The Maid of Maiden Lane Part 22

"They have loved each other all their lives."

"The Earl is delighted with the marriage."

"He is the most devoted of lovers."

And there was not a word of dissent from this opinion until pretty Sally McKean said, "A fig for your prophecies! George Hyde has loved and galloped away a score of times. I would not pay any more attention to his proposals and promises, than I would pay to the wind that blows where it listeth; here to-day, and somewhere else to-morrow."

To all these speculations Cornelia forced herself to listen with a calm unalterable; and Hyde and Annie watched her from a distance. "So that is the marvellous beauty!" said Annie.

"Is she not marvellously beautiful?" asked Hyde.

"Yes. I will say that much. But why did she look at you with so much of reproach? What have you done to her?"

"That is it. What have I done? Or left undone?"

"Who is the gentleman with her?"

"I know not. She has many relatives here; wealthy Quakers, and some of them doubtless of the new order, who do not disdain the frivolity of fine clothing."

"Indeed, I a.s.sure you the Quakers were ever nice in their taste for silks and velvets and laces. The man is handsome enough even to be her escort. And to judge by appearances he is her devoted servant. Will you regard them, cousin?"

"I do. Alas, I see nothing else! She is more lovely then ever."

"She is wonderfully dressed. That gown of pale blue and silver would make any woman look like an angel?-but indeed she is lovely beyond comparison. There are none like her in this room. It will be a thousand pities if you lose her."

"I shall be inconsolable."

"You may have another opportunity even tonight. I see that my aunt is approaching with a young lady, if you do not wish to make a new acquaintance, go and try to meet Cornelia again."

"Thank you, Annie. You can tell me what I have missed afterwards."

He wandered through the parlours speaking to one and another but ever on the watch for Cornelia. He saw her no more that night. She had withdrawn as soon as possible after meeting Hyde, and he was so miserably disappointed, so angry at the unpropitious circ.u.mstances which had dominated their casual meeting, that he hardly spoke to anyone as they returned home; and was indeed so little interested in other affairs that he forgot until the next day to ask Annie whose acquaintance he had rather palpably refused.

"You cannot guess who it was," said Annie in answer to his query; "so I will make a favour of telling you. Do you remember the Rev. Mr. Darner, rector of Downhill Market?"

"Very well. He preached very tiresome sermons."

"The young lady was his daughter Mary."

"'Tis a miracle! What is Mary Darner doing in America?"

"She is on a visit to her cousin, who is married to the Governor of Ma.s.sachusetts. He is here on some state matter, and as Miss Damer also wished to see Was.h.i.+ngton, he brought her with him."

"Mary Damer! We went nutting together one autumn. She came often to Hyde Court when I was a lad."

"And she promises to come often to see me when I return to England. I wonder what we have been brought together for. There must be a reason for a meeting so unlikely-Can it be Cornelia?"

"'Tis the most improbable of suppositions. I do not suppose she ever saw Cornelia."

"She had not even heard of her-and yet my mind will connect them."

"You have no reason to do so; and it is beyond all likelihood. I am sorry I went away from Mary."

"She took no notice of your desertion."

"That is, as maybe. I was a mere lad when I saw her last. Is she pa.s.sable?"

"She is extremely handsome. My aunt heard that she is to marry a Boston gentleman of good promise and estate. I dare say it is true."

It was so true that even while they were speaking of the matter Mary was writing these words to her betrothed: "Yesterday I met the Hydes. You know my father has the living of Downhill Market from them, and I had a constraint on me to be agreeable. The young Lord got out of my way. Did he imagine I had designs on him? I look for a better man. What fate brought us together in Philadelphia, I know not. I may see a great deal of them in the coming summer, and then I may find out. At present I will dismiss the Hydes. I have met pleasanter company."

Annie dismissed the subject with the same sort of impatience. It seemed to no one a matter of any importance, and even Annie that day had none of the penetrative insight which belongs to

"that finer atmosphere, Where footfalls of appointed things, Reverberant of days to be, Are heard in forecast echoings, Like wave beats from a viewless sea."

As for Hyde, he was shaken, confused, lifted off his feet, as it were; but after another day had pa.s.sed, he had come to one steady resolution-HE WOULD SPEAL TO CORNELIA WHEN NEXT HE MET HER, NO MATTER WHERE IT WAS, OR WHO WAS WITH HER. And that pa.s.sionate stress of spirit which induced this resolve, led him also to go out and seek for this opportunity.

For nearly a week he kept this conscious, constant watch. Its insisting sorrowful longing was like a cry from Love's watch towers, but it did not reach the beloved one; or else she did not answer it. One bright morning he resolved to walk through the great dry goods stores-Whiteside's, Guest's, and the famous Mrs. Holland's, where the beauties of the "gay Quakers" bought their choicest fabrics in foreign chintzes, lawns, and Indian muslins. All along Front, Arch, and Walnut Streets, the pavements were lumbered with boxes and bales of fine imported goods, and he was getting impatient of the bustle and pus.h.i.+ng, when he saw Anthony Clymer approaching him. The young man was driving a new and very spirited team, and as he with some difficulty held them, he called to Hyde to come and drive with him. Hyde was just in the weary mood that welcomed change, and he leaped to his friend's side, and felt a sudden exhilaration in the rapid motion of the buoyant, active animals. After an hour's driving they came to a famous hostelry, and Clymer said, "Let us give ourselves lunch, and the horses bait and a rest, then we will make them show their mettle home again."

The proposal met with a hearty response, and the young men had a luxurious meal and more good wine than they ought to have taken. But Hyde had at last found some one who could talk of Cornelia; rave of her face and figure, and vow she was the topmost beauty in Philadelphia. He listened, and finally asked where she dwelt, and learned that she was staying with Mr. Theodore Willing, a wealthy gentleman of the strictest Quaker principles, but whose son was one of the "feeble men or wet Quakers" who wore powder and ruffles and dressed like a person of fas.h.i.+on.

"He dangles around the bewitching Miss Moran, and gives no other man a chance," said Clymer spitefully. "It is the talk from east to west, and 'tis said, he is so enamoured of the beauty, that he will have her, if he buy her."

"Do you talk in your sleep? Or do you tell your dreams for truth?" asked Hyde angrily. "'Tis not to be believed that a girl so lovely can be bought by mere pounds sterling. A woman's heart lies not so near her hand-G.o.d's mercy for it! or any fool might seize it."

"What are you raging at? She is not your mistress."

"Let us talk of horses-or politics-or the last play-or anything but women. They breed quarrels, if you do but name them."

"Content. I will tell you a good story about Tom Herring,"

The story was evidently a good one, for Hyde laughed at the recital with a noisy merriment very unusual to him. The champ and gallop of the horses, and Clymer's vociferous enjoyment of his own wit, blended with it; and for a moment or two Hyde was under a physical exhilaration as intoxicating as the foam of the champagne they had been drinking. In the height of this meretricious gaiety, a carriage, driving at a rather rapid rate turned into the road; and Cornelia suddenly raised her eyes to the festive young men, and then dropped them with an abrupt, even angry expression.

Hyde became silent and speechless, and Clymer was quickly infected by the very force and potency of his companion's agitation and distressed surprise. He heard him mutter, "Oh this is intolerable!" and then, it was, as if a cold sense of dislike had sprung up between them.-Both were glad to escape the other's company, and Hyde fled to the privacy of his own room, that he might hide there the almost unbearable chagrin and misery this unfortunate meeting had caused him.

"Where shall I run to avoid myself?" he cried as he paced the floor in an agony of shame. "She will never respect me again. She ought not. I am the most wretched of lovers. Such a tom-fool to betray me as Anthony Clymer! A man like a piece of gla.s.s, that I have seen through a dozen times!" Then he threw himself into a chair and covered his face with his hands, and wept tears full of anger and shameful distress.

For some days sorrow, and confusion, and distraction bound his senses; he refused all company, would neither eat, nor sleep, nor talk, and he looked as white and wan as a spectre. A stupid weight, a dismal sullen stillness succeeded the storm of shame and grief; and he felt himself to be the most forlorn of human beings. If it had been only possible to undo things done! he would have bought the privilege with years. At length, however, the first misery of that wretched meeting pa.s.sed away, and then he resolved to forget.

"It is all past!" he said despairingly. "She is lost to me forever! Her memory breaks my heart! I will not remember any longer! I will forfeit all to forgetfulness. Alas, alas, Cornelia! Though you would not believe me, it was the perfectest love that I gave you!"

Cornelia's sorrow, though quite as profound, was different in character. Her s.e.x and various other considerations taught her more restraint; but she also felt the situation to be altogether unendurable, and after a few moments of bitterly eloquent silence, she said-

"Mother, let us go home. I can bear this place no longer. Let us go home to-morrow. Twice this past week I have been made to suffer more than you can imagine. The man is apparently worthless-but I love him."

"You say 'apparently' Cornelia?"

"Oh, how can I tell? There may be excuses-compulsions-I do not know what. I am only sure of one thing, that I love and suffer."

For despite all reason, despite even the evidence of her own eyes, Cornelia kept a reserve. And in that pitiful last meeting, there had been a flash from Hyde's eyes, that said to her-she knew not what of unconquerable love and wrong and sorrow-a flash swifter than lightning and equally potential. It had stirred into tumult and revolt all the plat.i.tudes with which she had tried to quiet her restless heart; made her doubtful, pitiful and uncertain of all things, even while her lover's reckless gaiety seemed to confirm her worst suspicions. And she felt unable to face constantly this distressing dubious questioning, so that it was with almost irritable entreaty she said, "Let us go home, mother."