Shortly after this discourse of Riccabocca's, an incident occurred to Leonard that served to carry his mind into new directions. One evening, when his mother was out, he was at work on a new mechanical contrivance, and had the misfortune to break one of the instruments which he employed. Now it will be remembered that his father had been the Squire's head-carpenter; the widow had carefully hoarded the tools of his craft which had belonged to her poor Mark; and though she occasionally lent them to Leonard, she would not give them up to his service. Amongst these, Leonard knew that he should find the one that he wanted; and being much interested in his contrivance, he could not wait till his mother's return. The tools, with other little relics of the lost, were kept in a large trunk in Mrs. Fairfield's sleeping room; the trunk was not locked, and Leonard went to it without ceremony or scruple. In rummaging for the instrument, his eye fell on a bundle of MSS.; and he suddenly recollected that when he was a mere child, and before he much knew the difference between verse and prose, his mother had pointed to these MSS. and said "One day or other, when you can read nicely I'll let you look at these, Lenny. My poor Mark wrote such verses—ah, he was a scollard!" Leonard, reasonably enough, thought that the time had now arrived when he was worthy the privilege of reading the paternal effusions, and he took forth the MSS. with a keen but melancholy interest. He recognized his father's handwriting, which he had often seen before in account-books and memoranda, and read eagerly some trifling poems, which did not show much genius, nor much mastery of language and rhythm—such poems, in short, as a self-educated man with a poetic taste and feeling, rather than poetic inspiration or artistic culture, might compose with credit, but not for fame. But suddenly, as he turned over these 'Occasional Pieces,' Leonard came to others in a different handwriting—a woman's handwriting—small, and fine, and exquisitely formed. He had scarcely read six lines of these last before his attention was irresistibly chained. They were of a different order of merit from poor Mark's; they bore the unmistakable stamp of genius. Like the poetry of women in general, they were devoted to personal feeling—they were not the mirror of a world, but reflections of a solitary heart. Yet this is the kind of poetry most pleasing to the young. And the verses in question had another attraction for Leonard; they seemed to express some struggle akin to his own—some complaint against the actual condition of the writer's life, some sweet melodious murmurs at fortune. For the rest, they were characterized by a vein of sentiment so elevated that, if written by a man, it would have run into exaggeration; written by a woman, the romance was carried off by so many revelations of sincere, deep, pathetic feeling, that it was always natural, though true to a nature from which you would not augur happiness.
Leonard was still absorbed in the perusal of these poems, when Mrs. Fairfield entered the room.
"What have you been about, Lenny?—searching in my box?"
"I came to look for my father's bag of tools, mother, and I found these papers, which you said I might read some day."
"I doesn't wonder you did not hear me when I came in," said the widow sighing. "I used to sit still for the hour together, when my poor Mark read his poems to me. There was such a pretty one about the Peasant's Fireside, Lenny—have you got hold of that?"
"Yes, dear mother; and I remarked the allusion to you; it brought tears to my eyes. But these verses are not my father's—whose are they? They seem a woman's hand."
Mrs. Fairfield looked—changed color—grew faint—and seated herself.
"Poor, poor Nora!" said she falteringly. "I did not know as they were there; Mark kep' 'em; they got among his"—
Leonard.—"Who was Nora?"
Mrs. Fairfield.—"Who?—child,—who? Nora was—was my own—own sister."