CHAPTER XXI.

"Who pleasure follows pleasure slays; God's wrath upon himself he wreaks; But all delights rejoice his days Who takes with thanks, yet never seeks."

COVENTRY PATMORE.

Two days after this, I was surprised by the appearance on my plate, at breakfast, of two notes. The first proved to be an invitation for a party from a Mrs. Humphrey, cards for which Mrs. and Miss Churchill had received a week ago.

"Well!" exclaimed Josephine, unceremoniously, "I wonder what inspired Mrs. Humphrey to send you an invitation."

"It would be difficult to say," I returned, taking up the second. "Certainly no suggestion from you."

"Alps on Alps!" exclaimed Grace, looking over my shoulder. "Tickets for the Charity Ball! What next?"

"What, indeed," I said. "John, some more sugar in my coffee, if you please."

"Really, you don't seem much excited by your invitations. I suppose you don't intend to accept them?"

"Accept them!" echoed Josephine. "What an idea! It would be perfectly absurd to think of it, when it's understood that she's not out yet."

"I think I'll risk that," I answered, decidedly. "If Aunt Edith has no objection, I will avail myself of any invitations that I may receive for the next ten days. After that, Lent, you know, will decide the matter for us all."

"You must follow the dictates of your own judgment," returned my aunt, coldly. "Staying at home was your own choice, going out is at your own option."

"I know, dear aunt," I replied, with unaltered _sang froid_, "that you would do anything to indulge me in anything reasonable, and as I have quite set my heart upon this, I am sure you will not make any objection to it. You are the last person to put anything in the way of my pleasure and advantage."

"Pleasure and advantage are not always synonymous terms, my dear. What you might be pleased to consider pleasure, I might look upon as anything but advantageous, you know."

"Oh! we shall not differ as to that, I fancy. You cannot be more careful of me than of Josephine, and she has certainly tested pretty thoroughly the merits of the question. I should not think of going out as she does, to two or three parties of an evening, and spending the intervening hours of daylight in bed; but just three or four balls before the season closes, to see what it's all like, I really must enjoy, with your permission."

"Or without it," muttered Josephine. "You have enough _aplomb_ to sustain you in that or any other impertinence you might undertake."

"Josephine," said her mother, sternly, "you forget yourself. My dear," to me, "you know I shall put no obstacle in the way of your enjoyment. You have my full permission to do as you think best."

"Thank you," I answered; "and I have the greatest desire to go to one of these mammoth charity balls. How lucky that it comes to-night, and that Mrs. Humphrey's is to-morrow, so that I can go to both."

"In what, if I may ask," said Grace, "do you propose appearing?"

"That's a question, I fancy, that has not occurred to our young friend," remarked Josephine.

"It's easily enough settled," I answered. "White muslin, 'with variations,' will be a sufficient toilette for _me_, you know."

"You'll excuse me for saying, that I think it is a matter of very little moment to any one but yourself," said she, with a laugh, as she rose from the table.

"Don't be spiteful, Joseph," said Grace, the only error of whose tactics was, that she could not confine herself to any one side in an encounter, and could not resist administering a blow on any exposed cranium, indiscriminately of friend or foe--"don't be spiteful, Joseph. She couldn't help taking off Victor, you know. It was trying, to be sure, but then it left you more time for 'the substantials.'"

Josephine, pressing her lips together, darted a threatening look at her sister, who, with a pleasant little nod, slipped through the folding doors and vanished.

"May I speak to you a moment?" I said, following Mrs. Churchill into the butler's pantry.

"Certainly," she answered, in a tone that did not invite confidence.

I had followed my aunt to say two things to her: the first was about myself, the second was about Esther. I had meant to say that if she really thought I was doing an unwise thing in going to these balls, I was willing to give them up. Conscience had made a suggestion or two that morning, and I was not yet careless about its admonitions. A kind word of advice, a look of motherly reluctance to deny me pleasure, and yet of motherly solicitude for my good, would have settled the doubt, and put me in the right way. But the tone in which she said "certainly," and proceeded to fit the key into the wine-closet, without so much as a look toward me, roused all the evil in my heart.

"You will never be troubled with any of my repentances," I thought, angrily; and then, in a tone that I suppose took its color from my thoughts, I said:

"I came to say, Aunt Edith, that perhaps you are not aware how much it irritates Essie to have Félicie take care of her. Félicie doesn't seem to have a pleasant way with her, and now she is confined to the nursery, she is continually fretted and unhappy. I find her more feverish every time I go upstairs, and I thought perhaps if you were willing to let Frances sit up there instead, she would amuse and keep her quiet better. She seems to like Frances."

Mrs. Churchill turned around and regarded me attentively for a moment, then said:

"I am sorry that your own good sense did not teach you the impropriety of such an interference as this, and that I am obliged to remind you of our relative positions, before you can understand how much such a thing as this offends me. The management of the household is my province, and any interference or advice concerning it I reject decidedly. If Esther is peevish and ill-tempered, I certainly hope Félicie will be strict with her. I have no intention of humoring her caprices, or disarranging the family to suit her whims. You may dismiss the subject from your mind entirely."

I bowed and left the room, with what bitter and resentful feelings it is easy to imagine. When Essie came crying to the door of my room, half an hour after, I sent her away; I was busy, she must not come in, and though her miserable face haunted me, I stubbornly put back the counsel that it gave me. I had been told not to interfere, and I would obey. All day I did not interfere--all day the evil spirit ruled, and I heard, without a remonstrance, the storm from the nursery, which, however, gradually subsided as the day advanced. I had enough employment, meantime, to keep down conscience; there was a flounce of my white dress to be repaired, and the blue bows to be made before evening. Mr. Waschlager did not come; Mr. Olman, poor man, had been ill for a week, and to-morrow was Miss Berteau's day, so there was nothing of duty to fill up the hours that would have hung heavily if it had not been for the anticipations of, and preparations for, the evening,

I turned the key of my door on Grace, and the key of my heart on poor little Essie, and toward evening threw myself into a chair by the fire, and read the latest number of "The Newcomes." And who ever read Thackeray without feeling the greatest longing to see the world which he decries? Who ever laid down a volume of his without a more eager thirst for the pomps and vanities than they had ever felt before? Who wouldn't have been Ethel, "with all swelldom at her feet," even if she did cheat herself of her happiness, and stored up sorrow for the heavy years to come? Who could have the heart to say that Pen, in his zenith, wasn't to be envied? or that George Osborne wasn't a good fellow? I, for one, never felt any less attracted toward them because Mr. Thackeray, after spending on them the finest colors on his pallet, tells us they are not to be approved after all, and that they are not in the right way, and that they have any amount of discipline to go through before they are perfected. I always felt inclined to "skip" the discipline; the natural man was the genuine one--the improvement wasn't spicy. So, on this occasion, I read on, fascinated, till twilight's gradual fingers stole between me and the page, and I reluctantly gave it up, and dreamed on about the story till the dinner bell rang.

Then I started up, struck with a feeling of remorse that Essie had missed her accustomed twilight story for the first time this winter. I smoothed my hair and hurried into the nursery. Silence reigned there; Félicie sat by the dim light, quietly pursuing her work. I asked for Essie, and she rather sullenly pointed to the bed. It was unusual for her to sleep at this hour; indeed at all hours she was a light sleeper, and I had never before known her to be willing to lie down even in the daytime, so it was with some surprise that, on stooping down, I saw she was sleeping, and sleeping heavily.

"Why does she sleep so soundly, Félicie?" I said, looking up.

"Because she's sleepy, I suppose, mademoiselle," she answered, rather shortly.

It was not worth while being angry with the woman, and indeed I did not feel like resenting any impertinence to myself, as I looked down at the quiet face of the little girl. Asleep, and free from the haggard, restless expression that her features ordinarily wore, she was almost pretty, almost child-like, but even in sleep there was a weary look about her that was pitiful. "Poor little mite," I murmured, "I've been unkind to you all day. Why won't you wake up and kiss me?"

But she did not wake; and when, in the selfishness of my self-reproach, I lifted her up and kissed her, in the hope that it would rouse her, the little arms fell down, limp and lifeless, and the little head sunk heavily back on the pillow, and she slept on unmoved. My interference in the morning had not been without its effect; as I left by one door, my aunt entered by another. She had been up twice since morning, and I could see she was uneasy; but, looking down at the child, I heard her say, in a tone of relief:

"Ah! she's sleeping nicely now!" and the voice of Félicie responded blandly. I think it was a load off her mind, for at dinner she was unusually affable.

Phil and Captain McGuffy were dining with us, and were to accompany us in the evening. The captain was extremely gracious to me; and as on former occasions he had appeared as nearly unconscious of my presence as was possible, I simply concluded that the sagacious captain was like the rest of the world, and was better satisfied to trust looking through his neighbors' glasses than through his own.

"Ever so many people," he said to me, as the soup was being removed (the captain rarely conversed much while there was anything engrossing on the table), "ever so many people have asked me about sending you invitations, and I've told 'em by all means; for you certainly were going out."

"Why didn't you remind them of Grace and Esther, and let them have the whole of the nursery, while they were about it?" asked Josephine, scornfully.

"Grace can speak for herself," said that young person, tartly. "You may tell them, if they ask anything about me," she continued, turning to the captain, "that they needn't look for my _début_ till Josephine is disposed of, and I am, _par excellence_, Miss Churchill."

"Then," said the captain, gallantly, "you will not have a long time to wait, if what they say is true. I hear it hinted, Miss Josephine, that since Mr. Rutledge came from abroad this last time, he is quite changed, softened, you know, and made rather a society man; and they _do_ say that his friends in Gramercy Square have something to do with it."

"I can't imagine how," said Josephine, all smiles and blushes.

"If Joseph knew when she was well off," interposed Grace, who loved to damp her sister's triumphs, "she wouldn't blush; she doesn't look well; she grows mahogany color, doesn't she Phil. Why, you're blushing too! What's the matter with everybody?"

"Everybody is blushing at your rudeness," said Mrs. Churchill, gravely. "I am sorry to be obliged to reprove you at the table; but I assure you, if you are not more careful"----

"Oh, mamma! you've always said it wasn't polite to deliver a reprimand in company; don't break through your rule. I won't say another word about blushing. Let's talk of something pleasanter. So," she continued, turning to the captain, "they really say Mr. Rutledge wants to marry Josephine?"

"Grace, leave the table," said her mother, concisely, but in a tone there was no mistaking, and which fell on the ears of the startled company with uncomfortable clearness, and on none more unexpectedly than on those of the young delinquent herself, who had never been so unequivocally disgraced before. She had trusted greatly to her mother's partiality and her own acuteness in warding off reproof, and this took her quite by surprise. She had not calculated the dangerous nature of the ground she was treading on, nor the decision of her mother's character when once roused, and so this edict came upon her like a clap of thunder. She was constitutionally incapable of blushing, or of looking confused, but she approached on this occasion more nearly to a state of embarrassment than I had ever supposed she could; but recovering herself in a moment, she deliberately folded her napkin and put it on the table, pushed back her chair, made a low courtesy, and saying, "Bon soir, mesdames; bon soir, messieurs," retreated in good order.

Rather an awkward pause ensued upon her exit; but it was soon broken by Mrs. Churchill's half laughing apology for her pertness, and Josephine was too much delighted with her adversary's discomfiture to be long silent. And she almost forgot to be spiteful to me, too, in the triumph of her acknowledged conquest. Even the dreaded task of dressing and preparing for the ball was accomplished without half of its accustomed drawbacks. Grace wisely kept out of sight, and Frances was less fluttering and timid than usual, so that at nine o'clock we all mustered in the parlor with comparatively undisturbed tempers.

I had left Esther still asleep when I came down. Félicie had undressed her and put her back in bed without arousing her. "You'd hardly let me go so quietly if you were awake, I think," I said to myself, as I bent down to kiss her.

I found myself much more excited than I meant to be, as the carriage drew near the Academy of Music. My excitement, however, had time enough to cool, for carriages choked the streets on every hand, and it was the work of half an hour to effect an entrance. The steps were crowded, the lobbies were crowded, the cloak-room was a hopeless crush, but the full sense of bewilderment did not overcome me, till following the captain and Mrs. Churchill, we ascended another pair of stairs, and passing through a side door, stood looking down upon the magnificent scene below. The captain said he had never seen anything finer in this country, so I felt at liberty to be enchanted with it. The decorations and lights were brilliant, the music delightful, and the sight of so many thousands of gaily-dressed people crowding the boxes, the passages, the floor, could not fail to excite the enthusiasm of one so new to such scenes as I was. To Josephine, on the other hand, the ball seemed by no means a wholly rapturous affair. A ruthless foot had trodden on her dress, and torn the lowest flounce; Phil was out of humor, and refused to be devoted; the captain had his hands full with mamma, and Josephine searched in vain among the crowd for the one or ones she wanted. We were in a private box, and too far from the floor to recognize the dancers easily, and by some neglect, the opera-glasses had been left in the carriage. Josephine was unspeakably annoyed. They might as well be looking out of the third-story window at home, she declared. For me, the scene was enough for the present, without any nearer interest in it. If I could have been further forward, it would have been pleasure enough to me to have looked on, but my aunt and cousin occupying the front of the box, left me no view of the house, but over their heads.

By and by, however, the door of the box opened, and Mr. Rutledge entered. He had exchanged a few words with me before Josephine saw him; her face lighted up instantly, and after a cordial welcome from mamma, a place was made for him in front. This, however, he declined to occupy, as the captain had been on the ground before him, and was better entitled to the position. He had an opera-glass, which he handed to Josephine, and good humor was partially restored. The captain availed himself of the front seat, and criticised the dancers for madame's benefit; Phil stood behind his cousin's chair, and Mr. Rutledge was left to me. I knew this arrangement did not suit; I knew my aunt was hearing very little of the captain's commentary; I knew that Josephine, but for Phil's jealous watchfulness, would have paid much more heed to Mr. Rutledge's low conversation with me, than to her desired opera-glass. I remembered, but too vividly, the conversation at dinner; and though I struggled hard with my pride and my timidity, the words died on my lips, my answers were hesitating and reserved, and for the most part, insincere; I said the very things that, the next moment, I would have given worlds to have unsaid; I felt that every word was estranging us more hopelessly, and yet there seemed a spell upon us--I could not be myself. The questions I had meant to ask him, if I should ever have a chance, the sentences of which I had said to myself a hundred times, I could now no more have uttered than if they had been in an unknown tongue.

When he spoke of Rutledge, the blood that always flashed into my face at the name, now rushed to my heart, and left me paler and more listless than before. If my manner wore any change while he talked of his return there in a few days, and of my friends, Kitty and Stephen, Madge and Tigre, it was an increased indifference and coldness. I said no more than "yes" when he asked me if I still remembered them with interest, and "I don't know exactly," when he asked what message he should take to them from me. Then he changed the subject, and with his accustomed way of reading my face while he talked, he asked me about my impressions of society. Which was most to my taste now, city or country?

"I don't know exactly," I said, hesitatingly.

"I think I know," he said, with a laugh that nettled me, low and pleasant as it was. "I think there is small doubt about your preferences just now. You acknowledge my wisdom at last, do you not? You see it was best for you to come to the city?"

"Yes," I said, lifting my eyes for a moment. "You were very right. I ought to thank you very much for your advice."

"My dear," said my aunt, leaning toward us, "you cannot see at all there. You must take my place for a little while, I insist upon it."

The captain rose with great _empressement_, and insisted upon my accepting his seat, and in the midst of the confusion consequent upon this change, the door of the box opened again, and Mr. Viennet entered. Mr. Rutledge was placing a chair for me as I looked up and recognized the new comer. The chilled and frightened blood that had crept fluttering round my heart, at this moment rushed into my face, and burned guiltily in my cheeks, as I caught Mr. Rutledge's eye. Mr. Viennet, after a moment devoted to salutation, inquiry and compliment, entered a protest against our remaining any longer in such a detestable corner, pronouncing it _de_testable, in his charming little French way. No one could get at us; he had only found us by the merest chance. We must come downstairs--everybody was on the floor--everybody was dancing. He assured madame it was perfectly _convenable;_ it was spoiling the pleasure of too many to hide ourselves any longer.

This met Josephine's views exactly, and she importuned "mamma" very prettily to yield. "Mamma" looked doubtingly for a moment at Mr. Rutledge, who responded to the look by saying that he really thought her strict ideas of propriety might allow this liberty without suffering any outrage. It was something new for New York, but these balls had taken very well, and the best people attended them, not only as spectators, but as participators. As for dancing, he said, with a slight shrug, he rather wondered at any lady's liking such an exhibition; but a promenade on the floor for half an hour or so, he really should think we would find more entertaining than remaining in our box.

This partly settled the wavering in Mrs. Churchill's mind, and with a dainty sort of reluctance, she gave her consent to our going on the floor for a little while.

"Cheek by jowl with Tom, Dick and Harry," muttered Phil, giving his arm to Josephine, who took it with but indifferent grace, and bit her lip in annoyance, as, standing nearest the door, Mr. Rutledge and Mr. Viennet at the same moment offered me an arm. Can any girl understand the impulse that made me accept Mr. Viennet's? No man possibly can; my only hope of comprehension is from my own incomprehensible, perverse, self-torturing sex.

Once on the floor, it was hardly to be expected that we could obey my aunt's injunction to keep together, and within sight of her. In five minutes her ermine and diamonds, and the captain's moustache and epaulettes, were, though very dear, of course, to memory, utterly lost to sight, and Paul and Virginia were not more romantically alone than were we, in that vast human wilderness. It was a very amusing and nice thing to be lost. For half an hour we searched for our party, though not, it must be confessed, as if our whole happiness in life depended on our success, but no trace of them could be discovered.

"We must amuse ourselves _alors_, mademoiselle, and let them look for us," said my companion. "Was there ever such a waltz before? You cannot resist it any longer, I know you cannot."

Perhaps I might have resisted it, as well as his eloquent pleading, if, raising my eyes at this moment to the boxes we had occupied, I had not caught sight of Josephine and Mr. Rutledge, who had returned there, evidently much more interested in each other than in anything below them.

"I'll dance once," I said, and in a moment his arm was on my waist, and we were floating along the elastic floor to such music as the fairies dance to, on soft summer nights, with the blue vault of heaven above their heads, and the green sward beneath their feet, and all wild ecstatic and untamed rapture thrilling in their elfin bosoms.

Conscience was drugged that night; self-will and pride, self-appointed regents, were holding sway as only usurpers can; and the glowing hours fled away without record or remorse.

"_N'importe_," murmured my companion, when I suggested a doubt, and _n'importe_ I allowed it to be, as, whirling giddily from end to end of the vast area, or sauntering slowly through the gradually lessening crowd, we let the minutes slip away into hours. It was rather a startling recall to stern reality, when, at one end of the hall, suddenly encountering Phil, he laid a heavy hand on my partner's arm, exclaiming:

"Victor, my boy, if you've any mercy on that unlucky girl, come this way. There is such a scolding in store for her as she never had before. The carriage has been waiting an hour, and the captain and I, being detailed for the detective service, have pursued you faithfully, but you have eluded us most skillfully, I'll do you the justice to say! And Mr. Rutledge and the ladies have watched you from upstairs, and said--well, we won't say what pretty things."

"Extraordinary!" exclaimed Victor. "Why, _we_ have been hunting for _you_ till we were entirely discouraged, disheartened, in despair!"

"Ah, well!" exclaimed Phil, with a laugh, leading the way. "I only hope you'll be able to make Mrs. Churchill believe it. It's my duty to prepare you for the worst, however."

"And our duty to be brave," said my comrade. "And fortune favors such, they tell us, mademoiselle."

Certainly I could not feel otherwise than grateful to my protector for his ingenious and powerful defence, as we appeared before the offended group at the door of the cloakroom. Though my aunt received it politely, I well knew the wrath that her knit brow portended, and Josephine's look of contempt was unmistakable. Mr. Rutledge had his visor down; no earthly intelligence could discover anything of his emotions through that impassive exterior. Even the captain was irritated; Phil was neutral, but Victor was my only friend.

"Good night," he whispered, as he put me into the carriage. "We'll finish that redowa at Mrs. Humphrey's to-morrow night."

I wished, with all my heart, it was to-morrow night, and all that I foresaw must intervene, safely past. The scolding was not to come before morning, I saw at once, and when my aunt, on our arrival at home, dismissed me to my room, it was with a cold, "I wish to have a few minutes' conversation with you after breakfast to-morrow."

With that dread before me--with a guilty sense of wrong-doing, and a bitter sense of shame, a humbled condemnation of myself, and an angry resentment toward others, the restless hours of that night offered anything but repose, anything but pleasant retrospect or anticipation.

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