THE TIGRESS AND THE DOVE.
"Oh, wanton malice—deathful sport—
Could ye not spare my all?
But mark my words, on thy cold heart
A fiery doom shall fall."
n the golden glow of the morning, Minnette Wiseman stood at the door, gazing out—not watching the radiant beauties of nature—not listening to the sweet singing of the birds—not watching the waves flashing and glittering in the sunlight—but nursing her own dark, fathomless thoughts.
From the first moment of the coming of Celeste she had hated her, with a deep, intense hatred, that was destined to be the one ruling passion of her life. She was jealous of her beauty, angry to see her so petted and caressed by every one, but too proud to betray it.
Pride and jealousy were her predominant passions; you could see them in the haughty poise of her superb little head, in the dusky fire smoldering in her glittering black eyes, in the scornful, curling upper lip, in the erect carriage and proud step. In spite of her beauty no one seemed to like Minnette, and she liked no one.
Among her schoolmates her superior talents won their admiration, but her eagle ambition to surpass them all soon turned admiration into dislike. But Minnette went haughtily on her way, living in the unknown world of her dark, sullen thoughts, despising both them and the love she might have won.
A week had passed since the coming of Celeste. Miss Hagar, feeling she was not competent to undertake the instruction of such a shy, sensitive little creature, wished to send her to school. The school to which Minnette and Gipsy went (sometimes) was two miles distant, and taught by the Sisters of Charity. Miss Hagar would have sent her there, but there was no one she could go with. She mentioned this difficulty to her brother.
"Can't she go with Minnette?" said the latter, impatiently.
"No, she sha'n't," said the amiable Minnette. "I'll have no such whimpering cry-baby tagging after me. Let Madam Hagar go with her darling herself if she likes."
"Just what I expected from you," said Miss Hagar, looking gloomingly in the sullen face before her. "If the Lord doesn't punish you one day for your hatred and hard-heartedness, it'll be because some of his creatures will do it for him. Take my word for it."
"I don't care for you or your threats," said Minnette, angrily; "and I do hate your pet, old Miss Hagar, and I'll make everybody else hate her if I can, too."
"Minnette, hold your tongue," called her father, angry at being interrupted in his reading.
Minnette left the room, first casting a glance full of dislike and contempt on Celeste, who sat in a remote corner, her hands over her face, while the tears she struggled bravely to suppress fell in bright drops through her taper fingers. Sob after sob swelled the bosom of the sensitive child, on whose gentle heart the cruel words of Minnette had fallen with crushing weight. Dr. Wiseman, after a few moments, too, left the room, and Celeste, in her dark corner, wept unseen and uncared for.
Suddenly a light footstep entering the room startled her. Her hands were gently removed from her tear-stained face, while a spirited voice exclaimed:
"Hallo! Sissy! what's the matter? Has that kite-heart, Minnette, been mocking you?"
"No-o-o!" faltered Celeste, looking up through her tears into the bright face of Archie Rivers.
"What's the case, then? Something's wrong, I know. Tell me, like a good little girl, and I'll see if I can't help you," said Archie, resolutely retaining the hands with which she struggled to cover her face.
"Miss Hagar wants to send me to school, and I've no one to go with. Minnette doesn't like to be troubled with——"
"Oh, I see it all! Minnette's been showing her angelic temper, and won't let you go with her, eh?"
"Ye-e-es," sobbed Celeste, trying bravely not to cry.
"Well, never mind, birdie! I have to pass the Sisters' school every day on my way to the academy, and I'll take care of you, if you'll go with me. Will you?" he said, looking doubtfully into her little, shrinking face.
"I—I think so," said Celeste, rather hesitatingly. "I will be a trouble, though, I'm afraid."
"Not you!" exclaimed Archie, gayly. "I'll be your true knight and champion now, and by and by you'll be my little wife. Won't you?"
"No-o-o, I don't like to," said Celeste, timidly.
Archie seemed to think this answer so remarkably funny that he gave way to a perfect shout of laughter. Then, perceiving the sensitive little creature on the verge of crying again, he stopped short by an effort, and said, apologetically:
"There! don't cry, sis: I wasn't laughing at you. I say, Miss Hagar," he added, springing abruptly to his feet as that ancient lady entered, "mayn't I bring Celeste to school? I'll 'tend to her as carefully as if she was my daughter. See if I don't."
A grim sort of smile relaxed the rigid muscles of Miss Hagar's iron face as she glanced benignly at his merry, thoughtless face over the top of her spectacles.
"Yes, she may go with you, and the Lord will bless you for your good, kind heart," she said, laying her hand fondly on his curly head.
Archie, throwing up his cap in the exuberance of his glee, said:
"Run and get ready, sis, and come along."
"No; wait until to-morrow," said Miss Hagar. "She cannot go to-day."
"All right; to-morrow, then, you've to make your debut in the school of St. Mark's. I say, Miss Hagar, what shall we call her? not your name—Dedley's too dismal."
"No; call her Pearl—she is a pearl," said Miss Hagar, while her voice became as gentle as such a voice could.
"Very well, Celeste. Pearl then be it. And so, Celeste, be ready bright and early to-morrow morning, and we'll go by Sunset Hall, and call for Gipsy and Louis. By the way, you haven't seen Louis yet, have you?"
"No," said Celeste.
"Oh, then, you must see him, decidedly, to-morrow. But mind, you mustn't go and like him better than you do me, because he's better-looking. I tell you what, little sis, he's a capital fellow, and so clever; he's ahead of every fellow in the academy, and beats me all to smash, because I'm not clever at anything except riding and shooting, and I'm his equal in those branches. So now I'm off—good-bye!"
And with a spring and a jump, Archie was out of the room and dashing along the road at a tremendous rate.
The next morning Celeste, with a beating heart, set out with Archie for school. How pretty she looked in her white muslin dress, her white sunbonnet covering her golden curls—a perfect little pearl!
Archie, having paid her a shower of compliments, took her by the hand and set out with her for Sunset Hall. At the gate Celeste halted, and no persuasions could induce her to enter.
"No, no; I'll wait here until you come back. Please let me," she said, pleadingly.
"Oh, well, then, I won't be long," said Archie, rushing frantically up the lawn and bursting like a whirlwind into the hall door.
In a few moments he reappeared, accompanied by Louis.
"Look, old fellow! there she is at the gate. Isn't she a beauty?" said Archie.
Louis stopped and gazed, transfixed by the radiant vision before him. In her floating, snowy robes, golden hair, her sweet, angel-like face, on which the morning sunshine rested like a glory, she was indeed lovely, bewildering, dazzling.
"How beautiful! how radiant! how splendid! Archie, she is as pretty as an angel!" burst forth Louis, impetuously.
"Ha, ha ha! a decided case of love at first sight. Come along and I'll introduce you," exclaimed Archie.
Having presented the admiring Louis to Celeste, who, after the first shy glance, never raised her eyes, he informed her that Gipsy had gone out riding early in the morning, and they were forced to go without her.
"Celeste, you must sit to me for your portrait," said Louis, impulsively, as they walked along.
"I don't know," said Celeste, shrinking closer to Archie, whom she had learned to trust in like an old friend.
"I'm sketching the 'Madonna in the Temple' for Sister Mary, and your sweet, holy, calm face will do exactly for a model," said Louis.
"That's a compliment, sis," said Archie, pinching her cheek; "you'd better sit. Hallo! if that isn't Gipsy's bugle! And here she comes, as usual, flying like the wind. If she doesn't break her neck some day, it will be a wonder."
As he spoke, the clear, sweet notes of a bugle resounded musically among the hills above them; and the next moment the spirited little Arabian, Mignonne, came dashing at a break-neck pace down the rocks, with Gipsy on his back, a fowling-piece slung over her shoulder, and sitting her horse as easily as though she were in an easy-chair. With a wild "tally-ho!" she cleared a yawning chasm at a bound, and reined her horse in so suddenly that he nearly fell back on his haunches. The next instant she was beside them, laughing at Celeste, who clung, pale with fear, to Archie.
"What luck this morning, Diana?" exclaimed Archie.
"Pretty well for two hours. Look!" said Gipsy, displaying a well-filled game-bag.
"Did you kill those birds?" inquired Celeste, lifting her eyes in fear, not unmixed with horror, to the sparkling face of the young huntress.
"To be sure! There! don't look so horror-struck. I declare if the little coward doesn't look as if she thought me a demon," said Gipsy, laughing at Celeste's sorrowful face. "Look! do you see that bird away up there, like a speck in the sky? Well, now watch me bring it down;" and Gipsy, fixing her eagle eye on the distant speck, took deliberate aim.
"Oh, don't—don't!" cried Celeste, in an agony of terror; but ere the words were well uttered, they were lost in the sharp crack of her little rifle.
Wounded and bleeding, the bird began rapidly to fall, and, with a wild shriek, Celeste threw up her arms, and fell to the ground.
"Good gracious! if I haven't scared the life out of Celeste!" exclaimed Gipsy, in dismay, as Archie raised her, pale and trembling, in his arms.
"What a timid little creature!" thought Louis, as he watched her, clinging convulsively to Archie.
"Oh, the bird! the poor bird!" said Celeste, bursting into tears.
Gipsy laughed outright, and pointing to a tree near at hand, said:
"There, Louis, the bird has lodged in that tree; go and get it for her."
Louis darted off to search the tree, and Gipsy, stooping down, said, rather impatiently:
"Now, Celeste, don't be such a little goose! What harm is it to shoot a bird?—everybody does it."
"I don't think it's right; it's so cruel. Please don't do it any more," said Celeste, pleadingly.
"Can't promise, dear? I must do something to keep me out of mischief. But here comes Louis. Well, is it dead?"
"No," said Louis, "but badly wounded. However, I'll take care of it; and if it recovers, Celeste, you shall have it for a pet."
"Oh, thank you! you're so good," said Celeste, giving him such a radiant look of gratitude that it quite overcame the gravity of Master Rivers, who fell back, roaring with laughter.
Celeste and Gipsy stood a little apart, conversing, and the boys sat watching them.
"I say, Louis, what do you think of her?" said Archie, pointing to Celeste.
"I think she is perfectly bewitching—the loveliest creature I ever beheld," replied Louis, regarding her with the eye of an artist. "She reminds me of a lily—a dove, so fair, and white, and gentle."
"And Gipsy, what does she remind you of?"
"Oh! of a young Amazon, or a queen eaglet of the mountains, so wild and untamed."
"And Minnette, what is she like?"
"Like a tigress, more than anything else I can think of just now," said Louis, laughing; "beautiful, but rather dangerous when aroused."
"Aroused! I don't think she could be aroused, she is made of marble."
"Not she. As Miss Hagar says, the day will come when she will, she must feel; every one does sometime in his life. What does Scott say:
"'Hearts are not flint, and flints are rent;
Hearts are not steel, and steel is bent.'"
"Well, if you take to poetry, you'll keep us here all day," said Archie, rising. "Good-bye, Gipsy; come along Celeste!"
True to promise, Louis adopted the wounded bird; and under his skillful hands it soon recovered and was presented to Celeste. She would have set it free, but Louis said: "No; keep it for my sake, Celeste." And so Celeste kept it; and no words can tell how she grew to love that bird. It hung in a cage in her chamber, and her greatest pleasure was in attending it. Minnette hated the very sight of it. That it belonged to Celeste would have been enough to make her hate it; but added to that, it had been given her by Louis Oranmore, the only living being Minnette had ever tried to please; and jealousy added tenfold to her hatred.
Seeing the bird hanging, one day, out in the sunshine, she opened the cage-door, and, with the most fiendish and deliberate malice, twisted its neck, and then, going to Celeste, pointed to it with malignant triumph sparkling in her bold, black eyes.
Poor Celeste! She took the dead and mangled body of her pretty favorite in her lap, and sitting down, wept the bitterest tears she had ever shed in her life. Let no one smile at her childish grief; who has been without them? I remember distinctly the saddest tears that ever I shed were over the remains of a beloved kitten, stoned to death. And through all the troubles of after years, that first deep grief never was forgotten.
While she was still sobbing as if her heart would break, a pair of strong arms were thrown around her, and the eager, handsome face of Louis was bending over her.
"Why, Celeste, what in the world are all those tears for?" he inquired, pushing the disheveled golden hair off her wet cheek.
"Oh, Louis, my bird! my poor bird!" she cried, hiding her face on his shoulder, in a fresh burst of grief.
"What! it's dead, is it?" said Louis, taking it up. "Did the cat get at it?"
"No, no; it wasn't the cat; it was—it was——"
"Who?" said Louis, while his dark eyes flashed. "Did any one dare to kill it? Did Minnette, that young tigress——"
"Oh, Louis! don't, don't! You mustn't call her such dreadful names!" said Celeste, placing her hand over his mouth. "I don't think she meant it; don't be angry with her, please; it's so dreadful!"
"You little angel!" he said, smoothing gently her fair hair; "no, for your sake I'll not. Never mind, don't cry; I'll get you another, twice as pretty as that!"
"No, Louis; I don't want any more! I'd rather have the dear birds free! And now, will you—will you bury poor birdie?" said Celeste, almost choking in her effort to be "good and not cry."
"Yes; here's a nice spot, under the rose-bush," said Louis; "and I'll get a tombstone and write a nice epitaph. And you must console yourself with the belief that it's happy in the bird's heaven, if there is such a place," added Louis, as he placed poor "Birdie" in its last resting-place.
Half an hour after, Celeste sought the presence of Minnette. She found her sitting by the window, her chin resting on her hand, as was her habit, gazing out. She did not turn round as Celeste entered; but the latter went up softly, and, placing her hand on hers, said gently:
"Minnette, I'm afraid you're angry with me? I'm very sorry; please forgive me?"
Minnette shook her roughly off, exclaiming:
"Don't bother me, you little whining thing! Go out of this!"
"Yes; but only say you forgive me, first! Indeed, indeed, Minnette, I didn't mean to offend you. I want to love you, if you'll let me!"
"Love!" exclaimed Minnette, springing fiercely to her feet, her black eyes gleaming like fire. "You artful little hypocrite! You consummate little cheat? Don't talk to me of love! Didn't I see you in the garden, with your arms around Louis Oranmore, in a way for which you ought to be ashamed of yourself—complaining to him of my wickedness and cruelty in killing the bird he gave you. And yet, after turning him against me, you come here, and tell me you love me! Begone, you miserable little beggar! I hate the very sight of you!"
Her face was convulsed with passion. With a cry of terror, Celeste fled from the room to weep alone in her own chamber, while Minnette sat by the window, watching the stars come out in their splendor, one by one, with the germs of that jealousy taking deep root in her soul, that would grow and bear fruit for evermore!