Evenings at Donaldson Manor; Or, The Christmas Guest

by Maria J. McIntosh

Mrs. Blakely left him, and he stationed himself at the door to watch for Lucy. Minutes, which seemed to him hours, passed, and she came not. At length, as he was about to ring again, steps were heard approaching; he turned quickly, but it was not Lucy. The girl who entered handed him a sealed note. He tore it open and read—"I dare not see you. When you receive this I shall have left the house, and, as no one knows whither I have gone, questions would be useless."

In an instant he was in the street, looking with eager eyes hither and thither for some trace of the lost one. He looked in vain, yet he went towards his office with happier feelings than he had long known. He knew now where Lucy was, and a thousand expedients suggested themselves, by which he could not fail to see her. If he could only converse with her for a few minutes, he was assured he could prevail on her to leave her present position, of which he could not for a moment bear to think. His heart swelled, his brow flushed, whenever the remembrance of that position flashed upon his mind, yet he never for an instant regarded it as changing his relations with Lucy, or lessening his desire to call her his. He recollected with pleasure two circumstances which had scarcely been remarked at the moment of their occurrence. The man who had opened the door to him, when he saw him spring forward to meet Lucy, had exclaimed, "Oh! it was Miss Lucy you meant, sir;" and the girl who had handed the note had said, "Miss Lucy has gone out, sir." It was evident she was not regarded by the servants as one of themselves—she had not been degraded by association with menials. This was true. Lucy had made such separation on her part an indispensable necessity, and Mrs. Blakely had been too sensible of the value of one possessing so much taste and skill in all feminine adornments, to hesitate about complying with her demand. This lady was one of the nouveaux riches, who occupied her life in scheming to attain a position to which neither birth nor education entitled her. The brightest dream connected with her present abode had been that its proximity to Lady Houstoun's residence might lead to an acquaintance with one of the proudest of that charmed circle in which Mrs. Blakely longed to tread. Hitherto this had proved a dream indeed, but Edward Houstoun's incursion into her domain, and the developments made by it, might, she thought, with a little address, render it a reality. It was with this purpose that she sent a note to Lady Houstoun, requesting an interview with her on a subject deeply connected with the honor of her family and the happiness of her son. Immediately on despatching this note, the servants were ordered to uncover the furniture in the drawing-room, while she herself hastened to assume her most becoming morning dress. Her labors were fruitless. "Lady Houstoun would be at home to Mrs. Blakely till noon," was the scarcely courteous reply to her carefully worded note. It was an occasion on which she could not afford to support her pride, and she availed herself of the permission to call.

The interview between Lady Houstoun and Mrs. Blakely would have been an interesting study to the nice observer of character. The efforts on the part of the one lady to be condescending, and on that of the other to be dignified, were almost equally successful. Mrs. Blakely had seldom felt her wealth of so little consequence as in the presence of her commanding yet simply attired hostess, and Lady Houstoun had never been more disposed to assert the privileges of her rank, than when she heard that her son had forgotten his own so far as to visit on terms of equality—nay, if Mrs. Blakely were to be believed, positively to address in the style of a lover—a seamstress—the seamstress of Mrs. Blakely.

"This is very painful intelligence to me, Mrs. Blakely—of course you must be aware that Mr. Houstoun could only have contemplated a temporary acquaintance with this girl. I do not fear that in his most reckless moment he could have thought of such a mésalliance—but this young woman must be saved—she was a protégé of Sir Edward Houstoun, and for his sake must not be allowed to come to harm—may I trouble you to send her to me?"

The request was given very much in the style of a command. Mrs. Blakely would not confess that she had great doubts of her power to comply with it, but this would have been sufficiently evident to any one who had marked the uncertain air and softened tone with which Lady Houstoun's wishes were made known to Lucy. Indignant as she was at Mrs. Blakely's impertinent interference, Lucy scarcely regretted Lady Houstoun's acquaintance with her son's feelings. We do not know that far below all those acknowledged impulses leading her to comply with the lady's request, there did not lie some romantic hope that influences were astir through which

"Pride might be quell'd and love be free,"

but this she did not whisper even to her own heart.

"Better that the lady should know all—she will act both wisely and tenderly—perhaps for her son's sake, she will aid me to leave New-York." Such was the only language into which she allowed even her thought silently to form itself.

Arranging her simple dress with as much care as though she were about to meet her lover himself, Lucy set out for her interview with Lady Houstoun. She had but a short distance to traverse, but she lingered on her way, oppressed by a tremulous anxiety. She was apprehensive of she knew not what or wherefore—for again and again her heart acquitted her of all blame. At length she is at the door—it opens, and, with a courtesy which the servants of Mrs. Blakely never show to a visitor who comes without carriage or attendants, she is ushered into the presence of Lady Houstoun. The lady fixes her eyes upon her as she enters, bows her head slightly in acknowledgment of her courtesy, and says coldly, "You are the young woman, I suppose, whom Mrs. Blakely was to send to me?"

Lucy paused for a moment, to still the throbbing of her heart, before she attempted to reply. The thought flashed through her mind, "I am a woman, and young, and therefore she should pity me"—but she answered in a low, sweet, tremulous tone, "I am the Lucy Watson, madam, to whom Sir Edward Houstoun was so kind."