A Book o' Nine Tales.

John stood in amazement, unable to utter a word, so bewildered was he by the beauty of the maiden who stood before him; a beauty which now, after nearly two centuries, is still a tradition of marvel. Something unreal and almost supernatural there might seem in the wonderful loveliness of this exquisite creature, were it not that she seemed so to overflow with life and vitality. Her soft and dove like eyes were full of gleams of human energy, of joy, of passion; she had all the beauty of a perfect dream without its unreality; and then and there the young Englishman’s heart fell down and worshipped her, never after to swerve from its allegiance.

“You must be Mr. Friendleton,” the maiden said, courtesying bewitchingly. “I knew your ship was in.”

“I – I have been minding my luggage,” he stammered, rather irrelevantly, his eyes fastened upon her face.

“Be pleased to enter,” said she, smiling a little at the boldness and unconsciousness of his stare. “Your room has been preserved as you left it at your departure. My aunt, good Mistress Henshaw, as I wrote you, straitly enjoined in her will that everything should be kept for you as you had left it. Her affections were marvellously set upon you.”

That he should be allowed to enter under the same roof with this beautiful creature seemed to John Friendleton the height of bliss, and he had no words to express his delight when he learned that Mistress Rose expected him to take up his abode there as in former times. Her aunt had wished it; had especially spoken of it in her will, and so it was to be.

It would be impossible to pretend that Friendleton struggled much against this proposition, when inclination so strongly pleaded for the carrying out of the wishes of his dead friend; and in this way he became the lodger of young Mistress Rose.

III

It did not long escape the eye of the young man that his new landlady wore always at her throat a cluster of the white, waxy blossoms of the tuberose. The circumstance was in itself sufficiently curious and unusual to excite his attention, and it recalled to his mind the plant he had given to Mistress Henshaw. He wondered what had been the fate of his gift, and one day he ventured to ask Mistress Rose about it. For reply she led him to the room formerly occupied by her aunt, and showed him the tuberose in a quaint pot. It had grown tall and thrifty, and half a dozen slim stalks upon it stood up stoutly, covered with buds, which showed here and there touches of dull red evolved in their transformation from green to white.

“I marvel how it hath increased,” John said.

“It hath thriven marvellously,” she replied. “Never before hath it been known that the plant would bloom throughout all the year, but this sends out buds continually. I daily wear a blossom, as you may see, and I find its odor wonderfully cheering, although for most it is too powerfully sweet.”

“It is an ornament which becometh you exceedingly well,” he responded, flushing.

“My neighbors,” returned she smiling, “regard it as exceeding frivolous.”

The fragrance of the flower which Mistress Rose wore at her throat floated about John wherever his daily occupations led him, and doubly did the delicious perfume steal through his dreams. He never thought of the maiden without feeling in the air that divinely sweet odor; and a thousand times he secretly compared her to the flower she wore. Nor was the comparison inapt; since her beauty was rendered somewhat unearthly by the strange pallor of her face, while the intense and passionate intoxication it produced might, without great straining of the simile, be directly compared to the exaltation which the delicious and powerful fragrance produces in sensuous and sensitive natures.

The intimacy between the young people was at first hindered by the shyness of Friendleton, who was only too conscious of the fervor and depth of his passion; but as Rose had many of the well-remembered ways of her aunt, and, stranger yet, appeared well versed in his own past history, he soon became more at his ease. In defiance of the proverb which condemns all true lovers to uneven ways and obstructed paths, the wooing of lovely Mistress Rose by John Friendleton ran smoothly and happily on, seeming to have begun with the young man’s first meeting with his lovely landlady. The gossips of Boston town, strangely enough, left the relations of the lovers untouched by any but friendly comment; and in a fashion as natural as the ripening of the year, their love ripened into completeness.

It was early autumn when Rose became Mistress Friendleton. The wedding was quietly celebrated in the old North Church, and never in its century of existence before its timbers went to feed the campfires of British soldiers, did that house shelter a more lovely bride or a more manly and blissful groom. A faint flush softened the pallor of the maiden, the one charm which could add to her beauty. Her only ornament was her usual cluster of tuberoses, and more than one spectator noted how like the flower was the lady. The circumstance was recalled afterward when the slab was placed above her grave in Copp’s Hill burial-ground. There still lingers among certain old gossips of tenacious memory the tradition of a stone which had on it “some sort of a flower.” It was the slab upon which John Friendleton, imaginative at sorest need, had caused to be carved simply a bunch of tuberoses.

If John had been happy in anticipation, he was, if such a thing be possible, no less so in reality. It is as trite to attempt as it is impossible to effect the portraying of the life of two young people who are profoundly happy in each other. Joy may be named, but not painted. Even were it easy to picture their existence, their self-absorption would prevent their being interesting. As I have sometimes passed the old house on Moon Street, standing worn and stained with the storms of two centuries, a picture has risen before me of the young bride and groom sitting together and inhaling the fragrance of a quaint pot of tuberoses, blooming so wonderfully that the whole house was filled with their odor; and the memory brings always the tears to my eyes.

IV

November was at its last day. A severe storm, half rain, half snow, was sweeping over Boston. The beacon upon Trimount trembled in the blast, and on the shores of the peninsula the waves roared sullenly. Few people were abroad, and there was never a watchman in the city who did not for that day at least regret having chosen a calling which kept him out of doors in such weather.

The house on Sun Court Street was too stoutly built to tremble, yet those within heard the wind howling over the hill as if scourged by all the furies. It was one of those nights when a man sits before his fire and realizes the value of all his blessings.

John and Rose sat together before the blazing hearth while the husband told stories of his boyhood in England. The wife nestled close to him, absorbed in the narration, yet not forgetting to fondle his hand with her smooth, soft fingers.

Suddenly into the room burst black, dumb Dinah, wringing her hands and moving her speechless lips with frightful earnestness. In her hands she carried the fragments of the pot which had held the tuberose.

Rose sprang up with a cry of anguish.

“Dinah! Dinah! My tuberose!”

The negress gesticulated wildly, but her mistress rushed past her; and, followed by her husband, hastened to see for herself the extent of the mischief.

The pot had been overturned by the wind, which had burst in one of the tiny greenish window panes, and the plant was completely crushed in the downfall. Not a single flower had escaped, and mingled with fragments of pottery and with the black church-yard mould in which the flower had – perhaps ill-fatedly – been planted, were the leaves and petals, torn and stained and mangled.

In the first sorrow of the discovery of the accident, Rose threw herself into her husband’s arms and burst into tears; but she soon controlled herself, and became perfectly calm. She directed Dinah to remove the débris, and returned to listen to her husband’s stories; and, although she was more quiet than before, she seemed no less interested.

It was late when they prepared to retire.

“John,” Rose said, hesitatingly, as they lingered a moment side by side before the wide hearth, “it is just a year to-night since Mistress Henshaw died. If you are willing, I wish to pass the night alone in her room.”

“I am always willing you should do whatever pleaseth you best,” he answered, smiling upon her; “but why do you mean to shut me out from your sorrow? I, too, loved her.”

“I know,” Rose returned, bending to kiss the hand he had laid upon hers, “and I fear you can never be shut out from my sorrows, however much I could wish to spare you. Still, I wish it to be so for to-night.”

“Then let it be so. The storm does not fright you?”

“The storm does not fright me.”

She took from her throat the tuberoses she had worn that day, and gazed at them sadly.

“I can never wear another,” she said. “These are faded like our happy days.”

“You speak but sadly,” returned her husband, with a look of such fondness that the tears started into her eyes despite all her efforts to restrain them. “You would have spoken so had you been bidding me farewell. The destruction of the flower makes you downcast. Mayhap there is still life in the root, and it may be made once more to grow and bloom.”

“John,” his wife said abruptly, “John, I have loved you from the first moment I saw you; I love you now, and I shall love you to all eternity. Whatever happens, remember that and believe it.”

“I have never doubted that you love me,” he answered, gathering her into his arms; “how else could it be that you could have made me so utterly happy?”

She clung to him passionately a moment. Then with an evident effort at self-control, she kissed his lips fervently, disengaged herself from his embrace, and turned away.

“Good-night, dear,” she said.

Then upon the threshold of Mistress Henshaw’s chamber she paused and looked back, tears shining in her beautiful dark eyes.

“Good-night,” she repeated; “good-night.”

V

It was somewhat past his usual hour of rising when John Friendleton next morning came downstairs. The storm was over, but everywhere had it left its traces in broken boughs, overturned fences, and dilapidated chimneys, so that as he looked from the window, John could see on all sides the evidences of its violence.

The house was strangely quiet, and he looked about him with the impatience of a lover for his wife, that she might chase away the unaccustomed sombreness which seemed to have descended upon the place.

“Dinah,” he asked, “has not your mistress risen?”

The mute regarded him with a strange appearance of wildness and terror, but she replied by a shake of the head, – instantly hurrying out of the room as if in fear.

John looked after her an instant in bewilderment, not understanding her odd manner; and then approaching the door of the room occupied by his wife, he tapped softly.

There was no response.

He tapped again somewhat more loudly. Still there was no reply. A third time he rapped, now with a heavy hand. All within was as silent as the grave.

Startled by he knew not what fear, with a sudden impulse he set his strong shoulder to the door, and strained until with a crash it flew open.

The heavy curtains were undrawn, and a grey gloom filled the chamber. A fearful silence followed the crash of the breaking lock, and met him like a palpable terror. He saw Rose lying on the bed, her face buried in the pillows; and by some fantastic jugglery, the light from the open door, as it fell upon her hair, – those abundant tresses whose rich, dark glory he so loved, – seemed to silver them to the whiteness of hoary age.

“Rose!” he cried, starting forward to seize her hand which lay upon the coverlid.

The hand was cold with a chill which smote him to the very heart.

“Rose! Sweetheart!” he cried in a piercing voice, bending over and tenderly turning her dear face up to the light.

What horrible mockery confronted him? He started back like one stung by a serpent!

Along the pillow lay a crushed and withered tuberose, and he looked upon the face, ghastly in death, and old and haggard and wrinkled – of Mistress Henshaw.

Interlude Second.

AN EVENING AT WHIST

[The scene is the parlor of a modern house, much adorned, and furnished with a wealth of bric-a-brac, which renders getting about a most difficult and delicate operation, unless one is wholly regardless of the consequences to the innumerable ornaments. Mrs. Greeleigh Vaughn, a corpulent and well-preserved widow, who passes for forty, and is not less, has just seated herself at the whist-table, with her daughter and two guests. One of these, Mr. Amptill Talbot, is one of those young men whose wits seem to be in some mysterious fashion closely connected with the parting of their hair exactly in the middle; the other is a handsome and keen-eyed gentleman of middle age, who answers to the name Colonel Graham.]

Mrs. Vaughn. I am so glad you could and would come, Colonel Graham. Now we shall have a delightful evening at whist. You are such a superb player that I am sure I shall learn more about the game by playing with you a single evening than I should by studying the books for a year.

Colonel Graham. You are too good. I make not the slightest pretence of —

Mrs. V. Oh, of course not. You are too modest; but everybody says that you are a wonderful player. I only hope you won’t be too hard on me if I make a mistake.

Miss Vaughn. Oh, I am so glad mamma is your partner, Colonel Graham. I should be frightened to death if I had to play with you. Mr. Talbot will be a good deal more merciful, I am sure.

Mr. Talbot. Anything you do is sure to be right, Miss Vaughn. If you can put up with me, I am sure I can afford to overlook any mistakes you make. I play whist so seldom that I am all out of practice.

Miss V. (dealing). Oh, I just never play, only when I have to make up the table. I have so many things on hand. Why weren’t you at the Wentworths’ last night, Mr. Talbot?

Mr. T. I was out of town. I think you gave yourself two cards that time.

Miss V. Oh, dear! Have I made a misdeal? I wish you’d count your cards.

Colonel G. You are right. The next card is mine.

Miss V. Thank you.

Mrs. V. That came out all right.

Colonel G. But the trump is not turned.

Miss V. Oh, which was the last card? I am sure I don’t know; I’ve got them all mixed up now.

Mrs. V. Well, never mind. Let me draw one. That will do just as well.

Mr. T. Diamonds? Can’t you draw again? I haven’t —

Miss V. I don’t think it was diamonds. I am almost sure it was spades.

Mrs. V. No, diamonds suits me, and of course you can’t change it now; can she, Colonel Graham?

Colonel G. It isn’t customary, I believe, unless we are to play Auction Pitch, and bid for the trump.

Miss V. Oh, now you are going to be sarcastic! I don’t think that’s fair.

Mrs. V. Do you put your trumps at one end of your hand, Colonel Graham?

Colonel G. No, I do not, but some people find it a convenience.

Mr. T. Is it my lead?

Colonel G. No, it is my partner’s.

Mrs. V. Oh, is it my lead? I’m sure I don’t know what to play. You always lead from your long suit, don’t you? There, I hope that queen will be good.

Mr. T. No, it won’t, for I have the ace.

Mrs. V. Oh, you mean man! Partner, can’t you trump that?

Colonel G. I have suit.

Miss V. There, I have got to put the king on, and I think it is mean.

Mr. T. I am awfully sorry. If I’d only known —

Miss V. I shook my head at you, but you wouldn’t look up.

Mrs. V. That wasn’t fair, and you deserve to be beaten. Now my jack is good, any way.

Mr. T. It isn’t your lead. I took the trick.

Mrs. V. Oh, I beg pardon.

Miss V. I would have trumped it, any way.

Mr. T. I wish I knew what you have.

Miss V. I wish I could tell you. Don’t make it too dark.

Mr. T. Then I’ll lead diamonds.

Miss V. That’s just right.

Mrs. V. Diamonds are trumps.

Miss V. Oh, are they? Oh, that’s too bad. I didn’t want trumps led.

Mr. T. But you said – Why, can’t you go over Colonel Graham’s nine-spot?

Miss V. I made a mistake. I meant to play the ten.

Mrs. V. Shall I put on a small one or a high one, Colonel Graham?

Colonel G. The trick is ours as it lies.

Mrs. V. Then if I put on a high one it will get it out of the way, so you’ll know what to do next time.

Mr. T. Why, you’ve thrown away the king of trumps!

Mrs. V. Wasn’t that right?

Miss V. Why, of course not, mamma. You ought to have put on either the ace or a low one.

Colonel G. It is your lead, Mrs. Vaughn.

Mrs. V. She says she’ll trump hearts, and I can’t play my knave. I’ll try spades. I hope you’ll take it.

Mr. T. And he did. How nice to have a partner do just what you tell him to.

Miss V. That means that I don’t.

Mr. T. You are always satisfactory, whatever you do.

Miss V. What was led? Clubs? Are clubs trumps?

Colonel G. No; diamonds.

Miss V. Second hand low. I know that, at any rate, so there’s a two-spot.

Mr. T. Your mother has taken it with the seven.

Miss V. Oh, and I had the ace, king, and queen. Ought I to have played one of those?

Colonel G. If you tell us your hand you must expect us to play to it.

Miss V. I didn’t mean to tell.

Mrs. V. (leading spades). That was your suit, wasn’t it?

Mr. T. But I hold the ace.

Miss V. It was your own lead, mamma. Any way, I’ll trump it.

Mr. T. Why, you’ve trumped my ace.

Miss V. Oh, did I? I didn’t mean to. Can’t I take it back?

Colonel G. It is a little late, but still —

Miss V. Oh, well, never mind. Let it go. I have the king, any way (leading it).

Colonel G. But you just trumped a spade.

Mrs. V. A revoke! That gives us three points.

Miss V. Oh, it doesn’t either! I didn’t see that king at all when I trumped, and that was the only spade I had. I’ll change it on the last trick, and then it will be all right.

Mrs. V. You can’t do that; can she, Colonel Graham?

Colonel G. It isn’t customary.

Mr. T. Oh, who wants to play the stiff club rules? I don’t; there isn’t any fun in whist if you are going to be so particular.

Miss V. Whose lead is it now?

Colonel G. If it isn’t yours it must be Mr. Talbot’s, as you decide about that trick.

Mr. T. Then I’ll lead a spade, and you can trump it.

Miss V. There, that’s better than having that trump wasted on your ace.

Mrs. V. Did you ever play Stop? We played it last summer at Bar Harbor. It’s a Western game, and you have chips, just like poker; and then you stop it if you have the stop cards; and sometimes you’ll have the meanest little cards left in your hands, and if it is the ace of diamonds you have to pay five chips for it, or the king, or the queen, or the knave, or the ten; not so much, of course, but it all counts up awfully fast.

Mr. T. Why, that is ever so much like Sixty-six. Do you remember the time we tried to play Sixty-six on the Bar Harbor boat, Miss Vaughn?

Miss V. Oh, yes; and Ethel Mott was such fun. She just would cheat, and there was no stopping her.

Colonel G. It is your lead, Miss Vaughn.

Mrs. V. Oh, just wait a moment. I want to know if fourth best has anything to do with playing fourth hand?

Colonel G. Nothing whatever.

Mr. T. Oh, fourth best is one of those things they’ve put in to make whist scientific. For my part, I don’t think there’s any fun —

Miss V. That’s just what I say. When I play whist I want to have a good time, and not feel as if I were going through an examination at a scientific school. Oh, did you know we are going to have a whist figure at Janet Graham’s german, Mr. Talbot? Won’t that be fun?

Mr. T. I am sure then that you’ll be trump.

Miss V. Thank you.

Mrs. V. How pretty!

Colonel G. It is your lead, Miss Vaughn.

Miss V. Why, did I take the last trick? What shall I – oh, I know, – the ace of clubs.

Mrs. V. The two-spot of diamonds ought to be good for that.

Miss V. How horrid! Now the rest of my clubs aren’t any good. Well, any way, I can throw them away.

Mrs. V. Have hearts been led?

Mr. T. I’m sure I can’t remember.

Miss V. (examining tricks). Yes, here’s one heart trick.

Mrs. V. Well, I must lead it, and I’m sure I don’t remember about it at all. I’ll lead a small one. Was that right, Colonel Graham?

Colonel G. You might have led your knave.

Mrs. V. Why, how did you know I had the knave. I declare, it’s like witchcraft, the way you keep run of the cards. I suppose you know where every card is. Who took that?

Colonel G. I did.

Mr. T. I ought to have trumped that, but I do hate to trump second hand.

Colonel G. But you played suit.

Mr. T. So I did. I forgot that.

Colonel G. (showing hand). The rest of the tricks are mine.

Miss V. Why, I have the king and queen of clubs, and you haven’t a club in your hand.

Colonel G. That is why the tricks are mine. I can keep the lead to the end. I am very sorry, Mrs. Vaughn; but I am suddenly attacked with a nervous headache, so that I cannot possibly go on playing. I shall have to ask to be excused.

Mrs. V. Oh, don’t break up the game when we are getting along so well.

Colonel G. I am very sorry; but I must go. I have enjoyed the game extremely.

Mr. T. Are you out?

Colonel G. Yes.

Mrs. V. I’m sure it was all owing to you.

Colonel G. It was all owing to the fall of the cards. I haven’t done anything.

Miss V. I’m sure we didn’t have anything on our side at all. I hate whist anyway; you have to be so quiet, and study on it so.

Mr. T. Yes, I think it’s awfully hard work.

Colonel G. Oh, you’ll have better luck next time. Good-by; don’t rise.

[And the Colonel goes to the club to relieve his mind by a quantity of vigorous expletives, and then to settle down to an evening of what he calls real whist.]

Tale the Third.

SAUCY BETTY MORK

I

“But, Miss Bessie – ”

“I have told you a dozen times, Mr. Granton, that my name is not Bessie. I abhor that final ie; and more than that, I was christened Betty, – plain Betty, – and Betty I will be.”

“Miss Betty, then, if that suits you; though why you should be so particular about that old-fashioned name, I’m sure I can’t conceive.”

“In the first place, it is my name,” Betty replied, bending upon him a glance at once bewitching and tantalizing; “that ought to count for something; and in the second place, my family name isn’t one that lends itself to soft prefixes. Besides all which, there has been a Betty Mork from time immemorial; and I shall never be one to spoil the line by changing my name.”

“What?” Mr. Granton demanded mischievously. “Never change it? Are you vowed to eternal single blessedness, then, or shall you imitate the women’s-rights women, who – ”

“It is really none of your affair what I intend to do,” returned she, bridling; “only, to go back to what we started on, I do intend to play in the tournament with Frank Bradford. I am not in the habit of breaking my promises.”