Part 3

"Well, I'll come," she answered. But she did not go for half an hour; Mr. Hammerton took the new book to her immediately and talked to her until her pale cheeks were in a glow.

The last day of the year, what a day it was!

It was like a mellow day in October; in the afternoon Tessa found herself wandering through Mayfield; as she sauntered past the school-house a voice arrested her, one of the voices that she knew best in the world. She stood near the entrance listening.

That thrilling pathetic voice; it had never touched her as it touched her to-day.

"Old year, you shall not die; We did so laugh and cry with you, I've half a mind to die with you, Old year, if you must die."

She stood but a moment, the voice read on, but she did not care to listen; she went on at a slow pace, enjoying each step of the way past the barren fields lying warm and brown in the sunlight, past the farm-houses, past the low-eaved homestead of the Harrisons, past the iron gates of the Old Place with the voice in her ears and the sigh for the old year in her heart. She almost wished that she could love Felix Harrison; she had refused him five times since her seventeenth birthday and in May she would be twenty-five! He had said that he would never ask her again. Why should she wish for any change to come into her life? If she might always live in the present, she would be content; she had her father and mother and Dine and Gus; her world was broad enough.

The sound of wheels had been pursuing her; a sudden stoppage, then another voice that she knew called to her, "Miss Tessa, will you ride with me?"

"Perhaps you are not going my way," she said lightly.

"I am going to Dunellen." He answered her words only.

As soon as they were seated in the carriage, she said very gravely, "I wrote you a letter last night, but I burned it this morning."

"I am sorry for that."

The words came out with a gasp and a jerk; she did not know that words _could_ choke like that, but she was glad as soon as she had spoken. "Mr. Towne, are you engaged to Sue Greyson?"

"Engaged! And to Sue Greyson!"

"I did not ask to be saucy--I did not believe it--but don't be heartless--don't be cruel--don't be stupid, do think about her, and don't let her die of shame."

"Excuse me, Miss Tessa. Why should you talk to me about Sue Greyson?"

"I knew that you would not understand."

"Perhaps you can explain."

"I can't explain; you ought to know."

"What ought I to know?" he queried, looking down at her with the sunshine in his eyes.

"It seems mean in me to tell you such a thing, but I do not know of any other way for your sake and hers. I would do any thing to keep you from doing a heartless thing."--Another heartless thing, she almost said.--"I would do any thing for Sue, as I would for Dine if _she_ had been led into trusting in a lie."

His face became perplexed, uncomprehending.

"Are you trying to tell me that Sue Greyson thinks that I am intending to marry her and that I have given her an occasion to believe it? You are warning me against trifling with Sue?"

"Yes."

"How do you know that she thinks so?"

"Nonsense! How do I know any thing?"

"I should as soon have thought--" he ended with a laugh.

"A woman's heart is not made of grains of sand to be blown hither and thither by a man's breath," she said very earnestly.

"Miss Tessa, you accuse me wrongfully. I have been kind to Sue--I have intended to be kind. Her life at home is too quiet for her, she has few friends and no education; you call me heartless. I thought that I was most brotherly and thoughtful."

His sincerity almost reassured her. Had she misjudged him?

"I beg your pardon," she said, after an uncomfortable pause. "I did not know that Old Place was a monastery and that you were a monk. If you are speaking sincerely, you are the most stupid human being that ever breathed; if you are not sincere, you are too wily for me to understand."

The color rose to his forehead, but he was silent.

"Mr. Towne! Excuse me. I am apt to speak too strongly; but I care so much for Sue. She is only a child in her experiences; she has no fore-thought, she trusts every body, and she thinks that you are so good and wonderful. She does not understand any thing but sincerity. Will you think about her?"

"I will."

She was almost frightened, was he angry?

"Are you angry with me?" she asked, laying her hand on his arm. "You can not misinterpret me; I don't want Sue to be hurt, and I do not want you to be capable of hurting her."

"I understand you, Miss Tessa."

He spoke gently; her heart was at rest again.

"You say that you can not understand whether I am wily or sincere?"

"I can not understand."

"Neither can I. But I _think_ that I am sincere!"

"And please be careful how you change your attitude towards her; you are unconventional enough to refuse a woman upon the slightest pretext. I know that you will say 'I regret exceedingly, Miss Sue, that you have misinterpreted my friendly attentions.'"

"I would like to; I think many things that I do not speak, Miss Tessa."

"Your head and heart would echo a perpetual silence if you did not," she laughed. "The Sphinx is a chatterbox compared to you."

As they drove up under the maple-trees before the low iron gate, he said, "Has this year been a happy year to you? Do you sleep well?"

"Wouldn't you like to look at my tongue and feel my pulse?" she returned in her lightest tone.

"Will you not answer me?" he asked gravely.

"This year has been the best year of my life."

"So has it been my best year. This winter I shall decide several things pertaining to my future; it is my plan to practice for awhile--and not marry!"

Were those last words for her? Discomfited and wounded--oh, how wounded!--her lips refused to speak.

"Good-by," she said, just touching his hand.

He turned as he was driving off and lifted his hat, the sunshine of his eyes fell full upon her; her smile was but a pitiful effort; what right had he to say such a thing to her?

"I hope," she said, as she walked up the path, "that I shall never see you again."

"I wish that I had never seen her," he ejaculated, touching his horse with the whip.

And thus a part of the old year died and was buried.

Shaking with cold, not daring to go away by herself, she irresolutely turned the knob of the sitting-room door; her face, she was aware, was not in a state to be taken before her mother's critical eyes; but her heart was so crushed, she pitied herself with such infinite compassion, that she longed for some one to speak to her kindly, to touch her as if they loved her; any thing to take some of the aching away from that place in her heart where the tears were frozen.

When she needed any mothering she gave it to herself; with her arms around her shivering, shrinking self, she was beseeching, "Be brave; it's almost over."

In the old days, the impulsive little Tessa had always chided herself; the sensitive little Tessa had always comforted herself; the truthful, eager, castle-building little Tessa had always been her own refuge, shield, adviser, and best comforter.

With more bosom friends than she knew how to have confidences with, with more admiring girl friends than she could find a place for, with more hearts open to her than to any one girl at school, Tessa the child, Tessa the maiden, and Tessa the woman had always lived within herself, leaned upon herself.

Mr. Hammerton said that she was a confutation of the oak and vine theory, that he had stood and stood to be entwined about, but that she would never entwine.

In this moment, standing at the door, with her hand upon the knob, a ray of comfort shone into her heart and nestled there like a gleam of sunlight peering through an opening in an under-growth, and the ray of comfort was, that, perhaps Gus Hammerton would come to-night and talk to her in his kindly, practical, unsentimental fashion, sympathizing with her unspoken thoughts, and tender towards the feelings of whose existence he was unaware.

Perhaps--but of late, did she fancy, or was it true? that he was rather shy with her, and dropped into the chair nearest to Dinah.

Well! she could be alone by and by and go to sleep!

So relentless was she, in that instant toward Ralph Towne that it would have been absolute relief could she have looked into his dead face: to see the cold lids shut down fast over the sunshiny eyes, to know that the stiff lips could never open to speak meaningless words, to touch his head and feel assured that, warm and soft, his fingers could never hold hers again.

"Why, Tessa, you look frozen to death," exclaimed her mother. "How far did you go and where did you meet Mr. Towne?"

"I went to Mayfield," she closed the door and moved towards the gay little figure reading "The Story of Elizabeth" upon the lounge. "Mr. Towne overtook me after I had passed Old Place."

"O, Tessa," cried Dinah, dropping her book, "Dr. Lake was here. What a pity you were out! He asked where 'Mystic' was. I made a list on the cover of my book of the things that he talked about. Just hear them. One ought to understand short-hand to keep up with him. Now listen."

Tessa stood and listened.

"'The Valley of the Dog, "'The Car of Juggernaut, "'Insanity, "'Intemperance, "'Tobacco, "'Slavery, "'Church and State, "'Conceit, "'Surgery, "'The English Government, "'Marriage, "'Flirtations, "'Ladies as Physicians, "'The Wicked World, "'A Quotation from Scott.'

"And that isn't half. I began to grow interested there, and forgot to write."

"Where did the professional call come in?"

"Oh, that doesn't take a second. He watches his patient while he talks! Oh, and he told two hospital stories, a story of his school life, and about being lost in the woods, and about a camp-meeting! He is from Mississippi. Your Mr. Towne couldn't say so much in ten years."

"He says that the disease in my lungs is not progressive, but that I should protect my health! I ought to spend every winter in the West Indies or in the south of Europe! South of Europe, indeed! On your father's business! Now if I had married John Gesner I might have spent my winters in any part of the civilized world."

"Would you have taken us?" asked Dinah.

"The future is veiled from us mercifully."

Dinah laughed. "Mother, you forget about love."

"_Love!_" exclaimed Mrs. Wadsworth scornfully, "I should like to know what love is."

"Father knows," said Dinah. "Have you read 'Elizabeth,' Tessa?"

"Yes."

"I'd _die_ before I'd act as she did, wouldn't you? I'd die before I'd let any body know that I cared for him more than he cared for me, wouldn't you?"

"It isn't so easy to die."

"Did Mr. Towne speak of Sue Greyson?" inquired Mrs. Wadsworth.

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

"Nothing--much?"

"He must have said something. Couldn't you judge of his feelings towards her?"

"I am not a detective."

"H'm," ejaculated Mrs. Wadsworth, glancing up at the uneasy lips, "if he can't talk or sing, he can say something."

"Possibly."

Standing alone at one of the windows in her chamber, she watched the sun go down the last night of the old year.

In her young indignation, she had called Ralph Towne some harsh names; while under the fascination of his presence, she had thought that she did not blame him for any thing; but standing alone with the happy, false old year behind her, and the new, empty year opening its door into nowhere, she cried, with a voiceless cry: "You are not true; you are not sincere; you are shallow and selfish."

At this moment, watching the same sunset, for he had an appreciation of pretty things, he was driving homeward almost as nerve-shaken as Tessa herself; according to his measure, he was regretting that these two trusting women were suffering because of his--he did not call it selfishness--he had been merely thoughtless.

Tessa's heart could kindle and glow and burn itself out into white ashes before his would feel the first tremor of heat; she had prided herself upon being a student of human nature, but this man in his selfishness, his slowness, his simplicity, had baffled her.

How could she be a student of human nature if she understood nothing but truth?

She was in a bitter mood to-night, not sparing Ralph Towne as she would not have spared herself. The crimson and gold faded! the gray shut down over her world: "How alone I shall be to live in a year without him!"

"O, Tessa! Tessa!" cried Dinah, running up-stairs, "here's Gus, and he has brought us something good and funny I know, for he's so provokingly cool."

How could she think thoughts about the old year and the sunset with this practical friend down-stairs and a mysterious package that must mean books! She had expected to cry herself to sleep; instead she read Dickens with Mr. Hammerton until the new year was upon them.

"Gus," she said severely, with the volumes of Dickens piled in her arms up to her chin, "if I become matter-of-fact, practical, and commonplace there will be no one in the world to thank but you. I had a poem at my finger tips about the old year that would have forever shattered the fame of Tennyson and Longfellow."

"As we have lost it, we'll be content with them," he said. "Drop your books and let us read them."

Before the dawn she was dreaming and weeping in her sleep, for a voice was repeating, not the voice in the school-house, nor the voice that had read Longfellow, but the voice that had spoken the cold good-by at the gate:

"The leaves are falling, falling, Solemnly and slow; Caw! Caw! the rooks are calling, It is a sound of woe, A sound of woe!"

IV.--SOMEBODY NEW.

There was the faintest streak of sunshine on the dying verbenas in her garden; the dead leaves, twigs, and sprays looked as if some one who did not care had trampled on them. She was glad that the plants were in, that there was a warm place for them somewhere.

The school children were jostling against each other on the planks, on the opposite side of the street, laughing and shouting. Nellie Bird was provokingly chanting:

"Freddie's mad, And I am glad, And I know what will please him."

and there were two little girls in red riding hoods, plaid cloaks, and gay stockings, skipping along with their hands joined. It was a hard world for little girls to grow up in. She had run along the planks from school once, not so very long ago, swinging her lunch-basket and teasing Felix Harrison just as at this minute Nellie Bird was teasing Freddie Stone.

Her needle was taking exquisite stitches; Dinah liked white aprons for school wear, and this was the last of the dainty half-dozen. Her mother's voice and step broke in upon her reverie.

"Tessa, I wouldn't have believed it, but six of my cans of tomatoes have all sizzled up! Not one was last year, though. Mrs. Bird never has such good luck with hers as we have with ours."

"That's too bad. But we have so many that we sha'n't miss them."

"That isn't the question. I remember how my side ached that day. Bridget was so stupid and you and Dine had gone up to West Point with Gus; he always is coming and taking you and Dine off somewhere! You are not attending to a word I say."

"Yes, I am; I am thinking how you took us all three to look at your cans of tomatoes."

"But you don't care about the tomatoes. You never do take an interest in house-work. I would rather have Sue Greyson's skin stuffed with straw than to have you around the house. And _she_ is going to marry Ralph Towne: she passed with him this morning; they were in the phaeton with that pair of little grays! And Sue was driving! I believe that you have taken cold in some way, you must see the doctor the next time he comes; your face is the color of chalk, and your eyes are as big as saucers with dark rims under them! You sat here writing altogether too late last night."

"It was only eleven when I went up-stairs."

"That was just an hour too late. What good does your writing do you or any body, I'd like to know."

"It is rather too early in my life to judge."

"Your father spoils you about writing; I suppose that he thinks you are a feather in _his_ cap; I tell him that you are none of my bringing up."

"I am not 'up' yet, perhaps."

"You may as well drop that work and take a run into Dunellen; the air will do you good. You had color enough in the summer. I want a spool of red silk, two pieces of crimson dress braid, and a spool of fifty cotton. Don't get scarlet braid, I want crimson; and run into the library and get me something exciting; you might have known better than to bring me that volume of essays!"

She folded the apron and laid it on the pile in the willow work-basket, wrapped herself in a bright shawl, covered her braids with a brown velvet hat, and started for her walk, drawing on her gloves as she went down the path.

Her mother stood at the window watching her. "She is too deep for me," she soliloquized; "there is more in her than I shall ever make out. She is so full of nonsense that I expect she has refused Ralph Towne, and what for, I can't see--there's no one else in the way."

In Tessa's pocket was a long and wide envelope containing the article that she had sat up last night to write; the lessons gathered from her old year she had told in her simple, quaint, forcible style. The title was as simple as the article: "Making Mistakes."

"Tessa, you are not brilliant," Miss Jewett had once remarked, "but you do go right to the spot."

The fresh air tinged her cheeks, she breathed more freely away from her work and her reveries; there was life and light somewhere, she need not suffocate in the dark.

It was not a long walk into the little city of Dunellen; fifteen minutes of brisk stepping along the planks brought her to the corner that turned into the broad, paved, maple-lined street. As she turned the corner, a lame child in a calico dress and torn hood staggered past her bent with the weight of a heavy basket. She stopped and would have spoken, but the shy eyes were not encouraging.

Two years ago all the world might have knocked at her gate and she would not have heard.

"Will you ride?" She lifted her eyes, with their color deepening, to find Mr. Towne sitting alone in his carriage looking down at her.

"You are going the wrong way."

"Because I am not going _your_ way?" he asked somewhat sternly.

"I thought that you had gone away," she said uncomfortably.

"We go on the seventeenth."

"You have not told me where?"

"Have I not? You have forgotten. Sue will stay at home and learn to be sensible."

"I don't like you when you speak in that tone."

"Then I will never do it again."

"Good-by," she said cheerily, passing on.

His thoughts ran on--"How bright she is! She has a sweet heart, if ever a woman had! I wonder if I _am_ letting slip through my fingers one of the opportunities that come to a man but once in a lifetime! A year or two hence will do; she cares too much to forget me."

Her thoughts ran on-"How _can_ you look so good and so handsome and not be true!"

With a quickened step she crossed the Park. Miss Jewett's large fancy store was opposite the Park.

Miss Jewett was never too tired or too busy to live again her young life. Sue Greyson was sure that she had broken somebody's heart, else she never was so eloquent in warning her about Stacey Rheid. Laura Harrison had decided that she had once lived in constant dread of having a step-mother. Mary Sherwood wondered if she had ever been a busybody, and in that experience had learned to warn her to keep quiet her busy tongue; and Tessa Wadsworth knew that she must have learned her one word of advice: "Wait," through years that she would not talk about.

Miss Jewett was seldom alone; Tessa was glad to find the clerks absent and no one bending over the counter but Sue Greyson.

"O, Tessa," she cried in her loud, laughing voice. "I haven't seen you in an age."

Miss Jewett's greeting was a hand-clasp; among all her girls (and all the girls in Dunellen were hers) Tessa Wadsworth was the elected one.

"Mrs. Towne has every thing so delicious," Sue was rattling on; "such perfumes and such silks and such jewels. Oh, how Old Place makes my mouth water! I wish you could go over the place, Tessa; you were never even through the grounds, were you? Mr. Ralph takes great pride in keeping it nice; of course, it is really his. I'd marry any body to live there and have plenty of money and do just as I please; not that Mr. Ralph isn't something out of the common, though. People say that he never means any thing by his attentions; Dr. Lake says--"

"I hear that you are going to St. Louis," interrupted Miss Jewett.

"No, I'm not. And I'm as provoked as I can be and live! Something has happened; Mr. Ralph is an uneasy mortal; he never knows what he will do next, and he has changed his mind about taking me. My cake is all dough about my winter's fun. How I cried the night she told me! The last night of the year, too, when I ought to have been full of fun. Mrs. Towne wants me to write to her, but I'd never dare, unless you would help me, Tessa, about the spelling and punctuation. Mr. Ralph would laugh until he died over my letters.

"I don't write to Stacey now, Miss Jewett. I wrote him a letter one Sunday from Old Place and told him that he might as well cease. Mr. Ralph and I had been walking through the wood and he asked me if I were engaged to Stacey! I thought it was about time to stop that."

"Perhaps if you had been home you wouldn't have written that letter. Stacey is a fine fellow."

"Oh, I had thought of it, but that day I decided! Stacey can hardly support one, let alone two. Father says that I was born to have a rich husband because I have such luxurious tastes! I know that I shall die cooped up at home. I have to go out to see the sons and daughters of the land. Tessa, I don't see how you live."

"I do, nevertheless," said Tessa, selecting her spool of silk.

"I shall have Dr. Lake this winter or I couldn't exist. He says that he will take me everywhere if father will only give him the time. He is great fun, only he does get so moody and serious; sits for two hours in the office with his head in his hands. Mr. Ralph doesn't have moods; he is always pleasant. I am going to stay these last few days at Old Place. Tessa, I am coming to stay all night with you and have a long talk."

"I shall be very glad; I have been wishing that you would."

"Oh, I'll come. I have a whole budget to tell you."

"Sue, you look thin," said Miss Jewett, rolling up her purchases.

"I _am_ thin. Since the night before New Years I have lost three pounds."

The night before New Years! Tessa's veil shaded her face falling between her and Sue.

"Mr. Ralph lectured me; oh, _how_ he talked! When he will, he will, that's the truth. His mother says that her will is nothing compared to his, and I believe it." Sue's face grew troubled. "He told me that I ought to read travels and histories, and throw away novels; that I ought to marry Stacey, if he is a good man and can take care of me--" Her voice sounded as if she were crying; she laughed instead and ran off.

"Something at Old Place has hurt Sue; I didn't like the idea of Mrs. Towne taking her up; Mr. Towne--I do not know about him! Do you?"

"No."

"Ah, here comes Sarah! Rachel has a sore throat, and Mary has gone to the city to buy to-day. Light the gas, Sarah."

The light flashed over the faces: Miss Jewett's almost as fair as a child's, and sweeter than any child's that Tessa had ever seen, with a mouth in the lines of which her whole history was written, with just a suspicion of dimples in the tinted cheeks, with brown rings of soft hair touching the smooth forehead; the younger face was hurried, anxious, with a trembling of the lips, and a nervous gleam in the eyes that were so dark, to-night, that they might have been mistaken for hazel.