Miss Ravenel's conversion from secession to loyalty

by John William De Forest

"What a pity!" she said several times to herself. "I have made them very miserable. I have done mischief when I meant none. Why didn't the stupid creature burn the letter! I burned all his. What a pity! Well, at any rate it will go no farther."

She had her trunks packed and drove immediately after breakfast to Carrollton, where she remained secluded in the hotel until she found a private boarding house in the unfrequented outskirts of the village. If the Ravenels moved away, her man servant was to inform her, so that she might return to her house. She realized perfectly the inhumanity of encountering Lillie, and was resolved that no such meeting should take place, no matter what might be the expense of keeping up two establishments. In her pity and regret she was almost willing to sell her house at a loss, or shut it up without rent, and pinch herself in some northern city, supposing that the Ravenels concluded to stay in New Orleans. "I owe them that much," she thought, with a consciousness of being generous, and not bad-hearted. Then she sighed, and said aloud, "Poor Lillie! I am so sorry for her! But she has a baby, and for his sake she will forgive her husband."

And then a feeling came over her that she would like to see the baby, and that it would have been a pleasure to at least kiss it good-bye.

The family with which she lived consisted of a man of sixty and his wife, with two unmarried daughters of twenty-eight and thirty, the parents New Englanders, the children born in Louisiana, but all alike orthodox, devout, silent, after the old fashion of New England. The father was a cotton broker, nearly bankrupted by the Rebellion, and was glad for pecuniary reasons to receive a respectable boarder. Such a household Mrs. Larue had chosen as an asylum, believing that she would be benefited just now by an odor of sanctity, if it were only derived from propinquity. Something might get out; Lillie might go delirious and make disclosures; and it was well to build up a character for staidness. The idea of entering a convent she rejected the moment that it occurred to her. "This is monastic enough," she thought with a repressed smile as she looked at the serious faces of her Presbyterian hosts male and female.

The Allens became as much infatuated with her as did the Chaplain on board the Creole, or the venerable D. D. in New York city. Her modest and retiring manner, her amiability, cheerfulness, and sprightly conversation, made her the most charming person in their eyes that they had ever met. The daughters regained something of their blighted youthfulness under the sunny influences of her presence, aided by the wisdom of her counsel, and the cunning of her fingers in matters of the toilet. Mrs. Allen kissed her with motherly affection every time that she bade the family good-night. The old trick of showing a mind ripe for conversion from Popery was played with the usual success. After she had left the house, and when she was once more receiving and flirting in New Orleans, Mr. Allen used to excite her laughter by presenting her with tracts against Romanism, or lending her volumes of sermons by eminent Protestant divines. Not that she ever laughed at him to his face: she would as soon have thought of striking him with her fist; she was too good-natured and well-bred to commit either impertinence.

For the sake of appearances she remained in the country a week or more after the Ravenels had left the city. Restored to her own house, she found herself somewhat lonely for lack of her relatives, and somewhat gloomy, or at least annoyed, when she thought of the cause of the separation. But there was no need of continuing solitude; any quantity of army society could be had by such New Orleans ladies as wished it; and Mrs. Larue finally resolved to break with treason, and flirt with loyalty in gilt buttons. In a short time her parlor was frequented by gentlemen who wore silver leaves and eagles and stars on their shoulders, and the loss of Colonel Carter was more than made up to her by the devotion of persons who were mightier in counsel and in war than he. The very latest news from her is of a highly satisfactory character. It is reported that she was fortunate enough to gain the special favor of an official personage very high in authority in some unmentionable department of the South, who, as a mark of his gratitude, gave her a permit to trade for several thousand bales of cotton. This curious billet-doux she sold to a New York speculator for fifteen thousand dollars, thereby re-establishing her somewhat dilapidated fortunes.

Just as a person whose dwelling falls about his head is sometimes preserved from death by some fragment of the wreck which prostrates him, but preserves him from the mass, so Lillie was shielded from the full pressure of her misery by a short fever, bringing with it a few days of delirium, and a long prostration, during which she had not strength to feel acutely. When we must bend or break, Nature often takes us in her own pitying hands, and lays us gently upon beds of insensibility or semi-consciousness. Thanks be to Heaven for the merciful opiate of sickness!

During the fever two letters arrived from Carter, but Ravenel put them away without showing them to the invalid. For some time she did not inquire about her husband; when she thought of him too keenly she asked with a start for her baby. Nature continually led her to that tender, helpless, speechless, potent consoler. The moment it was safe for her to travel, Ravenel put her on board a vessel bound to New York, choosing a sailing craft, not only for economy's sake, but to secure the benefit of a lengthy voyage, and to keep longer away from all news of earth and men. She made no objection to going; her father wished it to be so; it was right enough. The voyage lasted three weeks, during which she slowly regained strength, and as a consequence something of her old cheerfulness and hopefulness. The Doctor had a strong faith that she would not be broken down by her calamity. Not only was her temper gay and remarkable for its elasticity, but her physical constitution seemed to partake of the same characteristics, and she had always recovered from sickness with rapidity. Not a bit disposed to brooding, taking a lively interest in whatever went on around her, she would not fall an easy prey to confirmed melancholy. The Doctor never alluded to her husband, and when Lillie at last mentioned his name, it was merely to say, "I hope he will not be killed."

"I hope not," replied Ravenel gently, and stopped there. He could not, however, repress a brief glance of surprise and investigation. Could it be that she would come to forgive that man? Had he been too hasty in dragging her away from New Orleans, and giving up the moderate salary which was so necessary to them both? But no: it would kill her to meet Mrs. Larue: they must never go back to that Sodom of a city.

The question of income was a serious one. He was nearly at the end of his own resources, and he had not suffered Lillie to draw any of her perfidious husband's money. But he did not dwell much on these pecuniary questions now, being chiefly occupied with the moral future of his child, wondering much whether she would indeed forgive her husband, and whether she would ever again be happy. Of course it was not until they reached New York that they learned the events which I must now relate.