East Angels: A Novel

by Constance Fenimore Woolson

And after a few more words with the old couple, who stood bowing and courtesying at their low door, the Doctor rode Osceola on a walk down the winding path which led from Madam Giron's to the water road. This water road ran southward from East Angels, following the edge of the lagoon; it was comparatively broad and open, and, though longer, the Doctor now preferred it to that dark track through the wood, since it had become evident that there was no one in the wood at present with whom it was necessary that he should hold some slight conversation.

Reaching East Angels in safety, he entered the drawing-room half an hour later, very tired, but freshly dressed, and repressing admirably all signs of his fatigue. He found Mrs. Carew engaged in telling Garda's fortune in solemn state with four packs of cards, as an appropriate rite for Christmas-eve; the cards were spread upon a large table before her, and Garda and Winthrop were looking on. Upon inquiring for Margaret (the Doctor always inquired for the absent), he was told that she was suffering from headache, and would not be able to join them.

Garda was merry; she was merry over the fact that a certain cousin of Madam Ruiz, whom they had never any of them seen, kept turning up (the card that represented him) through deal after deal as her close companion in the "fortune," while the three other named cards—Winthrop, Manuel, and Torres—remained as determinedly remote from her as the table would allow.

"I don't see what ever induced me to put him in at all," said Betty, in great vexation, rubbing her chin spitefully with the card she was holding in her hand. "I suppose it's because Madam Ruiz has kept talking about him—Julio de Sandoval, Julio de Sandoval—and something in his name always reminded me of sandal-wood, you know, which is so nice, though some people do faint away if you have fans made of it, which is dreadful at concerts, of course, because then they have to be carried out, and that naturally makes everybody think, of course, that the house is on fire. Well, the real trouble was, Garda, that I had to have four knights for you, of coarse, because that's the rule, and there are only three unmarried men in Gracias—Mr. Winthrop, Manuel (he's away), and Adolfo (he's away too)—which I must say is a very poor assortment for anybody to choose from!"

This entirely unintended disparagement made Winthrop smile. In spite of his smile, however, the Doctor thought he looked preoccupied. The Doctor had put on his glasses to inspect Betty's spread-out cards, and, having them on, he took the opportunity to glance across, two or three times, at their host, who had now left the table, and was seated with a newspaper near a lamp on the opposite side of the room. Their host, for such in fact he was, though everything at East Angels went on in Mrs. Rutherford's name, seemed to the furtively watching Kirby to be at present something more than preoccupied; his face behind the paper (he probably thought he was not observed) had taken on a very stern expression. Having established this point beyond a doubt, the Doctor felt his cares growing heavier; he crossed the room to a distant window, and stood there looking out by himself for some time.

It troubled him to see Winthrop with that expression, and the reason it troubled him was because he could not tell what sternness with him might mean. It might mean—and then again it might not mean—he confessed to himself that he had not the least idea what interpretation to give it, he had never really understood this northerner at all. Garda was engaged to him, of course, there was no doubt of that; he wished with all his heart that the engagement had never been formed. But he recognized that wishes were useless, the thing was done; to the Doctor, an engagement was almost as binding as a marriage. He stared out into the darkness in a depressed sort of way, and his back, which was all of him that could be seen by the others, had a mournful look; the Doctor's back was always expressive, but generally it expressed a gallant cheerfulness that met the world bravely. Winthrop's purchase, at a high price, not only of East Angels with its empty old fields, but also of all the outlying tracts of swamp and forest land owned by the Dueros, to the very last acre, had made Garda's position independent as regarded money; but in his present mood the Doctor cursed the independence as well as the wealth that had produced it. Independence? what does a young girl want with independence? Garda had needed nothing; they were able to take care of her themselves, and they wanted no such gross modern fortunes invading and deteriorating Gracias-á-Dios! But it was too late now; their little girl was not their own any more, she was engaged.

As to her imprudence of to-day—that was owing to her taste for amusement, or rather for being amused; they had not, perhaps, paid sufficient attention to this trait of hers. But, in any case, it was, on her side, nothing but thoughtlessness. The person who had been to blame was Lucian Spenser! He (the Doctor) had been too late in his pursuit of Lucian. But perhaps Winthrop would not be too late. For of course Winthrop would wish—— But there, again—would he wish?—the Doctor felt, with bewildered discomfiture, that he had not sufficient knowledge of this man's opinions to enable him to form any definite conclusions on this subject, plain and simple as the matter appeared to his own view.

And then, in order to wish anything, Winthrop must first know; and who was to tell him? And when he had been told, would he take their view, his (the Doctor's) view—the only true one—of Garda's taste for being amused? The Doctor felt that he should like to see him take any other! Still, he did not own Evert Winthrop, and he could not help asking himself whether any of that sternness now visible on the face behind the newspaper would be apt to fall upon Garda, in case the possessor of the face should have a different opinion from theirs as to her little fancies. He clinched his fist at the mere thought.

Garda's voice broke in upon his reverie, she summoned him to the table to see the conclusion of her "fortune." And as he obeyed her summons, his cares suddenly grew lighter: a girl with such a frank voice as that could not possibly have a secret to guard. In the midst of this reasoning, the Doctor would have knocked down anybody (beginning with himself) who had dared to suggest that she had.

That night, before going to bed, the Doctor burned upon the hearth of his own room Garda's sealed note just as it was; and he took the precaution, furthermore, to wrap it in an old newspaper, in order that he should not by chance see any of its written words in the momentary magnifying power of the flames. A limp flannel dressing-gown of orange hue, and an orange silk handkerchief in the shape of a tight turban, formed his costume during this rite. But no knight of old (poet's delineation) was ever influenced by a more delicate sense of honor than was this flannel-draped little cavalier of Gracias, as he walked up and down his room, keeping his eyes turned away from the hearth until the dying light told him that nothing was left but ashes.