Ernest Linwood Part 16

There was silence for a few moments. All words seemed vain and sacrilegious after this sublimest language of revelation.

At length I said,--

"Let me wear white, the livery of my mother, in heaven. 'T is a sin to mourn for her whose tears the hand of G.o.d has wiped away."

CHAPTER XVIII.

One week, and another week pa.s.sed by, and every evening was as charming as the first of the return of Ernest Linwood. In that fortnight were compressed the social and intellectual joys of a lifetime. Music, reading, and conversation filled the measure of the evening hours. Such music, such reading, and such conversation as I never heard before. I had been accustomed to read aloud a great deal to my own dear mother, to Mrs. Linwood, and to my young pupils also, and I had reason to think I could read remarkably well; but I could not read like Ernest,--I never heard any one that could. He infused his own soul into the soul of the author, and brought out his deepest meanings. When he read poetry I sat like one entranced, bound by the double spell of genius and music. Mrs.

Linwood could sew; Edith could sew or net, but I could do nothing but listen. I could feel the blood tingling to my finger ends, the veins throbbing in my temples, and the color coming and going in my cheek.

"You love poetry," said he once, pausing, and arresting my fascinated glance.

"Love it," I exclaimed, sighing in the fulness of delight, "it is the pa.s.sion of my soul."

"You have three pa.s.sions, music, flowers, and poetry," said he, with a smile that seemed to mock the extravagance of my language, "which is the regal one, the pa.s.sion of pa.s.sions?"

"I can hardly imagine the existence of one without the other," I answered, "their harmony is so entire; flowers are silent poetry, and poetry is written music."

"And music?" he asked.

"Is the breath of heaven, the language of angels. As the voice of Echo lingered in the woods, where she loved to wander, when her beauteous frame had vanished, so music remains to show the angel nature we have lost."

I blushed at having said so much, but the triune pa.s.sion warmed my soul.

"Gabriella is a poetess herself," said Edith, "and may well speak of the magic of numbers. She has a portfolio, filled with papers written, like Ezekiel's scroll, within and without. I wish you would let me get it, Gabriella,--do."

"Impossible!" I answered, "I never wrote but one poem for exhibition, and the experience of that hour was sufficient for a lifetime."

"You were but a child then, Gabriella. Mr. Regulus would give it a very different reception now, I know he would," said Edith.

"If it is a child's story, will you not relate it?" asked Ernest; "you have excited my curiosity."

"Curiosity, brother, I thought you possessed none."

"Interest is a better word. If I understand aright, the buddings of Gabriella's genius met with an untimely blight."

I know not how it was, but I felt in an exceedingly ingenuous mood, and I related this episode in my childish history without reserve. I touched lightly on the championship of Richard Clyde, but I was obliged to introduce it. I had forgotten that he was a.s.sociated with the narration, or I should have been silent.

"This youthful knight, and the hero of commencement day are one, then,"

observed Ernest. "He is a fortunate youth, with the myrtle and the laurel both entwining his brows; you must be proud of your champion."

"I am _grateful_ to him," I replied, resolved to make a bold effort to remove the impression I knew he had received. Mrs. Linwood was not present, or I could not have spoken as I did. "He defended me because he thought I was oppressed; he befriended me because my friends were few.

He has the generous spirit of chivalry which cannot see wrong without seeking to redress it, or suffering without wishing to relieve it. I am under unspeakable obligations to him, for he it was who spoke kindly of the obscure little girl to your mother and sister, and obtained for me the priceless blessing of their love."

"I dare say _they_ feel very grateful to him, likewise," said he, in a tone of genuine feeling. "I acknowledge _my_ share of the obligation.

But is he so disinterested as to claim no recompense, or does he find that chivalry, like goodness, is its own exceeding great reward?"

"I thought I regarded him as a brother, till now Edith has convinced me I am mistaken."

"How so?" he asked, with so peculiar an expression, I forgot what I was going to say.

"How so?" he repeated, while Edith leaned towards him and laid her hand on his.

"By showing me how strong and fervent a sister's love can be."

His eyes flashed; they looked like fountains of light, full to overflowing. His arm involuntarily encircled Edith, and a smile, beautiful as a woman's, curled his lips.

"How he does love her!" thought I; "strong indeed must be the counter charm, that can rival hers."

I had never seen his spirits so light as they were the remainder of the evening. They rose even to gaiety; and again I wondered what had become of the reserve and moodiness whose dark shadow had preceded his approach.

"We are so happy now," said Edith, when we were alone, "I dread the interruption of company. Ernest does not care for it, and if it be of an uncongenial kind, he wraps himself in a mantle of reserve, that neither sun nor wind can unfold. After commencement, our house will be overflowing with city friends. They will return with us, and we shall not probably be alone again for the whole summer."

She sighed at the antic.i.p.ation, and I echoed the sound. I was somebody now; but what a n.o.body I should dwindle into, in comparison with the daughters of wealth and fashion who would gather at Grandison Place!

"Ernest must like you very much, Gabriella, or he would not show the interest he does in all that concerns you. You do not know what a compliment he pays you, because you have not seen him in company with other young girls. I have sometimes felt quite distressed at his indifference when they have been my guests. He has such a contempt for affectation and display, that he cannot entirely conceal it. He is not apt to express his opinion of any one, but there are indirect ways of discovering it. I found him this morning in the library, standing before that beautiful picture of the Italian flower girl, which you admire so much. He was so absorbed, that he did not perceive my entrance, till I stole behind him and laid my hand on his shoulder. 'Do you not see a likeness?' he asked. 'To whom?' 'To Gabriella.' 'To Gabriella!' I repeated. 'Yes, it is like her, but I never observed it before.' 'A very striking resemblance,' he said, 'only she has more mind in her face.'"

"That enchanting picture like me!" I exclaimed, "impossible! There is, there can be no likeness. It is nothing but a.s.sociation. He knows I am the flower-girl of the house, and that is the reason he thought of me."

I tried to speak with indifference, but my voice trembled with delight.

The next morning, when I came in from the garden, all laden with flowers, an irresistible impulse drew me to the library. It was very early. The hush of repose still lingered over the household, and that particular apartment, in which the silent eloquence of books, paintings, and statues hung like a solemn spell, seemed in such deep quietude, I started at the light echo of my own footsteps.

I stole with guilty consciousness towards the picture, in whose lineaments the fastidious eye of Ernest Linwood had traced a similitude to mine. They were all engraven on my memory, but now they possessed a new fascination; and I stood before it, gazing into the soft, dark depths of the eyes, in which innocent mildness and bashful tenderness were mingled like the _clare-obscure_ of an Italian moonlight; gazing on the dawning smile that seemed to play over the beautiful and glowing lips, and the bright, rich, dark hair, so carelessly, gracefully arranged you could almost see the balmy breezes of her native clime rustling amid the silken tresses; on the charming contour of the head and neck, slightly turned as if about to look back and give a parting glance at the garden she had reluctantly quitted.

As I thus stood, with my hands loaded with blossoms, a flower basket suspended from my arm, and a straw hat such as shepherdesses wear, on my head,--my garden costume,--involuntarily imitating the att.i.tude of the lovely flower girl, the door, which had been left ajar, silently opened, and Ernest Linwood entered.

Had I been detected in the act of stealing or counterfeiting money, I could not have felt more intense shame. He knew what brought me there. I saw it in his penetrating eye, his half-suppressed smile; and, ready to sink with mortification, I covered my face with the roses I held in my hands.

"Do you admire the picture?" he asked, advancing to where I stood; "do you perceive the resemblance?"

I shook my head without answering; I was too much disconcerted to speak.

What would he think of my despicable vanity, my more than childish foolishness?

"I am glad to see we have congenial tastes," he said, with a smile in his voice. "I came on purpose to gaze on that charming representation of youth and innocence, without dreaming that its original was by it."

"Original!" I repeated. "Surely you do mock me,--'t is but a fancy sketch,--and in nought but youth and flowers resembles me."

"We cannot see ourselves, and it is well we cannot. The image reflected from the mirror is but a cold, faint shadow of the living, breathing soul. But why this deep confusion,--that averted face and downcast eye?

Have I offended by my intrusion? Do you wish me to withdraw, and yield to you the privilege of solitary admiration?"

"It is I who am the intruder," I answered, looking wistfully towards the door, through which I was tempted to rush at once. "I thought you had not risen,--I thought,--I came"--

"And why did you come at this hour, Gabriella? and what has caused such excessive embarra.s.sment? Will you not be ingenuous enough to tell me?"