CHAPTER III.
THE FUGITIVE BELLE.
“What’s become of ‘Marguerite’
Since she gave us all the slip—
Chose land travel, or sea faring,
Box and trunk, or staff and scrip,
Rather than pace up and down
Any longer this old town?
Who’d have guessed it from her lip,
Or her brow’s accustomed bearing,
On the night she thus took ship,
Or started landward, little caring?”
—BROWNING.
Christmas approached, and the gay belles of Richmond were preparing for the festivities of that season.
Colonel Compton with his family and a few chosen friends went down to Compton Lodge to spend the holidays in country hospitalities, hunting, etc.
The party had been there but a few days, when, on Christmas morning, while the family and their guests were assembled in the old, oak-paneled, front parlor, before breakfast, and Colonel Compton was standing at a side table, presiding over an immense old family punch bowl, from which he ladled out goblets of frothy eggnog to the company, the door was quietly opened, and without announcement Marguerite De Lancie entered, saying, “A merry Christmas! friends.”
“Marguerite! Marguerite!” exclaimed—first Cornelia, and then all the young ladies that were present, pressing forward to meet her, while the matrons and the gentlemen of the party, with less vehemence but equal cordiality, waited to welcome her.
“My lost sweetheart, by all that’s amazing!” cried Colonel Compton, who, in his engrossment, was the very last to discover the arrival.
“Why, where upon the face of the earth did you come from?” inquired Cornelia, scarcely restrained by the presence of others from seizing and covering her friend with caresses.
“From Loudoun street,” answered Miss De Lancie gayly, as she shook hands right and left.
“From Loudoun street? that will do! How long have you been in Loudoun street, sweetheart? You were not there when we passed through the town in coming hither.” said Colonel Compton.
“I arrived only the day before yesterday, rested a day, and hearing that you were at the Lodge, came hither, this morning, to breakfast with you.”
“Enchanted to see you, my dear! truly so! But—you arrived the day before yesterday—whence?”
“I may be mistaken, yet it seems to me that Colonel Compton’s asking questions,” said Marguerite, with good-humored sarcasm.
“Oh! ah! I beg pardon, ten thousand pardons, as the French say,” replied Colonel Compton, bowing with much deprecation, and then raising a bumper of eggnog. “To our reconciliation, Miss De Lancie,” he continued, offering to her the first, and filling for himself a second goblet.
“Paix à vous,” said Marguerite, pledging him.
“And now to breakfast—sortez, sortez!” exclaimed the Colonel, leading the way to the dining-room.
Cornelia was, to use her own expression, “dying” to be alone with Marguerite, to hear the history of the last seven months absence. Never before was she more impatient over the progress of a meal, never before seemed the epicureanism of old folks so tedious, or the appetites of young people so unbecoming; notwithstanding which the coffee, tea and chocolate, the waffles, rolls and corn pone, the fresh venison, ham, and partridges were enjoyed by the company with equal gusto and deliberation.
“At last!” exclaimed Cornelia, as rising from the table, she took Marguerite’s hand and drew her stealthily away through the crowd, and up the back stairs to her own little bedchamber, where a cheerful fire was burning.
“Now, then, tell me all about it, Marguerite,” she said, putting her friend into her easy-chair of state before the fire, and seating herself on a stool at her feet. “Where have you been?”
“Gypsying,” answered Miss De Lancie.
“Gypsying; oh, nonsense, that is no answer. What have you been about?”
“Gypsying,” repeated Marguerite.
“Gypsying!” exclaimed Cornelia, now in wonder.
“Aye! Did you never—or have you too little life ever to feel like spreading your wings and flying away, away from all human ken—to feel the perfect liberty of loneliness, as only an irresponsible stranger in a strange place can feel it!”
“No, no! I never did,” said Cornelia, amazed; “but, tell me then where did you go from Plover’s Point.”
“To Tierra-del-Fuego, or the Land of Fire,” said Marguerite, with a deep flush.
“Fiddlesticks! Where did you come from last to Winchester?”
“From Iceland,” said Marguerite, with a shiver.
“Oh, pshaw! you are making fun of me, Marguerite!”
“My dear, if I felt obliged to give an account of my wanderings, their wild liberty would not seem half so sweet. Even my property agent shall not always know where to find me; it is enough that I know where to find him when he is wanted,” said Miss De Lancie, with such a dash of hauteur that Cornelia dropped the subject. And then Marguerite, to compensate for her passing severity, tenderly embraced Nellie.
The Christmas party at Compton Lodge lasted until after New Year, and then the family and their friends returned to Richmond.
Miss De Lancie, yielding to a pressing invitation, accompanied them. And in town, Marguerite had again to run the gantlet of questions from her acquaintances, such as:
“Where have you been so long, Marguerite?” To which she would answer:
“To Obdorskoi on the sea of Obe,” or some such absurdity, until at last all inquiry ceased.
Miss De Lancie resumed her high position in society, and was once more the bright, particular star of every saloon. Those who envied, or disliked her, thought the dazzling Marguerite somewhat changed; that the fine, oval face was thinned and sharpened; the brilliant and changeful complexion fixed and deepened with a flush that looked like fever; and the ever-varying graceful, glowing vivacity rather fitful and eccentric. However, envious criticism did not prevent the most desirable partis in the city becoming suitors for the hand of the belle, muse and heiress, as she was still called. But Marguerite, in her old spirit of sarcasm, laughed all these overtures to scorn, and remained faithful to her sole attachment, her inexplicable love for Cornelia.
“I am twenty-four, I shall never marry, Nellie. I wish I were sure that you would never do so either, that we might be sisters for life, and that when your dear parents are gathered to their fathers, you might come and live with me, and we might be all in all to each other, forever,” said Marguerite, one day, to her friend.
“Oh, Marguerite, if that will make you happy, I will promise you faithfully never, never to marry, but to be your own dear, little Nellie forever and ever; for indeed why should I not? I love no one in the world but my parents and you!”
Will it be credited (even although we know that such compacts are sometimes made and always broken) that these two girls entered into a solemn engagement never to marry; but to live for each other only?
From the day of this singular treaty, Marguerite De Lancie grew fonder than ever of her friend, lavished endearments upon her, calling Cornelia her Consolation, her Hope, her Star, and many other pet or poetic names besides. Nevertheless, when the fashionable season was over, Miss De Lancie left town without taking her “Consolation” with her. And again for a few months Marguerite was among the missing. She was not one to disappear with impunity or without inquiry. Where was she? Not at either of her own seats, nor at either of the watering places, not, as far as her most intimate friends and acquaintances knew, at New York, Philadelphia or Richmond, for her arrival at either of these places would have been chronicled by some one interested. Where was she, then? No one could answer; even her bosom friend, Cornelia Compton, could only reply, “Gone gypsying, I suppose.”
Again seven months rolled by, while the brightest star of fashion remained in eclipse.
Again a Christmas party was assembled at Compton Lodge, when the news of Miss De Lancie’s arrival at her house on Loudoun street reached them.
Colonel and Mrs. Compton waited some days for her call, and then not having received it, they went to visit her at her home. They found Marguerite, as ever, gay, witty and sarcastic. She told them in answer to their friendly inquiries that she had been “at Seringapatam,” and gave them no further satisfaction. She accepted the invitation to join the Christmas party at Compton Lodge, went thither the same day, and as always before, distinguished herself as the most brilliant conversationalist, the most accomplished musician, the most graceful dancer, and the most fearless rider of the set. At the breaking up of the company, however, though invited and pressed to return with the Comptons to Richmond, she steadily declined doing so, alleging the necessity of visiting her plantation.
Therefore the Comptons returned to Richmond without their usual guest, and Cornelia, for the first time in many years, spent the whole winter in town without Marguerite. But if Miss Compton was bereaved of her friend, she was also freed from her mistress, and entered with much more levity into all the gayeties of the season than she ever had done in the restraining companionship of Marguerite De Lancie.
Meantime Marguerite, in her wild and lonely home on the wooded banks of the great Potomac, lived a strange and dreamy life, taking long, solitary rides through the deep forests, and among the rocky hills and glens that rolled ruggedly westward of the river; or taking long walks up and down the lonely beach; wiled away to double some distant headland, or explore some unfrequented creek—or pausing lazily, dreamily to watch the flash and dip of the fish in the river, the dusky flight of the water fowl, or the course of a distant sail; getting home late in the afternoon to meet a respectful remonstrance from the elderly gentlewoman who officiated as her housekeeper, and a downright motherly scolding from her old black nurse, aunt Hapzibah, who never saw in the world’s magnificent Marguerite any other than the beautiful, wayward child she had tended from babyhood; or giving audience to the overseer, who, spreading the farm book before her, would enter into long details of the purchase or sale of stock, crops, etc., not one word of which Marguerite heard or understood, yet which she would at the close of the interview indorse by saying, “All right, Mr. Hayhurst, you are an admirable manager”—leaving her friends only to hope that he might be an honest man.
But one circumstance seemed to have power to arouse Miss De Lancie’s interest—the arrival of the weekly mail at Seaview, the nearest village. All day, from the moment the messenger departed in the morning until he came back at night, Marguerite lingered in the house, or mounted her horse and rode in the direction from which the messenger was expected—or returned if it were dark, and waited with ill-concealed anxiety for his arrival. Upon one occasion, the mail seemed to have brought her news as terrible as it was mysterious. Upon opening a certain letter she grew deathly pale, struggled visibly to sustain herself against an inclination to swoon, read the contents to the close, threw the letter into the fire, rang and ordered horses and a servant to attend her, and the same night set out from home, and never drew rein until she reached Bellevue, when sending her horses back by her servant, she took a packet for New York.
She was absent six weeks, at the end of which time she returned home, looking worn and exhausted, yet relieved and cheerful. She found two letters from Cornelia awaiting her; the first one, after much preface, apology and explanation, announced the fact that a suitor, Colonel Houston, of Northumberland, in all respects very acceptable to her parents, had presented himself to Cornelia, and that, but for the mutual pledge existing between herself and Marguerite, she might be induced to please her parents by listening to his addresses. Marguerite De Lancie pondered long and gravely over this letter; re-read it, and looked graver than before. Then she opened the second letter, which was dated three weeks later, and seemed to have been written under the impression that the first one, remaining unanswered, had been received, and had given offense to Marguerite. This last was a long, sentimental epistle, declaring firstly, that she, Cornelia, would not break her “rash” promise to Marguerite, but pleading the wishes of her parents, the approbation of her friends, the merits of her suitor, and in short everything except the true and governing motive, her own inclinations.
Miss De Lancie read this second letter with impatience; at the close threw it into the fire; drew her writing-desk toward her, took pen and paper, and answered both long epistles in one—a miracle of brevity—thus, “dear Nellie—tut—Marguerite,” and sealed and sent it off.
Apparently, Cornelia did not find this answer as clear as it was brief. She wrote in reply a long, heroic epistle of eight pages, announcing her willingness to sacrifice her parents’ wishes, her friends’ approval, her lover’s happiness, and her own peace of mind, all to fidelity and Marguerite, if the latter required the offering!
Marguerite read this letter with more impatience than the others, and drawing a sheet of paper before her, wrote, “Nellie! Do as you like, else I’ll make you—Marguerite.”
In two weeks back came the answer, a pleading, crying letter, of twelve pages, the pith of which was that Nellie would do only as Marguerite liked, and that she wanted more explicit directions.
“Pish! tush! pshaw!” exclaimed Miss De Lancie, tapping her foot with impatience, as she read page after page of all this twaddle, and finally casting the whole into the fire, she took her pen and wrote, “Cornelia! marry Colonel Houston forthwith before I compel you—Marguerite.”
A few days from the dispatch of this letter arrived the answer, brought by an express-mounted messenger in advance of the mail. It was a thick packet of many closely-written pages, the concentrated essence of which was that Nellie would follow the advice of Marguerite, whom she loved and honored more than any one else in the world, yes, more than mother and father and lover together; that Marguerite must never wrong her by doubting this, or above all, by being jealous of the colonel, for indeed, after all, Nellie did not like him inordinately; how could she when he was a widower past thirty with two children? And finally, that she would not venture to ask Miss De Lancie to be her bridesmaid, for that would be like requesting a queen to attend her maid of honor in such a capacity; but would Marguerite, her dear Lady Marguerite, come and preside over the marriage of her poor little Nellie?
Miss De Lancie sat, for a long time, holding this letter open in her hand, moralizing upon its contents. “The little simpleton—is she only timid, or is she insincere? which after all means—is she weak or wicked? foolish or knavish? And above all, why am I fond of her? why have her brown eyes and her cut of countenance such power to draw and knit my heart to hers?—for indeed though to superficial eyes, hers may be a countenance resplendent with feeling, strong in thought, yet it is a cheat, without depth, without earnestness—let it be said!—without soul. Ay, truly! seeing all this, why do I love her? Because of the ‘strong necessity of loving’ somebody, or something, I suppose,” thought Marguerite, sinking deeper into reverie. These sparks of light elicited by the strokes of Cornelia’s steel-like policy upon the flint of Marguerite’s sound integrity, thus revealed, by flashes, the true character of the former to the latter; but the effect was always transient, passing away with the cause.
Miss De Lancie took up the letter and re-read it, with comments as—“I jealous of her lover! truly! I preside over her marriage! Come, I must answer that!” And drawing writing materials before her, she wrote, briefly as before.
“I would see you in Gehenna first, you little imbecile. Marguerite.”
And sealed and dispatched the letter.
This brought Nellie down in person to Plover’s Point, where by dint of caressing, and coaxing, and weeping, she prevailed with Marguerite, who at last exclaimed:
“Well, well! go home and prepare for your wedding, Nellie! I’ll come and assist at the farce.”