As Ralph Harrington was returning
from Benson’s cabin one night, he met Agnes
Barker. It was yet early in the evening, but the
sharp, frosty air rendered it singular that a young
girl should have ventured into the cold, without some
important object to urge her forth. Ralph had
been touched, and a good deal subdued, by his conversation
with Ben; and he would gladly have avoided this rencontre
with the governess, who invariably left him excited
and wretched with fresh doubts whenever he conversed
with her. But Agnes came directly towards him,
and he remarked that her manner of walking was excited,
and like that of a person who had some important object
to pursue.
“Mr. Ralph Harrington, you have
been unjust to me. When I told you that Lina
French was still in the neighborhood quietly domesticated,
where your saintly step-brother could visit her at
will, you disbelieved me, and cast discredit on my
word. Since then, James Harrington has disappeared
mysteriously as she did. I now say that he, also,
is in the city, making preparations to take the girl
South; in a few days she will leave it with him.”
“Why should he take this course,
Miss Barker, if it is true? My brother was wealthy,
free, and has been for years his own master. If
he loved Lina, there was no need of concealment nothing
but my own mad passion stood in the way, and Heaven
knows that I was ready to take the heart from my bosom,
could that have made him or her happier. There
is a mystery in all this that I cannot fathom.
My brother, so noble, so more than generous, could
not have lived the life he has, to prove this traitor
to himself and us at last.”
“Then you still have faith in this girl?”
“I will not believe so ill of
her as you seem to desire, until some farther explanation
is had. She may love my brother, and he, I cannot
well understand how any man could help loving her,
for she was the purest, the most lovely character
I ever knew.”
“She was that character,
it is well you say was,” answered Agnes, with
a dash of scorn in her voice; “for I am about
to offer you proof of what she is.”
Ralph turned white, and recoiled a
step back. “Proof proof, have
you heard something, then?”
“Yes, I have heard from Miss
Lina she has sent for me. A private
message, of which no one is to be informed.”
“And, when are you going? where
is she now?” inquired Ralph, in breathless astonishment.
“Now,” answered Agnes.
“She has sent a conveyance from the city, which
waits at a curve of the road. I may not return
to-night may never return. My occupation
here is gone, and no one will regret me. I came
unloved, and I go away the stranger I was then!”
It was dark, and Ralph could not see
her face distinctly, but the sound of tears was in
her voice.
“Not so not so!”
said he, impetuously. “You will be regretted we,
at least, are not strangers; I will go with you.
If this girl is in the city, I will convince myself
of the fact; then, if your suspicions were correct,
she shall never occupy a thought of mine while I have
existence.”
“Go with me if you wish,”
said Agnes, mournfully; “it will be a few moments
taken from the desolation of life that must follow;
after that I shall be alone.”
Ralph scarcely heeded her; a wild
desire to see Lina, and convince himself of her falsehood,
drove all other thoughts from his mind; but the words
and voice which bespoke so much tender sorrow, were
remembered afterward.
“Come, let us begone at once,”
he said, folding his paletot closely, and drawing
her arm through his. “I thank Heaven this
suspense will be ended to-morrow. I shall be
a man again.”
Agnes leaned heavily on his arm; the
deep snow made walking difficult, and this was her
excuse. Ralph only noticed it to lend her assistance;
his thoughts ran wildly toward Lina French, the gentle,
kind-hearted girl who had been so long a portion of
his own life, and whose unworthiness he could not
yet wholly realize.
A two-horse sleigh, crowded with buffalo
robes, evidently the equipage of some wealthy establishment,
stood on the highway where it swept down to General
Harrington’s mansion. Ralph helped his companion
in, and they dashed off noiselessly as lightning,
and almost as swift.
No word was spoken between the two
during the ride. Agnes shivered now and then,
as if with cold, and this aroused Ralph for an instant
from the painful reverie into which he had fallen;
but he only drew the fur robes more closely about
her, and sunk into perfect unconsciousness of her
presence once more. Thus, in profound silence
they reached the city, and dashing onward, they drew
up before the house to which Lina had been conveyed
only a few weeks before.
“This is the house,” said
Agnes, pushing the fur robes from around her; and,
without waiting for help, she sprang out, and mounted
the steps just as the door was opened by some one
from within. A single word passed between her
and the servant, just as Ralph reached her side; but
he only heard her inquiring in the ordinary way for
the young lady who had just taken up her residence
there.
The door was flung wide open, as if
she had been expected, and the servant led the way
into what, in the dim light, seemed a small drawing-room.
The bland, warm atmosphere that filled this room would
have been most welcome, under other circumstances,
after the severe cold of the night; but now Ralph
was hardly conscious either of the warmth, or an atmosphere
of blooming plants which floated luxuriously around
him. Rich jets of gas burned like fairy beads
in the lower end of the room, dimly revealing the
small conservatory from which this fragrance came,
and affording a glimpse here and there of rich silk
hangings and pictures upon the wall, whose gorgeousness
forced itself upon the observation even in that dim
twilight.
Ralph looked around with surprise;
the place was so unlike anything he had expected to
find, that for the moment he lost sight of the object
of his coming. All at once he became conscious
of a third presence a soft flutter of garments,
and the movement of some person advancing towards
that portion of the room in which those tiny stars
seemed burning. Directly a glow of light burst
over the whole apartment. The stars had broken
into brilliant jets of flame, and a tent of blossoms
rose before him, like some fairy nook flooded with
radiance.
Half-way between this background of
plants and the place he occupied, stood a female,
so gorgeously attired and so singular in her whole
appearance, that the young man uttered an exclamation
of surprise, which was answered by an angry start
and an abrupt movement of the woman, who was evidently
both astonished and displeased by his presence there.
“What is this?” she said,
haughtily; “I gave no orders for the admission
of strangers here.”
Before Ralph could speak, Agnes Barker
came forward, and stood for a moment looking steadily
in the woman’s face, thus concentrating her
entire attention on herself.
“Madam, if you are the mistress
of this house,” she said, with great self-possession,
“you will not consider this an intrusion, for
it must have been with your knowledge that I was sent
for to attend Miss French the young lady
who has lately taken up her residence here.”
The woman stood for a moment as if
struck dumb with astonishment, then a faint smile
dawned on her mouth, which was at once displaced by
angry glances cast upon Ralph Harrington.
“And this young gentleman, certainly
he was not sent for?”
Again Agnes interrupted the explanation
Ralph was ready to give.
“Your message, madam, was a
strange one, and reached me after dark. Surely
a young girl coming so far from home, might be expected
to bring an escort.”
“Besides,” said Ralph,
impetuously, “if Lina if Miss French
is here, I have a better right to see her than any
one else; and if she is in this house, I must and
will know her reasons for coming here.”
“The young lady is in her room,
and will receive no one at this time of night,”
answered the woman, firmly; “if you wish to see
her, let it be at some more proper hour.”
“But I, madam, have been summoned
here by Miss French herself!” said Agnes, with
that firmness which had marked her conduct since she
entered the house. “Permit me to desire
that you lead me to her room.”
The woman looked keenly in her face
a moment, as if about to contest the wish, but some
new thought seemed to spring up; and answering abruptly,
“Come, then,” she left the room.