Originally published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine (Harper and Brothers) vol.18 #106 (Mar 1859).
I felt a thrill of delight when the last goodby was spoken, and the coach rolled from the door bearing all my family away on a pleasure-tour and leaving me sole occupant of our house for three or four blessed weeks. It was not often I could be so entirely alone.
I opened the windows to let in the June sky, which had grown calm in assured possession of the day after the happy flutter of sunrise, and sank into an arm-chair to think, or dream, or sleep, just as it chanced, but certainly to enjoy. I could faintly hear the whir of the domestic machinery in the other part of the house, but no wheel nor band connected it with my deserted tenement; I hadn't got to oil them to keep them going, nor look out lest my fingers got ground off. There was nothing in the wide world for me to do but to entertain my company—and such company!
They were there from the blissful skies, as though last night's stars had put on the invisible glove and dropped to see what I was about, but betrayed by their divine stillness; they fluttered out from the beautiful elm that seemed scarce to know whether to be a tree or a vine, shooting up very proud and grand away from the common earth, then yearning back again with tremulous, pendent branches; they came from the air that was like a presence; from the books that contained the attar of so many souls within their weird brown covers; from the living, breathing roses all throbbing and crimson, and the voiceless japonicas pallid with suppressed fragrance; from the birds that were singing a Gloria, and the winds that were faltering a Kyrie; from every thing animate and inanimate save and except Bertha Mills, my "intimate enemy," who stood within the door-way presently, extinguishing the morning.
"My darling Marian!"
While she is kissing me and caressing my hair with her small fingers, let me give a short pen-and-ink sketch of her, mentally holding her at arm's-length, and pinching her somewhat in my grasp. She is very pretty, undoubtedly, with a small, well-formed figure; an abundant flow of flaxen curls all over her neck and bosom; dimpled, colorless cheeks; a pair of pale-blue eyes, which do not often meet yours in unconscious frankness; broken, ill-tempered eye-brows; a mouth almost offensively full, but hiding the prettiest of teeth; a nose beautiful enough to put in marble; and a voice of velvet when she chooses. Add to this, my Cousin Bertha is no fool. The girl is selfish and treacherous, I know, holding her off so and looking through her. She is not capable of a single act of pure, disinterested friendship, though there is a sort of warmth somewhere in her nature—a warmth that will scorch what it touches. But why should I blame her for being incapable of living or dying for a friend? If that immortal stream that starts westward from the Ontario were coaxed and frittered away into all the dear little brook-channels, and sweet pools, and charming fishponds, we would scarce wonder at missing the headlong thunder of Niagara. And so, if some internal system of pipes converts all my Cousin Bertha's embryo affections into gas before they have time to condense into sentiments and acts, it isn't her fault surely. And we are exceedingly intimate; call each other "my dear," "my love," and all the sweet little hypocritical names women use to each other; write charming little notes; and dress alike, though I am brown and she fair; Bertha will—she has no taste, the girl, though she manages to look well in all my browns, and crimsons, and flame-colors.
Well, on that June day I embraced her with a slight scringe, and, seating her in my arm-chair, threw myself down upon the floor, out of reach of her arms, with my hands clasped around my knees.
"My sweet Marian!" she said; "how will you live here alone? I can't comprehend! What will you do?" putting such a look of pity into her face as made me want to box her ears.
"Bertha Mills, if you dare to pity me, Miss—"
"Not for worlds, Regina! but what will you do?"
"Oh, curl my hair, and pinch my cheeks, and practice attitudes. I can sink into a chair almost as gracefully as you. See!"
"How absurd! but won't you be afraid nights?"
"No. I am not beautiful enough to tempt desperate and despairing lovers, nor rich enough to stand (or lie) in danger of burglars, nor wicked enough to fear the devil in full canonicals; and I like to be alone, an' it please you."
"It doesn't please me now, you queer thing! I've come in full of news and don't mean to go till I've imparted. The new minister, 'long looked for but come at last,' was at our house yesterday, and such—"
"Short sentences, if you please, and no rhapsodies."
"Well, he's a bachelor, and charming! Papa spoke of you—you're one of his hobbies, you know—and Mr. Lynde, that's his name, proposed calling. So you need not be surprised to find yourself invaded at any moment by this general of the church militant. He's the most delightful singer, dear! We sung 'Though the sinner,' and ever so many pieces yesterday."
"I shall be very happy to see him."
"Oh, you shall! I expect you'll talk him into believing you a saint, with that sweet tongue of yours; you naughty coquette!"
"Bertha Mills! if you ever call me a coquette again I'll—I'll captivate the first man you fall in love with."
"If you can!" she laughed saucily back from the door which she shut hard, but threw a sweet good-by, and a sneer with it, in at the window.
You are welcome to your minister, Bertha Mills! What I want is to be let alone by all flesh. But how dare she speak in presence of the company here! and talk of music, too, so near my orchestra! within hearing and touch of the melodious agonies of Byron, and Milton's Gregorian chant; where Longfellow's songs only want a touch to set them ringing, and the Brownings stand ready to cast their nude clarion thoughts into your startled soul! You and Mr. Lynde may sing your songs; but for me,
"I pant for the music which is divine,
My heart in its thirst is a dying flower;
Pour forth the sound like enchanted wine!
Loosen the notes in a golden shower!"
Nay, not Dante! I can't have the trouble to bow myself before him now. Tennyson, lull me into Elysium with your lotos song! Lying upon the veranda that night with my eyes blind to all the earth, and conscious only of the skies whose purple distance sucked my soul away into it presently; searching that vast river whose vastness is only rendered greater by the golden sands over which it rolls; lying thus, awed, oppressed, lost, I was conscious how dear the earth is, and could feel the throb of Columbus's heart when he fell upon his face and kissed the tender, upholding, home-like earth that dawned upon his strained eyes after the ocean and sky eternity were past. A little child was with me, such a child as I can love—not one of your selfish, nestling, kissing things, but a shy little one whose eyes are not mirrors but inhabited worlds, and whose soul is astir before its time, troubling her with mysterious thoughts and fancies in the early twilight. I took her small face between my hands and turned it upward.
"What is it, Pansie?"
"Is God there?" she asked.
"Yes."
"Where?"
"Oh, every where. What we see isn't the whole of God, but only a sweep of his garments. Perhaps the Milky Way there across might be a girdle, and the solar system a jeweled breast-plate, or only a rose upon His bosom."
"Are we on God's bosom, Marian?"
"Yes, dear, or in it. It throbs and sends the worlds spinning through his veins. Do you suppose any little speck or globule of blood in this wee hand of yours knows or can understand you?"
"Are we in God's veins, Marian?"
"Yes, little one; in an artery, I think. Don't you feel the throb? don't you feel near the heart?"
"Is that what shakes me so sometimes?" asked the child in a whisper.
"Yes, love; don't fear, it's God's heart beating."
"I want to go to sleep, Marian; don't you?"
"Yes, Pansie, I want to go to sleep."
But there was no sleep for us, but callers; so the bell said, whose imperious ring betrayed my Uncle Thomas's hand, which presently clasped mine. And there were Aunt Anne, and Bertha, and a stranger behind.
"Mr. Lynde, Marian."
Looking up in the dim light of the hall, I saw a dark face with clear gray eyes, and masses of careless black hair thrown back from a wide, strong forehead which had not preyed upon a puny frame, but was royally upborne. He greeted me with grave kindness, and when we were under the chandelier gave me a look that made me feel as though my soul were in a glass case of uncommon clearness, but became commonplace, and proper, and polite immediately, reassuring me of opacity by his questions, and greatly delighting my Uncle Thomas, whose delight is in lions, and whose lions often turn out to be only Snug the joiner.
If, as philosophers say, all bodies attract in proportion to their quantity of matter, then were my Uncle Thomas Mills a very attractive person; as it is, my body and soul recoil from him, though I dare say he is a very good sort of man. He considers himself a philosopher indeed; not one of your gassy Platonists, but a genuine Baconian; to the truth of which estimate the dinner-table gives ample testimony, positively, and his own person punningly. As to my Aunt Anne, any one with eyes could read her at a glance; sitting there in an economical gray dress, with a procession of daisies marching precisely through the middle of her white cap-ribbon, suggestive of Sunday-school picnics, and her features arranged in proper order for the evening, from which order not an earthquake could move them.
She is a good woman by the yard-stick, geometrically holy, as conscientious as a rectangled-triangle and as three-cornered, too. I don't believe she ever did a wicked thing in all her life, and don't doubt that when I run against her opinions in any way, and commit something that is an enormity on her retina, she forgives me, as the Bible tells her to do, and prays for my conversion. Nevertheless my Aunt Anne does not attract me to religion.
"Seeing no light here, we thought you might have gone to bed," said my uncle; "but I was determined to rout you out."
"Marian was star-gazing, were you not, dear?" asked Bertha, sweetly, sitting down upon a tabouret beside me, with her arm across my lap, making a very pretty tableau for Mr. Lynde opposite.
"Star-gazing!" repeated my uncle, contemptuously.
"The sky is unusually fine to-night," interposed Mr. Lynde. "You were gazing, Miss Marian, and dreaming, perhaps?" and his eyes smiled rather than his lips.
"I was wondering, Sir, if God didn't still think it good."
"Marian is a romantic thing," said my uncle, apologizingly; "but with all her nonsense she knows some things pretty well. She'll soon outgrow her star-gazing and rhyming;" and he laughed indulgently toward me, looking very lenient and superior.
"One need not be what you call romantic to be moved by the beauty and sublimity of nature," said the minister, earnestly. "All nature hints at Divinity. If we looked upon things thoughtfully, every new day and every new night would be a miracle to make us adore the Worker."
"Oh, if you take it so," returned my uncle, somewhat uneasily, "if you take it so, every thing is a miracle, I suppose; but people get accustomed to them and don't mind."
"Too much accustomed, I fear," was the rely.
"My dear Sir," said my uncle, "if great things did not become familiarized by repetition, existence would be unbearable. Suppose, now, my wife should look upon every sunrise as a miracle, what would become of my breakfast?"
This was unanswerable, and the minister retreated from his fortress, laughing.
"I wish disagreeable things could become so familiarized," said Bertha, as a voice and step we knew sounded at the gate. One of her admirers had found out her retreat and followed her.
"Oh, there's Warren!" smiled my uncle, with a mischievous look toward Bertha. "He's a very wealthy and well-connected young man," to the minister. "He traces his descent directly from an English earl."
"Yes," said Bertha, scornfully, "and he'll be sure to tell Mr. Lynde of it in less than ten minutes."
Sure enough, after a few minutes of commonplace talk, during which the young gentleman complimented Bertha profusely, it just chanced that he mentioned his family.
Bertha turned toward Mr. Lynde with sparkling eyes. "Mr. Warren," she said, "can trace his family back through all its changes till he comes to a sponge; which is a great way, though you mightn't think."
Mr. Warren, who, to do him justice, was good-natured, though not worth mentioning otherwise, took her attack in good part, proposing to subdue her ferocity by music, which, unlike the untamed of old, she was to furnish herself. He had brought her a new song. Would she try it?
Bertha had good taste in those matters, and never waited to be coaxed; so she went immediately to the piano, and sang his song, and sang it very sweetly.
I went to hear Mr. Lynde preach the next Sunday. So did every one else, I think, in our good town. I believe, too, they all wanted to go again. I am sure I did. And yet he was not one of your flowery speakers, who crowns his hearers with lotos-blooms, and throws garlands upon graves, but a good man who knew in his soul that the moments are golden. His eyes had the upward look of one who is used to climbing difficult heights, looking ever at the goal; and yet I felt certainly that he never crushed even the tiniest flower under his firm tread. His sermon fired me, and I went home trembling, and when safe alone wept myself calm. After this baptism of fire and water Mr. Lynde was sacred to me.
"Dear me! wasn't he stupid?" cried Bertha, coming to see me the next day. "And do you know he's going to live with us? To think of papa's taking boarders! But he will. I only hope Mr. Lynde won't try to convert me. I thought at first, dear, that I should adore him; but I don't believe he'll be one of my flames."
"Certainly not, Bertha. Mr. Lynde is a good man, and your flames always smell of brimstone."
Nevertheless, when Bertha, who often let me think for her, found that I looked up to and admired the new minister, and that, although averse to general society, I marked those days with white on which I conversed with him, she began to think it worth her while to notice him. My family returned, and Mr. Lynde became a frequent visitor; but our pleasant intercourse was at an end. Bertha was always there; and if we spoke together she came between us with a flower to look at, or a pretty word to say, or a song to sing, or she would throw herself at my feet, with her clinging arms around me, crushing all disposition to speak with their soft pressure. Bertha had a pretty, childish way with her which always pleases men who seldom realize the truth that a woman who pretends to be a child is invariably an actress. She asked Mr. Lynde's advice so sweetly that he failed to remember how seldom it was followed. She was by turns so gentle, so merry, so serious, and, altogether, so charming, that I didn't wonder to see his eyes follow her, and his grave lips smile when she spoke. I gradually withdrew from them, feeling that I was not needed; and I could see after a while that Mr. Lynde's manner cooled toward me, and that he seemed to have got the impression that I was eccentric and somewhat dangerously independent. I knew where he got these impressions, but, after choking a little, determined not to contradict them. I felt, indeed, a strong inclination to vex him into scolding me. It would be so nice to get him angry with me that I might be penitent and be forgiven. If he would but chide me as gently as he did Bertha sometimes, when she would drop the lids over her blue eyes, and let her curls almost hide her downcast face, then, when he had finished, look up with an arch smile and a soft "Are you very angry with me?" which made him forget his gravity at once.
"Bertha is making a fool of herself, trying to get Mr. Lynde," said my uncle to me, confidentially. "Warren would suit her tastes much better, besides being far richer than Mr. Lynde can ever be. But that girl is an inveterate coquette!" and he laughed; "she can't rest nor let a man alone till he's on his knees to her."
Mr. Mills understood his daughter, evidently.
'Do you think Mr. Lynde likely to take that orthodox and most ministerial position before my cousin?" I asked, smiling, but with a sinking heart. I couldn't bear such a good man to be made a fool of.
"Well, I hardly know," was the hesitating answer. "He's certainly very fond of her, but then he treats her as a child, and, perhaps, looks upon her as one."
"But she is not a child, uncle, and he knows it."
"Well, Marian, I will leave them to manage it themselves. Her mother would be delighted, I know, but I'd much rather Bertha would have Warren. But I came near forgetting. Bertha wants you to come over there to tea. Your aunt has gone to the sewing-circle, and she's alone. Will you come?"
I went.
"Will you come into my room, young ladies?" asked Mr. Lynde after tea. "I believe it is the pleasantest room in the house at this time of day."
"We'll not let you write," said Bertha, leading the way. "We'll examine his papers, Marian, and see if there are any stray rhymes among them. I suspect him of being a poet."
"It is a wonder I am not with such an inspiration near me," he said, smiling; "but I must resign all claims to that distinction."
"Here's just the paper to write poems on," said my cousin, taking up a quire of Bath post as thick and glossy as lily leaves; "only it isn't lined. It's only your fanatics, like Marian, who use unruled paper; for me, I want a true-blue line of precedent to set my ideas on."
How pretty Bertha looked that day, with her dress the color of an autumn mist with a sunbeam dissolved in it, and that sprig of evergreen in her hair. She had taken it from my bosom when I came in. I gave her a flower.
"Crown yourself with this, Bertha, and give me my arbor vite," I said; "it doesn't suit you."
"And why not?" asked Mr. Lynde, with a searching glance in my face.
"The evergreens are nature's fanatics," I said—" green in season and out of season; and Bertha blooms only in orthodox times and ways. Here's an aster would no more blossom in spring than my cousin would laugh in church: when you were preaching;" and I wound it into her curls as she stood in a single stray sunbeam, looking so beautiful she hurt me.
"I hope you wouldn't do that either," he said, smiling, yet coloring.
"Indeed I might, Sir, if any thing comical happened. I could laugh more easily in church than any where else."
"Not if your deeper feelings were aroused," he replied, gravely. "If one goes there conscious of eternity she will feel no disposition to trifle;" and he turned to put some books upon a shelf.
Here was the displeasure I had wished for, but I scarcely felt it as delightful as I had anticipated. Indeed, I could have wept if it had not been for Bertha's exulting smile. I turned the leaves of a book blindly, trying to hide my burning cheek. So he judged me. Bertha's deeper feelings were aroused forsooth, and I was the trifler. Well, perhaps it was so. Her deeper feelings were awake, indeed, quite to the dregs. I preferred trifling.
"I must go, dear," I said, recovering myself. "I have an engagement this evening. I am sorry, but must go."
Must I, really? Bertha was so sorry. She would get my bonnet if I would have it, but it was too bad! and she went with great alacrity to fetch my things. The door had scarcely closed upon her when I was aware that Mr. Lynde stood by me in the window. I would not appear to see him, but kept my eyes fixed upon the sunset.
"Marian!" he said, softly.
I turned to him quickly. He was standing beside me with tears in his eyes, and with such a tender face that my heart leaped.
"Forgive me, dear; I didn't mean to wound you. I know you better than to mean what I said!" and he held out his hand to me. What right had I to be angry with one so much older and better than I? How was I worthy that he should ask me to pardon him for giving a deserved reproof? I bent my head till my lips touched his hand, and then turned hastily to take my bonnet from Bertha, who entered at that moment. A single fierce ray darted from her eyes, but they melted in a moment, and she led me to the door, holding my hand and kissing me good-by.
After that Bertha was always between me and every thing; clinging, and kissing, and watching me till I longed to fling her off, but could not. She was my cousin, and our families were always together, and any trouble between us would communicate itself to the rest. Then, what pretext had I? Bertha was wary and left me nothing to tell, and all my coldness could not offend her. I knew the girl's art and her object, and yet she made me believe, at last, that Mr. Lynde was at some pains to be able to regard me with Christian charity, but that she was the light of his eyes. It was evident enough that he liked her in a frank way. He liked to talk with her, to look at her, to hear her sing, and she gave him enough of all.
"I wouldn't believe a grave man could say such sweet things," she said to me once; "but Mr. Lynde can compliment more prettily than Warren, who does nothing else."
'The charm is in your loving heart, dear," I said, with a smile that belied my own heart.
"Nonsense, Marian! I don't care so much for him; though I like to make him serve me, I don't deny." She gave her curls a toss, and a little laugh rippled over her lips.
I knew that Bertha wanted me to think him in love with her, and that she had a very curious way of telling the truth sometimes, and so made allowances.
One evening she came in, and came up directly, as usual, to my room. I saw that she was greatly elated, and with a sinking presentiment kept to my writing.
"I am in haste to finish this," I said; "don't bother me." I bent my head low over the paper. She shouldn't see my face if she told me any thing.
"Oh, I won't bother you, darling; only let me sit beside you:" and she came and leaned upon my lap. Of course this did not bother me in the least.
I put my pen away impatiently.
"Oh, I'm glad you're done," she said, "for I'm in a talking and walking mood. Get your things and let us go out. You won't? You naughty Marian! You ought to be very grateful to me for coming. Such a time as I had! Mr. Lynde coaxed me full fifteen minutes to stay and sing to him, or else let him walk with me; but I was determined to have you to-night, you dear, ungrateful Marian!"
"Poor Mr. Lynde!" I said, curling my lip.
"He's the kindest man," Bertha said, with her eyes full on my face. "I told him to-night that he was like a brother to me, and he answered, so earnestly that I felt really confused, that I was more than a sister to him."
I felt the blood curdle around my heart, and the room swam before my eyes.
"I will go, dear, and leave you to your writing," she said, rising and evidently a little startled by my looks. I know my face was white.
"Well, good-by," I answered, recovering myself. '*I hope you'll give me an invitation to the wedding; I see it can't be far off. Poor Warren! I shall have to console him."
"Oh, no!" she exclaimed, laughing. "I mean to keep him to make Mr. Lynde jealous. Then, Marian, I only want to flirt with the minister. I wouldn't marry him for any thing. I like to try my power over him, though. It's worth while having power over such a man."
I turned upon her.
"Bertha Mills, you're an insolent little fool! You to talk of having power over Mr. Lynde! You have deceived him with regard to your true character; and if you dare to trifle with him, I will tell him every word you have said to-night."
"Why, Marian," she sneered, pale with anger, "one would think you wanted him yourself."
"You may go!" I said, opening the door.
She made me a little mocking courtesy when she went out, saying, "You may have him, dear, when I've done with him."
The air of the room stifled me, and I threw on my bonnet and went out into the evening. A few steps from the gate a figure met me and stopped. It was Mr. Lynde; in search of her, I thought. He bade me a pleasant "good-evening," and walked beside me till we came to the corner of the street. I wanted to get rid of him, and so said, "Bertha has gone home, I think."
"Has she?"
"Yes, Sir; and I am going this way. Goodnight."
"On that lonely road?" he asked, in surprise. "You won't go there alone in the evening?"
"My object in coming out was to get solitude and pure air," I said, without caring whether my voice was calm or not.
"May I go with you, Marian?" he asked, gently. "The pure air you can have, but I don't believe solitude is good for you to-night."
I made no answer, but walked on blindly under the stars. After a few steps he drew my hand within his arm. The road grew lonelier, and stretched out pale and spectral. It seemed a type of my life—a dim path leading to darkness.
I stopped short.
"I don't want to go any farther."
"You had best go home," he said, "and I will accompany you, unless you forbid me. Forgive me if I intrude, but I wished to speak with you."
I led Mr. Lynde to the parlor and sat down to hear what he had to say. He wanted my intercession with Bertha perhaps; or it might be that he would wish me, as her intimate friend, to be a little fitter for the office, and have a care lest I should taint her innocent simplicity with my wayward moods. Truly his business was a long time in coming.
"You wished to speak with me?" I said, coldly.
"I don't dare to, now I have come," he said, in a low voice. "I had something to ask of you—" He stopped.
"Mr. Lynde," I said, earnestly, with a pang of self-reproach at his faltering voice, "you can not please me more than by letting me serve you. Ask me whatever you will, I will do it."
"Marian!" he exclaimed.
I started up, shaking the blood into my face.
"I want you, Marian, body and soul!"
How the stars shone that night, every little urn full and brimming to drink my health and happiness! How the morning baptized the earth, and how the earth smiled up to the morning! How the first liquid notes of the universal harmony stole upon my ear, convincing me of God and heaven! How the smiles and kind words of my dear home friends shone like gold in the chain of the universal brotherhood! How my heart throbbed yet with the sudden tightening of my anchor chain, which every day would make shorter till those it connected were one and needed no chain, being so! How little Pansie lighted her flickering eyes at mine, and listened smiling, breathless, and silent, except for those eyes, while I told her what I scarcely told him as yet! How I kissed Bertha Mills when she came two days after to tell me that she was engaged to Mr. Warren (poor fellow!), and did hope we could be married at the same time—and would I wear a vail? or be married in a traveling dress, and start directly on a journey?
I hadn't got so far as to have settled that, but still was sure of a vail and a journey—the sweet vail of happiness, and the beautiful journey where love would make all the thorns bear flowers, and glorify the darkest clouds.
"It takes clouds to make rainbows, my Marian," said Mr. Lynde; "and when they are darkest we may always look for the brightening."