Cousin Maude Part 13

said Miss Thayer, while young Robinson, a lisping, insipid dandy, drawled out, "A sthool-marm, J. Thee? I'th really romantic! Thend for her, of courth. A little dithipline won't hurt any of uth."

J.C. made a faint effort to rally, but they joked him so hard that he remained silent, while James regarded him with a look of cool contempt sufficiently indicative of his opinion.

At last when Miss Thayer asked "if the bridal day were fixed," he roused himself, and thinking if he told the truth he should effectually deceive them, he answered, "Yes, next Christmas is the time appointed. We were to have been married in June, but the lady lost her fortune and the marriage was deferred."

"Oh, teaching to purchase her bridal trousseau. I'm dying to see it," laughingly replied Miss Thayer, while another rejoined, "Lost her fortune. Was she then an heiress?"

"Yes, a milkman's heiress," said J.C., with a slightly scornful emphasis on the name which he himself had given to Maude at a time when a milkman's money seemed as valuable to him as that of any other man.

There was a dark, stern look on the face of James De Vere, and as Miss Thayer, the ruling spirit of the party, had an eye on him and his broad lands, she deemed it wise to change the conversation from the "Milkman's Heiress" to a topic less displeasing to their handsome host. In the course of the afternoon the cousins were alone for a few moments, when the elder demanded of the other: "Do you pretend to love Maude Remington, and still make light both of her and your engagement with her?"

"I pretend to nothing which is not real," was J.C.'s haughty answer; "but I do dislike having my matters canva.s.sed by every silly tongue, and have consequently kept my relation to Miss Remington a secret. I cannot see her to-day, but with your permission I will pen a few lines by way of explanation," and, glad to escape from the rebuking glance he knew he so much deserved, he stepped into his cousin's library, where he wrote the note James gave to Maude.

Under some circ.u.mstances it would have been a very unsatisfactory message, but with her changed feelings toward the writer and James De Vere sitting at her side, she scarcely noticed how cold it was, and throwing it down, tore open Louis' letter which had come in the evening mail. It was very brief, and hastily perusing its contents Maude cast it from her with a cry of horror and disgust--then catching it up, she moaned, "Oh, must I go!--I can't! I can't!"

"What is it?" asked Mr. De Vere, and pointing to the lines Maude bade him read.

He did read, and as he read his own cheek blanched, and he wound his arm closely round the maiden's waist as if to keep her there and thus save her from danger. Dr. Kennedy had the smallpox, so Louis wrote, and Nellie, who had been home for a few days, had fled in fear back to the city. Hannah, too, had gone, and there was no one left to care for the sick man save John and the almost helpless Louis.

"Father is so sick," he wrote, "and he says, tell Maude, for humanity's sake, to come."

If there was one disease more than another of which Maude stood in mortal fear it was the smallpox, and her first impulse was, "I will not go." But when she reflected that Louis, too, might take it, and need her care, her resolution changed, and moving away from her companion she said firmly, "I must go, for if anything befall my brother, how can I answer to our mother for having betrayed my trust? Dr. Kennedy, too, was her husband, and he must not be left to die alone."

Mr. De Vere was about to expostulate, but she prevented him by saying, "Do not urge me to stay, but rather help me to go, for I must leave Hampton to-morrow. You will get someone to take my place, as I, of course, shall not return, and if I have it--"

Here she paused, while the trembling of her body showed how terrible to her was the dread of the disease.

"Maude Remington," said Mr. De Vere, struck with admiration by her n.o.ble, self-sacrificing spirit, "I will not bid you stay, for I know it would be useless; but if that which you so much fear comes upon you, if the face now so fair to took upon be marred and disfigured until not a lineament is left of the once beautiful girl, come back to me. I will love you all the same."

As he spoke he stretched his arms involuntarily toward her, and scarce knowing what she did, she went forward to the embrace. Very lovingly he folded her for a moment to his bosom, then turning her face to the fading sunlight which streamed through the dingy window, he looked at it wistfully and long, as if he would remember every feature. Pushing back the silken curls which cl.u.s.tered around her forehead, he kissed her twice, and then releasing her said: "Forgive me, Maude, if I have taken more than a cousin's liberty with you, I could not help it."

Bewildered at his words and manner, Maude raised her eyes wonderingly to his, and looking into the shining orbs, he thought how soft, how beautiful they were, but little, little did he dream their light would e'er be quenched in midnight darkness. A while longer they talked together, Mr. De Vere promising to send a servant to take her home in the morning. Then, as the sun had set and the night shadows were deepening in the room, they bade each other good-by, and ere the next day's sun was very high in the heavens Maude was far on her way to Laurel Hill.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE DARK HOUR.

Dr. Kennedy had been to Buffalo, and taken the smallpox, so his attending physician said, and the news spread rapidly, frightening nervous people as they never were frightened before. Nellie had been home for a week or two, but at the first alarm she fled, rushing headlong through the hall and down the stairs, unmindful of the tremulous voice, which cried imploringly, "Don't leave me, daughter, to die alone!"

Hannah followed next, holding the camphor bottle to her nose, and saying to John when he expostulated with her, "I reckon I's not gwine to spile what little beauty I've got with that fetched complaint."

"But, mother," persisted John, "may be it's nothin' but vary-o-lord after all, and that don't mark folks, you know."

"You needn't talk to me about your very-o-lord," returned Hannah. "I know it's the very-o-devil himself, and I won't have them pock-ed marks on me for all the n.i.g.g.e.rs in Virginny."

"Then go," said John, "hold tight to the camphire, and run for your life, or it may cotch you before you git out of the house."

Hannah needed no second bidding to run, and half an hour later she was domesticated with a colored family who lived not far from the Hill. Thus left to themselves, Louis and John, together with the physician, did what they could for the sick man, who at last proposed sending for Maude, feeling intuitively that she would not desert him as his own child had done. Silent, desolate, and forsaken the old house looked as Maude approached it, and she involuntarily held her breath as she stepped into the hall, whose close air seemed laden with infection. She experienced no difficulty in finding the sick-room, where Louis' cry of delight, John's expression of joy, and the sick man's whispered words, "G.o.d bless you, Maude," more than recompensed her for the risk she had incurred. Gradually her fear subsided, particularly when she learned that it was in fact the varioloid. Had it been possible to remove her brother from danger she would have done so, but it was too late now, and she suffered him to share her vigils, watching carefully for the first symptoms of the disease in him.

In this manner nearly two weeks pa.s.sed away, and the panic-stricken villagers were beginning to breathe more freely, when it was told them one day that Maude and Louis were both smitten with the disease. Then indeed the more humane said to themselves, "Shall they be left to suffer alone?" and still no one was found who dared to breathe the air of the sick-room. Dr. Kennedy was by this time so much better that Louis was taken to his apartment, where he ministered to him himself, while the heroic Maude was left to the care of John. Everything he could do for her he did, but his heart sunk within him when he saw how fast her fever came on, and heard her, in her sleep, mourn for her mother, to hold her aching head.

"She mustn't die," he said, and over his dark skin the tears rolled like rain, as raising his eyes to the ceiling he cried imploringly, "Will the good Father send someone to help?"

The prayer of the weak African was heard, and ere the sun went down a man of n.o.ble mien and n.o.ble heart stood at the maiden's bedside, bathing her swollen face, pushing back her silken curls, counting her rapid pulses, and once, when she slept, kissing her parched lips, e'en though he knew that with that kiss he inhaled, perhaps, his death! James De Vere had never for a day lost sight of Maude.

Immediately after her return he had written to the physician requesting a daily report, and when, at last he learned that she was ill, and all alone, he came unhesitatingly, presenting a striking contrast to the timid J.C., who had heard of her illness, and at first, dared not open the letter which his cousin wrote, apprising him of Maude's affliction. But when he reflected that he could be re-vaccinated, and thus avert the dreaded evil, he broke the seal and read, commenting as follows: "Jim is a splendid fellow, though I can't see why he takes so much interest in her. Don't I have confounded luck, though? That will first, the five thousand dollars next, and now the smallpox, too. Of course she'll be marked, and look like a fright. Poor girl! I'd help her if I could," and, as the better nature of J.C. came over him, he added mournfully: "What if she should die?"

But Maude did not die; and at the expiration of ten days she was so far out of danger that James De Vere yielded to the importunity of his mother, who, in an agony of terror, besought him to return. When first he came to her bedside Maude had begged of him to leave her and not risk his life in her behalf; but he silenced her objections then, and now when he bade her adieu he would not listen to her protestations of grat.i.tude.

"I would do even more for you if I could," he said. "I am not afraid of the varioloid, and henceforth I shall think gratefully of it for having dealt so lightly with you."

So saying, he turned away, feeling happier than he could well express, that Maude had not only escaped from death, but that there would be no marks left to tell how near the ravager had been.

Scarcely had the door closed on him when, emboldened by his last words to ask a question she greatly wished, yet dreaded to ask, Maude turned to John and said, "Am I much pitted?"

Rolling up his eyes and wholly mistaking her meaning, John replied, "I aint no great of a physiognomer, but when a thing is as plain as day I can discern it as well as the next one, and if that ar' chap haint pitied you, and done a heap more'n that, I'm mistaken."

"But," continued Maude, smiling at his simplicity, "I mean shall I probably be scarred?"

"Oh, bless you, not a scar," answered John, "for don't you mind how he kep' the iled silk and wet rags on yer face, and how that night when you was sickest he held yer hands so you couldn't tache that little feller between yer eyes. That was the s.p.u.n.kiest varmint of 'em all, and may leave a mark like the one under yer ear, but it won't spile yer looks an atom."

"And Louis?" said Maude, "is he disfigured?"

"Not a disfigurement," returned John, "but the ole governor, he's a right smart sprinklin' of 'em, one squar' on the tip of his nose, and five or six more on his face."

Thus relieved of her immediate fears Maude asked many questions concerning Louis, who she learned had not been very sick.

"You can see him afore long, I reckon," said John, and in a few days she was able to join him in the sitting room below.

After a while Hannah returned to her post of duty, her beauty unimpaired, and herself thoroughly ashamed of having thus heartlessly deserted her master's family in their affliction. As if to make amends for this she exerted herself to cleanse the house from everything which could possibly inspire fear on the villagers, and by the last of August there was scarce a trace left of the recent scourge, save the deep scar on the end of the doctor's nose, one or two marks on Louis' face, and a weakness of Maude's eyes, which became at last a cause of serious alarm.

It was in vain that Louis implored his father to seek medical aid in Rochester, where the physicians were supposed to have more experience in such matters. The doctor refused, saying, "'twas a maxim of his not to counsel with anyone, and he guessed he knew how to manage sore eyes."

But Maude's eyes were not sore--they were merely weak, while the pain in the eyeball was sometimes so intense as to wring from her a cry, of suffering. Gradually there crept into her heart a horrid fear that her sight was growing dim, and often in the darkness of the night she wept most bitterly, praying that she might not be blind.

"Oh, Louis," she said to her brother one day, "I would so much rather die than to be blind, and never see you any more--never see the beautiful world I love so much. Oh, must it be? Is there no help?"

"James De Vere could help us if he were here," answered Louis, his own tears mingling with his sister's.

But James De Vere had left Hampton for New Orleans, where he would probably remain until the winter, and there could be no aid expected from him. The doctor, too, was wholly absorbed in thoughts of his approaching nuptials, for Maude Glendower, failing to secure the wealthy bachelor, and overhearing several times the remark that she was really getting old, had consented to name the 20th of October for their marriage. And so the other Maude was left to battle with the terrible fear which was strengthened every day.

At length J.C., roused not so much by the touching letter which she wrote him as by the uncertain handwriting, came himself, bringing with him a physician, who carefully examined the soft black eyes, which could not now endure the light, then shaking his head he said gravely, "There is still some hope, but she must go to the city, where I can see her every day."

J.C. looked at Dr. Kennedy, and Dr. Kennedy, looked at J.C., and then both their hands sought their pockets, but came out again--empty!

J.C. really had not the ready means with which to meet the expense, while Dr. Kennedy had not the inclination. But one there was, the faithful John, who could not stand by unmoved, and darting from the room, he mounted the woodshed stairs, and from beneath the rafters drew out an old leathern wallet, where from time to time he had deposited money for "the wet day." That wet day had come at last; not to him, but to another--and without a moment's hesitation he counted out the ten golden eagles which his purse contained, and, going back to Maude, placed them in her hand, saying: "Go to Rochester, Miss Maude. I saved 'em for you, for I wouldn't have the light squenched in them shinin' eyes for all the land in old Virginny."

It was a n.o.ble act, and it shamed the paler faces who witnessed it, but they offered no remonstrance, though Maude did, refusing to accept it, until Louis said: "Take it, sister--take it, and when I'm twenty-one I'll give to him ten times ten golden eagles."