"And I am your father—oh, say that your heart no longer denies me the title."
The young girl looked into his face, full of the most yearning love and anguish; her own soul was deeply stirred. The dreams with which her melancholy childhood had been haunted, had ever pictured to her something different from the commonplace, narrow, poverty-enthralled life about her. Her vague memories of a mother, beautiful and refined, together with long musings over the few jewels and fine articles of clothing she had left, had helped her to build up a world as different from the coarse scenes of her daily experience as Paradise from common earth. It was in this world of dreams she moved when those dark eyes floated with those far-away, lustrous looks which made those about her feel that she was different from them, and leave her undisturbed to her reveries. Kind and gentle as she had ever been to her friends, winning their warmest love, she was conscious of affections and aspirations which their companionship never called forth.
"Speak—let me hear you call me father!"
The deep, musical tones, whose singular power seldom failed to move those whom he addressed with earnestness, and now quivering with untold pathos, pierced to her heart; her bosom fluttered like a frightened bird's—her eyes turned to each one of the group, those true, affectionate friends of hers, and lastly, lingered an instant on those of Nat Wolfe, who had risen and was standing motionless, regarding her with a keen look—then her hand slipped into Dr. Carollyn's, she kissed his cheek and called him—
"Father."
When she thought of him again, Nat had disappeared; he had turned abruptly from the scene, and was walking off the pain and anger which tormented him, out of sight of the camp. He was more wordly-wise than Elizabeth; when he saw her yield to the claim of this courtly father, he knew that all her old associations were to be shaken off like a worn-out garment. For hours he strode back and forth along the outskirts of the camp, like a sentinel doing duty most conscientiously, his mind in such a tumult as had not shaken it for years.
"It is my fate," he muttered. "The soft blessings of a woman's love are never to warm this rough experience of mine. I was mad—a fool, to dream that it could be! I will not suffer the whole accursed thing over again," he continued. "It is enough to have had life blighted once, as mine was blighted. Why have I allowed this flower to spring again on the withered stalk? I should have known some frost would blacken it. The Fates should have made me more heartless or her less pure and lovely. What man could have cherished that innocent girl through days and nights, seeing her so confiding, so entirely a child in heart yet a woman in beauty, and not have felt the hard suspicion and dislike within him melt away? I wish I had never met her? I wish that confounded dark-skinned Doctor had chanced in some other company. I'm a fool to believe in woman! Two days ago she told me with her dying eyes, that she loved me—to-morrow she will tell me that she has changed her mind. The prospect of a little worldly splendor and flattery will turn any woman's head—or heart!"
Poor Nat! it was no wonder he spoke bitterly—that he stamped and stalked about in a manner quite different from his usual careless dignity. Far back in the past of his early manhood, when his fresh, boyish soul trusted all, and adored every woman as something to be revered and idolized, he had loved a girl of his own age. He was not a hunter of bison and Indians in those days—he was a handsome, proud, well-educated youth, the son of an esteemed clergyman, who, though poor, as is the wont of village ministers, managed to send his oldest son to college, and was glad, as even a minister has a right to be, to see him so bright, so graceful, so brilliant in intellect—the peer of any of the young men with whom he associated.
The Rev. Mr. Wolfe had never been so unwise as to plan that his son should follow his own profession; for that Nathaniel was never made for the quiet, severely-disciplined life of his father was self-evident. Reckless, gay, full of wit and courage, it was yet impossible for the surliest deacon in his father's church to find fault with any action of his life. His morals were pure, his impulses good and generous—the deficiency in his character was that those impulses were not under the control of his judgment, and that his feelings were allowed too rash a rule.
He was just the young man to make the most devoted and winning lover. The maidens were all pleased with his attentions; and, of course, before he was fairly out of college, he was desperately enamored of the belle and beauty of the village, the 'Judge's' daughter. She liked him, too; she could not resist his handsome face and delicious devotion; she allowed herself to be engaged to him—and then, of course, he had to think of marriage, and the future. He had nothing, and she would be quite an heiress; he was too proud to live off her family, who wouldn't have permitted it, if he had been willing; he decided to study law, an offer having been made him by a friend of his father's in the city of New York—bade his darling betrothed a two years' passionate farewell, and set out, full of hope and ambition, to begin the struggle for the anticipated reward. Before his probation was much more than half over, he received news of the marriage of his affianced, to a wealthy widower, a squire of a neighboring town, who had seen and admired her beauty.