University of Virginia Library

1. I.
THE LADY IN BLACK.

I HAD walked through the train, carpet-bag in hand,
without finding an eligible seat. So I walked back
again, looking very hard at all the non-paying bandboxes,
bundles, and babies that monopolized the cushions and
kept gentlemen standing with tickets in their hatbands.
Not a child was moved, however, by my silent appeal for
justice. Not a bandbox flinched before my stern, reproving
gaze. Only one proprietress of such encumbrances
deigned to take the least notice of me.

“There is a seat, sir!” she said, in a tone extremely
mortifying to my self-respect, while her overfed carpet-bag
appeared choking with merriment at my expense.

A lady in black filled the designated seat with widespread
mourning apparel and an atmosphere of gloom.
Everybody seemed by a natural instinct to avoid intruding
upon her melancholy privacy. The place seemed sacred
to sorrow. But as she of the babies and bundles spoke,
she of the voluminous ebon skirts gathered up their folds,
with a mournfully civil gesture inviting me to sit down.
I sat down accordingly, awed and chilled by the funereal
presence. Her bonnet was of black crape, a black veil
eclipsed her face, and she wore a mourning-ring over the
finger of a black glove.

“Will you have the kindness to open this window, sir?”
she said to me, in a voice which also appeared clad in
mourning, — so sombre, so soft, so suggestive of lost
friends.

I opened it.

“Thank you,” she said, and, putting aside the woven
midnight of her veil, revealed the most perfect mourning
countenance I ever beheld, — black hair, black eyes, and
long, black eyelashes. It was a youthful face, however,
and rather plump and smooth, I thought, for such stunning
woe.

“Will you have the shade raised, madam?”

“O no, thank you.” And out of the cloud of her countenance
shone a smile, a very misty, tender, pensive smile.

I remarked, with appropriate solemnity, that the weather
was fine.

“O yes!” she sighed, “it is too beautiful for one that
a'n't happy.”

The lady in black soon grew communicative, and told
me her story. She was the widow of a physician in one
of the Western States, who, besides his regular practice,
had purchased lands which had increased in value, and,
dying suddenly, had left her a widow with twenty thousand
dollars. She was going, she added, to visit her uncle, in
Shoemake.

“In Shoemake!” I repeated, with a start of interest.
For I must mention here that I was going to Shoemake.
My errand was to woo, and of course win, Miss Susie
Thornton of that place, solely on the recommendation of
my friend Jones, whose praises of his country cousin, whom
I had never seen, had induced me to venture upon the
rather unusual procedure.

“Is Shoemake a pleasant place?” I inquired.

“O yes!” with another sigh, and another of those

smiles, so very attractive that they would have charmed
even me, had I not considered myself already engaged.

“Do you know the Thornton family?” I asked, carelessly.

“What!” said she, “do you know the Thorntons?”

“Not at all; only a relation of theirs has intrusted me
with a package for them.”

“Susie Thornton is a very pretty girl.”

“Indeed!” said I, gratified to hear my wife commended.

“At least, she was five years ago. But five years make
such dreadful changes!”

“How far are the Thorntons from the village?”

“O, not far! A nice little farm down the river. A
charming situation.”