Sea-gift

CHAPTER XII

The afternoon was still and sultry, as I gazed out of my window, leaning on the sill, and waiting for Reuben to bring my fishing poles and bait.

From the corn fields in the distance a trembling haze was continually rising, and I could hear the occasional song of the negroes, as they moved behind their plows slowly up and down the long green rows. In the yard all was still; the chickens, with palpitating throats, were lying under the bushes, flirting the cool dark earth up into their feathers; and the ducks were gathered around the cool trough at the well, bubbling the water with their bills, and shaking their wings as if they wished to dive in it, if the trough were just wide enough; the bull-dog, at the door of his kennel, was lying on his side, with his head stretched out on the earth, from which he would raise it constantly to snap at the flies biting his flanks. A solitary peacock, with his tail all pulled out for the feathers, was sitting on the fence, with his blue neck and coroneted head reverted, as if gazing at the absence of his plumage. Down at the quarters I could catch the changing hum of the spinning wheel, making echo to the nasal minor strains of a negro woman at the wash tub. Everything was calculated to inspire reverie, and I leaned there, thinking of the cool shady bank of the creek, and of Lulie and myself sitting there alone; and musing on the pleasure of the evening, and wondering if anything would occur to mar it, I drew my eyes from the scenes in the yard, and gazed down the side of the house, noticing every little dent in the planking and the dark rain marks under the nails; and dropping bits of paper at a lazy red wasp that was crawling slowly up the weather-boarding. Reuben, passing under my window with the poles and a gourd full of worms, broke my reverie, and taking my hat and gloves I went down stairs, where Lulie was already awaiting me, looking sweeter than ever in a pink gingham sun-bonnet. Holding an umbrella carefully over her, Reuben leading the way with the poles, I went down the avenue through a long lane, down a wooded hill, and stopped at “de bes’ fishin’ hole on de creek,” as Reuben called it. ‘Twas a steep grassy bank under a large sycamore, at a sudden curve in the stream, where the water, running down heedlessly, struck the bank, and hurried off with many a curling dimple of confusion for its carelessness. After Reuben had undone and baited our lines, I dismissed him, and we both took our seats, pole in hand.

The thick branches overhead made an impervious shade, except where they opened here and there to let a little ray of sunlight dance upon the water. The lines, serpent-like, curled down from the poles, and the painted float circled up and down the eddy, but with no other motion but what the water gave. Presently Lulie’s stood still, then bobbed under and up, while the water rings retreated from it as if afraid; again it goes down, and Lulie – like all lady fishers – gave the pole such a jerk that the line and its hooked victim were lodged in the branches above. All my efforts to disengage it were unavailing till, at last, I broke off the line, and threw pieces of stick at the little fish till I battered it down, its mouth torn out by the hook, and its shining scales all beaten off. Lulie took her little victim in her hand very tenderly, and almost shed tears over it. She declared she would never come fishing again; that it was mean and cruel to catch the poor little creatures out of the water when they were so happy.

“And, John,” she continued, “I am so sorry I broke your hook and line, when you had fixed it up so nicely for me; I know you are really mad with me about it.”

I did not notice her remark about the hook and line, but said (winding the broken line around the pole, and laying it behind us on the grass):

“Your compassion and pity for the little fish are so sweet, Lulie, that I wish I could be transformed into one, like another Indur.”

The old roguish twinkle came back to her eyes as she said:

“You can have my compassion now if you will be caught like this fish.”

“You know how quickly I would be, Lulie, but all your lines are occupied.”

“No, indeed, John, you are the one in fault; but, then, you are completely fastened by a hook baited with a pair of dark Cuban eyes.”

“Of course, Lulie, you refer to Carlotta; you are entirely mistaken; she is only a sister, and a very reserved and distant sister at that. I admire her beauty, but cannot love her.”

“Well, you look at her as if you did, any way, and I feel every time that we three are together, that you are wishing I had not come up here to spoil your pleasure, and be in the way.”

“Lulie!” I said softly, as I sat down by her on the cool green moss, and as I said it a hot flush came over my face, for I felt there was no retreat after such a tone, and that I must now tell her what I had been hinting at by action and word through my life from a child. She, too, well knew what I meant, for she dropped her eyes from mine, and laying down the little fish, commenced to pick from her finger, with great earnestness and effort, a bright scale that adhered to it.

“Let me get it off,” I said, taking her hand and flipping off the scale, but still keeping the hand in mine; “Lulie, I am holding the hand of the only girl in the world that I love. It is no jest now, but solemn earnest truth. Darling, your own heart tells you how I have idolized you from a child, and my heart tells me how I adore you now. Sometimes I have felt that you did not care for me, and my despair has been worse than eternal death; at other times I’ve thought, perhaps, you did return my love, and the happiness would have been supreme but for the dread uncertainty. But oh! Lulie, I can endure it no longer; tell me, dearest, if you – ”

She drew her hand suddenly from mine, and placing both hands over her eyes, she burst into convulsive sobbing. I put my arm around her, and tried to take her hands from her eyes. She turned towards me, putting both arms around my neck, laid her face, streaming with tears, on my shoulder, and cried as if her little heart would break. I sat still, supporting her, and not knowing what to do or say. Gradually her hands relaxed their clasp, and she raised her head from my shoulder, and, wiping her eyes with her handkerchief, which she tremblingly drew forth, said, with a tear-hoarse voice and a great sob:

“Oh! – John!”

“Lulie, darling,” I said, gazing at her tenderly, “have I distressed you so much, and is it painful to you to know that I love you?”

“Yes, yes, dear John, the deepest pain, because – because I cannot love you in return.”

“Not love me! Oh, Lulie! After all the years of fondest fidelity!”

“John, I do love you as the dearest friend I have on earth; as the one of all others in whom I can confide most implicitly; and because I love and esteem you so dearly your avowal of love causes me such intense pain. I could tell another I did not love him without remorse, but I know your noble heart is so truly in earnest, and its love is so sincere, that it almost kills me to turn it away and to offer only in return that bitterest of all words – friendship. But, John, by all the magnanimity of your generous nature, I beseech you not to hate me now, but hold me still as the same little Lulie of the nursery, when our hearts knew love as only childhood’s friendship.”

I sat as if in a dream, and only murmured:

“Hate you, Lulie! Never! never!”

After a long pause, I at length said:

“Lulie, darling – for you will permit me to call you so this evening, at least – the scales have fallen from my eyes, and I see so plainly what a blind, blind fool I have been to grope on in vague belief that you loved me. The fault has not been yours, for your actions have told me a thousand times that my hopes were vain; but well, indeed, is Cupid always pictured blind. And, darling, before we dismiss this subject forever, I want to thank you for the grief, and I know ‘twas real, that you felt in rejecting my proffered love. Had you heartlessly cast it aside ‘twould have crushed me too deeply for fortitude. And for our friendship, I vow before high Heaven it shall be deepened; and truer than a brother, with the devotion of an unrequited yet undying love, will I prove myself your friend.”

“Thank you. Oh! a thousand times thank you, John.”

“But, dearest Lulie,” I continued, “while my heart is bleeding, let me tear it all it may be torn. Tell me, do you love Frank Paning? Does he hold what I would give my life to win? Do not fear to hurt me now.”

“John, dear John, do not ask me;” and her frame commenced trembling violently again.

“‘Tis as I expected,” I said, bitterly. “But, oh! this is the keenest pain of all. Frank Paning! To know that he may hold your hand, and feel it throb its love to his; that he may gaze into your eyes and read your love for him; that he may know that Lulie, my darling, my idol, is his alone; while I – Oh, Lulie, I’d rather you’d love the veriest dog that laps the dust around your door than Frank Paning.”

“Hush! hush! for the love of mercy hush!” she said, putting up her hand.

“Lulie, I cannot, will not hush. We will never talk together again as we do now; and, as that dearest friend you have termed me, I wish to warn you. He is not worthy of your love.”

She laid down the bonnet string, which she had been crimping in her fingers while I was talking, and looking straight at me, the least perceptible frown on her brow, and a flush on her cheek, said:

“John, I know you too well to believe you capable of meanly trying to injure a rival simply because of his success. I do you the justice to believe you sincere in your opinions, but your judgment is warped by prejudice; you cannot know him as I do, or you would love and trust him.”

“My dear Lulie, it is because I know him far better than you do that I warn you against him. I expect you to believe that all I say in regard to him is the fruit of my disappointment, but I must, ere we close this subject forever, tell you why he is unworthy, and why I warn you against him. And I trust, as you believe in my honor, you will not think I am influenced by any hope of thus supplanting him in your favor. I bow to your decision of this evening as final, nor would I cause you to revoke it, if I could, by maligning him.”

“John, I believe you; and I thank you more than I can tell for your intended kindness, but ‘tis better that we speak no further on this subject. It might beget unpleasant feelings, and I would not feel, nor have you feel, one shade of anger, for the world. My heart is sad enough when I think what a change one hour has wrought. No more the same John and Lulie we have ever been; no more the same playful attentions you have always paid me, nor the same thoughtless encouragement I have given. Respectful courtesy now our only intercourse. Oh, how little did I think, when I lightly returned your looks and smiles of love, to what it all would lead!”

“Lulie, darling, I cannot feel anger toward you, whatever you do; but, even if you hate me for it, I must tell you of Frank Paning. He is utterly destitute of principle. He does not love you, and if he did would only love you as his slave. He is tyrannical and overbearing, yet sycophantic in his nature, imposing on the weak and cringing to the strong. He is free and forward in the presence of ladies, and impure and slanderous in his remarks about them behind their backs. I have known him to leave a company of ladies, and then, for the mere applause of a vulgar throng, make witticisms on their appearance and manners that would have caused a blush in Cyprus. He does not bear a proper respect for you, for I have heard him publicly boast of your love, and make remarks that I have been forced to resent.”

“John, do not revile him any more. You perhaps mean well, but ‘tis an utter waste of breath. For years I have loved and trusted him; and if an angel were to stand upon the rippling water there and warn me, I would not believe Frank false. When I gave him my heart I gave him my life, and, though you and all the world turn against him, I will cling to him and trust him, and when he spurns me I will die.”

“May God protect you, Lulie, my own love, from all wrong,” and I kissed gently and respectfully her dear, soft cheek, henceforth to be for other lips. She did not reproach me, but sat gazing at the dancing sunlight on the water. I rose and took up the pole that we had left set in the bank. A fish had hung itself upon the hook, and, utterly exhausted by its unheeded efforts to disengage itself, came up from the water limp and motionless. Putting it on our string, and tying up our tackle, I assisted Lulie over the rail fence, and we ascended the hill and walked up the lane in silence.

Reader! did you ever love earnestly and devotedly? Did you ever, after months, perhaps years, of doubt and hesitation, at last make up your mind to declare it? and did you ever have it rejected, perhaps kindly, perhaps cruelly? If so, you know what I felt then.

So bitterly disappointed, so deeply humiliated to have confessed yourself so conceitedly mistaken, and such a wild despair in your heart as you think how she will greet another with her smiles, while you, poor fool, are forgotten; how another’s arms will fold her, another’s lips press hers! Oh! there’s a world of sad meaning in those exquisite lines of Tennyson’s:

“And sweet as those by hopeless Fancy feigned,On lips that are for others.”

Again, before we reached home, we assured each other of our kind feelings, and agreed to act as nearly as possible in the same old way.

When we reached the house the others were at tea, the table being placed in the hall, without lamps, as the sun was hardly down. After being rallied for our solitary fish we took our seats, and father, taking from his pocket a bundle of letters, ran over them, and tossed one to me. I excused myself, and read it at the table. How my face burned and my hand shook as I found it was from Paning himself! His father and mother had gone to South Carolina, leaving him to devote the balance of his vacation to study. He had gotten lonely keeping house by himself, had written to Ned to join him, and they were coming up to spend a couple of weeks with me. They would not wait for my reply, as they knew I would be glad to see them, but would leave Wilmington by the next train.

I sat looking at the bold handwriting till the letters danced on the page, and father said:

“John, that is the longest letter I ever saw to be written on one page. We have nearly finished tea while you have been reading it. From whom can it be?”

“It is from Frank Paning, sir. He and Ned Cheyleigh are coming up to spend a week or two with me.”

I could not look at Lulie, as I said this, but I knew her face was bent over her tea, with the blood scarcely beneath the skin.

“I am glad of that,” said mother, “for your sake, John; you will then have some company in your rambles.”

I laughed as well as I could, and said “yes, indeed!”

“And while I think of it,” said father, taking another paper from his pocket, “here is a railroad receipt for a horse, shipped from Baltimore. He will be at Goldsboro’ to-morrow, and as you will go over for the boys, you can bring him home with you.”

I assented, but asked what he wanted with another horse when he already had several he did not use.

“But this is something extra, my son, and I did not buy him for myself, but for a friend of mine. You will find his name on the bill of shipment.”

I looked at it again, and saw that the Bay line had received, in good order, but subject to a score of risks, one horse, to be sent to John Smith, Jr., at Goldsboro’, N. C. I thanked him with all the gratitude I could command under the conflict of feelings, and we all went out to the front porch, and sat there till the twilight darkened into night. Carlotta, with Lulie, took her seat on the steps, and I could hear her rich voice even laughing heartily at times as they talked together in low tones. I was glad that she was resuming her cheerfulness, and felt that I ought to join them, and not be so silent and moody in my own home. But I somehow wanted to be near mother to-night, and let her hand caress my head, because I was in trouble.

CHAPTER XIII

The sun shining into my eyes next morning awoke me, and turning over I heard the rattle and rub of the brush as Reuben polished away on my boots, just outside the door.

“Reuben,” I yawned, “has Horace fed the horses?” Reuben came into the room, with one boot casing his arm up to the elbow, like an ill-shaped boxing glove, and the brush still flying up and down the shining instep.

“I d’no, sir, spec he has doe, st – too!” and he stopped to spit on the end of the brush, as if he wished to spit the hairs away, “he allays de fust one up on de plantash’n.”

“Well, as soon as you get through with the boots, tell him to hitch the gray horses to the spring wagon directly after breakfast; I am going to town; and tell him to put in my saddle and bridle, as I want to ride my horse back.”

“Which un, Marse John?” said Reuben, as he set the boots by my bedside, “how’s one horse gwine to pull de wagin back here agin?”

“Dry up, and go tell Horace what I said. It is a new horse I am going after, and you have got to attend to him for me, and you can ride him to water every day.”

“Golly, dat’s ‘lishus; won’t dese quarter niggers stand back,” and he ran down stairs, cutting an audible shuffle every third step.

I was just tying on my cravat when Reuben returned, with a lengthened visage and a woful tale.

“Unken Horris was a waterin’ de horses, and when I tole him, he said marster dun tole him, and dat was nough; and just cause I tole him to hurry up, he tuk and cut me mos’ in two with de carridge whip.”

“I expect you were impudent to him; but he ought not to have struck you when I sent you. I will see him about it after breakfast.”

This silenced but did not satisfy Reuben, who, like all negroes, was anxious enough to see swift punishment fall on one who had offended against himself, though he would have been full of sympathy for one who suffered for any offence, however grievous, against a white person.

As we drove into Goldsboro’, an hour afterwards, the whistle sounded, and the morning train came into sight, nodding up the track; the engine steamed by like a great hog rooting its way along; then the baggage car, its door open, and the baggage master leaning out; then the coaches, and, as they all came to a stop, amid the shouts of a dozen white aproned waiters, who were vowing that every passenger had plenty of time to eat the most delicious breakfast ever prepared, Frank and Ned, guns in hand, came down the car steps. I welcomed them warmly, being delighted to see Ned, and determined that I would crush every feeling of repugnance to Frank, and receive him with the hospitality of a Southern home. As we walked up to our wagon, where our grays were prancing and snorting at the train, Reuben came around from the hotel stables, whither I had sent him for my new horse, leading him by the halter. I almost forgot to breathe in my rapt admiration. He was the most perfect specimen of horse flesh I had ever seen. His color was the deepest chestnut or claret, and his hair looked as if it was just wound from the cocoon, and his large prominent eye had a soft intelligent expression that was almost human. His limbs were as delicate as a gazelle’s, yet had that peculiar turn of the rounded muscles that told of desert born ancestors. There was nothing of the charger about him – no thunder-clothed neck, nor trumpet-like nostril; all was dainty symmetry, but the symmetry of a form that could not know fatigue.

I could not tell whether he would drive or not, but I felt that it would almost be a sin to clog such superb motion with harness. I ordered Reuben to put the saddle and bridle on him, and turned to Ned and Frank, and asked their opinion of him.

“I’ll vow he’s a beauty, John,” said Frank, as we put the valises in the wagon; “let me ride him home for you, and find out his bad points, if he has any.”

I could not refuse, and with much chagrin and disappointment saw Frank gallop fleetly on ahead of the wagon, as we rattled on towards home. Ned and I had much to talk about, and almost before we were aware of it, were driving down the avenue.

Frank had waited for us to come up, and now cantered along by the side of the wagon, descanting the praises of my steed in unmeasured terms.

When we entered the house, and Ned and Frank were met by the family, I was really sorry for Lulie, so great was her embarrassment. She could not bear to torture me by greeting Frank with the cordiality their relations demanded, and she could not bear to hurt his feelings by treating him coldly without a cause. Frank noticed her confusion, and asked, in his free and easy way, “Why, Lulie, what is the matter with you. Have you become so rustic already as to be frightened out of your wits by the presence of gentlemen?”

“Don’t let him tease you, Lulie,” said mother, coming to her aid; “Frank has mistaken the roses which our fresh air has given her for blushes at his presence.”

“Not at all, Mrs. Smith; I am too much of a connoisseur in ladies’ faces to mistake confusion for health. I will leave it to Miss Rurleston if Lulie wasn’t ashamed to meet us.”

But Carlotta, with her face all bright with animation, was deeply engaged in questioning Ned about Mr. and Mrs. Cheyleigh, and expressing her gratitude for their kindness, and did not hear his remark.

“Well, boys,” interrupted mother, “I suppose you are both dusty and warm, and wish to go to your rooms. John, show them up; and remember one thing, you came up here to enjoy yourselves; do so to the fullest extent. Everything on the premises that will serve your amusement is at your service; the house and furniture are old, so you need not fear to be as boisterous as you please. When you come down from your rooms your breakfast will be ready, or I will send it up, if you prefer it.”

“You are very kind,” said both, “we will soon be down.”

I had persuaded mother to fix the large room for us all three, so that we could enjoy ourselves more together than if formally separated.

As soon as we got into our room, and Frank had thrown off his duster and coat, he broke forth in his praises of Carlotta.

“I’ll vow she is superb; my life! what an eye she has! I had no idea, when I wrapped her up in our jackets on the beach, and she looked so cold and pitiful, that she was such a beauty. Ned, she seemed to tackle to you strongly. I could not make her hear me.”

“She was only asking me about home. You know she staid there several days before she came up to Col. Smith’s.”

“She’s devilish grave, though,” said Frank, pouring the basin full of water.

“Remember, Frank, what she has so recently passed through,” said I; “she is really bright when she can forget her bereavement; then, too, she is contrasted here with Lulie, who is all life and gaiety.”

“Ah!” said Frank, wiping the words out of his mouth with the towel, “Lulie is the star after all. If she just had Carlotta’s beauty she would break all your hearts. I wonder what she meant, though, by being so confoundedly sour towards me. I believe I’ll try a little game with Carlotta, any way, and see what grit she is made of, if for nothing more than to pique Lulie.”

“Frank, you forget Carlotta is my sister, now,” I said, gravely enough to let him see that I was in earnest, yet not enough so to offend him, as he was my guest.

“Pardons, mille pardons, monsieur,” he replied, folding a clean collar, and nodding to me gaily.

“Frank,” said Ned, dusting his hat, “you are terribly conceited. How do you know that your attentions to Miss Rurleston will pique Lulie?”

“Oh, that’s my biz, you know,” returned Frank, shutting one eye at him; “but I am afraid we are keeping Mrs. Smith’s breakfast waiting; let’s go down.”

As we reached the basement stairs Lulie called me out to the porch, while Ned and Frank went down. She was very much agitated as she said:

“John, I must go home to-morrow.”

“Go home, Lulie!”

“Yes; it will be a perfect torture to remain here with you and Frank. He does not know of anything having passed between us, and will be constantly rallying me about a confusion I cannot conceal, when I think that you are watching me and suffering with every smile I give him. Oh, John, I am very unhappy about it all.”