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      Malbone, by Thomas Wentworth Higginson
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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Malbone, by Thomas Wentworth Higginson

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org


Title: Malbone
       An Oldport Romance

Author: Thomas Wentworth Higginson

Release Date: July 27, 2008 [EBook #993]
Last Updated: November 8, 2016

Language: English

Character set encoding: UTF-8

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MALBONE ***




Produced by Judy Boss, and David Widger





</pre>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
    <h1>
      MALBONE
    </h1>
    <h2>
      AN OLDPORT ROMANCE.
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br />
    </p>
    <h2>
      By Thomas Wentworth Higginson
    </h2>
    <p>
      <br /> <br />
    </p>
    <h4>
      &ldquo;What is Nature unless there is an eventful human life passing within her?<br />
      <br /> Many joys and many sorrows are the lights and shadows in which she
      shows most beautiful."<br /> <br /> &mdash;THOREAU, MS. Diary.
    </h4>
    <p>
      <br /> <br />
    </p>
    <hr />
    <p>
      <br /> <br />
    </p>
    <blockquote>
      <p class="toc">
        <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big>
      </p>
      <p>
        <br />
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>MALBONE.</b> </a>
      </p>
      <p>
        <br />
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> PRELUDE. </a>
      </p>
      <p>
        <br />
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> I. AN ARRIVAL. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> II. PLACE AUX DAMES! </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> III. A DRIVE ON THE AVENUE. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> IV. AUNT JANE DEFINES HER POSITION. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> V. A MULTIVALVE HEART. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VI. &ldquo;SOME LOVER&rsquo;S CLEAR DAY.&rdquo; </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> VII. AN INTERNATIONAL EXPOSITION. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> VIII. TALKING IT OVER. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> IX. DANGEROUS WAYS. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> X. REMONSTRANCES. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> XI. DESCENSUS AVERNI. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> XII. A NEW ENGAGEMENT. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> XIII. DREAMING DREAMS. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> XIV. THE NEMESIS OF PASSION. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> XV. ACROSS THE BAY. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> XVI. ON THE STAIRS. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0019"> XVII. DISCOVERY. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0020"> XVIII. HOPE&rsquo;S VIGIL. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0021"> XIX. DE PROFUNDIS. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0022"> XX. AUNT JANE TO THE RESCUE. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0023"> XXI. A STORM. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0024"> XXII. OUT OF THE DEPTHS. </a>
      </p>
      <p class="toc">
        <a href="#link2H_4_0025"> XXIII. REQUIESCAT. </a>
      </p>
    </blockquote>
    <p>
      <br /> <br />
    </p>
    <hr />
    <p>
      <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <h1>
      MALBONE.
    </h1>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      PRELUDE.
    </h2>
    <p>
      AS one wanders along this southwestern promontory of the Isle of Peace,
      and looks down upon the green translucent water which forever bathes the
      marble slopes of the Pirates&rsquo; Cave, it is natural to think of the ten
      wrecks with which the past winter has strewn this shore. Though almost all
      trace of their presence is already gone, yet their mere memory lends to
      these cliffs a human interest. Where a stranded vessel lies, thither all
      steps converge, so long as one plank remains upon another. There centres
      the emotion. All else is but the setting, and the eye sweeps with
      indifference the line of unpeopled rocks. They are barren, till the
      imagination has tenanted them with possibilities of danger and dismay. The
      ocean provides the scenery and properties of a perpetual tragedy, but the
      interest arrives with the performers. Till then the shores remain vacant,
      like the great conventional armchairs of the French drama, that wait for
      Rachel to come and die.
    </p>
    <p>
      Yet as I ride along this fashionable avenue in August, and watch the
      procession of the young and fair,&mdash;as I look at stately houses, from
      each of which has gone forth almost within my memory a funeral or a bride,&mdash;then
      every thoroughfare of human life becomes in fancy but an ocean shore, with
      its ripples and its wrecks. One learns, in growing older, that no fiction
      can be so strange nor appear so improbable as would the simple truth; and
      that doubtless even Shakespeare did but timidly transcribe a few of the
      deeds and passions he had personally known. For no man of middle age can
      dare trust himself to portray life in its full intensity, as he has
      studied or shared it; he must resolutely set aside as indescribable the
      things most worth describing, and must expect to be charged with
      exaggeration, even when he tells the rest.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      I. AN ARRIVAL.
    </h2>
    <p>
      IT was one of the changing days of our Oldport midsummer. In the morning
      it had rained in rather a dismal way, and Aunt Jane had said she should
      put it in her diary. It was a very serious thing for the elements when
      they got into Aunt Jane&rsquo;s diary. By noon the sun came out as clear and
      sultry as if there had never been a cloud, the northeast wind died away,
      the bay was motionless, the first locust of the summer shrilled from the
      elms, and the robins seemed to be serving up butterflies hot for their
      insatiable second brood, while nothing seemed desirable for a human
      luncheon except ice-cream and fans. In the afternoon the southwest wind
      came up the bay, with its line of dark-blue ripple and its delicious
      coolness; while the hue of the water grew more and more intense, till we
      seemed to be living in the heart of a sapphire.
    </p>
    <p>
      The household sat beneath the large western doorway of the old Maxwell
      House,&mdash;he rear door, which looks on the water. The house had just
      been reoccupied by my Aunt Jane, whose great-grandfather had built it,
      though it had for several generations been out of the family. I know no
      finer specimen of those large colonial dwellings in which the genius of
      Sir Christopher Wren bequeathed traditions of stateliness to our
      democratic days. Its central hall has a carved archway; most of the rooms
      have painted tiles and are wainscoted to the ceiling; the sashes are
      red-cedar, the great staircase mahogany; there are pilasters with delicate
      Corinthian capitals; there are cherubs&rsquo; heads and wings that go astray and
      lose themselves in closets and behind glass doors; there are curling
      acanthus-leaves that cluster over shelves and ledges, and there are those
      graceful shell-patterns which one often sees on old furniture, but rarely
      in houses. The high front door still retains its Ionic cornice; and the
      western entrance, looking on the bay, is surmounted by carved fruit and
      flowers, and is crowned, as is the roof, with that pineapple in whose
      symbolic wealth the rich merchants of the last century delighted.
    </p>
    <p>
      Like most of the statelier houses in that region of Oldport, this abode
      had its rumors of a ghost and of secret chambers. The ghost had never been
      properly lionized nor laid, for Aunt Jane, the neatest of housekeepers,
      had discouraged all silly explorations, had at once required all barred
      windows to be opened, all superfluous partitions to be taken down, and
      several highly eligible dark-closets to be nailed up. If there was
      anything she hated, it was nooks and odd corners. Yet there had been times
      that year, when the household would have been glad to find a few more such
      hiding-places; for during the first few weeks the house had been crammed
      with guests so closely that the very mice had been ill-accommodated and
      obliged to sit up all night, which had caused them much discomfort and
      many audible disagreements.
    </p>
    <p>
      But this first tumult had passed away; and now there remained only the
      various nephews and nieces of the house, including a due proportion of
      small children. Two final guests were to arrive that day, bringing the
      latest breath of Europe on their wings,&mdash;Philip Malbone, Hope&rsquo;s
      betrothed; and little Emilia, Hope&rsquo;s half-sister.
    </p>
    <p>
      None of the family had seen Emilia since her wandering mother had taken
      her abroad, a fascinating spoiled child of four, and they were all eager
      to see in how many ways the succeeding twelve years had completed or
      corrected the spoiling. As for Philip, he had been spoiled, as Aunt Jane
      declared, from the day of his birth, by the joint effort of all friends
      and neighbors. Everybody had conspired to carry on the process except Aunt
      Jane herself, who directed toward him one of her honest, steady, immovable
      dislikes, which may be said to have dated back to the time when his father
      and mother were married, some years before he personally entered on the
      scene.
    </p>
    <p>
      The New York steamer, detained by the heavy fog of the night before, now
      came in unwonted daylight up the bay. At the first glimpse, Harry and the
      boys pushed off in the row-boat; for, as one of the children said, anybody
      who had been to Venice would naturally wish to come to the very house in a
      gondola. In another half-hour there was a great entanglement of embraces
      at the water-side, for the guests had landed.
    </p>
    <p>
      Malbone&rsquo;s self-poised easy grace was the same as ever; his chestnut-brown
      eyes were as winning, his features as handsome; his complexion, too
      clearly pink for a man, had a sea bronze upon it: he was the same Philip
      who had left home, though with some added lines of care. But in the
      brilliant little fairy beside him all looked in vain for the Emilia they
      remembered as a child. Her eyes were more beautiful than ever,&mdash;the
      darkest violet eyes, that grew luminous with thought and almost black with
      sorrow. Her gypsy taste, as everybody used to call it, still showed itself
      in the scarlet and dark blue of her dress; but the clouded gypsy tint had
      gone from her cheek, and in its place shone a deep carnation, so hard and
      brilliant that it appeared to be enamelled on the surface, yet so firm and
      deep-dyed that it seemed as if not even death could ever blanch it. There
      is a kind of beauty that seems made to be painted on ivory, and such was
      hers. Only the microscopic pencil of a miniature-painter could portray
      those slender eyebrows, that arched caressingly over the beautiful eyes,&mdash;or
      the silky hair of darkest chestnut that crept in a wavy line along the
      temples, as if longing to meet the brows,&mdash;or those unequalled
      lashes! &ldquo;Unnecessarily long,&rdquo; Aunt Jane afterwards pronounced them; while
      Kate had to admit that they did indeed give Emilia an overdressed look at
      breakfast, and that she ought to have a less showy set to match her
      morning costume.
    </p>
    <p>
      But what was most irresistible about Emilia,&mdash;that which we all
      noticed in this interview, and which haunted us all thenceforward,&mdash;was
      a certain wild, entangled look she wore, as of some untamed out-door
      thing, and a kind of pathetic lost sweetness in her voice, which made her
      at once and forever a heroine of romance with the children. Yet she
      scarcely seemed to heed their existence, and only submitted to the kisses
      of Hope and Kate as if that were a part of the price of coming home, and
      she must pay it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Had she been alone, there might have been an awkward pause; for if you
      expect a cousin, and there alights a butterfly of the tropics, what
      hospitality can you offer? But no sense of embarrassment ever came near
      Malbone, especially with the children to swarm over him and claim him for
      their own. Moreover, little Helen got in the first remark in the way of
      serious conversation.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Let me tell him something!&rdquo; said the child. &ldquo;Philip! that doll of mine
      that you used to know, only think! she was sick and died last summer, and
      went into the rag-bag. And the other split down the back, so there was an
      end of her.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Polar ice would have been thawed by this reopening of communication.
      Philip soon had the little maid on his shoulder,&mdash;the natural throne
      of all children,&mdash;and they went in together to greet Aunt Jane.
    </p>
    <p>
      Aunt Jane was the head of the house,&mdash;a lady who had spent more than
      fifty years in educating her brains and battling with her ailments. She
      had received from her parents a considerable inheritance in the way of
      whims, and had nursed it up into a handsome fortune. Being one of the most
      impulsive of human beings, she was naturally one of the most entertaining;
      and behind all her eccentricities there was a fund of the soundest sense
      and the tenderest affection. She had seen much and varied society, had
      been greatly admired in her youth, but had chosen to remain unmarried.
      Obliged by her physical condition to make herself the first object, she
      was saved from utter selfishness by sympathies as democratic as her
      personal habits were exclusive. Unexpected and commonly fantastic in her
      doings, often dismayed by small difficulties, but never by large ones, she
      sagaciously administered the affairs of all those around her,&mdash;planned
      their dinners and their marriages, fought out their bargains and their
      feuds.
    </p>
    <p>
      She hated everything irresolute or vague; people might play at
      cat&rsquo;s-cradle or study Spinoza, just as they pleased; but, whatever they
      did, they must give their minds to it. She kept house from an easy-chair,
      and ruled her dependants with severity tempered by wit, and by the very
      sweetest voice in which reproof was ever uttered. She never praised them,
      but if they did anything particularly well, rebuked them retrospectively,
      asking why they had never done it well before? But she treated them
      munificently, made all manner of plans for their comfort, and they all
      thought her the wisest and wittiest of the human race. So did the youths
      and maidens of her large circle; they all came to see her, and she
      counselled, admired, scolded, and petted them all. She had the gayest
      spirits, and an unerring eye for the ludicrous, and she spoke her mind
      with absolute plainness to all comers. Her intuitions were instantaneous
      as lightning, and, like that, struck very often in the wrong place. She
      was thus extremely unreasonable and altogether charming.
    </p>
    <p>
      Such was the lady whom Emilia and Malbone went up to greet,&mdash;the one
      shyly, the other with an easy assurance, such as she always disliked.
      Emilia submitted to another kiss, while Philip pressed Aunt Jane&rsquo;s hand,
      as he pressed all women&rsquo;s, and they sat down.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Now begin to tell your adventures,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;People always tell their
      adventures till tea is ready.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Who can have any adventures left,&rdquo; said Philip, &ldquo;after such letters as I
      wrote you all?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Of which we got precisely one!&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;That made it such an event,
      after we had wondered in what part of the globe you might be looking for
      the post-office! It was like finding a letter in a bottle, or
      disentangling a person from the Dark Ages.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I was at Neuchatel two months; but I had no adventures. I lodged with a
      good Pasteur, who taught me geology and German.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is suspicious,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Had he a daughter passing fair?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Indeed he had.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;And you taught her English? That is what these beguiling youths always do
      in novels.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What was her name?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Lili.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What a pretty name! How old was she?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She was six.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O Philip!&rdquo; cried Kate; &ldquo;but I might have known it. Did she love you very
      much?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Hope looked up, her eyes full of mild reproach at the possibility of
      doubting any child&rsquo;s love for Philip. He had been her betrothed for more
      than a year, during which time she had habitually seen him wooing every
      child he had met as if it were a woman,&mdash;which, for Philip, was
      saying a great deal. Happily they had in common the one trait of perfect
      amiability, and she knew no more how to be jealous than he to be constant.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Lili was easily won,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Other things being equal, people of six
      prefer that man who is tallest.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Philip is not so very tall,&rdquo; said the eldest of the boys, who was
      listening eagerly, and growing rapidly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Philip, meekly. &ldquo;But then the Pasteur was short, and his
      brother was a dwarf.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;When Lili found that she could reach the ceiling from Mr. Malbone&rsquo;s
      shoulder,&rdquo; said Emilia, &ldquo;she asked no more.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then you knew the pastor&rsquo;s family also, my child,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane,
      looking at her kindly and a little keenly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I was allowed to go there sometimes,&rdquo; she began, timidly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;To meet her American Cousin,&rdquo; interrupted Philip. &ldquo;I got some relaxation
      in the rules of the school. But, Aunt Jane, you have told us nothing about
      your health.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There is nothing to tell,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;I should like, if it were
      convenient, to be a little better. But in this life, if one can walk
      across the floor, and not be an idiot, it is something. That is all I aim
      at.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t it rather tiresome?&rdquo; said Emilia, as the elder lady happened to
      look at her.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not at all,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, composedly. &ldquo;I naturally fall back into
      happiness, when left to myself.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;So you have returned to the house of your fathers,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;I hope
      you like it.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is commonplace in one respect,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;General Washington
      once slept here.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;It is one of that class of houses?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;There is not a village in America that has not half a
      dozen of them, not counting those where he only breakfasted. Did ever man
      sleep like that man? What else could he ever have done? Who governed, I
      wonder, while he was asleep? How he must have travelled! The swiftest
      horse could scarcely have carried him from one of these houses to
      another.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I never was attached to the memory of Washington,&rdquo; meditated Philip; &ldquo;but
      I always thought it was the pear-tree. It must have been that he was such
      a very unsettled person.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;He certainly was not what is called a domestic character,&rdquo; said Aunt
      Jane.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I suppose you are, Miss Maxwell,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;Do you often go out?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Sometimes, to drive,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;Yesterday I went shopping with
      Kate, and sat in the carriage while she bought under-sleeves enough for a
      centipede. It is always so with that child. People talk about the trouble
      of getting a daughter ready to be married; but it is like being married
      once a month to live with her.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I wonder that you take her to drive with you,&rdquo; suggested Philip,
      sympathetically.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is a great deal worse to drive without her,&rdquo; said the impetuous lady.
      &ldquo;She is the only person who lets me enjoy things, and now I cannot enjoy
      them in her absence. Yesterday I drove alone over the three beaches, and
      left her at home with a dress-maker. Never did I see so many lines of
      surf; but they only seemed to me like some of Kate&rsquo;s ball-dresses, with
      the prevailing flounces, six deep. I was so enraged that she was not
      there, I wished to cover my face with my handkerchief. By the third beach
      I was ready for the madhouse.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Is Oldport a pleasant place to live in?&rdquo; asked Emilia, eagerly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is amusing in the summer,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;though the society is
      nothing but a pack of visiting-cards. In winter it is too dull for young
      people, and only suits quiet old women like me, who merely live here to
      keep the Ten Commandments and darn their stockings.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Meantime the children were aiming at Emilia, whose butterfly looks amazed
      and charmed them, but who evidently did not know what to do with their
      eager affection.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I know about you,&rdquo; said little Helen; &ldquo;I know what you said when you were
      little.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Did I say anything?&rdquo; asked Emilia, carelessly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; replied the child, and began to repeat the oft-told domestic
      tradition in an accurate way, as if it were a school lesson. &ldquo;Once you had
      been naughty, and your papa thought it his duty to slap you, and you
      cried; and he told you in French, because he always spoke French with you,
      that he did not punish you for his own pleasure. Then you stopped crying,
      and asked, &lsquo;Pour le plaisir de qui alors?&rsquo; That means &lsquo;For whose pleasure
      then?&rsquo; Hope said it was a droll question for a little girl to ask.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not think it was Emilia who asked that remarkable question, little
      girl,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I dare say it was,&rdquo; said Emilia; &ldquo;I have been asking it all my life.&rdquo; Her
      eyes grew very moist, what with fatigue and excitement. But just then, as
      is apt to happen in this world, they were all suddenly recalled from tears
      to tea, and the children smothered their curiosity in strawberries and
      cream.
    </p>
    <p>
      They sat again beside the western door, after tea. The young moon came
      from a cloud and dropped a broad path of glory upon the bay; a black yacht
      glided noiselessly in, and anchored amid this tract of splendor. The
      shadow of its masts was on the luminous surface, while their reflection
      lay at a different angle, and seemed to penetrate far below. Then the
      departing steamer went flashing across this bright realm with gorgeous
      lustre; its red and green lights were doubled in the paler waves, its four
      reflected chimneys chased each other among the reflected masts. This
      jewelled wonder passing, a single fishing-boat drifted silently by, with
      its one dark sail; and then the moon and the anchored yacht were left
      alone.
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently some of the luggage came from the wharf. Malbone brought out
      presents for everybody; then all the family went to Europe in photographs,
      and with some reluctance came back to America for bed.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      II. PLACE AUX DAMES!
    </h2>
    <p>
      IN every town there is one young maiden who is the universal favorite, who
      belongs to all sets and is made an exception to all family feuds, who is
      the confidante of all girls and the adopted sister of all young men, up to
      the time when they respectively offer themselves to her, and again after
      they are rejected. This post was filled in Oldport, in those days, by my
      cousin Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      Born into the world with many other gifts, this last and least definable
      gift of popularity was added to complete them all. Nobody criticised her,
      nobody was jealous of her, her very rivals lent her their new music and
      their lovers; and her own discarded wooers always sought her to be a
      bridesmaid when they married somebody else.
    </p>
    <p>
      She was one of those persons who seem to have come into the world
      well-dressed. There was an atmosphere of elegance around her, like a
      costume; every attitude implied a presence-chamber or a ball-room. The
      girls complained that in private theatricals no combination of disguises
      could reduce Kate to the ranks, nor give her the &ldquo;make-up&rdquo; of a
      waiting-maid. Yet as her father was a New York merchant of the precarious
      or spasmodic description, she had been used from childhood to the wildest
      fluctuations of wardrobe;&mdash;a year of Paris dresses,&mdash;then
      another year spent in making over ancient finery, that never looked like
      either finery or antiquity when it came from her magic hands. Without a
      particle of vanity or fear, secure in health and good-nature and
      invariable prettiness, she cared little whether the appointed means of
      grace were ancient silk or modern muslin. In her periods of poverty, she
      made no secret of the necessary devices; the other girls, of course,
      guessed them, but her lovers never did, because she always told them.
      There was one particular tarlatan dress of hers which was a sort of local
      institution. It was known to all her companions, like the State House.
      There was a report that she had first worn it at her christening; the
      report originated with herself. The young men knew that she was going to
      the party if she could turn that pink tarlatan once more; but they had
      only the vaguest impression what a tarlatan was, and cared little on which
      side it was worn, so long as Kate was inside.
    </p>
    <p>
      During these epochs of privation her life, in respect to dress, was a
      perpetual Christmas-tree of second-hand gifts. Wealthy aunts supplied her
      with cast-off shoes of all sizes, from two and a half up to five, and she
      used them all. She was reported to have worn one straw hat through five
      changes of fashion. It was averred that, when square crowns were in vogue,
      she flattened it over a tin pan, and that, when round crowns returned, she
      bent it on the bedpost. There was such a charm in her way of adapting
      these treasures, that the other girls liked to test her with new problems
      in the way of millinery and dress-making; millionnaire friends implored
      her to trim their hats, and lent her their own things in order to learn
      how to wear them. This applied especially to certain rich cousins, shy and
      studious girls, who adored her, and to whom society only ceased to be
      alarming when the brilliant Kate took them under her wing, and graciously
      accepted a few of their newest feathers. Well might they acquiesce, for
      she stood by them superbly, and her most favored partners found no way to
      her hand so sure as to dance systematically through that staid sisterhood.
      Dear, sunshiny, gracious, generous Kate!&mdash;who has ever done justice
      to the charm given to this grave old world by the presence of one
      free-hearted and joyous girl?
    </p>
    <p>
      At the time now to be described, however, Kate&rsquo;s purse was well filled;
      and if she wore only second-best finery, it was because she had lent her
      very best to somebody else. All that her doting father asked was to pay
      for her dresses, and to see her wear them; and if her friends wore a part
      of them, it only made necessary a larger wardrobe, and more varied and
      pleasurable shopping. She was as good a manager in wealth as in poverty,
      wasted nothing, took exquisite care of everything, and saved faithfully
      for some one else all that was not needed for her own pretty person.
    </p>
    <p>
      Pretty she was throughout, from the parting of her jet-black hair to the
      high instep of her slender foot; a glancing, brilliant, brunette beauty,
      with the piquant charm of perpetual spirits, and the equipoise of a
      perfectly healthy nature. She was altogether graceful, yet she had not the
      fresh, free grace of her cousin Hope, who was lithe and strong as a
      hawthorne spray: Kate&rsquo;s was the narrower grace of culture grown
      hereditary, an in-door elegance that was born in her, and of which
      dancing-school was but the natural development. You could not picture Hope
      to your mind in one position more than in another; she had an endless
      variety of easy motion. When you thought of Kate, you remembered precisely
      how she sat, how she stood, and how she walked. That was all, and it was
      always the same. But is not that enough? We do not ask of Mary Stuart&rsquo;s
      portrait that it should represent her in more than one attitude, and why
      should a living beauty need more than two or three?
    </p>
    <p>
      Kate was betrothed to her cousin Harry, Hope&rsquo;s brother, and, though she
      was barely twenty, they had seemed to appertain to each other for a time
      so long that the memory of man or maiden aunt ran not to the contrary. She
      always declared, indeed, that they were born married, and that their
      wedding-day would seem like a silver wedding. Harry was quiet,
      unobtrusive, and manly. He might seem commonplace at first beside the
      brilliant Kate and his more gifted sister; but thorough manhood is never
      commonplace, and he was a person to whom one could anchor. His strong,
      steadfast physique was the type of his whole nature; when he came into the
      room, you felt as if a good many people had been added to the company. He
      made steady progress in his profession of the law, through sheer worth; he
      never dazzled, but he led. His type was pure Saxon, with short, curling
      hair, blue eyes, and thin, fair skin, to which the color readily mounted.
      Up to a certain point he was imperturbably patient and amiable, but, when
      overtaxed, was fiery and impetuous for a single instant, and no more. It
      seemed as if a sudden flash of anger went over him, like the flash that
      glides along the glutinous stem of the fraxinella, when you touch it with
      a candle; the next moment it had utterly vanished, and was forgotten as if
      it had never been.
    </p>
    <p>
      Kate&rsquo;s love for her lover was one of those healthy and assured ties that
      often outlast the ardors of more passionate natures. For other
      temperaments it might have been inadequate; but theirs matched perfectly,
      and it was all sufficient for them. If there was within Kate&rsquo;s range a
      more heroic and ardent emotion than that inspired by Harry, it was put
      forth toward Hope. This was her idolatry; she always said that it was
      fortunate Hope was Hal&rsquo;s sister, or she should have felt it her duty to
      give them to each other, and not die till the wedding was accomplished.
      Harry shared this adoration to quite a reasonable extent, for a brother;
      but his admiration for Philip Malbone was one that Kate did not quite
      share. Harry&rsquo;s quieter mood had been dazzled from childhood by Philip, who
      had always been a privileged guest in the household. Kate&rsquo;s clear,
      penetrating, buoyant nature had divined Phil&rsquo;s weaknesses, and had
      sometimes laughed at them, even from her childhood; though she did not
      dislike him, for she did not dislike anybody. But Harry was magnetized by
      him very much as women were; believed him true, because he was tender, and
      called him only fastidious where Kate called him lazy.
    </p>
    <p>
      Kate was spending that summer with her aunt Jane, whose especial pet and
      pride she was. Hope was spending there the summer vacation of a Normal
      School in which she had just become a teacher. Her father had shared in
      the family ups and downs, but had finally stayed down, while the rest had
      remained up. Fortunately, his elder children were indifferent to this, and
      indeed rather preferred it; it was a tradition that Hope had expressed the
      wish, when a child, that her father might lose his property, so that she
      could become a teacher. As for Harry, he infinitely preferred the drudgery
      of a law office to that of a gentleman of leisure; and as for their
      step-mother, it turned out, when she was left a widow, that she had
      secured for herself and Emilia whatever property remained, so that she
      suffered only the delightful need of living in Europe for economy.
    </p>
    <p>
      The elder brother and sister had alike that fine physical vigor which New
      England is now developing, just in time to save it from decay. Hope was of
      Saxon type, though a shade less blonde than her brother; she was a little
      taller, and of more commanding presence, with a peculiarly noble carriage
      of the shoulders. Her brow was sometimes criticised as being a little too
      full for a woman; but her nose was straight, her mouth and teeth
      beautiful, and her profile almost perfect. Her complexion had lost by
      out-door life something of its delicacy, but had gained a freshness and
      firmness that no sunlight could impair. She had that wealth of hair which
      young girls find the most enviable point of beauty in each other. Hers
      reached below her knees, when loosened, or else lay coiled, in munificent
      braids of gold, full of sparkling lights and contrasted shadows, upon her
      queenly head.
    </p>
    <p>
      Her eyes were much darker than her hair, and had a way of opening naively
      and suddenly, with a perfectly infantine expression, as if she at that
      moment saw the sunlight for the first time. Her long lashes were somewhat
      like Emilia&rsquo;s, and she had the same deeply curved eyebrows; in no other
      point was there a shade of resemblance between the half-sisters. As
      compared with Kate, Hope showed a more abundant physical life; there was
      more blood in her; she had ampler outlines, and health more absolutely
      unvaried, for she had yet to know the experience of a day&rsquo;s illness. Kate
      seemed born to tread upon a Brussels carpet, and Hope on the softer luxury
      of the forest floor. Out of doors her vigor became a sort of ecstasy, and
      she walked the earth with a jubilee of the senses, such as Browning
      attributes to his Saul.
    </p>
    <p>
      This inexhaustible freshness of physical organization seemed to open the
      windows of her soul, and make for her a new heaven and earth every day. It
      gave also a peculiar and almost embarrassing directness to her mental
      processes, and suggested in them a sort of final and absolute value, as if
      truth had for the first time found a perfectly translucent medium. It was
      not so much that she said rare things, but her very silence was eloquent,
      and there was a great deal of it. Her girlhood had in it a certain dignity
      as of a virgin priestess or sibyl. Yet her hearty sympathies and her
      healthy energy made her at home in daily life, and in a democratic
      society. To Kate, for instance, she was a necessity of existence, like
      light or air. Kate&rsquo;s nature was limited; part of her graceful equipoise
      was narrowness. Hope was capable of far more self-abandonment to a
      controlling emotion, and, if she ever erred, would err more widely, for it
      would be because the whole power of her conscience was misdirected. &ldquo;Once
      let her take wrong for right,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;and stop her if you can;
      these born saints give a great deal more trouble than children of this
      world, like my Kate.&rdquo; Yet in daily life Hope yielded to her cousin nine
      times out of ten; but the tenth time was the key to the situation. Hope
      loved Kate devotedly; but Kate believed in her as the hunted fugitive
      believes in the north star.
    </p>
    <p>
      To these maidens, thus united, came Emilia home from Europe. The father of
      Harry and Hope had been lured into a second marriage with Emilia&rsquo;s mother,
      a charming and unscrupulous woman, born with an American body and a French
      soul. She having once won him to Paris, held him there life-long, and kept
      her step-children at a safe distance. She arranged that, even after her
      own death, her daughter should still remain abroad for education; nor was
      Emilia ordered back until she brought down some scandal by a romantic
      attempt to elope from boarding-school with a Swiss servant. It was by
      weaning her heart from this man that Philip Malbone had earned the thanks
      of the whole household during his hasty flight through Europe. He
      possessed some skill in withdrawing the female heart from an undesirable
      attachment, though it was apt to be done by substituting another. It was
      fortunate that, in this case, no fears could be entertained. Since his
      engagement Philip had not permitted himself so much as a flirtation; he
      and Hope were to be married soon; he loved and admired her heartily, and
      had an indifference to her want of fortune that was quite amazing, when we
      consider that he had a fortune of his own.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      III. A DRIVE ON THE AVENUE.
    </h2>
    <p>
      OLDPORT AVENUE is a place where a great many carriages may be seen driving
      so slowly that they might almost be photographed without halting, and
      where their occupants already wear the dismal expression which befits that
      process. In these fine vehicles, following each other in an endless file,
      one sees such faces as used to be exhibited in ball-rooms during the
      performance of quadrilles, before round dances came in,&mdash;faces marked
      by the renunciation of all human joy. Sometimes a faint suspicion suggests
      itself on the Avenue, that these torpid countenances might be roused to
      life, in case some horse should run away. But that one chance never
      occurs; the riders may not yet be toned down into perfect breeding, but
      the horses are. I do not know what could ever break the gloom of this
      joyless procession, were it not that youth and beauty are always in
      fashion, and one sometimes meets an exceptional barouche full of boys and
      girls, who could absolutely be no happier if they were a thousand miles
      away from the best society. And such a joyous company were our four youths
      and maidens when they went to drive that day, Emilia being left at home to
      rest after the fatigues of the voyage.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What beautiful horses!&rdquo; was Hope&rsquo;s first exclamation. &ldquo;What grave
      people!&rdquo; was her second.
    </p>
<pre xml:space="preserve">
          &ldquo;What though in solemn silence all
            Roll round&mdash;&rdquo;
 </pre>
    <p>
      quoted Philip.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope is thinking,&rdquo; said Harry, &ldquo;whether &lsquo;in reason&rsquo;s ear they all
      rejoice.&rsquo;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;How COULD you know that?&rdquo; said she, opening her eyes.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;One thing always strikes me,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;The sentence of stupefaction
      does not seem to be enforced till after five-and-twenty. That young lady
      we just met looked quite lively and juvenile last year, I remember, and
      now she has graduated into a dowager.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Like little Helen&rsquo;s kitten,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;She justly remarks that, since
      I saw it last, it is all spoiled into a great big cat.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Those must be snobs,&rdquo; said Harry, as a carriage with unusually gorgeous
      liveries rolled by.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I suppose so,&rdquo; said Malbone, indifferently. &ldquo;In Oldport we call all
      new-comers snobs, you know, till they have invited us to their grand ball.
      Then we go to it, and afterwards speak well of them, and only abuse their
      wine.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;How do you know them for new-comers?&rdquo; asked Hope, looking after the
      carriage.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;By their improperly intelligent expression,&rdquo; returned Phil. &ldquo;They look
      around them as you do, my child, with the air of wide-awake curiosity
      which marks the American traveller. That is out of place here. The Avenue
      abhors everything but a vacuum.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I never can find out,&rdquo; continued Hope, &ldquo;how people recognize each other
      here. They do not look at each other, unless they know each other: and how
      are they to know if they know, unless they look first?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It seems an embarrassment,&rdquo; said Malbone. &ldquo;But it is supposed that
      fashion perforates the eyelids and looks through. If you attempt it in any
      other way, you are lost. Newly arrived people look about them, and, the
      more new wealth they have, the more they gaze. The men are uneasy behind
      their recently educated mustaches, and the women hold their parasols with
      trembling hands. It takes two years to learn to drive on the Avenue. Come
      again next summer, and you will see in those same carriages faces of
      remote superciliousness, that suggest generations of gout and ancestors.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What a pity one feels,&rdquo; said Harry, &ldquo;for these people who still suffer
      from lingering modesty, and need a master to teach them to be insolent!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They learn it soon enough,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Philip is right. Fashion lies in
      the eye. People fix their own position by the way they don&rsquo;t look at you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There is a certain indifference of manner,&rdquo; philosophized Malbone,
      &ldquo;before which ingenuous youth is crushed. I may know that a man can hardly
      read or write, and that his father was a ragpicker till one day he picked
      up bank-notes for a million. No matter. If he does not take the trouble to
      look at me, I must look reverentially at him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Here is somebody who will look at Hope,&rdquo; cried Kate, suddenly.
    </p>
    <p>
      A carriage passed, bearing a young lady with fair hair, and a keen, bright
      look, talking eagerly to a small and quiet youth beside her.
    </p>
    <p>
      Her face brightened still more as she caught the eye of Hope, whose face
      lighted up in return, and who then sank back with a sort of sigh of
      relief, as if she had at last seen somebody she cared for. The lady waved
      an un-gloved hand, and drove by.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Who is that?&rdquo; asked Philip, eagerly. He was used to knowing every one.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope&rsquo;s pet,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;and she who pets Hope, Lady Antwerp.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Is it possible?&rdquo; said Malbone. &ldquo;That young creature? I fancied her
      ladyship in spectacles, with little side curls. Men speak of her with such
      dismay.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;she asks them sensible questions.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is bad,&rdquo; admitted Philip. &ldquo;Nothing exasperates fashionable Americans
      like a really intelligent foreigner. They feel as Sydney Smith says the
      English clergy felt about Elizabeth Fry; she disturbs their repose, and
      gives rise to distressing comparisons,&mdash;they long to burn her alive.
      It is not their notion of a countess.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am sure it was not mine,&rdquo; said Hope; &ldquo;I can hardly remember that she is
      one; I only know that I like her, she is so simple and intelligent. She
      might be a girl from a Normal School.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is because you are just that,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;that she likes you. She
      came here supposing that we had all been at such schools. Then she
      complained of us,&mdash;us girls in what we call good society, I mean,&mdash;because,
      as she more than hinted, we did not seem to know anything.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Some of the mothers were angry,&rdquo; said Hope. &ldquo;But Aunt Jane told her that
      it was perfectly true, and that her ladyship had not yet seen the
      best-educated girls in America, who were generally the daughters of old
      ministers and well-to-do shopkeepers in small New England towns, Aunt Jane
      said.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;she said that the best of those girls went to High
      Schools and Normal Schools, and learned things thoroughly, you know; but
      that we were only taught at boarding-schools and by governesses, and came
      out at eighteen, and what could we know? Then came Hope, who had been at
      those schools, and was the child of refined people too, and Lady Antwerp
      was perfectly satisfied.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Especially,&rdquo; said Hope, &ldquo;when Aunt Jane told her that, after all, schools
      did not do very much good, for if people were born stupid they only became
      more tiresome by schooling. She said that she had forgotten all she
      learned at school except the boundaries of ancient Cappadocia.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Aunt Jane&rsquo;s fearless sayings always passed current among her nieces; and
      they drove on, Hope not being lowered in Philip&rsquo;s estimation, nor raised
      in her own, by being the pet of a passing countess.
    </p>
    <p>
      Who would not be charmed (he thought to himself) by this noble girl, who
      walks the earth fresh and strong as a Greek goddess, pure as Diana,
      stately as Juno? She belongs to the unspoiled womanhood of another age,
      and is wasted among these dolls and butterflies.
    </p>
    <p>
      He looked at her. She sat erect and graceful, unable to droop into the
      debility of fashionable reclining,&mdash;her breezy hair lifted a little
      by the soft wind, her face flushed, her full brown eyes looking eagerly
      about, her mouth smiling happily. To be with those she loved best, and to
      be driving over the beautiful earth! She was so happy that no mob of
      fashionables could have lessened her enjoyment, or made her for a moment
      conscious that anybody looked at her. The brilliant equipages which they
      met each moment were not wholly uninteresting even to her, for her
      affections went forth to some of the riders and to all the horses. She was
      as well contented at that moment, on the glittering Avenue, as if they had
      all been riding home through country lanes, and in constant peril of being
      jolted out among the whortleberry-bushes.
    </p>
    <p>
      Her face brightened yet more as they met a carriage containing a graceful
      lady dressed with that exquisiteness of taste that charms both man and
      woman, even if no man can analyze and no woman rival its effect. She had a
      perfectly high-bred look, and an eye that in an instant would calculate
      one&rsquo;s ancestors as far back as Nebuchadnezzar, and bow to them all
      together. She smiled good-naturedly on Hope, and kissed her hand to Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;So, Hope,&rdquo; said Philip, &ldquo;you are bent on teaching music to Mrs.
      Meredith&rsquo;s children.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Indeed I am!&rdquo; said Hope, eagerly. &ldquo;O Philip, I shall enjoy it so! I do
      not care so very much about her, but she has dear little girls. And you
      know I am a born drudge. I have not been working hard enough to enjoy an
      entire vacation, but I shall be so very happy here if I can have some real
      work for an hour or two every other day.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope,&rdquo; said Philip, gravely, &ldquo;look steadily at these people whom we are
      meeting, and reflect. Should you like to have them say, &lsquo;There goes Mrs.
      Meredith&rsquo;s music teacher&rsquo;?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; said Hope, with surprise. &ldquo;The children are young, and it is
      not very presumptuous. I ought to know enough for that.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Malbone looked at Kate, who smiled with delight, and put her hand on that
      of Hope. Indeed, she kept it there so long that one or two passing ladies
      stopped their salutations in mid career, and actually looked after them in
      amazement at their attitude, as who should say, &ldquo;What a very mixed
      society!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      So they drove on,&mdash;meeting four-in-hands, and tandems, and
      donkey-carts, and a goat-cart, and basket-wagons driven by pretty girls,
      with uncomfortable youths in or out of livery behind. They met, had they
      but known it, many who were aiming at notoriety, and some who had it; many
      who looked contented with their lot, and some who actually were so. They
      met some who put on courtesy and grace with their kid gloves, and laid
      away those virtues in their glove-boxes afterwards; while to others the
      mere consciousness of kid gloves brought uneasiness, redness of the face,
      and a general impression of being all made of hands. They met the four
      white horses of an ex-harness-maker, and the superb harnesses of an
      ex-horse-dealer. Behind these came the gayest and most plebeian equipage
      of all, a party of journeymen carpenters returning from their work in a
      four-horse wagon. Their only fit compeers were an Italian opera-troupe,
      who were chatting and gesticulating on the piazza of the great hotel, and
      planning, amid jest and laughter, their future campaigns. Their work
      seemed like play, while the play around them seemed like work. Indeed,
      most people on the Avenue seemed to be happy in inverse ratio to their
      income list.
    </p>
    <p>
      As our youths and maidens passed the hotel, a group of French naval
      officers strolled forth, some of whom had a good deal of inexplicable gold
      lace dangling in festoons from their shoulders,&mdash;&ldquo;topsail halyards&rdquo;
       the American midshipmen called them. Philip looked hard at one of these
      gentlemen.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I have seen that young fellow before,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;or his twin brother. But
      who can swear to the personal identity of a Frenchman?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      IV. AUNT JANE DEFINES HER POSITION.
    </h2>
    <p>
      THE next morning had that luminous morning haze, not quite dense enough to
      be called a fog, which is often so lovely in Oldport. It was perfectly
      still; the tide swelled and swelled till it touched the edge of the green
      lawn behind the house, and seemed ready to submerge the slender pier; the
      water looked at first like glass, till closer gaze revealed long sinuous
      undulations, as if from unseen water-snakes beneath. A few rags of
      storm-cloud lay over the half-seen hills beyond the bay, and behind them
      came little mutterings of thunder, now here, now there, as if some wild
      creature were roaming up and down, dissatisfied, in the shelter of the
      clouds. The pale haze extended into the foreground, and half veiled the
      schooners that lay at anchor with their sails up. It was sultry, and there
      was something in the atmosphere that at once threatened and soothed.
      Sometimes a few drops dimpled the water and then ceased; the muttering
      creature in the sky moved northward and grew still. It was a day when
      every one would be tempted to go out rowing, but when only lovers would
      go. Philip and Hope went.
    </p>
    <p>
      Kate and Harry, meanwhile, awaited their opportunity to go in and visit
      Aunt Jane. This was a thing that never could be done till near noon,
      because that dear lady was very deliberate in her morning habits, and
      always averred that she had never seen the sun rise except in a panorama.
      She hated to be hurried in dressing, too; for she was accustomed to say
      that she must have leisure to understand herself, and this was clearly an
      affair of time.
    </p>
    <p>
      But she was never more charming than when, after dressing and breakfasting
      in seclusion, and then vigilantly watching her handmaiden through the
      necessary dustings and arrangements, she sat at last, with her affairs in
      order, to await events. Every day she expected something entirely new to
      happen, and was never disappointed. For she herself always happened, if
      nothing else did; she could no more repeat herself than the sunrise can;
      and the liveliest visitor always carried away something fresher and more
      remarkable than he brought.
    </p>
    <p>
      Her book that morning had displeased her, and she was boiling with
      indignation against its author.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am reading a book so dry,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;it makes me cough. No wonder
      there was a drought last summer. It was printed then. Worcester&rsquo;s
      Geography seems in my memory as fascinating as Shakespeare, when I look
      back upon it from this book. How can a man write such a thing and live?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Perhaps he lived by writing it,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Perhaps it was the best he could do,&rdquo; added the more literal Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It certainly was not the best he could do, for he might have died,&mdash;died
      instead of dried. O, I should like to prick that man with something sharp,
      and see if sawdust did not run out of him! Kate, ask the bookseller to let
      me know if he ever really dies, and then life may seem fresh again.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; asked Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Somebody&rsquo;s memoirs,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;Was there no man left worth writing
      about, that they should make a biography about this one? It is like a life
      of Napoleon with all the battles left out. They are conceited enough to
      put his age in the upper corner of each page too, as if anybody cared how
      old he was.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Such pretty covers!&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;It is too bad.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;I mean to send them back and have new leaves put
      in. These are so wretched, there is not a teakettle in the land so
      insignificant that it would boil over them. Don&rsquo;t let us talk any more
      about it. Have Philip and Hope gone out upon the water?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes, dear,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Did Ruth tell you?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;When did that aimless infant ever tell anything?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then how did you know it?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;If I waited for knowledge till that sweet-tempered parrot chose to tell
      me,&rdquo; Aunt Jane went on, &ldquo;I should be even more foolish than I am.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then how did you know?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Of course I heard the boat hauled down, and of course I knew that none
      but lovers would go out just before a thunder-storm. Then you and Harry
      came in, and I knew it was the others.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Aunt Jane,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;you divine everything: what a brain you have!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Brain! it is nothing but a collection of shreds, like a little girl&rsquo;s
      work-basket,&mdash;a scrap of blue silk and a bit of white muslin.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Now she is fishing for compliments,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;and she shall have one.
      She was very sweet and good to Philip last night.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I know it,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, with a groan. &ldquo;I waked in the night and
      thought about it. I was awake a great deal last night. I have heard cocks
      crowing all my life, but I never knew what that creature could accomplish
      before. So I lay and thought how good and forgiving I was; it was quite
      distressing.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Remorse?&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes, indeed. I hate to be a saint all the time. There ought to be
      vacations. Instead of suffering from a bad conscience, I suffer from a
      good one.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It was no merit of yours, aunt,&rdquo; put in Harry. &ldquo;Who was ever more
      agreeable and lovable than Malbone last night?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Lovable!&rdquo; burst out Aunt Jane, who never could be managed or manipulated
      by anybody but Kate, and who often rebelled against Harry&rsquo;s blunt
      assertions. &ldquo;Of course he is lovable, and that is why I dislike him. His
      father was so before him. That is the worst of it. I never in my life saw
      any harm done by a villain; I wish I could. All the mischief in this world
      is done by lovable people. Thank Heaven, nobody ever dared to call me
      lovable!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I should like to see any one dare call you anything else,&mdash;you dear,
      old, soft-hearted darling!&rdquo; interposed Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But, aunt,&rdquo; persisted Harry, &ldquo;if you only knew what the mass of young men
      are&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t I?&rdquo; interrupted the impetuous lady. &ldquo;What is there that is not
      known to any woman who has common sense, and eyes enough to look out of a
      window?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;If you only knew,&rdquo; Harry went on, &ldquo;how superior Phil Malbone is, in his
      whole tone, to any fellow of my acquaintance.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Lord help the rest!&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;Philip has a sort of refinement
      instead of principles, and a heart instead of a conscience,&mdash;just
      heart enough to keep himself happy and everybody else miserable.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do you mean to say,&rdquo; asked the obstinate Hal, &ldquo;that there is no
      difference between refinement and coarseness?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes, there is,&rdquo; she said.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Well, which is best?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Coarseness is safer by a great deal,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;in the hands of a
      man like Philip. What harm can that swearing coachman do, I should like to
      know, in the street yonder? To be sure it is very unpleasant, and I wonder
      they let people swear so, except, perhaps, in waste places outside the
      town; but that is his way of expressing himself, and he only frightens
      people, after all.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Which Philip does not,&rdquo; said Hal.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Exactly. That is the danger. He frightens nobody, not even himself, when
      he ought to wear a label round his neck marked &lsquo;Dangerous,&rsquo; such as they
      have at other places where it is slippery and brittle. When he is here, I
      keep saying to myself, &lsquo;Too smooth, too smooth!&rsquo;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Aunt Jane,&rdquo; said Harry, gravely, &ldquo;I know Malbone very well, and I never
      knew any man whom it was more unjust to call a hypocrite.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Did I say he was a hypocrite?&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;He is worse than that; at
      least, more really dangerous. It is these high-strung sentimentalists who
      do all the mischief; who play on their own lovely emotions, forsooth, till
      they wear out those fine fiddlestrings, and then have nothing left but the
      flesh and the D. Don&rsquo;t tell me!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do stop, auntie,&rdquo; interposed Kate, quite alarmed, &ldquo;you are really worse
      than a coachman. You are growing very profane indeed.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I have a much harder time than any coachman, Kate,&rdquo; retorted the injured
      lady. &ldquo;Nobody tries to stop him, and you are always hushing me up.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hushing you up, darling?&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;When we only spoil you by praising
      and quoting everything you say.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Only when it amuses you,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;So long as I sit and cry my
      eyes out over a book, you all love me, and when I talk nonsense, you are
      ready to encourage it; but when I begin to utter a little sense, you all
      want to silence me, or else run out of the room! Yesterday I read about a
      newspaper somewhere, called the &lsquo;Daily Evening Voice&rsquo;; I wish you would
      allow me a daily morning voice.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do not interfere, Kate,&rdquo; said Hal. &ldquo;Aunt Jane and I only wish to
      understand each other.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am sure we don&rsquo;t,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane; &ldquo;I have no desire to understand you,
      and you never will understand me till you comprehend Philip.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Let us agree on one thing,&rdquo; Harry said. &ldquo;Surely, aunt, you know how he
      loves Hope?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Aunt Jane approached a degree nearer the equator, and said, gently, &ldquo;I
      fear I do.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Fear?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes, fear. That is just what troubles me. I know precisely how he loves
      her. Il se laisse aimer. Philip likes to be petted, as much as any cat,
      and, while he will purr, Hope is happy. Very few men accept idolatry with
      any degree of grace, but he unfortunately does.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Unfortunately?&rdquo; remonstrated Hal, as far as ever from being satisfied.
      &ldquo;This is really too bad. You never will do him any justice.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Ah?&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, chilling again, &ldquo;I thought I did. I observe he is
      very much afraid of me, and there seems to be no other reason.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;The real trouble is,&rdquo; said Harry, after a pause, &ldquo;that you doubt his
      constancy.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What do you call constancy?&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;Kissing a woman&rsquo;s picture ten
      years after a man has broken her heart? Philip Malbone has that kind of
      constancy, and so had his father before him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      This was too much for Harry, who was making for the door in indignation,
      when little Ruth came in with Aunt Jane&rsquo;s luncheon, and that lady was soon
      absorbed in the hopeless task of keeping her handmaiden&rsquo;s pretty blue and
      white gingham sleeve out of the butter-plate.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      V. A MULTIVALVE HEART.
    </h2>
    <p>
      PHILIP MALBONE had that perfectly sunny temperament which is peculiarly
      captivating among Americans, because it is so rare. He liked everybody and
      everybody liked him; he had a thousand ways of affording pleasure, and he
      received it in the giving. He had a personal beauty, which, strange to
      say, was recognized by both sexes,&mdash;for handsome men must often
      consent to be mildly hated by their own. He had travelled much, and had
      mingled in very varied society; he had a moderate fortune, no vices, no
      ambition, and no capacity of ennui.
    </p>
    <p>
      He was fastidious and over-critical, it might be, in his theories, but in
      practice he was easily suited and never vexed.
    </p>
    <p>
      He liked travelling, and he liked staying at home; he was so continually
      occupied as to give an apparent activity to all his life, and yet he was
      never too busy to be interrupted, especially if the intruder were a woman
      or a child. He liked to be with people of his own age, whatever their
      condition; he also liked old people because they were old, and children
      because they were young. In travelling by rail, he would woo crying babies
      out of their mothers&rsquo; arms, and still them; it was always his back that
      Irishwomen thumped, to ask if they must get out at the next station; and
      he might be seen handing out decrepit paupers, as if they were of royal
      blood and bore concealed sceptres in their old umbrellas. Exquisitely nice
      in his personal habits, he had the practical democracy of a good-natured
      young prince; he had never yet seen a human being who awed him, nor one
      whom he had the slightest wish to awe. His courtesy, had, therefore, that
      comprehensiveness which we call republican, though it was really the least
      republican thing about him. All felt its attraction; there was really no
      one who disliked him, except Aunt Jane; and even she admitted that he was
      the only person who knew how to cut her lead-pencil.
    </p>
    <p>
      That cheerful English premier who thought that any man ought to find
      happiness enough in walking London streets and looking at the lobsters in
      the fish-markets, was not more easily satisfied than Malbone. He liked to
      observe the groups of boys fishing at the wharves, or to hear the chat of
      their fathers about coral-reefs and penguins&rsquo; eggs; or to sketch the
      fisher&rsquo;s little daughter awaiting her father at night on some deserted and
      crumbling wharf, his blue pea-jacket over her fair ring-leted head, and a
      great cat standing by with tail uplifted, her sole protector. He liked the
      luxurious indolence of yachting, and he liked as well to float in his
      wherry among the fleet of fishing schooners getting under way after a
      three days&rsquo; storm, each vessel slipping out in turn from the closely
      packed crowd, and spreading its white wings for flight. He liked to watch
      the groups of negro boys and girls strolling by the window at evening, and
      strumming on the banjo,&mdash;the only vestige of tropical life that
      haunts our busy Northern zone. But he liked just as well to note the ways
      of well-dressed girls and boys at croquet parties, or to sit at the club
      window and hear the gossip. He was a jewel of a listener, and was not
      easily bored even when Philadelphians talked about families, or New
      Yorkers about bargains, or Bostonians about books. A man who has not one
      absorbing aim can get a great many miscellaneous things into each
      twenty-four hours; and there was not a day in which Philip did not make
      himself agreeable and useful to many people, receive many confidences, and
      give much good-humored advice about matters of which he knew nothing. His
      friends&rsquo; children ran after him in the street, and he knew the pet
      theories and wines of elderly gentlemen. He said that he won their hearts
      by remembering every occurrence in their lives except their birthdays.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was, perhaps, no drawback on the popularity of Philip Malbone that he
      had been for some ten years reproached as a systematic flirt by all women
      with whom he did not happen at the moment to be flirting. The reproach was
      unjust; he had never done anything systematically in his life; it was his
      temperament that flirted, not his will. He simply had that most perilous
      of all seductive natures, in which the seducer is himself seduced. With a
      personal refinement that almost amounted to purity, he was constantly
      drifting into loves more profoundly perilous than if they had belonged to
      a grosser man. Almost all women loved him, because he loved almost all; he
      never had to assume an ardor, for he always felt it. His heart was
      multivalve; he could love a dozen at once in various modes and gradations,
      press a dozen hands in a day, gaze into a dozen pair of eyes with
      unfeigned tenderness; while the last pair wept for him, he was looking
      into the next. In truth, he loved to explore those sweet depths; humanity
      is the highest thing to investigate, he said, and the proper study of
      mankind is woman. Woman needs to be studied while under the influence of
      emotion; let us therefore have the emotions. This was the reason he gave
      to himself; but this refined Mormonism of the heart was not based on
      reason, but on temperament and habit. In such matters logic is only for
      the by-standers.
    </p>
    <p>
      His very generosity harmed him, as all our good qualities may harm us when
      linked with bad ones; he had so many excuses for doing kindnesses to his
      friends, it was hard to quarrel with him if he did them too tenderly. He
      was no more capable of unkindness than of constancy; and so strongly did
      he fix the allegiance of those who loved him, that the women to whom he
      had caused most anguish would still defend him when accused; would have
      crossed the continent, if needed, to nurse him in illness, and would have
      rained rivers of tears on his grave. To do him justice, he would have done
      almost as much for them,&mdash;for any of them. He could torture a devoted
      heart, but only through a sort of half-wilful unconsciousness; he could
      not bear to see tears shed in his presence, nor to let his imagination
      dwell very much on those which flowed in his absence. When he had once
      loved a woman, or even fancied that he loved her, he built for her a
      shrine that was never dismantled, and in which a very little faint incense
      would sometimes be found burning for years after; he never quite ceased to
      feel a languid thrill at the mention of her name; he would make even for a
      past love the most generous sacrifices of time, convenience, truth
      perhaps,&mdash;everything, in short, but the present love. To those who
      had given him all that an undivided heart can give he would deny nothing
      but an undivided heart in return. The misfortune was that this was the
      only thing they cared to possess.
    </p>
    <p>
      This abundant and spontaneous feeling gave him an air of earnestness,
      without which he could not have charmed any woman, and, least of all, one
      like Hope. No woman really loves a trifler; she must at least convince
      herself that he who trifles with others is serious with her. Philip was
      never quite serious and never quite otherwise; he never deliberately got
      up a passion, for it was never needful; he simply found an object for his
      emotions, opened their valves, and then watched their flow. To love a
      charming woman in her presence is no test of genuine passion; let us know
      how much you long for her in absence. This longing had never yet seriously
      troubled Malbone, provided there was another charming person within an
      easy walk.
    </p>
    <p>
      If it was sometimes forced upon him that all this ended in anguish to some
      of these various charmers, first or last, then there was always in reserve
      the pleasure of repentance. He was very winning and generous in his
      repentances, and he enjoyed them so much they were often repeated. He did
      not pass for a weak person, and he was not exactly weak; but he spent his
      life in putting away temptations with one hand and pulling them back with
      the other. There was for him something piquant in being thus neither
      innocent nor guilty, but always on some delicious middle ground. He loved
      dearly to skate on thin ice,&mdash;that was the trouble,&mdash;especially
      where he fancied the water to be just within his depth. Unluckily the sea
      of life deepens rather fast.
    </p>
    <p>
      Malbone had known Hope from her childhood, as he had known her cousins,
      but their love dated from their meetings beside the sickbed of his mother,
      over whom he had watched with unstinted devotion for weary months. She had
      been very fond of the young girl, and her last earthly act was to place
      Hope&rsquo;s hand in Philip&rsquo;s. Long before this final consecration, Hope had won
      his heart more thoroughly, he fancied, than any woman he had ever seen.
      The secret of this crowning charm was, perhaps, that she was a new
      sensation. He had prided himself on his knowledge of her sex, and yet here
      was a wholly new species. He was acquainted with the women of society, and
      with the women who only wished to be in society. But here was one who was
      in the chrysalis, and had never been a grub, and had no wish to be a
      butterfly, and what should he make of her? He was like a student of
      insects who had never seen a bee. Never had he known a young girl who
      cared for the things which this maiden sought, or who was not dazzled by
      things to which Hope seemed perfectly indifferent. She was not a devotee,
      she was not a prude; people seemed to amuse and interest her; she liked
      them, she declared, as much as she liked books. But this very way of
      putting the thing seemed like inverting the accustomed order of affairs in
      the polite world, and was of itself a novelty.
    </p>
    <p>
      Of course he had previously taken his turn for a while among Kate&rsquo;s
      admirers; but it was when she was very young, and, moreover, it was hard
      to get up anything like a tender and confidential relation with that frank
      maiden; she never would have accepted Philip Malbone for herself, and she
      was by no means satisfied with his betrothal to her best beloved. But that
      Hope loved him ardently there was no doubt, however it might be explained.
      Perhaps it was some law of opposites, and she needed some one of lighter
      nature than her own. As her resolute purpose charmed him, so she may have
      found a certain fascination in the airy way in which he took hold on life;
      he was so full of thought and intelligence; possessing infinite leisure,
      and yet incapable of ennui; ready to oblige every one, and doing so many
      kind acts at so little personal sacrifice; always easy, graceful, lovable,
      and kind. In her just indignation at those who called him heartless, she
      forgot to notice that his heart was not deep. He was interested in all her
      pursuits, could aid her in all her studies, suggest schemes for her
      benevolent desires, and could then make others work for her, and even work
      himself. People usually loved Philip, even while they criticised him; but
      Hope loved him first, and then could not criticise him at all.
    </p>
    <p>
      Nature seems always planning to equalize characters, and to protect our
      friends from growing too perfect for our deserts. Love, for instance, is
      apt to strengthen the weak, and yet sometimes weakens the strong. Under
      its influence Hope sometimes appeared at disadvantage. Had the object of
      her love been indifferent, the result might have been otherwise, but her
      ample nature apparently needed to contract itself a little, to find room
      within Philip&rsquo;s heart. Not that in his presence she became vain or petty
      or jealous; that would have been impossible. She only grew credulous and
      absorbed and blind. A kind of gentle obstinacy, too, developed itself in
      her nature, and all suggestion of defects in him fell off from her as from
      a marble image of Faith. If he said or did anything, there was no appeal;
      that was settled, let us pass to something else.
    </p>
    <p>
      I almost blush to admit that Aunt Jane&mdash;of whom it could by no means
      be asserted that she was a saintly lady, but only a very charming one&mdash;rather
      rejoiced in this transformation.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I like it better, my dear,&rdquo; she said, with her usual frankness, to Kate.
      &ldquo;Hope was altogether too heavenly for my style. When she first came here,
      I secretly thought I never should care anything about her. She seemed
      nothing but a little moral tale. I thought she would not last me five
      minutes. But now she is growing quite human and ridiculous about that
      Philip, and I think I may find her very attractive indeed.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      VI. &ldquo;SOME LOVER&rsquo;S CLEAR DAY.&rdquo;
     </h2>
    <p>
      &ldquo;HOPE!&rdquo; said Philip Malbone, as they sailed together in a little boat the
      next morning, &ldquo;I have come back to you from months of bewildered dreaming.
      I have been wandering,&mdash;no matter where. I need you. You cannot tell
      how much I need you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I can estimate it,&rdquo; she answered, gently, &ldquo;by my need of you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not at all,&rdquo; said Philip, gazing in her trustful face. &ldquo;Any one whom you
      loved would adore you, could he be by your side. You need nothing. It is I
      who need you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; she asked, simply.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Because,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I am capable of behaving very much like a fool. Hope,
      I am not worthy of you; why do you love me? why do you trust me?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not know how I learned to love you,&rdquo; said Hope. &ldquo;It is a blessing
      that was given to me. But I learned to trust you in your mother&rsquo;s
      sick-room.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; said Philip, sadly, &ldquo;there, at least, I did my full duty.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;As few would have done it,&rdquo; said Hope, firmly,&mdash;&ldquo;very few. Such
      prolonged self-sacrifice must strengthen a man for life.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not always,&rdquo; said Philip, uneasily. &ldquo;Too much of that sort of thing may
      hurt one, I fancy, as well as too little. He may come to imagine that the
      balance of virtue is in his favor, and that he may grant himself a little
      indulgence to make up for lost time. That sort of recoil is a little
      dangerous, as I sometimes feel, do you know?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;And you show it,&rdquo; said Hope, ardently, &ldquo;by fresh sacrifices! How much
      trouble you have taken about Emilia! Some time, when you are willing, you
      shall tell me all about it. You always seemed to me a magician, but I did
      not think that even you could restore her to sense and wisdom so soon.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Malbone was just then very busy putting the boat about; but when he had it
      on the other tack, he said, &ldquo;How do you like her?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Philip,&rdquo; said Hope, her eyes filling with tears, &ldquo;I wonder if you have
      the slightest conception how my heart is fixed on that child. She has
      always been a sort of dream to me, and the difficulty of getting any
      letters from her has only added to the excitement. Now that she is here,
      my whole heart yearns toward her. Yet, when I look into her eyes, a sort
      of blank hopelessness comes over me. They seem like the eyes of some
      untamable creature whose language I shall never learn. Philip, you are
      older and wiser than I, and have shown already that you understand her.
      Tell me what I can do to make her love me?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Tell me how any one could help it?&rdquo; said Malbone, looking fondly on the
      sweet, pleading face before him.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am beginning to fear that it can be helped,&rdquo; she said. Her thoughts
      were still with Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Perhaps it can,&rdquo; said Phil, &ldquo;if you sit so far away from people. Here we
      are alone on the bay. Come and sit by me, Hope.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      She had been sitting amidships, but she came aft at once, and nestled by
      him as he sat holding the tiller. She put her face against his knee, like
      a tired child, and shut her eyes; her hair was lifted by the summer
      breeze; a scent of roses came from her; the mere contact of anything so
      fresh and pure was a delight. He put his arm around her, and all the first
      ardor of passion came back to him again; he remembered how he had longed
      to win this Diana, and how thoroughly she was won.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is you who do me good,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;O Philip, sail as slowly as you
      can.&rdquo; But he only sailed farther, instead of more slowly, gliding in and
      out among the rocky islands in the light north wind, which, for a wonder,
      lasted all that day,&mdash;dappling the bare hills of the Isle of Shadows
      with a shifting beauty. The tide was in and brimming, the fishing-boats
      were busy, white gulls soared and clattered round them, and heavy
      cormorants flapped away as they neared the rocks. Beneath the boat the
      soft multitudinous jellyfishes waved their fringed pendants, or glittered
      with tremulous gold along their pink, translucent sides. Long lines and
      streaks of paler blue lay smoothly along the enamelled surface, the low,
      amethystine hills lay couched beyond them, and little clouds stretched
      themselves in lazy length above the beautiful expanse. They reached the
      ruined fort at last, and Philip, surrendering Hope to others, was himself
      besieged by a joyous group.
    </p>
    <p>
      As you stand upon the crumbling parapet of old Fort Louis, you feel
      yourself poised in middle air; the sea-birds soar and swoop around you,
      the white surf lashes the rocks far below, the white vessels come and go,
      the water is around you on all sides but one, and spreads its pale blue
      beauty up the lovely bay, or, in deeper tints, southward towards the
      horizon line. I know of no ruin in America which nature has so resumed; it
      seems a part of the living rock; you cannot imagine it away.
    </p>
    <p>
      It is a single round, low tower, shaped like the tomb of Cacilia Metella.
      But its stately position makes it rank with the vast sisterhood of
      wave-washed strongholds; it might be King Arthur&rsquo;s Cornish Tyntagel; it
      might be &ldquo;the teocallis tower&rdquo; of Tuloom. As you gaze down from its
      height, all things that float upon the ocean seem equalized. Look at the
      crowded life on yonder frigate, coming in full-sailed before the steady
      sea-breeze. To furl that heavy canvas, a hundred men cluster like bees
      upon the yards, yet to us upon this height it is all but a plaything for
      the eyes, and we turn with equal interest from that thronged floating
      citadel to some lonely boy in his skiff.
    </p>
    <p>
      Yonder there sail to the ocean, beating wearily to windward, a few slow
      vessels. Inward come jubilant white schooners, wing-and-wing. There are
      fishing-smacks towing their boats behind them like a family of children;
      and there are slender yachts that bear only their own light burden. Once
      from this height I saw the whole yacht squadron round Point Judith, and
      glide in like a flock of land-bound sea-birds; and above them, yet more
      snowy and with softer curves, pressed onward the white squadrons of the
      sky.
    </p>
    <p>
      Within, the tower is full of debris, now disintegrated into one solid
      mass, and covered with vegetation. You can lie on the blossoming clover,
      where the bees hum and the crickets chirp around you, and can look through
      the arch which frames its own fair picture. In the foreground lies the
      steep slope overgrown with bayberry and gay with thistle blooms; then the
      little winding cove with its bordering cliffs; and the rough pastures with
      their grazing sheep beyond. Or, ascending the parapet, you can look across
      the bay to the men making hay picturesquely on far-off lawns, or to the
      cannon on the outer works of Fort Adams, looking like vast black insects
      that have crawled forth to die.
    </p>
    <p>
      Here our young people spent the day; some sketched, some played croquet,
      some bathed in rocky inlets where the kingfisher screamed above them, some
      rowed to little craggy isles for wild roses, some fished, and then were
      taught by the boatmen to cook their fish in novel island ways. The morning
      grew more and more cloudless, and then in the afternoon a fog came and
      went again, marching by with its white armies, soon met and annihilated by
      a rainbow.
    </p>
    <p>
      The conversation that day was very gay and incoherent,&mdash;little
      fragments of all manner of things; science, sentiment, everything: &ldquo;Like a
      distracted dictionary,&rdquo; Kate said. At last this lively maiden got Philip
      away from the rest, and began to cross-question him.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;about Emilia&rsquo;s Swiss lover. She shuddered when she
      spoke of him. Was he so very bad?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not at all,&rdquo; was the answer. &ldquo;You had false impressions of him. He was a
      handsome, manly fellow, a little over-sentimental. He had travelled, and
      had been a merchant&rsquo;s clerk in Paris and London. Then he came back, and
      became a boatman on the lake, some said, for love of her.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Did she love him?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Passionately, as she thought.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Did he love her much?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I suppose so.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then why did she stop loving him?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She does not hate him?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;that is what surprises me. Lovers hate, or those who
      have been lovers. She is only indifferent. Philip, she had wound silk upon
      a torn piece of his carte-de-visite, and did not know it till I showed it
      to her. Even then she did not care.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Such is woman!&rdquo; said Philip.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Nonsense,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;She had seen somebody whom she loved better, and
      she still loves that somebody. Who was it? She had not been introduced
      into society. Were there any superior men among her teachers? She is just
      the girl to fall in love with her teacher, at least in Europe, where they
      are the only men one sees.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There were some very superior men among them,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;Professor
      Schirmer has a European reputation; he wears blue spectacles and a maroon
      wig.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do not talk so,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;I tell you, Emilia is not changeable, like
      you, sir. She is passionate and constant. She would have married that man
      or died for him. You may think that your sage counsels restrained her, but
      they did not; it was that she loved some one else. Tell me honestly. Do
      you not know that there is somebody in Europe whom she loves to
      distraction?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not know it,&rdquo; said Philip.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Of course you do not KNOW it,&rdquo; returned the questioner. &ldquo;Do you not think
      it?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I have no reason to believe it.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That has nothing to do with it,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Things that we believe
      without any reason have a great deal more weight with us. Do you not
      believe it?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Philip, point-blank.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is very strange,&rdquo; mused Kate. &ldquo;Of course you do not know much about
      it. She may have misled you, but I am sure that neither you nor any one
      else could have cured her of a passion, especially an unreasonable one,
      without putting another in its place. If you did it without that, you are
      a magician, as Hope once called you. Philip, I am afraid of you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There we sympathize,&rdquo; said Phil. &ldquo;I am sometimes afraid of myself, but I
      discover within half an hour what a very commonplace land harmless person
      I am.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Meantime Emilia found herself beside her sister, who was sketching. After
      watching Hope for a time in silence, she began to question her.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Tell me what you have been doing in all these years,&rdquo; she said.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O, I have been at school,&rdquo; said Hope. &ldquo;First I went through the High
      School; then I stayed out of school a year, and studied Greek and German
      with my uncle, and music with my aunt, who plays uncommonly well. Then I
      persuaded them to let me go to the Normal School for two years, and learn
      to be a teacher.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;A teacher!&rdquo; said Emilia, with surprise. &ldquo;Is it necessary that you should
      be a teacher?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Very necessary,&rdquo; replied Hope. &ldquo;I must have something to do, you know,
      after I leave school.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;To do?&rdquo; said the other. &ldquo;Cannot you go to parties?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not all the time,&rdquo; said her sister.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Emilia, &ldquo;in the mean time you can go to drive, or make calls,
      or stay at home and make pretty little things to wear, as other girls do.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I can find time for that too, little sister, when I need them. But I love
      children, you know, and I like to teach interesting studies. I have
      splendid health, and I enjoy it all. I like it as you love dancing, my
      child, only I like dancing too, so I have a greater variety of
      enjoyments.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But shall you not sometimes find it very hard?&rdquo; said Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is why I shall like it,&rdquo; was the answer.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What a girl you are!&rdquo; exclaimed the younger sister. &ldquo;You know everything
      and can do everything.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;A very short everything,&rdquo; interposed Hope.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Kate says,&rdquo; continued Emilia, &ldquo;that you speak French as well as I do, and
      I dare say you dance a great deal better; and those are the only things I
      know.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;If we both had French partners, dear,&rdquo; replied the elder maiden, &ldquo;they
      would soon find the difference in both respects. My dancing came by
      nature, I believe, and I learned French as a child, by talking with my old
      uncle, who was half a Parisian. I believe I have a good accent, but I have
      so little practice that I have no command of the language compared to
      yours. In a week or two we can both try our skill, as there is to be a
      ball for the officers of the French corvette yonder,&rdquo; and Hope pointed to
      the heavy spars, the dark canvas, and the high quarter-deck which made the
      &ldquo;Jean Hoche&rdquo; seem as if she had floated out of the days of Nelson.
    </p>
    <p>
      The calm day waned, the sun drooped to his setting amid a few golden bars
      and pencilled lines of light. Ere they were ready for departure, the tide
      had ebbed, and, in getting the boats to a practicable landing-place,
      Malbone was delayed behind the others. As he at length brought his boat to
      the rock, Hope sat upon the ruined fort, far above him, and sang. Her
      noble contralto voice echoed among the cliffs down to the smooth water;
      the sun went down behind her, and still she sat stately and noble, her
      white dress looking more and more spirit-like against the golden sky; and
      still the song rang on,&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Never a scornful word should grieve thee, I&rsquo;d smile on thee, sweet, as
      the angels do; Sweet as thy smile on me shone ever, Douglas, Douglas,
      tender and true.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      All sacredness and sweetness, all that was pure and brave and truthful,
      seemed to rest in her. And when the song ceased at his summons, and she
      came down to meet him,&mdash;glowing, beautiful, appealing, tender,&mdash;then
      all meaner spells vanished, if such had ever haunted him, and he was hers
      alone.
    </p>
    <p>
      Later that evening, after the household had separated, Hope went into the
      empty drawing-room for a light. Philip, after a moment&rsquo;s hesitation,
      followed her, and paused in the doorway. She stood, a white-robed figure,
      holding the lighted candle; behind her rose the arched alcove, whose
      quaint cherubs looked down on her; she seemed to have stepped forth, the
      awakened image of a saint. Looking up, she saw his eager glance; then she
      colored, trembled, and put the candle down. He came to her, took her hand
      and kissed it, then put his hand upon her brow and gazed into her face,
      then kissed her lips. She quietly yielded, but her color came and went,
      and her lips moved as if to speak. For a moment he saw her only, thought
      only of her.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then, even while he gazed into her eyes, a flood of other memories surged
      over him, and his own eyes grew dim. His head swam, the lips he had just
      kissed appeared to fade away, and something of darker, richer beauty
      seemed to burn through those fair features; he looked through those gentle
      eyes into orbs more radiant, and it was as if a countenance of eager
      passion obliterated that fair head, and spoke with substituted lips,
      &ldquo;Behold your love.&rdquo; There was a thrill of infinite ecstasy in the work his
      imagination did; he gave it rein, then suddenly drew it in and looked at
      Hope. Her touch brought pain for an instant, as she laid her hand upon
      him, but he bore it. Then some influence of calmness came; there swept by
      him a flood of earlier, serener memories; he sat down in the window-seat
      beside her, and when she put her face beside his, and her soft hair
      touched his cheek, and he inhaled the rose-odor that always clung round
      her, every atom of his manhood stood up to drive away the intruding
      presence, and he again belonged to her alone.
    </p>
    <p>
      When he went to his chamber that night, he drew from his pocket a little
      note in a girlish hand, which he lighted in the candle, and put upon the
      open hearth to burn. With what a cruel, tinkling rustle the pages flamed
      and twisted and opened, as if the fire read them, and collapsed again as
      if in agonizing effort to hold their secret even in death! The closely
      folded paper refused to burn, it went out again and again; while each time
      Philip Malbone examined it ere relighting, with a sort of vague curiosity,
      to see how much passion had already vanished out of existence, and how
      much yet survived. For each of these inspections he had to brush aside the
      calcined portion of the letter, once so warm and beautiful with love, but
      changed to something that seemed to him a semblance of his own heart just
      then,&mdash;black, trivial, and empty.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then he took from a little folded paper a long tress of dark silken hair,
      and, without trusting himself to kiss it, held it firmly in the candle. It
      crisped and sparkled, and sent out a pungent odor, then turned and writhed
      between his fingers, like a living thing in pain. What part of us has
      earthly immortality but our hair? It dies not with death. When all else of
      human beauty has decayed beyond corruption into the more agonizing
      irrecoverableness of dust, the hair is still fresh and beautiful, defying
      annihilation, and restoring to the powerless heart the full association of
      the living image. These shrinking hairs, they feared not death, but they
      seemed to fear Malbone. Nothing but the hand of man could destroy what he
      was destroying; but his hand shrank not, and it was done.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      VII. AN INTERNATIONAL EXPOSITION.
    </h2>
    <p>
      AT the celebrated Oldport ball for the French officers, the merit of each
      maiden was estimated by the number of foreigners with whom she could talk
      at once, for there were more gentlemen than ladies, and not more than half
      the ladies spoke French. Here Emilia was in her glory; the ice being once
      broken, officers were to her but like so many school-girls, and she
      rattled away to the admiral and the fleet captain and two or three
      lieutenants at once, while others hovered behind the circle of her
      immediate adorers, to pick up the stray shafts of what passed for wit.
      Other girls again drove two-in-hand, at the most, in the way of
      conversation; while those least gifted could only encounter one small
      Frenchman in some safe corner, and converse chiefly by smiles and signs.
    </p>
    <p>
      On the whole, the evening opened gayly. Newly arrived Frenchmen are apt to
      be so unused to the familiar society of unmarried girls, that the most
      innocent share in it has for them the zest of forbidden fruit, and the
      most blameless intercourse seems almost a bonne fortune. Most of these
      officers were from the lower ranks of French society, but they all had
      that good-breeding which their race wears with such ease, and can
      unhappily put off with the same.
    </p>
    <p>
      The admiral and the fleet captain were soon turned over to Hope, who spoke
      French as she did English, with quiet grace. She found them agreeable
      companions, while Emilia drifted among the elder midshipmen, who were
      dazzling in gold lace if not in intellect. Kate fell to the share of a
      vehement little surgeon, who danced her out of breath. Harry officiated as
      interpreter between the governor of the State and a lively young ensign,
      who yearned for the society of dignitaries. The governor was quite aware
      that he himself could not speak French; the Frenchman was quite unaware
      that he himself could not speak English; but with Harry&rsquo;s aid they plunged
      boldly into conversation. Their talk happened to fall on steam-engines,
      English, French, American; their comparative cost, comparative power,
      comparative cost per horse power,&mdash;until Harry, who was not very
      strong upon the steam-engine in his own tongue, and was quite helpless on
      that point in any other, got a good deal astray among the numerals, and
      implanted some rather wild statistics in the mind of each. The young
      Frenchman was far more definite, when requested by the governor to state
      in English the precise number of men engaged on board the corvette. With
      the accuracy of his nation, he beamingly replied, &ldquo;Seeshundredtousand.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      As is apt to be the case in Oldport, other European nationalities beside
      the French were represented, though the most marked foreign accent was of
      course to be found among Americans just returned. There were European
      diplomatists who spoke English perfectly; there were travellers who spoke
      no English at all; and as usual each guest sought to practise himself in
      the tongue he knew least. There was the usual eagerness among the
      fashionable vulgar to make acquaintance with anything that combined broken
      English and a title; and two minutes after a Russian prince had seated
      himself comfortably on a sofa beside Kate, he was vehemently tapped on the
      shoulder by Mrs. Courtenay Brash with the endearing summons: &ldquo;Why! Prince,
      I didn&rsquo;t see as you was here. Do you set comfortable where you be? Come
      over to this window, and tell all you know!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      The prince might have felt that his summons was abrupt, but knew not that
      it was ungrammatical, and so was led away in triumph. He had been but a
      month or two in this country, and so spoke our language no more correctly
      than Mrs. Brash, but only with more grace. There was no great harm in Mrs.
      Brash; like most loquacious people, she was kind-hearted, with a tendency
      to corpulence and good works. She was also afflicted with a high color,
      and a chronic eruption of diamonds. Her husband had an eye for them,
      having begun life as a jeweller&rsquo;s apprentice, and having developed
      sufficient sharpness of vision in other directions to become a
      millionnaire, and a Congressman, and to let his wife do as she pleased.
    </p>
    <p>
      What goes forth from the lips may vary in dialect, but wine and oysters
      speak the universal language. The supper-table brought our party together,
      and they compared notes.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Parties are very confusing,&rdquo; philosophized Hope,&mdash;&ldquo;especially when
      waiters and partners dress so much alike. Just now I saw an ill-looking
      man elbowing his way up to Mrs. Meredith, and I thought he was bringing
      her something on a plate. Instead of that, it was his hand he held out,
      and she put hers into it; and I was told that he was one of the leaders of
      society. There are very few gentlemen here whom I could positively tell
      from the waiters by their faces, and yet Harry says the fast set are not
      here.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Talk of the angels!&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;There come the Inglesides.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Through the door of the supper-room they saw entering the drawing-room one
      of those pretty, fair-haired women who grow older up to twenty-five and
      then remain unchanged till sixty. She was dressed in the loveliest pale
      blue silk, very low in the neck, and she seemed to smile on all with her
      white teeth and her white shoulders. This was Mrs. Ingleside. With her
      came her daughter Blanche, a pretty blonde, whose bearing seemed at first
      as innocent and pastoral as her name. Her dress was of spotless white,
      what there was of it; and her skin was so snowy, you could hardly tell
      where the dress ended. Her complexion was exquisite, her eyes of the
      softest blue; at twenty-three she did not look more than seventeen; and
      yet there was such a contrast between these virginal traits, and the worn,
      faithless, hopeless expression, that she looked, as Philip said, like a
      depraved lamb. Does it show the higher nature of woman, that, while &ldquo;fast
      young men&rdquo; are content to look like well-dressed stable boys and
      billiard-markers, one may observe that girls of the corresponding type are
      apt to addict themselves to white and rosebuds, and pose themselves for
      falling angels?
    </p>
    <p>
      Mrs. Ingleside was a stray widow (from New Orleans via Paris), into whose
      antecedents it was best not to inquire too closely. After many ups and
      downs, she was at present up. It was difficult to state with certainty
      what bad deed she had ever done, or what good deed. She simply lived by
      her wits, and perhaps by some want of that article in her male friends.
      Her house was a sort of gentlemanly clubhouse, where the presence of two
      women offered a shade less restraint than if there had been men alone. She
      was amiable and unscrupulous, went regularly to church, and needed only
      money to be the most respectable and fastidious of women. It was always
      rather a mystery who paid for her charming little dinners; indeed, several
      things in her demeanor were questionable, but as the questions were never
      answered, no harm was done, and everybody invited her because everybody
      else did. Had she committed some graceful forgery tomorrow, or some mild
      murder the next day, nobody would have been surprised, and all her
      intimate friends would have said it was what they had always expected.
    </p>
    <p>
      Meantime the entertainment went on.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I shall not have scalloped oysters in heaven,&rdquo; lamented Kate, as she
      finished with healthy appetite her first instalment.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Are you sure you shall not?&rdquo; said the sympathetic Hope, who would have
      eagerly followed Kate into Paradise with a supply of whatever she liked
      best.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I suppose you will, darling,&rdquo; responded Kate, &ldquo;but what will you care? It
      seems hard that those who are bad enough to long for them should not be
      good enough to earn them.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      At this moment Blanche Ingleside and her train swept into the supper-room;
      the girls cleared a passage, their attendant youths collected chairs.
      Blanche tilted hers slightly against a wall, professed utter exhaustion,
      and demanded a fresh bottle of champagne in a voice that showed no signs
      of weakness. Presently a sheepish youth drew near the noisy circle.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Here comes that Talbot van Alsted,&rdquo; said Blanche, bursting at last into a
      loud whisper. &ldquo;What a goose he is, to be sure! Dear baby, it promised its
      mother it wouldn&rsquo;t drink wine for two months. Let&rsquo;s all drink with him.
      Talbot, my boy, just in time! Fill your glass. Stosst an!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      And Blanche and her attendant spirits in white muslin thronged around the
      weak boy, saw him charged with the three glasses that were all his head
      could stand, and sent him reeling home to his mother. Then they looked
      round for fresh worlds to conquer.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There are the Maxwells!&rdquo; said Miss Ingleside, without lowering her voice.
      &ldquo;Who is that party in the high-necked dress? Is she the schoolmistress?
      Why do they have such people here? Society is getting so common, there is
      no bearing it. That Emily who is with her is too good for that slow set.
      She&rsquo;s the school-girl we heard of at Nice, or somewhere; she wanted to
      elope with somebody, and Phil Malbone stopped her, worse luck. She will be
      for eloping with us, before long.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Emilia colored scarlet, and gave a furtive glance at Hope, half of shame,
      half of triumph. Hope looked at Blanche with surprise, made a movement
      forward, but was restrained by the crowd, while the noisy damsel broke out
      in a different direction.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;How fiendishly hot it is here, though! Jones junior, put your elbow
      through that window! This champagne is boiling. What a tiresome time we
      shall have to-morrow, when the Frenchmen are gone! Ah, Count, there you
      are at last! Ready for the German? Come for me? Just primed and up to
      anything, and so I tell you!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      But as Count Posen, kissing his hand to her, squeezed his way through the
      crowd with Hal, to be presented to Hope, there came over Blanche&rsquo;s young
      face such a mingled look of hatred and weariness and chagrin, that even
      her unobserving friends saw it, and asked with tender commiseration what
      was up.
    </p>
    <p>
      The dancing recommenced. There was the usual array of partners,
      distributed by mysterious discrepancies, like soldiers&rsquo; uniforms, so that
      all the tall drew short, and all the short had tall. There were the timid
      couples, who danced with trembling knees and eyes cast over their
      shoulders; the feeble couples, who meandered aimlessly and got tangled in
      corners; the rash couples, who tore breathlessly through the rooms and
      brought up at last against the large white waistcoat of the violon-cello.
      There was the professional lady-killer, too supreme and indolent to dance,
      but sitting amid an admiring bevy of fair women, where he reared his head
      of raven curls, and pulled ceaselessly his black mustache. And there were
      certain young girls who, having astonished the community for a month by
      the lowness of their dresses, now brought to bear their only remaining
      art, and struck everybody dumb by appearing clothed. All these came and
      went and came again, and had their day or their night, and danced until
      the robust Hope went home exhausted and left her more fragile cousins to
      dance on till morning. Indeed, it was no easy thing for them to tear
      themselves away; Kate was always in demand; Philip knew everybody, and had
      that latest aroma of Paris which the soul of fashion covets; Harry had the
      tried endurance which befits brothers and lovers at balls; while Emilia&rsquo;s
      foreign court held out till morning, and one handsome young midshipman, in
      special, kept revolving back to her after each long orbit of separation,
      like a gold-laced comet.
    </p>
    <p>
      The young people lingered extravagantly late at that ball, for the
      corvette was to sail next day, and the girls were willing to make the most
      of it. As they came to the outer door, the dawn was inexpressibly
      beautiful,&mdash;deep rose melting into saffron, beneath a tremulous
      morning star. With a sudden impulse, they agreed to walk home, the fresh
      air seemed so delicious. Philip and Emilia went first, outstripping the
      others.
    </p>
    <p>
      Passing the Jewish cemetery, Kate and Harry paused a moment. The sky was
      almost cloudless, the air was full of a thousand scents and songs, the
      rose-tints in the sky were deepening, the star paling, while a few vague
      clouds went wandering upward, and dreamed themselves away.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There is a grave in that cemetery,&rdquo; said Kate, gently, &ldquo;where lovers
      should always be sitting. It lies behind that tall monument; I cannot see
      it for the blossoming boughs. There were two young cousins who loved each
      other from childhood, but were separated, because Jews do not allow such
      unions. Neither of them was ever married; and they lived to be very old,
      the one in New Orleans, the other at the North. In their last illnesses
      each dreamed of walking in the fields with the other, as in their early
      days; and the telegraphic despatches that told their deaths crossed each
      other on the way. That is his monument, and her grave was made behind it;
      there was no room for a stone.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Kate moved a step or two, that she might see the graves. The branches
      opened clear. What living lovers had met there, at this strange hour,
      above the dust of lovers dead? She saw with amazement, and walked on
      quickly that Harry might not also see.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was Emilia who sat beside the grave, her dark hair drooping and
      dishevelled, her carnation cheek still brilliant after the night&rsquo;s
      excitement; and he who sat at her feet, grasping her hand in both of his,
      while his lips poured out passionate words to which she eagerly listened,
      was Philip Malbone.
    </p>
    <p>
      Here, upon the soil of a new nation, lay a spot whose associations seemed
      already as old as time could make them,&mdash;the last footprint of a
      tribe now vanished from this island forever,&mdash;the resting-place of a
      race whose very funerals would soon be no more. Each April the robins
      built their nests around these crumbling stones, each May they reared
      their broods, each June the clover blossomed, each July the wild
      strawberries grew cool and red; all around was youth and life and ecstasy,
      and yet the stones bore inscriptions in an unknown language, and the very
      graves seemed dead.
    </p>
    <p>
      And lovelier than all the youth of Nature, little Emilia sat there in the
      early light, her girlish existence gliding into that drama of passion
      which is older than the buried nations, older than time, than death, than
      all things save life and God.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      VIII. TALKING IT OVER.
    </h2>
    <p>
      AUNT JANE was eager to hear about the ball, and called everybody into her
      breakfast-parlor the next morning. She was still hesitating about her bill
      of fare.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I wish somebody would invent a new animal,&rdquo; she burst forth. &ldquo;How those
      sheep bleated last night! I know it was an expression of shame for
      providing such tiresome food.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You must not be so carnally minded, dear,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;You must be very
      good and grateful, and not care for your breakfast. Somebody says that
      mutton chops with wit are a great deal better than turtle without.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;A very foolish somebody,&rdquo; pronounced Aunt Jane. &ldquo;I have had a great deal
      of wit in my life, and very little turtle. Dear child, do not excite me
      with impossible suggestions. There are dropped eggs, I might have those.
      They look so beautifully, if it only were not necessary to eat them. Yes,
      I will certainly have dropped eggs. I think Ruth could drop them; she
      drops everything else.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Poor little Ruth!&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Not yet grown up!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She will never grow up,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;but she thinks she is a woman;
      she even thinks she has a lover. O that in early life I had provided
      myself with a pair of twins from some asylum; then I should have had some
      one to wait on me.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Perhaps they would have been married too,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They should never have been married,&rdquo; retorted Aunt Jane. &ldquo;They should
      have signed a paper at five years old to do no such thing. Yesterday I
      told a lady that I was enraged that a servant should presume to have a
      heart, and the woman took it seriously and began to argue with me. To
      think of living in a town where one person could be so idiotic! Such a
      town ought to be extinguished from the universe.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Auntie!&rdquo; said Kate, sternly, &ldquo;you must grow more charitable.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Must I?&rdquo; said Aunt Jane; &ldquo;it will not be at all becoming. I have thought
      about it; often have I weighed it in my mind whether to be monotonously
      lovely; but I have always thrust it away. It must make life so tedious. It
      is too late for me to change,&mdash;at least, anything about me but my
      countenance, and that changes the wrong way. Yet I feel so young and
      fresh; I look in my glass every morning to see if I have not a new face,
      but it never comes. I am not what is called well-favored. In fact, I am
      not favored at all. Tell me about the party.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What shall I tell?&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Tell me what people were there,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;and how they were
      dressed; who were the happiest and who the most miserable. I think I would
      rather hear about the most miserable,&mdash;at least, till I have my
      breakfast.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;The most miserable person I saw,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;was Mrs. Meredith. It was
      very amusing to hear her and Hope talk at cross-purposes. You know her
      daughter Helen is in Paris, and the mother seemed very sad about her. A
      lady was asking if something or other were true; &lsquo;Too true,&rsquo; said Mrs.
      Meredith; &lsquo;with every opportunity she has had no real success. It was not
      the poor child&rsquo;s fault. She was properly presented; but as yet she has had
      no success at all.&rsquo; 
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope looked up, full of sympathy. She thought Helen must be some
      disappointed school-teacher, and felt an interest in her immediately.
      &lsquo;Will there not be another examination?&rsquo; she asked. &lsquo;What an odd phrase,&rsquo; 
      said Mrs. Meredith, looking rather disdainfully at Hope. &lsquo;No, I suppose we
      must give it up, if that is what you mean. The only remaining chance is in
      the skating. I had particular attention paid to Helen&rsquo;s skating on that
      very account. How happy shall I be, if my foresight is rewarded!&rsquo; 
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope thought this meant physical education, to be sure, and fancied that
      handsome Helen Meredith opening a school for calisthenics in Paris!
      Luckily she did not say anything. Then the other lady said, solemnly, &lsquo;My
      dear Mrs. Meredith, it is too true. No one can tell how things will turn
      out in society. How often do we see girls who were not looked at in
      America, and yet have a great success in Paris; then other girls go out
      who were here very much admired, and they have no success at all.&rsquo; 
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope understood it all then, but she took it very calmly. I was so
      indignant, I could hardly help speaking. I wanted to say that it was
      outrageous. The idea of American mothers training their children for
      exhibition before what everybody calls the most corrupt court in Europe!
      Then if they can catch the eye of the Emperor or the Empress by their
      faces or their paces, that is called success!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Good Americans when they die go to Paris,&rdquo; said Philip, &ldquo;so says the
      oracle. Naughty Americans try it prematurely, and go while they are alive.
      Then Paris casts them out, and when they come back, their French disrepute
      is their stock in trade.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said the cheerful Hope, &ldquo;that it is not quite so bad.&rdquo; Hope
      always thought things not so bad. She went on. &ldquo;I was very dull not to
      know what Mrs. Meredith was talking about. Helen Meredith is a
      warm-hearted, generous girl, and will not go far wrong, though her mother
      is not as wise as she is well-bred. But Kate forgets that the few hundred
      people one sees here or at Paris do not represent the nation, after all.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;The most influential part of it,&rdquo; said Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Are you sure, dear?&rdquo; said her sister. &ldquo;I do not think they influence it
      half so much as a great many people who are too busy to go to either
      place. I always remember those hundred girls at the Normal School, and
      that they were not at all like Mrs. Meredith, nor would they care to be
      like her, any more than she would wish to be like them.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They have not had the same advantages,&rdquo; said Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Nor the same disadvantages,&rdquo; said Hope. &ldquo;Some of them are not so well
      bred, and none of them speak French so well, for she speaks exquisitely.
      But in all that belongs to real training of the mind, they seem to me
      superior, and that is why I think they will have more influence.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;None of them are rich, though, I suppose,&rdquo; said Emilia, &ldquo;nor of very nice
      families, or they would not be teachers. So they will not be so prominent
      in society.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But they may yet become very prominent in society,&rdquo; said Hope,&mdash;&ldquo;they
      or their pupils or their children. At any rate, it is as certain that the
      noblest lives will have most influence in the end, as that two and two
      make four.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Is that certain?&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;Perhaps there are worlds where two and
      two do not make just that desirable amount.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I trust there are,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;Perhaps I was intended to be born in
      one of them, and that is why my housekeeping accounts never add up.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Here hope was called away, and Emilia saucily murmured, &ldquo;Sour grapes!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not a bit of it!&rdquo; cried Kate, indignantly. &ldquo;Hope might have anything in
      society she wishes, if she would only give up some of her own plans, and
      let me choose her dresses, and her rich uncles pay for them. Count Posen
      told me, only yesterday, that there was not a girl in Oldport with such an
      air as hers.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not Kate herself?&rdquo; said Emilia, slyly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I?&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;What am I? A silly chit of a thing, with about a dozen
      ideas in my head, nearly every one of which was planted there by Hope. I
      like the nonsense of the world very well as it is, and without her I
      should have cared for nothing else. Count Posen asked me the other day,
      which country produced on the whole the most womanly women, France or
      America. He is one of the few foreigners who expect a rational answer. So
      I told him that I knew very little of Frenchwomen personally, but that I
      had read French novels ever since I was born, and there was not a woman
      worthy to be compared with Hope in any of them, except Consuelo, and even
      she told lies.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do not begin upon Hope,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;It is the only subject on which
      Kate can be tedious. Tell me about the dresses. Were people over-dressed
      or under-dressed?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Under-dressed,&rdquo; said Phil. &ldquo;Miss Ingleside had a half-inch strip of
      muslin over her shoulder.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Here Philip followed Hope out of the room, and Emilia presently followed
      him.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Tell on!&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;How did Philip enjoy himself?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;He is easily amused, you know,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;He likes to observe people,
      and to shoot folly as it flies.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It does not fly,&rdquo; retorted the elder lady. &ldquo;I wish it did. You can shoot
      it sitting, at least where Philip is.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Auntie,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;tell me truly your objection to Philip. I think you
      did not like his parents. Had he not a good mother?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She was good,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, reluctantly, &ldquo;but it was that kind of
      goodness which is quite offensive.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;And did you know his father well?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Know him!&rdquo; exclaimed Aunt Jane. &ldquo;I should think I did. I have sat up all
      night to hate him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That was very wrong,&rdquo; said Kate, decisively. &ldquo;You do not mean that. You
      only mean that you did not admire him very much.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I never admired a dozen people in my life, Kate. I once made a list of
      them. There were six women, three men, and a Newfoundland dog.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What happened?&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;The Is-raelites died after Pharaoh, or
      somebody, numbered them. Did anything happen to yours?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It was worse with mine,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;I grew tired of some and others
      I forgot, till at last there was nobody left but the dog, and he died.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Was Philip&rsquo;s father one of them?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Tell me about him,&rdquo; said Kate, firmly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Ruth,&rdquo; said the elder lady, as her young handmaiden passed the door with
      her wonted demureness, &ldquo;come here; no, get me a glass of water. Kate! I
      shall die of that girl. She does some idiotic thing, and then she looks in
      here with that contented, beaming look. There is an air of baseless
      happiness about her that drives me nearly frantic.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Never mind about that,&rdquo; persisted Kate. &ldquo;Tell me about Philip&rsquo;s father.
      What was the matter with him?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;My dear,&rdquo; Aunt Jane at last answered,&mdash;with that fearful moderation
      to which she usually resorted when even her stock of superlatives was
      exhausted,&mdash;&ldquo;he belonged to a family for whom truth possessed even
      less than the usual attractions.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      This neat epitaph implied the erection of a final tombstone over the whole
      race, and Kate asked no more.
    </p>
    <p>
      Meantime Malbone sat at the western door with Harry, and was running on
      with one of his tirades, half jest, half earnest, against American
      society.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;In America,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;everything which does not tend to money is thought
      to be wasted, as our Quaker neighbor thinks the children&rsquo;s croquet-ground
      wasted, because it is not a potato field.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not just!&rdquo; cried Harry. &ldquo;Nowhere is there more respect for those who give
      their lives to intellectual pursuits.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What are intellectual pursuits?&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;Editing daily newspapers?
      Teaching arithmetic to children? I see no others flourishing hereabouts.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Science and literature,&rdquo; answered Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Who cares for literature in America,&rdquo; said Philip, &ldquo;after a man rises
      three inches above the newspaper level? Nobody reads Thoreau; only an
      insignificant fraction read Emerson, or even Hawthorne. The majority of
      people have hardly even heard their names. What inducement has a writer?
      Nobody has any weight in America who is not in Congress, and nobody gets
      into Congress without the necessity of bribing or button-holing men whom
      he despises.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But you do not care for public life?&rdquo; said Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Malbone, &ldquo;therefore this does not trouble me, but it troubles
      you. I am content. My digestion is good. I can always amuse myself. Why
      are you not satisfied?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Because you are not,&rdquo; said Harry. &ldquo;You are dissatisfied with men, and so
      you care chiefly to amuse yourself with women and children.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I dare say,&rdquo; said Malbone, carelessly. &ldquo;They are usually less ungraceful
      and talk better grammar.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But American life does not mean grace nor grammar. We are all living for
      the future. Rough work now, and the graces by and by.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is what we Americans always say,&rdquo; retorted Philip. &ldquo;Everything is in
      the future. What guaranty have we for that future? I see none. We make no
      progress towards the higher arts, except in greater quantities of
      mediocrity. We sell larger editions of poor books. Our artists fill larger
      frames and travel farther for materials; but a ten-inch canvas would tell
      all they have to say.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;The wrong point of view,&rdquo; said Hal. &ldquo;If you begin with high art, you
      begin at the wrong end. The first essential for any nation is to put the
      mass of the people above the reach of want. We are all usefully employed,
      if we contribute to that.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;So is the cook usefully employed while preparing dinner,&rdquo; said Philip.
      &ldquo;Nevertheless, I do not wish to live in the kitchen.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yet you always admire your own country,&rdquo; said Harry, &ldquo;so long as you are
      in Europe.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No doubt,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;I do not object to the kitchen at that distance.
      And to tell the truth, America looks well from Europe. No culture, no art
      seems so noble as this far-off spectacle of a self-governing people. The
      enthusiasm lasts till one&rsquo;s return. Then there seems nothing here but to
      work hard and keep out of mischief.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is something,&rdquo; said Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;A good deal in America,&rdquo; said Phil. &ldquo;We talk about the immorality of
      older countries. Did you ever notice that no class of men are so apt to
      take to drinking as highly cultivated Americans? It is a very demoralizing
      position, when one&rsquo;s tastes outgrow one&rsquo;s surroundings. Positively, I
      think a man is more excusable for coveting his neighbor&rsquo;s wife in America
      than in Europe, because there is so little else to covet.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Malbone!&rdquo; said Hal, &ldquo;what has got into you? Do you know what things you
      are saying?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Perfectly,&rdquo; was the unconcerned reply. &ldquo;I am not arguing; I am only
      testifying. I know that in Paris, for instance, I myself have no
      temptations. Art and history are so delightful, I absolutely do not care
      for the society even of women; but here, where there is nothing to do, one
      must have some stimulus, and for me, who hate drinking, they are, at
      least, a more refined excitement.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;More dangerous,&rdquo; said Hal. &ldquo;Infinitely more dangerous, in the morbid way
      in which you look at life. What have these sickly fancies to do with the
      career that opens to every brave man in a great nation?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They have everything to do with it, and there are many for whom there is
      no career. As the nation develops, it must produce men of high culture.
      Now there is no place for them except as bookkeepers or pedagogues or
      newspaper reporters. Meantime the incessant unintellectual activity is
      only a sublime bore to those who stand aside.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then why stand aside?&rdquo; persisted the downright Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I have no place in it but a lounging-place,&rdquo; said Malbone. &ldquo;I do not wish
      to chop blocks with a razor. I envy those men, born mere Americans, with
      no ambition in life but to &lsquo;swing a railroad&rsquo; as they say at the West.
      Every morning I hope to wake up like them in the fear of God and the love
      of money.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You may as well stop,&rdquo; said Harry, coloring a little. &ldquo;Malbone, you used
      to be my ideal man in my boyhood, but&rdquo;&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am glad we have got beyond that,&rdquo; interrupted the other, cheerily, &ldquo;I
      am only an idler in the land. Meanwhile, I have my little interests,&mdash;read,
      write, sketch&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Flirt?&rdquo; put in Hal, with growing displeasure.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not now,&rdquo; said Phil, patting his shoulder, with imperturbable
      good-nature. &ldquo;Our beloved has cured me of that. He who has won the pearl
      dives no more.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do not let us speak of Hope,&rdquo; said Harry. &ldquo;Everything that you have been
      asserting Hope&rsquo;s daily life disproves.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That may be,&rdquo; answered Malbone, heartily. &ldquo;But, Hal, I never flirted; I
      always despised it. It was always a grande passion with me, or what I took
      for such. I loved to be loved, I suppose; and there was always something
      new and fascinating to be explored in a human heart, that is, a woman&rsquo;s.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Some new temple to profane?&rdquo; asked Hal severely.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Never!&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;I never profaned it. If I deceived, I shared the
      deception, at least for a time; and, as for sensuality, I had none in me.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Did you have nothing worse? Rousseau ends where Tom Jones begins.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;My temperament saved me,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;A woman is not a woman to me,
      without personal refinement.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Just what Rousseau said,&rdquo; replied Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I acted upon it,&rdquo; answered Malbone. &ldquo;No one dislikes Blanche Ingleside
      and her demi monde more than I.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You ought not,&rdquo; was the retort. &ldquo;You help to bring other girls to her
      level.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Whom?&rdquo; said Malbone, startled.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Emilia.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Emilia?&rdquo; repeated the other, coloring crimson. &ldquo;I, who have warned her
      against Blanche&rsquo;s society.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;And have left her no other resource,&rdquo; said Harry, coloring still more.
      &ldquo;Malbone, you have gained (unconsciously of course) too much power over
      that girl, and the only effect of it is, to keep her in perpetual
      excitement. So she seeks Blanche, as she would any other strong stimulant.
      Hope does not seem to have discovered this, but Kate has, and I have.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Hope came in, and Harry went out. The next day he came to Philip and
      apologized most warmly for his unjust and inconsiderate words. Malbone,
      always generous, bade him think no more about it, and Harry for that day
      reverted strongly to his first faith. &ldquo;So noble, so high-toned,&rdquo; he said
      to Kate. Indeed, a man never appears more magnanimous than in forgiving a
      friend who has told him the truth.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      IX. DANGEROUS WAYS.
    </h2>
    <p>
      IT was true enough what Harry had said. Philip Malbone&rsquo;s was that perilous
      Rousseau-like temperament, neither sincere enough for safety, nor false
      enough to alarm; the winning tenderness that thrills and softens at the
      mere neighborhood of a woman, and fascinates by its reality those whom no
      hypocrisy can deceive. It was a nature half amiable, half voluptuous, that
      disarmed others, seeming itself unarmed. He was never wholly ennobled by
      passion, for it never touched him deeply enough; and, on the other hand,
      he was not hardened by the habitual attitude of passion, for he was never
      really insincere. Sometimes it seemed as if nothing stood between him and
      utter profligacy but a little indolence, a little kindness, and a good
      deal of caution.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There seems no such thing as serious repentance in me,&rdquo; he had once said
      to Kate, two years before, when she had upbraided him with some desperate
      flirtation which had looked as if he would carry it as far as gentlemen
      did under King Charles II. &ldquo;How does remorse begin?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Where you are beginning,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not perceive that,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;My conscience seems, after all, to
      be only a form of good-nature. I like to be stirred by emotion, I suppose,
      and I like to study character. But I can always stop when it is evident
      that I shall cause pain to somebody. Is there any other motive?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;In other words,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;you apply the match, and then turn your back
      on the burning house.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Philip colored. &ldquo;How unjust you are! Of course, we all like to play with
      fire, but I always put it out before it can spread. Do you think I have no
      feeling?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Kate stopped there, I suppose. Even she always stopped soon, if she
      undertook to interfere with Malbone. This charming Alcibiades always
      convinced them, after the wrestling was over, that he had not been thrown.
    </p>
    <p>
      The only exception to this was in the case of Aunt Jane. If she had
      anything in common with Philip,&mdash;and there was a certain element of
      ingenuous unconsciousness in which they were not so far unlike,&mdash;it
      only placed them in the more complete antagonism. Perhaps if two beings
      were in absolutely no respect alike, they never could meet even for
      purposes of hostility; there must be some common ground from which the
      aversion may proceed. Moreover, in this case Aunt Jane utterly disbelieved
      in Malbone because she had reason to disbelieve in his father, and the
      better she knew the son the more she disliked the father retrospectively.
    </p>
    <p>
      Philip was apt to be very heedless of such aversions,&mdash;indeed, he had
      few to heed,&mdash;but it was apparent that Aunt Jane was the only person
      with whom he was not quite at ease. Still, the solicitude did not trouble
      him very much, for he instinctively knew that it was not his particular
      actions which vexed her, so much as his very temperament and atmosphere,&mdash;things
      not to be changed. So he usually went his way; and if he sometimes felt
      one of her sharp retorts, could laugh it off that day and sleep it off
      before the next morning.
    </p>
    <p>
      For you may be sure that Philip was very little troubled by inconvenient
      memories. He never had to affect forgetfulness of anything. The past slid
      from him so easily, he forgot even to try to forget. He liked to quote
      from Emerson, &ldquo;What have I to do with repentance?&rdquo; &ldquo;What have my
      yesterday&rsquo;s errors,&rdquo; he would say, &ldquo;to do with the life of to-day?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Everything,&rdquo; interrupted Aunt Jane, &ldquo;for you will repeat them to-day, if
      you can.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not at all,&rdquo; persisted he, accepting as conversation what she meant as a
      stab. &ldquo;I may, indeed, commit greater errors,&rdquo;&mdash;here she grimly
      nodded, as if she had no doubt of it,&mdash;&ldquo;but never just the same.
      To-day must take thought for itself.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I wish it would,&rdquo; she said, gently, and then went on with her own
      thoughts while he was silent. Presently she broke out again in her
      impulsive way.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Depend upon it,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;there is very little direct retribution in
      this world.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Phil looked up, quite pleased at her indorsing one of his favorite views.
      She looked, as she always did, indignant at having said anything to please
      him.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;it is the indirect retribution that crushes. I&rsquo;ve seen
      enough of that, God knows. Kate, give me my thimble.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Malbone had that smooth elasticity of surface which made even Aunt Jane&rsquo;s
      strong fingers slip from him as they might from a fish, or from the soft,
      gelatinous stem of the water-target. Even in this case he only laughed
      good-naturedly, and went out, whistling like a mocking-bird, to call the
      children round him.
    </p>
    <p>
      Toward the more wayward and impulsive Emilia the good lady was far more
      merciful. With all Aunt Jane&rsquo;s formidable keenness, she was a little apt
      to be disarmed by youth and beauty, and had no very stern retributions
      except for those past middle age. Emilia especially charmed her while she
      repelled. There was no getting beyond a certain point with this strange
      girl, any more than with Philip; but her depths tantalized, while his
      apparent shallows were only vexatious. Emilia was usually sweet, winning,
      cordial, and seemed ready to glide into one&rsquo;s heart as softly as she
      glided into the room; she liked to please, and found it very easy. Yet she
      left the impression that this smooth and delicate loveliness went but an
      inch beyond the surface, like the soft, thin foam that enamels yonder
      tract of ocean, belongs to it, is a part of it, yet is, after all, but a
      bequest of tempests, and covers only a dark abyss of crossing currents and
      desolate tangles of rootless kelp. Everybody was drawn to her, yet not a
      soul took any comfort in her. Her very voice had in it a despairing
      sweetness, that seemed far in advance of her actual history; it was an
      anticipated miserere, a perpetual dirge, where nothing had yet gone down.
      So Aunt Jane, who was wont to be perfectly decisive in her treatment of
      every human being, was fluctuating and inconsistent with Emilia. She could
      not help being fascinated by the motherless child, and yet scorned herself
      for even the doubting love she gave.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Only think, auntie,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;how you kissed Emilia, yesterday!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Of course I did,&rdquo; she remorsefully owned. &ldquo;I have kissed her a great many
      times too often. I never will kiss her again. There is nothing but sorrow
      to be found in loving her, and her heart is no larger than her feet. Today
      she was not even pretty! If it were not for her voice, I think I should
      never wish to see her again.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      But when that soft, pleading voice came once more, and Emilia asked
      perhaps for luncheon, in tones fit for Ophelia, Aunt Jane instantly
      yielded. One might as well have tried to enforce indignation against the
      Babes in the Wood.
    </p>
    <p>
      This perpetual mute appeal was further strengthened by a peculiar physical
      habit in Emilia, which first alarmed the household, but soon ceased to
      inspire terror. She fainted very easily, and had attacks at long intervals
      akin to faintness, and lasting for several hours. The physicians
      pronounced them cataleptic in their nature, saying that they brought no
      danger, and that she would certainly outgrow them. They were sometimes
      produced by fatigue, sometimes by excitement, but they brought no
      agitation with them, nor any development of abnormal powers. They simply
      wrapped her in a profound repose, from which no effort could rouse her,
      till the trance passed by. Her eyes gradually closed, her voice died away,
      and all movement ceased, save that her eyelids sometimes trembled without
      opening, and sweet evanescent expressions chased each other across her
      face,&mdash;the shadows of thoughts unseen. For a time she seemed to
      distinguish the touch of different persons by preference or pain; but soon
      even this sign of recognition vanished, and the household could only wait
      and watch, while she sank into deeper and yet deeper repose.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was something inexpressibly sweet, appealing, and touching in this
      impenetrable slumber, when it was at its deepest. She looked so young, so
      delicate, so lovely; it was as if she had entered into a shrine, and some
      sacred curtain had been dropped to shield her from all the cares and
      perplexities of life. She lived, she breathed, and yet all the storms of
      life could but beat against her powerless, as the waves beat on the shore.
      Safe in this beautiful semblance of death,&mdash;her pulse a little
      accelerated, her rich color only softened, her eyelids drooping, her
      exquisite mouth curved into the sweetness it had lacked in waking,&mdash;she
      lay unconscious and supreme, the temporary monarch of the household,
      entranced upon her throne. A few hours having passed, she suddenly waked,
      and was a self-willed, passionate girl once more. When she spoke, it was
      with a voice wholly natural; she had no recollection of what had happened,
      and no curiosity to learn.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      X. REMONSTRANCES.
    </h2>
    <p>
      IT had been a lovely summer day, with a tinge of autumnal coolness toward
      nightfall, ending in what Aunt Jane called a &ldquo;quince-jelly sunset.&rdquo; Kate
      and Emilia sat upon the Blue Rocks, earnestly talking.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Promise, Emilia!&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      Emilia said nothing.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Remember,&rdquo; continued Kate, &ldquo;he is Hope&rsquo;s betrothed. Promise, promise,
      promise!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Emilia looked into Kate&rsquo;s face and saw it flushed with a generous
      eagerness, that called forth an answering look in her. She tried to speak,
      and the words died into silence. There was a pause, while each watched the
      other.
    </p>
    <p>
      When one soul is grappling with another for life, such silence may last an
      instant too long; and Kate soon felt her grasp slipping. Momentarily the
      spell relaxed. Other thoughts swelled up, and Emilia&rsquo;s eyes began to
      wander; delicious memories stole in, of walks through blossoming paths
      with Malbone,&mdash;of lingering steps, half-stifled words and sentences
      left unfinished;&mdash;then, alas! of passionate caresses,&mdash;other
      blossoming paths that only showed the way to sin, but had never quite led
      her there, she fancied. There was so much to tell, more than could ever be
      explained or justified. Moment by moment, farther and farther strayed the
      wandering thoughts, and when the poor child looked in Kate&rsquo;s face again,
      the mist between them seemed to have grown wide and dense, as if neither
      eyes nor words nor hands could ever meet again. When she spoke it was to
      say something evasive and unimportant, and her voice was as one from the
      grave.
    </p>
    <p>
      In truth, Philip had given Emilia his heart to play with at Neuchatel,
      that he might beguile her from an attachment they had all regretted. The
      device succeeded. The toy once in her hand, the passionate girl had kept
      it, had clung to him with all her might; he could not shake her off. Nor
      was this the worst, for to his dismay he found himself responding to her
      love with a self-abandonment of ardor for which all former loves had been
      but a cool preparation. He had not intended this; it seemed hardly his
      fault: his intentions had been good, or at least not bad. This piquant and
      wonderful fruit of nature, this girlish soul, he had merely touched it and
      it was his. Its mere fragrance was intoxicating. Good God! what should he
      do with it?
    </p>
    <p>
      No clear answer coming, he had drifted on with that terrible facility for
      which years of self-indulged emotion had prepared him. Each step, while it
      was intended to be the last, only made some other last step needful.
    </p>
    <p>
      He had begun wrong, for he had concealed his engagement, fancying that he
      could secure a stronger influence over this young girl without the
      knowledge. He had come to her simply as a friend of her Transatlantic
      kindred; and she, who was always rather indifferent to them, asked no
      questions, nor made the discovery till too late. Then, indeed, she had
      burst upon him with an impetuous despair that had alarmed him. He feared,
      not that she would do herself any violence, for she had a childish dread
      of death, but that she would show some desperate animosity toward Hope,
      whenever they should meet. After a long struggle, he had touched, not her
      sense of justice, for she had none, but her love for him; he had aroused
      her tenderness and her pride.
    </p>
    <p>
      Without his actual assurance, she yet believed that he would release
      himself in some way from his betrothal, and love only her.
    </p>
    <p>
      Malbone had fortunately great control over Emilia when near her, and could
      thus keep the sight of this stormy passion from the pure and unconscious
      Hope. But a new distress opened before him, from the time when he again
      touched Hope&rsquo;s hand. The close intercourse of the voyage had given him for
      the time almost a surfeit of the hot-house atmosphere of Emilia&rsquo;s love.
      The first contact of Hope&rsquo;s cool, smooth fingers, the soft light of her
      clear eyes, the breezy grace of her motions, the rose-odors that clung
      around her, brought back all his early passion. Apart from this
      voluptuousness of the heart into which he had fallen, Malbone&rsquo;s was a
      simple and unspoiled nature; he had no vices, and had always won
      popularity too easily to be obliged to stoop for it; so all that was
      noblest in him paid allegiance to Hope. From the moment they again met,
      his wayward heart reverted to her. He had been in a dream, he said to
      himself; he would conquer it and be only hers; he would go away with her
      into the forests and green fields she loved, or he would share in the life
      of usefulness for which she yearned. But then, what was he to do with this
      little waif from the heart&rsquo;s tropics,&mdash;once tampered with, in an hour
      of mad dalliance, and now adhering in-separably to his life? Supposing him
      ready to separate from her, could she be detached from him?
    </p>
    <p>
      Kate&rsquo;s anxieties, when she at last hinted them to Malbone, only sent him
      further into revery. &ldquo;How is it,&rdquo; he asked himself, &ldquo;that when I only
      sought to love and be loved, I have thus entangled myself in the fate of
      others? How is one&rsquo;s heart to be governed? Is there any such governing?
      Mlle. Clairon complained that, so soon as she became seriously attached to
      any one, she was sure to meet somebody else whom she liked better. Have
      human hearts,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;or at least, has my heart, no more stability than
      this?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      It did not help the matter when Emilia went to stay awhile with Mrs.
      Meredith. The event came about in this way. Hope and Kate had been to a
      dinner-party, and were as usual reciting their experiences to Aunt Jane.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Was it pleasant?&rdquo; said that sympathetic lady.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It was one of those dreadfully dark dining-rooms,&rdquo; said Hope, seating
      herself at the open window.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Why do they make them look so like tombs?&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Because,&rdquo; said her aunt, &ldquo;most Americans pass from them to the tomb,
      after eating such indigestible things. There is a wish for a gentle
      transition.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Aunt Jane,&rdquo; said Hope, &ldquo;Mrs. Meredith asks to have a little visit from
      Emilia. Do you think she had better go?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Mrs. Meredith?&rdquo; asked Aunt Jane. &ldquo;Is that woman alive yet?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Why, auntie!&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;We were talking about her only a week ago.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Perhaps so,&rdquo; conceded Aunt Jane, reluctantly. &ldquo;But it seems to me she has
      great length of days!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;How very improperly you are talking, dear!&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;She is not more
      than forty, and you are&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Fifty-four,&rdquo; interrupted the other.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then she has not seen nearly so many days as you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But they are such long days! That is what I must have meant. One of her
      days is as long as three of mine. She is so tiresome!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She does not tire you very often,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She comes once a year,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;And then it is not to see me.
      She comes out of respect to the memory of my great-aunt, with whom
      Talleyrand fell in love, when he was in America, before Mrs. Meredith was
      born. Yes, Emilia may as well go.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      So Emilia went. To provide her with companionship, Mrs. Meredith kindly
      had Blanche Ingleside to stay there also. Blanche stayed at different
      houses a good deal. To do her justice, she was very good company, when put
      upon her best behavior, and beyond the reach of her demure mamma. She was
      always in spirits, often good-natured, and kept everything in lively
      motion, you may be sure. She found it not unpleasant, in rich houses, to
      escape some of those little domestic parsimonies which the world saw not
      in her own; and to secure this felicity she could sometimes lay great
      restraints upon herself, for as much as twenty-four hours. She seemed a
      little out of place, certainly, amid the precise proprieties of Mrs.
      Meredith&rsquo;s establishment. But Blanche and her mother still held their
      place in society, and it was nothing to Mrs. Meredith who came to her
      doors, but only from what other doors they came.
    </p>
    <p>
      She would have liked to see all &ldquo;the best houses&rdquo; connected by secret
      galleries or underground passages, of which she and a few others should
      hold the keys. A guest properly presented could then go the rounds of all
      unerringly, leaving his card at each, while improper acquaintances in vain
      howled for admission at the outer wall. For the rest, her ideal of social
      happiness was a series of perfectly ordered entertainments, at each of
      which there should be precisely the same guests, the same topics, the same
      supper, and the same ennui.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XI. DESCENSUS AVERNI.
    </h2>
    <p>
      MALBONE stood one morning on the pier behind the house. A two days&rsquo; fog
      was dispersing. The southwest breeze rippled the deep blue water;
      sailboats, blue, red, and green, were darting about like white-winged
      butterflies; sloops passed and repassed, cutting the air with the white
      and slender points of their gaff-topsails. The liberated sunbeams spread
      and penetrated everywhere, and even came up to play (reflected from the
      water) beneath the shadowy, overhanging counters of dark vessels. Beyond,
      the atmosphere was still busy in rolling away its vapors, brushing the
      last gray fringes from the low hills, and leaving over them only the
      thinnest aerial veil. Farther down the bay, the pale tower of the
      crumbling fort was now shrouded, now revealed, then hung with floating
      lines of vapor as with banners.
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope came down on the pier to Malbone, who was looking at the boats. He
      saw with surprise that her calm brow was a little clouded, her lips
      compressed, and her eyes full of tears.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Philip,&rdquo; she said, abruptly, &ldquo;do you love me?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do you doubt it?&rdquo; said he, smiling, a little uneasily.
    </p>
    <p>
      Fixing her eyes upon him, she said, more seriously: &ldquo;There is a more
      important question, Philip. Tell me truly, do you care about Emilia?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      He started at the words, and looked eagerly in her face for an
      explanation. Her expression only showed the most anxious solicitude.
    </p>
    <p>
      For one moment the wild impulse came up in his mind to put an entire trust
      in this truthful woman, and tell her all. Then the habit of concealment
      came back to him, the dull hopelessness of a divided duty, and the
      impossibility of explanations. How could he justify himself to her when he
      did not really know himself? So he merely said, &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She is your sister,&rdquo; he added, in an explanatory tone, after a pause; and
      despised himself for the subterfuge. It is amazing how long a man may be
      false in action before he ceases to shrink from being false in words.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Philip,&rdquo; said the unsuspecting Hope, &ldquo;I knew that you cared about her. I
      have seen you look at her with so much affection; and then again I have
      seen you look cold and almost stern. She notices it, I am sure she does,
      this changeableness. But this is not why I ask the question. I think you
      must have seen something else that I have been observing, and if you care
      about her, even for my sake, it is enough.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Here Philip started, and felt relieved.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You must be her friend,&rdquo; continued Hope, eagerly. &ldquo;She has changed her
      whole manner and habits very fast. Blanche Ingleside and that set seem to
      have wholly controlled her, and there is something reckless in all her
      ways. You are the only person who can help her.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;How?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not know how,&rdquo; said Hope, almost impatiently. &ldquo;You know how. You
      have wonderful influence. You saved her before, and will do it again. I
      put her in your hands.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What can I do for her?&rdquo; asked he, with a strange mingling of terror and
      delight.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Everything,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;If she has your society, she will not care for
      those people, so much her inferiors in character. Devote yourself to her
      for a time.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;And leave you?&rdquo; said Philip, hesitatingly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Anything, anything,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;If I do not see you for a month, I can
      bear it. Only promise me two things. First, that you will go to her this
      very day. She dines with Mrs. Ingleside.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Philip agreed.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then,&rdquo; said Hope, with saddened tones, &ldquo;you must not say it was I who
      sent you. Indeed you must not. That would spoil all. Let her think that
      your own impulse leads you, and then she will yield. I know Emilia enough
      for that.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Malbone paused, half in ecstasy, half in dismay. Were all the events of
      life combining to ruin or to save him? This young girl, whom he so
      passionately loved, was she to be thrust back into his arms, and was he to
      be told to clasp her and be silent? And that by Hope, and in the name of
      duty?
    </p>
    <p>
      It seemed a strange position, even for him who was so eager for fresh
      experiences and difficult combinations. At Hope&rsquo;s appeal he was to risk
      Hope&rsquo;s peace forever; he was to make her sweet sisterly affection its own
      executioner. In obedience to her love he must revive Emilia&rsquo;s. The tender
      intercourse which he had been trying to renounce as a crime must be
      rebaptized as a duty. Was ever a man placed, he thought, in a position so
      inextricable, so disastrous? What could he offer Emilia? How could he
      explain to her his position? He could not even tell her that it was at
      Hope&rsquo;s command he sought her.
    </p>
    <p>
      He who is summoned to rescue a drowning man, knowing that he himself may
      go down with that inevitable clutch around his neck, is placed in some
      such situation as Philip&rsquo;s. Yet Hope had appealed to him so simply, had
      trusted him so nobly! Suppose that, by any self-control, or wisdom, or
      unexpected aid of Heaven, he could serve both her and Emilia, was it not
      his duty? What if it should prove that he was right in loving them both,
      and had only erred when he cursed himself for tampering with their
      destinies? Perhaps, after all, the Divine Love had been guiding him, and
      at some appointed signal all these complications were to be cleared, and
      he and his various loves were somehow to be ingeniously provided for, and
      all be made happy ever after.
    </p>
    <p>
      He really grew quite tender and devout over these meditations. Phil was
      not a conceited fellow, by any means, but he had been so often told by
      women that their love for him had been a blessing to their souls, that he
      quite acquiesced in being a providential agent in that particular
      direction. Considered as a form of self-sacrifice, it was not without its
      pleasures.
    </p>
    <p>
      Malbone drove that afternoon to Mrs. Ingleside&rsquo;s charming abode, whither a
      few ladies were wont to resort, and a great many gentlemen. He timed his
      call between the hours of dining and driving, and made sure that Emilia
      had not yet emerged. Two or three equipages beside his own were in waiting
      at the gate, and gay voices resounded from the house. A servant received
      him at the door, and taking him for a tardy guest, ushered him at once
      into the dining-room. He was indifferent to this, for he had been too
      often sought as a guest by Mrs. Ingleside to stand on any ceremony beneath
      her roof.
    </p>
    <p>
      That fair hostess, in all the beauty of her shoulders, rose to greet him,
      from a table where six or eight guests yet lingered over flowers and wine.
      The gentlemen were smoking, and some of the ladies were trying to look at
      ease with cigarettes. Malbone knew the whole company, and greeted them
      with his accustomed ease. He would not have been embarrassed if they had
      been the Forty Thieves. Some of them, indeed, were not so far removed from
      that fabled band, only it was their fortunes, instead of themselves, that
      lay in the jars of oil.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You find us all here,&rdquo; said Mrs. Ingleside, sweetly. &ldquo;We will wait till
      the gentlemen finish their cigars, before driving.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Count me in, please,&rdquo; said Blanche, in her usual vein of frankness.
      &ldquo;Unless mamma wishes me to conclude my weed on the Avenue. It would be
      fun, though. Fancy the dismay of the Frenchmen and the dowagers!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;And old Lambert,&rdquo; said one of the other girls, delightedly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Blanche. &ldquo;The elderly party from the rural districts, who
      talks to us about the domestic virtues of the wife of his youth.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Thinks women should cruise with a broom at their mast-heads, like Admiral
      somebody in England,&rdquo; said another damsel, who was rolling a cigarette for
      a midshipman.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You see we do not follow the English style,&rdquo; said the smooth hostess to
      Philip. &ldquo;Ladies retiring after dinner! After all, it is a coarse practice.
      You agree with me, Mr. Malbone?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Speak your mind,&rdquo; said Blanche, coolly. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t say yes if you&rsquo;d rather
      not. Because we find a thing a bore, you&rsquo;ve no call to say so.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I always say,&rdquo; continued the matron, &ldquo;that the presence of woman is
      needed as a refining influence.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Malbone looked round for the refining influences. Blanche was tilted back
      in her chair, with one foot on the rung of the chair before her, resuming
      a loud-toned discourse with Count Posen as to his projected work on
      American society. She was trying to extort a promise that she should
      appear in its pages, which, as we all remember, she did. One of her
      attendant nymphs sat leaning her elbows on the table, &ldquo;talking horse&rdquo; with
      a gentleman who had an undoubted professional claim to a knowledge of that
      commodity. Another, having finished her manufactured cigarette, was making
      the grinning midshipman open his lips wider and wider to receive it. Mrs.
      Ingleside was talking in her mincing way with a Jew broker, whose English
      was as imperfect as his morals, and who needed nothing to make him a
      millionnaire but a turn of bad luck for somebody else. Half the men in the
      room would have felt quite ill at ease in any circle of refined women, but
      there was not one who did not feel perfectly unembarrassed around Mrs.
      Ingleside&rsquo;s board.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Upon my word,&rdquo; thought Malbone, &ldquo;I never fancied the English after-dinner
      practice, any more than did Napoleon. But if this goes on, it is the
      gentlemen who ought to withdraw. Cannot somebody lead the way to the
      drawing-room, and leave the ladies to finish their cigars?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Till now he had hardly dared to look at Emilia. He saw with a thrill of
      love that she was the one person in the room who appeared out of place or
      ill at ease. She did not glance at him, but held her cigarette in silence
      and refused to light it. She had boasted to him once of having learned to
      smoke at school.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s the matter, Emmy?&rdquo; suddenly exclaimed Blanche. &ldquo;Are you under a
      cloud, that you don&rsquo;t blow one?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Blanche, Blanche,&rdquo; said her mother, in sweet reproof. &ldquo;Mr. Malbone, what
      shall I do with this wild girl? Such a light way of talking! But I can
      assure you that she is really very fond of the society of intellectual,
      superior men. I often tell her that they are, after all, her most
      congenial associates. More so than the young and giddy.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You&rsquo;d better believe it,&rdquo; said the unabashed damsel. &ldquo;Take notice that
      whenever I go to a dinner-party I look round for a clergyman to drink wine
      with.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Incorrigible!&rdquo; said the caressing mother. &ldquo;Mr. Malbone would hardly
      imagine you had been bred in a Christian land.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I have, though,&rdquo; retorted Blanche. &ldquo;My esteemed parent always accustomed
      me to give up something during Lent,&mdash;champagne, or the New York
      Herald, or something.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      The young men roared, and, had time and cosmetics made it possible, Mrs.
      Ingleside would have blushed becomingly. After all, the daughter was the
      better of the two. Her bluntness was refreshing beside the mother&rsquo;s
      suavity; she had a certain generosity, too, and in a case of real
      destitution would have lent her best ear-rings to a friend.
    </p>
    <p>
      By this time Malbone had edged himself to Emilia&rsquo;s side. &ldquo;Will you drive
      with me?&rdquo; he murmured in an undertone.
    </p>
    <p>
      She nodded slightly, abruptly, and he withdrew again.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It seems barbarous,&rdquo; said he aloud, &ldquo;to break up the party. But I must
      claim my promised drive with Miss Emilia.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Blanche looked up, for once amazed, having heard a different programme
      arranged. Count Posen looked up also. But he thought he must have
      misunderstood Emilia&rsquo;s acceptance of his previous offer to drive her; and
      as he prided himself even more on his English than on his gallantry, he
      said no more. It was no great matter. Young Jones&rsquo;s dog-cart was at the
      door, and always opened eagerly its arms to anybody with a title.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XII. A NEW ENGAGEMENT.
    </h2>
    <p>
      TEN days later Philip came into Aunt Jane&rsquo;s parlor, looking excited and
      gloomy, with a letter in his hand. He put it down on her table without its
      envelope,&mdash;a thing that always particularly annoyed her. A letter
      without its envelope, she was wont to say, was like a man without a face,
      or a key without a string,&mdash;something incomplete, preposterous. As
      usual, however, he strode across her prejudices, and said, &ldquo;I have
      something to tell you. It is a fact.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Is it?&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, curtly. &ldquo;That is refreshing in these times.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;A good beginning,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Go on. You have prepared us for something
      incredible.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You will think it so,&rdquo; said Malbone. &ldquo;Emilia is engaged to Mr. John
      Lambert.&rdquo; And he went out of the room.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Good Heavens!&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, taking off her spectacles. &ldquo;What a man! He
      is ugly enough to frighten the neighboring crows. His face looks as if it
      had fallen together out of chaos, and the features had come where it had
      pleased Fate. There is a look of industrious nothingness about him, such
      as busy dogs have. I know the whole family. They used to bake our bread.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I suppose they are good and sensible,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Like boiled potatoes, my dear,&rdquo; was the response,&mdash;&ldquo;wholesome but
      perfectly uninteresting.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Is he of that sort?&rdquo; asked Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said her aunt; &ldquo;not uninteresting, but ungracious. But I like an
      ungracious man better than one like Philip, who hangs over young girls
      like a soft-hearted avalanche. This Lambert will govern Emilia, which is
      what she needs.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She will never love him,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;which is the one thing she needs.
      There is nothing that could not be done with Emilia by any person with
      whom she was in love; and nothing can ever be done with her by anybody
      else. No good will ever come of this, and I hope she will never marry
      him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      With this unusual burst, Kate retreated to Hope. Hope took the news more
      patiently than any one, but with deep solicitude. A worldly marriage
      seemed the natural result of the Ingleside influence, but it had not
      occurred to anybody that it would come so soon. It had not seemed Emilia&rsquo;s
      peculiar temptation; and yet nobody could suppose that she looked at John
      Lambert through any glamour of the affections.
    </p>
    <p>
      Mr. John Lambert was a millionnaire, a politician, and a widower. The late
      Mrs. Lambert had been a specimen of that cheerful hopelessness of
      temperament that one finds abundantly developed among the middle-aged
      women of country towns. She enjoyed her daily murders in the newspapers,
      and wept profusely at the funerals of strangers. On every occasion,
      however felicitous, she offered her condolences in a feeble voice, that
      seemed to have been washed a great many times and to have faded. But she
      was a good manager, a devoted wife, and was more cheerful at home than
      elsewhere, for she had there plenty of trials to exercise her eloquence,
      and not enough joy to make it her duty to be doleful. At last her poor,
      meek, fatiguing voice faded out altogether, and her husband mourned her as
      heartily as she would have bemoaned the demise of the most insignificant
      neighbor. After her death, being left childless, he had nothing to do but
      to make money, and he naturally made it. Having taken his primary
      financial education in New England, he graduated at that great business
      university, Chicago, and then entered on the public practice of wealth in
      New York.
    </p>
    <p>
      Aunt Jane had perhaps done injustice to the personal appearance of Mr.
      John Lambert. His features were irregular, but not insignificant, and
      there was a certain air of slow command about him, which made some persons
      call him handsome. He was heavily built, with a large, well-shaped head,
      light whiskers tinged with gray, and a sort of dusty complexion. His face
      was full of little curved wrinkles, as if it were a slate just ruled for
      sums in long division, and his small blue eyes winked anxiously a dozen
      different ways, as if they were doing the sums. He seemed to bristle with
      memorandum-books, and kept drawing them from every pocket, to put
      something down. He was slow of speech, and his very heaviness of look
      added to the impression of reserved power about the man.
    </p>
    <p>
      All his career in life had been a solid progress, and his boldest
      speculations seemed securer than the legitimate business of less potent
      financiers. Beginning business life by peddling gingerbread on a railway
      train, he had developed such a genius for railway management as some men
      show for chess or for virtue; and his accumulating property had the
      momentum of a planet.
    </p>
    <p>
      He had read a good deal at odd times, and had seen a great deal of men.
      His private morals were unstained, he was equable and amiable, had strong
      good sense, and never got beyond his depth. He had travelled in Europe and
      brought home many statistics, some new thoughts, and a few good pictures
      selected by his friends. He spent his money liberally for the things
      needful to his position, owned a yacht, bred trotting-horses, and had
      founded a theological school. He submitted to these and other social
      observances from a vague sense of duty as an American citizen; his real
      interest lay in business and in politics. Yet he conducted these two
      vocations on principles diametrically opposite. In business he was more
      honest than the average; in politics he had no conception of honesty, for
      he could see no difference between a politician and any other merchandise.
      He always succeeded in business, for he thoroughly understood its
      principles; in politics he always failed in the end, for he recognized no
      principles at all. In business he was active, resolute, and seldom
      deceived; in politics he was equally active, but was apt to be irresolute,
      and was deceived every day of his life. In both cases it was not so much
      from love of power that he labored, as from the excitement of the game.
      The larger the scale the better he liked it; a large railroad operation, a
      large tract of real estate, a big and noisy statesman,&mdash;these
      investments he found irresistible.
    </p>
    <p>
      On which of his two sets of principles he would manage a wife remained to
      be proved. It is the misfortune of what are called self-made men in
      America, that, though early accustomed to the society of men of the world,
      they often remain utterly unacquainted with women of the world, until
      those charming perils are at last sprung upon them in full force, at New
      York or Washington. John Lambert at forty was as absolutely ignorant of
      the qualities and habits of a cultivated woman as of the details of her
      toilet. The plain domesticity of his departed wife he had understood and
      prized; he remembered her household ways as he did her black alpaca dress;
      indeed, except for that item of apparel, she was not so unlike himself. In
      later years he had seen the women of society; he had heard them talk; he
      had heard men talk about them, wittily or wickedly, at the clubs; he had
      perceived that a good many of them wished to marry him, and yet, after
      all, he knew no more of them than of the rearing of humming-birds or
      orchids,&mdash;dainty, tropical things which he allowed his gardener to
      raise, he keeping his hands off, and only paying the bills. Whether there
      was in existence a class of women who were both useful and refined,&mdash;any
      intermediate type between the butterfly and the drudge,&mdash;was a
      question which he had sometimes asked himself, without having the
      materials to construct a reply.
    </p>
    <p>
      With imagination thus touched and heart unfilled, this man had been
      bewitched from the very first moment by Emilia. He kept it to himself, and
      heard in silence the criticisms made at the club-windows. To those
      perpetual jokes about marriage, which are showered with such graceful
      courtesy about the path of widowers, he had no reply; or at most would
      only admit that he needed some elegant woman to preside over his
      establishment, and that he had better take her young, as having habits
      less fixed. But in his secret soul he treasured every tone of this girl&rsquo;s
      voice, every glance of her eye, and would have kept in a casket of gold
      and diamonds the little fragrant glove she once let fall. He envied the
      penniless and brainless boys, who, with ready gallantry, pushed by him to
      escort her to her carriage; and he lay awake at night to form into words
      the answer he ought to have made, when she threw at him some careless
      phrase, and gave him the opportunity to blunder.
    </p>
    <p>
      And she, meanwhile, unconscious of his passion, went by him in her beauty,
      and caught him in the net she never threw. Emilia was always piquant,
      because she was indifferent; she had never made an effort in her life, and
      she had no respect for persons. She was capable of marrying for money,
      perhaps, but the sacrifice must all be completed in a single vow. She
      would not tutor nor control herself for the purpose. Hand and heart must
      be duly transferred, she supposed, whenever the time was up; but till then
      she must be free.
    </p>
    <p>
      This with her was not art, but necessity; yet the most accomplished art
      could have devised nothing so effectual to hold her lover. His strong
      sense had always protected him from the tricks of matchmaking mammas and
      their guileless maids. Had Emilia made one effort to please him, once
      concealed a dislike, once affected a preference, the spell might have been
      broken. Had she been his slave, he might have become a very unyielding or
      a very heedless despot. Making him her slave, she kept him at the very
      height of bliss. This king of railways and purchaser of statesmen, this
      man who made or wrecked the fortunes of others by his whim, was absolutely
      governed by a reckless, passionate, inexperienced, ignorant girl.
    </p>
    <p>
      And this passion was made all the stronger by being a good deal confined
      to his own breast. Somehow it was very hard for him to talk sentiment to
      Emilia; he instinctively saw she disliked it, and indeed he liked her for
      not approving the stiff phrases which were all he could command. Nor could
      he find any relief of mind in talking with others about her. It enraged
      him to be clapped on the back and congratulated by his compeers; and he
      stopped their coarse jokes, often rudely enough. As for the young men at
      the club, he could not bear to hear them mention his darling&rsquo;s name,
      however courteously. He knew well enough that for them the betrothal had
      neither dignity nor purity; that they held it to be as much a matter of
      bargain and sale as their worst amours. He would far rather have talked to
      the theological professors whose salaries he paid, for he saw that they
      had a sort of grave, formal tradition of the sacredness of marriage. And
      he had a right to claim that to him it was sacred, at least as yet; all
      the ideal side of his nature was suddenly developed; he walked in a dream;
      he even read Tennyson.
    </p>
    <p>
      Sometimes he talked a little to his future brother-in-law, Harry,&mdash;assuming,
      as lovers are wont, that brothers see sisters on their ideal side. This
      was quite true of Harry and Hope, but not at all true as regarded Emilia.
      She seemed to him simply a beautiful and ungoverned girl whom he could not
      respect, and whom he therefore found it very hard to idealize. Therefore
      he heard with a sort of sadness the outpourings of generous devotion from
      John Lambert.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know how it is, Henry,&rdquo; the merchant would gravely say, &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t
      get rightly used to it, that I feel so strange. Honestly, now, I feel as
      if I was beginning life over again. It ain&rsquo;t a selfish feeling, so I know
      there&rsquo;s some good in it. I used to be selfish enough, but I ain&rsquo;t so to
      her. You may not think it, but if it would make her happy, I believe I
      could lie down and let her carriage roll over me. By &mdash;&mdash;-, I
      would build her a palace to live in, and keep the lodge at the gate
      myself, just to see her pass by. That is, if she was to live in it alone
      by herself. I couldn&rsquo;t stand sharing her. It must be me or nobody.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Probably there was no male acquaintance of the parties, however hardened,
      to whom these fine flights would have seemed more utterly preposterous
      than to the immediate friend and prospective bridesmaid, Miss Blanche
      Ingleside. To that young lady, trained sedulously by a devoted mother,
      life was really a serious thing. It meant the full rigor of the marriage
      market, tempered only by dancing and new dresses. There was a stern sense
      of duty beneath all her robing and disrobing; she conscientiously did what
      was expected of her, and took her little amusements meanwhile. It was
      supposed that most of the purchasers in the market preferred slang and
      bare shoulders, and so she favored them with plenty of both. It was merely
      the law of supply and demand. Had John Lambert once hinted that he would
      accept her in decent black, she would have gone to the next ball as a
      Sister of Charity; but where was the need of it, when she and her mother
      both knew that, had she appeared as the Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, she
      would not have won him? So her only resource was a cheerful acquiescence
      in Emilia&rsquo;s luck, and a judicious propitiation of the accepted favorite.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I wouldn&rsquo;t mind playing Virtue Rewarded myself, young woman,&rdquo; said
      Blanche, &ldquo;at such a scale of prices. I would do it even to so slow an
      audience as old Lambert. But you see, it isn&rsquo;t my line. Don&rsquo;t forget your
      humble friends when you come into your property, that&rsquo;s all.&rdquo; Then the
      tender coterie of innocents entered on some preliminary consideration of
      wedding-dresses.
    </p>
    <p>
      When Emilia came home, she dismissed the whole matter lightly as a settled
      thing, evaded all talk with Aunt Jane, and coolly said to Kate that she
      had no objection to Mr. Lambert, and might as well marry him as anybody
      else.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am not like you and Hal, you know,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;I have no fancy for love
      in a cottage. I never look well in anything that is not costly. I have not
      a taste that does not imply a fortune. What is the use of love? One
      marries for love, and is unhappy ever after. One marries for money, and
      perhaps gets love after all. I dare say Mr. Lambert loves me, though I do
      not see why he should.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I fear he does,&rdquo; said Kate, almost severely.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Fear?&rdquo; said Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;It is an unequal bargain, where one side does all the
      loving.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be troubled,&rdquo; said Emilia. &ldquo;I dare say he will not love me long.
      Nobody ever did!&rdquo; And her eyes filled with tears which she dashed away
      angrily, as she ran up to her room.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was harder yet for her to talk with Hope, but she did it, and that in a
      very serious mood. She had never been so open with her sister.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Aunt Jane once told me,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;that my only safety was in marrying a
      good man. Now I am engaged to one.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Do you love him, Emilia?&rdquo; asked Hope, gravely.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not much,&rdquo; said Emilia, honestly. &ldquo;But perhaps I shall, by and by.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Emilia,&rdquo; cried Hope, &ldquo;there is no such thing as happiness in a marriage
      without love.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Mine is not without love,&rdquo; the girl answered. &ldquo;He loves me. It frightens
      me to see how much he loves me. I can have the devotion of a lifetime, if
      I will. Perhaps it is hard to receive it in such a way, but I can have it.
      Do you blame me very much?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Hope hesitated. &ldquo;I cannot blame you so much, my child,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;as if I
      thought it were money for which you cared. It seems to me that there must
      be something beside that, and yet&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O Hope, how I thank you,&rdquo; interrupted Emilia. &ldquo;It is not money. You know
      I do not care about money, except just to buy my clothes and things. At
      least, I do not care about so much as he has,&mdash;more than a million
      dollars, only think! Perhaps they said two million. Is it wrong for me to
      marry him, just because he has that?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not if you love him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not exactly love him, but O Hope, I cannot tell you about it. I am
      not so frivolous as you think. I want to do my duty. I want to make you
      happy too: you have been so sweet to me.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Did you think it would make me happy to have you married?&rdquo; asked Hope,
      surprised, and kissing again and again the young, sad face. And the two
      girls went upstairs together, brought for the moment into more sisterly
      nearness by the very thing that had seemed likely to set them forever
      apart.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XIII. DREAMING DREAMS.
    </h2>
    <p>
      SO short was the period between Emilia&rsquo;s betrothal and her marriage, that
      Aunt Jane&rsquo;s sufferings over trousseau and visits did not last long. Mr.
      Lambert&rsquo;s society was the worst thing to bear.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;He makes such long calls!&rdquo; she said, despairingly. &ldquo;He should bring an
      almanac with him to know when the days go by.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But Harry and Philip are here all the time,&rdquo; said Kate, the accustomed
      soother.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Harry is quiet, and Philip keeps out of the way lately,&rdquo; she answered.
      &ldquo;But I always thought lovers the most inconvenient thing about a house.
      They are more troublesome than the mice, and all those people who live in
      the wainscot; for though the lovers make less noise, yet you have to see
      them.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;A necessary evil, dear,&rdquo; said Kate, with much philosophy.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am not sure,&rdquo; said the complainant. &ldquo;They might be excluded in the deed
      of a house, or by the terms of the lease. The next house I take, I shall
      say to the owner, &lsquo;Have you a good well of water on the premises? Are you
      troubled with rats or lovers?&rsquo; That will settle it.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      It was true, what Aunt Jane said about Malbone. He had changed his habits
      a good deal. While the girls were desperately busy about the dresses, he
      beguiled Harry to the club, and sat on the piazza, talking sentiment and
      sarcasm, regardless of hearers.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;When we are young,&rdquo; he would say, &ldquo;we are all idealists in love. Every
      imaginative boy has such a passion, while his intellect is crude and his
      senses indifferent. It is the height of bliss. All other pleasures are not
      worth its pains. With older men this ecstasy of the imagination is rare;
      it is the senses that clutch or reason which holds.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Is that an improvement?&rdquo; asked some juvenile listener.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No!&rdquo; said Philip, strongly. &ldquo;Reason is cold and sensuality hateful; a man
      of any feeling must feed his imagination; there must be a woman of whom he
      can dream.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is,&rdquo; put in some more critical auditor, &ldquo;whom he can love as a woman
      loves a man.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;For want of the experience of such a passion,&rdquo; Malbone went on,
      unheeding, &ldquo;nobody comprehends Petrarch. Philosophers and sensualists all
      refuse to believe that his dream of Laura went on, even when he had a
      mistress and a child. Why not? Every one must have something to which his
      dreams can cling, amid the degradations of actual life, and this tie is
      more real than the degradation; and if he holds to the tie, it will one
      day save him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What is the need of the degradation?&rdquo; put in the clear-headed Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;None, except in weakness,&rdquo; said Philip. &ldquo;A stronger nature may escape it.
      Good God! do I not know how Petrarch must have felt? What sorrow life
      brings! Suppose a man hopelessly separated from one whom he passionately
      loves. Then, as he looks up at the starry sky, something says to him: &lsquo;You
      can bear all these agonies of privation, loss of life, loss of love,&mdash;what
      are they? If the tie between you is what you thought, neither life nor
      death, neither folly nor sin, can keep her forever from you.&rsquo; Would that
      one could always feel so! But I am weak. Then comes impulse, it thirsts
      for some immediate gratification; I yield, and plunge into any happiness
      since I cannot obtain her. Then comes quiet again, with the stars, and I
      bitterly reproach myself for needing anything more than that stainless
      ideal. And so, I fancy, did Petrarch.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Philip was getting into a dangerous mood with his sentimentalism. No
      lawful passion can ever be so bewildering or ecstatic as an unlawful one.
      For that which is right has all the powers of the universe on its side,
      and can afford to wait; but the wrong, having all those vast forces
      against it, must hurry to its fulfilment, reserve nothing, concentrate all
      its ecstasies upon to-day. Malbone, greedy of emotion, was drinking to the
      dregs a passion that could have no to-morrow.
    </p>
    <p>
      Sympathetic persons are apt to assume that every refined emotion must be
      ennobling. This is not true of men like Malbone, voluptuaries of the
      heart. He ordinarily got up a passion very much as Lord Russell got up an
      appetite,&mdash;he, of Spence&rsquo;s Anecdotes, who went out hunting for that
      sole purpose, and left the chase when the sensation came. Malbone did not
      leave his more spiritual chase so soon,&mdash;it made him too happy.
      Sometimes, indeed, when he had thus caught his emotion, it caught him in
      return, and for a few moments made him almost unhappy. This he liked best
      of all; he nursed the delicious pain, knowing that it would die out soon
      enough, there was no need of hurrying it to a close. At least, there had
      never been need for such solicitude before.
    </p>
    <p>
      Except for his genius for keeping his own counsel, every acquaintance of
      Malbone&rsquo;s would have divined the meaning of these reveries. As it was, he
      was called whimsical and sentimental, but he was a man of sufficiently
      assured position to have whims of his own, and could even treat himself to
      an emotion or so, if he saw fit. Besides, he talked well to anybody on
      anything, and was admitted to exhibit, for a man of literary tastes, a
      good deal of sense. If he had engaged himself to a handsome
      schoolmistress, it was his fancy, and he could afford it. Moreover she was
      well connected, and had an air. And what more natural than that he should
      stand at the club-window and watch, when his young half-sister (that was
      to be) drove by with John Lambert? So every afternoon he saw them pass in
      a vehicle of lofty description, with two wretched appendages in dark blue
      broadcloth, who sat with their backs turned to their masters, kept their
      arms folded, and nearly rolled off at every corner. Hope would have
      dreaded the close neighborhood of those Irish ears; she would rather have
      ridden even in an omnibus, could she and Philip have taken all the seats.
      But then Hope seldom cared to drive on the Avenue at all, except as a
      means of reaching the ocean, whereas with most people it appears the
      appointed means to escape from that spectacle. And as for the footmen,
      there was nothing in the conversation worth their hearing or repeating;
      and their presence was a relief to Emilia, for who knew but Mr. Lambert
      himself might end in growing sentimental?
    </p>
    <p>
      Yet she did not find him always equally tedious. Their drives had some
      variety. For instance, he sometimes gave her some lovely present before
      they set forth, and she could feel that, if his lips did not yield
      diamonds and rubies, his pockets did. Sometimes he conversed about money
      and investments, which she rather liked; this was his strong and
      commanding point; he explained things quite clearly, and they found, with
      mutual surprise, that she also had a shrewd little brain for those
      matters, if she would but take the trouble to think about them. Sometimes
      he insisted on being tender, and even this was not so bad as she expected,
      at least for a few minutes at a time; she rather enjoyed having her hand
      pressed so seriously, and his studied phrases amused her. It was only when
      he wished the conversation to be brilliant and intellectual, that he
      became intolerable; then she must entertain him, must get up little
      repartees, must tell him lively anecdotes, which he swallowed as a dog
      bolts a morsel, being at once ready for the next. He never made a comment,
      of course, but at the height of his enjoyment he gave a quick, short,
      stupid laugh, that so jarred upon her ears, she would have liked to be
      struck deaf rather than hear it again.
    </p>
    <p>
      At these times she thought of Malbone, how gifted he was, how
      inexhaustible, how agreeable, with a faculty for happiness that would have
      been almost provoking had it not been contagious. Then she looked from her
      airy perch and smiled at him at the club-window, where he stood in the
      most negligent of attitudes, and with every faculty strained in
      observation. A moment and she was gone.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then all was gone, and a mob of queens might have blocked the way, without
      his caring to discuss their genealogies, even with old General Le Breton,
      who had spent his best (or his worst) years abroad, and was supposed to
      have been confidential adviser to most of the crowned heads of Europe.
    </p>
    <p>
      For the first time in his life Malbone found himself in the grasp of a
      passion too strong to be delightful. For the first time his own heart
      frightened him. He had sometimes feared that it was growing harder, but
      now he discovered that it was not hard enough.
    </p>
    <p>
      He knew it was not merely mercenary motives that had made Emilia accept
      John Lambert; but what troubled him was a vague knowledge that it was not
      mere pique. He was used to dealing with pique in women, and had found it
      the most manageable of weaknesses. It was an element of spasmodic
      conscience than he saw here, and it troubled him.
    </p>
    <p>
      Something told him that she had said to herself: &ldquo;I will be married, and
      thus do my duty to Hope. Other girls marry persons whom they do not love,
      and it helps them to forget. Perhaps it will help me. This is a good man,
      they say, and I think he loves me.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Think?&rdquo; John Lambert had adored her when she had passed by him without
      looking at him; and now when the thought came over him that she would be
      his wife, he became stupid with bliss. And as latterly he had thought of
      little else, he remained more or less stupid all the time.
    </p>
    <p>
      To a man like Malbone, self-indulgent rather than selfish, this poor,
      blind semblance of a moral purpose in Emilia was a great embarrassment. It
      is a terrible thing for a lover when he detects conscience amidst the
      armory of weapons used against him, and faces the fact that he must blunt
      a woman&rsquo;s principles to win her heart. Philip was rather accustomed to
      evade conscience, but he never liked to look it in the face and defy it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Yet if the thought of Hope at this time came over him, it came as a
      constraint, and he disliked it as such; and the more generous and
      beautiful she was, the greater the constraint. He cursed himself that he
      had allowed himself to be swayed back to her, and so had lost Emilia
      forever. And thus he drifted on, not knowing what he wished for, but
      knowing extremely well what he feared.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XIV. THE NEMESIS OF PASSION.
    </h2>
    <p>
      MALBONE was a person of such ready, emotional nature, and such easy
      expression, that it was not hard for Hope to hide from herself the gradual
      ebbing of his love. Whenever he was fresh and full of spirits, he had
      enough to overflow upon her and every one. But when other thoughts and
      cares were weighing on him, he could not share them, nor could he at such
      times, out of the narrowing channel of his own life, furnish more than a
      few scanty drops for her.
    </p>
    <p>
      At these times he watched with torturing fluctuations the signs of
      solicitude in Hope, the timid withdrawing of her fingers, the questioning
      of her eyes, the weary drooping of her whole expression. Often he cursed
      himself as a wretch for paining that pure and noble heart. Yet there were
      moments when a vague inexpressible delight stole in; a glimmering of
      shame-faced pleasure as he pondered on this visible dawning of distrust; a
      sudden taste of freedom in being no longer fettered by her confidence. By
      degrees he led himself, still half ashamed, to the dream that she might
      yet be somehow weaned from him, and leave his conscience free. By
      constantly building upon this thought, and putting aside all others, he
      made room upon the waste of his life for a house of cards, glittering,
      unsubstantial, lofty,&mdash;until there came some sudden breath that swept
      it away; and then he began on it again.
    </p>
    <p>
      In one of those moments of more familiar faith which still alternated with
      these cold, sad intervals, she asked him with some sudden impulse, how he
      should feel if she loved another? She said it, as if guided by an
      instinct, to sound the depth of his love for her. Starting with amazement,
      he looked at her, and then, divining her feeling, he only replied by an
      expression of reproach, and by kissing her hands with an habitual
      tenderness that had grown easy to him,&mdash;and they were such lovely
      hands! But his heart told him that no spent swimmer ever transferred more
      eagerly to another&rsquo;s arms some precious burden beneath which he was
      consciously sinking, than he would yield her up to any one whom she would
      consent to love, and who could be trusted with the treasure. Until that
      ecstasy of release should come, he would do his duty,&mdash;yes, his duty.
    </p>
    <p>
      When these flushed hopes grew pale, as they soon did, he could at least
      play with the wan fancies that took their place. Hour after hour, while
      she lavished upon him the sweetness of her devotion, he was half
      consciously shaping with his tongue some word of terrible revealing that
      should divide them like a spell, if spoken, and then recalling it before
      it left his lips. Daily and hourly he felt the last agony of a weak and
      passionate nature,&mdash;to dream of one woman in another&rsquo;s arms.
    </p>
    <p>
      She, too, watched him with an ever-increasing instinct of danger, studied
      with a chilly terror the workings of his face, weighed and reweighed his
      words in absence, agonized herself with new and ever new suspicions; and
      then, when these had accumulated beyond endurance, seized them
      convulsively and threw them all away. Then, coming back to him with a
      great overwhelming ardor of affection, she poured upon him more and more
      in proportion as he gave her less.
    </p>
    <p>
      Sometimes in these moments of renewed affection he half gave words to his
      remorse, accused himself before her of unnamed wrong, and besought her to
      help him return to his better self. These were the most dangerous moments
      of all, for such appeals made tenderness and patience appear a duty; she
      must put away her doubts as sins, and hold him to her; she must refuse to
      see his signs of faltering faith, or treat them as mere symptoms of ill
      health. Should not a wife cling the closer to her husband in proportion as
      he seemed alienated through the wanderings of disease? And was not this
      her position? So she said within herself, and meanwhile it was not hard to
      penetrate her changing thoughts, at least for so keen an observer as Aunt
      Jane. Hope, at length, almost ceased to speak of Malbone, and revealed her
      grief by this evasion, as the robin reveals her nest by flitting from it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Yet there were times when he really tried to force himself into a revival
      of this calmer emotion. He studied Hope&rsquo;s beauty with his eyes, he
      pondered on all her nobleness. He wished to bring his whole heart back to
      her&mdash;or at least wished that he wished it. But hearts that have
      educated themselves into faithlessness must sooner or later share the
      suffering they give. Love will be avenged on them. Nothing could have now
      recalled this epicure in passion, except, possibly, a little withholding
      or semi-coquetry on Hope&rsquo;s part, and this was utterly impossible for her.
      Absolute directness was a part of her nature; she could die, but not
      manouvre.
    </p>
    <p>
      It actually diminished Hope&rsquo;s hold on Philip, that she had at this time
      the whole field to herself. Emilia had gone for a few weeks to the
      mountains, with the household of which she was a guest. An ideal and
      unreasonable passion is strongest in absence, when the dream is all pure
      dream, and safe from the discrepancies of daily life. When the two girls
      were together, Emilia often showed herself so plainly Hope&rsquo;s inferior,
      that it jarred on Philip&rsquo;s fine perceptions. But in Emilia&rsquo;s absence the
      spell of temperament, or whatever else brought them together, resumed its
      sway unchecked; she became one great magnet of attraction, and all the
      currents of the universe appeared to flow from the direction where her
      eyes were shining. When she was out of sight, he needed to make no
      allowance for her defects, to reproach himself with no overt acts of
      disloyalty to Hope, to recognize no criticisms of his own intellect or
      conscience. He could resign himself to his reveries, and pursue them into
      new subtleties day by day.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was Mrs. Meredith&rsquo;s house, too, where they had been so happy. And
      now the blinds were pitilessly closed, all but one where the Venetian
      slats had slipped, and stood half open as if some dainty fingers held
      them, and some lovely eyes looked through. He gazed so long and so often
      on that silent house,&mdash;by day, when the scorching sunshine searched
      its pores as if to purge away every haunting association, or by night,
      when the mantle of darkness hung tenderly above it, and seemed to collect
      the dear remembrances again,&mdash;that his fancy by degrees grew morbid,
      and its pictures unreal. &ldquo;It is impossible,&rdquo; he one day thought to
      himself, &ldquo;that she should have lived in that room so long, sat in that
      window, dreamed on that couch, reflected herself in that mirror, breathed
      that air, without somehow detaching invisible fibres of her being,
      delicate films of herself, that must gradually, she being gone, draw
      together into a separate individuality an image not quite bodiless, that
      replaces her in her absence, as the holy Theocrite was replaced by the
      angel. If there are ghosts of the dead, why not ghosts of the living
      also?&rdquo; This lover&rsquo;s fancy so pleased him that he brought to bear upon it
      the whole force of his imagination, and it grew stronger day by day. To
      him, thenceforth, the house was haunted, and all its floating traces of
      herself visible or invisible,&mdash;from the ribbon that he saw entangled
      in the window-blind to every intangible and fancied atom she had imparted
      to the atmosphere,&mdash;came at last to organize themselves into one
      phantom shape for him and looked out, a wraith of Emilia, through those
      relentless blinds. As the vision grew more vivid, he saw the dim figure
      moving through the house, wan, restless, tender, lingering where they had
      lingered, haunting every nook where they had been happy once. In the windy
      moanings of the silent night he could put his ear at the keyhole, and
      could fancy that he heard the wild signals of her love and despair.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XV. ACROSS THE BAY.
    </h2>
    <p>
      THE children, as has been said, were all devoted to Malbone, and this was,
      in a certain degree, to his credit. But it is a mistake to call children
      good judges of character, except in one direction, namely, their own. They
      understand it, up to the level of their own stature; they know who loves
      them, but not who loves virtue. Many a sinner has a great affection for
      children, and no child will ever detect the sins of such a friend;
      because, toward them, the sins do not exist.
    </p>
    <p>
      The children, therefore, all loved Philip, and yet they turned with
      delight, when out-door pleasures were in hand, to the strong and adroit
      Harry. Philip inclined to the daintier exercises, fencing, billiards,
      riding; but Harry&rsquo;s vigorous physique enjoyed hard work. He taught all the
      household to swim, for instance. Jenny, aged five, a sturdy, deep-chested
      little thing, seemed as amphibious as himself. She could already swim
      alone, but she liked to keep close to him, as all young animals do to
      their elders in the water, not seeming to need actual support, but
      stronger for the contact. Her favorite position, however, was on his back,
      where she triumphantly clung, grasping his bathing-dress with one hand,
      swinging herself to and fro, dipping her head beneath the water, singing
      and shouting, easily shifting her position when he wished to vary his, and
      floating by him like a little fish, when he was tired of supporting her.
      It was pretty to see the child in her one little crimson garment, her face
      flushed with delight, her fair hair glistening from the water, and the
      waves rippling and dancing round her buoyant form. As Harry swam farther
      and farther out, his head was hidden from view by her small person, and
      she might have passed for a red seabird rocking on the gentle waves. It
      was one of the regular delights of the household to see them bathe.
    </p>
    <p>
      Kate came in to Aunt Jane&rsquo;s room, one August morning, to say that they
      were going to the water-side. How differently people may enter a room!
      Hope always came in as the summer breeze comes, quiet, strong, soft,
      fragrant, resistless. Emilia never seemed to come in at all; you looked
      up, and she had somehow drifted where she stood, pleading, evasive,
      lovely. This was especially the case where one person was awaiting her
      alone; with two she was more fearless, with a dozen she was buoyant, and
      with a hundred she forgot herself utterly and was a spirit of irresistible
      delight.
    </p>
    <p>
      But Kate entered any room, whether nursery or kitchen, as if it were the
      private boudoir of a princess and she the favorite maid of honor. Thus it
      was she came that morning to Aunt Jane.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;We are going down to see the bathers, dear,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;Shall you miss
      me?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I miss you every minute,&rdquo; said her aunt, decisively. &ldquo;But I shall do very
      well. I have delightful times here by myself. What a ridiculous man it was
      who said that it was impossible to imagine a woman&rsquo;s laughing at her own
      comic fancies. I sit and laugh at my own nonsense very often.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is a shame to waste it,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It is a blessing that any of it is disposed of while you are not here,&rdquo;
       said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;You have quite enough of it.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;We never have enough,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;And we never can make you repeat any
      of yesterday&rsquo;s.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Of course not,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;Nonsense must have the dew on it, or it
      is good for nothing.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;So you are really happiest alone?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Not so happy as when you are with me,&mdash;you or Hope. I like to have
      Hope with me now; she does me good. Really, I do not care for anybody
      else. Sometimes I think if I could always have four or five young kittens
      by me, in a champagne-basket, with a nurse to watch them, I should be
      happier. But perhaps not; they would grow up so fast!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Then I will leave you alone without compunction,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am not alone,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane; &ldquo;I have my man in the boat to watch
      through the window. What a singular being he is! I think he spends hours
      in that boat, and what he does I can&rsquo;t conceive. There it is, quietly
      anchored, and there is he in it. I never saw anybody but myself who could
      get up so much industry out of nothing. He has all his housework there, a
      broom and a duster, and I dare say he has a cooking-stove and a gridiron.
      He sits a little while, then he stoops down, then he goes to the other
      end. Sometimes he goes ashore in that absurd little tub, with a stick that
      he twirls at one end.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is called sculling,&rdquo; interrupted Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Sculling! I suppose he runs for a baked potato. Then he goes back. He is
      Robinson Crusoe on an island that never keeps still a single instant. It
      is all he has, and he never looks away, and never wants anything more. So
      I have him to watch. Think of living so near a beaver or a water-rat with
      clothes on! Good-by. Leave the door ajar, it is so warm.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      And Kate went down to the landing. It was near the &ldquo;baptismal shore,&rdquo;
       where every Sunday the young people used to watch the immersions; they
      liked to see the crowd of spectators, the eager friends, the dripping
      convert, the serene young minister, the old men and girls who burst forth
      in song as the new disciple rose from the waves. It was the weekly
      festival in that region, and the sunshine and the ripples made it
      gladdening, not gloomy. Every other day in the week the children of the
      fishermen waded waist-deep in the water, and played at baptism.
    </p>
    <p>
      Near this shore stood the family bathing-house; and the girls came down to
      sit in its shadow and watch the swimming. It was late in August, and on
      the first of September Emilia was to be married.
    </p>
    <p>
      Nothing looked cool, that day, but the bay and those who were going into
      it. Out came Hope from the bathing-house, in a new bathing-dress of dark
      blue, which was evidently what the others had come forth to behold.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Hope, what an imposter you are!&rdquo; cried Kate instantly. &ldquo;You declined all
      my proffers of aid in cutting that dress, and now see how it fits you! You
      never looked so beautifully in your life. There is not such another
      bathing-dress in Oldport, nor such a figure to wear it.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      And she put both her arms round that supple, stately waist, that might
      have belonged to a Greek goddess, or to some queen in the Nibelungen Lied.
    </p>
    <p>
      The party watched the swimmers as they struck out over the clear expanse.
      It was high noon; the fishing-boats were all off, but a few pleasure-boats
      swung different ways at their moorings, in the perfect calm. The white
      light-house stood reflected opposite, at the end of its long pier; a few
      vessels lay at anchor, with their sails up to dry, but with that deserted
      look which coasters in port are wont to wear. A few fishes dimpled the
      still surface, and as the three swam out farther and farther, their merry
      voices still sounded close at hand. Suddenly they all clapped their hands
      and called; then pointed forward to the light-house, across the narrow
      harbor.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They are going to swim across,&rdquo; said Kate. &ldquo;What creatures they are! Hope
      and little Jenny have always begged for it, and now Harry thinks it is so
      still a day they can safely venture. It is more than half a mile. See! he
      has called that boy in a boat, and he will keep near them. They have swum
      farther than that along the shore.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      So the others went away with no fears.
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope said afterwards that she never swam with such delight as on that day.
      The water seemed to be peculiarly thin and clear, she said, as well as
      tranquil, and to retain its usual buoyancy without its density. It gave a
      delicious sense of freedom; she seemed to swim in air, and felt singularly
      secure. For the first time she felt what she had always wished to
      experience,&mdash;that swimming was as natural as walking, and might be
      indefinitely prolonged. Her strength seemed limitless, she struck out more
      and more strongly; she splashed and played with little Jenny, when the
      child began to grow weary of the long motion. A fisherman&rsquo;s boy in a boat
      rowed slowly along by their side.
    </p>
    <p>
      Nine tenths of the distance had been accomplished, when the little girl
      grew quite impatient, and Hope bade Harry swim on before her, and land his
      charge. Light and buoyant as the child was, her tightened clasp had begun
      to tell on him.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It tires you, Hal, to bear that weight so long, and you know I have
      nothing to carry. You must see that I am not in the least tired, only a
      little dazzled by the sun. Here, Charley, give me your hat, and then row
      on with Mr. Harry.&rdquo; She put on the boy&rsquo;s torn straw hat, and they yielded
      to her wish. People almost always yielded to Hope&rsquo;s wishes when she
      expressed them,&mdash;it was so very seldom.
    </p>
    <p>
      Somehow the remaining distance seemed very great, as Hope saw them glide
      away, leaving her in the water alone, her feet unsupported by any firm
      element, the bright and pitiless sky arching far above her, and her head
      burning with more heat than she had liked to own. She was conscious of her
      full strength, and swam more vigorously than ever; but her head was hot
      and her ears rang, and she felt chilly vibrations passing up and down her
      sides, that were like, she fancied, the innumerable fringing oars of the
      little jelly-fishes she had so often watched. Her body felt almost
      unnaturally strong, and she took powerful strokes; but it seemed as if her
      heart went out into them and left a vacant cavity within. More and more
      her life seemed boiling up into her head; queer fancies came to her, as,
      for instance, that she was an inverted thermometer with the mercury all
      ascending into a bulb at the top. She shook her head and the fancy cleared
      away, and then others came.
    </p>
    <p>
      She began to grow seriously anxious, but the distance was diminishing;
      Harry was almost at the steps with the child, and the boy had rowed his
      skiff round the breakwater out of sight; a young fisherman leaned over the
      railing with his back to her, watching the lobster-catchers on the other
      side. She was almost in; it was only a slight dizziness, yet she could not
      see the light-house. Concentrating all her efforts, she shut her eyes and
      swam on, her arms still unaccountably vigorous, though the rest of her
      body seemed losing itself in languor. The sound in her ear had grown to a
      roar, as of many mill-wheels. It seemed a long distance that she thus swam
      with her eyes closed. Then she half opened her eyes, and the breakwater
      seemed all in motion, with tier above tier of eager faces looking down on
      her. In an instant there was a sharp splash close beside her, and she felt
      herself grasped and drawn downwards, with a whirl of something just above
      her, and then all consciousness went out as suddenly as when ether brings
      at last to a patient, after the roaring and the tumult in his brain, its
      blessed foretaste of the deliciousness of death.
    </p>
    <p>
      When Hope came again to consciousness, she found herself approaching her
      own pier in a sail-boat, with several very wet gentlemen around her, and
      little Jenny nestled close to her, crying as profusely as if her pretty
      scarlet bathing-dress were being wrung out through her eyes. Hope asked no
      questions, and hardly felt the impulse to inquire what had happened. The
      truth was, that in the temporary dizziness produced by her prolonged swim,
      she had found herself in the track of a steamboat that was passing the
      pier, unobserved by her brother. A young man, leaping from the dock, had
      caught her in his arms, and had dived with her below the paddle-wheels,
      just as they came upon her. It was a daring act, but nothing else could
      have saved her. When they came to the surface, they had been picked up by
      Aunt Jane&rsquo;s Robinson Crusoe, who had at last unmoored his pilot-boat and
      was rounding the light-house for the outer harbor.
    </p>
    <p>
      She and the child were soon landed, and given over to the ladies. Due
      attention was paid to her young rescuer, whose dripping garments seemed
      for the moment as glorious as a blood-stained flag. He seemed a simple,
      frank young fellow of French or German origin, but speaking English
      remarkably well; he was not high-bred, by any means, but had apparently
      the culture of an average German of the middle class. Harry fancied that
      he had seen him before, and at last traced back the impression of his
      features to the ball for the French officers. It turned out, on inquiry,
      that he had a brother in the service, and on board the corvette; but he
      himself was a commercial agent, now in America with a view to business,
      though he had made several voyages as mate of a vessel, and would not
      object to some such berth as that. He promised to return and receive the
      thanks of the family, read with interest the name on Harry&rsquo;s card, seemed
      about to ask a question, but forbore, and took his leave amid the general
      confusion, without even giving his address. When sought next day, he was
      not to be found, and to the children he at once became as much a creature
      of romance as the sea-serpent or the Flying Dutchman.
    </p>
    <p>
      Even Hope&rsquo;s strong constitution felt the shock of this adventure. She was
      confined to her room for a week or two, but begged that there might be no
      postponement of the wedding, which, therefore, took place without her. Her
      illness gave excuse for a privacy that was welcome to all but the
      bridesmaids, and suited Malbone best of all.
    </p>
    <p>
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      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
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    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XVI. ON THE STAIRS.
    </h2>
    <h3>
      AUGUST drew toward its close, and guests departed from the neighborhood.
    </h3>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What a short little thing summer is,&rdquo; meditated Aunt Jane, &ldquo;and
      butterflies are caterpillars most of the time after all. How quiet it
      seems. The wrens whisper in their box above the window, and there has not
      been a blast from the peacock for a week. He seems ashamed of the summer
      shortness of his tail. He keeps glancing at it over his shoulder to see if
      it is not looking better than yesterday, while the staring eyes of the old
      tail are in the bushes all about.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Poor, dear little thing!&rdquo; said coaxing Katie. &ldquo;Is she tired of autumn,
      before it is begun?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am never tired of anything,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;except my maid Ruth, and
      I should not be tired of her, if it had pleased Heaven to endow her with
      sufficient strength of mind to sew on a button. Life is very rich to me.
      There is always something new in every season; though to be sure I cannot
      think what novelty there is just now, except a choice variety of spiders.
      There is a theory that spiders kill flies. But I never miss a fly, and
      there does not seem to be any natural scourge divinely appointed to kill
      spiders, except Ruth. Even she does it so feebly, that I see them come
      back and hang on their webs and make faces at her. I suppose they are
      faces; I do not understand their anatomy, but it must be a very unpleasant
      one.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You are not quite satisfied with life, today, dear,&rdquo; said Kate; &ldquo;I fear
      your book did not end to your satisfaction.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It did end, though,&rdquo; said the lady, &ldquo;and that is something. What is there
      in life so difficult as to stop a book? If I wrote one, it would be as
      long as ten &lsquo;Sir Charles Grandisons,&rsquo; and then I never should end it,
      because I should die. And there would be nobody left to read it, because
      each reader would have been dead long before.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But the book amused you!&rdquo; interrupted Kate. &ldquo;I know it did.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It was so absurd that I laughed till I cried; and it makes no difference
      whether you cry laughing or cry crying; it is equally bad when your
      glasses come off. Never mind. Whom did you see on the Avenue?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O, we saw Philip on horseback. He rides so beautifully; he seems one with
      his horse.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am glad of it,&rdquo; interposed his aunt. &ldquo;The riders are generally so
      inferior to them.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;We saw Mr. and Mrs. Lambert, too. Emilia stopped and asked after you, and
      sent you her love, auntie.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Love!&rdquo; cried Aunt Jane. &ldquo;She always does that. She has sent me love
      enough to rear a whole family on,&mdash;more than I ever felt for anybody
      in all my days. But she does not really love any one.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I hope she will love her husband,&rdquo; said Kate, rather seriously.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Mark my words, Kate!&rdquo; said her aunt. &ldquo;Nothing but unhappiness will ever
      come of that marriage. How can two people be happy who have absolutely
      nothing in common?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But no two people have just the same tastes,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;except Harry
      and myself. It is not expected. It would be absurd for two people to be
      divorced, because the one preferred white bread and the other brown.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They would be divorced very soon,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, &ldquo;for the one who ate
      brown bread would not live long.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But it is possible that he might live, auntie, in spite of your
      prediction. And perhaps people may be happy, even if you and I do not see
      how.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Nobody ever thinks I see anything,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, in some dejection.
      &ldquo;You think I am nothing in the world but a sort of old oyster, making
      amusement for people, and having no more to do with real life than oysters
      have.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No, dearest!&rdquo; cried Kate. &ldquo;You have a great deal to do with all our
      lives. You are a dear old insidious sapper-and-miner, looking at first
      very inoffensive, and then working your way into our affections, and
      spoiling us with coaxing. How you behave about children, for instance!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; said the other meekly. &ldquo;As well as I can.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But you pretend that you dislike them.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But I do dislike them. How can anybody help it? Hear them swearing at
      this moment, boys of five, paddling in the water there! Talk about the
      murder of the innocents! There are so few innocents to be murdered! If I
      only had a gun and could shoot!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You may not like those particular boys,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;but you like good,
      well-behaved children, very much.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It takes so many to take care of them! People drive by here, with
      carriages so large that two of the largest horses can hardly draw them,
      and all full of those little beings. They have a sort of roof, too, and
      seem to expect to be out in all weathers.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;If you had a family of children, perhaps you would find such a travelling
      caravan very convenient,&rdquo; said Kate.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;If I had such a family,&rdquo; said her aunt, &ldquo;I would have a separate
      governess and guardian for each, very moral persons. They should come when
      each child was two, and stay till it was twenty. The children should all
      live apart, in order not to quarrel, and should meet once or twice a day
      and bow to each other. I think that each should learn a different
      language, so as not to converse, and then, perhaps, they would not get
      each other into mischief.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I am sure, auntie,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;you have missed our small nephews and
      nieces ever since their visit ended. How still the house has been!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; was the answer. &ldquo;I hear a great many noises about the
      house. Somebody comes in late at night. Perhaps it is Philip; but he comes
      very softly in, wipes his feet very gently, like a clean thief, and goes
      up stairs.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O auntie!&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;you know you have got over all such fancies.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;They are not fancies,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;Things do happen in houses! Did I
      not look under the bed for a thief during fifteen years, and find one at
      last? Why should I not be allowed to hear something now?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But, dear Aunt Jane,&rdquo; said Kate, &ldquo;you never told me this before.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;I was beginning to tell you the other day, but Ruth was
      just bringing in my handkerchiefs, and she had used so much bluing, they
      looked as if they had been washed in heaven, so that it was too
      outrageous, and I forgot everything else.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But do you really hear anything?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said her aunt. &ldquo;Ruth declares she hears noises in those closets
      that I had nailed up, you know; but that is nothing; of course she does.
      Rats. What I hear at night is the creaking of stairs, when I know that
      nobody ought to be stirring. If you observe, you will hear it too. At
      least, I should think you would, only that somehow everything always seems
      to stop, when it is necessary to prove that I am foolish.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      The girls had no especial engagement that evening, and so got into a great
      excitement on the stairway over Aunt Jane&rsquo;s solicitudes. They convinced
      themselves that they heard all sorts of things,&mdash;footfalls on
      successive steps, the creak of a plank, the brushing of an arm against a
      wall, the jar of some suspended object that was stirred in passing. Once
      they heard something fall on the floor, and roll from step to step; and
      yet they themselves stood on the stairway, and nothing passed. Then for
      some time there was silence, but they would have persisted in their
      observations, had not Philip come in from Mrs. Meredith&rsquo;s in the midst of
      it, so that the whole thing turned into a frolic, and they sat on the
      stairs and told ghost stories half the night.
    </p>
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    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XVII. DISCOVERY.
    </h2>
    <p>
      THE next evening Kate and Philip went to a ball. As Hope was passing
      through the hall late in the evening, she heard a sudden, sharp cry
      somewhere in the upper regions, that sounded, she thought, like a woman&rsquo;s
      voice. She stopped to hear, but there was silence. It seemed to come from
      the direction of Malbone&rsquo;s room, which was in the third story. Again came
      the cry, more gently, ending in a sort of sobbing monologue. Gliding
      rapidly up stairs in the dark, she paused at Philip&rsquo;s deserted room, but
      the door was locked, and there was profound stillness. She then descended,
      and pausing at the great landing, heard other steps descending also.
      Retreating to the end of the hall, she hastily lighted a candle, when the
      steps ceased. With her accustomed nerve, wishing to explore the thing
      thoroughly, she put out the light and kept still. As she expected, the
      footsteps presently recommenced, descending stealthily, but drawing no
      nearer, and seeming rather like sounds from an adjoining house, heard
      through a party-wall. This was impossible, as the house stood alone.
      Flushed with excitement, she relighted the hall candles, and, taking one
      of them, searched the whole entry and stairway, going down even to the
      large, old-fashioned cellar.
    </p>
    <p>
      Looking about her in this unfamiliar region, her eye fell on a door that
      seemed to open into the wall; she had noticed a similar door on the story
      above,&mdash;one of the closet doors that had been nailed up by Aunt
      Jane&rsquo;s order. As she looked, however, a chill breath blew in from another
      direction, extinguishing her lamp. This air came from the outer door of
      the cellar, and she had just time to withdraw into a corner before a man&rsquo;s
      steps approached, passing close by her.
    </p>
    <p>
      Even Hope&rsquo;s strong nerves had begun to yield, and a cold shudder went
      through her. Not daring to move, she pressed herself against the wall, and
      her heart seemed to stop as the unseen stranger passed. Instead of his
      ascending where she had come down, as she had expected, she heard him
      grope his way toward the door she had seen in the wall.
    </p>
    <p>
      There he seemed to find a stairway, and when his steps were thus turned
      from her, she was seized by a sudden impulse and followed him, groping her
      way as she could. She remembered that the girls had talked of secret
      stairways in that house, though she had no conception whither they could
      lead, unless to some of the shut-up closets.
    </p>
    <p>
      She steadily followed, treading cautiously upon each creaking step. The
      stairway was very narrow, and formed a regular spiral as in a turret. The
      darkness and the curving motion confused her brain, and it was impossible
      to tell how high in the house she was, except when once she put her hand
      upon what was evidently a door, and moreover saw through its cracks the
      lamp she had left burning in the upper hall. This glimpse of reality
      reassured her. She had begun to discover where she was. The doors which
      Aunt Jane had closed gave access, not to mere closets, but to a spiral
      stairway, which evidently went from top to bottom of the house, and was
      known to some one else beside herself.
    </p>
    <p>
      Relieved of that slight shudder at the supernatural which sometimes
      affects the healthiest nerves, Hope paused to consider. To alarm the
      neighborhood was her first thought. A slight murmuring from above
      dispelled it; she must first reconnoitre a few steps farther. As she
      ascended a little way, a gleam shone upon her, and down the damp stairway
      came a fragrant odor, as from some perfumed chamber. Then a door was shut
      and reopened. Eager beyond expression, she followed on. Another step, and
      she stood at the door of Malbone&rsquo;s apartment.
    </p>
    <p>
      The room was brilliant with light; the doors and windows were heavily
      draped. Fruit and flowers and wine were on the table. On the sofa lay
      Emilia in a gay ball-dress, sunk in one of her motionless trances, while
      Malbone, pale with terror, was deluging her brows with the water he had
      just brought from the well below.
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope stopped a moment and leaned against the door, as her eyes met
      Malbone&rsquo;s. Then she made her way to a chair, and leaning on the back of
      it, which she fingered convulsively, looked with bewildered eyes and
      compressed lips from the one to the other. Malbone tried to speak, but
      failed; tried again, and brought forth only a whisper that broke into
      clearer speech as the words went on. &ldquo;No use to explain,&rdquo; he said.
      &ldquo;Lambert is in New York. Mrs. Meredith is expecting her&mdash;to-night
      after the ball. What can we do?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Hope covered her face as he spoke; she could bear anything better than to
      have him say &ldquo;we,&rdquo; as if no gulf had opened between them. She sank slowly
      on her knees behind her chair, keeping it as a sort of screen between
      herself and these two people,&mdash;the counterfeits, they seemed, of her
      lover and her sister. If the roof in falling to crush them had crushed her
      also, she could scarcely have seemed more rigid or more powerless. It
      passed, and the next moment she was on her feet again, capable of action.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;She must be taken,&rdquo; she said very clearly, but in a lower tone than
      usual, &ldquo;to my chamber.&rdquo; Then pointing to the candles, she said, more
      huskily, &ldquo;We must not be seen. Put them out.&rdquo; Every syllable seemed to
      exhaust her. But as Philip obeyed her words, he saw her move suddenly and
      stand by Emilia&rsquo;s side.
    </p>
    <p>
      She put out both arms as if to lift the young girl, and carry her away.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You cannot,&rdquo; said Philip, putting her gently aside, while she shrank from
      his touch. Then he took Emilia in his arms and bore her to the door, Hope
      preceding.
    </p>
    <p>
      Motioning him to pause a moment, she turned the lock softly, and looked
      out into the dark entry. All was still. She went out, and he followed with
      his motionless burden. They walked stealthily, like guilty things, yet
      every slight motion seemed to ring in their ears. It was chilly, and Hope
      shivered. Through the great open window on the stairway a white fog peered
      in at them, and the distant fog-whistle came faintly through; it seemed as
      if the very atmosphere were condensing about them, to isolate the house in
      which such deeds were done. The clock struck twelve, and it seemed as if
      it struck a thousand.
    </p>
    <p>
      When they reached Hope&rsquo;s door, she turned and put out her arms for Emilia,
      as for a child. Every expression had now gone from Hope&rsquo;s face but a sort
      of stony calmness, which put her infinitely farther from Malbone than had
      the momentary struggle. As he gave the girlish form into arms that shook
      and trembled beneath its weight, he caught a glimpse in the pier-glass of
      their two white faces, and then, looking down, saw the rose-tints yet
      lingering on Emilia&rsquo;s cheek. She, the source of all this woe, looked the
      only representative of innocence between two guilty things.
    </p>
    <p>
      How white and pure and maidenly looked Hope&rsquo;s little room,&mdash;such a
      home of peace, he thought, till its door suddenly opened to admit all this
      passion and despair! There was a great sheaf of cardinal flowers on the
      table, and their petals were drooping, as if reluctant to look on him.
      Scheffer&rsquo;s Christus Consolator was upon the walls, and the benign figure
      seemed to spread wider its arms of mercy, to take in a few sad hearts
      more.
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope bore Emilia into the light and purity and warmth, while Malbone was
      shut out into the darkness and the chill. The only two things to which he
      clung on earth, the two women between whom his unsteady heart had
      vibrated, and both whose lives had been tortured by its vacillation, went
      away from his sight together, the one victim bearing the other victim in
      her arms. Never any more while he lived would either of them be his again;
      and had Dante known it for his last glimpse of things immortal when the
      two lovers floated away from him in their sad embrace, he would have had
      no such sense of utter banishment as had Malbone then.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XVIII. HOPE&rsquo;S VIGIL.
    </h2>
    <p>
      HAD Emilia chosen out of life&rsquo;s whole armory of weapons the means of
      disarming Hope, she could have found nothing so effectual as nature had
      supplied in her unconsciousness. Helplessness conquers. There was a
      quality in Emilia which would have always produced something very like
      antagonism in Hope, had she not been her sister. Had the ungoverned girl
      now been able to utter one word of reproach, had her eyes flashed one look
      of defiance, had her hand made one triumphant or angry gesture, perhaps
      all Hope&rsquo;s outraged womanhood would have coldly nerved itself against her.
      But it was another thing to see those soft eyes closed, those delicate
      hands powerless, those pleading lips sealed; to see her extended in
      graceful helplessness, while all the concentrated drama of emotion
      revolved around her unheeded, as around Cordelia dead. In what realms was
      that child&rsquo;s mind seeking comfort; through what thin air of dreams did
      that restless heart beat its pinions; in what other sphere did that
      untamed nature wander, while shame and sorrow waited for its awakening in
      this?
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope knelt upon the floor, still too much strained and bewildered for
      tears or even prayer, a little way from Emilia. Once having laid down the
      unconscious form, it seemed for a moment as if she could no more touch it
      than she could lay her hand amid flames. A gap of miles, of centuries, of
      solar systems, seemed to separate these two young girls, alone within the
      same chamber, with the same stern secret to keep, and so near that the hem
      of their garments almost touched each other on the soft carpet. Hope felt
      a terrible hardness closing over her heart. What right had this cruel
      creature, with her fatal witcheries, to come between two persons who might
      have been so wholly happy? What sorrow would be saved, what shame,
      perhaps, be averted, should those sweet beguiling eyes never open, and
      that perfidious voice never deceive any more? Why tend the life of one who
      would leave the whole world happier, purer, freer, if she were dead?
    </p>
    <p>
      In a tumult of thought, Hope went and sat half-unconsciously by the
      window. There was nothing to be seen except the steady beacon of the
      light-house and a pale-green glimmer, like an earthly star, from an
      anchored vessel. The night wind came softly in, soothing her with a touch
      like a mother&rsquo;s, in its grateful coolness. The air seemed full of
      half-vibrations, sub-noises, that crowded it as completely as do the
      insect sounds of midsummer; yet she could only distinguish the ripple
      beneath her feet, and the rote on the distant beach, and the busy wash of
      waters against every shore and islet of the bay. The mist was thick around
      her, but she knew that above it hung the sleepless stars, and the fancy
      came over her that perhaps the whole vast interval, from ocean up to sky,
      might be densely filled with the disembodied souls of her departed human
      kindred, waiting to see how she would endure that path of grief in which
      their steps had gone before. &ldquo;It may be from this influence,&rdquo; she vaguely
      mused within herself, &ldquo;that the ocean derives its endless song of sorrow.
      Perhaps we shall know the meaning when we understand that of the stars,
      and of our own sad lives.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      She rose again and went to the bedside. It all seemed like a dream, and
      she was able to look at Emilia&rsquo;s existence and at her own and at all else,
      as if it were a great way off; as we watch the stars and know that no
      speculations of ours can reach those who there live or die untouched. Here
      beside her lay one who was dead, yet living, in her temporary trance, and
      to what would she wake, when it should end? This young creature had been
      sent into the world so fresh, so beautiful, so richly gifted; everything
      about her physical organization was so delicate and lovely; she had seemed
      like heliotrope, like a tube-rose in her purity and her passion (who was
      it said, &ldquo;No heart is pure that is not passionate&rdquo;?); and here was the
      end! Nothing external could have placed her where she was, no violence, no
      outrage, no evil of another&rsquo;s doing, could have reached her real life
      without her own consent; and now what kind of existence, what career, what
      possibility of happiness remained? Why could not God in his mercy take
      her, and give her to his holiest angels for schooling, ere it was yet too
      late?
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope went and sat by the window once more. Her thoughts still clung
      heavily around one thought, as the white fog clung round the house. Where
      should she see any light? What opening for extrication, unless, indeed,
      Emilia should die? There could be no harm in that thought, for she knew it
      was not to be, and that the swoon would not last much longer. Who could
      devise anything? No one. There was nothing. Almost always in perplexities
      there is some thread by resolutely holding to which one escapes at last.
      Here there was none. There could probably be no concealment, certainly no
      explanation. In a few days John Lambert would return, and then the storm
      must break. He was probably a stern, jealous man, whose very dulness, once
      aroused, would be more formidable than if he had possessed keener
      perceptions.
    </p>
    <p>
      Still her thoughts did not dwell on Philip. He was simply a part of that
      dull mass of pain that beset her and made her feel, as she had felt when
      drowning, that her heart had left her breast and nothing but will
      remained. She felt now, as then, the capacity to act with more than her
      accustomed resolution, though all that was within her seemed boiling up
      into her brain. As for Philip, all seemed a mere negation; there was a
      vacuum where his place had been. At most the thought of him came to her as
      some strange, vague thrill of added torture, penetrating her soul and then
      passing; just as ever and anon there came the sound of the fog-whistle on
      Brenton&rsquo;s Reef, miles away, piercing the dull air with its shrill and
      desolate wail, then dying into silence.
    </p>
    <p>
      What a hopeless cloud lay upon them all forever,&mdash;upon Kate, upon
      Harry, upon their whole house! Then there was John Lambert; how could they
      keep it from him? how could they tell him? Who could predict what he would
      say? Would he take the worst and coarsest view of his young wife&rsquo;s mad
      action or the mildest? Would he be strong or weak; and what would be
      weakness, and what strength, in a position so strange? Would he put Emilia
      from him, send her out in the world desolate, her soul stained but by one
      wrong passion, yet with her reputation blighted as if there were no good
      in her? Could he be asked to shield and protect her, or what would become
      of her? She was legally a wife, and could only be separated from him
      through convicted shame.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then, if separated, she could only marry Philip. Hope nerved herself to
      think of that, and it cost less effort than she expected.
    </p>
    <p>
      There seemed a numbness on that side, instead of pain. But granting that
      he loved Emilia ever so deeply, was he a man to surrender his life and his
      ease and his fair name, in a hopeless effort to remove the ban that the
      world would place on her. Hope knew he would not; knew that even the
      simple-hearted and straightforward Harry would be far more capable of such
      heroism than the sentimental Malbone. Here the pang suddenly struck her;
      she was not so numb, after all!
    </p>
    <p>
      As the leaves beside the window drooped motionless in the dank air, so her
      mind drooped into a settled depression. She pitied herself,&mdash;that
      lowest ebb of melancholy self-consciousness. She went back to Emilia, and,
      seating herself, studied every line of the girl&rsquo;s face, the soft texture
      of her hair, the veining of her eyelids. They were so lovely, she felt a
      sort of physical impulse to kiss them, as if they belonged to some utter
      stranger, whom she might be nursing in a hospital. Emilia looked as
      innocent as when Hope had tended her in the cradle. What is there, Hope
      thought, in sleep, in trance, and in death, that removes all harsh or
      disturbing impressions, and leaves only the most delicate and purest
      traits? Does the mind wander, and does an angel keep its place? Or is
      there really no sin but in thought, and are our sleeping thoughts
      incapable of sin? Perhaps even when we dream of doing wrong, the dream
      comes in a shape so lovely and misleading that we never recognize it for
      evil, and it makes no stain. Are our lives ever so pure as our dreams?
    </p>
    <p>
      This thought somehow smote across her conscience, always so strong, and
      stirred it into a kind of spasm of introspection. &ldquo;How selfish have I,
      too, been!&rdquo; she thought. &ldquo;I saw only what I wished to see, did only what I
      preferred. Loving Philip&rdquo; (for the sudden self-reproach left her free to
      think of him), &ldquo;I could not see that I was separating him from one whom he
      might perhaps have truly loved. If he made me blind, may he not easily
      have bewildered her, and have been himself bewildered? How I tried to
      force myself upon him, too! Ungenerous, unwomanly! What am I, that I
      should judge another?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      She threw herself on her knees at the bedside.
    </p>
    <p>
      Still Emilia slept, but now she stirred her head in the slightest possible
      way, so that a single tress of silken hair slipped from its companions,
      and lay across her face. It was a faint sign that the trance was waning;
      the slight pressure disturbed her nerves, and her lips trembled once or
      twice, as if to relieve themselves of the soft annoyance. Hope watched her
      in a vague, distant way, took note of the minutest motion, yet as if some
      vast weight hung upon her own limbs and made all interference impossible.
      Still there was a fascination of sympathy in dwelling on that atom of
      discomfort, that tiny suffering, which she alone could remove. The very
      vastness of this tragedy that hung about the house made it an
      inexpressible relief to her to turn and concentrate her thoughts for a
      moment on this slight distress, so easily ended.
    </p>
    <p>
      Strange, by what slender threads our lives are knitted to each other! Here
      was one who had taken Hope&rsquo;s whole existence in her hands, crushed it, and
      thrown it away. Hope had soberly said to herself, just before, that death
      would be better than life for her young sister. Yet now it moved her
      beyond endurance to see that fair form troubled, even while unconscious,
      by a feather&rsquo;s weight of pain; and all the lifelong habit of tenderness
      resumed in a moment its sway.
    </p>
    <p>
      She approached her fingers to the offending tress, very slowly, half
      withholding them at the very last, as if the touch would burn her. She was
      almost surprised that it did not. She looked to see if it did not hurt
      Emilia. But it now seemed as if the slumbering girl enjoyed the caressing
      contact of the smooth fingers, and turned her head, almost imperceptibly,
      to meet them. This was more than Hope could bear. It was as if that slight
      motion were a puncture to relieve her overburdened heart; a thousand
      thoughts swept over her,&mdash;of their father, of her sister&rsquo;s childhood,
      of her years of absent expectation; she thought how young the girl was,
      how fascinating, how passionate, how tempted; all this swept across her in
      a great wave of nervous reaction, and when Emilia returned to
      consciousness, she was lying in her sister&rsquo;s arms, her face bathed in
      Hope&rsquo;s tears.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XIX. DE PROFUNDIS.
    </h2>
    <h3>
      THIS was the history of Emilia&rsquo;s concealed visits to Malbone.
    </h3>
    <p>
      One week after her marriage, in a crisis of agony, Emilia took up her pen,
      dipped it in fire, and wrote thus to him:&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Philip Malbone, why did nobody ever tell me what marriage is where there
      is no love? This man who calls himself my husband is no worse, I suppose,
      than other men. It is only for being what is called by that name that I
      abhor him. Good God! what am I to do? It was not for money that I married
      him,&mdash;that you know very well; I cared no more for his money than for
      himself. I thought it was the only way to save Hope. She has been very
      good to me, and perhaps I should love her, if I could love anybody. Now I
      have done what will only make more misery, for I cannot bear it. Philip, I
      am alone in this wide world, except for you. Tell me what to do. I will
      haunt you till you die, unless you tell me. Answer this, or I will write
      again.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Terrified by this letter, absolutely powerless to guide the life with
      which he had so desperately entangled himself, Philip let one day pass
      without answering, and that evening he found Emilia at his door, she
      having glided unnoticed up the main stairway. She was so excited, it was
      equally dangerous to send her away or to admit her, and he drew her in,
      darkening the windows and locking the door. On the whole, it was not so
      bad as he expected; at least, there was less violence and more despair.
      She covered her face with her hands, and writhed in anguish, when she said
      that she had utterly degraded herself by this loveless marriage. She
      scarcely mentioned her husband. She made no complaint of him, and even
      spoke of him as generous. It seemed as if this made it worse, and as if
      she would be happier if she could expend herself in hating him. She spoke
      of him rather as a mere witness to some shame for which she herself was
      responsible; bearing him no malice, but tortured by the thought that he
      should exist.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then she turned on Malbone. &ldquo;Philip, why did you ever interfere with my
      life? I should have been very happy with Antoine if you had let me marry
      him, for I never should have known what it was to love you. Oh! I wish he
      were here now, even he,&mdash;any one who loved me truly, and whom I could
      love only a little. I would go away with such a person anywhere, and never
      trouble you and Hope any more. What shall I do? Philip, you might tell me
      what to do. Once you told me always to come to you.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What can you do?&rdquo; he asked gloomily, in return.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I cannot imagine,&rdquo; she said, with a desolate look, more pitiable than
      passion, on her young face. &ldquo;I wish to save Hope, and to save my&mdash;to
      save Mr. Lambert. Philip, you do not love me. I do not call it love. There
      is no passion in your veins; it is only a sort of sympathetic selfishness.
      Hope is infinitely better than you are, and I believe she is more capable
      of loving. I began by hating her, but if she loves you as I think she
      does, she has treated me more generously than ever one woman treated
      another. For she could not look at me and not know that I loved you. I did
      love you. O Philip, tell me what to do!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Such beauty in anguish, the thrill of the possession of such love, the
      possibility of soothing by tenderness the wild mood which he could not
      meet by counsel,&mdash;it would have taken a stronger or less sympathetic
      nature than Malbone&rsquo;s to endure all this. It swept him away; this revival
      of passion was irresistible. When her pent-up feeling was once uttered,
      she turned to his love as a fancied salvation. It was a terrible remedy.
      She had never looked more beautiful, and yet she seemed to have grown old
      at once; her very caresses appeared to burn. She lingered and lingered,
      and still he kept her there; and when it was no longer possible for her to
      go without disturbing the house, he led her to a secret spiral stairway,
      which went from attic to cellar of that stately old mansion, and which
      opened by one or more doors on each landing, as his keen eye had found
      out. Descending this, he went forth with her into the dark and silent
      night. The mist hung around the house; the wet leaves fluttered and fell
      upon their cheeks; the water lapped desolately against the pier. Philip
      found a carriage and sent her back to Mrs. Meredith&rsquo;s, where she was
      staying during the brief absence of John Lambert.
    </p>
    <p>
      These concealed meetings, once begun, became an absorbing excitement. She
      came several times, staying half an hour, an hour, two hours. They were
      together long enough for suffering, never long enough for soothing. It was
      a poor substitute for happiness. Each time she came, Malbone wished that
      she might never go or never return. His warier nature was feverish with
      solicitude and with self-reproach; he liked the excitement of slight
      risks, but this was far too intense, the vibrations too extreme. She, on
      the other hand, rode triumphant over waves of passion which cowed him. He
      dared not exclude her; he dared not continue to admit her; he dared not
      free himself; he could not be happy. The privacy of the concealed stairway
      saved them from outward dangers, but not from inward fears. Their
      interviews were first blissful, then anxious, then sad, then stormy. It
      was at the end of such a storm that Emilia had passed into one of those
      deathly calms which belonged to her physical temperament; and it was under
      these circumstances that Hope had followed Philip to the door.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XX. AUNT JANE TO THE RESCUE.
    </h2>
    <p>
      THE thing that saves us from insanity during great grief is that there is
      usually something to do, and the mind composes itself to the mechanical
      task of adjusting the details. Hope dared not look forward an inch into
      the future; that way madness lay. Fortunately, it was plain what must come
      first,&mdash;to keep the whole thing within their own walls, and therefore
      to make some explanation to Mrs. Meredith, whose servants had doubtless
      been kept up all night awaiting Emilia. Profoundly perplexed what to say
      or not to say to her, Hope longed with her whole soul for an adviser.
      Harry and Kate were both away, and besides, she shrank from darkening
      their young lives as hers had been darkened. She resolved to seek counsel
      in the one person who most thoroughly distrusted Emilia,&mdash;Aunt Jane.
    </p>
    <p>
      This lady was in a particularly happy mood that day. Emilia, who did all
      kinds of fine needle-work exquisitely, had just embroidered for Aunt Jane
      some pillow-cases. The original suggestion came from Hope, but it never
      cost Emilia anything to keep a secret, and she had presented the gift very
      sweetly, as if it were a thought of her own. Aunt Jane, who with all her
      penetration as to facts was often very guileless as to motives, was
      thoroughly touched by the humility and the embroidery.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;All last night,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I kept waking up, and thinking about
      Christian charity and my pillow-cases.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      It was, therefore, a very favorable day for Hope&rsquo;s consultation, though it
      was nearly noon before her aunt was visible, perhaps because it took so
      long to make up her bed with the new adornments.
    </p>
    <p>
      Hope said frankly to Aunt Jane that there were some circumstances about
      which she should rather not be questioned, but that Emilia had come there
      the previous night from the ball, had been seized with one of her peculiar
      attacks, and had stayed all night. Aunt Jane kept her eyes steadily fixed
      on Hope&rsquo;s sad face, and, when the tale was ended, drew her down and kissed
      her lips.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Now tell me, dear,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;what comes first?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;The first thing is,&rdquo; said Hope, &ldquo;to have Emilia&rsquo;s absence explained to
      Mrs. Meredith in some such way that she will think no more of it, and not
      talk about it.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane. &ldquo;There is but one way to do that. I will call
      on her myself.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;You, auntie?&rdquo; said Hope.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Yes, I,&rdquo; said her aunt. &ldquo;I have owed her a call for five years. It is the
      only thing that will excite her so much as to put all else out of her
      head.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O auntie!&rdquo; said Hope, greatly relieved, &ldquo;if you only would! But ought you
      really to go out? It is almost raining.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I shall go,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, decisively, &ldquo;if it rains little boys!&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But will not Mrs. Meredith wonder&mdash;?&rdquo; began Hope.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That is one advantage,&rdquo; interrupted her aunt, &ldquo;of being an absurd old
      woman. Nobody ever wonders at anything I do, or else it is that they never
      stop wondering.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      She sent Ruth erelong to order the horses. Hope collected her various
      wrappers, and Ruth, returning, got her mistress into a state of
      preparation.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;If I might say one thing more,&rdquo; Hope whispered.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; said her aunt. &ldquo;Ruth, go to my chamber, and get me a pin.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What kind of a pin, ma&rsquo;am?&rdquo; asked that meek handmaiden, from the doorway.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What a question!&rdquo; said her indignant mistress. &ldquo;Any kind. The common pin
      of North America. Now, Hope?&rdquo; as the door closed.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I think it better, auntie,&rdquo; said Hope, &ldquo;that Philip should not stay here
      longer at present. You can truly say that the house is full, and&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I have just had a note from him,&rdquo; said Aunt Jane severely. &ldquo;He has gone
      to lodge at the hotel. What next?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Aunt Jane,&rdquo; said Hope, looking her full in the face, &ldquo;I have not the
      slightest idea what to do next.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      (&ldquo;The next thing for me,&rdquo; thought her aunt, &ldquo;is to have a little plain
      speech with that misguided child upstairs.&rdquo;)
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I can see no way out,&rdquo; pursued Hope.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Darling!&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, with a voice full of womanly sweetness, &ldquo;there
      is always a way out, or else the world would have stopped long ago.
      Perhaps it would have been better if it had stopped, but you see it has
      not. All we can do is, to live on and try our best.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      She bade Hope leave Emilia to her, and furthermore stipulated that Hope
      should go to her pupils as usual, that afternoon, as it was their last
      lesson. The young girl shrank from the effort, but the elder lady was
      inflexible. She had her own purpose in it. Hope once out of the way, Aunt
      Jane could deal with Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      No human being, when met face to face with Aunt Jane, had ever failed to
      yield up to her the whole truth she sought. Emilia was on that day no
      exception. She was prostrate, languid, humble, denied nothing, was ready
      to concede every point but one. Never, while she lived, would she dwell
      beneath John Lambert&rsquo;s roof again. She had left it impulsively, she
      admitted, scarce knowing what she did. But she would never return there to
      live. She would go once more and see that all was in order for Mr.
      Lambert, both in the house and on board the yacht, where they were to have
      taken up their abode for a time. There were new servants in the house, a
      new captain on the yacht; she would trust Mr. Lambert&rsquo;s comfort to none of
      them; she would do her full duty. Duty! the more utterly she felt herself
      to be gliding away from him forever, the more pains she was ready to
      lavish in doing these nothings well. About every insignificant article he
      owned she seemed to feel the most scrupulous and wife-like responsibility;
      while she yet knew that all she had was to him nothing, compared with the
      possession of herself; and it was the thought of this last ownership that
      drove her to despair.
    </p>
    <p>
      Sweet and plaintive as the child&rsquo;s face was, it had a glimmer of wildness
      and a hunted look, that baffled Aunt Jane a little, and compelled her to
      temporize. She consented that Emilia should go to her own house, on
      condition that she would not see Philip,&mdash;which was readily and even
      eagerly promised,&mdash;and that Hope should spend the night with Emilia,
      which proposal was ardently accepted.
    </p>
    <p>
      It occurred to Aunt Jane that nothing better could happen than for John
      Lambert, on returning, to find his wife at home; and to secure this
      result, if possible, she telegraphed to him to come at once.
    </p>
    <p>
      Meantime Hope gave her inevitable music-lesson, so absorbed in her own
      thoughts that it was all as mechanical as the metronome. As she came out
      upon the Avenue for the walk home, she saw a group of people from a
      gardener&rsquo;s house, who had collected beside a muddy crossing, where a team
      of cart-horses had refused to stir. Presently they sprang forward with a
      great jerk, and a little Irish child was thrown beneath the wheel. Hope
      sprang forward to grasp the child, and the wheel struck her also; but she
      escaped with a dress torn and smeared, while the cart passed over the
      little girl&rsquo;s arm, breaking it in two places. She screamed and then grew
      faint, as Hope lifted her. The mother received the burden with a wail of
      anguish; the other Irishwomen pressed around her with the dense and
      suffocating sympathy of their nation. Hope bade one and another run for a
      physician, but nobody stirred. There was no surgical aid within a mile or
      more. Hope looked round in despair, then glanced at her own disordered
      garments.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;As sure as you live!&rdquo; shouted a well-known voice from a carriage which
      had stopped behind them. &ldquo;If that isn&rsquo;t Hope what&rsquo;s-her-name, wish I may
      never! Here&rsquo;s a lark! Let me come there!&rdquo; And the speaker pushed through
      the crowd.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Miss Ingleside,&rdquo; said Hope, decisively, &ldquo;this child&rsquo;s arm is broken.
      There is nobody to go for a physician. Except for the condition I am in, I
      would ask you to take me there at once in your carriage; but as it is&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;As it is, I must ask you, hey?&rdquo; said Blanche, finishing the sentence. &ldquo;Of
      course. No mistake. Sans dire. Jones, junior, this lady will join us.
      Don&rsquo;t look so scared, man. Are you anxious about your cushions or your
      reputation?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      The youth simpered and disclaimed.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Jump in, then, Miss Maxwell. Never mind the expense. It&rsquo;s only the family
      carriage;&mdash;surname and arms of Jones. Lucky there are no parents to
      the fore. Put my shawl over you, so.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;O Blanche!&rdquo; said Hope, &ldquo;what injustice&mdash;&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve done myself?&rdquo; said the volatile damsel. &ldquo;Not a doubt of it. That&rsquo;s
      my style, you know. But I have some sense; I know who&rsquo;s who. Now, Jones,
      junior, make your man handle the ribbons. I&rsquo;ve always had a grudge against
      that ordinance about fast driving, and now&rsquo;s our chance.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      And the sacred &ldquo;ordinance,&rdquo; with all other proprieties, was left in ruins
      that day. They tore along the Avenue with unexplained and most
      inexplicable speed, Hope being concealed by riding backward, and by a
      large shawl, and Blanche and her admirer receiving the full indignation of
      every chaste and venerable eye. Those who had tolerated all this girl&rsquo;s
      previous improprieties were obliged to admit that the line must be drawn
      somewhere. She at once lost several good invitations and a matrimonial
      offer, since Jones, junior, was swept away by his parents to be wedded
      without delay to a consumptive heiress who had long pined for his
      whiskers; and Count Posen, in his Souvenirs, was severer on Blanche&rsquo;s one
      good deed than on the worst of her follies.
    </p>
    <p>
      A few years after, when Blanche, then the fearless wife of a regular-army
      officer, was helping Hope in the hospitals at Norfolk, she would stop to
      shout with delight over the reminiscence of that stately Jones equipage in
      mad career, amid the barking of dogs and the groaning of dowagers. &ldquo;After
      all, Hope,&rdquo; she would say, &ldquo;the fastest thing I ever did was under your
      orders.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XXI. A STORM.
    </h2>
    <p>
      THE members of the household were all at the window about noon, next day,
      watching the rise of a storm. A murky wing of cloud, shaped like a hawk&rsquo;s,
      hung over the low western hills across the bay. Then the hawk became an
      eagle, and the eagle a gigantic phantom, that hovered over half the
      visible sky. Beneath it, a little scud of vapor, moved by some
      cross-current of air, raced rapidly against the wind, just above the
      horizon, like smoke from a battle-field.
    </p>
    <p>
      As the cloud ascended, the water grew rapidly blacker, and in half an hour
      broke into jets of white foam, all over its surface, with an angry look.
      Meantime a white film of fog spread down the bay from the northward. The
      wind hauled from southwest to northwest, so suddenly and strongly that all
      the anchored boats seemed to have swung round instantaneously, without
      visible process. The instant the wind shifted, the rain broke forth,
      filling the air in a moment with its volume, and cutting so sharply that
      it seemed like hail, though no hailstones reached the ground. At the same
      time there rose upon the water a dense white film, which seemed to grow
      together from a hundred different directions, and was made partly of rain,
      and partly of the blown edges of the spray. There was but a glimpse of
      this; for in a few moments it was impossible to see two rods; but when the
      first gust was over, the water showed itself again, the jets of spray all
      beaten down, and regular waves, of dull lead-color, breaking higher on the
      shore. All the depth of blackness had left the sky, and there remained
      only an obscure and ominous gray, through which the lightning flashed
      white, not red. Boats came driving in from the mouth of the bay with a rag
      of sail up; the men got them moored with difficulty, and when they sculled
      ashore in the skiffs, a dozen comrades stood ready to grasp and haul them
      in. Others launched skiffs in sheltered places, and pulled out bareheaded
      to bail out their fishing-boats and keep them from swamping at their
      moorings.
    </p>
    <p>
      The shore was thronged with men in oilskin clothes and by women with
      shawls over their heads. Aunt Jane, who always felt responsible for
      whatever went on in the elements, sat in-doors with one lid closed,
      wincing at every flash, and watching the universe with the air of a
      coachman guiding six wild horses.
    </p>
    <p>
      Just after the storm had passed its height, two veritable wild horses were
      reined up at the door, and Philip burst in, his usual self-composure gone.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Emilia is out sailing!&rdquo; he exclaimed,&mdash;&ldquo;alone with Lambert&rsquo;s
      boatman, in this gale. They say she was bound for Narragansett.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Impossible!&rdquo; cried Hope, turning pale. &ldquo;I left her not three hours ago.&rdquo;
       Then she remembered that Emilia had spoken of going on board the yacht, to
      superintend some arrangements, but had said no more about it, when she
      opposed it.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Harry!&rdquo; said Aunt Jane, quickly, from her chair by the window, &ldquo;see that
      fisherman. He has just come ashore and is telling something. Ask him.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      The fisherman had indeed seen Lambert&rsquo;s boat, which was well known.
      Something seemed to be the matter with the sail, but before the storm
      struck her, it had been hauled down. They must have taken in water enough,
      as it was. He had himself been obliged to bail out three times, running in
      from the reef.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Was there any landing which they could reach?&rdquo; Harry asked.
    </p>
    <p>
      There was none,&mdash;but the light-ship lay right in their track, and if
      they had good luck, they might get aboard of her.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;The boatman?&rdquo; said Philip, anxiously,&mdash;&ldquo;Mr. Lambert&rsquo;s boatman; is he
      a good sailor?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; was the reply. &ldquo;Stranger here. Dutchman, Frenchman,
      Portegee, or some kind of a foreigner.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Seems to understand himself in a boat,&rdquo; said another.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Mr. Malbone knows him,&rdquo; said a third. &ldquo;The same that dove with the young
      woman under the steamboat paddles.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Good grit,&rdquo; said the first.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s so,&rdquo; was the answer. &ldquo;But grit don&rsquo;t teach a man the channel.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      All agreed to this axiom; but as there was so strong a probability that
      the voyagers had reached the light-ship, there seemed less cause for fear.
    </p>
    <p>
      The next question was, whether it was possible to follow them. All agreed
      that it would be foolish for any boat to attempt it, till the wind had
      blown itself out, which might be within half an hour. After that, some
      predicted a calm, some a fog, some a renewal of the storm; there was the
      usual variety of opinions. At any rate, there might perhaps be an interval
      during which they could go out, if the gentlemen did not mind a wet
      jacket.
    </p>
    <p>
      Within the half-hour came indeed an interval of calm, and a light shone
      behind the clouds from the west. It faded soon into a gray fog, with puffs
      of wind from the southwest again. When the young men went out with the
      boatmen, the water had grown more quiet, save where angry little gusts
      ruffled it. But these gusts made it necessary to carry a double reef, and
      they made but little progress against wind and tide.
    </p>
    <p>
      A dark-gray fog, broken by frequent wind-flaws, makes the ugliest of all
      days on the water. A still, pale fog is soothing; it lulls nature to a
      kind of repose. But a windy fog with occasional sunbeams and sudden films
      of metallic blue breaking the leaden water,&mdash;this carries an
      impression of something weird and treacherous in the universe, and
      suggests caution.
    </p>
    <p>
      As the boat floated on, every sight and sound appeared strange. The music
      from the fort came sudden and startling through the vaporous eddies. A
      tall white schooner rose instantaneously near them, like a light-house.
      They could see the steam of the factory floating low, seeking some outlet
      between cloud and water. As they drifted past a wharf, the great black
      piles of coal hung high and gloomy; then a stray sunbeam brought out their
      peacock colors; then came the fog again, driving hurriedly by, as if
      impatient to go somewhere and enraged at the obstacle. It seemed to have a
      vast inorganic life of its own, a volition and a whim. It drew itself
      across the horizon like a curtain; then advanced in trampling armies up
      the bay; then marched in masses northward; then suddenly grew thin, and
      showed great spaces of sunlight; then drifted across the low islands, like
      long tufts of wool; then rolled itself away toward the horizon; then
      closed in again, pitiless and gray.
    </p>
    <p>
      Suddenly something vast towered amid the mist above them. It was the
      French war-ship returned to her anchorage once more, and seeming in that
      dim atmosphere to be something spectral and strange that had taken form
      out of the elements. The muzzles of great guns rose tier above tier, along
      her side; great boats hung one above another, on successive pairs of
      davits, at her stern. So high was her hull, that the topmost boat and the
      topmost gun appeared to be suspended in middle air; and yet this was but
      the beginning of her altitude. Above these were the heavy masts, seen
      dimly through the mist; between these were spread eight dark lines of
      sailors&rsquo; clothes, which, with the massive yards above, looked like part of
      some ponderous framework built to reach the sky. This prolongation of the
      whole dark mass toward the heavens had a portentous look to those who
      gazed from below; and when the denser fog sometimes furled itself away
      from the topgallant masts, hitherto invisible, and showed them rising
      loftier yet, and the tricolor at the mizzen-mast-head looking down as if
      from the zenith, then they all seemed to appertain to something of more
      than human workmanship; a hundred wild tales of phantom vessels came up to
      the imagination, and it was as if that one gigantic structure were
      expanding to fill all space from sky to sea.
    </p>
    <p>
      They were swept past it; the fog closed in; it was necessary to land near
      the Fort, and proceed on foot. They walked across the rough peninsula,
      while the mist began to disperse again, and they were buoyant with
      expectation. As they toiled onward, the fog suddenly met them at the turn
      of a lane where it had awaited them, like an enemy. As they passed into
      those gray and impalpable arms, the whole world changed again.
    </p>
    <p>
      They walked toward the sound of the sea. As they approached it, the dull
      hue that lay upon it resembled that of the leaden sky. The two elements
      could hardly be distinguished except as the white outlines of the
      successive breakers were lifted through the fog. The lines of surf
      appeared constantly to multiply upon the beach, and yet, on counting them,
      there were never any more. Sometimes, in the distance, masses of foam rose
      up like a wall where the horizon ought to be; and, as the coming waves
      took form out of the unseen, it seemed as if no phantom were too vast or
      shapeless to come rolling in upon their dusky shoulders.
    </p>
    <p>
      Presently a frail gleam of something like the ghost of dead sunshine made
      them look toward the west. Above the dim roofs of Castle Hill
      mansion-house, the sinking sun showed luridly through two rifts of cloud,
      and then the swift motion of the nearer vapor veiled both sun and cloud,
      and banished them into almost equal remoteness.
    </p>
    <p>
      Leaving the beach on their right, and passing the high rocks of the
      Pirate&rsquo;s Cave, they presently descended to the water&rsquo;s edge once more. The
      cliffs rose to a distorted height in the dimness; sprays of withered grass
      nodded along the edge, like Ossian&rsquo;s spectres. Light seemed to be
      vanishing from the universe, leaving them alone with the sea. And when a
      solitary loon uttered his wild cry, and rising, sped away into the
      distance, it was as if life were following light into an equal
      annihilation. That sense of vague terror, with which the ocean sometimes
      controls the fancy, began to lay its grasp on them. They remembered that
      Emilia, in speaking once of her intense shrinking from death, had said
      that the sea was the only thing from which she would not fear to meet it.
    </p>
    <p>
      Fog exaggerates both for eye and ear; it is always a sounding-board for
      the billows; and in this case, as often happens, the roar did not appear
      to proceed from the waves themselves, but from some source in the unseen
      horizon, as if the spectators were shut within a beleaguered fortress, and
      this thundering noise came from an impetuous enemy outside. Ever and anon
      there was a distinct crash of heavier sound, as if some special barricade
      had at length been beaten in, and the garrison must look to their inner
      defences.
    </p>
    <p>
      The tide was unusually high, and scarcely receded with the ebb, though the
      surf increased; the waves came in with constant rush and wail, and with an
      ominous rattle of pebbles on the little beaches, beneath the powerful
      suction of the undertow; and there were more and more of those muffled
      throbs along the shore which tell of coming danger as plainly as
      minute-guns. With these came mingled that yet more inexplicable humming
      which one hears at intervals in such times, like strains of music caught
      and tangled in the currents of stormy air,&mdash;strains which were
      perhaps the filmy thread on which tales of sirens and mermaids were first
      strung, and in which, at this time, they would fain recognize the voice of
      Emilia.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XXII. OUT OF THE DEPTHS.
    </h2>
    <p>
      AS the night closed in, the wind rose steadily, still blowing from the
      southwest. In Brenton&rsquo;s kitchen they found a group round a great fire of
      driftwood; some of these were fishermen who had with difficulty made a
      landing on the beach, and who confirmed the accounts already given. The
      boat had been seen sailing for the Narragansett shore, and when the squall
      came, the boatman had lowered and reefed the sail, and stood for the
      light-ship. They must be on board of her, if anywhere.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There are safe there?&rdquo; asked Philip, eagerly.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Only place where they would be safe, then,&rdquo; said the spokesman.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Unless the light-ship parts,&rdquo; said an old fellow.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Parts!&rdquo; said the other. &ldquo;Sixty fathom of two-inch chain, and old Joe
      talks about parting.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Foolish, of course,&rdquo; said Philip; &ldquo;but it&rsquo;s a dangerous shore.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s so,&rdquo; was the answer. &ldquo;Never saw so many lines of reef show
      outside, neither.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s an old saying on this shore,&rdquo; said Joe:&mdash;
    </p>
<pre xml:space="preserve">
       &ldquo;When Price&rsquo;s Neck goes to Brenton&rsquo;s Reef,
       Body and soul will come to grief.
       But when Brenton&rsquo;s Reef comes to Price&rsquo;s Neck,
       Soul and body are both a wreck.&rdquo;
 </pre>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What does it mean?&rdquo; asked Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;It only means,&rdquo; said somebody, &ldquo;that when you see it white all the way
      out from the Neck to the Reef, you can&rsquo;t take the inside passage.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;But what does the last half mean?&rdquo; persisted Harry.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t know as I know,&rdquo; said the veteran, and relapsed into silence, in
      which all joined him, while the wind howled and whistled outside, and the
      barred windows shook.
    </p>
    <p>
      Weary and restless with vain waiting, they looked from the doorway at the
      weather. The door went back with a slam, and the gust swooped down on them
      with that special blast that always seems to linger just outside on such
      nights, ready for the first head that shows itself. They closed the door
      upon the flickering fire and the uncouth shadows within, and went forth
      into the night. At first the solid blackness seemed to lay a weight on
      their foreheads. There was absolutely nothing to be seen but the two
      lights of the light-ship, glaring from the dark sea like a wolf&rsquo;s eyes
      from a cavern. They looked nearer and brighter than in ordinary nights,
      and appeared to the excited senses of the young men to dance strangely on
      the waves, and to be always opposite to them, as they moved along the
      shore with the wind almost at their backs.
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;What did that old fellow mean?&rdquo; said Malbone in Harry&rsquo;s ear, as they came
      to a protected place and could hear each other, &ldquo;by talking of Brenton&rsquo;s
      Reef coming to Price&rsquo;s Neck.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Some sailor&rsquo;s doggerel,&rdquo; said Harry, indifferently. &ldquo;Here is Price&rsquo;s Neck
      before us, and yonder is Brenton&rsquo;s Reef.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Where?&rdquo; said Philip, looking round bewildered.
    </p>
    <p>
      The lights had gone, as if the wolf, weary of watching, had suddenly
      closed his eyes, and slumbered in his cave.
    </p>
    <p>
      Harry trembled and shivered. In Heaven&rsquo;s name, what could this
      disappearance mean?
    </p>
    <p>
      Suddenly a sheet of lightning came, so white and intense, it sent its
      light all the way out to the horizon and exhibited far-off vessels, that
      reeled and tossed and looked as if wandering without a guide. But this was
      not so startling as what it showed in the foreground.
    </p>
    <p>
      There drifted heavily upon the waves, within full view from the shore,
      moving parallel to it, yet gradually approaching, an uncouth shape that
      seemed a vessel and yet not a vessel; two stunted masts projected above,
      and below there could be read, in dark letters that apparently swayed and
      trembled in the wan lightning, as the thing moved on,
    </p>
<pre xml:space="preserve">
      BRENTON&rsquo;S REEF.
</pre>
    <p>
      Philip, leaning against a rock, gazed into the darkness where the
      apparition had been; even Harry felt a thrill of half-superstitious
      wonder, and listened half mechanically to a rough sailor&rsquo;s voice at his
      ear:&mdash;
    </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;God! old Joe was right. There&rsquo;s one wreck that is bound to make many. The
      light-ship has parted.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Drifting ashore,&rdquo; said Harry, his accustomed clearness of head coming
      back at a flash. &ldquo;Where will she strike?&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;Price&rsquo;s Neck,&rdquo; said the sailor.
    </p>
    <p>
      Harry turned to Philip and spoke to him, shouting in his ear the
      explanation. Malbone&rsquo;s lips moved mechanically, but he said nothing.
      Passively, he let Harry take him by the arm, and lead him on.
    </p>
    <p>
      Following the sailor, they rounded a projecting point, and found
      themselves a little sheltered from the wind. Not knowing the region, they
      stumbled about among the rocks, and scarcely knew when they neared the
      surf, except when a wave came swashing round their very feet. Pausing at
      the end of a cove, they stood beside their conductor, and their eyes, now
      grown accustomed, could make out vaguely the outlines of the waves.
    </p>
    <p>
      The throat of the cove was so shoal and narrow, and the mass of the waves
      so great, that they reared their heads enormously, just outside, and
      spending their strength there, left a lower level within the cove. Yet
      sometimes a series of great billows would come straight on, heading
      directly for the entrance, and then the surface of the water within was
      seen to swell suddenly upward as if by a terrible inward magic of its own;
      it rose and rose, as if it would ingulf everything; then as rapidly sank,
      and again presented a mere quiet vestibule before the excluded waves.
    </p>
    <p>
      They saw in glimpses, as the lightning flashed, the shingly beach, covered
      with a mass of creamy foam, all tremulous and fluctuating in the wind; and
      this foam was constantly torn away by the gale in great shreds, that
      whirled by them as if the very fragments of the ocean were fleeing from it
      in terror, to take refuge in the less frightful element of air.
    </p>
    <p>
      Still the wild waves reared their heads, like savage, crested animals, now
      white, now black, looking in from the entrance of the cove. And now there
      silently drifted upon them something higher, vaster, darker than
      themselves,&mdash;the doomed vessel. It was strange how slowly and
      steadily she swept in,&mdash;for her broken chain-cable dragged, as it
      afterwards proved, and kept her stern-on to the shore,&mdash;and they
      could sometimes hear amid the tumult a groan that seemed to come from the
      very heart of the earth, as she painfully drew her keel over hidden reefs.
      Over five of these (as was afterwards found) she had already drifted, and
      she rose and fell more than once on the high waves at the very mouth of
      the cove, like a wild bird hovering ere it pounces.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then there came one of those great confluences of waves described already,
      which, lifting her bodily upward, higher and higher and higher, suddenly
      rushed with her into the basin, filling it like an opened dry-dock,
      crashing and roaring round the vessel and upon the rocks, then sweeping
      out again and leaving her lodged, still stately and steady, at the centre
      of the cove.
    </p>
    <p>
      They could hear from the crew a mingled sound, that came as a shout of
      excitement from some and a shriek of despair from others. The vivid
      lightning revealed for a moment those on shipboard to those on shore; and
      blinding as it was, it lasted long enough to show figures gesticulating
      and pointing. The old sailor, Mitchell, tried to build a fire among the
      rocks nearest the vessel, but it was impossible, because of the wind. This
      was a disappointment, for the light would have taken away half the danger,
      and more than half the terror. Though the cove was more quiet than the
      ocean, yet it was fearful enough, even there. The vessel might hold
      together till morning, but who could tell? It was almost certain that
      those on board would try to land, and there was nothing to do but to await
      the effort. The men from the farmhouse had meanwhile come down with ropes.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was simply impossible to judge with any accuracy of the distance of the
      ship. One of these new-comers, who declared that she was lodged very near,
      went to a point of rocks, and shouted to those on board to heave him a
      rope. The tempest suppressed his voice, as it had put out the fire. But
      perhaps the lightning had showed him to the dark figures on the stern; for
      when the next flash came, they saw a rope flung, which fell short. The
      real distance was more than a hundred yards.
    </p>
    <p>
      Then there was a long interval of darkness. The moment the next flash came
      they saw a figure let down by a rope from the stern of the vessel, while
      the hungry waves reared like wolves to seize it. Everybody crowded down to
      the nearest rocks, looking this way and that for a head to appear. They
      pressed eagerly in every direction where a bit of plank or a barrel-head
      floated; they fancied faint cries here and there, and went aimlessly to
      and fro. A new effort, after half a dozen failures, sent a blaze mounting
      up fitfully among the rocks, startling all with the sudden change its
      blessed splendor made. Then a shrill shout from one of the watchers
      summoned all to a cleft in the cove, half shaded from the firelight, where
      there came rolling in amidst the surf, more dead than alive, the body of a
      man. He was the young foreigner, John Lambert&rsquo;s boatman. He bore still
      around him the rope that was to save the rest.
    </p>
    <p>
      How pale and eager their faces looked as they bent above him! But the
      eagerness was all gone from his, and only the pallor left. While the
      fishermen got the tackle rigged, such as it was, to complete the
      communication with the vessel, the young men worked upon the boatman, and
      soon had him restored to consciousness. He was able to explain that the
      ship had been severely strained, and that all on board believed she would
      go to pieces before morning. No one would risk being the first to take the
      water, and he had at last volunteered, as being the best swimmer, on
      condition that Emilia should be next sent, when the communication was
      established.
    </p>
    <p>
      Two ropes were then hauled on board the vessel, a larger and a smaller. By
      the flickering firelight and the rarer flashes of lightning (the rain now
      falling in torrents) they saw a hammock slung to the larger rope; a
      woman&rsquo;s form was swathed in it; and the smaller rope being made fast to
      this, they found by pulling that she could be drawn towards the shore.
      Those on board steadied the hammock as it was lowered from the ship, but
      the waves seemed maddened by this effort to escape their might, and they
      leaped up at her again and again. The rope dropped beneath her weight, and
      all that could be done from shore was to haul her in as fast as possible,
      to abbreviate the period of buffeting and suffocation. As she neared the
      rocks she could be kept more safe from the water; faster and faster she
      was drawn in; sometimes there came some hitch and stoppage, but by steady
      patience it was overcome.
    </p>
    <p>
      She was so near the rocks that hands were already stretched to grasp her,
      when there came one of the great surging waves that sometimes filled the
      basin. It gave a terrible lurch to the stranded vessel hitherto so erect;
      the larger rope snapped instantly; the guiding rope was twitched from the
      hands that held it; and the canvas that held Emilia was caught and swept
      away like a shred of foam, and lost amid the whiteness of the seething
      froth below. Fifteen minutes after, the hammock came ashore empty, the
      lashings having parted.
    </p>
    <p>
      The cold daybreak was just opening, though the wind still blew keenly,
      when they found the body of Emilia. It was swathed in a roll of sea-weed,
      lying in the edge of the surf, on a broad, flat rock near where the young
      boatman had come ashore. The face was not disfigured; the clothing was
      only torn a little, and tangled closely round her; but the life was gone.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was Philip who first saw her; and he stood beside her for a moment
      motionless, stunned into an aspect of tranquility. This, then, was the
      end. All his ready sympathy, his wooing tenderness, his winning
      compliances, his self-indulgent softness, his perilous amiability, his
      reluctance to give pain or to see sorrow,&mdash;all had ended in this. For
      once, he must force even his accommodating and evasive nature to meet the
      plain, blank truth. Now all his characteristics appeared changed by the
      encounter; it was Harry who was ready, thoughtful, attentive,&mdash;while
      Philip, who usually had all these traits, was paralyzed among his dreams.
      Could he have fancied such a scene beforehand, he would have vowed that no
      hand but his should touch the breathless form of Emilia. As it was, he
      instinctively made way for the quick gathering of the others, as if almost
      any one else had a better right to be there.
    </p>
    <p>
      The storm had blown itself out by sunrise; the wind had shifted, beating
      down the waves; it seemed as if everything in nature were exhausted. The
      very tide had ebbed away. The light-ship rested between the rocks,
      helpless, still at the mercy of the returning waves, and yet still upright
      and with that stately look of unconscious pleading which all shipwrecked
      vessels wear, it is wonderfully like the look I have seen in the face of
      some dead soldier, on whom war had done its worst. Every line of a ship is
      so built for motion, every part, while afloat, seems so full of life and
      so answering to the human life it bears, that this paralysis of shipwreck
      touches the imagination as if the motionless thing had once been animated
      by a soul.
    </p>
    <p>
      And not far from the vessel, in a chamber of the seaside farm-house, lay
      the tenderer and fairer wreck of Emilia. Her storms and her passions were
      ended. The censure of the world, the anguish of friends, the clinging arms
      of love, were nothing now to her. Again the soft shelter of
      unconsciousness had clasped her in; but this time the trance was longer
      and the faintness was unto death.
    </p>
    <p>
      From the moment of her drifting ashore, it was the young boatman who had
      assumed the right to care for her and to direct everything. Philip seemed
      stunned; Harry was his usual clear-headed and efficient self; but to his
      honest eyes much revealed itself in a little while; and when Hope arrived
      in the early morning, he said to her, &ldquo;This boatman, who once saved your
      life, is Emilia&rsquo;s Swiss lover, Antoine Marval.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      &ldquo;More than lover,&rdquo; said the young Swiss, overhearing. &ldquo;She was my wife
      before God, when you took her from me. In my country, a betrothal is as
      sacred as a marriage. Then came that man, he filled her heart with
      illusions, and took her away in my absence. When my brother was here in
      the corvette, he found her for me. Then I came for her; I saved her
      sister; then I saw the name on the card and would not give my own. I
      became her servant. She saw me in the yacht, only once; she knew me; she
      was afraid. Then she said, &lsquo;Perhaps I still love you,&mdash;a little; I do
      not know; I am in despair; take me from this home I hate.&rsquo; We sailed that
      day in the small boat for Narragansett,&mdash;I know not where. She hardly
      looked up or spoke; but for me, I cared for nothing since she was with me.
      When the storm came, she was frightened, and said, &lsquo;It is a retribution.&rsquo; 
      I said, &lsquo;You shall never go back.&rsquo; She never did. Here she is. You cannot
      take her from me.&rdquo;
     </p>
    <p>
      Once on board the light-ship, she had been assigned the captain&rsquo;s
      state-room, while Antoine watched at the door. She seemed to shrink from
      him whenever he went to speak to her, he owned, but she answered kindly
      and gently, begging to be left alone. When at last the vessel parted her
      moorings, he persuaded Emilia to come on deck and be lashed to the mast,
      where she sat without complaint.
    </p>
    <p>
      Who can fathom the thoughts of that bewildered child, as she sat amid the
      spray and the howling of the blast, while the doomed vessel drifted on
      with her to the shore? Did all the error and sorrow of her life pass
      distinctly before her? Or did the roar of the surf lull her into quiet,
      like the unconscious kindness of wild creatures that toss and bewilder
      their prey into unconsciousness ere they harm it? None can tell. Death
      answers no questions; it only makes them needless.
    </p>
    <p>
      The morning brought to the scene John Lambert, just arrived by land from
      New York.
    </p>
    <p>
      The passion of John Lambert for his wife was of that kind which ennobles
      while it lasts, but which rarely outlasts marriage. A man of such
      uncongenial mould will love an enchanting woman with a mad, absorbing
      passion, where self-sacrifice is so mingled with selfishness that the two
      emotions seem one; he will hungrily yearn to possess her, to call her by
      his own name, to hold her in his arms, to kill any one else who claims
      her. But when she is once his wife, and his arms hold a body without a
      soul,&mdash;no soul at least for him,&mdash;then her image is almost
      inevitably profaned, and the passion which began too high for earth ends
      far too low for heaven. Let now death change that form to marble, and
      instantly it resumes its virgin holiness; though the presence of life did
      not sanctify, its departure does. It is only the true lover to whom the
      breathing form is as sacred as the breathless.
    </p>
    <p>
      That ideality of nature which love had developed in this man, and which
      had already drooped a little during his brief period of marriage, was born
      again by the side of death. While Philip wandered off silent and lonely
      with his grief, John Lambert knelt by the beautiful remains, talking
      inarticulately, his eyes streaming with unchecked tears. Again was Emilia,
      in her marble paleness, the calm centre of a tragedy she herself had
      caused. The wild, ungoverned child was the image of peace; it was the
      stolid and prosperous man who was in the storm. It was not till Hope came
      that there was any change. Then his prostrate nature sought hers, as the
      needle leaps to the iron; the first touch of her hand, the sight of her
      kiss upon Emilia&rsquo;s forehead, made him strong. It was the thorough
      subjection of a worldly man to the higher organization of a noble woman,
      and thenceforth it never varied. In later years, after he had foolishly
      sought, as men will, to win her to a nearer tie, there was no moment when
      she had not full control over his time, his energies, and his wealth.
    </p>
    <p>
      After it was all ended, Hope told him everything that had happened; but in
      that wild moment of his despair she told him nothing. Only she and Harry
      knew the story of the young Swiss; and now that Emilia was gone, her early
      lover had no wish to speak of her to any but these two, or to linger long
      where she had been doubly lost to him, by marriage and by death. The
      world, with all its prying curiosity, usually misses the key to the very
      incidents about which it asks most questions; and of the many who gossiped
      or mourned concerning Emilia, none knew the tragic complication which her
      death alone could have solved. The breaking of Hope&rsquo;s engagement to Philip
      was attributed to every cause but the true one. And when the storm of the
      great Rebellion broke over the land, its vast calamity absorbed all minor
      griefs.
    </p>
    <p>
      <a name="link2H_4_0025" id="link2H_4_0025">
      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
    </p>
    <div style="height: 4em;">
      <br /><br /><br /><br />
    </div>
    <h2>
      XXIII. REQUIESCAT.
    </h2>
    <p>
      THANK God! it is not within the power of one man&rsquo;s errors to blight the
      promise of a life like that of Hope. It is but a feeble destiny that is
      wrecked by passion, when it should be ennobled. Aunt Jane and Kate watched
      Hope closely during her years of probation, for although she fancied
      herself to be keeping her own counsel, yet her career lay in broad light
      for them. She was like yonder sailboat, which floats conspicuous by night
      amid the path of moonbeams, and which yet seems to its own voyagers to be
      remote and unseen upon a waste of waves.
    </p>
    <p>
      Why should I linger over the details of her life, after the width of ocean
      lay between her and Malbone, and a manhood of self-denying usefulness had
      begun to show that even he could learn something by life&rsquo;s retributions?
      We know what she was, and it is of secondary importance where she went or
      what she did. Kindle the light of the light-house, and it has nothing to
      do, except to shine. There is for it no wrong direction. There is no need
      to ask, &ldquo;How? Over which especial track of distant water must my light go
      forth, to find the wandering vessel to be guided in?&rdquo; It simply shines.
      Somewhere there is a ship that needs it, or if not, the light does its
      duty. So did Hope.
    </p>
    <p>
      We must leave her here. Yet I cannot bear to think of her as passing
      through earthly life without tasting its deepest bliss, without the last
      pure ecstasy of human love, without the kisses of her own children on her
      lips, their waxen fingers on her bosom.
    </p>
    <p>
      And yet again, is this life so long? May it not be better to wait until
      its little day is done, and the summer night of old age has yielded to a
      new morning, before attaining that acme of joy? Are there enough
      successive grades of bliss for all eternity, if so much be consummated
      here? Must all novels end with an earthly marriage, and nothing be left
      for heaven?
    </p>
    <p>
      Perhaps, for such as Hope, this life is given to show what happiness might
      be, and they await some other sphere for its fulfilment. The greater part
      of the human race live out their mortal years without attaining more than
      a far-off glimpse of the very highest joy. Were this life all, its very
      happiness were sadness. If, as I doubt not, there be another sphere, then
      that which is unfulfilled in this must yet find completion, nothing
      omitted, nothing denied. And though a thousand oracles should pronounce
      this thought an idle dream, neither Hope nor I would believe them.
    </p>
    <p>
      It was a radiant morning of last February when I walked across the low
      hills to the scene of the wreck. Leaving the road before reaching the
      Fort, I struck across the wild moss-country, full of boulders and
      footpaths and stunted cedars and sullen ponds. I crossed the height of
      land, where the ruined lookout stands like the remains of a Druidical
      temple, and then went down toward the ocean. Banks and ridges of snow lay
      here and there among the fields, and the white lines of distant capes
      seemed but drifts running seaward. The ocean was gloriously alive,&mdash;the
      blackest blue, with white caps on every wave; the shore was all snowy, and
      the gulls were flying back and forth in crowds; you could not tell whether
      they were the white waves coming ashore, or bits of snow going to sea. A
      single fragment of ship-timber, black with time and weeds, and crusty with
      barnacles, heaved to and fro in the edge of the surf, and two fishermen&rsquo;s
      children, a boy and girl, tilted upon it as it moved, clung with the
      semblance of terror to each other, and played at shipwreck.
    </p>
    <p>
      The rocks were dark with moisture, steaming in the sun. Great sheets of
      ice, white masks of departing winter, clung to every projecting cliff, or
      slid with crash and shiver into the surge. Icicles dropped their slow and
      reverberating tears upon the rock where Emilia once lay breathless; and it
      seemed as if their cold, chaste drops were sent to cleanse from her memory
      each scarlet stain, and leave it virginal and pure.
    </p>
    <p>
      <br /><br />
    </p>
<pre xml:space="preserve">





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