Title Page
Author
Bressant
Idolatry
About the Publisher
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Julian Hawthorne was the second child of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Sophia Peabody Hawthorne. He was born June 22, 1846, at 14 Mall Street in Salem, Massachusetts. It was shortly after sunrise and his father wrote to his sister:
A small troglodyte made his appearance here at ten minutes to six o'clock, this morning, who claims to be your nephew and the heir of all our wealth and honors. He has dark hair and is no great beauty at present, but is said to be a particularly fine little urchin by everybody who has seen him.
His parents had difficulty choosing a name for eight months. Possible names included George, Arthur, Edward, Horace, Robert, and Lemuel. His father referred to him for some time as "Bundlebreech" or "Black Prince", due to his dark curls and red cheeks. As a boy, Julian was well-behaved and good-natured. He was raised in a loving household, later reflecting: "it was almost appalling to be the subject of such limitless devotion and affection." His father used Julian as an inspiration for the character of Sweet Fern in his children's books A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys and Tanglewood Tales.
The Hawthorne family eventually lived in Concord, Massachusetts, at a home they called The Wayside. There, Julian attended a school run by Franklin Benjamin Sanborn. The school was coeducational, though Julian's sisters Una and Rose did not attend. His parents disapproved particularly of dances hosted by the school. His mother Sophia wrote: "We entirely disapprove of this commingling of youths and maidens at the electric age in school. I find no end of ill effect from it, and this is why I do not send Una and Rose to your school." Young Julian was close friends with his neighbors at the Orchard House, the Alcott family, and pursued a relationship with the older Abigail May Alcott while he was a young teenager.
Hawthorne entered Harvard College in 1863, but did not graduate. He was tutored privately in German by James Russell Lowell, a professor and writer who encouraged Nathaniel Hawthorne's work. It was during his freshman year at Harvard that he learned of his father's death, coincidentally the same day he was initiated into a fraternity. Years later, he wrote of the incident:
I was initiated into a college secret society—a couple of hours of grotesque and good-humored rodomontade and horseplay, in which I cooperated as in a kind of pleasant nightmare, confident, even when branded with a red-hot iron or doused head-over heels in boiling oil, that it would come out all right. The neophyte is effectively blindfolded during the proceedings, and at last, still sightless, I was led down flights of steps into a silent crypt and helped into a coffin, where I was to stay until the Resurrection ... Thus it was that just as my father passed from this earth, I was lying in a coffin during my initiation into Delta Kappa Epsilon.
He studied civil engineering in the United States and Germany, was engineer in the New York City Dock Department under General McClellan (1870–72), spent 10 years abroad, and on his return edited his father's unfinished Dr. Grimshawe's Secret (1883). His sister Rose, upon hearing of the book's announcement, had not known about the fragment and originally thought her brother was guilty of forgery or a hoax. She published the accusation in the New York Tribune on August 16, 1882, and claimed, "No such unprinted work has been in existence ... It cannot be truthfully published as anything but an experimental fragment". He defended himself from the charge, however, and eventually dedicated the book to his sister and her husband George Parsons Lathrop. While in Europe he wrote the novels: Bressant (1873); Idolatry (1874); Garth (1874); Archibald Malmaison (1879); and Sebastian Strome (1880).
Hawthorne wrote two books about his parents, called Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Wife (1884–85) and Hawthorne and His Circle (1903). In the latter, he responded to a remark from his father's friend Herman Melville that the famous author had a "secret". Julian dismissed this, claiming Melville was inclined to think so only because "there were many secrets untold in his own career", causing much speculation. The younger Hawthorne also wrote a critique of his father's novel The Scarlet Letter that was published in The Atlantic Monthly in April 1886.
Julian Hawthorne published an article in the October 24, 1886, issue of the New York World titled "Lowell in a Chatty Mood" based on a long interview with James Russell Lowell. Hawthorne reported that Lowell called the Prince of Wales "immensely fat" as well as other negative comments on British royalty and politicians. Lowell angrily complained that the article made him seem like "a toothless old babbler".
In 1889 there were reports that Hawthorne was one of several writers who had, under the name of "Arthur Richmond", published in the North American Review devastating attacks on President Grover Cleveland and other leading Americans. Hawthorne denied the reports.
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HOW PROFESSOR VALEYON LOSES HIS HANDKERCHIEF.
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One warm afternoon in June—the warmest of the season thus far—Professor Valeyon sat, smoking a black clay pipe, upon the broad balcony, which extended all across the back of his house, and overlooked three acres of garden, inclosed by a solid stone-wall. All the doors in the house were open, and most of the windows, so that any one passing in the road might have looked up through the gabled porch and the passage-way, which divided the house, so to speak, into two parts, and seen the professor's brown-linen legs, and slippers down at the heel, projecting into view beyond the framework of the balcony-door. Indeed—for the professor was an elderly man, and, in many respects, a creature of habit—precisely this same phenomenon could have been observed on any fine afternoon during the summer, even to the exact amount of brown-linen leg visible.
Why the old gentleman's chair should always have been so placed as to allow a view of so much of his anatomy and no more is a question of too subtle and abstruse conditions to be solved here. One reason doubtless lay in the fact that, by craning forward over his knees, he could see down the passage-way, through the porch, and across the grass-plot which intervened between the house and the fence, to the road, thus commanding all approaches from that direction, while his outlook on either side, and in front, remained as good as from any other position whatsoever. To be sure, the result would have been more easily accomplished had the chair been moved two feet farther forward, but that would have made the professor too much a public spectacle, and, although by no means backward in appearing, at the fitting time, before his fellow-men, he enjoyed and required a certain amount of privacy.
Moreover, it was not toward the road that Professor Valeyon's eyes were most often turned. They generally wandered southward, over the ample garden, and across the long, winding valley, to the range of rough-backed hills, which abruptly invaded the farther horizon. It was a sufficiently varied and vigorous prospect, and one which years had endeared to the old gentleman, as if it were the features of a friend. Especially was he fond of looking at a certain open space, near the summit of a high, wooded hill, directly opposite. It was like an oasis among a desert of trees. Had it become overgrown, or had the surrounding timber been cut away, the professor would have taken it much to heart. A voluntary superstition of this kind is not uncommon in elderly gentlemen of more than ordinary intellectual power. It is a sort of half-playful revenge they wreak upon themselves for being so wise. Probably Professor Valeyon would have been at a loss to explain why he valued this small green spot so much; but, in times of doubt or trouble, be seemed to find help and relief in gazing at it.
The entire range of hills was covered with a dense and tangled timber-growth, save where the wood-cutters had cleared out a steep, rectangular space, and dotted it with pale-yellow lumber-piles, that looked as if nothing less than a miracle kept them from rolling over and over down to the bottom of the valley, or where the gray, irregular face of a precipice denied all foothold to the boldest roots. There was nothing smooth, swelling, or graceful, in the aspect of the range. They seemed, hills though they were, to be inspired with the souls of mountains, which were ever seeking to burst the narrow bounds that confined them. And, for his part, the professor liked them much better than if they had been mountains indeed. They gave an impression of greater energy and vitality, and were all the more comprehensible and lovable, because not too sublime and vast.
In another way, his garden afforded as much pleasure to the professor as his hills. From having planned and, in a great measure, made it himself, he took in it a peculiar pride and interest. He knew just the position of every plant and shrub, tree and flower, and in what sort of condition they were as regarded luxuriance and vigor. Sitting quietly in his chair, his fancy could wander in and out along the winding paths, mindful of each new opening vista or backward scene—of where the shadow fell, and where the sunshine slept hottest; could inhale the fragrance of the tea-rose bush, and pause beneath the branches of the elm-tree; the material man remaining all the while motionless, with closed eyelids, or, now and then, half opening them to verify, by a glance, some questionable recollection. This utilization, by the mental faculties alone, of knowledge acquired by physical experience, always produces an agreeable sub-consciousness of power—the ability to be, at the same time, active and indolent.
In about the centre of the garden, flopped and tinkled a weak-minded little fountain. The shrubbery partly hid it from view of the balcony, but the small, irregular sound of its continuous fall was audible in the quiet of the summer afternoons. Weak-minded though it was, Professor Valeyon loved to listen to it. It suited him better than the full-toned rush and splash of a heavier water-power; there was about it a human uncertainty and imperfection which brought it nearer to his heart. Moreover, weak and unambitious though it was, the fountain must have been possessed of considerable tenacity of purpose, to say the least, otherwise, doing so little, it would not have been persistent enough to keep on doing it at all. It was really wonderful, on each recurring year, to behold this poor little water-spout effecting neither more nor less than the year before, and with no signs of any further aspirations for the future.
A flight of five or six granite steps led up from the garden to the balcony, and, although they were quite as old as the rest of the house, they looked nearly as fresh and crude as when they were first put down. The balcony itself was strongly built of wood, and faced by a broad and stout railing, darkened by sun and rain, and worn smooth by much leaning and sitting. Overhead spread an ample roof, which kept away the blaze of the noonday sun, but did not deny the later and ruddier beams an entrance. On either side the door-way, the windows of the dining-room and of the professor's study opened down nearly to the floor. Every thing in the house seemed to have some reference to the balcony, and, in summer, it was certainly the most important part of all.
From the balcony to the front door extended, as has already been said, a straight passage-way, into which the stairs descended, and on which opened the doors of three rooms. It was covered with a deeply-worn strip of oil-cloth, the pattern being quite undistinguishable in the middle, and at the entrances of the doors and foot of the stairs, but appearing with tolerable clearness for a distance of several inches out along the walls. A high wainscoting ran along the sides; at the front door stood an old-fashioned hat-tree, with no hats upon it; for the professor had a way of wearing his hat into the house, and only taking it off when he was seated at his study-table.
The gabled porch was wide and roomy, but had seen its best days, and was rather out of repair. The board flooring creaked as you stepped upon it, and the seams of the roof admitted small rills of water when it rained hard, which, falling on the old brown mat, hastened its decay not a little. A large, arched window opened on either side, so that one standing in the porch could be seen from the upper and lower front windows of the house. The outer woodwork and roof of the porch were covered by a woodbine, trimmed, however, so as to leave the openings clear. A few rickety steps, at the sides and between the cracks of which sprouted tall blades of grass, led down to the path which terminated in the gate. This path was distinguished by an incongruous pavement of white limestone slabs, which were always kept carefully clean. The gate was a rattle-boned affair, hanging feebly between two grandfatherly old posts, which hypocritically tried to maintain an air of solidity, though perfectly aware that they were wellnigh rotted away at the base. The action of this gate was assisted—or more correctly encumbered—by the contrivance of a sliding ball and chain, creating a most dismal clatter and flap as often as it was opened. The white-washed picket fence, scaled and patched by the weather, kept the posts in excellent countenance; and inclosed a moderate grass-plot, adorned with a couple of rather barren black cherry-trees, and as many firs, with low-spread branches.
Above the house and the road rose a rugged eminence, sparely clothed with patches of grass, brambles, and huckleberry-bushes, the gray knots of rock pushing up here and there between. On the summit appeared against the sky the outskirts of a sturdy forest, paradise of nuts and squirrels. The rough road ran between rude stone-fences and straggling apple-trees to the village, lying some two miles to the southeast. About two hundred yards beyond the Parsonage—so Professor Valeyon's house was called, he, in times past, having officiated as pastor of the village—it made a sharp turn to the left around a spur of the hill, bringing into view the tall white steeple of the village meeting-house, relieved against the mountainous background beyond.
They dined in the Parsonage at two o'clock. At about three the professor was wont to cross the entry to his study, take his pipe from its place on the high wooden mantel-piece, fill it from the brown earthen-ware tobacco-box on the table, and stepping through the window on to the balcony, takes his place in his chair. Here he would sit sometimes till sundown, composed in body and mind; dreaming, perhaps, over the rough pathway of his earlier life, and facilitating the process by exhaling long wreaths of thinnest smoke-layers from his mouth, and ever and anon crossing and recrossing his legs.
On the present afternoon it was really very hot. Professor Valeyon, occupying his usual position, had nearly finished his second pipe. He had thrown off the light linen duster he usually wore, and sat with his waistcoat open, displaying a somewhat rumpled, but very clean white shirt-bosom; and his sturdy old neck was swathed in the white necktie which was the only visible relic of his ministerial career. He had covered his bald head with a handkerchief, for the double purpose of keeping away the flies, and creating a cooling current of air. One of his down-trodden slippers had dropped off, and lay sole-upward on the floor. There was no symptom of a breeze in the still, warm valley, nor even on the jagged ridges of the opposing hills. The professor, with all his appliances for coolness and comfort, felt the need of one strongly.
Mellowed by the distance, the long shriek of the engine, on its way from New York, streamed upon his ears and set him thinking. A good many years since he had been to New York!—nine, positively nine—not since the year after his wife's death. It hardly seemed so long, looking back upon it. He wondered whether time had passed as silently and swiftly to his daughters as to him. At all events, they had grown in the interval from little girls into young ladies—Cornelia nineteen, and Sophie not more than a year younger. "Bless me!" murmured the professor aloud, taking the pipe from his mouth, and bringing his heavy eyebrows together in a thoughtful frown.
He would scarcely have believed, in his younger years, that he would have remained anywhere so long, without even a thought of changing the scene. But then, his society days were over long ago, and he had seen all he ever intended to see of the world. Here he had his house, and his daily newspaper, and his books, and his garden, and the love and respect of his daughters and fellow-townspeople. Was not that enough—was it not all he could desire? But here, insensibly, the professor's eyes rested upon the vacant spot at the summit of the hill opposite.
Very few people, be they never so old, or their circumstances never so good, would find it impossible to mention something which they believe they would be the happier for possessing. Perhaps Professor Valeyon was not one of the exceptions, and was haunted by the idea that, were some certain event to come to pass, life would be more pleasant and gracious to him than it was now. Doubtless, however, an ideal aspiration of some kind, even though it be never realized, is itself a kind of happiness, without which we might feel at a loss. If the professor's solitary wish had been fulfilled, and there had been no longer cause for him to say, "If I had but this, I should be satisfied," might it not still happen that in some unguarded, preoccupied moment he should start and blush to find his lips senselessly forming themselves into the utterance of the old formula? Would it not be a sad humiliation to acknowledge that the treasure he had all his life craved, did not so truly fill and occupy his heart as the mere act of yearning after it had done?
In indulging in these speculations, however, we are pretending to a deeper knowledge of Professor Valeyon's private affairs than is at present authorizable. After a while he withdrew his eyes from the hill-tops, sighed, as those do whose thoughts have been profoundly absorbed, and knocked the ashes out of his pipe. He began to debate within himself—for the mind, unless strictly watched, is apt to waver between light thoughts and grave—whether or no it was worth while to make a second journey into the study after more tobacco. Perhaps Cornelia was within call, and would thus afford a means of cutting the Gordian knot at once. No! he remembered now that she had walked over to the village for the afternoon mail, and would not be back for some time yet. And Sophie—poor child! she would not leave her room for two weeks to come, at least.
"I wonder whether they ever want to see any thing of the outside world?" said the old gentleman to himself, elevating his chin, and scratching his short, white beard. "Reasonable to suppose they could appreciate something better than the society hereabouts! A picnic once in a while—sleigh-ride in winter—sewing-bees—dance at—at Abbie's; and all in the company of a set of country bumpkins, like Bill Reynolds, and awkward farmers' daughters!
"It won't do—must be attended to! The good education I was at such pains to give them—it'll only make them miserable if they're to wear their lives out here. I'm getting old and selfish—that's the truth of the matter. I want to sit here, and have my girls take care of me! Pshaw!
"Sophie, now—well, perhaps she don't need it so much, yet; she's younger than her sister, and has a good deal more internal resource: besides, she's too delicate at present. But Neelie—Neelie ought to go at once—this very summer. She needs an enormous deal of action and excitement, bodily and mental both, to keep her in wholesome condition. Has that same restless, feverish devil in her that I used to have; never do to let it feed upon itself! must get her absorbed in outside things!
"But what am I to do?" resumed the professor, sitting up in his chair, and shaking out his shirt-sleeves—for the heat of his meditations had brought on a perspiration; "what can I do—eh? Sophie not in condition to travel—can't leave her to take Cornelia—no one else to take her—and she can't go alone, that's certain! Humph!"
Professor Valeyon paused in his soliloquy, like a man who has turned into a closed court under the impression that it is a thoroughfare, and stared down with upwrinkled forehead at the sole of the kicked-off slipper, indulging the while in a mental calculation of how many days it would take for the hole near the toe to work down to the hole under the instep, and thus render problematical the possibility of keeping the shoe on at all. It might take three weeks, or, say at the utmost, a month; one month from the present time. It was at the present time about the 15th of June, the 14th or the 15th, say the 15th! Well, then, on the 15th of July the slipper would be worn out; in all human probability the weather would be even hotter then than it was now; and yet, in the face of that heat he would be obliged to go over to the village, get Jonas Hastings to fit him with a new pair, and then go through the long agony of breaking them in! At the thought, great drops formed on the old gentleman's nose, and ran suddenly down into his white mustache.
But this digression of thought was but superficial, and the sense that something serious underlaid it remained always latent. The professor leaned back in his chair, and sighed again heavily. It was true that he was growing old, and now that he contemplated action, he felt that in the last nine years the inertia of age had gained upon him. Besides, he greatly loved his daughters, and though it is easy to say that the greatest love is the greatest unselfishness, yet do we find a weakness in our hearts which we cannot believe wholly wrong, strongly prompting us to yearn and cling—even unwisely—to those who have our best affection. "And what seems wise to-day may be proved folly to-morrow," is our argument, "so let us cling to the good we have."
And Professor Valeyon well knew that what time his daughters departed to visit the outer world was likely to be the beginning of a longer journey than to Boston or New York. They were attractive, and, it was to be supposed, liable to be attracted; he would not be so weak as to imagine that their love for their father could long remain supreme. But this old man, who had kept abreast of the learning of the world, and was scarred with many a bruise and stab received during his life's journey; who had filled a pulpit, too, and preached Christian humility to his fellow townspeople, had yet so much human heat and pride glowing like embers in his old heart as to feel strong within him a bitter jealousy and sense of wrong toward whatever young upstarts should intrude themselves, and venture to brag of a love for his flesh and blood which might claim precedence over his own. Doubtless the feeling was unworthy of him, and he would, when the time came, play his part generously and well; but, so long as the matter was purely imaginary, we may allow him some natural ebullition of feeling.
So powerful, indeed, was the effect produced upon Professor Valeyon by the succession and conflict of gloomy and painful emotions, that he laid down his black clay-pipe upon the broad arm of the easy-chair, and began to search in all directions for his handkerchief: indulging himself meanwhile with the base reflection that as there was no present probability of depriving himself of his daughters, that ceremony must, for a time at least, be postponed. While yet the handkerchief-hunt was in full cry, the professor's ears caught the rattle and flap of the opening gate, and following it the quick, vigorous tap of small boot-heels upon the marble flagstones. Next came a light, rustling spring up the creaking porch-steps, and ere the old gentleman could get his head far enough over his knees to see down the entry, a fresh-looking young woman appeared smiling in the door-way, dressed in a tawny summer-suit, and holding up in one hand a long, slender envelop, sealed with a conspicuous monogram, and stamped with the New York post-mark.
SIGNS OF A THUNDER-SHOWER.
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Before the delivery of the letter, a very pretty little ceremony took place. The professor had stretched forth his hand to receive it, when, by a sudden turn of the wrist and arm, the young lady whisked it out of his reach and behind her back, and in place of it brought down her fresh, sweet face with its fragrant mouth to within two inches of his own wrinkled and bristly visage. A moment after, the ceremony was completed, the letter delivered, and the postman, stepping over her father's fallen slipper, leaned against the balcony-railing, and waited for further developments.
The professor took his spectacles from his waistcoat pocket, placed them carefully upon his strongly-marked nose, and scrutinized in turn the direction, post-mark, and seal. With a sniff of surprise, he then tore open the envelop, and became immediately absorbed in the contents of the inclosure, indicating his progress by much pursing and biting of his lips, wrinkling of his forehead, and drawing together of his heavy eyebrows. Having at length reached the end of the last page, he turned it sharply about, and went through it once more, with half-articulate grunts of comment; and finally, folding the letter carefully up, and replacing it in the torn envelop, he caught the spectacles off his nose, and, with them in one hand and the paper in the other, fixed his eyes upon the vacant spot at the summit of the hill.
His daughter meanwhile had taken off her brown straw-hat, and was using it as a fan, keeping up a light tattoo with one foot upon the plank flooring. Her face was glowing with her four-mile walk in the hot sun, but she showed no signs of weariness. The position in which she stood was easy and graceful, but there was nothing statuesque or imposing about it; it was evident that at the very next instant she might shift into another equally as happy. Her eyes wandered from one object to another with the absence of concentration of one whose mind is not fixed upon any thing in particular. From the letter between the professor's finger and thumb, they traveled upward to his thoughtful countenance; thence took a leap to the decrepit water-spout which depended weakly from the corner of the balcony-roof, and thence again ascended to a great, solid, white cloud, with turreted outline clear against the blue, which was slowly sliding across the sky from the westward, and threatened soon to cut off the afternoon sunshine.
The professor restlessly altered the position of his legs, thereby drawing his daughter's attention once more to himself. Thinking she had waited as long as was requisite for the maintenance of her dignity as a non-inquisitive person, she transferred herself lightly to the arm of her father's chair, grasping his beard in her plump, slender hand, and turned his face up toward hers.
"Well, papa! aren't you going to tell what the news is? Is it nice?"
"Very nice!" said papa, taking her irreverent hand into his own, and keeping it there. "At least you will think so," he added, looking half playful and half wistful.
Cornelia brought her lips into a pout, all ready to say, "what?" but did not say it, and gazed at her father with round, interrogating eyes.
"You'd be very glad to go away and leave me, of course," continued the professor, assuming an air of studied unconcern.
"Papa!" exclaimed the young lady, with an emphatic intonation of affection, indignation, and bewilderment.
"What! not be glad to go to New York, and to all the fashionable watering-places, and be introduced to all the best society?" queried the old gentleman, in hypocritical astonishment.
"Papa!" again exclaimed the young lady; but this time in a tone which the tumult of delight, anticipation, and a fear lest there should be a mistake somewhere, softened almost into a whisper. She had risen from the arm of the chair to her feet, and stood with her hands clasped together beneath her chin.
The professor laughed a short and rather unnatural laugh. "I thought you wouldn't be obstinate about it, when you came to think it over," said he, dryly. He folded up his spectacles and put them back in his waistcoat pocket with, unusual elaboration of manner. "So you would really like to have a change, would you? Well, I trust you will not be disappointed in your expectations of society and watering-places. At all events, you may learn to appreciate home more!" Here the professor laughed again, as if he considered it a joke.
Cornelia was too much entranced by the new idea to have any notion of what he was talking about; she was already hundreds of miles away, living in stately houses, driving in magnificent carriages, sweeping in gorgeous silks and laces through gilded and illuminated ballrooms, and listening to courtly compliments from handsome and immaculate gentlemen. But when, presently, her scattered faculties began to return to a more normal state, an unquenchable curiosity to know how the miracle was to be worked, seized upon her. She dropped on her knees beside her father's chair, took his hand in both of hers, and looked up in his face.
"But how is it to be, papa, dear? I mean, whom am I to go with? and when am I to go?—dear me, I haven't a thing to wear! Shall I have time to get any thing ready? Isn't Sophie invited too? How strange it all seems! I can hardly realize it, somehow. From whom is the letter?"
"Can you remember when you were about nine years old?" inquired the professor.
"I don't know, I am sure," replied Cornelia, in some surprise at the irrelevancy of the question. "Nothing particular. Oh! I know! we were in New York!" said she, beginning to see some connection, and breaking into a smile.
"Do you remember seeing a lady there," continued the professor, talking and looking straight at nothing, "who made a great deal of you and Sophie, and asked you to call her Aunt Margaret?"
"Oh—I believe—I do—," said Cornelia, slowly; "I think I didn't like her much, because she was deaf or something, and talked in such a high voice. She wasn't really our aunt, was she? Did she write the letter?"
"Yes, she did, my dear, and invites you and Sophie to spend the summer with her. You don't dislike her so much as to refuse, I suppose, do you?"
"O papa!" exclaimed his daughter, deprecatingly; for the old gentleman had spoken rather in a tone of reproof. "I'm sure she's as kind and good as she can be; I was only telling what I especially remembered about her, you know. How did she come to think of us after so long?"
"I used to know her quite well, long before you were born, my dear," replied the professor, tapping with his fingers on the arm of the chair; "and at that time I should not have been surprised at her offering me any kindness. I am surprised now," he added, with a good deal of feeling; "she's a better friend than I thought."
Cornelia remained silent for several moments, because, not in the least comprehending what sort of ground her papa was walking on, she feared that the questions and remarks she was anxious to advance might jar with his mood. At length, a sufficient time having elapsed to warrant, in her opinion, the introduction of intelligible topics, she looked up and spoke again.
"How soon, papa—how soon did you say—am I to go?"
"First of July, Aunt Margaret says. Will that give you time enough to make yourself fine?"
"Now, papa, you're making fun of me," exclaimed the young lady, delighted that he should be in the humor to do so, yet speaking in that semi-reproachful tone which ladies sometimes adopt when the other sex makes their costume the object of remark, "I can make myself as fine as I can be by that time, of course! But how is it about Sophie? Won't she be able to go too?"
Papa shook his head, and combed his bristly white beard with his fingers. "Sophie has been very ill," said he; "it wouldn't be safe to have her go anywhere this summer. We can't take too much care of her. Typhoid pneumonia is a dangerous thing, and though she's on the way to recovery now, she might easily relapse. And then," added the old gentleman, in a more inward tone, "she would recover no more."
Although he mumbled this sentence to himself, Cornelia caught his meaning, more, probably, from his manner than from any thing she heard; and being of an emotional and warmly-tender disposition, she began to cry. She loved her sister very much; and something must also be allowed to the fact that, having a great happiness in prospect for herself, she could afford to expend more sympathy on those less fortunate. As for the professor, he, for a second time that afternoon, gave evidence of possessing disgracefully little control over himself. He began another fruitless search after his handkerchief, and finally asked Cornelia, with some heat, whether she knew what had become of it.
"Why, it's on your head, papa!" warbled she, brightly changing a laugh for her tears; and papa, putting up his hand in great confusion, and finding that it was indeed so, laughed also, and this time in a perfectly natural manner; but he blew his nose very resoundingly, for all that.
The atmosphere being serene once more, the joy of the future became again strong in Cornelia's heart, and coupled with it, an earnest longing to disburden herself to some one, and who but her sister should be her confidant? So she rose from her knees, and picked up her brown straw hat, which, in the excitement, had fallen to the floor.
"Is there any thing you'd like to do, papa dear?" asked she, laying her forefinger caressingly upon his bald head. "Because if there isn't, I, I should like—I think I'd better go to Sophie."
Professor Valeyon nodded his head, being in truth desirous of taking solitary counsel with himself. The letter contained a good deal more than the invitation he had communicated to Cornelia, and he could not feel at ease until he had more thoroughly analyzed and digested it. So when his daughter had vanished through the door, with a smile and a kiss of the hand, he mounted his spectacles again, and spread the letter open on his knee.
After reading a while in silence, he spoke; though his voice was audible only to his own mental ears.
"There was a time," said he, "when I wouldn't have believed I could ever hear the news of that man's death, and take it so quietly! And now he sends me his son!—as it were bequeaths him to me. Can it be as a hostage for forgiveness, though so late? or is it merely because he knew I could not but feel a vital interest in the boy, and would instruct and treat him as my own? He was a shrewd judge of human nature—and yet, I must not judge him harshly now."
Here Professor Valeyon happened again to catch sight of his slipper, and interrupted his soliloquy to extend his stockinged toe, fork it toward himself, and having, with some trouble, got it right side uppermost, to put it on. And then he referred once more to the letter.
"I should like to know whether he was aware that Abbie was here, or that she was alive at all! Margaret says nothing about it in her letter. If he did, of course he must have written to her, or, if he was determined to die as for these last twenty years and more he has lived, he would never knowingly have sent the boy where she was, on any consideration. Well, well, I can easily find out how that is, from either Abbie or the boy. By-the-way, I wonder whether this incognito of his may have any thing to do with it? Hum! Margaret says it's only so that he may not be interrupted in his studies by acquaintances. Well, that's likely enough—that's likely enough!"
"By-the-way, where's the young man to stay? At Abbie's, of course, if—Margaret says, at some good boarding-house. Well, Abbie's is the only one in town. It's a singular coincidence, certainly, if it is a coincidence! Perhaps I'd better go down at once and see Abbie, and have the whole matter cleared up. I shall have time enough before supper, if I harness Dolly now."
As Professor Valeyon arrived at this conclusion, he uplifted himself, with some slight signs of the rustiness of age, from his chair, took his brown-linen duster from the balcony railing across which it had been thrown, and put it on, with laborious puffings, and a slight increase of perspiration. Then, first turning round, to make sure that he had all his belongings with him, he entered the hall-door, and passed through into his study.
The rooms in which we live seem to imbibe something of our characteristics, and the examination of a dwelling-place may not infrequently throw some light upon the inner nature of its occupant. The professor's study was of but moderate size, carpeted with a red-and-white check straw matting, considerably frayed and defaced in the region of the table, and faded where the light from the windows fell upon it. The four walls were hidden, to a height of about seven feet from the floor, with rows upon rows of books, of all sizes and varieties of binding, no small proportion being novels, and even those not invariably of a classical standard. The only picture was a stained engraving of the Transfiguration, over the mantel-piece, in a faded and fly-be-spotted gilt frame. In the centre of the room, occupying, indeed, a pretty large share of all the available space, stood an ample study-table, covered with green baize, darkened, for a considerable space around the inkstand, by innumerable spatterings of ink. It supported a confused medley of natural and unnatural accompaniments to reading and writing. A ponderous ebony inkstand, with solid cut-glass receptacles, one being intended for powder, though none was ever put in it, a mighty dictionary, which, being too heavy to be considered movable, occupied one corner of the table by itself: the earthen tobacco-jar, with a small piece chipped from the cover; pamphlets and books, standing or lying upon one another; heaps of rusty steel and blunted quill pens; a quire or two of blue and white letter-paper; a paper-knife, loose in the handle, but smooth of edge; a box of lucifer matches, and several burnt ends; an extra pipe or two; the professor's straw hat; a brass rack for holding letters and cards; and a great deal of pink blotting-paper scattered about everywhere.
Opposite the table stood a chair, straight-backed and severe, in which Professor Valeyon always sat when at work. He had a theory that it was not well to be too much at bodily ease when intellectually occupied. Directly behind the chair, upon the shelf of a bookcase, stood a plaster cast of Shakespeare's face, the nose of which was most unaccountably darkened and polished. It is doubtful whether even the professor himself could have cleared up the mystery of this deepened color in the immortal bard's nose. But whoever, during those hours set apart by the old gentleman for solitary labor and meditation, had happened to peep in at the window, would, ten to one, have beheld him tilted thoughtfully back in his chair, abstractedly tweaking, with the forefinger and thumb of his right hand, the sacred feature in question. He had done it every day, for many years past, and never once found himself out, and, doubtless, the great poet was far too broad-minded ever to think of resenting the liberty, especially as it was only in his most thoughtful moments that the professor meddled with him.
The room contained little else in the way of furniture, except a few extra chairs, and a malacca-joint cane, with an ivory head, which stood in a corner near the door. It produced an impression at once of cleanliness and disorder, therein bearing a strong analogy to the professor's own person and habits; and the disorder was of such a kind, that, although no rule or system in the arrangement of any thing was perceptible, Professor Valeyon would have been at once and almost instinctively aware of any alteration that might have been made, however slight.
On entering the study, the old gentleman first shuffled up to the fireplace, flapping the heels of his slippers behind him as he went, and deposited his pipe on the mantel-piece. Next, he put on his straw hat, and, turning to the engraving of the Transfiguration, which had served him as a looking-glass almost ever since it had hung there, he put himself to rights, with his usual fierce scowlings, liftings of the chin, and jerkings at collar and stock. When every thing seemed in proper trim, he took his ivory-headed cane from its place in the corner, and made his way along the entry to the front door.
"Bless me!" ejaculated the professor, as he emerged upon the porch, shading his eyes from the white dazzle of the road; "how hot it is, sure enough!" Scarcely had he spoken, however, when the sun, which had been coquetting for the last half-hour with the majestic white cloud which Cornelia had idly watched from the balcony, suddenly plunged his burning face right into its cool, soft bosom, and immediately a clear, gray shadow gently took possession of the landscape.
"Humph!" grunted the professor again, turning a sharp, wise eye to the westward, "we shall have a thunder-shower before long. I must take the covered wagon. But how's this? I declare I've forgotten to change my slippers! I'm growing old—I'm growing old, that's certain!"
As the old gentleman stood, shaking his head over this new symptom of approaching senility, he happened to turn his eyes in the direction of the village, and descried a figure approaching rapidly from the turn in the road, which at once arrested his attention.
"Who can that be?" muttered he to himself, frowning to assist his vision. "None of the town boys, that's certain. Never saw such a figure but once before! If any thing, this is the better man of the two. By-the-way, what if it should be—! Humph! I believe it is, sure enough."
By this time the stranger, a very tall and broadly built young man, with a close brown beard, and quick, comprehensive eyes, had arrived opposite the house, and stood with one hand on the gate.
"Is this the parsonage?" demanded he, speaking with great rapidity of utterance, and turning his head half sideways as he spoke, without, however, removing his eyes from the professor's face.
The old gentleman nodded his head, "It is known by that name, sir!" said he.
With the almost impatient quickness which marked every thing he did—a quickness which did not seem in any way allied to slovenliness or inaccuracy, however—the young man pushed through the gate, which protested loudly against such rough usage, and walked hastily up to the porch-steps. He paused a moment ere ascending.
"Are you Professor Valeyon?" he asked.
Again the professor bowed his head in assent. "And are you—?" began he.
The young man sprang up the steps, and grasping the other's half-extended hand, gave it a brief, hard shake.
"I'm Bressant," said he.
SOPHIE AND CORNELIA ENTER INTO A COVENANT.
––––––––
When Cornelia left her father on the balcony, she danced up-stairs, and chasséed on tiptoe up to the door of Sophie's room. There she stopped and knocked.
Somehow or other, nobody ever went into that room without knocking. It never entered any one's head to burst in unannounced. The door was an unimposing-looking piece of deal, grained by some village artist into the portraiture of an as yet undiscovered kind of wood, and considerably impaired in various ways by time. It could not have been the door, therefore. Nor was the bolt ever drawn, save at certain hours of the morning and night. Sophie was not an ogre, either. Cornelia, who was very trying at times, would have found it hard to recall an occasion when Sophie had answered or addressed her sharply or crossly. If she exerted any influence, or wielded any power, it was not of the kind which attends a violent or morose temper. But no vixen or shrew, how terrible soever she may be, can hope at all times or from all people to meet with respect or consideration; while to Sophie Valeyon the world always put on its best face and manner, secretly wondering at itself the while for being so well-behaved.
As to the affair of knocking, Sophie herself had never said a word about it, one way or another. She always took it as a matter of course; indeed, had she been loquacious on the subject, or insisted upon the observance, Cornelia for one would have been very likely to laugh to scorn and disregard her, therein acting upon a principle of her own, which prompted her to measure her strength against any thing which seemed to challenge her, and never to give up if she could help it. But she had never had a trial of strength with Sophie, and possibly was quite contented that it should be so. She would have shrunk from thwarting or crossing her sister as she would from committing a secret sin: there might be no material or visible ill-consequence, but the stings of conscience would be all the sharper.
So Cornelia knocked and entered, and the quiet, cool room in which her sister lay seemed to glow and become enlivened by the joyous reflection of her presence. Yet the effect of the room upon Cornelia was at least as marked. She hushed herself, as it were, and tried, half unconsciously, to adapt herself to the tone of her surroundings; for, although her physical nature was sound and healthy, almost to boisterousness, her perceptions remained very keen and delicate, and occasionally rallied her upon the redundancy of her animal well-being with something like reproof.
It was singular, with how few and how simple means was created the impression of purity and repose that this chamber produced! It brought to mind the pearly interior of a shell, and a fanciful person might have listened for the sea-music whispering through. The walls were papered with pale gray, relieved by a light pink tracery, and the white-muslin curtains were set off by a pink lining. A bunch of wild-flowers and grasses, which Cornelia had gathered that morning, and Sophie had arranged, stood on the mantel-piece. There were four or five pictures—one, a bass-relief of Endymion, deep asleep, yet conscious in his dream that the moon is peeping shyly over his polished shoulder, had been copied from a famous original by Sophie herself. She had painted it in a pale-brown mezzotint, which was like nothing in nature, but seemed suitable of all others for the embodiment of the classic fable. This picture hung over the mantel-piece. Opposite Sophie's bed was an illumination of the Lord's Prayer, with clear gold lettering, and capitals and border of celestial colors. The dressing-table was covered with a white cloth, on which reposed a comb and brush and a pink pin-cushion with a muslin cover, and over which hung a crayon of the cherub of the Sistine Madonna, who leans his chin upon his hand.
Within reach of Sophie's hand as she lay, were suspended a couple of hanging shelves, which held her books. There were not a great many of them, but they all bore signs of having been well read, and there was at the same time a certain neatness and spotlessness in their appearance which no merely new books could ever possess, but which was communicated solely by Sophie's pure finger-touches. On the opposite side of the bed stood a small table, on which ticked a watch; and beside the watch was a work-basket, full of those multifarious little articles that only a woman knows how to get together.
Looking around the room, and noting the delicate nicety and precision of its condition and arrangement, one would have supposed that Sophie's own hands must have been very lately at work upon it. But it was many weeks since she had even sat in the easy-chair that stood in the rosy-curtained window; and, although now far advanced in convalescence, she had taken no part in the care of her room since her illness. Why it had still continued to retain its immaculateness was one of many similar mysteries which must always surround a character like Sophie's. Every thing she accomplished seemed not so much to be done, as to take place, in accordance with her idea or resolve; and there were always, in her manifestations of whatever kind, more spiritual than material elements.
When Cornelia entered, Sophie laid down her sewing, and looked up-with a smile in her eyes, which were large and gray, and the only regularly beautiful part of her face. She had a way of confining a smile to them, when wishing merely to express good-will or pleasure, which was peculiar to herself, and very effective. Cornelia walked quite soberly up to the bedside, kissed her sister, and then stood silent for several moments.