The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865

"We have been quite anxious about you," said the gentleman, as she concluded; and turning to me, "Why, we are indebted for your safe return to the young man by whom my horse was shod this evening!"

And before I could stammer a reply, Miss Darry exclaimed,—

"Jump out, if you please, Sandy. I should like to do the same."

I did so, mechanically, and was about to stand aside for the gentleman to offer his hand, but she extended hers to me, and sprang lightly beside me.

"You will surely take cold, Alice," said the gentleman, drawing Miss Merton's hand within his arm, and turning to ascend the steps. Then, first, I awoke from mingled surprise and admiration sufficiently to say quietly,—

"I must go home. Good evening."

"Not at all," exclaimed the gentleman, turning round; "it is nearly twelve o'clock, and I verily believe you think of walking back to Warren to-night. You must take the horse and sleigh, if you go. Shall he not, Alice?"

Miss Merton, thus appealed to, replied by saying to me,—

"Come in with us, Mr. Allen, and get warmed at least. I have heard Miss Darry speak of you as the one of her class in whom she is especially interested; so you see we are not strangers, after all."

There was no condescension in the gentle voice and smile for even my sensitiveness to detect. I had never been addressed as Mr. Allen before; and this of itself would have confused me sometimes, but now I forgot myself in admiration of her.

That face was of perfect contour. Small and delicately fair, soft bands of light-brown hair shaded the low, smooth brow and large gray eyes, and the full red lips were tremulous with varying expression. Her hands and figure were of the same delicate outline as her face. And as her cape blew aside, I noticed the violet silk she wore, of that blended blue and purple so becoming to blondes.

It were surely a narrow view, to ascribe this grace of expression and manner, so peculiarly womanly, this evident desire to please even, betrayed in careful attention to the artistic finish and details of dress, to vanity or coquetry merely,—it is so often the outgrowth of a beauty-loving nature, to be found in some of the most sensitive and refined of the other sex.

Looking at Miss Merton, therefore, I seemed to have a vision of what Annie Bray might become, if she were developed from within and surrounded from without by that halo of refinement which crowned the lady before me. Already I was developing an Epicurean taste for that spirit of beauty which flooded Annie Bray's humble life as well as her own.

Miss Darry spoke to me, as we went up the steps; but to what I assented I do not know. I listened to the low tones in front of me. I have always possessed a preternaturally quick ear; but I confess I might have used it to better purpose on that occasion.

"Now, Hamilton, of course he must stay all night," she whispered, as she leaned on the gentleman's arm; "and I want you to make him feel perfectly comfortable in doing so."

"Certainly, if he will; but pray don't spoil him, Alice, darling. Because he is a youth of some scholarship, a good deal of refinement, and develops a talent for drawing, it is no reason he should be made to forget he's a blacksmith."

"It is too late for theories to-night, Hamilton," she replied, playfully. "I have none, you know, like you and Frank Darry. I only wish to treat him considerately. We can afford to forget distinctions which undoubtedly seem a great barrier to him. If he stays, he shares our hospitality like any other guest."

The answer I did not catch. I had heard enough, however, to feel both grateful and irritated.

I went in and warmed myself by the coal-fire in the library. I looked covertly at books and Miss Merton while toasting my hands, and answered intelligently, I believe, Mr. Hamilton Lang's questions as to the village and my pursuits there. I did not neglect to speak a few cordial, yet respectful, words to Miss Darry, at parting; but all I clearly recall is the fact that I insisted upon going home that night, and that Miss Merton, kindly offering to lend me any books I could find time to read, laid her little hand in my rough palm at parting.

CHAPTER V

There was a variety-store on Main Street, with "Jane Dinsmore" painted in letters of mingled blue and orange on the sign above its door. Miss Dinsmore boarded in one of those green lanes whose inhabitants formed the second circle of Warren society. To this fact it may have been partly due that she was less appealed to than Mrs. Bray on all questions of social etiquette; but undoubtedly a more sufficient reason was to be found in Miss Dinsmore herself, who, though more beloved than any other woman in the village, had a suppressed, quiet manner, not at all adapted for leadership. Her reputation was that of having been a pretty, giddy young girl, a farmer's daughter; but some great crisis had swept over her life, muffling all the tinkling melodies, the ringing laugh, the merry coquettings of the village belle. It was rumored that the old story of disappointed love had changed the current of her life. Jenny Dinsmore, though humbly born and bred, had been fastidious; the uncouth advances of her rustic admirers were not agreeable to her; and so the romance of the fresh young heart was expended on a college youth, who found his way to Warren from classic halls for the renovation of physical and moral health, and who, attracted by her pretty face and figure, made his rustication less burdensome by devotion to her.

Jenny had not one of those weak natures whose influence dies away in absence. She had inherited some of the old farmer's sturdy traits of character, and her affections had a clinging tenacity of hold which would not suffer the young scholar to throw her off so easily. When he returned to college, he walked the grounds more than once, summoning through the avenues of embowering elms the slender figure, the smiling face, with the glow of the setting sun upon it, which had so often awaited his coming at the stile of the old orchard.

However, parental authority, and the prospect of an ample fortune on good behavior, soon convinced the young man of his folly. Let us be thankful, who note this brief sketch of their mingled fortunes, that he had a tender care for Jenny's trusting nature, and removed the sting from the sorrow he inflicted by making her believe it inevitable. Thus this little wellspring of romance forever watered and kept fresh her otherwise withered life; if subdued, she was not bitter; and no one can tell how the thin, wan face renewed its youth, and the wrinkled cheeks their pinkish bloom, caught in that far-off spring-time in her father's orchards, as, sitting in her solitary room, she remembered the man, now occupying a prominent position in life, who said, as he bade her tenderly good-bye, that he would never forget her, no matter what woman reigned by his fireside, or what children played on his hearth. Perhaps, in his stately library, no book was so welcome on a winter's evening as an idyl of rural life, no picture so pleasing as that of some Maud Muller raking hay or receiving the dumb caresses of the cows she milked.

What would the elegant woman, with her costly jewels, India shawls, and splendid equipage, have thought of this whilom rival, who issued every summer morning from the lane, in her hand a bunch of those simple flowers, occupying, as she did, the border-ground between the wild hemlock and honeysuckle of the wilderness and the exotic of the parterre, the bachelor's-button, mulberry-pink, southernwood, and bee-larkspur, destined to fill a tumbler on an end of the counter where she displayed her most attractive goods?

She prided herself upon the tastefulness and variety of her selections: ribbons and gowns, pins, needles, soap, and matches for all; jars of striped candy for well, and hoarhound for sick children; and a little fragrant Old Hyson and San Domingo for venerable customers. She walked about gently; was never betrayed into any bustle by the excitement of traffic; liked all sweet, shy, woodland natures, from Annie Bray to squirrels; and contracted an affection for me because of my diffidence and devotion to the former.

Whenever she came to the cottage, she poured oil upon the turbulent waters of its domestic life; coaxed up Amos as daintily and charily as a child would proffer crumbs to a bear in a menagerie; pleased Mrs. Bray by accounts of her city shopping; and petted Annie, giving her occasionally, in a shy way, some bow or bit of silk, of an especially brilliant hue, which had caught her eye in town. She was a very useful member of the Methodist Society, for she had always innumerable odds and ends for pin-cushions and needle-books; and although her religious experiences did not seek those stormy channels which the Reverend Mr. Purdo believed to have been elected for the saints, yet her sympathies were so ready, her heart so kind, that, when he saw her after a day of activity collect her bunch of flowers again in her hand, and start, as she often did, for one of the lanes or outlying farms, to watch through the night with some sick woman or child, he was fain to remember that "faith without works is dead."

Miss Dinsmore's store was exceedingly attractive to the young people of the village. She lent a cordial ear to every matrimonial scheme; was quite willing that all preliminaries for such arrangements should be settled within her precincts; and many a tender word and glance, doubtless, received its inspiration from a conspicuous stand for bonnets, whose four pegs were kept supplied with those of Miss Dinsmore's own manufacture, originally white, but so seldom demanded for village wear that the honey-moon in Warren shed its pale yellow beams on this crowning article of bridal attire long before it was donned by the happy wearer. These bonnets were severally labelled on modest slips of paper, after city nomenclature, "Bridal Hat"; and Miss Dinsmore would on no account have parted with them for any less occasion, however festive; so that one consulting her stand had as accurate a knowledge of impending marriages as could have been obtained from the "publishing-list" of the "meeting-house."

Moreover, Miss Dinsmore herself was laboring under that hallucination, not infrequent with maiden ladies rather advanced, that her own spring-time was perennial; and though by no means disposed to displace the hero of her youth from his supremacy in her heart, she yet accepted, with the ordinary feminine serenity, gallant attentions from youths over whose infant slumbers she had, in times of domestic disturbance, often presided. Hence it happened that the "Variety Store" often afforded the first introduction to Warren society; indeed, so sharp was the rivalry between it, as a lounging-place, and the tavern, that, when a youth was won over from the bar-room to its counter fascinations, his work of regeneration was regarded by Mr. Purdo as begun; and the walk round the corner to the parsonage (which Miss Dinsmore's hats suggested) made his calling and election sure.

Entering the store, therefore, on one of my leisure evenings, I was not surprised to find there a number of Miss Darry's class, and the Reverend Mr. Purdo himself, who had evidently walked in to discover what young men had sowed their wild oats and were seeking the "strait and narrer path" between Miss Dinsmore's counter and the wall. Mr. Purdo was of middle height, and portly; and there was such a sombre hue about the entire man,—black suit of clothes, jet-black hair, eyebrows, and eyes,—that it was a relief to find that Nature had relented in her mourning over making him, and bestowed a sallow complexion, which strove to enliven his aspect by an infusion of orange. He greeted me with a mild and forgiving manner, which at once reminded me of the quiet strolls I occasionally preferred, on a pleasant Sunday, to a prolonged sitting and homily in the church; but I was glad of his presence, since it would be likely to restrain the boisterous mirth of the young men, when I should make known my errand.

Since seeing Miss Merton, my imagination had been so filled with the idea of how complete a transformation Annie Bray would undergo, if only the ugly garments she wore could be pulled away like weeds from her sweet, flower-like beauty, that I resolved to expend a part of my money in buying her a dress. With diffidence, therefore, I made known my wish to Miss Dinsmore, who responded at once with a ready comprehension of the whole matter.

"I know jest what'll suit you, Sandy. Nothin' like vi'let for blue eyes and yeller hair; my own was like June butter once, but of course it's been darker since I've grown up" (Miss Dinsmore's gold was fast becoming silver); "Sary Ann's is changin', too, I see. Miss Bray says she isn't over-fond of stirrin' round; and I shouldn't wonder if 't was so. Sary Ann don't look no more like workin' than a buttercup; but then, as I tell Miss Bray, corn is made for usin' and flowers for starin' at, and I don't know as any special sign is set on either of 'em to show which is the best. Don't mind them youngsters, Sandy; they're always pretty chipper of an evenin'. You see, I've measured off this piece of calico,—nine yard and a finger; if you like it, seein' it's for you and Annie, and a remnant, I'd want it to go cheap."

It was as near the shade of Miss Merton's dress as the coarser material could copy it; and with all the embarrassment of a novice in such matters, I signified my wish to take it, when the door swung open to admit Annie Bray herself, who had come to make some trifling purchase for her mother.

"All right, Sandy; we'll settle some other time," whispered Miss Dinsmore, quite aware that I should scarcely like to make so public a presentation of my gift, and quietly concealing it in a sheet of wrapping-paper, while Annie, surprised and pleased at seeing me, approached the counter.

"Bless your sweet face, it isn't often I see it of an evenin'," was Miss Dinsmore's welcome to her favorite.

"Beauty's but a witherin' flower," said Mr. Purdo, by way of professional improvement of the occasion, and pointing the remark by a glance at Miss Dinsmore, whose early bloom he undoubtedly remembered. "Still it's cause for great gratitude, Sary, that your cheeks are so rosy,"—here a general laugh warned him of the dangerous admission, and he added,—"it shows you're healthy, and that's a most aboundin' blessin'."

"That's so!" exclaimed Tracy Waters. "You're mighty pretty now, Sary Ann; and it a'n't no use to look ahead to the time when you won't be, is it?"

Annie's cheeks glowed more deeply still now. She was accomplishing her errand as quickly as possible; and while Miss Dinsmore tied up her parcel, Tracy Waters bent over her, whispering. It may have been only that "innate gallantry" alluded to by Miss Darry that made me reprove his evidently unwelcome admiration.

"Annie is a shy little thing. Don't you see, Tracy, that she doesn't like flattery?" I exclaimed, angrily approaching them.

"I see pretty plain that you don't want her to have it from any other fellow than yourself," he answered, roughly. "Miss Annie," he added, in imitation of my manner, "supposin' I see you home?"

But I pushed past him and went out of the store with her.

"He says I am to be his little wife by-and-by," said Annie, a most unusual expression of disgust and alarm ruffling the quiet serenity of her face; "but that can never be, unless I wish it, can it, Sandy?"

"I should think not, indeed," I answered, smiling at her earnestness. "When he speaks of it again, tell him I want you myself."

"That would be a good way to stop him," she replied, accepting graciously this solution of her present difficulty.

CHAPTER VI

Miss Darry, knowing I could borrow books at Hillside, and that those which I already possessed were the old English classics, bought for me in the city only a Greek Grammar, through whose intricacies she proposed to be my guide, and a box of water-colors, and brought to me some lives of the old painters from Miss Merton's library.

She bewildered my mind by telling me of all there was in store for it in the way of work and study. Her interest in my progress seemed to have received a new impetus from her visit in town. She described the rooms where were casts of legs and arms, heads and groups of figures, to which I might one day have access, with the privilege of copying; and in return I showed her two crayon sketches I had made in her absence. Michel Angelo might have relished the knotty, muscular development of the arm I showed her first. If there is beauty and satisfaction in coarse brute strength, this member of my master's body was worthy of all praise. On another sheet I had drawn, by way of contrast, Annie's delicately small and fair, but round, arm and hand, which might have served in her infancy as models for those of one of Raphael's cherubs. She liked them both, and said that I should do as well, perhaps, in the school of Nature as anywhere, for the present.

She desired me to become a sculptor, for form appealed more strongly to her nature than color; and it seemed to be tacitly decided between us that Art was to be my vocation. She thought that my strong hands, accustomed to labor, could hew my own idea out of the marble for the present, and save the expense of workmen. And then she described to me the beautiful marbles she had seen abroad, where the artist's inspiration was so chastely uttered by the purity of his material, declaring that a subject which coloring would debase might be worthily treated by the chisel. And when I exclaimed, that Autumn, with her glowing palette, was as pure an artist as the old sculptor Winter, chiselling in unvaried white, she reminded me that Nature was infinite, handling all themes with equal power and purity; but that man, in copying, became, as she thought some of the Preraphaelites had done, a caricaturist, in attempting to follow her too closely. I was unconvinced by her arguments, but held my newly bought color-box as a means of proving to her the wisdom of my choice.

When I was about to leave, she said,—

"Sandy, pray don't make an enemy of Tracy Waters on account of any words you had the other evening about the blacksmith's little girl. He's a rough, but kind fellow, and your superiority and desire to rise in life will stir up envy enough of themselves. Why not let him show his admiration of the child, if he wanted to?"

"Oh, have they been telling you about that, Miss Darry?" I answered, awkwardly. "If you knew Annie Bray, you would not ask me why I didn't let him bend his great rough face over hers. She's only a child in years, to be sure; but she has a woman's modesty."

"Oh, well, if she shrank from it, of course, as a gentleman, you were bound to take her part; but don't spoil your chances in life, Sandy, I beg, by any entanglement with these villagers of which you may repent. A pretty country lassie to smile when you look at her would doubtless be a comforting companion in your struggles. But once attain what you long for in other ways, and you will crave an intelligent friend, whose gaucheries shall not forever put you to the blush."

Miss Darry, in her appreciation of my abilities, sometimes forgot my lack of attainment. I was not always familiar with her quotations, but now I was more disturbed by her regarding so seriously my brotherly devotion to Annie Bray, and by the depreciating estimate which she held of her.

"I did not know you looked down so entirely upon our villagers. The only way in which I could expect to differ from them is through my talent for painting, if I prove to have any. My mother was a good woman, gentle and quiet in her ways, but only a farmer's daughter; and though my father was the village doctor, he studied his profession without any regular training, and I suppose knew less of chemistry and anatomy than you, Miss Darry. Annie Bray is as much a lady, in her childish way, as Miss Merton; only she is the stone in its native soil, and Miss Merton has been set by the jeweller."

I was irritated and had spoken warmly, but the bright smile did not leave Miss Darry's face, as she answered,—

"Sandy, you have unmistakably the poetic temperament; but use your brush on the canvas, and don't color every human being you see. I never could comprehend why the practical affairs of life should not be ruled by judgment and reason,—why the mental mansion should not have every needful arrangement for comfort, though a hundred illusions may fresco its ceilings. Every child is charming because it is a child, as every bud is charming because it is a bud, though it may open a poppy or a rose. I haven't a doubt but this little friend of yours will develop some qualities of her ignorant ancestors to remove her in a few years far from your ideal of womanhood. The rare gift of genius is as often bestowed on the child of common parentage as on any other; but the refinement which makes a woman a congenial companion is a mingling of birth, education, and associations, in my opinion. It seems from your own account, that poverty, not choice, apprenticed you to Amos Bray."

Her good-nature shamed me, and her unselfish labor for my improvement touched me more deeply. So, though we did not agree about my profession or friendship, I said no more.

CHAPTER VII

As I have said, Miss Darry and I differed about Annie Bray. Yet her words, having the weight of her greater knowledge of the world, and really strong, though prejudiced mind, made their impression upon me. Instead of regarding Annie with the old brotherly interest, I looked critically now to see if any sign of rude origin betrayed itself in look or speech. I found only the wayside bloom and sweetness quite peculiar to herself, and many a quaint, rare fancy born of lonely rambles in field and wood; but at fourteen, with no outward stimulus to act upon her life, she was an undeveloped being, a child to be loved and petted, but no friend for my growing and restless manhood.

In the evenings I worked hard, endeavoring both to improve myself intellectually and to progress in my art. I was supplied with constant reading from the Hillside library; but I had never been there since the evening when I had driven Miss Darry home. The impression made upon me at that time by Mr. Lang had not been wholly pleasant. Notwithstanding his words at the forge, I felt as though he had in some way contended for making me feel the drawbacks of my position.

One mild day in April, the Spring sun lay warm upon the earth, and the wind brought from the woods the delicious scent of early flowers. I had worked very steadily for several days in sole charge of the smithy; for Mr. Bray had been away to visit a sister who lived some thirty miles off. I had handed him quite large profits that morning; so I ventured to ask for a half-holiday. It was granted, and after dinner I went up to my room to prepare for it. I had practised in water-colors for the last few weeks, and intended to surprise Miss Darry with a picture from Nature as the result of the afternoon's work. So I thrust my paint-box into the pocket of my portfolio, took a tin cup for water, and ran down stairs.

Annie was sitting on the door-step studying Gray's Botany, which at odd moments in the winter I had attended to with her. My heart smote me for that egotistic contemplation of myself and my prospects which had led me to neglect her.

"Come, Annie," I said, "bring your Botany into the woods. We will find plenty of wild-flowers there, and you shall help me, besides, to paint my first picture."

The little face which had looked so dull a moment before brightened at once. She gained her mother's permission, and was soon walking by my side.

On the slope of the hill which led to the stone house where so many of my dreams centred, we found innumerable bloodroot and anemone blossoms, with a few buds of trailing arbutus just blushing at their edges.

Annie had a wonderful fellowship with Nature, liking even its wildest, most uncouth forms. The snakes, with shining skin and sinuous movement, glistening like streams of water, or lying coiled like stagnant pools amid the rank luxuriance of grass and flowers, were as eagerly watched by her as the most brilliant butterfly that ever fanned a blossom. She had a faculty for tracing resemblances in the material creation, akin to that, perhaps, which causes many to see points of likeness in faces, so that they, as it were, carry their home about with them, and see their friends in the new costume of every land.