CHAPTER IX.
“A MAN’S HEART IS NOT SIMPLY A TOY!”
Before Viola went to the Capitol that morning she had gone through something of a scene with her father.
After breakfast he had asked her to come with him to the library for a few moments.
Fondly slipping her little hand through his arm, she had danced along by his side, exclaiming curiously:
“Papa, dear, what makes you look so grumpy this morning?”
“You will soon know,” he replied, sternly, handing her a chair.
Judge Van Lew was a fine looking man about fifty years old, whose life had been prematurely saddened by the loss of two beautiful sons in their early childhood, and afterward of his wife, when Viola was eleven years old.
Mrs. Herman, his widowed sister, had very willingly agreed to preside over his household when, several years before, he had accepted a high position in Washington and removed there from his native state, West Virginia, where he had occupied a seat on the judicial bench.
Viola had been educated at a high-class boarding-school in Baltimore, and only a year ago had graduated and made her entrée into Washington society. Her grace and beauty and sprightliness had at once made her a much-admired belle.
Judge Van Lew was a quiet, undemonstrative man, absorbed in politics since his wife’s death, and caring little for social diversions; but he was both fond and proud of Viola, and helped his sister Edwina to spoil her to the top of her bent. His daughter knew only the sunny side of his character, but the reverse of it was stern and hard, a fact she was yet to learn to her sorrow.
Leaving Viola to the social chaperonage of Mrs. Herman, Judge Van Lew seldom accompanied her himself to the brilliant functions that she graced with her dazzling beauty, so it was a long time before a shocking event opened his horrified eyes to the fact that his beautiful young daughter was at once the most admired belle and the most reckless flirt in the gay circles where she moved—and this before she had attained her nineteenth birthday. And it came upon him with a shock of surprise.
Viola could not remember that her father had ever given her a cold look or a harsh word, and she started now at the sternness of his tone, exclaiming:
“Papa, I hope you have no bad news for me! You haven’t lost all your money by the failure of some dreadful bank, have you, dear?”
How troubled she looked at the prospect, poor, pretty Viola! and her likeness to her dead mother so touched his heart, that he hastened to reassure her, saying:
“You deserve some ill-fortune; but I have not lost my money. I am not going to tell you that you can have no more new gowns or jewels, or servants to wait on you, or that you will have to move out of this luxurious home into cheap lodgings.”
“Then what is it, dear papa? I am just wild with curiosity,” she replied, uneasily.
“I am going to lecture you, Viola,” he returned, with a sternness that struck terror to her heart.
“Dear me, what have I done, papa?” she exclaimed, in such innocent wonder that he found it hard to go on, she had such an appealing air of injured innocence.
Gathering his courage for the final attack, and steeling his heart against her appealing eyes, he returned, sadly and gravely:
“Viola, I had a great shock last night, and I could scarcely sleep afterward, I was so terribly unnerved. Can you guess what I mean?”
“No, papa,” she replied truthfully.
“Then I will tell you, Viola, that I learned last night a dreadful truth about my dear little daughter whom I believed to be so good and pretty and tender-hearted. I learned that she is a heartless girl guilty of sin in the sight of God, although there is no earthly law to punish her for her folly.”
“Papa!” she gasped in horror, going deathly white with indignation, two pearly tears flashing into her great luminous gray eyes, almost black now with excitement. “Papa, who has slandered me to you? Who dares accuse me of anything wrong?”
She almost fainted when he answered, sternly and rebukingly:
“You thoughtless child, it is only the mercy of God that has saved a lost soul from being your accuser this moment at the bar of Heaven!”
Viola’s wonder and amazement only increased at this terrible charge from her father’s lips. She felt herself sinking, almost fainting, as he caught her hand, looking anxiously into her face.
In a few minutes she recovered herself, and sighed fearfully:
“I do not understand, papa.”
“You have heard nothing?” he exclaimed.
“Nothing, papa,” wildly.
“Then prepare yourself for a great shock, Viola, for surely you can not be as heartless as the world believes you.”
“Oh, no, papa!” she cried, eagerly, wondering if he had found out her secret engagement to Florian, and was going to scold her for it.
It was something like that, she discovered the next moment, for he added:
“You were at Mrs. Dean’s reception last night, and a young government clerk, George Merrington, proposed to you.”
Viola’s eyes dilated with wonder, but she answered, eagerly:
“Yes, papa, but—I refused him.”
To her amazement, he asked, angrily:
“What right had you, Viola, to refuse him?”
“Why, papa, what a question! I had a right because I did not love him!” cried Viola, gaining courage again.
“You did not love him, you say, Viola; then why did you lead him to believe that you did? Why did you flirt with the poor young fellow till he felt sure of you, and ventured to lay his honest heart at your feet?” angrily.
“Papa, no man has a right to be sure of a woman’s heart until he has asked for it and been answered,” she replied, uneasily, seeing that he was in deadly earnest.
“You are wrong,” he answered, earnestly. “A true man and woman, when truly in love, may always be sure of each other. The woman may always show her preference without brushing the bloom from her modesty. All honor to her for doing so, and everlasting shame for pretending what she does not feel for the poor triumph of rejecting him at the last.”
Judge Van Lew’s scathing words sank into his daughter’s soul, and she hid her burning face in her hands, trying to stem the torrent of his reproaches by faltering:
“Really, papa, I meant no harm. I was simply kind to him. I could not tell him to go away because I saw he was learning to love me, could I? And, besides,” hopefully, “you—you would have been furious if I had accepted him, you know you would. He is only a government clerk, you know, and I—have refused a senator, a general, some millionaires—and others,” proudly.
He knew that what she said was true. He would not have accepted George Merrington for a son-in-law. He was proud, but withal he was just, and justice ranged him on the side of the discarded suitor.
He answered reproachfully:
“Subterfuge will not help you, Viola; for a good woman can always find a way to dismiss a man before the affair reaches the point of a proposal, unless the man is a fool and can not read her face; and George Merrington was no fool, though he acted like a madman afterward. You simply coquetted with him, led him on by encouraging smiles and words, just for the amusement of the moment. Is this not true?”
“Yes, papa; but I meant no harm. I did not regard it as a serious matter at all. Plenty of girls do the same,” said Viola, frankly, trying to smile him into a good humor.
But he remained portentously grave, as he returned:
“I believe you have erred through thoughtless vanity, my daughter, and that you do not realize the sacredness of love. That is the only excuse I can find for what you have done. But from today I wish you to turn over a new leaf, and give up this despicable flirting that has so nearly ended in a terrible tragedy that must have lain heavily on your conscience forever. You must promise me today that you will never again lead any man on, to gratify your love of conquest at the expense of his happiness.”
His words and looks were so solemn that she exclaimed, almost petulantly:
“Papa, you talk of a tragedy. Do you call a harmless flirtation with George Merrington a tragedy?”
“A harmless flirtation, Viola! Wait till you hear all,” he exclaimed.
“Well, papa, I am waiting to hear all that you will tell me. Did George Merrington come to you to complain of my flirting with him?” sarcastically.
To her amazement and indignation, he replied instantly:
“Yes; he came from the reception where you had refused the offer of his warm, loving heart, with a girlish laugh and jest, straight to the club where I was sitting with some gentlemen, and he told me the truth about you—that you were the most heartless coquette in the world, and had broken his heart just as you had broken many others. Then crying, ‘Bid her remember she wrecked my life!’ he whipped out a pistol, and before any one could prevent the rash deed, fired a bullet into his breast!”
“Ah, Heaven!” shrieked Viola, remorsefully, and sank back like one dying.
He bent over her in an agony of pitying love, soothing her back to calmness, saying, gently:
“I knew it would shock you terribly, Viola, but it had to be told. Indeed, I feared you had heard it already. It must be a lesson to you hereafter never to amuse yourself at flirting again. A man’s heart is not simply a toy.”
“Dead! dead! and through my folly! Oh, what a bitter thought!” sobbed the poor girl, remorsefully.
But her father answered:
“No; thank Heaven, the wound was not a mortal one. The bullet was meant for his heart, but it was deflected from its course by a silver card-case in his breast-pocket, and imbedded itself in a less vital point. He was removed to Garfield Hospital, and will very likely recover.”
“But every one will be talking about it and blaming me. I can never hold up my head again!” moaned Viola, and strangely enough, the keenest inward pang was the instant thought: “What will Professor Desha say about it?”
To her joy and relief, her father answered, kindly:
“I have taken care of that, Viola, for your sake. There were but three men with me when young Merrington burst in upon us, and I have persuaded them to keep the truth a secret. The poor fellow himself is glad now, that he did not die, and glad that I invented a clever story to account for his accident. We told his mother, who was frantic with grief, that he was showing us a pistol supposed not to be loaded—common occurrence, you know—and it went off and wounded him. He will get well, I think; and as for you, dear, you must, as I said just now, turn over a new leaf.”
Viola clung to his neck, sobbing remorsefully:
“Oh, I will—I will, papa, if you will forgive me for the past! I hate flirting now, and will never be so thoughtless any more!”