A Romantic Young Lady

"On the contrary, very slight."

"Nice people are very much the same everywhere," she observed haughtily.

"To tell the truth," said Mr. Spence, "I have been rather disappointed at finding the people, as well as the manners and customs, of this country so similar to those across the water. I had been led to expect originality and independence. That was what I was taught to believe as a child. But after an absence from my country of six years I came back to find nearly the same manners and customs, and the same virtues and vices, as I left behind me in Europe."

"Vices?" echoed Aunt Helen. "I should say there was much less vice in this country than in Europe."

"Not if we judge by the newspapers."

"Ah, but one can't believe all one reads in the newspapers," she said with an air of triumph.

Mr. Spence had, unluckily for the impression he was likely to create, the courage of his convictions as I well knew, and as he began to reply I felt less secure that he would not trench upon dangerous ground.

"There is a general tendency to ape foreign ideas, which is fast destroying our originality as a nation," he continued.

"Foreign ideas are often the best," said my aunt.

"We are beginning to talk and dress, and dine and give in marriage, just like all the rest of the world," he explained, without regarding her comment.

Aunt Helen looked a little blank. Then with her most stately air she said: —

"Surely you wouldn't have marriages performed before a Justice of the Peace? It destroys all their sentiment. I know a great many persons who wouldn't consider themselves married so. As to living differently, I don't know what you mean. There are people here who advocate cremation, co-operation, and that sort of thing, but one doesn't meet them in society."

"I am no judge," said Mr. Spence coolly, "for I never go into society."

"Indeed!" Aunt Helen surveyed him through her eye-glass as if he were a curious animal, and her haughtiness perceptibly increased. "Are you – eh – in business in Boston?"

"No, madam. I am a Bohemian," replied Mr. Spence, in whose eye I perceived a twinkle.

"A what? Ah, yes, of course. I understood you to say you were born in this country. And the other gentleman – eh – is he a foreigner too?"

For an instant Mr. Spence looked bewildered; and as for me I was inwardly convulsed, so much so that I betrayed my feelings in a smile at the moment when Paul Barr was reciting a bloodcurdling piece of poetry of his own composing, – an indiscretion which offended the artist-poet to such an extent that in my efforts to mollify him I failed to catch Mr. Spence's reply. He rose to take his leave at this point; but it chanced that just then my father entered the room, and I was obliged to repeat the introductions. While I was saying a few last words to Mr. Spence in regard to the sort of instruction I was to receive from Mr. Fleisch, Paul Barr conversed with my father, laying down the law in his most superb fashion regarding the immense fortune in store for any one who would start what he called a fig farm in this country. Although I had never heard him broach a business matter before, he seemed entirely familiar with his subject, and fairly bristled with statistics and calculations to prove the soundness of his theory, gardeners to the contrary notwithstanding. My father listened to him patiently, and seemed to be amused. Aunt Helen sat apart with a reserved, patrician air.

My two callers took their leave together; and when the front door closed, my father said jocosely, —

"Who are your friends, Virginia? I hope they have not been persuading you to invest in a fig farm."

I blushed, remembering my former design of speculating with Mr. Dale, – of which, however, my father had no knowledge.

"Both are literary men of high reputation," I answered quietly, though I had an instinctive feeling that my father would make sport of this assertion. But experience had taught me that with him it was best to call a spade a spade.

"That accounts for it. I thought the gentleman in velveteen had a screw loose somewhere," he said as he passed out of the room.

"Well, Virginia," exclaimed Aunt Helen when we were alone, "whom have you picked up now?"

"I don't understand you," said I.

"Who are those young men who were here just now? They are foreigners, on their own admission, – Bohemians. My own belief is that they have gypsy blood in their veins, for what can one know of the antecedents of persons who come from a small German principality? They don't even claim to be counts, and any one with the smallest pretext to respectability in that part of the world is a count, at least. They look to me as if they had been on the stage, especially the one to whom you were talking. I will do him the justice to say he is a handsome wretch, but like all those foreign adventurers he has a dissipated air. As for the other, he is simply commonplace and vulgar, with little upstart radical notions."

I waited for her to finish before replying. "I have already said that Mr. Spence and Mr. Barr are both literary men of high standing. They are neither of them foreigners, but were born in this State. By 'Bohemian' Mr. Spence meant the literary and artistic fraternity in general, Aunt Helen. He is a philosopher as well as a poet; and Mr. Barr paints pictures in addition to his other work."

"But who are they? Where do they come from? It is all very well to say they were born in this country. But who and what are their parents? Spence – Spence – I never heard the name in my life. There were some Barrs who used to live in the next street to us when your mother and I were young; but they were all girls, and, as I remember them, ordinary."

"When men have acquired fame, it is hardly necessary to inquire if they belong to the best families," I rejoined, borrowing a leaf from Aunt Agnes's book.

"It is one thing to admire the works of genius, and another to have it trampoosing over your house. Your acquaintances are, I dare say, well enough as poets and philosophers, but I don't see what that has to do with you. You are neither a poet nor a philosopher, and you will flatter them much more by buying their books than by asking them to five o'clock tea. I must say that, philosopher or no philosopher, the young man who was talking with me has very strange ideas. Just think of his advocating co-operative house-keeping, and marriages before a Justice of the Peace. I fancy too that he is lax in his religious opinions. If he is your idea of a desirable acquaintance to invite to your house, I am sorry for it. You never got any such notions from my side of the family."

"It is useless to talk with you if you go off at a tangent, Aunt Helen," said I. "I am proud to call both those young men my friends, and they are vastly superior in every way to nine tenths of those one meets in society. Mr. Spence, whose ideas you think so peculiar, is one of the ablest scientists in the country, and I am going to take lessons in his philosophy from one of his assistants. As I told you the other day, I am tired of frittering away my time in nonsense."

"And as I told you the other day, Virginia, go on as you have begun, and we shall hear of you presently on the stage. That Mr. Barr might pass in a drawing-room on account of his picturesqueness, if he were to brush his hair; but the other one is simply a gawk, to be plain. Science indeed! Don't come in a few weeks to ask me to believe that we are all descended from monkeys, or any other stuff, for I sha'n't do it. That's what I call nonsense; and you will discover some day that most people who have any self-respect are of my way of thinking."

I had never known Aunt Helen to be so excited, but there was nothing to be done. Society and etiquette were her household gods; and by ceasing to worship the same divinities I had drawn upon myself the full energy of her displeasure. Nothing could have offended her so much. To be odd or different from other people was in her estimation a cardinal sin; whereas I parted from her with a still firmer conviction that I had chosen wisely. The calm unselfish wisdom and steadfastness of Mr. Spence seemed more indisputable to me than ever; and in the way of companionship, Paul Barr's gallantries and sallies were vastly preferable to any drawing-room flirtation.

It was only when I thought of my father that I felt any concern or doubt. I knew that he had set his heart upon my devoting myself to the study of practical matters. He wished me to become cultivated, but scarcely in the direction I had chosen. What would he say if he knew of my determination; and was it filial and just to let him remain in ignorance of it? Yet I reasoned that after all I had made no final decision. I was attracted, it is true, by what might be called a visionary theory; but when I had given the principles of moderation further thought, I might conclude not to devote myself to them. It would be time enough later to speak of the subject. At present I was only too poorly prepared to present the ideas of Mr. Spence in an intelligent manner, and should probably prejudice my father against the whole system.

However, I could not refrain from a few reflections on the apparent hostility of practical men to pure theory, which must after all be the basis of all intelligent action. How much nobler to help to establish principles serviceable to humanity than to make later unconscious use of those same principles to advance one's own selfish interests! Why must there needs be mutual disdain and coolness between those who thought and those who acted? It had been easy for me to perceive at a glance that there was likely to be but little mutual sympathy between my father and Mr. Spence, and the consciousness grieved me.

But I did not falter in my purpose. Mr. Fleisch called to see me the following day and laid out an elaborate course of study. He was to come twice a week to examine me and give me suggestions, but he said that my progress was mainly dependent on my own exertions. I bought a number of books of his selection, and tried to devote five hours each day to systematic work. My tasks were largely of a philosophical character, but poetry and music of a restrained sort were also included in Mr. Fleisch's instruction; and he said that after the foundations were laid, I should be taught the dangers of extremes by studying examples of the overmuch and the undermuch.

At last I was successful one day in finding Aunt Agnes at home, and alone. It was about a week after my visit from Mr. Spence. I was disturbed at seeing her brow contract at sight of me, but my worst fears were realized when she said: —

"I do not wonder that you have preferred to keep away from me."

"On the contrary, Aunt Agnes, I have called twice before, this week."

"When you knew I was out, I dare say."

There was no answering such logic as this.

"I seem never to be able to satisfy you," I said bravely. "I had come to tell you that I am studying hard under the direction of Mr. Fleisch, a favorite pupil of Mr. Spence, and am doing all I can to improve myself."

"Fiddlesticks! Tell me!"

"But, Aunt Agnes, it is so."

"I have heard all about you. You can't tell me anything about the matter I don't know already. We shall hear next of your carrying your habit of flirting into the sanctuary itself. You might almost as well coquet with a minister of the holy Gospel as with him you have selected to try your fascinations on. I might have guessed what would be the result of introducing you to sober-minded people. It was none of my work, thank Heaven! Lucretia Kingsley has herself to blame, for I heard her give you the invitation from her own lips. But I blush for you as my niece. No amount of proficiency or cleverness can be a palliation of your behavior."

"I have been maligned, Aunt Agnes," I cried with flashing eyes. "Some one has told you a pack of falsehoods. It is not true that I have been flirting with anybody. I have given up everything of the kind, as I said I should. Who has been accusing me? I insist on knowing who told you."

"No matter who told me. My authority is of the best."

"I suppose it was your friend Miss Kingsley. I half suspected that she would misrepresent me in private."

"You admit, then, that you are guilty?"

"I admit nothing. If, as your words seem to imply, Miss Kingsley says I acted unbecomingly at her house, she does not speak the truth. She is jealous. The long and short of it is, Mr. Spence was polite to me, and that made her angry. I believe she wishes to marry him herself," I said in the fulness of my anger.

"Virginia! I am astonished at you. It will not mend matters to insult your benefactors. What motive had Miss Kingsley, pray, in asking you to her house but kindness?"

"Pshaw!" I cried, now thoroughly roused. "She asked me because she thought I was fashionable, and because it would read well in the newspaper that I had been at one of her tea-parties. She imagined I was so silly and brainless that her friends would take no notice of me; and when it turned out that they did she lost her temper."

"You have lost yours, Virginia. I presume you will tell me presently that Mr. Spence flirted with you. I never heard such nonsense in my life, and wicked nonsense too; for you are doing your best to injure the character of a young woman who is in every way your superior, and has had none of your advantages. As I just said, I presume you will claim that Mr. Spence flirted with you, and that he wrote to you first."

"Wrote to me? He has never written to me; nor I to him, except to ask his advice about a teacher."

"You admit so much?"

"Why shouldn't I? I was interested in his theories, and I applied to him as the most natural person to consult."

"It is very easy to explain it away in that manner, but unfortunately for you my informant adopted – "

"Why don't you say Miss Kingsley, and have done with it, Aunt Agnes?"

"Very well then, if you prefer, Miss Kingsley adopted a very different style in speaking of you than you employ in speaking of her. She tried to spare you as much as possible, and said what she did only with great reluctance. I could see that she was holding back, and was resolved not to tell the whole. 'Of course,' she said, 'I know Miss Virginia did not mean to offend, and very likely in general society her little indiscretions would have been quite proper; but at a purely intellectual gathering like ours, from which as you know all vanities are rigorously excluded, it did seem to me unsympathetic of a new-comer to introduce an element of coquetry. When I say that since then she has written notes to Mr. Spence, whose time is precious as gold, asking him to call upon her in a social way, you will I am sure, my dear Miss Harlan, excuse my speaking. It is for her own good that I have ventured to do so, as a word from you would convince her of her thoughtlessness.'"

"The hypocrite!" I murmured, too indignant to restrain myself.

"There you go again, vilifying her with abusive epithets when she has simply done her duty as a friend. Contrast for instance your various expressions with hers. 'Jealous;' 'invited you to her house because you were fashionable' (a most unwarranted assumption); 'a hypocrite;' and, worst of all, you accuse her of trying to win the affections of a man whom she venerates as a master, and who though he has never taken the vow of celibacy is too much absorbed in the life-work he is pursuing to give a thought to marriage. And what does she say of you? She merely calls it 'unsympathetic' of a new-comer to disturb the harmony of sober-minded people by the introduction of coquetry. 'Unsympathetic'! If I were to stigmatize such behavior, I should call it disgraceful. I was mortified, Virginia, thoroughly mortified; and especially as Mr. Spence had been here the day before, and spoken of you in terms that made me feel really proud. As Miss Kingsley said, however, he is the last man in the world to notice such a thing as coquetry."

I made a mental interrogation point, but I did not dare to give utterance to the heresy lest I should seem to be carrying out Aunt Agnes's insinuation that I would next accuse Mr. Spence of flirting with me. I replied with as much quietness as I could at the moment command, —

"I can only repeat what I have already said. Miss Kingsley has slandered me, whether intentionally or not I do not know. But her charge of coquetry is utterly without foundation."

"Did you not make eyes at Mr. Barr, and give him a rose?" she interrupted. "You see I know all."

"No, I did not," I answered, flushing. "On the contrary, Mr. Barr made me feel excessively uncomfortable during most of the evening by the absurd compliments he paid me, and by the way in which he stared at me. As for the rose, I dropped it accidentally as I was getting into my carriage, and I believe he picked it up."

"Accidentally!" said Aunt Agnes with a sniff. "As my informant said, 'when a young woman flings herself at the head of a hot-souled poet, what is she to expect?' Human nature is human nature, and there are not many men with the self-control of Mr. Spence."

"Miss Kingsley seems to have given you a great deal of information, Aunt Agnes."

"You are mistaken again, as usual. The person who told me this is a sober-minded woman of middle age, who could not have been influenced by jealousy."

"Mrs. Marsh, I suppose. I might have known it, from her choice vocabulary. Talk of gossips, Aunt Agnes, I never heard a worse one in any drawing-room in the city. Who is Mrs. Marsh?"

I was glowing with indignation again, and justly so as it seemed to me. I had been cruelly misconstrued, and my self-control on the occasion of Miss Kingsley's tea had been wholly unappreciated.

"Who is Mrs. Marsh? You may well ask who is Mrs. Marsh, after what you have said about her. Gossip or no gossip, vocabulary or no vocabulary, Mrs. Marsh is a very deserving woman, who by her own unaided efforts has risen to the position she now occupies. How often shall I be obliged to impress upon you that it is the spirit, not the letter, that is of importance? As secretary of the Society for the Practice of Moderation, Mrs. Marsh can afford to disregard the ill-natured sneers of those who may have enjoyed greater advantages in early life than she. It is not by wholesale abuse of others, Virginia, that you will persuade me of your innocence. On your own showing, you have written to Mr. Spence, and misconstrued Mr. Barr's poetic impetuosity as an attempt to flirt with you. I do not desire to discuss the matter further. We shall soon know whether you are sincere or not in your professions of study. As I have told you before, your future is in your own hands; but first and foremost you must rid yourself of this propensity to behave in a trivial manner."

I felt that silence would be the best palliative for my wounds; and so discouraged was I of being able to change Aunt Agnes's opinion, I thought it a waste of breath at the moment even to mention Mrs. Marsh as my authority for the statement that Miss Kingsley had a tender feeling for Mr. Spence.

V

A year passed without special incident, and yet certain things require to be told so that the sequel may seem consistent. Contrary to Aunt Agnes's insinuation, I proved sincere in my devotion to study. Mr. Fleisch came regularly twice a week, and during the summer months when I was away from home his instruction was continued by means of correspondence. I found him, as Mr. Spence had predicted, an admirable teacher. His work was everything to him, and he imbued me with his ability to look at our relations as strictly impersonal. He might have been a machine, so little was he susceptible to any mood of mine, – a characteristic which I deemed more and more indispensable each day to a proper understanding between pupil and master.

As a result of his teaching and my own industry, I acquired before many months an intimate knowledge of the views shared by those who called themselves Moderationists, and moreover without the slightest diminution of my enthusiasm. I was able to converse intelligently with the most proficient of the school, and there was little of the system that failed to commend itself to me as entitled to faith and support. I attended meetings and lectures in advocacy of its theories, and occasionally took part in debates on questions relating to the management of the Society for the Practice of Moderation, of which I was elected treasurer. Thus it happened that my name appeared in the newspapers as one of the leading spirits of the movement, and among my former acquaintances there was a general impression that I had become very peculiar. My old ball-room rivals, who were for the most part waltzing as hard as ever, would stop me in the street and say, "Virginia dear, is it true you are going into a convent?" or, "What is this that I hear, Virginia, about you being in favor of female suffrage? Do you really think women ought to vote?" Once in a while some friend, who was either more accurate by nature or who really felt an interest in me, would hit closer to the mark, and perhaps with a sigh express regret at not having the courage to become literary too. "But it does separate one so from other people, – that is, people one knows; don't you think so dear?"

It certainly did. I was completely estranged from my old associations, and spent my time, when not employed in study, largely at the rooms of our Society, where Mrs. Marsh presided as secretary. There were countless circulars and pamphlets to be mailed, setting forth our purposes and needs. Mrs. Marsh, despite an inaccurate acquaintance with and an overweening curiosity regarding the doings of fashionable people, was a model of executive ability. With some one at hand to correct her grammar and spelling, she could transact a greater amount of business than half-a-dozen ordinary women. In my zeal to see things properly done, I constituted myself her assistant; and we managed together the whole work of the Bureau, as Miss Kingsley liked to call our humble quarters.

My relations with Miss Kingsley were outwardly very friendly. I had thought it best upon reflection not to appear offended when we met again, and she on her part greeted me with effusive warmth and a little deprecatory look, as if to say, "You will excuse me, I am sure, for what I said to your aunt. It was for your good, or I should never have spoken." Subsequently, in our relations at the Bureau, she liked to patronize me slightly. She would come whisking into the rooms where Mrs. Marsh and I were hard at work, and putter about for a few moments, asking questions and giving us advice, and then whisk out again with an encouraging nod. She was apt to time her visits so as to meet Mr. Spence, who came regularly sometime during every forenoon, to superintend our labors. He stayed usually about half an hour; and from the first day I became connected with the Bureau I made a point to avoid him as much as possible, – a course which seemed acceptable to him, for he always addressed his business suggestions to Mrs. Marsh, and did not encourage me to converse with him. Once in a while, however, he would approach me in a constrained fashion, and express satisfaction with the reports Mr. Fleisch made of my progress. It was through his silent agency also, I had no question, that I was appointed treasurer, and was regarded as a prominent worker in the cause. With Miss Kingsley, on the other hand, he was easy and familiar. It was evident that he liked her, and he listened to her opinions; but I could never detect what seemed to me any signs of sentiment on his part in her regard. Miss Kingsley must have thought differently, for on one or two occasions she was unable to resist the temptation, as they went out of the door together, of looking back at me with an air of triumph. The more Mr. Spence seemed to avoid me, the kinder and more patronizing was her manner; and she so far evinced her friendship presently as to show me the manuscript of a novel which she had written, entitled "Moderation," and which was dedicated "To him to whom I owe all that in me is of worth, – Charles Liversage Spence." It was an attempt, as she explained to me, to return to the rational style and improving tone of Jane Austen, whose novels were sound educators as well as sources of amusement. From Miss Kingsley's natural fluency and sprightliness I expected something "racy," to quote Paul Barr, and I was disappointed to find "Moderation" dull and didactic. It was however heralded and published with a great flourish of trumpets; and Mr. Spence wrote a review of it in one of the leading newspapers under the symbol XXX (a signature of his known only to the initiated), in which he called attention to its exquisite moral tone, which had no counterpart in fiction since the writings of Miss Edgeworth were on every parlor table. In conclusion he said: "Whatever the too captious critic may say of the dramatic interest of the story, it is indeed a triumph for a young writer, and that writer a woman, to embody in her first novel opinions that will make the book of value to the student of psychology long after the craving of human nature for fictitious narrative has ceased to exist."