Honor Edgeworth; Or, Ottawa's Present Tense Part 4

"That was easy enough, I am happy to say. I am pretty well known now, and Edgeworth took the most direct way to me, by applying to our family solicitors at home, but I blame him for not having sought me while he had his health and strength--he is dead now, poor fellow, and all he had prized in this world he has left to me. When I wrote you, that important business called me to Europe, I was starting to execute the first part of my friend's dying request. I did not talk about it much beforehand, but now that we are safely back, the whole world is free to know that I am in charge of the sweetest girl under the sun, let who can, deny it, if you are as anxious to meet her as I was, stay and drink tea with us this evening--they are out driving now, but they wont be much longer--do stay."

"Not this evening," Guy said hastily, as he rose, "I am not prepared, uncle, besides, she is strange yet, and it is as well not to thrust too many new faces on her at once, you can mention my name to her if you will, she will feel more at home when we meet." There was a pause of a moment, and then Guy, as he appropriated a cigar from a china stand that tempted him close by, resumed, "this certainly is a strange, unlooked- for incident in your hum-drum life, but it is also a very fortunate one, since she is such a comfort to you and such an acquisition to your home--I fancy, from your description she could scarcely be otherwise. I hope we will all be an agreeable and sociable family yet, and now, if I don't want to be caught, I had better be off at once," saying which, Henry Rayne's handsome nephew shook himself out of comfort's wrinkles, lighted his cheroot, put on his becoming hat, bade his uncle a temporary "good bye," and departed.

I would undertake too common-place a theme, were I to try and interpret the feelings that struggled for ascendancy in the breast of Guy Elersley. How many pens have been stowed away rusty and old from having told no other tale than that of new-born love? How many gray-haired bards have tuned their lay to the sighs from the human breast under the "first loves" influence? How many eyes, even among those that rest upon this very page, have wept the overflowing of their hearts away, at the moment that love's first whispers stole into their souls? How many tired and weary hands are folded on the laps of those who are sitting in the twilight of their years dreaming all over again in bitter joy their "Loves young dream?" Ah! they are many indeed! and so it is superfluous almost to tell the world what it is to love for the first time. That trembling existence that is balancing on Hope and Despair, is an experience so well learned that no one thinks of telling it. It is a strange part of destiny, that even those who have never heard what it is to love, are not surprised when called to teach it to themselves.

Instinctively, we hide our emotion, we steady our hand, we check our words. There is the pity; there are grand unspoken thoughts, burning in the souls of many to-day, that may never reach the threshold of the lips. Men are gliding through the world disinterestedly, day by day, and they know not, often care not to know, that there are devoted hearts existing on their memories alone. There are pretty blue eyes weeping over the "garden gate" where "some one" is "waiting" and "wishing in vain." Let them weep. There are miseries in life, that can be learned only by many repet.i.tions. If they don't break the heart at first they perseveringly "try again."

If my belief be not a popular one, I hardly like to be the first to preach it, but it seems to me that few can study society as it is to-day, without concluding very disagreable things; one of these is the deplorable fact that, in our day, the purest selfishness seems to have established itself as the source and promoter of, not only the indifferent, but the apparently best impulses of the human heart. It is a pity indeed, that our a.n.a.lysing tendency has been so strengthened by cultivation, for most often, by prying into the very remotest origin and causes of things we learn a lesson that for ourselves or the world would have been infinitely better unlearned. Hence it is trait in our own day we are not satisfied that certain lavish displays of generosity pa.s.s for Christian charity, simply, and without more ado. We will not look upon the givers, with an admiring eye, and spend our enthusiasm, on a religion which teaches the love of our neighbor so effectively, oh no!

we must "open the drum to find where the noise is kept," and how, unfortunately, often, do we find, that practical virtues, or at least, what are so called by the world, have nothing more solid at base than the hollow drum. It sounds deplorable, to say that nineteenth century charity is a Dead Sea apple, even the guilty ones will not like to hear that they have subscribed to this fund, or built that asylum, through policy, or as an advertis.e.m.e.nt, or for the less harmful but still unworthy reason that they like to give something, when there is plenty around them. Nevertheless, is it not true that in all countries, in our own little city, there are men, who drive the starving beggar from their doors, and who yet head a public charity list handsomely. There are people, who, under their parson's eye, wear down-cast look and thump their b.r.e.a.s.t.s, but, who behind his back, would much sooner thump any one else's breast, or cast down any other person's eyes. There are members of high society, who feel it their duty to set good example for their social inferiors, and so they feast and dance and gratify themselves all through the hours of the night, and then in half spoiled frizzes and sleepy looks repair to church in the early morning. This may all be right enough, but if so, there is more than one version of right and wrong, and that is impossible. This omnipotent selfishness has even crept into our loves. Men kiss the dainty finger tips of their lady-loves, to-day, with a pa.s.sionate fondness that is proportionate to the bulk of lucre that dainty hand can hold. The words "be mine" so sweetly answered by fair trusting damsels, are addressed to them, because estates and dowries cannot speak of themselves, and must consequently be wooed and won by proxy. The divine inst.i.tution as marriage was wont to be considered, is better understood in our day as a "linking transaction", a "speculation in the matrimonial market," or for the man alone, he is either "spliced" or "fleeced."

At least our century has succeeded in one thing: it is the grandest parody on all that is lofty, or elevated or holy, it is an unparalleled burlesque on any exalted sentiment or practical good. Every enn.o.bling tendency, every redeeming trait is cunningly caricatured, and so cleverly ridiculed that is impossible to respect them afterwards. It is hard to tell what another era may bring forth of good, but it is certain that ours has killed, to the very possibility of a future regeneration, every germ and atom of solid morality, that sustained it. Perhaps that is what was wanted, the end may be achieved now. It has been clearly and undeniably proved to the world, that there is no longer any G.o.d, there is no eternity, no atonement, no recompense. We are left to wonder whose business it was to call some of us into this miserable existence, to take us out of it again before we have culled any real happiness, and send us back to--Well, we are not allowed to say where, because there is some inconsistency mixed up with it, but we are sure to go there at all events.

This may seem a most exaggerated deviation from the smooth course of the narrative, but in reality it is not so. The little reflections made may serve to remind the reader, that those great universal movements, social, political and religious, floating as they are at random in the atmosphere, cannot fail, when breathed by our youth to develop into substance with their growth, and to manifest their poisonous influences later, in the lives of their wretched victims. After pondering over such reminders for a moment or more, there will be no call for surprise, when our young men are pictured in their true colors. The mind need not hesitate to enquire, when it views youth and manhood, beautiful and _blase_, attractive and cynical, credulous to simplicity in many things, and infidels in the one great act of faith that alone merits anything.

From the taint of this evil, and all its sorrowful consequences I am tempted to exempt Guy Elersley, so handsome, so young, so winning; but I cannot give the lie to obstinate reality. Of course, Guy Elersley was not a bad man, he was exactly what most young men of to-day are--what you, my reader, know them to be, what all the world, but themselves, know them to be. Guy thought he "wasn't such a bad sort of fellow at all," and yet in every movement of his, one could detect him--the victim of the age. He had never professed any direct code of belief. He would have been very much offended if any one called him an "atheist." He knew there was some reason why a fellow should go to church now and then, and not be everlastingly doing mischief. He confided to himself in strict secret that "to die" was about the very last thing he'd like to do; but, somehow, such serious considerations as these never lingered long, a good cigar or "half-a-gla.s.s" easily sufficing to turn the current of his thought into a more pleasant course. He had all the "might-have-beens"

in the collection of qualities that he possessed, to make any one sorry, but as fast as a new trait developed itself in him, he put it to the worst possible advantage, and made those who took an interest in him intensely sorry for his grave mistakes.

He had early fallen in with the tide, and learned to love _himself_ before and above all else.

One hardly likes to say that this new born enthusiasm of his was a selfish gratification, and yet in its radical sense it was thoroughly so. He delighted in it because of the benefit it brought himself. He had long felt a void within his heart, a want or craving for something, something indefinite, intangible certainly--something that no sensual indulgence could appease, that no light pleasure could distract, and now all at once it seemed to him that long-felt vacuum was filling up. A something, just as ethereal as his craving had been, was creeping into his heart. It felt like the liquid music of a low, serious voice, or it may have been a pa.s.sion, such as he had seen in the depths of two large, sad, gray eyes, or it might have been the soft soothing influence of a sweet, dreamy smile. It was just as abstract as any of these, and yet just as fascinating and just as exquisite. This was Love for him, a beautiful but a dreadful thing! feeding his hungry soul and quenching his heart's awful thirst, yet swaying him with a merciless tyranny, for love caresses with one hand and smites with the other. If it can be the exponent of certain delicate phases in our spiritual nature, it can also, alas! almost smother the good it does by the pain it so cruelly inflicts. It has a double mission, for in the cry of joy that escapes the lips under its influence there is an echo of pain and despair, and hence it is that love is so violent a pa.s.sion. If it were a pleasure only to love, we could never prize the object of our wild affection as when it has cost us sighs and tears, and anxiety untold.

It was thus Guy Elersley ruminated as he sauntered through the streets this sear October day, whistling silently to himself, and knocking the clotted leaves recklessly from side to side with his slender cane. He was persuading himself that at last his destiny was beginning to accomplish itself. She would surely see the lines he had traced for her eye in the book he had been reading, and if she were what he supposed her to be, they would be an eloquent appeal in his behalf--but. Here the misery came in--

"Love was never yet without The pang, the agony, the doubt."

What if she never reciprocated?--if there did not linger in her breast a single responsive sigh? But he dared not ask. What then? Not until hope had quite faded away and left the bare, truthful reality to confront him by itself.

CHAPTER V.

"And then I met with one who was my fate, he saw me and I knew 'Twas Love, like swift lightning darted through My spirit 'ere I thought, my heart was won-- Spell-bound to his, forever and forever!"

In this interesting meanwhile, life was unfolding its strange mysteries just as unexpectedly to Honor Edgeworth as to Guy Elersley. After she had returned from her pleasant drive, a half hour after Guy's departure from his uncle's house, dinner was announced, immediately after which Mr. Rayne had to excuse himself, having had an engagement "up town."

Honor, left to her own resources for distractions, repaired, as usual, to the sitting room, and seated herself on the floor before the grate.

Her eyes a.s.sumed their old hazy look, she clasped her hands over her knees and looked vacantly into the fire. What a strange girl this was!

So dreamy, so pensive. She was reasoning with herself now as she often did, trying to feel thankful for all the good things with which her life was blest, but though she acknowledged to herself that youth and health, and comfort and kind friends were grand gifts of Providence, she could not stifle the dissatisfaction that filled her as she yearned for "something else." She could not say what it was, only she knew that she yearned for a gratification that is not found in any of those things that she enjoyed so profusely.

Oh, that "something else!" Why do we not stop and gather it by the roadside we are pa.s.sing now? We will not find it farther on. That which is enticing us onward is only the illusionary flicker of a will o'-the-wisp! We will stretch out our hands too late--when we have been caught in its fatal snares, and then in the darkness and misery that will surround us, we will feel how foolish we have been, and our cries of despair and distress will be echoed back to our own ears in sounds of mockery and scorn. Let us not build upon that "something else" that is always buried in the to-morrows, for we are losing the present and risking the future thereby.

Poor Honor, after thinking until her head sank wearily upon her shoulder, sighed and rose up, pacing the room with her hands behind her back. As she pa.s.sed by the little _etagere_ she smiled curiously, and stretching out her hand drew towards her Guy's book of poetic selections. As she slid the pages through her delicate fingers, she murmured slowly--

"I have said that my life is a terrible thing, All ruined and-"

She stopped suddenly, for her eyes had fallen on the pencil marks traced under these little verses she was accustomed to recite--her heart gave a sudden bound--

"Oh, sweeter self, like me art thou astray"

She quoted the words in bewilderment. What did it mean? There was no one in the house to write such meaning words there! That pretty, legible penmanship did not correspond with anyone's she had ever known--except-- where was it she had noticed something just the same? Suddenly she remembered. On the fly-leaf of the book were words traced in the same hand. She turned over the leaves and compared them. There was no doubting their ident.i.ty. It was, then, G. E. who had written this pa.s.sionate little quotation. "G. E. How strange" she muttered. Was it her "fairy prince" had come to visit her while she was away? She could not fathom it--some hidden meaning lay stowed away under those pretty words. "They were not there when last I had the book, of that I am sure," Honor said meditatively. "Some one has been in here since, and that 'some one' sympathises with me, that 'some one,' I feel, is my long-sought ideal. Has destiny changed its frown into a smile at last for this lone, eccentric girl, I wonder?" She dropped her hands negligently, still clasping the mysterious volume, and looked wistfully into the s.p.a.ce before her. She was undergoing the change that comes over each of us as soon as we yield our hearts to the strange influence that fascinates them. We have been told that "Love is a great transformer,"

and if we had never heard it we would have found it out for ourselves.

Honor Edgeworth, sitting alone in the cosy enclosures of a cushioned _fauteuil_, thought out the queer circ.u.mstance that had visited her to-night; never noticing how fast time flitted by, never heeding the stillness of advancing night, until Mr. Rayne's late arrival roused her from her reverie, and brought her suddenly back from the sunlight of her dreams to the grim darkness of the reality. Kissing him a sleepy good- night, Honor left the room, henceforth haunted by the spirits of her earliest conceptions of love, and went silently, almost gloomily, up to her own handsome little room, bringing to her friendly pillow all the hazardous hopes and fears, and interesting experiences of a love unborn but well conceived.

In the gray of the following morning, the angels of slumber on their upward flight must have borne one another an interesting message, for Honor's guardian spirit had noted the happy smile creeping over her face, as in her dreams she saw the n.o.ble hero of her waking reverie--and Guy, as he tossed restlessly on his pillow, betrayed to his "silent watcher" a heart overflowing with a new-born love for a creature to whom he had yet spoken no word. And how those angels must have smiled, knowing, as they did, that 'ere another day had pa.s.sed those two would have met, to recognize in one another the destiny of each!

"It will soon be four o'clock," Honor said to herself on the afternoon of this same day, looking, as she spoke, towards the delicately tinted window-sill. She had whiled away so many afternoons in this little _boudoir_, or family sitting room, that she could tell by the progress of the sun on the broad sill when to expect Mr. Rayne home from his office. "He will be here in half-an-hour," she soliloquized, then looking aimlessly around for distraction, Honor spied a half-knitted stocking and a ponderous looking pair of gold-mounted spectacles lying carefully on a side table. Smiling mischievously, she adjusted the gla.s.ses, very low down on her nose, for of course she can see much better _over_ than through them, and unwinding a yard or two of the wool, tucked the ball professionally under her arm, and began slowly to penetrate the intricate mysteries of "narrowing the gore." She had just seated herself in the great rocking chair, when a very familiar sort of tap at the door caused her to look up. She thought to make a joke for Fitts, and feigned "Nanette" accordingly--she dropped her head on her shoulder, slowly moving her needles all the while--and with closed lids, and mouth half-way open, she considered the _tableau_ perfect. The knock was not repeated, but she knew that the door had been opened. For a few seconds longer she remained in her interesting att.i.tude, and then considering that Fitts was rather slow to appreciate a joke, she opened her eyes, and was about to close her mouth, but the exclamation of surprise that rose to her lips, kept it wide open for a second or two longer. The blankest of blank stupid wonder looked out from her eyes over the old-fashioned, gold-rimmed spectacles.

"I hope you won't think I am intruding," said the person at the door, "but being quite at home in the house, and having received no answer when I announced myself, I thought I might admit myself here as usual."

Honor detected an effort in the speaker's voice to refrain from laughing outright, and did not feel too comfortable at the success of her joke.

"Did you--did you wish to see Mr. Rayne?" she stammered, dragging the unsightly spectacles off her nose, and throwing them back on the table.

"I certainly expected he was here," the stranger answered mischievously, "but I had mistaken you for him on coming suddenly in."

Honor felt mortified, while her companion evidently was very much amused. She looked at him suddenly, her pretty face suffused with blushes, but on raising her eyes they met his in a quick glance--the large, pa.s.sionate gray and the deep, dreamy blue penetrated each other's depths in an instant--only during one short breath, and then Honor's fell. She had been about to speak, but the mischief in his look reminded her of the absurdity of this _recontre_, and she could only turn aside, and show him by her shaking shoulders that she was forced to laugh.

At last the situation became too ridiculous, and Honor, between smothered fits of laughter, said,

"If you have made any appointment with Mr. Rayne, he will not detain you, I know. Be seated; I will enquire if he has yet arrived"

"Do not trouble yourself," her companion answered. "My uncle, Mr. Rayne makes no ceremony for me, I a.s.sure I you. I must only await his pleasure. But lest I have disturbed you--"

"Not at all," Honor interrupted, "I was only amusing myself."

"We may as well not be strangers," Guy said, courteously advancing towards Honor, "for we are likely to meet very often henceforward. I am Mr. Rayne's nephew, his sister's son, and I was the only toy in the big nursery of his heart until Miss Edgeworth appeared, which young lady I think I have at present the honor to address."

Honor bowed, and, extending her hand, said in her sweetest voice--

"For Mr. Rayne's sake we must certainly be friends,"--then feeling a little more at home with her visitor, she continued, "As no one comes in here unannounced, I ventured to attempt a little disguise this afternoon. I mistook your knock for some one's of the household, and had just struck the last att.i.tude of my a.s.sumed character when you caught me--I hope the effect on your nerves was nothing serious," and as she spoke this in her bewitching confusion Guy felt like taking her up in his arms, little bundle of blushes and smiles as she looked, and devouring her, but before he had time for word or action, the door opened again, and this time Henry Rayne bustled in, glaring in bewilderment upon them--

"Why! You two young rascals, how did you come together? Here you've cheated me out of antic.i.p.ated pleasure by finding one another out behind my back--this is too bad!" and Mr. Rayne as he spoke looked suspiciously at each of them.

"Oh, Mr. Rayne," and "Really, uncle," broke simultaneously from their lips, and then Guy, advancing, explained the interesting circ.u.mstances of their premature introduction.

"Well, it's just as well," Henry Rayne said, laughing, "we are all to be the one family henceforth, and the sooner it began the better--sit down Honor--sit down my boy," continued he, drawing chairs towards the fire, "come Guy, tell us the news, you have nothing else to do but gather it."

It was all over and done, those hands that had been groping in the darkness for so long, had met at length in one another's clasp. True it was, that no word had yet betrayed the feeling of either heart, no action, no sign had been made, and yet each knew full well that they had met at a threshold which they were both destined to cross, hand in hand.

It was not presumption on either side, but each felt so truly that it would be easy now to love, that they had met. It seemed as though one had sought the other for a long tune, and that now they had met never, never to part.

It will avail us nothing to dwell upon the details that made up the happy days of Honor Edgeworth's life after her meeting with Guy Elersley. To those who know what it is to breathe, live, and act under the soothing influence of a first love, the page would be a superfluous one, and to those for whom such a blessed phase of life is yet among the things to be, mine must not be the pen that will spoil the luxury thereof by antic.i.p.ating its joy--and again, to the wrinkled brows and aching hearts for which such a thing lies among the "might have beens,"

oh, I will not surely speak--I see their blinding tears--I hear a long, mournful sigh--somebody's fate is cursed, somebody's hope is trampled, somebody's heart is withered and dead! There remain only those who live their love-days in a holy remembrance, those who, in going backward through time go

"--hand in hand With spirits from the shadowland,"

and to those I whisper the words of our poet, and say--

"'Tis better to have loved and lost, Than never to have loved at all."