Not Pretty, but Precious; And Other Short Stories Part 5

"He's the hardest hit man I've seen for years," said one.

"And that such a thing should come to pa.s.s, as Ross Norval in love with his own wife, is beyond belief--after making love to everybody else's!"

"That's it! He was always the darling of fortune: the choicest fruit always dropped his side the wall."

But Ross, as he held her in that "tight hold" which was so much admired by his partners, said only, "Percy! Percy! I do not know you at all. How cruel you are to me! Everybody knows you and your gifts but me."

When the German had commenced he came to her and whispered, "Do you care for it?"

"The German, Ross? Indeed no: I am tired too, and was just coming to ask you if I might let old Mr. L---- take me home: he says it will be no trouble."

"And you would not have asked me to take you?" he said, reproachfully.

"Take you away from the German, Ross! Such an unheard-of thing as that!

You must think me very selfish. Indeed; I am not where your pleasure is concerned: I only want you to enjoy yourself."

"Then, for Charity's sake, let's go home," he said.

"With all my heart if you really wish it!" and she started; then pausing: "Are you going because you think I want to go? I do not indeed: I will stay gladly."

"I am going because I want to--because I am dead tired, and long, with a perfect pa.s.sion, for our cozy room, the dim firelight, and my darling toasting her pretty slippers."

"You dear, foolish Ross!" and she was gone like the wind. On their way out, Sheldon Wilber met them in the hall, and, handing her something, said, "To-night, little girl: if you have ever doubted, doubt no more. And remember, a trusting heart is a priceless one;" and he was gone.

When they were home and comfortable, Ross said, "My wife, it was cruel to let me learn your wonderful gifts through strangers: it has hurt me cruelly."

"Oh, Ross, don't say so! Hurt you! I hurt you, my love, my love! I had hoped no pang of the lightest sort would ever reach you through me, and now I've grieved you sorely! It's all due to my morbid fancies, dear. I could not ask to sing to you lest you should not like my singing: I think I should have gone mad if you had not liked my voice, Ross I have so hoped it would be pleasant to your ear! Do you like it, Ross? Is my voice sweet to you?" and she held his face between her hands and looked eagerly and steadfastly into his eyes.

"The sweetest thing I ever heard. It thrills my blood yet, that love-song you sang."

She gave a little cooing laugh: "That is _your_ love-song, dear--your very own." Then she said, gravely, "I must tell you _all_ about myself now, Ross, so you shall never be able to reproach me with having given you pain. No matter, dear: it was, true," she said in answer to his caressing protest, "and I feel the hurt through you. I am your wife. The reason those gentlemen are so fond of me is because--Wait;" and she slid from his embrace and brought a pile of books: "this and this are mine; these two I translated from the German, others from the old Provencal tongue, with which my father made me familiar." Then she told him how lovingly she did this work, how kind scholarly men had been to her, and how eagerly they had sought to know her otherwise than by letter--"Until, to-night, I bade them find Ross Norval's wife, and know the little girl who, shielded by his name, feared nothing any more."

"Percy," he said, quite humbly, "you must bear with me, dear. I lose all hope of winning you when I learn these things of you."

"But you are not sorry, Ross? I will not write any more if you dislike literary women."

But he stopped her: "Dislike it! I am proud as a king of all your endowments. But, sweetheart, you said a word just now that is worth all else that you have told me--a word, I know, you said only half meaning it.

Oh, my little girl, will there ever come a time when, meaning it and out of a full heart, you will say, My love! my love!"

She held him tight a long, long moment, then with one lingering love-kiss on his lips--her very first--she said faintly, putting him away from her, "Ross, not now--wait, my dearest. Sheldon gave me this to give to you to-night;" and she held out a little worn letter, then buried her face upon his breast and tremblingly waited while he read it. It ran thus:

"Sheldon, my cousin, it can never be: give up all hope for ever. I kill it now, because it is best you should know the truth. I almost give up my life, my cousin, when I make my heritage of woe known to you. You will pity me, Sheldon, when you realize what agony the confession you thus wring from me gives my heart. But if it cures your pa.s.sion it is not borne in vain. I love with an undying love, a faith that knows no change, an endurance that years of neglect have not weakened, that years of cruelty could never change, a man who would laugh to scorn my very name. I love--and have loved since I was sixteen years old, until now--Ross Norval. Keep my secret.

"PERCY HASTINGS."

It was dated four years back.

"Ross, Ross! you know it now! Oh, my love! my love!"

I will attempt no painting of the effect that confession had upon him. But after a long, long time she whispered, "I will sing the last verse of your song, dear, which only you shall ever hear." And lying on his breast, she sang--

"Dear love I thy face above me gleaming A sunset radiance gives: Ah, love! thy tones' sweet cadence dying Sings in my heart and lives.

Clasped, love, close to thy heart, thy birdling Foldeth her wings in peace-- Trusts, love! feeling nor cold nor shadow, Finding at last her ease, From fear a safe release, Heart's love, with thee."

MARGRET FIELD.

The Victims of Dreams.

My friend Bessie Haines had no mother, but her father was such a very large man that I remember thinking, when I was quite a child, that a kind Providence had intended to make up her loss in that way. She and I did not live in the same city, but managed to keep up a lively friendship through the medium of correspondence and half-yearly visits.

I was a complete orphan, and my uncle, with whom I lived, was her father's attached friend. She had a very happy home, and I was glad to enjoy it with her, particularly when my uncle accompanied me, for then her father and he became absorbed in each other, and left us to our own devices--not very evil ones, but too childish and trifling to claim the sympathy of such very grave men as they were.

We had both become tall, womanly girls, but Uncle Pennyman and Mr. Haines called us children, and treated us as such; and Bessie was just writing to me about her father's telling her she must begin to think of serious things, when my uncle remarked to me that the time was approaching when I should prepare myself to a.s.sume the duties and responsibilities of a rational female. Just as if we had waited to be told this, when in fact Bessie and I had been consulting about our bonnets and dresses in the most grave and mature manner for years past, and arranging our future on plans that for variety and agreeability could not have been surpa.s.sed had we been brought up on the _Arabian Nights_ and Moore's _Poems_, instead of Baxter's _Saint's Rest_ and Pollok's _Course of Time_.

"There are several questions of vital importance that have been growing daily stronger in my mind," said my uncle Pennyman. "My friend Thomas Haines has a gift in clearing points and expounding meanings; so that I feel it to be for my mind's edifying and my soul's profit to go to him for counsel."

I was delighted to hear this. I wanted to see Bessie, and I blessed the bond that united these good brothers in Israel and drew us together so often. Mr. Haines was good at texts, and my uncle was wonderfully expert at dreams. Mr. Haines was a great dreamer, and my uncle constantly stumbled over pa.s.sages needing elucidation. So we lived in harmonious intercourse, and Bessie and I talked of all our plans and delights while they got themselves entangled in obscurities with a commentary under each arm.

It would have appeared, from Mr. Haines' dreams, that Bessie's mother had been a most fussy and bothering lady, though I was told by the housekeeper, who knew her well, that she was the mildest and most timid of little wives while living.

According to these visions, she was constantly troubled in her spiritual state on the greatest variety of small subjects; and my expert uncle, in expounding her communications, was always able to draw from them strong religious lessons, and to administer much strengthening comfort to his friend the dreamer.

"I was hoping papa would soon have a vision," said Bessie when we were settled together all comfortably, and she had told me how glad she was to see me again. "Mrs. Tanner said last week that she was sure he was going to have another, because the spire which he felt he was directed in his last dream to put on the little chapel was all complete, and the missionary outfit which he had believed himself called upon to provide was ready and gone to the South Seas, and he naturally looked for more work.

When he said last week, 'Bessie, I have sent for Brother Pennyman concerning a visitation in the night,' I was so glad, for, Winnie dear--would you believe it?--I have been dreaming too, and I want you to tell me if I have read my dream aright."

Now, this was the most wonderful thing that Bessie Haines could have told me--the most startling and least to be expected altogether; for if ever there was a wide-awake girl, it was she.

I suppose my perfectly frank stare said as much, for she blushed a little, and continued with a very suspicious flutter, which I had learnt, in the case of young engaged persons I knew, to look on as a bad symptom:

"I do not mean dreaming with my eyes shut, you know, but having deep, serious thoughts, unlike the gay fancies that have held me captive all my life."

"Dress tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs and poetry?" I suggested.

"Yes, yes--all the useless, perishable fancies of thoughtless youth," she replied.

This sounded more like an Essay on Vanity than Bessie Haines, and I really was astonished, and had nothing to say for a little while, during which she, being full of her subject, went on:

"I can scarcely trace the beginning of the--the awakening, shall I call it?"

"You called it a dream before."

"Yes, dear Winnie, but it is so hard to know how to cla.s.sify new emotions, and this is such a peculiar one that it seems nameless. You know papa feels bound, ever since that water-dream he had, to go down to the Mariners' Chapel on Sunday afternoon, and I used to read solemn poetry when it was too warm or too cold to go with him. Well, about two months ago it was fearfully warm, and papa had come home a fortnight earlier from the sh.o.r.e, on account of a suspicion he had that he had dreamed something and had forgotten it as soon as he awoke. This indistinct warning made him think we had better go home at all events, and home we came the first week in September, to the roasting, dusty city. But I did not then know that I was perhaps drawn back for a purpose; and oh, dear Winnie, there may be something in papa's visions, after all."