Louisa reached her seventeenth year, and as the bud gave promise so proved the flower, beautiful indeed and lovely. Mr. Oakly was really proud of this! He mentally contrasted her light elegant figure with the probable appearance of Agatha, and congratulated himself that he had not to bear about the shame of acknowledging the latter! Still, he did not love Louisa—strange that he almost hated her for possessing those very attributes of loveliness for which he had preferred her above his own offspring!
When Louisa emerged from the seclusion of the school-room to the brilliant circles of fashion, she was caressed, flattered, adored. Wealth and beauty tripping hand in hand seldom fail to win favor, and brought a throng of admirers to the feet of the heiress, who, however, did not seem easily moved; and many were the suitors to her favor who met with a kind but firm refusal. But, beware, Louisa, your affections will be held by your tyrant father just as much enslaved as your person; and now, wo to you, should they centre where he does not approve.
Moonlight, golden, twinkling stars, fragrant zephyrs, sweet from the lip of the lily, soft music from tinkling leaves, a murmur from the rippling river, and through the winding shrubbery, slowly along the path tesselated by the moonbeams, which glint through the leafy curtain, Louisa is straying—but not alone. A youth is by her side, one whose arm her own encircles, who clasps her willing hand in his; one whose whispers are of love, and to whom her own voice, gentle and low, speaks of hope and happiness in return.
Ah! foolish, foolish Louisa! what are you thinking of? Only a poor painter—and you in love! True, he has talent, worth, grace, refinement, but—no money! And you, unfortunate youth, why did you love this beautiful maiden? Know you not that man of heartlessness and pride, her father, would gladly crush you to the earth for lifting your eyes heaven-ward to his daughter; that he would sooner buy her winding-sheet than that she should don her wedding-robe for thee! And yet, even now, closer and closer are you both riveting the chain, drawing heart to heart, which no hand but death can loose.
It was the second summer after Louisa’s initiation into the gay world that the Oakly family were once more assembled at Oak Villa, their annual resort during the warm months of July and August. With no taste for reading, a mind not attuned for meditation, and the querulousness of an ungraceful old age gradually stealing upon him, Mr. Oakly found the time drag most wearily on amid those quiet groves. In his extremity an idea suddenly flashed across his brain, which he eagerly caught at, as it promised to relieve somewhat of that tedious vacuum between those hours when such a man and happiness may alone be said to look each other in the face: viz., the hour of meals—and this was to summon an artist to the villa, for the purpose of decorating the walls of the saloon with the portraits of its inmates. He had not thought of it before, but, quite luckily, it now occurred to him that he already had the address of a young artist in his pocket, for whom some friend of struggling genius had solicited patronage. Now he could kill two birds with one stone, as it were, secure the plaudits of the world by taking the artist by the hand in so flattering a manner, and at the same time pull away the drag from the wheels of time. He looked at the card—“Walter Evertson,”—and to Walter Evertson did he immediately address a letter, requesting his presence at the villa.
He came—a fine, handsome youth of three-and-twenty, with an eye like an eagle, and hair dark as a starless night—a dangerous companion, we must allow, for the gentle Louisa. He was met with condescending affability made most apparent by the master of the house, and by Mrs. Oakly, who seldom manifested much interest in any thing, with cool indifference. No wonder, then, that he turned with a thrill of pleasure tingling his heart-strings, to the gentle Louisa, whose manners, at once so courteous and refined, offered so agreeable a contrast.
There are some, perhaps, whose hearts have never yet felt the power of love, who rail about love at first sight as a theory too ridiculous to dwell upon—a chimera only originating in the heads of romantic school-girls and beardless shop-boys; very well, let them have it so; I only assert that both Louisa and the artist, at that first interview, were favorably impressed; and that a brief intercourse under the same roof cemented their young hearts with all the strength of a first and truthful affection. Love (himself a sly artist) traced each on the other a heart in fadeless tints. Sincere and unselfish was the love which Walter Evertson had conceived for Louisa; a love which he intended to bury within his own throbbing breast—for he dared not flatter himself that it would be returned—she, the heiress of thousands—he, the poor, unfriended artist. Vain resolve! It was the evening with which this chapter commences, that, in an unguarded moment, he had revealed to her his love, and received the blest assurance of her own in return. But their cup of joy was even then embittered by the consciousness that her father, in his cold, selfish nature, would tear their hearts asunder, even though he snapped their life-strings.
In the meantime the business which had brought him to the villa was being accomplished. Mr. and Mrs. Oakly saw themselves to the life on canvas, and now it only remained to consummate his work by portraying the features of Louisa. Delightful, yet difficult task! Mrs. Oakly had so far aroused herself from her usual lethargy, as to insist that the figure of Louisa herself should be but secondary in the picture about to be executed. She was tired, she said, of those stiff, prim figures on sombre-tinted ground, looking out from gilded frames with eye-balls ever coldly glaring upon one, and would have a large painting of rare design and skill—woods, fountains, birds, and flowers, to relieve the form and face of Louisa from this dull sameness. Various were the sketches brought forward for her approval; and whole days, which Evertson wished might never end, were spent in vain endeavors to settle upon some one of them for the purpose. Accident, however, at length furnished the desired tableau although it would be doing injustice to Evertson to imply that he lacked talent or originality—fine as were his sketches, they failed to please Mrs. Oakly, because—she would not be pleased.
One morning Louisa strolled out alone, and unconsciously pursued her ramble until she reached a beautiful meadow fringed with fine old trees, whose branches bent down to meet their dark, leafy shadows in the bright waters of the Susquehanna. Birds were singing merrily, butterflies sported their golden wings, and the grasshopper chirped, blithely leaping through the tall grass. Here and there, where the rays of the sun had not yet penetrated, were the gossamers of elfin broidery—mantles dropped by fairies on their merry rounds in the checkered moonlight beneath those old trees; there was a drop of bright nectar, too, left in the cup of the wild-flower, and the large, red clover-tops were sparkling with dew-gems. I cannot assert that Louisa saw all the beauties of this fine morning; for, absorbed in pleasing thoughts, upon which we will not intrude, satisfied as we ought to be that the artist occupied a full share, she seated herself beneath one of those shadowing trees, and resting her chin within the palm of her little hand, most likely, I am sorry to say, heard neither the warble of the birds, the cheerful chirping insect, or saw the bright glancing river, with the little boat which was just then dancing over its silver ripples.