do you will be
quite worn out; and I want you to look your best on all
occasions, for you will meet everybody. This collar won't
wear well; Clara has n't a particle of judgment, though
her taste is sweet. These hose, now, are a good, firm
article; I chose them myself. Do be sure you get all your
things from the wash. At those great hotels there 's a deal
of pilfering, and you are so careless.”

Here Sylvia came out of her reverie with a sigh that was
almost a groan.

“Don't they fit? I knew they would n't!” said Prue,
with an air of triumph.

“The boots suit me, but the hotels do not; and if it was
not ungrateful, after all your trouble, I should like to make
a bonfire of this roomful of haberdashery, and walk quietly
away to my new home by the light of it.”

As if the bare idea of such an awful proceeding robbed
her of all strength, Miss Yule sat suddenly down in the
trunk by which she was standing. Fortunately it was

nearly full, but her appearance was decidedly ludicrous as
she sat with the collar in one uplifted hand, the hose in the
other, and the ball dress laid over her lap like a fainting
lady; while she said, with imploring solemnity, which
changed abruptly from the pathetic to the comic at the end
of her speech —

“Sylvia, if I ever cherished a wish in this world of disappointment,
it is that your wedding shall have nothing
peculiar about it, because every friend and relation you 've
got expects it. Do let me have the comfort of knowing
that every one was surprised and pleased; for if the expression
was elegant (which it is n't, and only suggested by
my trials with those dressmakers), I should say I was on
pins and needles till it 's all over. Bless me! and so I am,
for here are three on the floor and one in my shoe.” Prue
paused to extract the appropriate figure of speech which she
had chosen, and Sylvia said —

“If we have everything else as you wish it, would you
mind if we did n't go the journey?”

“Of course I should. Every one goes a wedding trip,
its part of the ceremony; and if two carriages and two
bridal pairs don't leave here to-morrow, I shall feel as if all
my trouble had been thrown away.”

“I'll go, Prue, I'll go; and you shall be satisfied. But
I thought we might go from here in style, and then slip off
on some quieter trip. I am so tired I dread the idea of
frolicking for a whole month, as Mark and Jessie mean
to do.”

It was Prue's turn to groan now, and she did so dismally.
But Sylvia had never asked a favor in vain, and
this was not the moment to refuse to her anything, so
worldly pride yielded to sisterly affection, and Prue said

with resignation, as she fell to work more vigorously than
ever, because she had wasted five good minutes —

“Do as you like, dear, you shall not be crossed on your
last day at home. Ask Geoffrey, and if you are happy I'm
satisfied.”

Before Sylvia could thank her sister there came a tap
and a voice asking —

“Might I come in?”

“If you can get in,” answered Prue, as, reversing her
plan in her hurry, she whisked the collar into a piecebag
and the hose into a bandbox.

Moor paused on the threshold in a masculine maze, that
one small person could need so much drapery.

“May I borrow Sylvia for a little while? A breath of
air will do her good, and I want her bright and blooming
for to-morrow, else young Mrs. Yule will outshine young
Mrs. Moor.”

“What a thoughtful creature you are, Geoffrey. Take
her and welcome, only pray put on a shawl, Sylvia, and
don't stay out late, for a bride with a cold in her head is
the saddest of spectacles.”

Glad to be released Sylvia went away, and, dropping the
shawl as soon as she was out of Prue's sight, paced up and
down the garden walks upon her lover's arm. Having
heard her wish and given a hearty assent Moor asked —

“Where shall we go? Tell me what you would like
best and you shall have it. You will not let me give you
many gifts, but this pleasure you will accept from me I
know.”

“You give me yourself, that is more than I deserve.
But I should like to have you take me to the place you like
best. Don't tell me beforehand, let it be a surprise.”

“I will, it is already settled, and I know you will like
it. Is there no other wish to be granted, no doubt to be
set at rest, or regret withheld that I should know. Tell
me, Sylvia, for if ever there should be confidence between
us it is now.”

As he spoke the desire to tell him of her love for Adam
rose within her, but with the desire came a thought that
modified the form in which impulse prompted her to make
confession. Moor was both sensitive and proud, would not
the knowledge of the fact mar for him the friendship that
was so much to both? From Warwick he would never
learn it, from her he should have only a half confidence,
and so love both friend and wife with an untroubled heart.
Few of us can always control the rebellious nature that so
often betrays and then reproaches, few always weigh the
moment and the act that bans or blesses it, and where is
the life that has not known some turning-point when a
fugitive emotion has decided great issues for good or ill?
Such an emotion came to Sylvia then, and another temptation,
wearing the guise of generosity, urged her to another
false step, for when the first is taken a second inevitably
follows.

“I have no wish, no regret, nothing but the old doubt
of my unstable self, and the fear that I may fail to make
you happy. But I should like to tell you something. I
don't know that you will care for it, or that there is any
need to tell it, but when you said there should be confidence
between us, I felt that I wanted you to know that I
had loved some one before I loved you.”

He did not see her face, he only heard her quiet voice.
He had no thought of Adam, whom she had known so short
a time, who was already bound; he only fancied that she

spoke of some young lover who had touched her heart, and
while he smiled at the nice sense of honor that prompted
the innocent confession, he said, with no coldness, no curiosity
in voice or face —

“No need to tell it, dear. I have no jealousy of any one
who has gone before me. Rest assured of this, for if I
could not share so large a heart with one who will never
claim my share I should not deserve it.”

“That is so like you! Now I am quite at ease.”

He looked down at her as she went beside him, thinking
that of all the brides he had ever seen his own looked least
like one.

“I always thought that you would make a very ardent
lover, Sylvia. That you would be excited, gay, and brilliant
at a time like this. But you are so quiet, so absorbed,
and so unlike your former self that I begin to think I do
not know you yet.”

“You will in time. I am passionate and restless by
nature, but I am also very sensitive to all influences, personal
or otherwise, and were you different from your tranquil,
sunshiny self, I too should change. I am quiet because
I seem in a pleasant state, half waking, half dreaming,
from which I never wish to wake. I am tired of the
past, contented with the present, and to you I leave the
future.”

“It shall be a happy one if I can make it so, and to-morrow
you will give me the dear right to try.”

“Yes,” she said, and thinking of the solemn promises to
be then made, she added, thoughtfully, “I think I love, I
know I honor, I will try to obey. Can I do more?”

Well for them both if they could have known that friendship
is love's twin, and the gentle sisters are too often mistaken

for each other. That Sylvia was innocently deceiving
both her lover and herself, by wrapping her friendship
in the garb her lost love had worn, forgetting that the wanderer
might return and claim its own, leaving the other to
suffer for the borrowed warmth. They did not know it,
and walked tranquilly together in the summer night, planning
the new life as they went, and when they parted Moor
pointed to a young moon hanging in the sky.

“See, Sylvia, our honeymoon has risen.”

“May it be a happy one!”

“It will be, and when the anniversary of this glad night
comes round it shall be shining still. God bless my little
wife.”