80. CHAPTER LXXX.
CLOUDS BREAKING.
The next morning Amy Waring came to Hope Wayne
radiant with the prospect of her Aunt Martha's restoration to
the world. Hope shook her hand warmly, and looked into her
friend's illuminated face.
“She is engaged to Lawrence Newt,” said Hope, in her
heart, as she kissed Amy's lips.
“God bless you, Amy!” she added, with so much earnestness
that Amy looked surprised.
“I am very glad,” said Hope, frankly.
“Why, what do you know about it?” asked Amy.
“Do you think I am blind?” said Hope.
“No; but no eyes could see it, it was so hidden.”
“It can't be hidden,” said Hope, earnestly.
Amy stopped, looked inquiringly at her friend, and blushed
—wondering what she meant.
“Come, Hope, at least we are hiding from each other. I
came to ask you to a family festival.”
“I am ready,” answered Hope, with an air of quiet knowledge,
and not at all surprised. Amy Waring was confused,
she hardly knew why.
“Why, Hope, I mean only that Lawrence Newt—”
Hope Wayne smiled so tenderly and calmly, and with such
tranquil consciousness that she knew every thing Amy was
about to say, that Amy stopped again.
“Go on,” said Hope, placidly; “I want to hear it from
your own lips.”
Amy Waring was in doubt no longer. She knew that Hope
expected to hear that she was engaged. And not with less
placidity than Hope's, she said:
“Lawrence Newt wants us all to come and dine with him,
because my Aunt Martha is found, and he wishes to bring
Aunt Bennet and her together.”
That was all. Hope looked as confusedly at the calm Amy
as Amy, a moment since, had looked at her. Then they both
smiled, for they had, perhaps, some vague idea of what each
had been thinking.
The same evening the Round Table met. Arthur Merlin
came early—so did Hope Wayne. They sat together talking
rapidly, but Hope did not escape observing the unusual sadness
of the artist—a sadness of manner rather than of expression.
In a thousand ways there was a deference in his treatment
of her which was unusual and touching. She had been
very sure that he had understood what she meant when she
spoke to him with an air of badinage about his picture. And
certainly it was plain enough. It was clear enough; only he
would not see what was before his eyes, nor hear what was
in his ears, and so had to grope a little further until Lawrence
Newt suddenly struck a light and showed him where he was.
While they were yet talking Lawrence Newt came in.
He spoke to Amy Waring, and then went straight up to Hope
Wayne and put out his hand with the old frank smile breaking
over his face. She rose and answered his smile, and laid
her hand in his. They looked in each other's eyes; and Lawrence
Newt saw in Hope Wayne's the beauty of a girl that
long ago, as a boy, he had loved; and in his own, Hope felt
that tenderness which had made her mother's happiness.
It was but a moment. It was but a word. For the first
time he said,
“Hope.”
And for the first time she answered,
“Lawrence.”
Amy Waring heard them. The two words seemed sharp:
they pierced her heart, and she felt faint. The room swam,
but she bit her lip till the blood came, and her stout heart
preserved her from falling.
“It is what I knew: they are engaged.”
But how was it that the manner of Lawrence Newt toward
herself was never before more loyal and devoted? How was
it that the quiet hilarity of the morning was not gone, but
stole into his conversation with her so pointedly that she could
not help feeling that it magnetized her, and that, against her
will, she was more than ever cheerful? How was it that she
knew it was herself who helped make that hilarity—that it
was not only her friend Hope who inspired it?
They are secrets not to be told. But as they all sat around
the table, and Arthur Merlin for the first time insisted upon
reading from Byron, and in his rich melancholy voice recited
“Though the day of my destiny's over,”
it was clear that the cloud had lifted—that the spell of constraint
was removed; and yet none of them precisely understood
why.
“To-morrow, then,” said Lawrence Newt as they parted.
“To-morrow,” echoed Amy Waring and Hope Wayne.
Arthur Merlin pulled his cap over his eyes and sauntered
slowly homeward, whistling musingly, and murmuring,
“A bird in the wilderness singing,
That speaks to my spirit of thee.”
His Aunt Winnifred heard him as he came in. The good
old lady had placed a fresh tract where he would be sure to
see it when he entered his room. She heard his cautious step
stealing up stairs, for the painter was careful to make no
noise; and as she listened she drew pictures upon her fancy
of the scenes in which her boy had been mingling. It was
Aunt Winnifred's firm conviction that society — that is, the
great world of which she knew nothing—languished for the
smile and presence of her nephew, Arthur. That very evening
her gossip, Mrs. Toxer, had been in, and Aunt Winnifred had
discussed her favorite theme until Mrs. Toxer went home with
a vague idea that all the young and beautiful unmarried women
in the city were secretly pining away for love of Arthur
Merlin.
“Mercy me, now!” said Aunt Winnifred as she lay listening
to the creaking step of her nephew. “I wonder what poor
girl's heart that wicked boy has been breaking to-night;” and
she turned over and fell asleep again.
That young man reached his room and struck a light. It
flashed upon a paper. He took it up eagerly, then smiled as
he saw that it was a tract, and read, “A word to the Unhappy.”
“Dear Aunt Winnifred!” said he to himself; “does she
think a man's griefs are like a child's bumps and bruises, to
be cured by applying a piece of paper?”
He smiled sadly, with the profound conviction that no man
had ever before really known what unhappiness was, and so
tumbled into bed and fell asleep. And as he dreamed, Hope
Wayne came to him and smiled, as Diana smiled in his picture
upon Endymion.
“See!” she said, “I love you; look here!”
And in his dream he looked and saw a full moon in a summer
sky shining upon a fresh grave upon a hill-top.
