Fashion and Famine Part 25

"None, aunt--nothing. I am only in a fit of the blues just now. It makes me home-sick to see you all alone here, that is all!" answered the youth, lifting his face, and shaking back the curls from his forehead, while he attempted one of his old careless smiles, but vainly enough.

The old lady was distressed. "Is it money, Robert?--have you been extravagant? The salary is a very nice one; but if you want more clothes, or anything, I wouldn't mind giving you twenty or thirty dollars. There, now, will that do?"

Blessed old woman, she did not understand the half sad, half comic smile that curled those young lips, and thinking, in her innocence, that she had dived to the heart of his mystery, her own face beamed with satisfaction.

"That is it; I see through it all now; come, how much shall it be--twenty, thirty, forty? It's extravagant, I know, but this day, of all others, I feel as if it would do me good to give somebody everything I've got in the world; there, nephew, there--two tens--three fives--a three, and, and--yes, I have it--here is a two. Now brighten up, and next time don't be afraid to come and tell me; only, Robert, remember the fate of the prodigal son--the husks, the tears--not that I wouldn't kill the fatted calf--not that I wouldn't forgive you, Bob--I couldn't help it; but it would break my heart. If I was to be called on for the sacrifice, I couldn't eat a morsel of the animal, I'm sure. So you won't be extravagant and spend the hard earnings of your old aunt, at any rate, till after she's dead and gone."

The good woman had worked herself up to a state of almost ludicrous sorrow with the future her fancy was coloring. Her hands shook as she drew an old black pocket-book from some mysterious place in the folds of her dress, and counting out the bank-notes as they were enumerated, crowded them into Robert's hand.

The youth had altered very strangely while she was speaking. His face was pale and red in alternate flashes; his lips quivered, and with a convulsive movement he pressed his eyelids down, thus crushing back the tears that swelled against them. Mrs. Gray attempted to press the bank-notes upon him, but his hand was cold, and his fingers refused to clasp the money. Drawing back with a faint struggle, he said, "No, no, aunt, I do not want it! Indeed it would do me no good!"

"Do you no good! What! is it not money that you want?" cried the kind woman. "Nonsense, nonsense, Robert; here, take it--take it. I wouldn't mind ten dollars more--it does seem as if I was crazy, but then really I would not mind it scarcely at all."

Robert was more composed now. The hot flushes had left his face very pale, and with a look of firm resolve upon it.

"No, aunt, he said," gently putting back the money, "I will not take it.

The salary I receive ought to be enough for my support, and it shall; besides, I tell you but the simple truth, that money would do me no good whatever."

The old lady took up the crushed notes, smoothed them across her knee with both hands, over and over, in a puzzled and dissatisfied way.

"What is it that you are worried about, if money will not answer?" she said, at length.

"Nothing, aunt--why should you think it?" He spoke slowly and in a wavering voice at first, then with a sort of reckless impetuosity he broke into a laugh. It was not his old gleeful laugh, and Mrs. Gray only looked startled by it.

"There, now, put up the old pocket-book, and give me a hearty good-night kiss," he said hurriedly, "I shall be off in the morning before you are up."

"Good night, Robert," said Mrs. Gray, with a meek and disappointed air.

"That kiss is the first one that ever fell heavily on your old aunt's heart. You are keeping something back from me."

"No, aunt, no!" The words were uttered faintly, and Mrs. Gray felt that the ardor of truth was not there. For a moment both were silent; Robert had lighted a candle, and stood on the hearth looking hard into the blaze; he turned his eyes slowly upon his aunt. She sat with one hand upon the pocket-book, gazing into the fire. There was anxiety and doubt in her features. Robert sighed heavily.

"Good night, aunt."

"Good night."

She listened to each slow footstep, as her nephew went up stairs. When his chamber door closed, she buckled the strap around her pocket-book, and dropped it with a deep sigh into its repository among her voluminous skirts.

"I can't understand it," she murmured--"I can't make out what ails him!"

All at once she remembered the presence of her brother, and her face brightened up. "Jacob will know what it means. Jacob, Jacob!"

Mrs. Gray uttered the name of her brother in a whisper, but it brought him forth at once.

"Well Jacob, you have seen him--you have heard him talk. Isn't he something worth loving?"

"He is worth loving and worth saving too," answered Jacob. "Sarah, I do not think anything on earth could make my heart beat as the sight of that boy did."

"He is in trouble, you see that, Jacob, and would not take money! What can it mean?"

"I saw all--heard all. His nature is n.o.ble--his will strong--have no fear. He needs a firmer hand than yours, Sarah; I will take care of him."

"I did not give a hint about you."

"That was right. It is best that he shouldn't know about me, at any rate, jest now."

"But I should so like to tell him!" said Mrs. Gray.

"And you shall in time, but not yet. I must know more and see more first."

"Well, you ought to know best," answered the sister, in a tone of gentle submission. "I'm sure he puzzles me!"

"Now," said Jacob, seating himself, "let us leave the boy to his rest. I wish to talk with you about old times--about the people Down East."

"It is a good while since I was in Maine, Jacob; I've almost forgotten all about the folks."

"But there was one family that you will remember. Old Mr. Wilc.o.x's, I want to hear about him."

There was something constrained and unnatural in Jacob's manner; he had evidently forced himself to appear calm when every word was sharpened with anxiety.

Mrs. Gray shook her head; Jacob's heart fell as he saw the motion.

"Nothing--can you tell me nothing?" he said, with an expression of deep anguish. "Oh, Sarah, try, try! you do not know how much happiness a word from you would bring!"

"If I could but speak it," said Mrs. Gray, "how glad I should be. Mr.

Wilc.o.x sold out and left Maine about the time we moved on to the Island; where he went, no one ever heard. It was a very strange thing, everybody thought so at the time; but that story about his daughter set people a-talking, and I suppose he couldn't bear it."

Jacob uttered a faint groan--her words had taken the last hope from his heart. "And this is all you know, Sarah?"

"It is all anybody knows of old Mr. Wilc.o.x or his family. As for his daughter--let me think, that was just before you left the old gentleman; n.o.body ever heard of her either. What is the matter, are you going away, Jacob?"

"Yes, I will talk over these things another time. Good night, Sarah. I will just throw myself on the bed till daybreak."

"But you are not going away to live?"

"Yes; but you will see me every now and then; I shall stay near you--in the city, may be."

"Why not here? I have enough for us both, and we two are all that is left, almost. It seems kind of hard for you to leave me so soon."

"Not now, Sarah, by and by we will settle down and grow old together; but the time has not come yet."

"I forgot to ask, are you married, Jacob?"

"Married!" answered Jacob Strong, and a grim, hard smile crept over his lips. "No, I was never married. Good night, Sarah."

"There, now, I suppose I've been inquisitive, and worried him," thought Mrs. Gray, as the bed-room door closed upon her brother. "What a Thanksgiving it has been? Who would have thought this morning that _he_ would sleep under my roof to-night and Robert close by, without knowing a word of it? Well, faith is a beautiful thing after all--I was certain that he would come back alive, and sure enough he has!"

Thus Mrs. Gray ruminated, unconscious of the lapse of time, till a sense of fatigue crept over her. Still she was keenly wakeful, for, unused to excitement of any kind, the agitation that crowded upon her that day forbade all inclination to sleep. There was a large moreen couch in the room, and as the night wore on she lay down upon it, still thoughtful and oppressed with the weight of her over-wrought feelings. Thus she lay till the candle burned out, and there was no light in the room save that which came from a bed of embers and the rays of a waning moon, half exhausted in the maple boughs.

A sleepy sensation was at length conquering the excitement that had kept her so long watchful, when she was aroused by the soft tread of a foot upon the stairs. Quietly, and with frequent pauses, it came downward; the door opened, and Mrs. Gray saw her nephew, in his night clothes, and barefooted, glide across the room. He went directly to an old-fashioned work-stand near the bed-room door, and opened one of the drawers. Then followed a faint rustle of papers, and he stole back again softly, and with something in his hand.