Marian Fletcher was certainly beautiful enough to excuse the jealousy of any man who loved her,—which, by the way, most men who knew her did! She was sufficiently a woman also to realize her own beauty—indeed, did ever daughter of Eve possess a charm of which she lacked knowledge? Even the most absolute ingénue is conscious that she is an ingénue, and Marian Fletcher was by no means that. And her wit and humor were not the least of her charms. She was gayety personified, light-hearted, healthy and red-cheeked, and joyous—quite a new woman for 1815, in fact; and that, too, in an artificial age in which languor and pallor, megrims and vapors were the fashion, "Nice customs curt'sy to"—beautiful women, and Marian had a fashion of her own. One word described the sum of her qualities,—fascination!
Even her best friends were forced to admit that she was a bit of a coquette, however. Indeed, if the truth were told, from the crown of her black hair, which brought to mind the usual simile of the raven's wing, down to her beautiful little feet, she was all of a coquette. She loved liberty, she loved love, she loved lovers. In addition to all of these things it might be said that, in her secret heart, she loved Robert Gardner. Whether she loved him more than she did the other three was a question which she had not settled to her own satisfaction, and about which Gardner himself was fearfully undecided.
She had said—but then she made many perjuries before the laughing Jove. She had permitted him to enjoy the fleeting and most unsatisfying pleasure of pressing his lips upon her brow. He believed that this was a step farther—he would have resented furiously any suggestion to the contrary—than any other suitor had gone. It was. She had allowed him to persuade her into a sort of an engagement, but the tie resulting was about as indefinite as could be imagined. With him—he was a sailor and his similes were nautical—it was a hempen cable which held him to her like a ship to a bower anchor. With her it was a daisy chain, ready to part at the first strain, and the strain was near at hand.
To celebrate the closing of the war of 1812, Colonel Fletcher, an old Revolutionary veteran and the father of the fair Marian, had assembled a house-party at his fine old place on the Hudson. He was a widower with a son and a daughter. The son had been an officer in Scott's army—a major—who had greatly distinguished himself in the Niagara campaign. Among others who had gladly accepted the veteran colonel's hospitality were two friends of young Major Fletcher, who had been college-mates with him at Harvard. One was Robert Gardner, a young lieutenant in the navy, and the other was John Mason, a young Virginian, who was a captain in the army. The young men had been guests of Colonel Fletcher before the war, and they had known Marian, whom they both loved, for several years. Their wooing, interrupted by the demands of the service, was at once renewed under the favorable circumstances of their meeting. Gardner was a gay, athletic, dashing young sailor,—blue-eyed, curly-haired, sunny in disposition; Mason, on the contrary, was tall and very slender, dignified and quiet, with a temper as dark as his complexion. One was impulsive, bold, impetuous; the other cool and determined, with an undercurrent of sleeping passion in his being; both were in the highest sense gentlemen.
The relations between the two men, at first friendly, had become markedly strained as their courtship proceeded, though no open rupture had yet occurred. Mason could not but be aware of Marian's preference for Gardner; yet, as she had not allowed the latter to announce their engagement, with dogged persistency the Virginian continued to proffer his attentions. Truth to say, these latter were not so unwelcome to the fair Marian as might be imagined. She had entered into a quasi-engagement with Gardner, yet she was by no means averse to the devotion of her melancholy yet handsome suitor, and her conduct between the two was not altogether above reproach. It was a joyous and delightful game,—also a dangerous!
On the evening in question it seemed that she had gone quite too far, and that even the hempen cable would not stand the strain which tautened it. During the day a pretty little lover's quarrel, which she had wilfully brought about to test her power, had culminated in an open rupture. Laughing at Gardner's pleas, she had devoted herself to Mason,—or had allowed Mason to devote himself to her, rather,—raising that young man to the seventh heaven of delight. She had ridden with him in the afternoon, gone to supper with him at night, and danced with him most of the evening at the party which had been arranged.
Manœuvring her out on the porch toward the close of the evening, Gardner unwisely endeavored to take her to task. Goaded beyond his power of restraint by her flirtation, he assumed an authority over her for which he had no warrant. Where he should have pleaded and entreated, he threatened and commanded. Miss Marian snapped her fingers at him metaphorically—she was too well bred to do such a thing physically. Rendered desperate by her obduracy, his anger passed all bounds and his words followed suit. The mock quarrel on her part became a real one. She repudiated him entirely, broke her engagement flatly, declared frankly that she did not love him,—and in the act of declaration she was convinced that she did,—and with her head high in the air, a brilliant flush on her cheek, and a sparkle of defiance in her eye, left him. He leaped from the porch and disappeared under the trees; she ran right into the arms of John Mason coming out of the house to seek her.
He saw her agitation, of course, and in her anger she let slip words which gave him a perfect clew to the cause of it. Before she realized what she did, she said that which she would have given worlds to recall—afterwards; then she was too much excited and indignant to care. Gardner had insulted her. She hated him.
"I hate him, too," said Mason, bending his head, his black eyes aflame in the shadow of the porch, "and the depth of my hatred is proportioned by my love for you, Marian. Give me leave, dearest, to make your cause mine."
His voice with its soft Southern tones was very persuasive and thrilling in the moonlight; there was such passion and yet such respect and adoration in its accents. He bent before her so deferentially and so pleadingly. There was such a contrast in his gentleness to the hectoring she had just undergone, that she yielded in spite of herself. With bent head she murmured words—she hardly knew what. Faintly resisting him, he swept her to his breast and pressed a kiss, not upon her forehead, but upon her lips.