Their Pilgrimage Part 12

Mr. Meigs tried to mend matters by saying that he had promised Mrs.

Benson, you know, to look after her. There was that in Irene's manner that said she was not to be appropriated without leave. But the consciousness that her look betrayed this softened her at once towards Mr. Meigs, and decidedly improved his chances for the evening. The philosopher says that women are cruelest when they set out to be kind.

The supper was an 'al fresco' affair, the party being seated about on rocks and logs and shawls spread upon the gra.s.s near the farmer's house.

The scene was a very pretty one, at least the artist thought so, and Miss Lamont said it was lovely, and the Ashley girls declared it was just divine. There was no reason why King should not enjoy the chaff and merriment and the sunset light which touched the group, except that the one woman he cared to serve was enveloped in the attentions of Mr. Meigs. The drive home in the moonlight was the best part of the excursion, or it would have been if there had not been a general change of seats ordered, altogether, as Mr. King thought, for the accommodation of the Boston man. It nettled him that Irene let herself fall to the escort of Mr. Meigs, for women can always arrange these things if they choose, and he had only a melancholy satisfaction in the college songs and conundrums that enlivened the festive buckboard in which he was a pa.s.senger. Not that he did not join in the hilarity, but it seemed only a poor imitation of pleasure. Alas, that the tone of one woman's voice, the touch of her hand, the glance of her eye, should outweigh the world!

Somehow, with all the opportunities, the suit of our friend did not advance beyond a certain point. Irene was always cordial, always friendly, but he tried in vain to ascertain whether the middle-aged man from Boston had touched her imagination. There was a boating party the next evening in Frenchman's Bay, and King had the pleasure of pulling Miss Benson and Miss Lamont out seaward under the dark, frowning cliffs until they felt the ocean swell, and then of making the circuit of Porcupine Island. It was an enchanting night, full of mystery. The rock face of the Porcupine glistened white in the moonlight as if it were encrusted with salt, the waves beat in a continuous roar against its base, which is honeycombed by the action of the water, and when the boat glided into its shadow it loomed up vast and wonderful. Seaward were the harbor lights, the phosph.o.r.escent glisten of the waves, the dim forms of other islands; all about in the bay row-boats darted in and out of the moonlight, voices were heard calling from boat to boat, songs floated over the water, and the huge Portland steamer came plunging in out of the night, a blazing, trembling monster. Not much was said in the boat, but the impression of such a night goes far in the romance of real life.

Perhaps it was this impression that made her a.s.sent readily to a walk next morning with Mr. King along the bay. The sh.o.r.e is nearly all occupied by private cottages, with little lawns running down to the granite edge of the water. It is a favorite place for strolling; couples establish themselves with books and umbrellas on the rocks, children are dabbling in the coves, sails enliven the bay, row-boats dart about, the cawing of crows is heard in the still air. Irene declared that the scene was idyllic. The girl was in a most gracious humor, and opened her life more to King than she had ever done before. By such confidences usually women invite avowals, and as the two paced along, King felt the moment approach when there would be the most natural chance in the world for him to tell this woman what she was to him; at the next turn in the sh.o.r.e, by that rock, surely the moment would come. What is this airy nothing by which women protect themselves in such emergencies, by a question, by a tone, an invisible strong barrier that the most impetuous dare not attempt to break?

King felt the subtle restraint which he could not define or explain. And before he could speak she said: "We are going away tomorrow." "We? And who are we?" "Oh, the Simpkinses and our whole family, and Mr. Meigs."

"And where?"

"Mr. Meigs has persuaded mother into the wildest scheme. It is nothing less than to leap from, here across all the intervening States to the White Sulphur Springs in Virginia. Father falls into the notion because he wants to see more of the Southerners, Mrs. Simpkins and her daughter are crazy to go, and Mr. Meigs says he has been trying to get there all his life, and in August the season is at its height. It was all arranged before I was consulted, but I confess I rather like it. It will be a change."

"Yes, I should think it would be delightful," King replied, rather absent-mindedly. "It's a long journey, a very long journey. I should think it would be too long a journey for Mr. Meigs--at his time of life."

It was not a fortunate remark, and still it might be; for who could tell whether Irene would not be flattered by this declaration of his jealousy of Mr. Meigs. But she pa.s.sed it over as not serious, with the remark that the going did not seem to be beyond the strength of her father.

The introduction of Mr. Meigs in the guise of an accepted family friend and traveling companion chilled King and cast a gloom over the landscape. Afterwards he knew that he ought to have dashed in and scattered this encompa.s.sing network of Meigs, disregarded the girl's fence of reserve, and avowed his love. More women are won by a single charge at the right moment than by a whole campaign of strategy.

On the way back to the hotel he was absorbed in thought, and he burst into the room where Forbes was touching up one of his sketches, with a fully-formed plan. "Old fellow, what do you say to going to Virginia?"

Forbes put in a few deliberate touches, moving his head from side to side, and with aggravating slowness said, "What do you want to go to Virginia for?"

"Why White Sulphur, of course; the most characteristic watering-place in America. See the whole Southern life there in August; and there's the Natural Bridge."

"I've seen pictures of the Natural Bridge. I don't know as I care much"

(still contemplating the sketch from different points of view, and softly whistling) "for the whole of Southern life."

"See here, Forbes, you must have some deep design to make you take that att.i.tude."

"Deep design!" replied Forbes, facing round. "I'll be hanged if I see what you are driving at. I thought it was Saratoga and Richfield, and mild things of that sort."

"And the little Lamont. I know we talked of going there with her and her uncle; but we can go there afterwards. I tell you what I'll do: I'll go to Richfield, and stay till snow comes, if you will take a dip with me down into Virginia first. You ought to do it for your art. It's something new, picturesque--negroes, Southern belles, old-time manners.

You cannot afford to neglect it."

"I don't see the fun of being yanked all over the United States in the middle of August."

"You want shaking up. You've been drawing seash.o.r.es with one figure in them till your pictures all look like--well, like Lamont and water."

"That's better," Forbes retorted, "than Benson and gruel."

And the two got into a huff. The artist took his sketch-book and went outdoors, and King went to his room to study the guide-books and the map of Virginia. The result was that when the friends met for dinner, King said:

"I thought you might do it for me, old boy."

And Forbes replied: "Why didn't you say so? I don't care a rap where I go. But it's Richfield afterwards."

VIII. NATURAL BRIDGE, WHITE SULFUR

What occurred at the parting between the artist and the little Lamont at Bar Harbor I never knew. There was that good comradeship between the two, that frank enjoyment of each other's society, without any sentimental nonsense, so often seen between two young people in America, which may end in a friendship of a summer, or extend to the cordial esteem of a lifetime, or result in marriage. I always liked the girl; she had such a sunny temper, such a flow of originality in her mental att.i.tude towards people and things without being a wit or a critic, and so much piquancy in all her little ways. She would take to matrimony, I should say, like a duck to water, with unruffled plumage, but as a wife she would never be commonplace, or anything but engaging, and, as the saying is, she could make almost any man happy. And, if unmarried, what a delightful sister-in-law she would be, especially a deceased wife's sister!

I never imagined that she was capable of a great pa.s.sion, as was Irene Benson, who under a serene exterior was moved by tides of deep feeling, subject to moods, and full of aspirations and longings which she herself only dimly knew the meaning of. With Irene marriage would be either supreme happiness or extreme wretchedness, no half-way acceptance of a conventional life. With such a woman life is a failure, either tragic or pathetic, without a great pa.s.sion given and returned. It is fortunate, considering the chances that make unions in society, that for most men and women the "grand pa.s.sion" is neither necessary nor possible. I did not share King's prejudice against Mr. Meigs. He seemed to me, as the world goes, a 'bon parti,' cultivated by travel and reading, well-bred, entertaining, amiable, possessed of an ample fortune, the ideal husband in the eyes of a prudent mother. But I used to think that if Irene, attracted by his many admirable qualities, should become his wife, and that if afterwards the Prince should appear and waken the slumbering woman's heart in her, what a tragedy would ensue. I can imagine their placid existence if the Prince should not appear, and I can well believe that Irene and Stanhope would have many a tumultuous pa.s.sage in the pa.s.sionate symphony of their lives. But, great heavens, is the ideal marriage a Holland!

If Marion had shed any tears overnight, say on account of a little lonesomeness because her friend was speeding away from her southward, there were no traces of them when she met her uncle at the breakfast-table, as bright and chatty as usual, and in as high spirits as one can maintain with the Rod.i.c.k coffee.

What a world of shifting scenes it is! Forbes had picked up his traps and gone off with his unreasonable companion like a soldier. The day after, when he looked out of the window of his sleeping-compartment at half-past four, he saw the red sky of morning, and against it the spires of Philadelphia.

At ten o'clock the two friends were breakfasting comfortably in the car, and running along down the c.u.mberland Valley. What a contrast was this rich country, warm with color and suggestive of abundance, to the pale and scrimped coast land of Maine denuded of its trees! By afternoon they were far down the east valley of the Shenandoah, between the Blue Ridge and the Ma.s.sanutten range, in a country broken, picturesque, fertile, so attractive that they wondered there were so few villages on the route, and only now and then a cheap shanty in sight; and crossing the divide to the waters of the James, at sundown, in the midst of a splendid effect of mountains and clouds in a thunderstorm, they came to Natural Bridge station, where a coach awaited them.

This was old ground to King, who had been telling the artist that the two natural objects east of the Rocky Mountains that he thought ent.i.tled to the epithet "sublime" were Niagara Falls and the Natural Bridge; and as for scenery, he did not know of any more n.o.ble and refined than this region of the Blue Ridge. Take away the Bridge altogether, which is a mere freak, and the place would still possess, he said, a charm unique.

Since the enlargement of hotel facilities and the conversion of this princely domain into a grand park, it has become a favorite summer resort. The gorge of the Bridge is a botanical storehouse, greater variety of evergreens cannot be found together anywhere else in the country, and the hills are still clad with stately forests. In opening drives, and cutting roads and vistas to give views, the proprietor has shown a skill and taste in dealing with natural resources, both in regard to form and the development of contrasts of color in foliage, which are rare in landscape gardening on this side of the Atlantic. Here is the highest part of the Blue Ridge, and from the gentle summit of Mount Jefferson the spectator has in view a hundred miles of this remarkable range, this ribbed mountain structure, which always wears a mantle of beauty, changeable purple and violet.

After supper there was an illumination of the cascade, and the ancient gnarled arbor-vita: trees that lean over it-perhaps the largest known specimens of this species-of the gorge and the Bridge. Nature is apt to be belittled by this sort of display, but the n.o.ble dignity of the vast arch of stone was superior to this trifling, and even had a sort of mystery added to its imposing grandeur. It is true that the flaming bonfires and the colored lights and the tiny figures of men and women standing in the gorge within the depth of the arch made the scene theatrical, but it was strange and weird and awful, like the fantasy of a Walpurgis' Night or a midnight revel in Faust.

The presence of the colored brother in force distinguished this from provincial resorts at the North, even those that employ this color as servants. The flavor of Old Virginia is unmistakable, and life drops into an easy-going pace under this influence. What fine manners, to be sure! The waiters in the diningroom, in white ties and dress-coats, move on springs, starting even to walk with a complicated use of all the muscles of the body, as if in response to the tw.a.n.g of a banjo; they do nothing without excessive motion and flourish. The gestures and good-humored vitality expended in changing plates would become the leader of an orchestra. Many of them, besides, have the expression of cla.s.s-leaders--of a worldly sort. There were the aristocratic chambermaid and porter, who had the air of never having waited on any but the first families. And what clever flatterers and readers of human nature! They can tell in a moment whether a man will be complimented by the remark, "I tuk you for a Richmond gemman, never shod have know'd you was from de Norf," or whether it is best to say, "We depen's on de gemmen frum de Norf; folks down hyer never gives noflin; is too pore."

But to a Richmond man it is always, "The Yankee is mighty keerful of his money; we depen's on the old sort, ma.r.s.e." A fine specimen of the "Richmond darkey" of the old school-polite, flattering, with a venerable head of gray wool, was the bartender, who mixed his juleps with a flourish as if keeping time to music. "Haven't I waited on you befo', sah? At Capon Springs? Sorry, sah, but tho't I knowed you when you come in. Sorry, but glad to know you now, sah. If that julep don't suit you, sah, throw it in my face."

A friendly, restful, family sort of place, with music, a little mild dancing, mostly performed by children, in the pavilion, driving and riding-in short, peace in the midst of n.o.ble scenery. No display of fashion, the artist soon discovered, and he said he longed to give the pretty girls some instruction in the art of dress. Forbes was a missionary of "style." It hurt his sense of the fitness of things to see women without it. He used to say that an ill-dressed woman would spoil the finest landscape. For such a man, with an artistic feeling so sensitive, the White Sulphur Springs is a natural goal. And he and his friend hastened thither with as much speed as the Virginia railways, whose time-tables are carefully adjusted to miss all connections, permit.

"What do you think of a place," he wrote Miss Lamont--the girl read me a portion of his lively letter that summer at Saratoga--"into which you come by a belated train at half-past eleven at night, find friends waiting up for you in evening costume, are taken to a champagne supper at twelve, get to your quarters at one, and have your baggage delivered to you at two o'clock in the morning?" The friends were lodged in "Paradise Row"--a whimsical name given to one of the quarters a.s.signed to single gentlemen. Put into these single-room barracks, which were neat but exceedingly primitive in their accommodations, by hilarious negro attendants who appeared to regard life as one prolonged lark, and who avowed that there was no time of day or night when a mint-julep or any other necessary of life would not be forthcoming at a moment's warning, the beginning of their sojourn at "The White" took on an air of adventure, and the two strangers had the impression of having dropped into a garrison somewhere on the frontier. But when King stepped out upon the gallery, in the fresh summer morning, the scene that met his eyes was one of such peaceful dignity, and so different from any in his experience, that he was aware that he had come upon an original development of watering-place life.

The White Sulphur has been for the better part of a century, as everybody knows, the typical Southern resort, the rendezvous of all that was most characteristic in the society of the whole South, the meeting-place of its politicians, the haunt of its belles, the arena of gayety, intrigue, and fashion. If tradition is to be believed, here in years gone by were concocted the measures that were subsequently deployed for the government of the country at Washington, here historic matches were made, here beauty had triumphs that were the talk of a generation, here hearts were broken at a ball and mended in Lovers'

Walk, and here fortunes were nightly lost and won. It must have been in its material conditions a primitive place in the days of its greatest fame. Visitors came to it in their carriages and unwieldy four-horse chariots, attended by troops of servants, making slow but most enjoyable pilgrimages over the mountain roads, journeys that lasted a week or a fortnight, and were every day enlivened by jovial adventure. They came for the season. They were all of one social order, and needed no introduction; those from Virginia were all related to each other, and though life there was somewhat in the nature of a picnic, it had its very well-defined and ceremonious code of etiquette. In the memory of its old habitues it was at once the freest and the most aristocratic a.s.sembly in the world. The hotel was small and its arrangements primitive; a good many of the visitors had their own cottages, and the rows of these cheap structures took their names from their occupants.

The Southern presidents, the senators, and statesmen, the rich planters, lived in cottages which still have an historic interest in their memory.

But cottage life was never the exclusive affair that it is elsewhere; the society was one body, and the hotel was the centre.

Time has greatly changed the White Sulphur; doubtless in its physical aspect it never was so beautiful and attractive as it is today, but all the modern improvements have not destroyed the character of the resort, which possesses a great many of its primitive and old-time peculiarities. Briefly the White is an elevated and charming mountain region, so cool, in fact, especially at night, that the "season" is practically limited to July and August, although I am not sure but a quiet person, who likes invigorating air, and has no daughters to marry off, would find it equally attractive in September and October, when the autumn foliage is in its glory. In a green rolling interval, planted with n.o.ble trees and flanked by moderate hills, stands the vast white caravansary, having wide galleries and big pillars running round three sides. The front and two sides are elevated, the galleries being reached by flights of steps, and affording room underneath for the large billiard and bar-rooms. From the hotel the ground slopes down to the spring, which is surmounted by a round canopy on white columns, and below is an opening across the stream to the race-track, the servants'

quarters, and a fine view of receding hills. Three sides of this charming park are enclosed by the cottages and cabins, which back against the hills, and are more or less embowered in trees. Most of these cottages are built in blocks and rows, some single rooms, others large enough to accommodate a family, but all reached by flights of steps, all with verandas, and most of them connected by galleries.

Occasionally the forest trees have been left, and the galleries built around them. Included in the premises are two churches, a gambling-house, a couple of country stores, and a post-office. There are none of the shops common at watering-places for the sale of fancy articles, and, strange to say, flowers are not systematically cultivated, and very few are ever to be had. The hotel has a vast dining-room, besides the minor eating-rooms for children and nurses, a large ballroom, and a drawing-room of imposing dimensions. Hotel and cottages together, it is said, can lodge fifteen hundred guests.

The natural beauty of the place is very great, and fortunately there is not much smart and fantastic architecture to interfere with it. I cannot say whether the knowledge that Irene was in one of the cottages affected King's judgment, but that morning, when he strolled to the upper part of the grounds before breakfast, he thought he had never beheld a scene of more beauty and dignity, as he looked over the ma.s.s of hotel buildings, upon the park set with a wonderful variety of dark green foliage, upon the elevated rows of galleried cottages marked by colonial simplicity, and the soft contour of the hills, which satisfy the eye in their delicate blending of every shade of green and brown. And after an acquaintance of a couple of weeks the place seemed to him ravishingly beautiful.

King was always raving about the White Sulphur after he came North, and one never could tell how much his judgment was colored by his peculiar experiences there. It was my impression that if he had spent those two weeks on a barren rock in the ocean, with only one fair spirit for his minister, he would have sworn that it was the most lovely spot on the face of the earth. He always declared that it was the most friendly, cordial society at this resort in the country. At breakfast he knew scarcely any one in the vast dining-room, except the New Orleans and Richmond friends with whom he had a seat at table. But their acquaintance sufficed to establish his position. Before dinner-time he knew half a hundred; in the evening his introductions had run up into the hundreds, and he felt that he had potential friends in every Southern city; and before the week was over there was not one of the thousand guests he did not know or might not know. At his table he heard Irene spoken of and her beauty commented on. Two or three days had been enough to give her a reputation in a society that is exceedingly sensitive to beauty. The men were all ready to do her homage, and the women took her into favor as soon as they saw that Mr. Meigs, whose social position was perfectly well known, was of her party. The society of the White Sulphur seems perfectly easy of access, but the ineligible will find that it is able, like that of Washington, to protect itself.

It was not without a little shock that King heard the good points, the style, the physical perfections, of Irene so fully commented on, and not without some alarm that he heard predicted for her a very successful career as a belle.

Coming out from breakfast, the Benson party were encountered on the gallery, and introductions followed. It was a trying five minutes for King, who felt as guilty, as if the White Sulphur were private property into which he had intruded without an invitation. There was in the civility of Mr. Meigs no sign of an invitation. Mrs. Benson said she was never so surprised in her life, and the surprise seemed not exactly an agreeable one, but Mr. Benson looked a great deal more pleased than astonished. The slight flush in Irene's face as she greeted him might have been wholly due to the unexpectedness of the meeting. Some of the gentlemen lounged off to the office region for politics and cigars, the elderly ladies took seats upon the gallery, and the rest of the party strolled down to the benches under the trees.

"So Miss Benson was expecting you!" said Mrs. Farquhar, who was walking with King. It is enough to mention Mrs. Farquhar's name to an habitue of the Springs. It is not so many years ago since she was a reigning belle, and as noted for her wit and sparkling raillery as for her beauty. She was still a very handsome woman, whose original cleverness had been cultivated by a considerable experience of social life in this country as well as in London and Paris.

"Was she? I'm sure I never told her I was coming here."

"No, simple man. You were with her at Bar Harbor, and I suppose she never mentioned to you that she was coming here?"

"But why did you think she expected me?"