The Linwoods Read online

  “And so am I, and so will I be to these fellows. This young man did only what any other young man would have done 138upon instinct; so don’t pester me any more about him. You know, Belle, I have sworn no rebel shall enter my doors.”

  “And you know, sir, that I have—not sworn; oh, no! but resolved, and my resolve is the feminine of my father’s oath, that you shall hang me on a gallows high as Haman’s, before I cease to plead that our doors may be opened to one rebel at least.”

  “Never, never!” replied her father, shutting his hall-door after him as he spoke, as if all the rebel world were on the other side of it.

  139CHAPTER XII.

  “Oui, je suis sûr que vous m’aimez, mais je ne le suis pas

  que vous m’aimiez toujours.”—MOLIERE.

  When Eliot rejoined his friend at the appointed rendezvous, Mrs. Billings’s, Herbert listened most eagerly to every particular of Eliot’s meeting with his father and sister, and thanked him over and over again for so thoughtfully smoothing the way for his interview with them in the evening. “Oh, Eliot,” he said, “may you never have such a hurricane in your bosom as I had when I stood by my father and Belle, and longed to throw myself at his feet, and take my sister into my arms. I believe I did kiss Jennet—what the deuse ailed the jade? she is the gentlest creature that ever stepped. Never doubt my self-control after this, Eliot!” Eliot’s apprehensions were not so easily removed. He perceived that Herbert was in a frame of mind unsuited to the cautious part he was to act. His feelings had been excited by his rencounter with his father and sister, and though he had passed through that trial with surprising self-possession, it had quite unfitted him for encountering the “botheration” (so he called it) that awaited him at Mrs. Billings’s.

  “We are in a beautiful predicament here,” he said; “our landlady, who is one of your ‘’cute Yankees,’ will not let us in till she has sent our names and a description of our persons to the Commandant Robertson’s:—this, she says, 140being according to his order. Now this cannot be—I will not implicate you—thus far I have proceeded on my sole responsibility, and if any thing happens, I alone am liable for the consequences. Are your instructions to stop at this house positive?”

  “Yes; and if they were not, we might not be better able to evade this police regulation elsewhere. I will see my countrywoman—‘hawks won’t pick out hawks’ e’en,’ you know they say; perhaps one Yankee hawk may blind another.”

  A loud rap brought the hostess herself to the door, a sleek lady, who, Eliot thought, looked as if she might be diplomatized, though a Yankee, and entitled to the discretion of at least forty-five years.

  “Mrs. Billings, I presume?”

  “The same, sir—will you walk in?”

  “Thank you, madam. Kisel, remain here while I speak with the lady.” Mrs. Billings looked at the master, then at the man, then hemmed, which being interpreted, meant, “I understand your mutual relations,” and then conducted Eliot to her little parlour, furnished with all the display she could command, and the frugality to which she was enforced, a combination not uncommon in more recent times. A carpet covered the middle of the floor, and just reached to the stately chairs that stood like grenadiers around the room, guarding the uncovered boards, the test of the housewife’s neatness. One corner was occupied by a high Chinese lackered clock; and another by a buffet filled with articles, like the poor vicar’s, “wisely kept for show,” because good for nothing else; and between them was the chest of drawers, that so mysteriously combined the uses which modern artisans have distributed over sideboards, wardrobes, &c. The snugness, order, and sufficiency of Mrs. Billings’s household certainly did present a striking contrast to the nakedness and desolation 141of our soldier’s quarters, and the pleased and admiring glances with which Eliot surveyed the apartment were quite unaffected.

  “You are very pleasantly situated here, madam,” he said.

  “Why, yes; as comfortably as I could expect.”

  “You are from Rhode Island, I believe, Mrs. Billings?”

  “I am happy to own I am, sir;” the expression of hostility with which the lady had begun the conference abated. It is agreeable to have such cardinal points in one’s history as where one comes from known—an indirect flattery, quite unequivocal.

  “I have been told, madam,” continued Eliot, “that you were a sufferer in the royal cause before you left your native state?”

  “Yes, sir, I may say that; but I have never regretted it.”

  “The lady’s loyalty is more conspicuous than her conjugal devotion,” thought Eliot, who remembered to have heard that, with some other property, she had lost her husband.

  “No, madam,” he replied, “one cannot regret sacrifices in a cause conscientiously espoused.”

  “Your sentiments meet my views, sir, exactly.”

  “But your sacrifices have been uncommon, Mrs. Billings; you have left a lovely part of our country to shut yourself up here.”

  “That’s true, sir; but you know one can do a great deal from a sense of duty. I am not a person that thinks of myself; I feel as if I ought to be useful while I am spared.” Our self-sacrificing philanthropist was driving a business, the gains of which she had never dreamed of on her steril New-England farm.

  “I am glad to perceive, Mrs. Billings, that your sacrifices are in some measure rewarded. You have, I believe, the best patronage in the city?”

  142“Yes, sir; I accommodate as many as I think it my duty to; my lodgers are very genteel persons and good pay. Still, I must say, it is a pleasure to converse with one’s own people. The British officers are not sociable except among themselves.”

  “I assure you our meeting is a mutual pleasure, Mrs. Billings. May I hope for the accommodation of a room under your roof for a day or two?”

  “I should be very happy to oblige you, sir. It appears to me to be a Christian duty to treat even our enemies kindly; but our officers—I mean no offence, sir—look down upon the rebels, and I could not find it suitable to do what they would not approve.”

  “As to that, Mrs. Billings, you know we are liable to optical illusions in measuring heights—that nearest seems most lofty.” Eliot paused, for he felt he had struck too high a note for his auditor; and lowering his pitch, he added, “you are a New-England woman, Mrs. Billings, and know we are not troubled by inequalities that are imaginary.”

  “Very true, sir.”

  “If you find it convenient to oblige me, I shall not intrude on your lodgers, as I prefer taking my meals in my own room.” This arrangement obviated all objection on the part of the lady, and the matter was settled after she had hinted that a private table demanded extra pay. Eliot perceived he was in that common case where a man must pay his quid pro quo, and acknowledge an irrequitable obligation into the bargain: he therefore submitted graciously, acceded to the lady’s terms, and was profuse in thanks.

  Looking over the mantel-piece, and seeming to see, for the first time, a framed advertisement suspended there, “I perceive, madam,” he said, “that your lodgers are required to report themselves to the commandant; but as my errand is from General Washington to Sir Henry Clinton, I imagine 143this ceremony will be superfluous; somewhat like going to your servants for leave to stay in your house. After obtaining it from you, madam, the honoured commander-in-chief?”

  “That would be foolish.”

  “Then all is settled, Mrs. Billings. As my man is a stranger in the city, you will allow one of your servants to take a note for me to Sir Henry Clinton?”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  Thus Eliot had secured an important point by adroitly and humanely addressing himself to the social sympathies of the good woman, who, though ycleped “a ’cute calculating Yankee,” was just that complex being found all the world over, made up of conceit, self-esteem, and good feeling; with this difference, that, like most of her country people, she had been trained to the devotion of her faculties to the provident arts of getting along.

  In
conformity to the answer received to his note, Eliot was at Sir Henry Clinton’s door precisely at half past one, and was shown into the library, there to await Sir Henry.

  The house then occupied by the English commander-in-chief, and afterward consecrated by the occupancy of Washington, is still standing at the southwestern extremity of Broadway, having been respectfully permitted by its proprietors to retain its primitive form, and fortunately spared the profane touch of the demon of change (soi-disant improvement) presiding over the city corporation.

  In the centre of the library, which Eliot found unoccupied, was a table covered with the freshest English journals and other late publications: among them, Johnson’s political pamphlets, and a poetic emission of light from the star just then risen above the literary horizon—Hannah More. Eliot amused himself for a half hour with tossing these over, and then retired to an alcove formed by a temporary damask drapery, enclosing some bookcases, a sofa, and a window. 144This window commanded a view of the Battery, the Sound, indenting the romantic shores of Long Island, the generous Hudson, pouring into the bay its tributary waters, and both enfolding in their arms the infant city, ordained by nature to be the queen of our country. “Ah!” thought Eliot, as his eye passed exultingly over the beautiful scene, and rested on one of his majesty’s ships that lay anchored in the bay, “How long are we to be shackled and sentinelled by a foreign power! how long before we may look out upon this avenue to the ocean as the entrance to our independent homes, and open or shut it, as pleases us, to the commerce and friendship of the world!”

  His natural revery was broken by steps in the adjoining drawing-room—the communicating door was open, and he heard a servant say, “Sir Henry bids me tell you, sir, he shall be detained in the council-room for half an hour, and begs you will excuse the delay of dinner.”

  “Easier excused than endured!” said a voice, as soon as the servant had closed the door, which Eliot immediately recognised to be Mr. Linwood’s. “I’ll take a stroll up the street, Belle—a half hour is an eternity to sit waiting for dinner!”

  “If Dante had found my father in his Inferno,” thought Isabella, “he certainly would have found him waiting for dinner!”

  The young lady, left to herself, did what we believe all young ladies do in the like case—walked up to the mirror, and there, while she was readjusting a sprig of jessamine with a pearl arrow that attached it to her hair, Eliot, from his fortunate position, contemplated at leisure her image. The years that had glided away since we first introduced our heroine on her vist to Effie, had advanced her to the ripe beauty of maturity. The freshness, purity, and frankness of childhood remained; but there was a superadded grace, an expression of sentiment, of thought, feelings, hopes, purposes, and responsibilities, 145that come not within the ken of childhood. Form and colouring may be described. Miss Linwood’s hair was dark, and, contrary to the fashion of the times (she was no thrall of fashion), unpowdered, uncurled, and unfrizzed, and so closely arranged in braids as to define (that rare beauty) the Grecian outline of her head. Her complexion had the clearness and purity that indicates health and cheerfulness. “How soon,” thought Eliot, as he caught a certain look of abstraction to which of late she was much addicted, “how soon she has ceased to gaze at her own image; is it that she is musing, or have her eyes a sibylline gaze into futurity!” Those eyes were indeed the eloquent medium of a soul that aspired to Heaven; but that was not, alas! above the “carking cares” of earth.

  We must paint truly, though we paint the lady of our love; and therefore we must confess that our heroine was not among the few favoured mortals whose noses have escaped the general imperfection of that feature. Hers was slightly—the least in the world—but incontrovertibly of the shrewish order; and her mouth could express pride and appalling disdain, but only did so when some unworthy subject made these merely human emotions triumph over the good-humour and sweet affections that played about this, their natural organ and interpreter.

  Her person was rather above the ordinary height, and approaching nearer to embonpoint than is common in our lean climate; but it had that grace and flexibility that make one forget critically to mark proportions and dimensions, and to conclude, from the effect produced, that they must be perfect. We said we could describe form and colour; but who shall describe that mysterious changing and all-powerful beauty of the soul, to which form and colour are but the obedient ministers?—who, by giving the form and dimensions of the 146temple, can give an idea of the exquisite spirits that look from its portals?

  Eliot was not long in making up his mind to emerge from his hiding-place, and was rising, when he was checked by the opening of the library door, and the exclamation, in a voice that made his pulses throb—“Nymph, in thy orisons be all my sins remembered!”

  “All, Jasper?” replied Miss Linwood, starting from her meditations, and blushing as deeply as if she had betrayed them—“all thy sins; I should be loath to charge my prayers with such a burden.”

  “Not one committed against you, Isabella,” replied Meredith, in a tone that made it very awkward for Eliot to present himself.

  “It would make no essential difference in my estimation of a fault whether it were committed against myself or another.”

  “Perhaps so!”

  Miss Linwood took up one gazette, and Meredith another. Suddenly recollecting herself—“Oh, do you know,” she said, “that Eliot Lee is in town?”

  “Now,” thought Eliot, “is my time.”

  “God forbid!” exclaimed Meredith. Miss Linwood looked at him with an expression of question and astonishment, and he adroitly added, “Of course, if he is in town he is a prisoner, and I am truly sorry for it.”

  “Spare your regrets—he comes in the honourable capacity of an emissary from his general to ours.”

  “It is extraordinary that he has not apprized me of his arrival—you must be misinformed.”

  Isabella recounted the adventure of the morning, and concluded by saying, “He must have some reason for withholding himself—you were friends?”

  147“Yes, college friends—boy friendship, which passes off with other morning mists—a friendship not originating in congeniality, but growing out of circumstances—a chance.”

  “Chance—friendship!” exclaimed Isabella, in a half suppressed tone, that was echoed from the depths of Eliot’s heart. He held his breath as she continued—“I do not understand this—the instincts of childhood and youth are true and safe. I love every thing and everybody I loved when I was a child. I now dread the effect of adventitious circumstances—the flattering illusions of society—the frauds that are committed on the imagination by the seeming beautiful.” Isabella was perhaps conscious that she was mentally giving a personal investment to these abstractions, for her voice faltered; but she soon continued with more steadiness and emphasis, and a searching of the eye that affected Meredith like an overpowering light—“chance friendship! This chance friendship may remind you of a chance love, growing out of circumstances too.”

  “No, no, Isabella, on my honour, no. In these serious matters I am a devout believer in the divinity that shapes our ends. The concerns of my heart never were, never could be at the mercy of the blind, blundering blockhead chance.”

  “Then, if it existed,” continued Isabella, her eye still riveted to Meredith’s face, where the pale olive had become livid—“if it had existed you would not—or rather, if you speak truly, you could not cast aside love for the sister as carelessly as you do friendship for the brother.”

  “If it existed!—my thanks to you for putting the question hypothetically; you cannot for a moment believe that I ever offered serious homage to that pretty little piece of rurality, Bessie Lee! Certainly, I found her an interesting exception to the prosaic world she lives in—a sunbeam breaking through those leaden New-England clouds—a wild rose-bud amid the corn and potatoes of her mother’s garden-patch. She relieved 148the inexpressible dulness of my position and pursuits. It was like finding a past
oral in the leaves of a statue-book—Aminte in Blackstone.”

  Poor Eliot: his ears tingled, his brain was giddy.

  “The case may have been reversed to Bessie,” answered Isabella, “and you may have been the statute-book that gave laws to her submissive heart.”

  “Ça peut-être!” replied Meredith; but he immediately checked the coxcomb smile that curled his lips, for it was very plain that Miss Linwood would bear no levity on the subject of her friend; and he added, apparently anxiously recalling the past,—“No—it is impossible—she could not make so egregious a mistake—she is quite unpresuming—she must have understood me, Isabella.” There was now emotion, serious emotion in his voice. “Bessie Lee was not a simpleton; she must have known what you also know”—he faltered. Eliot would have given worlds for a single glance at Isabella’s face at this moment; but even if the screen between them had fallen he could not have seen it, for she had laid her hands on the table and buried her face in her palms. “I appeal,” continued Meredith, “from this stage of our being, troubled and darkened with distrust, to our childhood—that you say is true and unerring:—then, Isabella, believe its testimony, and believe that, from the fountain which you then unsealed in my heart, there has ever since flowed a stream, never diverted, and always increasing, till I can no longer control it. Not one word, not one look, Isabella? Again I appeal to the past:—were you unconscious of the wild hopes you raised when you said, ‘I love everybody that I loved in my childhood?’”

  “Oh!” cried Isabella, raising her head, “I did not mean that—not that!”

  The drawing-room door opened, and Helen Ruthven appeared, calling out, “Isabella Linwood—a tête-à-tête—ten thousand pardons—but, Isabella dear, as the charm is 149broken, do come here, and you too, Mr. Meredith—here is the drollest looking fellow at Sir Henry’s door. He was walking straight into the hall, when the sentinel pointed his bayonet at him. ‘Now don’t,’ said he, ‘that’s a plaguy sharp thing, and you’ll hurt me if you don’t take care; I only want to speak a word to my kappen,’ meaning captain, you know. Finding the sentinel would not let him pass, he screamed out to me as I was coming up the stairs, ‘Miss, just please give my duty to Gin’ral Clinton, and ask him if he wont be so accommodating as to let me speak to Kappen Lee.’—Was it not comical?”