We left school at the same time, but our positions were very different in the world. She belonged to a gay family, and was immediately plunged into the whirl of fashionable life, while I led a very quiet, sober existence, which was well suited to my shy nature, but formed a strong contrast to pretty Meta’s sphere of action. One might have supposed our intercourse would have been broken off; on the contrary, we remained as intimate, as when we studied the same lessons, and sat at the same desk. True, a great deal of the visiting had to depend upon Meta, as home duties necessarily kept me from her; and she seldom passed a day without peeping in upon my “little nest,” as she called our cozy library; and once in a while she would enliven an evening by drinking tea with us; thus she kept me “booked up” in all the gossip and doings of the fashionable world.
She had no parents; her sister, two years her senior, and a widowed aunt, were her only near relatives. Meta and her sister were in comfortable circumstances—they had a nice little fortune apiece, which, of course, the world magnified. Their aunt had, however, quite a large life income, which, united with their own, made a very handsome appearance. Mrs. Hunsdon, the aunt, was a silly one-ideaed woman. To be fashionable, was the sole aim of her existence. She had no children, and turned all her attention to the establishment in life of her nieces. She had not cleverness, nor independence enough to be a leader in the gay world, but was always found fastened on to some distingué person, whose shadow she made herself—going and coming, living and breathing as near like her model as possible; poor soul! how much labor she endured for her position in society. Her eldest niece was her exact counterpart; and at the time of Meta’s entrée, Miss Hallowell had secured an excellent offer from a most unexceptionable person, according to their ideas of such things; and the preparations for the approaching wedding were carried on in a grand manner. The whole town rang with Miss Hallowell’s magnificent wardrobe; the beautiful gifts presented by her husband elect; and I heard no less than a dozen different accounts of what was to be her wedding-dress; each account professing to come from Miss W., the fashionable dress-maker and modiste of the day.
One morning Meta came dancing into the library where I had snugly seated myself for a quiet hour’s study, after having settled for the day, the affairs of my little domestic kingdom.
“Ah; this is a treat,” she exclaimed, “here is true comfort;” and taking possession of her favorite lounge, she gave me a half-laughing, half-serious account of the bustle and preparatory arrangements for the approaching wedding. “How stupid is all this ceremony, Enna, dear,” she continued, “aunt fusses about, and Therese looks as grand as a queen. Then Mr. Folwell is so wearying; how Tettie can fancy him is a wonder to me. I have never heard him call her ‘dear Therese’ yet; it is always ‘Miss Hallowell’—such dignity chills me. When I marry, there shall be no grandeur about the affair. I want quiet, home love. My husband shall call me ‘Meta, darling,’ varying it once in a while with ‘angel bird,’ and all sorts of sweet expletives; he shall love me dearly, put me in a nice little home like this—just such a library; here he shall study and write, and I’ll sit beside him, sew and sing, and look at him, and bless heaven for making me so happy.”
“Why, Meta, your aunt and sister would lift their hands in horror,” I said, laughingly. “But where are you going to find such a nice lover—will Mr. Lawson be all this?”
A look of vexation overspread Meta’s pretty face as she replied, “Oh no, not Mr. Lawson. I know aunt would be delighted with him, but he is almost as stupid as the rest of them.”
“Mr. Lawson stupid!” I exclaimed. “Meta, where is your taste? He is quiet and calm, I admit, but not stupid. You naughty girl, not to love him; he is just the husband for you, madcap. To be sure he might not indulge in so many affectionate expletives, as you say your husband must, but he would watch over your happiness tenderly.”
“Better marry him yourself, Enna, since you think him so agreeable,” said Meta, a little quickly; then springing toward me, she threw her arms around me exclaiming, “I have just such a lover as I have pictured, pet one; and I depend on your assistance in my love affair.”
Now, young as I was, I was a perfect model of propriety—the idea of being an assistant in a “love affair,” frightened me out of my wits; for I was in truth, a “born old maid,” as my old nurse, Katy, used to call me.
“Me assist you?” I asked. “How can that be possible; I—who never go out any where, never see any one?”