CHAPTER XII.
WAYS AND MEANS.
With all the showy parade and empty pomp of a fashionable city funeral, Ella was laid to rest in Greenwood, and, in their darkened parlor, arrayed in the latest style of mourning, the mother and sisters received the sympathy of their friends, who hoped they would try to be reconciled, and were so sorry they could not now go to the Springs, as usual. In another parlor, too, far more elegant but less showy than that of Mrs. Grey, another mother wept for her only son, speaking to him blessed words of comfort in his bereavement, and telling him of the better world, where again he would meet the loved and lost. Once she ventured to hope that he would come back again to her fireside, now that his was desolate, but he refused. Rose Hill henceforth would be his home, and though it was lonely and drear, he must in a few days go back to it; for the sake of the little one, doubly dear to him now that its mother was gone. Oh, how sad was that journey back, and what a sense of desolation came over him, as he drew near his home, and knew that Ella was not there!—that never more would she come forth to meet him—never again would her little feet stray through the winding walks, or her fairy fingers pluck the flowers she had loved so well.
It was near the first of July. The day had been rainy and the evening was dark and cold. Wet, chilly, and forlorn, he entered the hall and ascended the stairs, but he could not that night go to the old room and find it empty; and he was passing on to his library, when the sound of some one singing made him pause, while a thrill of joy ran through his veins, for he knew that childish voice, knew it was Dora Deane singing to his child. Another moment and he stood within the room where Ella had died. All traces of sickness and death had been removed, and everything was in perfect order. Vases of flowers adorned the mantel and the stands, seeming little out of place with the rain which beat against the window, and the fire which burned within the grate. In her crib lay Fannie, and sitting near was Dora Deane, her rich auburn hair combed smoothly back, and the great kindness of her heart shining out from the depths of her clear blue eyes.
There are people whose very presence brings with it a feeling of comfort, and such a one was Dora. Mr. Hastings had not expected to find her there; and the sight of her bright face, though it did not remove the heavy pain from his heart, took from him the sense of utter desolation, the feeling of being alone in his sorrow.
"Dora," he exclaimed, coming to her side, "I did not expect this! How happened you to stay?"
"The baby cried so hard," answered Dora, "that Eugenia told me I might remain until your return."
"It was very kind and thoughtful in her, and I thank her very much. Will you tell her so?" he said, involuntarily laying his hand on Dora's head.
Divesting himself at last of his damp overcoat, and donning the warm dressing gown, which Dora brought him, he sat down before the fire, and listened while she told him how she had stayed in that room and kept it in order for him, because she thought it would not seem half so bad to him if he came into it at once and found it comparatively pleasant.
"You are a very thoughtful girl," he said, when she had finished, "and
I hope I shall some time repay you for your kindness to myself and
Ella."
But Dora did not wish for any pay, and at the mention of Ella's name her tears burst forth afresh. The next morning, when news of Mr. Hastings's return was received at Locust Grove, Eugenia at once suggested that Dora be sent for immediately. "It did not look well," she said, "for a good sized girl, fourteen and a half years of age, to be staying in the same house with a widower. Folks would talk!"
And growing suddenly very careful of her cousin's reputation, she dispatched a note to Rose Hill requesting her immediate return. Not that she really thought there would be any impropriety in Dora's staying with Mr. Hastings, but because she had a plan by which she hoped herself to see him every day. And in this plan she succeeded. As she had expected, her note brought down Mr. Hastings himself, who, on his child's account, objected to parting with Dora, unless it were absolutely necessary.
"She is as well off there as here," said he; "and why can't she stay?"
"I am perfectly willing she should take care of little Ella," answered the previously instructed Mrs. Deane, who, in a measure, shared her daughter's ambitious designs; "but it must be done here, if at all. I can't suffer her to remain alone with those gossiping servants."
"Oh, yes!" exclaimed Eugenia, speaking as if this were the first she had heard of it. "That is a good idea. It will be delightful to have the dear little creature here, and so much better for her too in case of croup, or anything like that, to be with an experienced person like mother!"
"But," said Mr. Hastings, "this would keep Dora entirely from her studies, and that ought not to be."
"It need not," hastily interrupted Eugenia. "She can go to school every day, for nothing will give me greater pleasure than to take care of our dear Ella's child;" and the pocket-handkerchief went up to her face to conceal the tears which might have been there, but probably were not.
It was finally arranged, and in the course of a few days the parlor of Locust Grove was echoing sometimes to the laughter, and sometimes to the screaming, of little Ella Grey, who, from some unaccountable freak of babyhood, conceived a violent fancy for Eugenia, to whom she would go quite as readily as to Dora, whose daily absence at school she at last did not mind. Regularly each day, and sometimes twice a day, Mr. Hastings came down to Locust Grove, and his manner was very kind toward Eugenia, when he found her, as he often did, with his baby sleeping in her arms. He did not know how many times, at his approach, it was snatched from the cradle by Eugenia, who, in reality, was not remarkably fond of baby-tending, and who, in the absence of the father, left the child almost wholly to the care of her mother and sister. Management, however, was everything, and fancying she had found the shortest avenue to Mr. Hastings's heart, she, in his presence, fondled, and petted and played with his child, taking care occasionally to hint of neglect on the part of Dora, whom he now seldom saw as, at the hour of his calling, she was generally in school. It was by such means as this that Eugenia sought to increase Mr. Hastings's regard for herself, and in a measure she succeeded; for though his respect for Dora was undiminished, he could not conceal from himself the fact that Eugenia was very agreeable, very interesting and very kind to his daughter!
As the autumn advanced, and the cold rainy weather precluded out-door exercise, it was but natural that he should spend much of his time at Locust Grove, where his tastes were carefully studied, his favorite books read, and his favorite authors discussed, while Eugenia's handsome black eyes smiled a welcome when he came, and drooped pensively beneath her long eyelashes when he went away. Thus the autumn and the winter passed, and when the spring had come, the village of Dunwood was rife with rumors concerning the attraction which drew Mr. Hastings so often to Locust Grove; some sincerely pitying him if, indeed, he entertained a serious thought of making Eugenia Deane his wife, while others severely censured him for having so soon forgotten one whose grave had not been made a twelvemonth. But he had not forgotten, and almost every hour of his life was her loved name upon his lips, and the long golden tress his own hand had severed from her head was guarded as his choicest treasure, while the dark hours of the night bore witness to his lonely grief. And it was to escape this loneliness—to forget for a brief time the sad memories of the past—that he went so often to Locust Grove, where as yet his child was the greater attraction, though he could not be insensible to the charms of Eugenia who spared no pains to interest him in herself.
He was passionately fond of music, and many an hour she sat patiently at the piano, seeking to perfect herself in a difficult piece, with which she thought to surprise him. But nothing, however admirably executed, could sound well upon her old-fashioned instrument, and how to procure a new one was the daily subject of her meditations. Occasionally, as she remembered the beautiful rosewood piano standing useless and untouched in the parlors of Rose Hill, something whispered her to wait "and it would yet be hers." But this did not satisfy her present desire, for aside from the sweet sounds, with which she hoped to entrance Mr. Hastings, was the wish to make him think them much wealthier than they were. From one or two circumstances, she had gathered the impression that he thought them poor, and, judging him by herself, she fancied her chances for becoming Mrs. Hastings 2d, would be greatly increased if by any means he could be made to believe her comparatively rich. As one means of effecting this, she must and would have a new piano, costing not less than four hundred dollars. But how to procure the money was the question; the remittance from Uncle Nat, which had come on the first day of January, was already half gone, and she could not, as she had once done before, make Dora's head keep her out of the difficulty. At last, a new idea suggested itself, and springing to her feet she exclaimed aloud, for she was alone, "I have it; strange I didn't think of that before. I'll write to the old man, and tell him that as Dora is now fifteen, we would gladly send her away to school, if we had the means, but our expenses are so great it is impossible, unless the money comes from him. And he'll do it too, the old miser!—for in his first letter he said he would increase the allowance as Dora grew older."
Suiting the action to the word, she drew out her writing-desk, and commenced a letter to her "dearest Uncle Nathaniel," feelingly describing to him their straitened circumstances, and the efforts of herself and her sister to keep the family in necessaries, which they were enabled to do very comfortably with the addition of the allowance he so generously sent them every year. But they wished now to send Dora to school, to see if anything could be made of her! She had improved latterly, and they really hoped a change of scene would benefit her. For Dora's sake, then, would "her dear uncle be so kind as to send them, on the receipt of that letter, such a sum as he thought best. If so, he would greatly oblige his loving niece."
"There! That will do," she said, leaning back in her chair, and laughing as she thought what her mother and Alice would say, if they knew what she had done. "But they needn't know it," she continued aloud, "until the money comes, and then they can't help themselves."
Then it occurred to her that if Dora herself were to send some message, the coming of the money might be surer; and calling her cousin into the room, she said:
"I am about writing to old Uncle Nat—have you any word or anything to send him?"
"Oh, yes," answered Dora. "Give him my love, and tell him how much I wish he would come home—and stay!" she added, leaving the room, and soon returning with a lock of soft brown hair, which she laid upon the table. "Give him that, and tell him it was mother's."
Had a serpent started suddenly into life before Eugenia, she could not have turned whiter than she did at the sight of that hair. It brought vividly to mind the shadowy twilight, the darkness in the corners, and the terror which came over her on that memorable night, when she had thought to steal Dora's treasure. Soon recovering her composure, however, she motioned her cousin from the room, and, resuming her pen, said to herself, "I shan't write all that nonsense about his coming home, for nobody wants him here; but the love and the hair may as well go."
Then, as she saw how much of the latter Dora had brought, she continued, "There's no need of sending all this. It would make beautiful hair ornaments, and I mean to keep a part of it; Dora won't care, of course, and I shall tell her."
Dividing off a portion of the hair for her own use, she laid it aside, and then in a postscript wrote, "Dora sends"—here she paused; and thinking that "Dora's love" would please the old man too much, and possibly give him too favorable an opinion of his niece, she crossed out the "sends," and wrote, "Dora wishes to be remembered to you, and sends for your acceptance a lock of her mother's hair."
Thus was the letter finished, and the next mail which left Dunwood bore it on its way to India, Eugenia little thinking how much it would influence her whole future life.
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