Joscelyn Cheshire Part 22

"I think it is beautiful in him."

"Beautiful! Well, I think it is _imbecile_! Hurt my maidenly modesty, indeed!--one would think my modesty were a sore toe to be stubbed or trod upon. Stop laughing, Joscelyn Cheshire; you are as stupid as Billy." And when Joscelyn answered with another silvery peal, Janet, in high indignation, flung out of the room and down the steps, her heels clattering as she went; and the next morning her maid carried the offending letter to Mistress Bryce with a sweetly worded note, saying Billy had no doubt made a mistake in the address of his missive. And Billy swore his first oath when he heard of it.

Nor was Janet the only one who came to confessional in Joscelyn's room.

It was there that Betty found the only outlet for her secret joy. In spite of the war and its sad consequences, the year had been such a happy one--the sweetest year she had ever known; for it had been full of dreams and fancies, of thrills and hopes. Even the self-reproach, with which she sometimes tormented herself because of her mother, had in it a touch of sweetness since it was linked with her love. The whole world was as a new place; the winter snows held an unthought of revelation of beauty, and each flower that budded to the spring sunshine was a fresh creation bearing on its petals an unspelled message of love. She would not write to Eustace, for that would be undutiful to her mother; but Joscelyn's letters were filled with tender messages for her, with now and then a little wafered note that burnt her fingers with a delicious sense of forbidden fruit, and which she read and re-read in the privacy of her white-curtained room, trembling and flushing at the story they told,--the future they painted.

But as the spring advanced, a shade of sadness crept over her happiness, a film like the impalpable dust that gathers on a fine picture hanging always in the light. Eustace had ceased to write. Two months had gone by, and no word had come from him. A strange, new fear was tugging at Betty's heart.

"Naught of evil has befallen him, or Mary would know; and you said they had no tidings?" she asked wistfully one evening, as she leaned against Joscelyn's window and watched the pale-petalled stars blossom through the purple gloaming.

"I rode all the way to the Singletons' yesterday afternoon on purpose to ask, and they know nothing."

"And his mother feels no uneasiness?"

"None. She says Lord Cornwallis would immediately inform her if he should be killed."

Betty heaved a deep sigh; and then that latent fear came out, "I suppose he finds the ladies of the city so beautiful and entertaining that he has forgotten his--his friends here."

"S-o! that is what makes you so long of face these days? Well, I do not believe a word of it. Eustace is no jilt. You will find that you at least are remembered, and that his silence is from reasonable cause."

"His cousin, Ellen Singleton, is such a beautiful woman--you remember Richard told us of her in his letter about the Philadelphia fete. Like Mary, he said, only more lovely. They must of necessity be much together, for she, too, is in New York."

"And betrothed to Major Grant, you jealous child."

"But that need really make no difference so far as Eustace's admiration goes. Besides, there must be others as lovely."

"Of course; but you are pretty, too, when your face is not long and your eyes red with weeping."

Betty went home comforted; and that night, when her mother made some sharp remark about the Singleton household, she plucked up courage to say it was scarcely fair to judge the whole family adversely because of the father's shortcomings. And then, scared at her own temerity, she ran away to her room, and cried out her trouble to that insensate and inanimate confessor of wronged or sorrowing womanhood,--her pillow.

A week later, Joscelyn, coming from the Singletons', tied a red ribbon on her shutter as a sign that she had news; and Betty, hastening over, soon learned of Clinton's long and tempestuous voyage from New York to Charleston, whither he went to subdue that city. Eustace had been badly hurt in the storm that wrecked so many of the transports, and had been laid up in the hospital at Tybee Bay for weeks, while Clinton went on to Charleston to begin the siege.

So the British had come again to the south to teach the people of that section their duty to their king, and the quiet that had reigned at Hillsboro' was broken by the coming and going of recruiting parties, and by the vacillating reports of victory or failure from the beleaguered city.

But it was not until August that the climax came. Then Gates, smarting with the defeat at Camden, halted the remnant of his flying army, scarcely a thousand strong, at the town on the Eno, to rest and sum up the full measure of the disaster that had befallen him. During the short time that he remained, the town was in a ferment. The way to the camp was thronged with sympathizers; kitchen chimneys smoked with the extra cooking, and in every house was a banquet of the best that could be had.

Only in the Cheshire house was there no preparation, nor yet upon the door was there the blue and buff c.o.c.kade that marked the others. There were not lacking those who called official attention to this fact, and so many comments and criticisms crept about among the soldiers that a couple of young officers, bent on a frolic and thinking to teach this wilful Joscelyn a needed lesson, stopped upon her porch and sent word that they would speak with her. And presently she came down to them, dressed fit to dance in a queen's minuet in silver brocade over a scarlet petticoat, the round whiteness of her neck and arms shining through foamy lace, a red rose in her powdered hair, and a black patch near the corner of her mouth giving a saucy emphasis to her lips. As she stepped out of the door, the young fellows who had been lounging on the porch rail instantly sprang up and uncovered at the sight of so much beauty and dignity. They had thought to find a country maid, mayhap a woman past her youth; and instead, this glowing creature stood before them.

"What is your pleasure, gentlemen?" she asked; but the stiff courtesy of her question was belied by the laugh in her eyes.

They exchanged uneasy glances, and one took a step toward the porch exit; but the other, who was to be spokesman, summing up resolution, stammered and answered:--

"We found no c.o.c.kade of the nation's colours on your door, and did but stop to ask the reason."

"Your general sent you?"

"No, no; we were but pa.s.sing, and came of our own accord."

"Oh, a friendly visit, with no official significance? I pray you present each other," and she courtesied at each name. "And now let us go into the parlour and see what can be done for your entertainment."

And in the parlour she gave them the best chairs, and set herself with much graciousness of manner to entertain them, plying them with delicate compliments, singing her Tory ballads with such laughing abandon that in the same spirit of fun they applauded her, thinking not a moment of the songs, but of the singer. Later on she brewed them a cup of tea, telling them it was a love potion to win a fair one's favour; and although they began by protesting vehemently, yet they ended by drinking it, for she first put her own lips to the cups, and then dared them with her eyes.

After that they would scarcely have hesitated at hemlock. At the end of an hour she dismissed them, each with a red rose in his coat.

"The colour suits your handsome eyes," she said softly to one, with a ravishing glance, as she fastened the flower in place. And to the other she murmured, with downcast lids and a sweet similitude of faltering, "This is for memory," as though for them both this hour was to be a tryst for thought and tender recollection, and the rose its symbol.

Neither of them had the wish nor the will to tear the flower away; and so with a certain crestfallen exhilaration they took their leave, riding slowly down the street, swearing each other to silence. But the story got the rounds within the hour, for Mistress Strudwick, seeing them enter the house and fearing some danger or annoyance to Joscelyn, had followed quickly, and sat in the next room with the door ajar during the entire interview. And she was not slow in publishing it abroad, so that the young officers were twitted unmercifully at mess and headquarters; even General Gates, when told of it, forgot for a moment the humiliation of his late defeat, and laughed long and loud. Under the banter one of the men threw his rose away; but the other held stoutly to his, meeting the raillery with the a.s.sertion that it was a lady's favour and not a king's colour that he wore.

"It was not kindly of you to take such mean advantage of them, Joscelyn, seeing how irresistible you can make yourself, but it was just the cleverest thing you ever did," Janet cried, squeezing Joscelyn's waist.

"Mistress Strudwick has near had apoplexy with laughter, and even Mistress Bryce--who hates you like a double dose of senna and was the first to call attention to your undecorated door--could not keep a straight face to hear how neatly you outwitted the young c.o.xcombs. But really, my dear, you deserve no great credit for it; for in that gown you are fit to melt harder hearts than Providence gave our gallant young soldiers."

"I do not flatter myself their hearts were touched; it was only their vanity that melted like wax in the flame of my flattery."

"Well, they deserved what they got,--trying to teach you behaviour, indeed!"

The next day the army, refreshed and rested, took up its line of march, pa.s.sing directly in front of the Cheshire homestead. On the veranda, in her brocade and brilliant petticoat and framed by the riotous rose vine, Joscelyn sat and made pretence to be very busy with her flax wheel; but from under her drooping lids she saw the whole procession.

Beside his company rode a young lieutenant, his eager gaze ahead of him until he reached the undecorated house; then his hat came off, and lifting his lapel on which hung a faded red rose, he cried up to the girl in the balcony:--

"This is for memory!"

And Joscelyn laughed and fluttered her white handkerchief with what might or might not be the suggestion of a kiss. And he, forgetful of military decorum, turned in his saddle and kept his gaze upon her until the troop pa.s.sed beyond the corner.

"Do you know, Joscelyn," cried Janet, rushing up the steps, her eyes shining and her yellow curls flying in the wind, "that was Lieutenant Wyley from Halifax--and he is brother to Frederick--and Frederick danced with no one but me last night (you don't know what you missed in not going to the cotillion!)--and he has been at my house the livelong morning."

"S-o! You have then a new beau to your string?"

"Oh, yes! and he is strong and masterful, and talks love beautifully, and he does not say 'by your leave' like Billy, but is just what a lover should be."

"Janet, Janet!" cried Joscelyn, reprovingly; but the laughing girl tossed her yellow curls coquettishly, the exhilaration of a new conquest upon her; then suddenly hid her face on Joscelyn's shoulder:--

"Joscelyn, dearest, did you ever feel a lover's lips against your cheek for just one little moment?"

And Joscelyn went suddenly as red as she, remembering that November day when Richard came home.

CHAPTER XX.

JOSCELYN'S PERIL.

"First time he kissed me, he but only kissed The fingers of this hand wherewith I write; And, ever since, it grew more clean and white, Slow to world greetings, quick with its 'O list!'

When the angels speak."

--MRS. BROWNING.

Thus the months had come and gone, and come again, until three years had pa.s.sed since Richard's company marched away that winter day to join their comrades at Valley Forge. Three years of warfare, and victory yet faltered to remain with either standard, but wavered like a fickle woman from side to side. And Joscelyn held to her allegiance, wearing her scarlet bodice in open rejoicing at news of an English victory, and decking herself in sombre mourning when tidings of the American triumph at King's Mountain thrilled the country with an awakened hope. And in these habiliments she walked the streets, or sat upon her balcony, that none might be in doubt as to her feelings.

"Joscelyn Cheshire be as good as a war barometer," said Mistress Strudwick; "one has but to look at her to know whether to rejoice or to sorrow."