University of Virginia Library

2. LETTER THE SECOND.

Oh, what a morning it is, Cousin Jane! Your heart
drinks in the incense of many such, I doubt not, but
to me, who have lived in the city all my life, each
jubilant sunrising comes like a new revelation of
power and beauty. I wish mamma could look out
of my window. The landscape she would see would
delight the heart of a painter. Hills, and dells, and
woodland, and, in the distance, the bright river winding
along like a thread of silver light. Blessed be
God for summer. I do not think I have so rejoiced
in the dewy freshness of any morning since I have
been here. And yet I am not very happy. I rose
early to tell you this. I have much to say to you;
but, though I have sat here half an hour, my pen has
only traveled over these few lines.

Philip Wyndham came yesterday in the ten o'clock
train. I was busy all the first part of the morning
helping Caddie; that is, I put little beautifying touches
here and there which she had not time to give. I
filled every vase with the sweet June roses and the
other early flowers which thrive so well in Caddie's
garden. The parlor looked charmingly when I had

thus adorned it with blossoms. I opened all the windows,
and fastened sprays of roses in with the ribbons
which looped back the snowy muslin curtains.

Then I went to Philip Wyndham's room. I knew
he would never know it, and so I indulged myself in
making it beautiful for him. I filled it with such
flowers as I remembered to have heard him say he
loved — bright, sweet-scented ones — roses, and heliotropes,
and geraniums. I scattered over the dressing-bureau
little articles of virtu from my own room, and
on the table I put a handsome port-folio full of all varieties
of stationery.

At length, when I could find nothing more to do,
I went to my room. There I took counsel with myself.
I called my heart to account for its foolish flutterings.
I bade my fingers cease their nervous trembling.
I chided my voice into calmer, less faltering
tones. You know I told you that I never loved Philip
Wyndham; that is, not well enough to give up wealth
and luxury for his sake. I reminded myself of this
fact, and then I remembered my other lover. I reflected
that a few months would probably see me Mrs.
Lionel Fitz-Herbert, and there was no reason I should
suffer my fancies to run riot about another. To be
sure, I never could, by any possibility, wax romantic
about Mr. Fitz-Herbert, but it was pleasant to contemplate
the future he could give me—so luxurious, so
free from care—to imagine myself presiding in my
stately mansion, or driving down town with my liveried
servants and my faultless equipage.

“Ah! Helen Hamilton,” I said to myself, “you are
a girl of sense. Poetry and romance are delightful
condiments at the banquet of life, but very unsubstantial

as a pièce de résistance.” I resolved to meet Mr.
Wyndham with calm indifference. I would not even
bestow a single extra adornment upon my toilet. I
put on a fresh, simple white muslin, with a blue ribbon
about my waist. Then I twined a few red roses
in my hair. As I did so, the face reflected in the mirror
arrested my gaze. It was as beautiful as ever;
perhaps a careless observer would have said it was as
youthful; but I could see it had grown old and worldly.
There was a proud curl to the lip; a haughty,
half-sarcastic gleam to the eye, which I did not like.
They had come there since Philip Wyndham saw me
last. The spirit had not become meeker in the past
two years—more chastened, more womanly. It had
grown proud, defiant, self-loving. Well, I could not
help it. He would read the change, perhaps he would
despise it, but why should the future Mrs. Lionel Fitz-Herbert
care for Philip Wyndham's scorn?

Just then I heard a step coming up the graveled
walk that thrilled me with the old memories which
rose, ghost-like, at its echoes. I went down stairs and
stood in the parlor as he and Will came up the steps.
Caddie met them at the door. I heard her joyful welcome,
and then they came in. I thought—perhaps I
was mistaken, Cousin Jane — but I thought Philip
Wyndham grew a shade paler as he saw me. His
voice did not falter. He came to me and extended
his hand.

“This is indeed a surprise, Miss Hamilton.”

I was quite as cool and self-possessed as he. Caddie
knows little of my acquaintance with him. I only
told her we had met several times in New York, and
I know, shrewd observer as she is, she saw no clew by
which to guess our past.

Now, Cousin Jane, that man is nothing to me. When
I might have been his wife, I refused him without a
moment's hesitation. And yet he has made me more
than half miserable with his indifference already. He
does not avoid me at all. He talks with me, when it
comes in his way, as easily and as agreeably as with
Will or Caddie, but he hardly seems to know whether
I am in the room or out of it. It must be my vanity
that is wounded. We women do not like to find our
captives quite so free and heart-whole. However indifferent
we may feel to the victim, we do not like to
find the chains we forged all broken.

There, he is going down stairs now. I am going
down too. Why not? Though he is nothing to me,
there is no reason I should not hear him declare what
this beautiful morning has said to his soul. I know
what a look of inspiration will beam from his earnest
face. But, look you, he shall not know this. I will
say some provoking, ridiculous thing; something that
shall make him feel that what he does and says is
nothing to me, even as what I do and say is nothing
to him.

I shall not send you this letter yet. I will leave it
open till Mr. Fitz-Herbert comes. You shall see how
I will welcome him.

June 26th.

Well, Cousin Jane, Lionel Fitz-Herbert came yesterday,
by the same train that brought Philip Wyndham
a week before. You shall hear all about it. In the
first place, you will want to know how I got along
with Mr. Wyndham seven mortal days. Well, I had
very little to do with him. The forenoons he has
spent in his room, writing diligently, as I suppose, on

the book which will find its way to your table next
autumn. Afternoons he has been for the most part
with Will. They have taken together long drives,
and been off on fishing excursions from which Caddie
and I were excluded. But I have seen enough of him
to give me more than one heart-thrill, yet I am unhappy
at his indifference no longer. I chose my own
path, and I must walk in it. It is strange, though,
what an influence this man has over me. If I were
with him always I couldn't help being good. His
earnestness is infectious. He makes one see life as he
sees it. In his presence it seems a solemn thing.
Wealth and station look like mere tinsel. They are
shorn of charms, and nothing on earth seems worth
the staining our souls with its dust. One cares only
to live the life heaven appoints—to live it simply, earnestly,
honestly, until this life on earth shall lose itself
and be absorbed in the fullness of the life of heaven.

You have felt something of this influence in his
books; you would feel it still more if you could see
him. I do not think I would have him stoop from
his lofty height to a poor butterfly of fashion such as
I. It would be like the kingly eagle mating with the
peacock. I know myself. I could not always live
on the enchanted mountains. I should come down
into the valleys sometimes, and then I should want
the luxuries that he could not give me. You see I
must marry Lionel Fitz-Herbert. And this brings
me back to his coming.

“I suppose you'll beautify Mr. Fitz-Herbert's room
for him?” said Caddie, standing by my side after
breakfast. I blushed, for Philip Wyndham had heard
her question, and was looking at me keenly.

“Not I, indeed. I'm not sure that the gentleman
cares for flowers; and, any way, I have all I can do
to beautify myself.”

I came up stairs and made an elaborate toilet. I
did all that art could do to enhance my attractions,
and I was well satisfied with the result. When the
visitor came I met him at the door. I received him
with much empressement.

I could see that he was highly elated. When we
walked into the parlor together, Philip Wyndham
looked at us both with one of his quick, analytic
glances. Then an expression passed over his face
which made me angry. It seemed to me it was compassion.
I remembered the tones in which he said to
me, long ago,

“I pity you, Helen Hamilton.”

Well, I think I made Mr. Fitz-Herbert's day a pleasant
one. I certainly devoted myself to him with most
flattering assiduity. I can see him now from the window.
He is walking to and fro in the garden, now and
then dashing the dew-drops from a shrub in his path
with a dainty cane about the size of my little finger.
His complexion looks bright; I guess he rested well.
His hair is smooth as the hat he has just lifted to bow
to Caddie, who spoke to him from the door. N.B.—
When I am his wife I will tumble his hair up. It
would kill me to sit opposite to it, day after day, so
uniformly smooth.

Oh, I forgot to tell you that Mr. Wyndham dresses
better than he used. Will says his books bring him
in eight or nine hundred dollars a year now. To be
sure, this would hardly find me in silk dresses, but
with it he manages to clothe his outer man with a

good degree of taste, to say nothing of keeping himself
in bread and butter.

But I must go down. My carpet knight has paused
in his walk to cast a languishing glance up to my
window. I shall send this letter off to-day, and when
there's any thing new I'll write to you again. My
heart loves, and sends you its blessing with as warm
a tenderness as when, on your bridal morning, you
kissed through your tears your cousin,