A Face Illumined Part 34

"Mr. Van Berg," she resumed, looking into his face with an expression that made his heart beat more quickly, "your life was endangered on my account this afternoon."

"That's a pleasant thought to me," he said, taking her hand, "that is if you are not offended that I presumed to be your knight."

"It is a dreadful thought to me," she answered, earnestly; then in a strange and excited manner she added: "You cannot know--death to some is a horrible thing--it prevents so much--I've known--let it come to the old and sad--I could welcome it--but to such as you--O merciful Heaven! Grant me, please grant me, the favor I would ask," she continued, clinging to his hand. "They say this man Sibley is very pa.s.sionate and revengeful. He may still try to carry out his dreadful purpose. Please shun him, please avoid him--in mercy do. I've more than I can bear now; and if--if--"

and she buried her face in her hands.

"And can my poor life be of such value to you, Miss Burton?" he asked, in a deep low tone.

"Ah! you cannot understand," she said, with a sudden and pa.s.sionate gesture, "and I entreat you not to ask me to explain. From the first you have been kind to me. I have felt from the day we met that I had found a friend in you; and your risk, your care for me to-day, gives you a peculiar claim as a friend, but in mercy do not ask me to explain why I am so urgent in my request. I cannot, indeed I cannot--at least not now, in this place. Something happened--Sudden death in one young, strong, and full of hope, like you, seems to me horrible--horrible. In mercy promise to incur no risk on my account," she said pa.s.sionately, and almost wildly.

"My poor little friend, how needlessly frightened you are!" he said, soothingly and gently. "There, I will promise you anything that a man of honor can. But a word against you, Jennie Burton, touches me close, very close. As said the Earl of Kent, 'It invades the region of my heart.'"

She looked up swiftly and questioningly, and then a sudden crimson suffused her face. With a strong and uncontrollable instinct she appeared to shrink from him.

"Kent served one who had lost the power to make return," she said, shaking her head sadly as she turned away.

"Let me reply with Kent again," he earnestly responded. "'You have that in your countenance'--in your character--'which I would fain call master'; and I am mastered, nor can I be shaken from my allegiance. I can at least imitate Kent's faithfulness, if not his obtrusiveness, in the service of his king. You have already claimed me as a friend, and so much at least I shall ever be. Let me win more if I can."

She became very quiet now, and looked steadily into his flushed, eager face with an expression of sorrowful regret and pain that would have restrained him had a ten-fold stronger and more impetuous love been seeking utterance, and by a gesture, simple yet eloquently impressive, she put her finger to her lips. Then giving him her hand she said, with strong emphasis:

"Mr. Van Berg, I would value such a FRIEND as you could be to me more than I can tell you."

"I shall be to you all that you will permit," he said, gently yet firmly. "As you now appear I could as soon think of urging my clamorous human love on a sad-eyed saint that had suffered some cruel form of martyrdom for her faith, and then, as the legends teach, had been sent from heaven among us mortals upon some errand of mercy."

"Your words are truer than you think," she replied, the pallor deepening in her face. "I have suffered a strange, cruel form of martyrdom. But I am not a saint, only a weak woman. I would value such a friend as you could be exceedingly. Indeed--indeed," she continued hesitatingly, "there are peculiar reasons why I wish we might meet as friends occasionally. If you knew--if you knew all--you would not ask to be more. Can you trust one who is clouded by sadness and mystery?"

He took her hand in both of his and answered, "Jennie Burton, there could no greater misfortune befall me than to lose my faith in you. I a.s.sociate you with all that is most sacred to me. Every instinct of my heart a.s.sures me that although the mystery that enshrouds your life may be as cold as death, it is, as far as you are concerned, as white as snow."

"Yes, and as far as another is concerned also," she said solemnly. "Your trust is generous, and I am very, very grateful.

Perhaps--possibly I may--some time--tell you, for you risked your life for me; and--and--there is another reason. But I have never spoken of it yet. Good-night."

"Stay," he said, "I cannot begin being a true friend to you by being a false friend to another. I am ashamed that I have been so preoccupied with myself that I have not spoken of it before. Mr.

Stanton resented Sibley's insulting language more promptly than I did. I have been basely accepting a grat.i.tude that rightly belongs to him, and I a.s.sure you he is in far more danger from Sibley than I am."

Her brow contracted in a sudden frown, and there was something like irritation in her tones as she said:

"Danger again! and to another, for my sake! Must I be tortured with fear and anxiety, because a low fellow, true to his nature, will be scurrilous? Mr. Van Berg," she continued, with a sudden flash of her eyes, "are you and Mr. Stanton quarrelling with Mr.

Sibley on your own account, or on mine? From henceforth I refuse to have the remotest relation to such a quarrel. No remarks of a man like Sibley can insult me, and hereafter any friend of mine who lowers himself to resent them, or has aught to do with the fellow, will both wound and humiliate me."

"After such words, Miss Burton," Van Berg answered with a smile, "rest a.s.sured I shall avoid him as I would a pestilence. But remember, I have been as guilty as Stanton, yes, more so; for Stanton received the first provocation, and he is naturally more impetuous than I am. But I have been thanked, as well as warned and justly rebuked. I think," he added, as if the words cost him an effort, " that if you will kindly ask Stanton to have nothing more to do with Sibley, he will accede to your wishes; and whatever he promises, he will perform."

"Is your friend, then, so honorable a man?" she asked.

"He is, indeed," replied Van Berg, earnestly, while a generous flush suffused his face, "a true, n.o.ble-hearted fellow. He shows his worst side at once, but you would discover new and good traits hin him every day."

She turned away with a low laugh. "Since you are so loyal to your old friend," she said, "I think you will prove true to your new one. I shall put Mr. Stanton to the test, and discover whether he will give up his quarrel with Mr. Sibley for the sake of such poor thanks as I can give. Once more, good-night."

She was hastening away, when he seized her hand and said:

"Why do you go with averted face? Have I offended you?"

She trembled violently. "Please do not look at me so," she said, falteringly. "I cannot endure it. Pity my weakness."

His hand tightened in its warm grasp, and the expression of his face grew more ardent.

She looked up with a sudden flash in her eyes, and said, almost sternly:

"You must not look at me in that way, or else even friends.h.i.+p will be impossible and we must become strangers. Perhaps, after all, this will be the wisest course for us both," she added, in a gentler tone.

He dropped her hand, but said firmly, "No, Miss Jennie, you have given me the right to call you my friend, and I have seen friends.h.i.+p in your eyes, and friends at least we shall be till the end of time.

I shall not say good-night. I shall not let you go away and brood by yourself. I have learned that cheering others is the very elixir of your life; so, come into the parlor. I will find Stanton and our friend with the soprano voice, and the guests of the house shall again bless the stars that sent you to us, as I do daily."

She smiled faintly and said:

"I'll join you there after a little while," and she flitted out into the darkening hall-way, and sought her room by a side stair.

A few moments later Stanton, finding the object of his thoughts did not appear among the guests who sought to escape the sultriness of the evening on the wide piazzas or in the large, s.p.a.cious parlor, began to wander restlessly in a half-unconscious search. A servant was just lighting the gas in the small and remote reception-room as he glanced in. The apartment was empty, and no echoes of the words just spoken were lingering.

A little later Miss Burton came down the main stair-way in her breezy, cheery manner, and his jealous fears were quieted.

He joined her at once, saying that it was the unanimous wish that she should give them some music again that evening.

She would join with him and others, she said; and her manner was so perfectly frank and cordial, so like her bearing towards a lady friend to whom she next spoke, that he fairly groaned in despair of touching a heart that seemed to overflow with kindness toward all.

Van Berg soon appeared, but Miss Burton, on this occasion, managed that the singing should be maintained by quite a large group about the piano, and on account of the sultriness of the evening the service of song was brief.

While Van Berg was leading a hymn that had been asked for by one of the guests, Miss Burton found the opportunity of saying, "Mr.

Stanton, I wish to thank you for your chivalric defence to-day of one who is poor and orphaned. Mr. Van Berg told me of your generous and friendly course. Thus far I can believe that your conduct has been inspired by the truest and most manly impulses. But if in any way you again have aught to do with Mr. Sibley, I shall feel deeply wounded and humiliated. I refuse to be a.s.sociated with that man, even in the remotest degree. Your delicate sense of honor will teach you that if any further trouble grows out of this affair no effort on your part can separate my name from it. The world rarely distinguishes between a gentlemanly quarrel and a vulgar brawl, especially where one of the parties is essentially vulgar. As a gentleman you will surely s.h.i.+eld me from any such a.s.sociations."

Stanton, remembering his appointment with Sibley, bowed low to hide his confusion.

"I would gladly s.h.i.+eld you with my life from anything that could cause you pain," he said, earnestly.

"I do not make any such vast and tragic demands," she replied, smilingly, and holding out her hand; "only simple and prosaic self-control, when tipsy, vulgar men act according to their nature.

Good-night."

He was about to kiss her hand, when she gently withdrew it, remarking:

"We plain people of New England are not descended from the Cavaliers, remember."

He watched until in despair of her appearing again that evening, and then strolled out into the night, feeling in his despondency that no star in the summer sky was more unattainable than the poor and orphaned girl, the impress of whose warm clasp still seemed within his hand.

Chapter x.x.xI. An Emblem.