KILIAN

You are well made have common sense,
And do not want for impudence.
Faust.

Tanto buen die val niente.

Un sot trouve toujours un plus sot qui l’admire_.

The packages finally ceased coming and the stiff old bell from being pulled; but only half an hour before the carriage drove to the door that was to take me to the boat. Ann Coddle was flying up and down the stairs, and calling messages over to Peter in a shrill voice. She was not designed by nature for a lady’s maid, and was a very disagreeable person to have about one’s room. She made me even more nervous than I should otherwise have been. I had never packed a trunk before, or had one packed, and might have thought it a very simple piece of business if Ann had not made such a mountain of it; packing every tray half a dozen times over, and going down-stairs three times about every article that was to come up from the laundry.

Happily she was not to go with me any farther than the boat. Richard was away again on business had been gone, indeed, since the day after we had driven in the Park: so I was to be put on board the boat, and left in charge of Kilian, his younger brother, who had called at my uncle’s office, and made the arrangement with him. I had never seen Kilian, and the meeting filled me with apprehension; my uncle, however, sent up one of his clerks in the carriage to take me to the boat, and put me in charge of this young gentleman. This considerate action on the part of my uncle seemed to fill up the measure of my surprises.

When we reached the boat, the clerk, a respectful youth, conducted me to the upper deck, and then left me with Ann, while he went down about the baggage.

With all our precautions, we were rather late, for the last bell was ringing; Ann was in a fever of impatience, and I was quite uncertain what to do, the clerk not having returned, and Mr. Kilian Vandermarck not having yet appeared. Ann was so disagreeable, and so disturbing to all thinking, that I had more than once to tell her to be quiet. Matters seemed to have reached a crisis. The man at the gangway was shouting “all aboard;” the whistle was blowing; the bell was ringing; Ann was whimpering; when a belated-looking young man with a book and paper under his arm came up the stairs hurriedly and looked around with anxiety. As soon as his eye fell on us, he looked relieved, and walked directly up to me, and called me by name, interrogatively.

“O yes,” I said eagerly, “but do get this woman off the boat or we’ll have to take her with us.” “Oh, no danger,” he said, “plenty of time,” and he took her toward the stairs, at the head of which she was met by the clerk, who touched his hat to me, handed the checks to Mr. Vandermarck, then hurried off with Ann. Mr. Vandermarck returned to me, but I was so engrossed looking over the side of the boat and watching for Ann and the clerk, that I took no notice of him.

At last I saw Ann scramble on the wharf, just before the plank was drawn in; with a sigh of relief I turned away.

“I want to apologize for being so late,” he said.

“Why, it is not any matter,” I answered, “only I had not the least idea what to do.”

“You are not used to travelling alone, then, I suppose?”

“Oh no,” nor to travelling any way, for the matter of that, I added to myself; but not aloud, for I had a great fear that it should be known how very limited my experience was.

“You must let me take your shawl and bag, and we will go and get a comfortable seat,” he said in a few moments. We went forward and found comfortable chairs under an awning, and where there was a fine breeze. It was a warm afternoon, and the change from the heated and glaring wharf was delightful. Mr. Vandermarck threw himself back in his chair with an expression of relief, and took off his straw hat.

“If you had been in Wall-street since ten o’clock this morning you would be prepared to enjoy this sail,” he said.

“Is Wall-street so very much more disagreeable than other places? I think my uncle regrets every moment that he spends away from it.”

“Ah, yes. Mr. Greer may; he has a good deal to make him like it; if I made as much money as he does every day there, I think it’s possible I might like it too. But it is a different matter with a poor devil like me: if I get off without being cheated out of all I’ve got, it is as much as I can ask.”

“Well, perhaps when he was your age, Uncle Leonard did not ask more than that.”

“Not he; he began, long before he was as old as I am, to do what I can never learn to do, Miss d’Esiree make money with one hand and save it with the other. Now, I’m ashamed to say, a great deal of money comes into my pockets, but it never stays there long enough to give me the feeling that I’m a rich man. One gets into a way of living that’s destruction to all chances of a fortune.”

“But what’s the good of a fortune if you don’t enjoy it?” I said, thinking of the dreary house in Varick-street.

“No good,” he said. “It isn’t in my nature to be satisfied with the knowledge that I’ve got enough to make me happy locked up somewhere in a safe: I must get it out, and strew it around in sight in the shape of horses, pictures, nice rooms, and good things to eat, before I can make up my mind that the money is good for anything. Now as to Richard, he is just the other way: old head on young shoulders, old pockets in young breeches (only there ar’nt any holes in them). He’s a model of prudence, is my brother Richard. Qui garde son diner, il a mieux a souper. He’ll be a rich man one of these fine days. I look to him to keep me out of jail. You know Richard very well, I believe?” he said, turning a sudden look on me, which would have been very disconcerting to an older person, or one more acquainted with the world.

“O, very well indeed,” I said with great simplicity. “You know he is such a favorite with my uncle, and he is a great deal at the house.”

“Well he may be a favorite, for he is built exactly on his model; at seventy, if I am not hung for debt before I reach it, I shall look to see him just a second Mr. Leonard Greer.”

I made a gesture of dissent. “I don’t think he is in the least like Uncle Leonard, and I don’t think he cares at all for money.”

“O, Miss Pauline, don’t you believe him if he says he doesn’t. I’m his younger brother, whom he has lectured and been hard on for these twenty-seven years, and I know more about it than anybody else.”

“Why, is Mr. Richard Vandermarck twenty-seven years old?” I said with much surprise.

“Twenty-nine his next birthday, and I am twenty-seven. Why, did he pass himself off for younger? That’s an excellent thing against him.”

“No; he did not pass himself off for anything in the matter of age. It was only my idea about him. I thought he was not more than twenty-five, perhaps even younger than that. But then I had nobody but Uncle Leonard to compare him with, and it isn’t strange that I didn’t get quite right.”

“It is something of a step from Mr. Greer to Richard, I must say. Mr.
Greer seems so much the oldest man in the world, and Richard well,
Richard isn’t that, but he is a good deal older than he ought to be.
But do you tell me, Miss Pauline, you havn’t any younger fellows than
Richard on your cards? Do they keep you as quiet as all that in
Varick-street?”

I knew by intuition this was impertinence, and no doubt I looked annoyed, and Mr. Vandermarck hastened to obliterate the impression by a very rapid movement upon the scenery, the beauties of the river, and many things as novel.

The three hours of our sail passed away pleasantly. Mr. Vandermarck did not move from his seat; did not even read his paper, though I gave him an opportunity by turning over the leaves of my “Littel” on the occurrence of every pause.

I felt that I knew him quite well before the journey was over, and I liked him exceedingly, almost as well as Richard. He was rather handsomer than Richard, not so tall, but more vivacious and more amusing, much more so. I began to think Richard rather dull when I contrasted him with his brother.

When we reached the wharf, Mr. Vandermarck, after disposing of the baggage, gave his arm to me, and took me to an open wagon which was waiting for us. He put me in the seat beside him, and took the reins with a look of pleasure.

“These are Tom and Jerry, Miss Pauline,” he said, “about the pleasantest members of the family; at least they contribute more to my pleasure than any other members of it. I squandered about half my income on them a year or two ago, and have not repented yet; though, indeed, repentance isn’t in my way. I shall hope for the happiness of giving you many drives with them, if I am permitted.”

“Nothing could make me happier, I am sure.”

“Richard hasn’t any horses, though he can afford it much better than I can. He does his driving, when he is here, with the carriage-horses that we keep for Sophie a dull old pair of brutes. He disapproves very much of Tom and Jerry; but you see it would never do to have two such wise heads in one family.”

“It would destroy the balance of power in the neighborhood.”

“Decidedly; as it is, we are a first-class power, owing to Sophie’s cleverness and Richard’s prudence; my prodigality is just needed to keep us from overrunning the county and proclaiming an empire at the next town meeting. How do you like Sophie, Miss d’Estree? I know you haven’t seen much of her but what you have? Isn’t she clever, and isn’t she a pretty woman to be nearly thirty-five?”

I was feeling very grateful for my invitation, and so I said a great deal of my admiration for his sister.

“Everybody likes her,” he said, complacently. “I don’t know a more popular person anywhere. She is the life of the neighborhood; people come to her for everything, if they want to get a new door-mat for the school-house, or if they want a new man nominated for the legislature. I think she’s awfully bored, sometimes, but she keeps it to herself. But though the summer is her rest, she always does enough to tire out anybody else. Now, for instance, she is going to have three young ladies with her for the next two months (besides yourself, Miss d’Estree), whom she will have to be amusing all the time, and some friends of mine who will turn the house inside out. But Sophie never grumbles.”

“Tell me about them all,” I said, consuming with a fever of curiosity.

“O, I forgot you did not know them. Shall I begin with the young ladies? (Sam, there’s a stone in Jerry’s off fore-foot; get down and look about it Steady! there, I knew it) Excuse me, Miss d’Estree. Well, the young ladies. There’s one of our cousins, a grand, handsome, sombre, estimable girl, whom nobody ever flirts with, but whom somebody will marry. That’s Henrietta Palmer. Then there is Charlotte Benson not pretty, but stylish and so clever. She carries too many guns for most men; she is a capital girl in her way. Then there is Mary Leighton; she is small, blonde, lovely. I do not believe in her particularly, but we are great friends, and flirt a little, I am told. I quite wonder how you will like each other. I hope you will tell me your impressions. No doubt she will be rather your companion, for Henrietta and Charlotte Benson are desperately intimate, and have a room together. They are quite romantic and very superior. Pretty Miss Leighton isn’t in their line exactly, and is rather left to her own reflections, I should think. But she makes up for it when the gentlemen appear; she isn’t left with any time upon her hands, you may be sure. I don’t know what it is about her; she never said a bright thing in her life, and a great, great many silly ones; but everybody wants to talk to her, and her silly words are precious to the man to whom she says them. Did you ever meet anybody like her?”

“I? oh no. I never met anybody,” I said, half-bitterly, beginning to be afraid of the people whom I so soon should meet; and then I began to talk about the road, and to inquire how far we had yet to drive, and to ask to have a shawl about my shoulders. It was not yet seven o’clock, but the country air was fresh and cool, and the rapid driving made it cooler.

“We are almost there; and I hope, Miss d’Estree, that you won’t feel as if you were going among strangers. You will not feel so long, at any rate. It is too bad Richard isn’t here; you know him so much better than the rest of us. But before he comes back, I am sure you will feel as much at home as he. But here’s the gate.”

There was a drive of perhaps an eighth of a mile from the gate to the house: the trees and hedge were thick, so that one saw little of the house from the road. The grounds were well kept; there was a nice lawn, in front of the house, and some very fine old trees. The house was low and irregular, but quite picturesque. It fronted the road; the rear looked toward the river, about quarter of a mile distant, and of which the view was lovely.

There was a piazza in front, on which four ladies stood; one of them came forward, and came down the steps, and met me as I got out of the carriage. That, of course, was Mrs. Hollenbeck, She welcomed me very cordially, and led me up the steps of the piazza, where the young ladies stood. Terrible young ladies! I shook with fear of them. I felt as if I did not know anything, as if I did not look well, as if my clothes were hideous. I should not have been afraid of young or old men, nor of old women; but they were just my age, just my class, just my equals, or ought to have been, if I had had any other fate than Uncle Leonard and Varick-street. How they would criticize me! How soon they would find out I had never been anywhere before! I wished for Richard then with all my heart. Kilian had already deserted me, and was talking to Miss Leighton, who had come half-way down the steps to meet him, and who only gave me a glance and a very pretty smile and nod, when Mrs. Hollenbeck presented me to them. Miss Benson and Miss Palmer each gave me a hand, and looked me over horribly; and the tones of their voices, when they spoke to me, were so constrained and cold, and so different from the tones in which they addressed each other. I hated them.

After a few moments of wretchedness, Sophie proposed to take me to my room. We went up the stairs, which were steep and old-fashioned, with a landing-place almost like a little room. My room was in a wing of the house, over the dining-room, and the windows looked out on the river. It was not large, but was very pretty. The windows were curtained, and the bed was dainty, and the little mantel was draped, and the ornaments and pictures were quaint and delightful to my taste.

Sophie laid the shawls she had been carrying up for me upon the bed, and said she hoped I would find everything I needed, and would try to feel entirely at home, and not hesitate to ask for anything that would make me comfortable.

Nothing could be kinder, but my affection and gratitude were fast dying out, and I was quite sure of one thing, namely, that I never should love Sophie if she spent her life in inviting me to pay her visits. She told me that tea would be ready in half an hour, and then left me. I sat down on the bed when she was gone, and wished myself back in Varick-street; and then cried, to think that I should be homesick for such a dreary home. But the appetites and affections common to humanity had not been left out of my heart, though I had been beggared all my life in regard to most of them. I could have loved a mother so a sister I could have had such happy feelings for a place that I could have felt was home. What matter, if I could not even remember the smile on my mother’s lips; what matter, if no brother or sister had ever been born to me; if no house had ever been my rightful home? I was hungry for them all the same. And these first glimpses of the happy lives of others seemed to disaffect me more than ever with my own.