A FEW SCENES FROM A TRUE HISTORY. [Concluded.]
SCENE IV.
They had lived thus nearly a year, when, one day as they were riding on horseback, Alfred saw Mr. Grossman approaching. "Drop your veil," he said, quickly, to his companion; for he could not bear to have that Satyr even look upon his hidden flower. The cotton-broker noticed the action, but silently touched his hat, and passed with a significant smile on his uncomely countenance. A few days afterward, when Alfred had gone to his business in the city, Loo Loo strolled to her favorite recess on the hill-side, and, lounging on the rustic seat, began to read the second volume of "Thaddeus of Warsaw." She was so deeply interested in the adventures of the noble Pole, that she forgot herself and all her surroundings. Masses of glossy dark hair fell over the delicate hand that supported her head; her morning-gown, of pink French muslin, fell apart, and revealed a white embroidered skirt, from beneath which obtruded one small foot, in an open-work silk stocking; the slipper having fallen to the ground. Thus absorbed, she took no note of time, and might have remained until summoned to dinner, had not a slight rustling disturbed her. She looked up, and saw a coarse face peering at her between the pine boughs, with a most disgusting expression. She at once recognized the man they had met during their ride; and starting to her feet, she ran like a deer before the hunter. It was not till she came near the house, that she was aware of having left her slipper. A servant was sent for it, but returned, saying it was not to be found. She mourned over the loss, for the little pink kid slippers, embroidered with silver, were a birth-day present from Alfred. As soon as he returned, she told him the adventure, and went with him to search the arbor of pines. The incident troubled him greatly. "What a noxious serpent, to come crawling into our Eden!" he exclaimed. "Never come here alone again, dearest; and never go far from the house, unless Madame is with you."
Her circle of enjoyments was already small, excluded as she was from society by her anomalous position, and educated far above the caste in which the tyranny of law and custom so absurdly placed her. But it is one of the blessed laws of compensation, that the human soul cannot miss that to which it has never been accustomed. Madame's motherly care, and Alfred's unvarying tenderness, sufficed her cravings for affection; and for amusement, she took refuge in books, flowers, birds, and those changes of natural scenery for which her lover had such quickness of eye. It was a privation to give up her solitary rambles in the grounds, her inspection of birds' nests, and her readings in that pleasant alcove of pines. But she more than acquiesced in Alfred's prohibition. She said at once, that she would rather be a prisoner within the house all her days than ever see that odious face again.
Mr. Noble encountered the cotton-broker, in the way of business, a few days afterward; but his aversion to the unclean conversation of the man induced him to conceal his vexation under the veil of common courtesy. He knew what sort of remarks any remonstrance would elicit, and he shrank from subjecting Loo Loo's name to such pollution. For a short time, this prudent reserve shielded him from the attacks he dreaded. But Mr. Grossman soon began to throw out hints about the sly hypocrisy of Puritan Yankees, and other innuendoes obviously intended to annoy him. At last, one day, he drew the embroidered slipper from his pocket, and, with a rakish wink of his eye, said, "I reckon you have seen this before, Mr. Noble."
Alfred felt an impulse to seize him by the throat, and strangle him on the spot. But why should he make a scene with such a man, and thus drag Loo Loo's name into painful notoriety? The old roué was evidently trying to foment a quarrel with him. Thoroughly animal in every department of his nature, he was boastful of brute courage, and prided himself upon having killed several men in duels. Alfred conjectured his line of policy, and resolved to frustrate it. He therefore coolly replied, "I have seen such slippers; they are very pretty"; and turned away, as if the subject were indifferent to him.
"Coward!" muttered Grossman, as he left the counting-house. Mr. Noble did not hear him; and if he had, it would not have altered his course. He could see nothing enviable in the reputation of being ever ready for brawls, and a dead-shot in duels; and he knew that his life was too important to the friendless Loo Loo to be thus foolishly risked for the gratification of a villain. This incident renewed his old feelings of remorse for the false position in which he had placed the young orphan, who trusted him so entirely. To his generous nature, the wrong seemed all the greater because the object was so unconscious of it. "It is I who have subjected her to the insolence of this vile man," he said within himself. "But I will repair the wrong. Innocent, confiding soul that she is, I will protect her. The sanction of marriage shall shield her from such affronts."
Alas for poor human nature! He was sincere in these resolutions, but he was not quite strong enough to face the prejudices of the society in which he lived. Their sneers would have fallen harmless. They could not take from him a single thing he really valued. But he had not learned to understand that the dreaded power of public opinion is purely fabulous, when unsustained by the voice of conscience. So he fell into the old snare of moral compromise. He thought the best he could do, under the circumstances, was to hasten the period of his departure for the North, to marry Loo Loo in Philadelphia, and remove to some part of the country where her private history would remain unknown.
To make money for this purpose, he had more and more extended his speculations, and they had uniformly proved profitable. If Mr. Grossman's offensive conduct had not forced upon him a painful consciousness of his position with regard to the object of his devoted affection, he would have liked to remain in Mobile a few years longer, and accumulate more; but, as it was, he determined to remove as soon as he could arrange his affairs satisfactorily. He set about this in good earnest. But, alas! the great pecuniary crash of 1837 was at hand. By every mail came news of failures where he expected payments. The wealth, which seemed so certain a fact a few months before, where had it vanished? It had floated away, like a prismatic bubble on the breeze. He saw that his ruin was inevitable. All he owned in the world would not cancel his debts. And now he recalled the horrible recollection that Loo Loo was a part of his property. Much as he had blamed Mr. Duncan for negligence in not manumitting her mother, he had fallen into the same snare. In the fulness of his prosperity and happiness, he did not comprehend the risk he was running by delay. He rarely thought of the fact that she was legally his slave; and when it did occur to him, it was always accompanied with the recollection that the laws of Alabama did not allow him to emancipate her without sending her away from the State. But this never troubled him, because there was always present with him that vision of going to the North and making her his wife. So time slipped away, without his taking any precautions on the subject; and now it was too late. Immersed in debt as he was, the law did not allow him to dispose of anything without consent of creditors; and he owed ten thousand dollars to Mr. Grossman. Oh, agony! sharp agony!
There was a meeting of the creditors. Mr. Noble rendered an account of all his property, in which he was compelled to include Loo Loo; but for her he offered to give a note for fifteen hundred dollars, with good endorsement, payable with interest in a year. It was known that his attachment to the orphan he had educated amounted almost to infatuation; and his proverbial integrity inspired so much respect, that the creditors were disposed to grant him any indulgence not incompatible with their own interests. They agreed to accept the proffered note, all except Mr. Grossman. He insisted that the girl should be put up at auction. For her sake, the ruined merchant condescended to plead with him. He represented that the tie between them was very different from the merely convenient connections which were so common; that Loo Loo was really good and modest, and so sensitive by nature, that exposure to public sale would nearly kill her. The selfish creditor remained inexorable. The very fact that this delicate flower had been so carefully sheltered from the mud and dust of the wayside rendered her a more desirable prize. He coolly declared, that ever since he had seen her in the arbor, he had been determined to have her; and now that fortune had put the chance in his power, no money should induce him to relinquish it.