Vassall Morton: A Novel

by Francis Parkman

solemnly averred that none but Providence was responsible for it.

There was abundant noise and vociferation. The passengers left the train, some lending their bungling aid to repair the mischief, while others withdrew to an inn which chanced to be in the neighborhood. After looking for a time at the downfallen tender and the uprooted rails, Morton, from some idle impulse, entered the car which he had lately left. It was empty; and, passing through it, he looked into that immediately behind, which had remained safely upon the rails. This also was empty, with the exception of a single person, a young female figure, seated at one of the windows. She was closely veiled, yet there was in her air that indefinable something which told Morton at a glance that she was a lady. He stepped to the ground, conjecturing whether or no she had a companion.

Five minutes after, glancing at the window, he saw the solitary traveller seated in the same position as before, and became convinced that she was unattended. The women in the train had left it at the outset. The busy and clamorous throng of men alone remained; and Morton easily conceived that her situation must be an embarrassing one. He therefore reëntered the car and approached her.

"I am afraid we shall be detained here for two or three hours, and perhaps till late at night. There is a public house a little way off, to which the ladies in the train have gone. If you will allow me, I will show you the way."

So he spoke; or, rather, so he would have spoken; but he had scarcely begun when the veiled head was joyfully raised, and the veil was thrown aside, disclosing to his astonished eyes the features of Edith Leslie. She explained that she was on her way from her father's country seat at Matherton; and that he was to meet her at the station on the arrival of the train. When the accident took place, she had been led to suppose, from the conversation of two men near her, that the train would not be very long detained, and had preferred remaining in the car to mingling with the tumultuous throng outside.

"It is too fine an afternoon," said Morton, as they left the spot, "to be mured in that tavern. This lane has an inviting look. Have you a mind to explore it?"

They walked accordingly in the direction he proposed; and, as they did so, Morton cast many a stolen glance at the face of his companion. The mind of the young philosopher was that day in a peculiarly susceptible state. It seemed as if Fanny Euston had kindled within him a flame which could not fix itself upon her, yet must needs find fuel somewhere; and as his eye met that of Edith Leslie, he began to feel that she held a deeper place in his thoughts than he had ever before suspected.

By the side of the lane stood an ancient abode, whose rotten shingles supported a rich crop of green mosses; and in the yard an old man, who looked like a relic of Bunker Hill fight, was diligently chopping firewood.

"What does this lane lead to?" asked Morton, looking over the fence.

The woodchopper leaned on his axe, wiped his brows with the tatters of a red handkerchief, and seemed revolving the expediency of communicating the desired information.