Daisy

"Things have changed, since we talked so lightly last summer of what might be," Thorold said at last. And he said it in a meditative way, as if he were pondering something.

"Yes," I assented.

"The North does not wish for war. The South have brought it upon themselves."

"Yes," I said again, wondering a little what was coming.

"However disagreeable my duty may be, it is my duty; and there is no shirking it."

"No," I said. "Of course."

"And if your friends are on one side and I on the other, – it is not my fault, Miss Randolph."

"No," I said; "not at all."

"Then you do not blame me for taking the part I must take?"

"No," I said. "You must take it."

"Are you sorry I take it?" said Thorold with a change of tone, and coming a step nearer.

"Sorry?" I said, and I looked up for an instant. "No; how could I be sorry? it is your duty. It is right." But as I looked down again I had the greatest difficulty not to burst into tears. I felt as though my heart would break in two with its burden of pain. It cost a great effort to stand still and quiet, without showing anything.

"What is it, then?" said Thorold; and with the next words I knew he had come close to my side and was stooping his head down to my face, while his voice dropped. "What is it, Daisy? – Is it – O Daisy, I love you better than anything else in the world, except my duty! Daisy, do you love me?"

Nothing could have been more impossible to me, I think, than to answer a word; but, indeed, Thorold did not seem to want it. As he questioned me, he had put his arm round me and drawn me nearer and nearer, stooping his face to me, till his lips took their own answer at mine; indeed, took answer after answer, and then, in a sort of passion of mute joy, kissed my face all over. I could not forbid him; between excitement and sorrow and happiness and shame, I could do nothing. The best I could do was to hide my face; but the breast of that grey coat was a strange hiding-place for it. With that inconsistent mingling of small things with great in one's perceptions, which everybody knows, I remember the soft feel of the fine grey cloth along with the clasp of Thorold's arms and the touch of his cheek resting upon my hair. And we stood so, quite still, for what seemed both a long and a short time, in which I think happiness got the upper hand with me, and pain for the moment was bid into the background. At last Thorold raised his head and bade me lift up mine.

"Look up, darling," he said; "look up, Daisy! let me see your face. Look up, Daisy – we have only a minute, and everything in the world to say to each other. Daisy – I want to see you."

I think it was one of the most difficult little things I ever had in my life to do, to raise my face and let him look at it; but I knew it must be done, and I did it. One glance at his I ventured. He was smiling at me; there was a flush upon his cheek; his eye had a light in it, and with that a glow of tenderness which was different from anything I had ever seen; and it was glittering, too, I think, with another sort of suffusion. His hand came smoothing down my hair and then touching my cheek while he looked at me.

"What are you going to do with yourself now?" he said softly.

"I am going on with my studies for another month or two."

"And you belong to me, Daisy?"

"Yes."

He bent his head and kissed my brow. There is an odd difference of effect between a kiss on the lips and on the forehead, or else it was a difference in the manner. This seemed a sort of taking possession or setting a seal; and it gave me a new feeling of something almost like awe, which I had never associated with the grey coat or with its wearer before. Along with that came another impression that I suppose most women know, and know how sweet it is; the sense of an enveloping protection. Not that I had not been protected all my life; but my mother's had been the protection of authority; my father's also, in some measure; Dr. Sandford's was emphatically that of a guardian; he guarded me a little too well. But this new thing that was stealing into my heart, with its subtle delight, was the protection of a champion; of one who set me and mine above all other interests or claims in the world, and who would guard me as if he were a part of myself, only stronger. Alto gether Thorold seemed to me different from what he had been the last summer; there was a gravity now in his face and air at times that was new and even stern; the gravity of a man taking stern life work upon him. I felt all this in a minute, while Thorold was smiling down into my face.

"And you will write to me?" he said.

"Yes."

"And I will write to you. And I belong to you, Daisy, and to no other. All I have is yours, and all that I am is yours – after my duty; you may dispose of me, pretty one, just as you like. You would not have that put second, Daisy."

A great yearning came over me, so great and strong that it almost took away my breath. I fancy it spoke in my eyes, for Thorold's face grew very grave, I remember, as he looked at me. But I must speak it more plainly than so, at any costs, breath or no breath, and I must not wait.

"Christian," I whispered, "won't you earn your right to your name?"

He pressed his lips upon mine by way of answer first, and then gave me a quick and firm "Yes." I certainly thought he had found a mouth he was talking of a little while ago. But at that instant the sound of the distant house door closing, and then of steps coming out from the parlour, made me know that Miss Cardigan's business was over, and that she was returning to us. I wanted to free myself from Thorold's arm, but he would not let me; on the contrary, held me closer, and half turned to meet Miss Cardigan as she came in. Certainly men are very different from women. There we stood, awaiting her; and I felt very much ashamed.

"Come on, Aunt Catherine," Thorold said, as she paused at the door, – "come in, come in, and kiss her – this little darling is mine."

Miss Cardigan came in slowly. I could not look up.

"Kiss her, Aunt Catherine," he repeated; "she is mine."

And to my great dismay he set her the example; but I think it was partly to reassure me, and cover my confusion, which he saw.

"I have kissed Daisy very often before now," said Miss Cardigan. I thought I discerned some concern in her voice.

"Then come, do it again," said Thorold, laughing. "You never kissed her as anything belonging to me, Aunt Catherine."

And he fairly laid me in Miss Cardigan's arms, till we kissed each other as he desired. But Miss Cardigan's gravity roused me out of my confusion. I was not ashamed before her; only before him.

"Now, Aunt Catherine," he said, pulling up a comfortable arm chair to the corner of the hearth, "sit there. And Daisy – come here!"

He put me into the fellow chair; and then built up the wood in the fireplace till we had a regular illumination. Then drew himself up before the fire, and looked at his aunt.

"It's like you!" broke out Miss Cardigan. "Ever since you were born, I think, you did what you liked, and had what you liked; and threw over everything to get at the best."

"On the contrary," said Thorold, "I was always of a very contented disposition."

"Contented with your own will, then," said his aunt. "And now, do you mean to tell me that you have got this prize – this prize – it's a first class, Christian – for good and for certain to yourself?"

I lifted my eyes one instant, to see the sparkles in Thorold's eyes; they were worth seeing.

"You don't think you deserve it?" Miss Cardigan went on.

"I do not think I deserve it," said Thorold. "But I think I will."

"I know what that means," said his aunt. "You will get worldly glory – just a bit or two more of gold on your coat – to match you with one of the Lord's jewels, that are to be 'all glorious within'; and you think that will fit you to own her."

"Aunt Catherine," said Thorold, "I do not precisely think that gold lace is glory. But I mean that I will do my duty. A man can do no more."

"Some would have said 'a man can do no less,'" said Miss Cardigan, turning to me. "But you are right, lad; more than our duty we can none of us do; where all is owing, less will not be overpay. But whatever do you think her father will say to you?"

"I will ask him when the time comes," said Thorold, contentedly. His tone was perfect, both modest and manly. Truth to say, I could not quite share his content in looking forward to the time he spoke of; but that was far ahead, and it was impossible not to share his confidence. My father and my mother had been practically not my guardians during six and a half long years; I had got out of the habit of looking first to them.

"And what are you going to do now in Washington?" said his aunt. "You may as well sit down and tell us."

"I don't know. Probably I shall be put to drill new recruits. All these seventy-five thousand men that the President has called for, won't know how to handle a gun or do anything else."

"And what is he going to do with these seventy-five thousand men, Christian?"

"Put down treason, if he can. Don't you realize yet that we have a civil war on our hands, Aunt Catherine? The Southern States are mustering and sending their forces; we must meet them, or give up the whole question; that is, give up the country."

"And what is it that they will try to do?" said Miss Cardigan. "It is a mystery to me what they want; but I suppose I know; only bad men are a mystery to me always."

"They will try to defy the laws," said Thorold. "We will try to see them executed."

"They seem very fierce," said Miss Cardigan; "to judge by what they say."

"And do," added Thorold. "I think there is a sort of madness in Southern blood."

He spoke with a manner of disgustful emphasis. I looked up at him to see an expression quite in keeping with his words. Miss Cardigan cried out —

"Hey, lad! ye're confident, surely, to venture your opinions so plainly and so soon!"

His face changed, as if sunlight had been suddenly poured over it. He came kneeling on one knee before me, taking my hand and kissing it, and laughing.

"And I see ye're not confident without reason!" added Miss Cardigan. "Daisy'll just let ye say your mind, and no punish you for it."

"But it is true, Miss Cardigan," I said, turning to her. I wished I had held my tongue the next minute, for the words were taken off my lips, as it were. It is something quite different from eating your own words, which I have heard of as not being pleasant; mine seemed to be devoured by somebody else.

"But is it true they are coming to attack Washington?" Miss Cardigan went on, when we had all done laughing. "I read it in the prints; and it seems to me I read every other thing there."

"I am afraid you read too many prints," said Thorold. "You are thinking of 'hear both sides,' Aunt Catherine? You must know there is but one side to this matter. There never are two sides to treason."

"That's true," said Miss Cardigan. "But about Washington, lad? I saw an extract from a letter written from that city, by a lady, and she said the place was in a terror; she said the President sleeps with a hundred men, armed, in the east room, to protect him from the Southern army; and keeps a sentinel before his bedroom door; and often goes clean out of the White House and sleeps somewhere else, in his fear."

I had never seen Thorold laugh as he did then. And he asked his aunt "where she had seen that extract?"

"It was in one of the papers – it was in an extract itself, I'm thinking."

"From a Southern paper," said Thorold.

"Well, I believe it was."

"I have seen extracts, too," said Thorold. "They say, Alexander H. Stephens is counselling the rebels to lay hold on Washington."

"Well, sit down and tell us what you do know, and how to understand things," said Miss Cardigan. "I don't talk to anybody, much, about politics."

So Thorold did as he was asked. He sat down on the other side of me, and with my hand in his, talked to us both. We went over the whole ground of the few months past, of the work then doing and preparing, of what might reasonably be looked for in both the South and the North. He said he was not very wise in the matter; but he was infinitely more informed than we; and we listened as to the most absorbing of all tales, till the night was far worn. A sense of the gravity and importance of the crisis; a consciousness that we were embarked in a contest of the most stubborn character, the end of which no man might foretell, pressed itself more and more on my mind as the night and the talk grew deeper. If I may judge from the changes in Miss Cardigan's face, it was the same with her. The conclusion was, the North was gathering and concentrating all her forces to meet the trial that was coming; and the young officers of the graduating class at the Military Academy had been ordered to the seat of war a little before their time of study was out, their help being urgently needed.

"And where is Preston?" said I, speaking for the first time in a long while.

"Preston?" echoed Thorold.

"My Cousin Preston – Gary; your classmate Gary."

"Gary! Oh, he is going to Washington, like the rest of us."

"Which side will he take?"

"You should know, perhaps, better than I," said Thorold. "He always has taken the Southern side, and very exclusively."

"Has taken?" said I. "Do you mean that among the cadets there has been a South and a North – until now, lately?"

"Aye, Daisy, always, since I have been in the Academy. The Southern clique and the Northern clique have been well defined; there is always an assumption of superiority on the one side, and some resenting of it on the other side. It was on that ground Gary and I split."

"Split!" I repeated.

But Thorold laughed and kissed me, and would give me no satisfaction. I began to put things together, though. I saw from Christian's eyes that he had nothing to be ashamed of, in looking back; I remembered Preston's virulence, and his sudden flush when somebody had repeated the word "coward," which he had applied to Thorold. I felt certain that more had been between them than mere words, and that Preston found the recollection not flattering, whatever it was; and having come to this settlement of the matter, I looked up at Thorold.

"My gentle little Daisy!" he said. "I will never quarrel with him again – if I can help it."

"You must quarrel with him, if he is on the wrong side," I answered. "And so must I."

"You say you must go immediately back to West Point," said Miss Cardigan. "Leave thanking Daisy's hand, and tell me when you are going; for the night is far past, children."

"I am gone when I bid you good-night," said Thorold. "I must set out with the dawn – to catch the train I must take."

"With the dawn! —this morning!" cried Miss Cardigan.

"Certainly. I should be there this minute, if the colonel had not given me something to do here that kept me."

"And when will ye do it?"

"Do it! It is done," said Thorold; "before I came here. But I must catch the first train in the morning."

"And you'll want some breakfast before that," she said, rising.

"No, I shall not," said Thorold, catching hold of her. "I want nothing. I did want my supper. Sit down, Aunt Catherine, and be quiet. I want nothing, I tell you, but more time."

"We may as well sit up the rest of the night," I said; "it is so far gone now."

"Yes, and what will you be good for to-morrow?" said Miss Cardigan. "You must lie down and take a bit of rest."

I felt no weariness; but I remember the grave, tender examination of Thorold's eyes, which seemed to touch me with their love, to find out whether I – and himself – might be indulged or not. It was a bit of the thoughtful, watchful affection which always surrounded me when he was near. I never had it just so from anybody else.

"It won't do, Daisy," said he gaily. "You would not have me go in company with self-reproaches all day to-morrow? You must lie down here on the sofa; and, sleep or not, we'll all be still for two hours. Aunt Catherine will thank me to stop talking for that length of time."

I was not sleepy, but Miss Cardigan and Thorold would not be resisted. Thorold wheeled up the sofa, piled the cushions, and made me lie down, with the understanding that nobody should speak for the time he had specified. Miss Cardigan, on her part, soon lost herself in her easy chair. Thorold walked perseveringly up and down the room. I closed my eyes and opened my eyes, and lay still and thought. It is all before me now. The firelight fading and brightening: Thorold took care of the fire; the gleam of the gaslight on the rows of books; Miss Cardigan's comfortable figure gone to sleep in the corner of her chair; and the figure which ever and anon came between me and the fire, piling or arranging the logs of wood, and then paced up and down just behind me. There was no sleep for my eyes, of course. How should there be? I seemed to pass all my life in review, and as I took the bearings of my present position I became calm.

I rose up the moment the two hours were over, for I could bear the silence no longer, nor the losing any more time. Thorold stopped his walk then, and we had along talk over the fire by ourselves, while Miss Cardigan slept on. Trust her, though, for waking up when there was anything to be done. Long before dawn she roused herself and went to call her servants and order our breakfast.

"What are you going to do now, Daisy?" said Thorold, turning to me with a weight of earnestness in his eyes, and a flash of that keen inspection which they sometimes gave me.

"You know," I said, "I am going to study as hard as I can for a month or two more, – till my school closes."

"What then, Daisy? Perhaps you will find some way to come on and see me at Washington – if the rebels don't take it first?"

It must be told.

"No – I cannot. – My father and mother wish me to go out to them as soon as I get a chance."

"Where?"

"In Switzerland."

"Switzerland! To stay how long?"

"I don't know – till the war is over, I suppose. I do not think they would come back before."

"I shall come and fetch you then, Daisy."

But it seemed a long way off. And how much might be between. We were both silent.

"That is heavy for me," said Thorold at last. "Little Daisy, you do not know how heavy!"

He was caressing my hair, smoothing and stroking it as he spoke. I looked up and his eyes flashed fire instantly.

"Say that in words!" he exclaimed, taking me in his arms. "Say it, Daisy! say it. It will be worth so much to me."

But my lips had hardly a chance to speak.

"Say what?"

"Daisy, you have said it. Put it in words, that is all."

But his eyes were so full of flashing triumph that I thought he had got enough for the time.

"Daisy, those eyes of yours are like mountain lakes, deep and still. But when I look quite down to the bottom of them – sometimes I see something – I thought I did then."

"What?" I asked, very much amused.

"I see it there now, Daisy!"

I was afraid he did, for his eyes were like sunbeams, and I thought they went through everything at that minute. I don't know what moved me, the consciousness of this inspection or the consciousness of what it discovered; but I know that floods of shyness seemed to flush my face and brow, and even to the tips of my fingers. I would have escaped if I could, but I could not; and I think Thorold rather liked what he saw. There was no hiding it, unless I hid it on his shoulder, and that I was ashamed to do. I felt that his lips knew just as well as his eyes what state my cheeks were in, and took their own advantage. Though presently their tenderness soothed me too, and even nullified the soft little laugh with which he whispered, "Are you ashamed to show it to me, Daisy?"

"You know," said I, still keeping my eyes veiled, "you have me at advantage. If you were not going – away – so soon, I would not do a great many things."

"Daisy!" said he, laughing – "Daisy!" – And he touched my cheek as one who meant to keep his advantage. Then his voice changed, and he repeated, with a deeper and deepening tone with each word – "Daisy! my Daisy!"

I had very nearly burst out into great sobs upon his breast, with the meeting of opposite tides of feeling. Sweet and bitter struggled for the upper hand; struggled, while I was afraid he would feel the laboured breath which went and came, straining me. And the sweetness, for the moment, got the better. I knew he must go, in an hour or little more, away from me. I knew it was for uncertain and maybe dangerous duty. I knew it might at best be long before we could see each other again; and back of all, the thought of my father and mother was not reassuring. But his arms were round me and my head was on his shoulder; and that was but the outward symbol of the inward love and confidence which filled all my heart with its satisfying content. For the moment happiness was uppermost. Not all the clouds on the horizon could dim the brightness of that one sun ray which reached me.

I do not know what Thorold thought, but he was as still for a while as I was.

"Daisy," he said at last, "my Daisy, you need not grudge any of your goodness to me. Don't you know, you are to be my light and my watchword in what lies before me?"

"Oh no!" I said, lifting my head; "Oh no, Christian!"

"Why no?" said he.

"I want you to have a better watchword and follow a better light. Not me. O Christian, won't you?"

"What shall my watchword be?" said he, looking into my eyes. But I was intent on something else then. I answered, "Whatsoever ye do, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus."

"A soldier, Daisy?"

"A soldier more than anybody," I said; "for He calls us to be soldiers, and you know what it means."

"But you forget," said he, not taking his eyes from my face – "in my service I must obey as well as command: I am not my own master exactly."

"Let Christ be your Master," I said.

"How then with this other service?"

"Why it is very plain," I said. "Command in the love of God and obey in the fear of God; that covers all."

I did not see the natural sequence of what followed; for it was a succession of kisses that left no chance for a word to get out of my mouth. Then Thorold rose up, and I saw Miss Cardigan enter.

"I will not forget, Daisy," he said, in a tone as if we had been talking of business. I thought, neither should I. And then came Miss Cardigan, and the servant behind her bringing coffee and bread and eggs and marmalade – I don't know what beside – and we sat down again to the table, knowing that the next move would be a move apart. But the wave of happiness was at the flood with me, and it bore me over all the underlying roughness of the shore – for the time. I do not think anybody wanted to eat much; we played with cups of coffee and with each other, and dallied with the minutes till the last one was spent.

And then came the parting. That was short.

THE END