"Put them in the light closet, Miss Betsey. I hope we shall be able to eat it all!" she continued to the girls.
"Never fear!" said Emma. "Your Richmond party could consume it in a week. How many are there?"
"Let me see! Arthur, Carry and my pet—three—Mr. and Mrs. Dana, three children and Charley—nine. They will be here to-morrow night—Ellen Morris, Monday or Tuesday. I have invited Anna Talbot and Josephine—but do not expect them. Then for Tuesday evening—from the neighborhood—Dr. Hall and lady—and a friend, who shall be nameless—" pinching Emma's cheek—"the Strattons—Kingstons—Frenches—and oh! I gave Charley carte-blanche to ask any of my Richmond acquaintances—and all for what? To hear that Miss Ida Ross is—"
"'Free, white, and twenty-one!'" sang Emma, cheerily.
"Twenty-one! in four years, I shall be a spinster of a quarter of a century! Heigho!" She said it jestingly; but at nightfall, she was pacing the porch alone—Laura having gone home, and Emma asleep, wearied by her day's activity; and the thought returned to her. Twenty-one! the golden sands were slipping fast. The sky-meeting waves upon the horizon no longer blushed with sunset dyes, and nodded their bright crests, in luring welcome; her eyes were bent upon the regular swell of the Present, as she glided over it. The navigation of the unknown seas beyond, she trusted to the Pilot, who had engaged to see her safely to the desired haven. It was a holy, still hour.
Her swift step scarcely broke the silence—the firm, elastic tread of youth and health;—and an unruffled spirit was within;—a fulness of contentment and peace the world could not disturb or take away. She had conned that invaluable lesson—"It is better to trust than to hope."
"A letter, ma'am—no papers," said Will, sententiously.
"Thank you, uncle Will. Tell James to bring a lamp into the parlor, if you please. I almost dread to open this!" she said to herself. "My fears are always on the alert, to forebode evil to those I love. I will be courageous—will have faith!" and she walked resolutely into the lighted room. But the superscription sent a tremor to her heart—a minute elapsed before she opened it.
the letter.
"I have come home alone, dear friend, leaving our Annie asleep in a foreign land. Her day of suffering closed in ease and peace; her 'good night' was as calm, as though she were sinking into a slumber of hours, instead of ages. A lonely, stricken man, I retraced the route we had travelled in company, to find that I had never indeed missed and mourned her, until I saw her empty chamber at home. Here—'I cannot make her dead!' Oh! the desolation of that word, when applied to one, in whose veins ran the same blood as in ours, who lived and loved with us—partaker of our individuality! As love is immortal, we would believe the frail clay to which it clings, imperishable too. But in our grief, there is a mingling of praise that her rest is safe—that a merciful Father is also wise, and will not, in answer to our selfish lamentations, restore her to an existence replete with pain.
"The date of the above—a month back—may surprise you. I wrote a fortnight after I touched my native shore; contemplating such a letter as one friend might send to another;—to inform you of my bereavement, and solicit the sympathy none ever ask in vain from you. I was interrupted to read a communication which has changed—not the tenor of this alone, but the current of all my anticipations. It was from Miss Arnold; an annulment of the contract between us; a step, she says, foreseen from an early period of our engagement, when she discovered that the heart, she thought she had surrendered to me, was wholly another's. I omit much that would be uninteresting to you; and which, in honour, I ought not to transcribe. Briefly then—the facts stand thus. She never loved me; and when the owner of her heart sued for her hand, she pledged it, and asked for a release from her previous vow. I have no inclination to animadvert upon her course—singular and inconsistent as it has been throughout—but am obliged to refer to certain particulars, to make clear the explanation which follows.
"I have told you, Ida, that my attentions, from the beginning of our intercourse, until my conviction of your betrothal, were correct exponents of my feelings. I cannot deny that when compelled to acknowledge the uselessness of my efforts, I judged you harshly—was tempted to believe you an unprincipled trifler with my hopes, and the truth of your accepted lover. As my indignation and disappointment cooled before mature reflection, my faith in your sterling integrity revived.
"Not a word had escaped me which Friendship might not have dictated; and your manner to me was less confidingly affectionate than to Charley. You regarded me as a brother; and if in that capacity, any act or word of mine could conduce to your happiness it should not be withheld. Your committal of your lover's cause to me was a powerful appeal to every generous feeling. I solemnly resolved then, that you should never regret your implicit trust. At his death-bed, my thought was for you and him; at his grave, as I upheld your sinking form—my heart answering the heavings of yours, in our common sorrow—I renewed the promise never to desecrate the purity of your friendship, by a breath of a love, demanding reciprocation in that which had gone down with him into the tomb. In this illusion, I came home. You know whom I met here; and that her surpassing loveliness, her apparent artlessness and amiability captivated us all. Annie loved her fervently, and threw us together by many innocent manoeuvres—Dear girl! it was the blameless impulse of a loving heart—to unite two, who seemed to her hopeful perceptions to be destined for each other. I was amused at her fancy—then uneasy, lest it should be a restriction upon Miss Arnold's kindly feelings for the brother of her friend. I could not wound Annie by reproof or caution; so, after a while, descrying in Miss Arnold's demeanor, a touch of the dreaded embarrassment, I introduced the subject in a tone of light badinage. I may not describe the interview;—my sentiments and bearing had been utterly misconstrued. She did not express this in words, but her perturbation was unmistakeable. I reflected upon this unlooked-for disclosure with no enviable emotions. I was free; no hope ventured to point to you; and I might learn to love the beautiful, tender creature, whom I had unintentionally deceived. In honour—in conscience—in humanity—what could I do, but tell her that, although not offering the deep tenderness of a first love I would cherish her as faithfully, if not as fondly, as man ever did the woman he wooed and won? I cannot dwell upon the untold anguish of the moment when the fallacy of my impressions and reasonings was exposed. The tempter was at my ear. Violation of my plighted word—the downfall of her hopes were nothing! the barrier which parted us was down—the impossibility of our union was a chimera, dissolving in the beams of truth. You saved me! looking away from our divided lives, you reminded me that duty here writes our title-deeds to reward hereafter—and I submitted to the decree.
"Now—dear Ida!—but the rush of hope ebbs suddenly. The thought that flew towards you, the moment I was freed—now, that the slow weeks I allotted to rigid self-examination have rolled by—spreads its wings as eagerly still—but—you?
"What was I to you? what may I hope to be? I have ascertained that you are unmarried—are you heart-free? May I come to you? Dare I say—reply at once? I would not wring from you a hasty decision, but remember my suspense. May every blessing be yours!
Morton Lacy."