Fashion and Famine Part 41

"Oh, yes," said the French servant, charmed with a mission so congenial to his taste, "I've had a good many to carry down before to-night."

"Do this quietly--you understand--and here is something for the postage."

"Monsieur is magnificent," said the man, taking the piece of gold with a profound bow. "He shall see how invisible I shall become."

Leicester stole back to the reception rooms again, and glided into the group that still surrounded the hostess, un.o.bserved as he thought; but those who watched Ada closely, would have seen the apathy, that had crept over her during his absence, suddenly flung off, while her manner and look became wildly brilliant once more. At this moment Night and Morning drew closer to the pillar, and sheltered themselves behind it.

"Here he comes--here comes the postman," cried half a dozen young ladies at once; "who will get a letter now? Mrs. Gordon, of course!"

One of the first lawyers of the State entered the room, acting the postman with great diligence and exact.i.tude. He carried a bundle of letters on his arm, and held some loose in his hands. There was a great commotion among the young ladies when he presented himself, a flirting of fans and waving of curls that might have tempted any man from his course. He turned neither to the right nor left, but marching directly up to Leicester, presented a letter with "Two cents, sir, if you please."

Leicester as gravely took the letter, drew a five-cent piece from his pocket, and placed it in the outstretched hand of the postman, with, "The change, if you please."

A burst of laughter followed this scene; but the postman, no way disconcerted, placed the five-cent piece between his teeth, while he searched his pocket for the change. Drawing forth three cents, he counted them into Leicester's palm, and strode on again, as if every mail in the United States depended on his diligence. Leicester stood a moment with the letter in his hand, smiling and seemingly a little embarra.s.sed about opening it!

Ada glanced sharply from the letter to his face. Even then she was struck with a jealous pang that made her recoil with self-contempt.

"No! no--that will never do," called out voices all around, as Leicester seemed about to place the note in his pocket--"All letters are public property here--break the seal--break the seal!"

With a derisive smile on his lip, as if coerced into doing a silly thing, he broke the seal and unfolded the missive. A tress of golden hair dropped to his feet, which he s.n.a.t.c.hed up hurriedly, and grasped in his hand. A burst of gay laughter followed the act.

"Read--read--it is poetry--we can see that--give us the poetry!" broke merrily around him.

"Spare me," said Leicester, apparently annoyed; "but if the fair lady chooses to enlighten you, she has my consent."

Ada reached forth her hand for the paper. A strange sensation crept over her, with the first sight of it in the mock postman's hand, and it was with an effort that she conquered this feeling sufficiently to open the paper, with her usual careless ease.

She glanced at the first line. Her lips moved as if she were trying to speak; but they uttered no sound, and by slow degrees the red died out from them.

Leicester watched her closely with his half averted eyes, and those around him looked on in gay expectation; for no one else observed the change in her countenance. To the crowd, she seemed only gathering up the spirit of the lines, before she commenced reading them aloud. The paper contained a wild, impulsive appeal to him, after the first jealous outbreak that had disturbed their married life. As usual, when a warm heart has either done or suffered wrong, it matters little which, she had been the first to make concessions, and lavish in self-blame, poured forth her pa.s.sionate regret, as if all the fault had been hers. In her first jealous indignation, she had demanded a tress of hair, for which he had importuned her one night at the old homestead.

He rendered it coldly back without a word. Wild with affright, lest this was the seal of eternal separation, she had sent back the tress of hair now grasped in Leicester's hand, with the lines which, with the plotting genius of a fiend, he had placed in her hand.

Poor Ada, she was unconscious of the crowd. The days of her youth came back--the old homestead--the pangs and joys of her first married life.

While she seemed to read, a life-time of memories swept through her brain, which ached with the sudden rush of thought.

Leicester stood regarding her with apparent unconcern; but it was as the spider watches the fly in his net.

"She cannot read it aloud--I thought so," he said inly, "let her struggle--while her lips pale in that fashion she is mine; I knew it would smite her to the heart. Let the fools clamor, she is struck dumb with old memories."

Unconsciously a cold smile of triumph crept over his lips, as these thoughts gained strength from Ada's continued silence. With her eyes on the paper, she still seemed to read.

At length her guests became politely impatient.

"We are all attention," cried a voice.

She did not hear it; but others set in with laughing clamor; and at length she looked up, as if wondering what all the noise was about. Her eyes fell upon Leicester. She saw the smile of which he was probably unconscious, and the present flashed back to her brain.

"He hopes to crush me with these memories," she thought with lightning intuition.

The life came back to her eyes, the strength to her limbs, and without hesitation or pause, her voice broke forth. As she went on, the fire of a wounded nature flashed over her face. Her voice swelled out rich and pa.s.sionately. Her woman's heart seemed beating in every word.

Take back the tress! the broken chain, Its fragile folds have linked around us, May never re-unite again!

And every gentle tie that bound us, The madness of a single hour-- The madness of a word--has parted, Leaving the marble in thy power: And me, ah more than broken hearted.

Take back the tress! I cannot bear To hold the link my hand has scattered; It mocks me, in my dark despair, With scenes and hopes forever shatter'd; It haunts me with a thousand things-- A thousand words, half felt, half spoken-- When thy proud soul with eagle wings Stoop'd to the heart now almost broken.

It haunts me with the deep, low tones, That stir'd my soul to more than gladness When we seemed in the world, alone, And joy grew deep almost to sadness.

Is there no charm to win thee back, To wake the love thy pride is crushing?

Has mem'ry left no golden track-- No music which thy heart is hushing?

Is there within this little tress No thought but that which wakes thy scorning?

Oh say, was there no happiness Within thy breast that summer morning, When from my brow the curl was shred With hand that shook in joy, and terror; And love, half hush'd in trembling dread, Shrunk back, as if to feel were error?

My soul is filled with deep regret, That I who loved thee so, could doubt thee!

Sweep back thy pride, forgive, forget!

Life is so desolate without thee.

I will not keep this tress of hair: As ravens from their gloomy wings Cast shadows, it but leaves despair Upon the weary heart it wrings.

Where hope, and life, and faith are given, I send it back, perchance too late; Go cast it to the winds of heaven, If it but rouse more bitter hate.

_I_ will not rend a single thread That binds my willing soul to thine: Take then the task; if love has fled, Despoil love's desolated shrine.

Her voice ceased to vibrate over the throng full half a minute, before the listeners breathed freely. The mesmeric influence of her hidden grief spread from heart to heart, till in its earnestness, the crowd forgot to applaud. Thus it happened that for some moments after she had done, there was silence all around her. The paper began to tremble in her hand--she tossed it carelessly toward Leicester.

"The lady is too much in earnest--she quite takes away my breath," she said, with an air of gay mockery; "a grand pa.s.sion like that must be very fatiguing."

A flash rose to Leicester's brow. He took the paper, and refolding the curl of hair in it, placed both in his bosom. His manner was grave--almost humble. She had baffled him for once. But the game was not played out yet.

The crowd that observed nothing but the surface of this scene, was still somewhat subdued by it; but the ringing notes of a waltz that swept in from the dancing saloon, set the gay current in motion again.

"Who was it that engaged me for this waltz?" cried the hostess, glancing around the throng of distinguished men that surrounded her.

Half a dozen voices gaily answered the challenge; but still, with a purpose at heart, she selected the most distinguished of the group, and was followed to the dancing saloon.

Leicester remained behind. Even his strong nerves were ready to break down under the excitement crowded upon him that evening. Never had he been placed in a position of such difficulty. With two important crimes, perpetrated almost the same hour, urging immediate flight to Europe, he found himself constrained to remain and secure the still richer prize, the discovery of that evening seemed to place within his grasp. He leaned against the pillar near which Ada had been stationed to receive her guests, and made a prompt review of his position.

"I must go," he thought, locking his teeth hard, as the necessity was forced upon him; "they must have time to put the boy up in Sing-Sing.

The girl, too--fool that I was--she is the most troublesome part of the business. I will get her over sea, at once--the witnesses are nothing--she can't live over a few months--if she does----"

A fiendish expression crept over his face, and after a moment, he muttered, so audibly, that the two shrouded females close by the pillar heard him; "But women's hearts never do break; if they did, Wilc.o.x's daughter would have been in her grave long ago."

A faint sob close by him, drove these evil thoughts inward again. There was a slight rustling near the pillar, and raising his eyes, he saw the two characters, Night and Morning, gliding away toward the dancers. He did not give the circ.u.mstance a second thought; but moved down the rooms toward the conservatory, where he could plot and think alone.

"Yes, I _must_ go off and find a safe place for Florence. Thanks to my icy-hearted mother, who never had a visitor, there is no chance for gossip. Robert will be snugly-housed when I come back, and my man shall go with me."

But a new obstacle arose in his mind--the flower-girl, his other witness. The old people, whose faces he had so dimly seen--what if Ada should learn all from them? The thought was formidable; but at last he thrust it aside, as undeserving of anxiety.