A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

Queechy

S >> Susan Warner >> Queechy




He shook hands and left them; and Mrs. Plumfield sat silently looking at
Fleda, who on her part looked at nothing but the grey stocking.

"What is all this, Fleda?"

"What is what, aunt Miriam?" said Fleda, picking up a stitch with
desperate diligence.

"Why did you want to run away from Mr. Olmney?"

"I didn't wish to be delayed--I wanted to get home."

"Then why wouldn't you let him go home with you?"

"I liked better to go alone, aunt Miriam."

"Don't you like him, Fleda?"

"Certainly, aunt Miriam--very much.'

"I think he likes you, Fleda," said her aunt smiling.

"I am very sorry for it," said Fleda with great gravity.

Mrs. Plumfield looked at her for a few minutes in silence and then said,

"Fleda, love, come over here and sit by me and tell me what you mean. Why
are you sorry? It has given me a great deal of pleasure to think of it."

But Fleda did not budge from her seat or her stocking and seemed
tongue-tied. Mrs. Plumfield pressed for an answer.

"Because, aunt Miriam," said Fleda, with the prettiest red cheeks in the
world but speaking very clearly and steadily,--"my liking only goes to a
point which I am afraid will not satisfy either him or you."

"But why?--it will go further."

"No ma'am."

"Why not? why do you say so?"

"Because I must if you ask me."

"But what can be more excellent and estimable, Fleda?--who could be more
worth liking? I should have thought he would just please you. He is one of
the most lovely young men I have ever seen."

"Dear aunt Miriam!" said Fleda looking up beseechingly,--"why should we
talk about it?"

"Because I want to understand you, Fleda, and to be sure that you
understand yourself."

"I do," said Fleda, quietly and with a quivering lip.

"What is there that you dislike about Mr. Olmney?"

"Nothing in the world, aunt Miriam."

"Then what is the reason you cannot like him enough?"

"Because, aunt Miriam," said Fleda speaking in desperation,--"there isn't
enough of him. He is _very_ good and excellent in every way--nobody feels
that more than I do--I don't want to say a word against him--but I do not
think he has a very strong mind; and he isn't cultivated enough."

"But you cannot have everything, Fleda."

"No ma'am--I don't expect it."

"I am afraid you have set up too high a standard for yourself," said Mrs.
Plumfield, looking rather troubled.

"I don't think that is possible, aunt Miriam."

"But I am afraid it will prevent your ever liking anybody?"

"It will not prevent my liking the friends I have already--it may prevent
my leaving them for somebody else," said Fleda, with a gravity that was
touching in its expression.

"But Mr. Olmney is sensible,--and well educated."

"Yes, but his tastes are not. He could not at all enter into a great many
things that give me the most pleasure. I do not think he quite understands
above half of what I say to him."

"Are you sure? I know he admires you, Fleda."

"Ah, but that is only half enough, you see, aunt Miriam, unless I could
admire him too."

Mrs. Plumfield looked at her in some difficulty;--Mr. Olmney was not
the only one, clearly, whose powers of comprehension were not equal to
the subject.

"Fleda," said her aunt inquiringly,--"is there anybody else that has put
Mr. Olmney out of your head?"

"Nobody in the world!" exclaimed Fleda with a frank look and tone of
astonishment at the question, and cheeks colouring as promptly. "How could
you ask?--But he never was in my head, aunt Miriam."

"Mr. Thorn?" said Mrs. Plumfield.

"Mr. Thorn!" said Fleda indignantly. "Don't you know me better than that,
aunt Miriam? But you do not know him."

"I believe I know you, dear Fleda, but I heard he had paid you a great
deal of attention last year; and you would not have been the first
unsuspecting nature that has been mistaken."

Fleda was silent, flushed and disturbed; and Mrs. Plumfield was silent and
meditating; when Hugh came in. He came to fetch Fleda home. Dr. Gregory
had arrived. In haste again Fleda sought her bonnet, and exchanging a more
than usually wistful and affectionate kiss and embrace with her aunt, set
off with Hugh down the hill.

Hugh had a great deal to say to her all the way home, of which Fleda's
ears alone took the benefit, for her understanding received none of
it; and when she at last came into the breakfast room where the doctor
was sitting, the fact of his being there was the only one which had
entered her mind.

"Here she is!--I declare!" said the doctor, holding her back to look at
her after the first greetings had passed,--"I'll be hanged if you ain't
handsome!--Now what's the use of pinking your cheeks any more at that, as
if you didn't know it before?--eh?"

"I will always do my best to deserve your good opinion, sir," said
Fleda laughing.

"Well sit down now," said he shaking his head, "and pour me out a cup of
tea--your mother can't make it right."

And sipping his tea, for some time the old doctor sat listening to Mrs.
Rossitur and eating bread and butter; saying little, but casting a very
frequent glance at the figure opposite him behind the tea-board.

"I am afraid," said he after a while, "that your care for my good opinion
won't outlast an occasion. Is _that_ the way you look for every day?"

The colour came with the smile; but the old doctor looked at her in a way
that made the tears come too. He turned his eyes to Mrs. Rossitur for an
explanation.

"She is well," said Mrs. Rossitur fondly,--"she has been very
well--except her old headaches now and then;--I think she has grown
rather thin lately."

"Thin!" said the old doctor,--"etherealized to a mere abstract of herself;
only that is a very bad figure, for an abstract should have all the bone
and muscle of the subject; and I should say you had little left but pure
spirit. You are the best proof I ever saw of the principle of the
homoeopaths--I see now that though a little corn may fatten a man, a great
deal may be the death of him."

"But I have tried it both ways, uncle Orrin," said Fleda laughing. "I
ought to be a happy medium between plethora and starvation. I am pretty
substantial, what there is of me."

"Substantial!" said the doctor; "you look as substantial a personage as
your old friend the 'faire Una,' just about. Well prepare yourself, gentle
Saxon, to ride home with me the day after to-morrow. I'll try a little
humanizing regimen with you."

"I don't think that is possible, uncle Orrin," said Fleda gently.

"We'll talk about the possibility afterwards--at present all you have to
do is to get ready. If you raise difficulties you will find me a very
Hercules to clear them away--I'm substantial enough I can tell you--so
it's just as well to spare yourself and me the trouble."

"There are no difficulties," Mrs. Rossitur and Hugh said both at once.

"I knew there weren't. Put a pair or two of clean stockings in your
trunk--that's all you want--Mrs. Pritchard and I will find the rest.
There's the people in Fourteenth street wants you the first of November
and I want you all the time till then, and longer too.--Stop--I've got a
missive of some sort here for you--"

He foisted out of his breast-pocket a little package of notes; one from
Mrs. Evelyn and one from Florence begging Fleda to come to them at the
time the doctor had named; the third from Constance.

"My darling little Fleda,

"I am dying to see you--so pack up and come down with Dr. Gregory if the
least spark of regard for me is slumbering in your breast--Mamma and
Florence are writing to beg you,--but though an insignificant member of
the family, considering that instead of being 'next to head' only little
Edith prevents my being at the less dignified end of this branch of the
social system,--I could not prevail upon myself to let the representations
of my respected elders go unsupported by mine--especially as I felt
persuaded of the superior efficacy of the motives I had it in my power to
present to your truly philanthropical mind.

"I am in a state of mind that baffles description--Mr. Carleton is going
home!!----

"I have not worn earrings in my ears for a fortnight--my personal
appearance is become a matter of indifference to me--any description
of mental exertion is excruciating--I sit constantly listening for the
ringing of the door-bell, and when it sounds I rush frantically to the
head of the staircase and look over to see who it is--the mere sight
of pen and ink excites delirious ideas--judge what I suffer in
writing to you--

"To make the matter worse (if it could be) I have been informed privately
that he is going home to crown at the altar of Hymen an old attachment to
one of the loveliest of all England's daughters. Conceive the complication
of my feelings!----

"Nothing is left me but the resources of friendship--so come darling
Fleda, before a barrier of ice interposes itself between my chilled heart
and your sympathy.

"Mr. Thorn's state would move my pity if I were capable of being moved by
anything--by this you will comprehend he is returned. He has been informed
by somebody that there is a wolf in sheep's clothing prowling about
Queechy, and his head is filled with the idea that you have fallen a
victim, of which in my calmer moments I have in vain endeavoured to
dispossess him--Every morning we are wakened up at an unseasonable hour by
a furious ringing at the door-bell--Joe Manton pulls off his nightcap and
slowly descending the stairs opens the door and finds Mr. Thorn, who
enquires distractedly whether Miss Ringgan has arrived; and being answered
in the negative gloomily walks off towards the East river--The state of
anxiety in which his mother is thereby kept is rapidly depriving her of
all her flesh--but we have directed Joe lately to reply 'no sir, but she
is expected,'--upon which Mr. Thorn regularly smiles faintly and rewards
the 'fowling piece' with a quarter dollar--

"So make haste, dear Fleda, or I shall feel that we are acting the part of
innocent swindlers.

"C.E."

There was but one voice at home on the point whether Fleda should go.
So she went.




Chapter XXXII.



_Host._ Now, my young guest! methinks you're allycholy; I pray you,
why is it?

_Jul_. Marry, mine host, because I cannot be merry.

Two Gentlemen of Verona.


Some nights after their arrival the doctor and Fleda were seated at tea in
the little snug old-fashioned back parlour, where the doctor's nicest of
housekeepers, Mrs. Pritchard, had made it ready for them. In general Mrs.
Pritchard herself poured it out for the doctor, but she descended most
cheerfully from her post of elevation whenever Fleda was there to fill it.

The doctor and Fleda sat cosily looking at each other across the toast and
chipped beef, their glances grazing the tea-urn which was just on one side
of their range of vision. A comfortable Liverpool-coal fire in a state of
repletion burned away indolently and gave everything else in the room
somewhat of its own look of sousy independence. Except perhaps the
delicate creature at whom the doctor between sips of his tea took rather
wistful observations.

"When are you going to Mrs. Evelyn?" he said breaking the silence.

"They say next week, sir."

"I shall be glad of it!" said the doctor.

"Glad of it?" said Fleda smiling. "Do you want to get rid of me,
uncle Orrin?"

"Yes!" said he. "This isn't the right place for you. You are too
much alone."

"No indeed, sir. I have been reading voraciously, and enjoying myself as
much as possible. I would quite as lieve be here as there, putting you out
of the question."

"I wouldn't as lieve have you," said he shaking his head. "What were you
musing about before tea? your face gave me the heart-ache."

"My face!" said Fleda, smiling, while an instant flush of the eyes
answered him,--"what was the matter with my face?"

"That is the very thing I want to know."

"Before tea?--I was only thinking,--" said Fleda, her look going back to
the fire from association,--"thinking of different things--not
disagreeably--taking a kind of bird's-eye view of things, as one does
sometimes."

"I don't believe you ever take other than a bird's-eye view of anything,"
said her uncle. "But what were you viewing just then, my little Saxon?"

"I was thinking of them at home," said Fleda smiling thoughtfully,--"and I
somehow had perched myself on a point of observation and was taking one of
those wider views which are always rather sobering."

"Views of what?"

"Of life, sir."

"As how?" said the doctor.

"How near the end is to the beginning, and how short the space between,
and how little the ups and downs of it will matter if we take the right
road and get home."

"Pshaw!" said the doctor.

But Fleda knew him too well to take his interjection otherwise than most
kindly. And indeed though he whirled round and eat his toast at the fire
discontentedly, his look came back to her after a little with even more
than its usual gentle appreciation.

"What do you suppose you have come to New York for?" said he.

"To see you, sir, in the first place, and the Evelyns in the second."

"And who in the third?"

"I am afraid the third place is vacant," said Fleda smiling.

"You are, eh? Well--I don't know--but I know that I have been inquired of
by two several and distinct people as to your coming. Ah, you needn't open
your bright eyes at me, because I shall not tell you. Only let me
ask,--you have no notion of fencing off my Queechy rose with a hedge of
blackthorn,--or anything of that kind, have you?"

"I have no notion of any fences at all, except invisible ones, sir," said
Fleda, laughing and colouring very prettily.

"Well those are not American fences," said the doctor, "so I suppose I am
safe enough. Whom did I see you out riding with yesterday?"

"I was with Mrs. Evelyn," said Fleda,--"I didn't want to go, but I
couldn't very well help myself."

"Mrs. Evelyn.--Mrs. Evelyn wasn't driving, was she?"

"No sir; Mr. Thorn was driving."

"I thought so. Have you seen your old friend Mr. Carleton yet?"

"Do you know him uncle Orrin?"

"Why shouldn't I? What's the difficulty of knowing people? Have you
seen him?"

"But how did you know that he was an old friend of mine?"

"Question?--" said the doctor. "Hum--well, I won't tell you--so there's
the answer. Now will you answer me?"

"I have not seen him, sir."

"Haven't met him in all the times you have been to Mrs. Evelyn's?"

"No sir. I have been there but once in the evening, uncle Orrin. He is
just about sailing for England."

"Well, you're going there to-night, aren't you? Run and bundle yourself up
and I'll take you there before I begin my work."

There was a small party that evening at Mrs. Evelyn's. Fleda was very
early. She ran up to the first floor,--rooms lighted and open, but
nobody there.

"Fleda Ringgan," called out the voice of Constance from over the
stairs,--"is that you?"

"Yes," said Fleda.

"Well just wait till I come down to you.--My darling little Fleda, it's
delicious of you to come so early. Now just tell me,--am I captivating?"

"Well,--I retain self-possession," said Fleda. "I cannot tell about the
strength of head of other people."

"You wretched little creature!--Fleda, don't you admire my hair?--it's new
style, my dear,--just come out,--the Delancys brought it out with
them--Eloise Delancy taught it us--isn't it graceful? Nobody in New York
has it yet, except the Delancys and we."

"How do you know but they have taught somebody else?" said Fleda.

"I won't talk to you!--Don't you like it?"

"I am not sure that I do not like you in your ordinary way better."

Constance made a gesture of impatience, and then pulled Fleda after her
into the drawing-rooms.

"Come in here--I won't waste the elegancies of my toilet upon your dull
perceptions--come here and let me shew you some flowers--aren't those
lovely? This bunch came to-day, 'for Miss Evelyn,' so Florence will have
it it is hers, and it's very mean of her, for I am perfectly certain it is
mine--it's come from somebody who wasn't enlightened on the subject of my
family circle and has innocently imagined that _two_ Miss Evelyns could
not belong to the same one! I know the floral representatives of all
Florence's dear friends and admirers, and this isn't from any of them--I
have been distractedly endeavouring all day to find who it came from, for
if I don't I can't take the least comfort in it."

"But you might enjoy the flowers for their own sake, I should think," said
Fleda, breathing the sweetness of myrtle and heliotrope.

"No I can't, for I have all the time the association of some horrid
creature they might have come from, you know; but it will do just as well
to humbug people--I shall make Cornelia Schenck believe that this came
from my dear Mr. Carleton!"

"No you won't, Constance," said Fleda gently.

"My dear little Fleda, I shock you, don't I? but I sha'n't tell any
lies--I shall merely expressively indicate a particular specimen and say,
'My dear Cornelia, do you perceive that this is an English rose?'--and
then it's none of my business, you know, what she believes--and she will
be dying with curiosity and despair all the rest of the evening."

"I shouldn't think there would be much pleasure in that, I confess," said
Fleda gravely. "How very ungracefully and stiffly those are made up!"

"My dear little Queechy rose?" said Constance impatiently, "you are,
pardon me, as fresh as possible. They can't cut the flowers with long
stems, you know,--the gardeners would be ruined. That is perfectly
elegant--it must have cost at least ten dollars. My dear little Fleda!"
said Constance capering off before the long pier-glass,--"I am afraid I am
not captivating!--Do you think it would be an improvement if I put drops
in my ears?--or one curl behind them? I don't know which Mr. Carleton
likes best!--"

And with her head first on one side and then on the other she stood
before the glass looking at herself and Fleda by turns with such a
comic expression of mock doubt and anxiety that no gravity but her own
could stand it.

"She is a silly girl, Fleda, isn't she?" said Mrs. Evelyn coming up
behind them.

"Mamma!--am I captivating?" cried Constance wheeling round.

The mother's smile said "Very!"

"Fleda is wishing she were out of the sphere of my influence,
mamma.--Wasn't Mr. Olmney afraid of my corrupting you?" she said with a
sudden pull-up in front of Fleda.--"My blessed stars!--there's somebody's
voice I know.--Well I believe it is true that a rose without thorns is a
desideratum.--Mamma, is Mrs. Thorn's turban to be an invariable _pendant_
to your coiffure all the while Miss Ringgan is here?"

"Hush!--"

With the entrance of company came Constance's return from extravaganzas to
a sufficiently graceful every-day manner, only enough touched with high
spirits and lawlessness to free it from the charge of commonplace. But the
contrast of these high spirits with her own rather made Fleda's mood more
quiet, and it needed no quieting. Of the sundry people that she knew among
those presently assembled there were none that she wanted to talk to; the
rooms were hot and she felt nervous and fluttered, partly from encounters
already sustained and partly from a little anxious expecting of Mr.
Carleton's appearance. The Evelyns had not said he was to be there but she
had rather gathered it; and the remembrance of old times was strong enough
to make her very earnestly wish to see him and dread to be disappointed.
She swung clear of Mr. Thorn, with some difficulty, and ensconced herself
under the shadow of a large cabinet, between that and a young lady who was
very good society for she wanted no help in carrying on the business of
it. All Fleda had to do was to sit still and listen, or not listen, which
she generally preferred. Miss Tomlinson discoursed upon varieties, with
great sociableness and satisfaction; while poor Fleda's mind, letting all
her sense and nonsense go, was again taking a somewhat bird's-eye view of
things, and from the little centre of her post in Mrs. Evelyn's
drawing-room casting curious glances over the panorama of her
life--England, France, New York, and Queechy!--half coming to the
conclusion that her place henceforth was only at the last and that the
world and she had nothing to do with each other. The tide of life and
gayety seemed to have thrown her on one side, as something that could not
swim with it; and to be rushing past too strongly and swiftly for her
slight bark ever to launch upon it again. Perhaps the shore might be the
safest and happiest place; but it was sober in the comparison; and as a
stranded bark might look upon the white sails flying by, Fleda saw the gay
faces and heard the light tones with which her own could so little keep
company. But as little they with her. Their enjoyment was not more foreign
to her than the causes which moved it were strange. Merry?--she might like
to be merry; but she could sooner laugh with the North wind than with one
of those vapid faces, or with any face that she could not trust.
Conversation might be pleasant,--but it must be something different from
the noisy cross-fire of nonsense that was going on in one quarter, or the
profitless barter of nothings that was kept up on the other side of her.
Rather Queechy and silence, by far, than New York and _this!_

And through it all Miss Tomlinson talked on and was happy.

"My dear Fleda!--what are you back here for?" said Florence coming
up to her.

"I was glad to be at a safe distance from the fire."

"Take a screen--here! Miss Tomlinson, your conversation is too exciting
for Miss Ringgan--look at her cheeks--I must carry you off--I want to
shew you a delightful contrivance for transparencies, that I learned the
other day--"

The seat beside her was vacated, and not casting so much as a look towards
any quarter whence a possible successor to Miss Tomlinson might be
arriving, Fleda sprang up and took a place in the far corner of the room
by Mrs. Thorn, happily not another vacant chair in the neighbourhood. Mrs.
Thorn had shewn a very great fancy for her and was almost as good company
as Miss Tomlinson; not quite, for it was necessary sometimes to answer and
therefore necessary always to hear. But Fleda liked her; she was
thoroughly amiable, sensible, and good-hearted. And Mrs. Thorn, very much
gratified at Fleda's choice of a seat, talked to her with a benignity
which Fleda could not help answering with grateful pleasure.

"Little Queechy, what has driven you into the corner?" said Constance
pausing a moment before her.

"It must have been a retiring spirit," said Fleda.

"Mrs. Thorn, isn't she lovely?"

Mrs. Thorn's smile at Fleda might almost have been called that, it was so
full of benevolent pleasure. But she spoiled it by her answer.

"I don't believe I am the first one to find it out."

"But what are you looking so sober for?" Constance went on, taking Fleda's
screen from her hand and fanning her diligently with it,--"you don't talk!
The gravity of Miss Ringgan's face casts a gloom over the brightness of
the evening. I couldn't conceive what made me feel chilly in the other
room, till I looked about and found that the shade came from this corner;
and Mr. Thorn's teeth, I saw, were chattering."

"Constance!" said Fleda laughing and vexed, and making the reproof more
strongly with her eyes,--"how can you talk so!"

"Mrs. Thorn, isn't it true?"

Mrs. Thorn's look at Fleda was the essence of good-humour.

"Will you let Lewis come and take you a good long ride to-morrow?"

"No, Mrs. Thorn, I believe not--I intend to stay perseveringly at home
to-morrow and see if it is possible to be quiet a day in New York."

"But you will go with me to the concert to-morrow night?--both of
you--and hear Truffi;--come to my house and take tea and go from there?
will you, Constance?"

"My dear Mrs. Thorn!" said Constance,--"I shall be in ecstacies, and Miss
Ringgan was privately imploring me last night to find some way of getting
her to it. We regard such material pleasures as tea and muffins with great
indifference, but when you look up after swallowing your last cup you will
see Miss Ringgan and Miss Evelyn, cloaked and hooded, anxiously awaiting
your next movement. My dear Fleda!--there is a ring!--"

And giving her the benefit of a most comic and expressive arching of
her eyebrows, Constance flung back the screen into Fleda's lap and
skimmed away.

Fleda was too vexed for a few minutes to understand more of Mrs. Thorn's
talk than that she was first enlarging upon the concert, and afterwards
detailing to her a long shopping expedition in search of something which
had been a morning's annoyance. She almost thought Constance was unkind,
because she wanted to go to the concert herself to lug her in so
unceremoniously; and wished herself back in her uncle's snug little quiet
parlour,--unless Mr. Carleton would come.

And there he is!--said a quick beat of her heart, as his entrance
explained Constance's "ring."

Such a rush of associations came over Fleda that she was in imminent
danger of losing Mrs. Thorn altogether. She managed however by some sort
of instinct to disprove the assertion that the mind cannot attend to two
things at once, and carried on a double conversation, with herself and
with Mrs. Thorn, for some time very vigorously.

Copyright (c) 2007. famouswriterz.com. All rights reserved.