Part 12

"I do not know how to talk to you; you remind me of Tryphena and Tryphosa; St. Paul would know what to say to you. You seem to have no worldliness in your aims. Your style is impressive. I think that we can keep your pen busy. Your last manuscript is still in the balance."

"If it be found wanting, what shall I do! The suspense wears upon me."

"I begin to understand why mediocrity is long-lived. Don't be a goose, child."

Mr. Wadsworth was at his desk; he read the letter through twice without comment.

"Well!" she said, playing with a morsel of pink blotting paper.

"It's _beautiful_, daughter."

She wondered why it did not seem so much to her as it did to him and to Miss Jewett.

"I expect that Dine will take to authorship next."

Tessa's lips were keeping a secret, for Dine was writing a little story. When had she ever failed to attempt the thing that Tessa had done? She had not taken Tessa's place in school, and had been graduated much nearer the foot of her class than Tessa had ever stood; still she had Tessa's knack of writing stories, and telling stories, and had, at her urging, written a story for boys, which Tessa had criticised and copied; Dinah's penmanship being very pretty, but not at all plain. The letter made no allusion to the fate of Dinah's story; somewhat anxious about this, she slipped the bulky envelope into her pocket and turned her face homewards. Her winter's work was laid out for her; there was nothing to do but to do it.

So full was she with plans for the books that she did not hear steps behind her and at her side until Sue Greyson nudged her.

"Say, Tessa, turn down Market Street with me; I have something to tell you." The serious, startled voice arrested her instantly. What new and dreadful thing had Sue been doing now? Her only dread was for Dr. Lake.

"I've been ordering things for dinner; we have dinner at four, so I can afford to run around town in the morning. I'm in a horrid fix and there's nobody to help me out."

"What about?"

"_I_ haven't been doing any thing; it's other people; it's always other people," she said plaintively, "somebody is always doing something to upset my plans. You do not sympathize with me, you never do."

"I do not know how to sympathize with any thing that is not straightforward and true, and your course is rather zigzag."

"Dr. Towne said--"

"You haven't been talking to _him_," interrupted Tessa, flushing.

"No, only he called to see father and I was home alone and he asked me what ailed me and I had to tell him that I didn't want to be married."

"Well, what could he say?"

"He said, 'Stay with your father and be a good girl,'" laughed Sue, "the last thing I would think of doing. Father looks so glum and says, 'Oh, my little girl, what shall I do without you! I wish that fellow was at the bottom of the sea!' So do I, too. I don't see why I ever promised to marry him! I think that I must have been bereft of my senses."

"Why not ask him to wait a year--you will know your own mind--if you have any--by that time."

"Oh, deary me! I'd be married to John Gesner or some other old fool with money by that time! You don't mind being an old maid, but _I_ do!"

"How do you know that I don't mind?" Tessa could not forbear asking.

"Oh, you wouldn't be so happy and like to do things. I believe that I like Gerald a great deal better any way."

She grew frightened at Tessa's stillness; there was not one sympathetic line in the stern curving of her lips.

"Have you told Dr. Lake that?"

"You needn't cut me in two," laughed Sue uneasily, "men can't _sue_ women for breach of promise can they?"

"Answer me, please."

Sue hesitated, colored, stammered, finally confessed in a weak voice that tried hard to be brave, "Yes, I have! There now! You can't hurt me! Father said last night that if I had taken Lake he would have given me the house and every thing in it 'for the old woman to keep house with,' you know! And then he said that it was hard for me to leave him now that he is growing old, that he would have to marry somebody that wouldn't care for him, that he never had had much pleasure in his life, that Gerald was a good physician and they could work together and how happy we might all have been! He was mad enough though when he first discovered that Gerald was in love with me; he threatened to send him off. But that's his way! He is one thing one day and another thing the next! And I couldn't help it, Tessa, I really, _really_ couldn't, but I was so homesick and just then Gerald came in--he looked so tired, his cough has come back, too--and when he said 'How many days yet, Susan?' I said quick, before I thought, 'I like you a hundred times better! I would rather marry you than Stacey.' And then he turned so white that I thought he was dead, and he said something, I don't know whether it was swearing or praying--and caught me in his arms, and said after that he would never let me go! And then I said--I said--I couldn't help it--that I would write to Stacey and send back the ring and he took it off and tossed it out the window! I And then I made him go and find it! Stacey can give it to some other girl. I didn't hurt it. I always took it off when I swept or wet my hands. Life is so uncertain, I thought that he might want it again."

"Life _is_ uncertain. I never realized it until this minute."

"Now your voice isn't angry," said poor Sue eagerly. "I want you to think that I have done right."

"When my moral perceptions are blunted, I will."

"Go away, saying 'moral perceptions.' I don't know what Dr. Towne will think either. Well, what's did can't be undid! Now Gerald says that I sha'n't put it off, but that I've got to marry him on that day. I know that you think it is horrid, but you never have lovers, so you don't know! I don't see why, either. You are a great deal prettier than I am. When I am tired, I am the lookingest thing, but you always look sweet and peaceful. Don't you think that I ought to please father and stay home? Why don't you say something? Are you struck dumb?"

"I can not understand it--yet."

"I think that I have made it plain enough," cried Sue, angrily. "You must be very stupid. You like Gerald so much--I used to be jealous--that you ought to be glad for him!"

"I do like him. I like him so well, Sue, that I want him to have a faithful and true wife. O, Sue! Sue Greyson! What are you to take that man's life into your hands?"

"I don't know what you mean. I love him, of course! If you think so much of him, why don't you marry him?"

"The question is not worth a reply."

"You ought to comfort me; I haven't any mother," returned Sue, miserably.

"It is well for her that you haven't."

"I don't see why you can't let me be comfortable," whined Sue; "every thing would be lovely if you didn't spoil it all. Gerald is as wild as a lunatic. He shall write to Stacey or father shall, or I'll be married beforehand and send him the paper. I could do it in ten days. Do come home with me, I want you to see my wedding dress! It's too lovely for any thing. My travelling dress is an elegant brown; I got brown to please Stacey, but Gerald likes it."

"It's a good idea to choose a color that gentlemen like generally; life is so uncertain."

"So it is," replied Sue, unconsciously. "I think that you might congratulate me," she added, with her hysterical laugh. "You didn't think that your gold thimble would make pretty things for Dr. Lake's wife, did you?"

"I congratulate _you_! I hope that I may congratulate him, in time. Dr. Lake is trying to pour a gallon into a half pint. I hope that one of you will die before you make each other very miserable."

"You mean thing," said Sue, almost crying.

"I do not mean to hurt you, Sue, but you are doing something that is wretched beyond words. Don't you care at all for that poor fellow who loves you?"

"Gerald loves me, too," she answered proudly. "You are ugly to me, and I haven't any body that I dare talk to but you. Mary Sherwood says that telling you things is like throwing things into the sea; nobody ever finds them."

"I must be very full of rubbish."

"We are going to Washington on our bridal trip; we can't stay long, for father will not spare Gerald. I shall ask nobody but Dr. Towne and his mother, and Miss Jewett, and you, and Dine. Will you come?" she asked hesitatingly.

"I will come for Dr. Lake's sake."

"I got a letter from Stacey this morning. I haven't opened it yet; it will make me very sad. I wish that I wasn't so sensitive about things. It's a dreadful trouble to me. I looked in the glass the first thing this morning expecting that my hair would be all white. I'm dying to show you my things; do come home with me."

"Sue, do you ever say your prayers?"

"To be sure I do," she replied, with a startled emphasis.

"Then be sure to say them before you write to that poor fellow."

"I wish that you would write for me. Will you come the night before and stay all night with me? I shall be so afraid that the roof will tumble in, or somebody come down the chimney to catch me, that I sha'n't sleep a wink."

The curves of Tessa's lips relented. "Yes, I will come. If somebody come they shall catch me, too."

"You are a darling, after all. We are to be married about noon; Day is to send in the breakfast and the waiters--that _was_ the plan, and if father isn't _too_ mad, I suppose he'll do the same now."

She stood still at the corner. "Well, if I do not see you--good-by till the last night of your girlhood."

"Last night of my girlhood," repeated Sue. "What are the other hoods?"

"Womanhood."

"Oh, yes, and _widowhood_," she said lightly.

Tessa turned the corner and walked rapidly along the pavement. "Motherhood," she was thinking, "the sweetest hood of all! But I can sooner think of that in connection with a monkey or a butterfly than with Sue."

At the next corner another interruption faced her in the forms of Mary Sherwood and laughing Naughty Nan.

The lively chat was ended with an expostulation from Nan. "Now, Mary Sherwood, hurry. You know that I must do several things this afternoon. I'm going to Mayfield and Green Valley with the handsome black bear, Miss Wadsworth."

It was the day for her afternoon with Mrs. Towne; it had chanced that she had given to her every Tuesday afternoon. It touched her to find the white-haired, feeble, old lady watching for her at the window. Tessa loved her because she was cultured and beautiful; she loved her voice, her shapely, soft hands, her pretty motions, her elegant and becoming dress, and because--O, foolish Tessa, for a reason that she had tossed away, scorning herself--she was Ralph Towne's mother. Not once in all these times had she met Dr. Towne in his own home; not until this afternoon in which he was to take Miss Gerard driving.

"My mother is engaged with callers, Miss Tessa; she asked me to take you to her sitting-room, and to take care of you for half an hour."

"I am sorry to trouble you," said she confusedly. "I want to see Miss Jewett; I will return in half an hour."

"And not give me the pleasure of the half hour? When have you and I had half an hour together?"

She remembered.

"On the last night of the old year, was it not? Come with me and 'take off your things.' Isn't that the thing to say?"

Unwillingly she followed him; he wheeled a chair into one of the wide windows overlooking the Park, laid away hat, sacque, and gloves, then seated himself lazily in the chair that he had wheeled to face her own. It was almost like the afternoons in the shabby parlor at home; so like them that she could not at first lift her eyes; in a mirror into which she had glanced, she had noticed how very pale lips and cheeks were and how dark her eyes were glowing.

He bent forward in a professional manner and laid two fingers on her throbbing wrist. "Miss Tessa, what are you doing to lose flesh so?"

With that, she lifted her eyes, the color coming with a rush. "Wouldn't you like to see my tongue, too?"

"I know your tongue; it has a sharp point."

"I am sorry."

"No you are not," he answered settling himself back in an easy position, and taking a penknife from his pocket to play with. The small knife, with the pearl handle; how often she had seen that in his fingers. "You are a student, of human nature; tell me what you think of me."

How could she give to that amused assurance the bare, ugly truth!

"How many times have you changed your mind about me?"

"Once, only once."

"Then your first impression of me was not correct."

With her usual directness, she answered, "No."

The blade snapped. If she had seen but his face she would have supposed that he had cut himself. She hastened to speak: "Some one says that we must change our minds three times before we can be sure."

"But I do not want to wait until you are sure."

"I am sure now."

"No doubt. Tell me now."

How many times his irresistibly boyish manner had forced from her words that she had afterward sorely regretted!

"You will not be pleased. You will dislike me forever after."

"Much you will care for that."

"Shall I not?" smiling at the humor in his eyes. "I think that I do not care as I once did for what people think of me; the question nowadays is what I think of them."

"I will remember," he said urgently, "that I brought it all upon my own head."

How could he guess that in her heart was lodged one unpleasant thought of him? Had she not a little while--such a little while since--cared so much for him that he was grieved for her?

"You must promise not to be cross."

"I promise," taking out his watch. "You may hammer at me for twenty minutes. I have an engagement at half past three."

Did Nan Gerard care as she had cared once? Would the sound of his wheels be to Naughty Nan what they were to her a year ago? A blue and gold edition of Longfellow was laid open on its face on the broad window-sill; she ran her forefinger the length of both covers before she could temper her voice; she did not wish to speak coldly, and yet her heart was very cold towards him.

"I think that you took me by surprise at first; I thought you were the handsomest man in the world--"

"You have changed that opinion?" he said, laughing.

"Yes; I should not think of describing you as handsome now; I should simply say that you were tall, dark, with deep-set, not remarkable, brown eyes, a quiet manner, given to few words--not at all remarkable, you are aware."

"Go on, I am not demolished yet."

"Your spirit I created out of my own fancies; I gave you in those enthusiastic days a heart like a woman's heart, and a perfect intellect. You were my Sir Galahad, until I knew that some things you said were not--quite true?"

"Not quite true!" he repeated huskily.

Her eyes as well as her fingers were on the blue covers.

"Not true as I meant truth. Your words did not mean to you what they meant to me--I beg your pardon; do not let me savor of strong-mindedness, but I speak from my heart to your heart. You asked me a question frankly, I have answered it frankly. You said some things to Sue that you ought not to have said and that hurt me; I began to feel that you are not sincere through and through and through. At first I believed wholly in you and then I believed not at all. I was very bitter. And it hurt me so that I would rather have died."

Her tone was as cold and even as if she were reciting a theorem in _Legendre_.

"So you died because you were not true, but you did not go to heaven because you had never lived, and therefore I can not expect to find you again. I did not know before how sad such a burial is."

"Why can not you expect to find me again?"

"To find what? That fancy? If there is any one in the world as good, as true, as strong, gentle and sympathetic as my ideal, I surely hope to find that he is in the world."

"You thought that his name was Ralph Towne, and now you know that his name is not Ralph Towne."

"I do not know what his name may be."

"You think the real Ralph Towne is a stranger not worth knowing?"

"He is a stranger, certainly; whether or not he is worth knowing you know best."

She laughed, but not the suspicion of a smile gleamed in his eyes; she had forgotten that they could be as dark and stern as this.

"Time will show you, Miss Tessa," he said humbly.

"I _am_ sharp. I did not mean to be. But it cuts me so when I think that you can flirt with girls like Sue and Miss Gerard. Do you know of what it reminds me? Once the enemy fell upon the rear of an army and smote all that were feeble, when they were faint and weary; it was an army of women and little children, as well as men, and they did not go forth to war; all they asked was a peaceable passage through the land."

The door was pushed softly open; Tessa lifted her eyes to behold the rare vision of shining gray silk, and real lace, a fine face crowned with white braids and lighted by the softest and brownest of brown eyes.

"My dear." All her motherhood was concentrated in the two worn-out words.

"Now you may run away, Ralph."

"I am very glad to," he said. "Good afternoon, Miss Tessa."

Tessa could not trust her voice to speak; raising her eyes she met his fully as he turned at the door to speak to his mother; a long searching look on both sides; neither smiled.

"Tessa, have you been quarrelling with my boy?"

"No, ma'am."

"Has he been quarrelling with you?"

"No, ma'am."

Mrs. Towne seated herself in the chair that Dr. Towne had vacated, arranged her dress and folded her hands in her lap.

"It is Nan Gerard again! What a flirt that girl is! She called yesterday and Ralph chanced to come in while she was here; she gave him such an invitation to invite her to drive with him that he could not--that is, he did not--refuse. I wish that he wouldn't, sometimes; but he says that he is amused and no one is harmed. I am not so sure of that. I do not understand Miss Gerard. I think that I do not understand girls of this generation. But I understand you."

"I wish that you would teach me to be as wise."

"You will be by and by. Do you know what I would like to ask you to promise?"

"I can not imagine."

"I have studied you. If you will give yourself five years to think, to grow, you will marry at thirty the man that you would refuse to-day. You are impetuous to-day, you form your judgments rashly, you despise what you can not understand, and you are not yet capable of the love that hopeth all things, endureth all things, that suffereth long and is _kind_."

"That is true; I am not capable of it. I have no patience with myself, nor with others."

"If you will wait these five years, your life and another life might be more blessed."

"Mrs. Towne! No one loves me. There is no occasion for me not to wait. I could promise without the least difficulty for the happiness or unhappiness of marriage is as unattainable to me to-day as the happiness or unhappiness of old age."

"I will not ask you to promise, my daughter, but I will ask you to promise this; before you say to any man, 'Yes,' will you come to me and talk it all out to me? As if I were really your mother!"

Tessa promised with misty eyes.

"I promised to show you an old jewel-case this afternoon," said Mrs. Towne in a lighter tone. "I wish that I might tell you the history of each piece." She brought the box from a small table and pushed her chair nearer Tessa that she might open it in her lap. "This emerald is for you," she said, slipping a ring containing an emerald in old-fashioned setting upon the first finger of Tessa's left hand; "and it means what you have promised. All that your mother will permit me, I give to you this hour."

"You are very kind to me."

"I am very kind to myself. All my life I have wanted a daughter like you: a girl with blue eyes and a pure heart; one who would not care to flirt and dress, but who would love me and talk to me as you talk to me. I am proud of my boy, but I want a daughter."

"I am not very good; you may be disappointed in me."

"I do not fear that. This, my mother gave me," lifting pin and ear-rings from the box. A diamond set in silver formed the centre of the pin; the diamond was surrounded by pearls of different sizes. "I was very proud of this pin. I did not know then that I could not have every thing in the world and out of it. This pin my father gave me."

Tessa laid it in her hand and counted the diamonds; it was a diamond with nine opals radiating from it, between each opal a small diamond. "It looks like a dahlia," she said. "I love pretty things. This ring is the first ring that I ever had."

"People say that the emerald means success in love," replied Mrs. Towne. "I did not remember it when I chose that for you. Perhaps you would prefer a diamond."

"I like best what you chose," said Tessa, taking from among the jewels, bracelet, pin, ear-rings and chatelaine of turquoises and pearls, and examining each piece with interested eyes. "These are old, too."

"Every thing in this box is old. Some day you shall see my later jewels. You will like this," she added, placing in her hands a bracelet formed of a network of iron wire, clasped with a medallion of Berlin iron on a steel plate; the necklace that matched it was also of medallions; the one in the centre held a bust of Psyche; upon the others were busts of men and women whom Tessa did not recognize; to this set belonged comb, pin, and ear-rings.

"These belonged to my mother. How old they are I do not know. See this ring, a portrait of Washington, painted on copper, and covered with glass. It is said to be one of the finest portraits in the country. I used to wear it a great deal. My father gave it to me on my fifteenth birthday. Have I told you that Lafayette kissed me when I was an infant in my mother's arms?"

While Tessa replaced the treasures with fingers that lingered over them, with the new weight of the emerald upon her finger, and the new weight of a promise upon her heart, Mrs. Towne related the story of the kiss from Lafayette.

Tessa was a perfect listener, Mrs. Towne thought; the lighting or darkening of her eyes, a flush rising to her cheeks now and then, the curving of the mobile lips, an exclamation of surprise or appreciation, were most grateful to the old heart that had found after long and intense waiting the daughter that she could love and honor.

In the late twilight Dr. Towne returned; Tessa was still listening, with the jewel-case in her lap.

"I have missed my husband with all the old loneliness since we came into Dunellen," she was saying when her tall son entered and stood at her side.

"Mother," he said, in the shy way that Tessa knew, "you forget that you have me."

"No, son, I do not forget; but your life is full of new interests. Yesterday I did not have ten minutes alone with you."

"It shall not happen again."

"I have persuaded Tessa to stay and hear Philip to-night; she says that he is like a west wind to her."

"He would not fall upon the hindmost in your army, Miss Tessa."

"I am sure that he would not."

"Not if they coaxed him to?"

"He should have manliness enough to resist all their pretty arts, and enticing ways."

"Mother, can't you convince her? She has been rating me soundly for flirting, when it is the girls that are flirting with me."

"It takes two to flirt," replied his mother.

Dr. Towne was sent for as they were rising from the dinner table; Mrs. Towne and Tessa crossed the Park alone; at the entrance of the Lecture Room Sue Greyson met them.

"I _had_ to come," Sue whispered, seizing Tessa's arm. "Father is so horrid and hateful, and said awful things to me just because I asked _him_ to write to Stacey. The letter is written anyhow, and I'm thankful it's over. Father says that he won't give me the house, and that I sha'n't be married under his roof. He is mad with Gerald, too, and told him to leave his house. So Gerald left and went to see a patient. He is so happy that he don't care what father says."